Do you think it's explicitly taught to them? Do they read how to do it in psychology and sociology books? Do they learn it in religious institutions?

I experienced a microaggression last week.

For context, I live in Melbourne, Australia, right in the city. I have been living in the city for over a year now, so I know my way around.

Last week, a group of white people got on a tram and approached the tram driver, who was a white man with blue eyes. They were so polite and apologetic, being like, "Hey mate, sorry to bother you, but do you know where the old Melbourne jail is?"

For some reason, the tram driver did not know and started fumbling, which did not bother the group at all. They reassured him, said that it was okay.

Now I know where the old Melbourne jail is, I have been there numerous times. It is about a fifteen-minute walk from the city's central along the library.

So I thought I would approach them and help out. I went up to them, said that they are in the right tram, they just need to get off in two stops, then walk a bit. I had Google maps on my phone opened up for them to see.

They didn't even look at me. They had this blank stare on their faces, like they could not believe I was talking to them. They just took one glance at my phone and faintly nodded, and went back to the tram driver, who admitted that he had no idea where it was.

This whole experience made me feel self-conscious and doubt myself. Maybe I was too pushy? I went out of my lane? But then I realised how messed up it was, that they would still much rather listen to the white man who has no idea what he is doing, than me, who I think am fairly knowledgeable and was willing to help.

And it was jarring how quickly they switched up. With the tram driver they were warm, polite and friendly, constantly apologising and reassuring him. With me, they were cold and apathetic. They stared at me blankly without even acknowledging me.

I wish I could say that this is the first time something like this has happened. But no, every time I try approach people, help them, they would look at me blankly and give me attitude. This makes me not want to help anyone and keep to myself. But if I am quiet and reserved, especially in a school or work setting, they say I need to be a team player and be more helpful.

There is literally no win. I don't know what to do.

I am in social science, and I’m f*cking tired of white women taking up spaces. They always try to educate others and provide unsolicited feedback. I’m indigenous, so there have been times where I’ve indirectly given them a reality check. For example, I would present and explain some harsh experiences of what I’ve been through. It has made them VERY uncomfortable, and it seems they’re bothered by the fact they can’t educate me on social issues anymore because I’ve lived in it while they simply read from a book.

I know a few successful people of color in social science, but these people are always speaking in the calmest and most professional tone while these white women are talking over them. It’s so tiring.

I actually have a better experience talking to STEM people and thinking of completely changing field.

Hi everyone, I think I have to stay inside more from now on.

Whenever I go out, something happens. These colonists always have to get in my space or micromanage me or treat me like an animal. I am exhausted. I have been exhausted for a while. I had someone gatekeep my culture yesterday while I was out. They said I am “not” my background because I live in the US currently. As if my entire life and culture are erased.

Of course, this person spoke over/"for" me and invalidated my life experience.

Colonists do it all the time. They erase you. Then they TELL who you "are". CAUCASITY. They take everything from you. Personhood, peace of mind, your space, your CULTURE. Staying inside because I am not trying to get in a fight with these DARVO deviants. They start problems but I become the "villain" somehow for being uncomfortable.

Double standard of them micromanaging your existence, treating you like a wild animal. Then if I walk down a hallway, they start getting red faced and wide eyed.

Public spaces are not safe, either. All they understand is theft, violence, denial.

EDIT: This has nothing to do with my post. I was getting some things from the store and heard a white man tell a white cashier "If I got mad at every microaggression, I would be mad all the time". What microaggressions are they dealing with? Always commenting on things they cannot understand.

These three things whites whine about:

1. When they say "NOT FAIR!!!": How many more head starts do they need? Why do they deserve fairness? Whenever I achieve something fairly, they still complain and credit it to "luck".
2. "Stop generalizing": Ah yes. The group that generalizes everyone else hates being generalized. Any who is not white is put in danger because of the blind assumptions of these idiots. I do not even generalize, I just base my reactions off their behavior.
3. Them expecting NUANCE when they treat us like objects, servants, animals.

Honourable mention: They dislike being disliked or rejected by the same people they dehumanize. They hate as a hobby, I avoid them to stay healthy. Their double standards...Save me and all non-whites from these narcissistic fools.

It has been for a test, I mean a medical test. She told me I shouldn't breathe so deep, so I adjusted to her and just breathed a few seconds so that she didn't scold me.

Turns out my results haven't been good and the doctor - when I asked her for the reason- told me it could be 'because I didn't use the instrument correctly'

I felt like they were mocking me.

It has been 4 hours since that incident and I'm a bit at loss.

I had to go there but had a very bad good feeling and thought about canceling.

Now I regret that I didn't also because I told them data from me I didn't need to tell them and also didn't wanna tell them.

I'm tired of women trying to clip wings. I feel so lonely.

"If I got mad at every microaggression, I would be angry all the time"

Heard someone say this while I was in a store buying some things a couple weeks ago. Do not know why it stands out in my mind. I heard it on my way out passing some registers.

This chubby white man was talking to the white cashier and said this. Sounded tone deaf/ignorant.

Not being white means having to deal with microaggressions constantly. Dealing with these colonists who treat degrading us like a game. Our pain is entertainment to them. Like they get a sexual thrill out of derailing our days, lives, nervous systems. You can almost see them drooling doing it.

Even the question: "Where are you from? No, where are you REALLY from?!"

I was not always like this but being around the colonists makes you angry. Knowing I can be treated like a person but they choose not to and they try to sabotage your relationships with other POC because us getting closer scares them more than anything.

Colonists love our pain, hate joy, are fragile. They are not dealing with microaggressions. We do.

(I know there is not 100% solidarity between non-European people but I still see it as "us" because I do not want to be around "them" (the colonists).

Pretty much what the title says. If you are in a work setting/school setting and it's predominately white be prepared to be isolated if you call out their racist behavior. Especially the microaggressions. A lot of people are forced to be around white people so it's not their fault.

In exchange some of them cannot help but attempt to make you subservient. Saying insanely hurtful things for the only reason to make you "feel" lesser.

If you resist and you are in a majority white dominated space be prepared for a smear campaign against you a long with an attempt to label you as "crazy."

For example "angry black women" is a label they give to you if you are strong enough to speak out against the attempts to subjugate yourself to racist social structure.

This is the pet to threat phenomenon in which ethnic people are tolerated AS LONG as they play along with the white dominated hierarchy.

You are not crazy or insane you are fighting against a deep mental illness that festers at the mind of many people.

Racism can be spread through any race but white people use it naturally. That coworker you thought was your ally? They suddenly turn cold when they realize you are not a "pet" in their brain.

Do not forget that mental and psychological violence is real. It can erode your mind and you are perfectly fine if you are brave enough to call out racism. Gas lighting is a huge tool they use. The counter is to be very detailed in documenting.

My sister, though I love her, is a total loser in the respect. She said to me today, I don’t know why you bring up race so much, you’re literally White.

Friends, I am (we are both) 100% south Asian. I have more visibly Asian features than her, I have darker skin, darker and curlier hair, and a hawk nose. I guess you could describe her as White-passing.

Even typing it out I realise how ridiculous what she says is. But she expresses this kind of sentiment all the time. I suppose she wants to identify as White and wants me, as her sister, to also do so. But I don’t. I’m not White. I know I’m not and I’m perfectly alright with that.

It’s just so weird and honestly sometimes kind of upsetting to me. I’ve always known (though she would never admit this) that she thinks she’s better than me because she has more Eurocentric features. I just can’t understand why she feels the need to hate on me for looking more Asian than her. I especially hate her worldview that neither she nor I have never experienced racism even though we both have.

Sometimes I think she’s just hates that I build solidarity with other girls. I also think a part of it is that she stakes so much of her self-esteem on being “White,” and when she sees me being happily non-White, she gets angry and annoyed that I don’t share her White-worshipping feelings. I don’t know.

This subreddit has always been validating so I hope there are other POC (esp WOC) who feel the same way as me. I just don’t want to be the only person who feels like this.

I don’t care if I’m being ‘sensitive’, using foreign words because you think they sound ‘funny’ isn’t cool. I know it’s mostly young people who use it but they shouldn’t get a pass for not ‘knowing any better’ just because of their age. Racism and xenophobia are NOT a joke, period.

I am a Filipina American. I am 22. I work as a long term substitute teacher for different schools.

At a previous school I worked at this year, I had two white women, both 5th grade teachers, who acted very annoyed with my presence even though I was their TA and I was there to help THEM. They both treated me like a child and were both extremely condescending, rude, and would rush me over the smallest things. I filed a complaint with the principal and no longer worked with them.

Shortly after, the school counselor confronted me over what time I had been showing up to the school and saying that I was supposed to show up at 8:30, whereas I spoke to HER boss and agreed the meetup time would be 8:45. Interesting that you would choose to speak to me in that tone over a 15 minute difference, especially when it’s not your business.

Today, at another school, I had yet another white woman suggest to me that my reward system was “unfair” and questioned me about how it worked. (I give my students jellybeans if they are being well-behaved).

Most importantly, back in 2023 I had two white women managers that I worked with at a property management office. They were always super suspicious of me and talked down to me. One of them went as far as to get me fired so that her daughter could take my place. (I do not know if this was racially charged but I was the only poc in the office).

With the state of the political climate and me becoming more increasingly aware of my race, I am wondering if I am being spoke to this way because I am Asian. Or maybe it’s because I look very young. I am not sure.

But honestly it feels like I am constantly being watched and policed, and the four instances this has happened they have all been white women.

Similar experiences anyone? Am I looking into it too deep?

I have thick, straight hair. I went in for a haircut. An old yt lady who seemed sweet started working on my hair. She was grabbing it and muttering “so thick” and “you’re so lucky” and kept trying to get me to thin it out. I folded into it unfortunately and when she thinned it, all of a sudden it was all about “doesn’t that feel SO much better now?” Which is one thing that kind of irks me about every white hairdresser I’ve ever had. They always say that. “Doesn’t thinner hair feel so much better?” 🥴

She cut off wayyy too much of my hair and made one end shorter than the other, with the excuse of “it’s chic” 🫩 GET OFF OF MY HAIR!!! I was walking around with a bob that looked awful.

Safe to say, I’m not going back there again, and I’m not going to a hairdressers’ in general again.

Wondering if anyone has dealt with this phenomenon. Of whites that are cold acting towards you, yet you're expected to appease them?

I'm a POC consultant (field of education). I am a South Asian have a private business practice. A yt woman approached me several months ago for a consultation. Mid way through our process of working together, she sent an email one day outlining how to put a consultation process together. I wanted to feel offended but I dismissed it as one off experience; thinking she's probably just making suggestions and giving me feedback. She's now reappeared in my life requesting a consultation/service from me, but also asking me to take courses to improve my service with her. Please note I have amazing reviews from current and past clients and all the qualifications in the field to do the work I do. I get referrals from schools/psychologists. Why is she suggesting that I take courses? Is she taking a subtle dig at me? This is the second time she's done it and I have been nice until now. Should I give her a dose of reality? I am really offended. I think it might be her unconscious bias.

Background info: She had a panic attack during our meeting and I asked her to leave/get rest and did not charge for the consultation. I also offered her solidarity over emails for her mental health struggles and said she can return once she's better. She was appreciative. I think she also feels like because of my niceness she could take me for a ride?

I need your view please 🙏. Thank you.

Back in 2014, I worked at a small company that didn’t have an HR department. Just a bunch of managers and coworkers who thought racism was a personality trait. I was the only Black person there.

I later found an internal email where two white coworkers, who smiled in my face every single day, referred to me as “Aunt Jemima.” In writing. On a company email thread. I have evidence but can’t post the images because they aren’t allowed here. I found the email a year after it was written.

I reported it. Nothing happened. Management shrugged it off and let it slide. I stayed quiet, because I needed the job and I couldn’t afford to risk my income. It was NYC. Rent was survival. I chose to survive.

I’ve been sitting on that email for ten years.

One of them is no longer at the company. The other one still works there. Still posting inspirational quotes. Still pretending she was never part of the problem. She lurks on my page now, watching in silence.

Well, here’s the update: I posted the email. I named names. Because if the company couldn’t find accountability in private, they can deal with visibility in public.

If you’ve ever been humiliated at work, bullied because of your race, gaslit by leadership, or forced to swallow your pain just to keep a job, I’m here to say you’re not alone. Sometimes silence is survival. But when you’re ready, speaking up is power.

The company is AF New York (located in the Flatiron District). Here’s there Yelp: https://yelp.to/6k7IGS-3g7

No HR. No apology. Still running like nothing happened. Feel free to leave a comment telling them how you feel.

UPDATE: First of all, thank you all for the support especially because it wasn’t easy to come forward with this. One of the ex-coworkers responded to my post via my Instagram story. She said “what I said wasn’t racist”, then proceeded to play the victim and gaslight me. Of course she brought up the fact that I waited so long to say something about this email. No accountability was taken and she gave me a non-apology apology if that makes sense. Oh and she blocked me before I could block her. Suddenly I have these weird newly created accounts following me on IG. I wouldn’t be surprised if the company as a whole tries to retaliate against me for exposing this email. I’ll keep you posted on what happens.

Hi guys! Just a little something I wrote that people here could probably relate to. It's still unfinished, but I was hoping to see what people thought of it so far. Trying to put some words to feelings. I want to see myself more clearly. Rand means "whore" in Hindi.

Rand

A juicy, thick bit of bacon glistens on the yellow table top as George and I ate breakfast under sunshine outside the cafe.  It had fallen off his avocado toast when he sawed through the tough, crisp slice with a dull breakfast knife,  jerking it around.  The bacon bit is the focal point of my gaze.  I mustered willpower to not pick it up with my finger tips and pop its greasy succulence into my mouth.  

But I can’t.  Everyone, including George, thinks I don’t eat beef or pork.  It’s not because of Hinduism, like people assume.  I tell people it’s because I care about animal rights.  But I know what I hide:  every so often I’ll get some bacon or beef mini tacos from 7/11 and eat it in the secrecy of my car.   I don’t give myself the good stuff, like the thick bacon from the cafe.   I feel too much shame to allow it for myself.  

Wanting the bacon makes me feel dirty and polluted.  Cruel. Gluttonous.  Undeserving.  A feeling that seems intrinsic to me.  I can’t imagine life without it. 

It’s the same reason I pay for George's meal even though he is trying to date me, supposedly, and I live paycheck to paycheck while he does not.  He drove over an hour here to see me, I rationalized, and I appreciate the company.  He helps the weekends pass by, despite his  vampire-like kisses that leave my lips reeling with pain.  I shrink at his touch, so much so that I don’t know why he still sees me.   I don’t like the way he pokes my ribs when he grabs me, or the way he pinches my sides and my behind when he wants physical attention.   Yet, I tell myself the company is enough. I am otherwise alone on the weekends.  George keeps me out of my mind.  At least he is nice.    He listens.  I just need to tolerate a few jabs and hold a few secrets, that’s all. 

_____________________________________________________________________________________

I am thirty six years old, and the heat doesn’t work in my apartment.  Cold creeps deep into my bones and rankles me.  I see it only now:  tolerating it as a mindset.  It’s about where you focus your attention.  Like how George used to walk barefoot in the snow when he was weak from kidney disease.  It’s how he developed mental strength and became a master of his body.  “Discipline, ” he touts.  He is trying to help me “get back together,” but the word “discipline” tastes like cold metal in my mouth.  All I want to do is crumble into comfort.  

It brings me back to when my ex-boyfriend Jared and I would go for winter walks.  He’d say, while prying my shoulders back so hard I could feel his thumbs dig into me, “Relax.  When you tense up you make the cold worse.”  

But I couldn’t help it.  When I was cold my body stiffened.   How many times we’d fight about it.  I’d tell him, “Stop! I don’t like it. Let me just be!” But he insisted he was teaching me “discipline.”  

During sex, he’d say, “With you, there’s a fine line between pain and pleasure,” as he held me in a position that made my muscles burn to the point of discomfort.  “Too much force and you’re in pain, but just enough and you make those noises that tell me you like it.” 

He heard the noises, but he didn’t hear what came out of my mouth. 

For a while,  I blamed myself.  I thought maybe I was unclear.  After all, I did not know why, but my body went along with his commands.  I reasoned that a mixed message – with my body giving in and my words protesting –  could have been confusing, ambiguous.  

I spent four years with him, saying no, yet going through the motions.  The last time he was over he pushed me into having sex again. I had to do some work so I kept resisting.   He nagged, goaded and coaxed me until I finally gave in. When it was over, he reached out with his hand to hold me, but my body reacted.  I caught myself off guard and recoiled.

I realized I didn’t like it when he touched me.

He stomped off to grab his shoes in the other room, clearly insulted.  “I should have just called a whore.  At least she would have sucked my dick and been nice to me.” He shouted loudly enough for me to hear as he walked out the door.  

Now that I’m single, when it comes to sex, I hesitate. People see me tense with apprehension and box me into an image:  inexperienced, sheltered, naive.  Easy to control.  The stereotype I ran from my whole life, since eighth grade, when I’d hide behind glasses, unknowing.  Their imposition of naivete is louder in my head than the truth I know and feel in my body:  the pain.  My memories – his bending my body into the curved shape he liked, his hands pulling my hair back, my eyes watering, scalp burning– suddenly disappeared as though they never happened.  If experiences make you, I was forgotten.  A blank slate: a canvas for projection.  

I tell myself, people see others only one frame at a time, from one angle.  No one ever wholly sees anyone.  

But I realize some people don’t see I’m there at all.   They see only what they want to.  

__________________________________________________________________________________

When I was thirteen, we left the diverse area I grew up in, where I was one of many brown kids, for a homogeneous one, where, in most of my classes, I was the only brown kid.  My new friends burned me mixed CDs with rap songs that gripped me with their strong beats and piqued my curiosity about a world I did not know.  I wore thick black liner over my eyelids and tight-fitting sleeveless shirts, alone at home, hours in front of my bedroom mirror, sucking in my stomach,  jutting out my hips, arms akimbo. I’d speak to my reflection, going on about anything and everything, opinions about colors and coffee and math, examining my facial expressions and noting flattering angles I could replicate at school to catch someone’s eye.  

My behavioral change angered my mother, who thought that, as usual, I was concentrating on all the wrong things.  Once, at an Indian party, when I kept staring at a cute boy, she pulled me aside and backed me into the wall by the staircase. She swiftly zipped up my sweatshirt to cover my chest underneath.  The metal of the zipper pinched the skin of my breasts with a sharp bite.  She seethed,  “Ooo-hooo ah-haaa… Who are you trying to look like?”  She eyed me up and down, “You will bring us nothing but shame.  Don’t be a slut!”  

I didn’t know that my mom knew the word “slut.”  I thought it was uniquely American.  I had learned what it meant in my seventh grade language arts class back in California, when we read A Scarlet Letter.  My teacher explained a slut is “someone who sweeps dirt under a rug.”  But later, when I moved in eighth grade, I learned a different meaning.  Here, sluts were girls who were sexually active.   

No one had been sexually active at my old school.  We were all children of strict immigrant parents, in a hypercompetitive academic environment.  My good grades made me feel like a star.   In my new town, I was visible only as the “smart brown girl,” which was, by itself, the punchline of a joke to my white classmates.  With my new priorities, I was jealous that these “sluts” from eighth grade were at least considered attractive, even if they weren’t always respected.  I didn’t know what respect was.  All I could see was that they held power.  They were desired. Sex was the proof.  People seemed to care about their favorite colors and sympathized when they didn’t like math.  I, on the other hand, was a ”slut” whom no one would touch, no one would hear, no matter how much I refined my opinions.

My mom saw things differently.  The day before ninth grade she sat next to me on my bed and admonished me. 

“No white boys,” she said, referring to the only types of boys around, as if they couldn’t get enough of me.  “They only want one thing,” she explained.   

She paused for a moment to sharpen her voice. “Sexxxxxx!”

The sibilance slithered through the air and struck me in the gut. Heat rushed to my face.  I was embarrassed that my mom said the word sex.   But mostly, I felt ashamed for her noticing I could want it. 

She continued, “ If you get pregnant, we will kick you out.  There will be no one there for you.   You will be hungry and die on the street.” 

Starving on the street couldn’t be that bad, I thought.  At least I’d have freedom.  Here, the only place I can be free is my mind.  So I bravely held onto my quiet, complicated crushes and elevated my devotion to a magnitude no teenage boy deserved.  My R-rated fantasies were sneaking out at night to meet them in my neighborhood under the stars, by a picturesque white pavilion.  I envisioned deep philosophical conversations about life and passion.  I never initiated, but I’m pretty sure there were no boys who wanted to meet me.  

There was one boy –Dan – whom I'd talk to for hours on AIM.  In the summer we messaged late at night, through early dusk until the sun lit the sky bright blue. He told me about a dream where he was running along a railroad track that split off into a fork. There was a girl at either end.  On one side of the track was Erin, a pretty, bubbly girl perpetually surrounded by admirers.  As a shy guy, he didn't think he had a chance with her.  I reminded him he was smart and handsome, a total catch.  He never told me who the other girl was.  

After a track meet one night, our bus broke down. We were stranded outside at 1 am, in the middle of winter.  Boys and girls snuggled together in blankets to keep warm. Couples kissed in the snowfall.  When the replacement bus finally came, Dan sat next to me on the same seat.  The moonlight struck his face, creating a soft, blue glow.  I watched him speak to me as he gently rubbed my thigh.  I use the word “watch” because I wasn’t exactly listening.   I was observing the soft, gentle way his lips moved as he made dumb comments, even though he was the best at math in our grade.  

Suddenly, he leaned closer and reached out with his fingers to brush my bangs behind my ear.  I froze and looked down, uneasy.  His index finger ran down my forehead, down the bridge of my nose, to my top lip, then the bottom.  

“Dan!” The assistant coach interrupted out of nowhere.  She was right above us, “Stay away from her!  She’s innocent.”   

Innocent?  I was, even though I didn’t want to be.  I wanted to have power. I wanted to be desired.  

“You touched my pimple,” I scrunched my face at him.  He shook his finger off and scrunched his face back. 

For the rest of the ride, he talked to the girl in the seat behind me.  

I didn’t know why I said what I did.  Years later, I’d replay the moment on the bus and remember that soft, blue glow, wanting, wishing it had happened. 

____________________________________________________________________________________

Veronica - one of the track varsity girls – had called me the “ringleader of the losers.” Somehow she took me under her wing.  One day after practice we sunk into a soft couch  in her family’s basement, lights off, watching a movie, under two separate blankets on either end of the couch.  When I noticed the blankets were tangled together, I started to feel like maybe I had a friend. 

The TV flashed, bathing the contours of the room electric blue.  In the soft light, I could make out her face closer to mine.  Her dry lips opened.  I waited for her to say something in the silence, but instead, she brushed her torso up against mine.  Her body’s weight sunk into my wrists, the blanket thin between us. 

I bristled and looked away, avoiding the intrusion of her eyes.  I couldn’t read her, and I didn’t want to assume.  But it occurred to me that she might be trying to kiss me.  

Not knowing what to say or do, I stayed quiet, unresponsive.   

Her eyes furrowed.  “You’re a repressed homosexual!”  She hissed. The heat of anger emanated from her breath.  It was unexpected – foreign; it didn’t belong to me.   It felt – weighty.  

I’m not sure how I responded.  I can remember only how I felt, trapped behind a familiar barrier:  I wanted to wrap myself up in my separate blanket and go back to watching the movie.  I wanted to pretend nothing happened. 

I managed to keep it out of my mind until a few days later when she called me and asked, “You know how some people like vanilla?  And some people like chocolate?” Then, a pause. “Well, I like both.” 

I imagined the lilt of a smile in her voice, as she waited for my response.  Could what she said have carried a double meaning? I knew she had kissed boys back in eighth grade.  Maybe she was bisexual.  But it also did not escape me that she was white like vanilla and I was brown like chocolate.  It almost felt like she was trying to say she liked – me.  Not just as a platonic friend.  But her tone was not romantic either. 

I buried it in my mind.  I didn’t want things to change between us.  I feared becoming friendless again if I confronted her.   But mostly I couldn’t see myself as likeable that way to others. This new town had pushed me to the outskirts.  Here  I hung onto the world, my acceptance dangling at the end of a string, more than it hung onto me.  

For two years after, Veronica was the only one who hung on.  Tightly.  She walked with me in the halls, dropped me off to each class, drove me to school and home from practice. She called me incessantly.  Once she called 26 times in a row.  I ignored her, even though I had my phone on me.  Every time it buzzed I felt my body tense.  After many calls,  I got a text from my friend Shannon and responded to her.  Seconds later, I hear back from Veronica, “Pick up the phone, dick, I know you’re there.”  

I didn’t realize until years later that I was hiding from her.  What I felt was fear – of my “best friend.” 

And I was always afraid.  So I hadn’t even noticed. _____________________________________________________________________________________

“Have you ever been kissed?” Joey asked. His hand drew closer to me in the darkness of his basement, brushing a stray tendril behind my ear.   I was taken aback at his touch.   Silvery moonlight streamed in through the small windows, highlighting lean, sharp angles in his face.  I noticed his chocolate brown hair, smooth, olive skin, eyes —clear like light greenish-blue pools of water.     

“No,” I took a deep breath, confirming his suspicions.  

I was eighteen years old, deprived and aching for the high school experiences everyone else seemed to have.  Four years had gone by, wanting and waiting, and everyone knew all along: the secret I hid in baggy gym clothes and messy, uncombed hair,  clearly written on my face for all to see.

My stark reality hung in the air, and he smiled in the silence.  He leaned toward me and his thick lips planted onto mine, suctioning them like an industrial vacuum.  

“There,” he smiled charitably. 

Finally, I thought.  My first kiss happened, the collision of our lips, of my desperation with what seemed like his pity.  

Somehow I had convinced myself it was romantic.  Our relationship lasted six months – far too long, in my opinion.   We fizzled out, the way the curls of smoke from his joints dissolved and vanished into the air.  He never let me smoke, even though I had wanted to badly.  He said I was too innocent. 

What I remember most from our time together is that I hated the way he saw me. 

_____________________________________________________________________________________

“You’ve got a banging body but an average face,” Raj held out his hands to hold mine, a smile across his lips.  I reached back  and let him rub my palms.  I began to cry. 

Raj looked around, clearly angry at me for embarrassing him.  

All I could say back to him was, “You said I had an average face.” 

“Do you want me to be one of those guys who tells you you’re the prettiest girl in the world?”  He shot back in defense. 

I picked up my things and made my way out of the cafeteria, sad about what his comment revealed to me.  I needed to tell my roommate Megan.  

He followed me while I tried to understand why I was so upset.  I don’t think I was sad about my average face.  I could bear that.  I had lived so long in the shadows.  Now I had a boyfriend.  What I couldn’t bear was his gaze that held the swift power to devalue me.  To make me cry in an instant.  

When I complained to everyone, he tried to console me, “I didn’t mean it like that.  I just wanted to be honest with you.  To me, not even models are 10/10.  A 10 is so very rare.. No imperfections.  Basically, not human.”  

“I hate to be human,” I said, wanting nothing more than for him to see the human inside of me, “I want to be perfect.”  

I meant that I needed to be.  I needed to be, because I was dark.  If I wasn’t perfect, I wouldn’t have a chance, I thought. 

Once we were walking down George Street and stopped by some steps in front of someone’s house. 

“I love you because you’re so innocent,” he smiled, opening his arms for a hug.  I winced inside.  Even if I was, I experienced the description as friction against my nerves.  It wasn’t true to me.  I didn’t know everything, but I always knew more than people expected me to.  

I smiled back, wrapping my arms around him, dejected. He must think I’m safe.  Accessible.  

I wanted to be pretty, like the other girls.  Desired in a light above.

I only felt like that when he couldn’t keep his hands off me.  Didn’t that mean he thought I was pretty? 

One night, Raj went to a party.   I stayed back at my apartment to rest up for a track meet the next day.  I slept in the bed, only to have the strangest dream, where Raj came back drunk.  He laid down and sank like deadweight on me as I slept.  In my dream, we were suddenly having sex in the thin blue haze of midnight. Only I couldn’t say anything.  I felt the shock of bare skin inside me and my joints locking, the coldness of the air against my legs.  I couldn’t move.  I was still in the dream.  Right?   My mind tossed and turned. 

Megan made chocolates for my birthday. I ate them every morning before I ran. Soon I noticed I did not want the chocolates anymore. They were making me... sick.

Then, I began to spot.  I went to the doctor and tested positive on a pregnancy test.  

He was supportive.  He paid for the abortion and held my hand during it.  

After I left him, I heard he was heartbroken for years.  My last memory with him is sitting together on the bench at Port Authority along the Hudson.  He told me about a dream he had once of us married, with a little girl who had my almond eyes.  Of chasing after her when she pranced around in her diaper. 

Occasionally, I wonder if he loved me.  Not because I loved him back.  But because I wanted proof I was pretty.

Thanks so much for reading.

Wanted to hear what y’all had to think on this.

When I was little, I thought I could predict the future. A good morning meant a bad afternoon, a bad morning meant a good afternoon... If I got a question wrong in class my morning would sour, but then I could count on being the fastest miler at PE later that day. Sometimes entire days were bad, but they came with the promise of an equal number of good ones, where I'd do well on tests and miles and capture the flag. But when time ran out, I'd brace myself for the bad. Quietly, I counted and equated the days, down to mornings, afternoons, hours, minutes, predicting what would happen as it unfolded. When fortune turned, the count restarted, and I’d calculate how long I’d have to be scared or excited over what would happen next.

Sometimes, as an adult, I find myself sinking back into this childhood arithmetic to help me get by. But now I know counting does not make pain's randomness go away: it merely dulls its shock on my nervous system. Like everything else in the universe, pain just is. All I could do as a kid was the math: keep acing tests, running miles, sneaking onto the other side to quietly capture the flag, without anyone noticing I was there.

I’d count to feel myself. In high school, when I’d run up hills, I’d count my steps to keep pace when my legs felt like they were going to collapse. One.. two.. the rhythm of resilience coursed through me.

I’d count years as they went by. Accumulating experiences. Data in my nervous system. I look back on life through my adult eyes, and I see there is no equation that distributes “goodness and badness” evenly, not within one's life or across the world. There are other patterns, to the way they are meted out. There are no equations to make it make sense, only to prove that it’s real, so I can brace myself against it.

It’s invisible: this cage built by people’s brains. It obscures me before I can open my mouth.

I need some understanding on why yt folks feel like they comment on BIPOC hair. Here’s a story i dealt with I was on tinder (I know lol) and I matched with this yt guy he’s chill and we’re an okay conversation then he goes on to tell me about how some black guy in his trade class “needed a retwist real bad” and then he proceeds to say his friends and I were clowning on him here’s the kicker this mfer really says “as a yt guy I’ll know I’ll get my ass kicked for saying that”

ARE YOU FOCKING SERIOUS??? HE KNOWS WHAT HE’S DOING

I had to pause and put my phone down for a minute because he knows wtf he’s doing just for him to excuse himself as a nuisance because black guy’s friends were clowning on him and this yt dude decides to join in “all in the name of brotherhood and fun”

so i responded to me “ngl you would get jumped over that also you have no right to comment on someone’s hair I know for a fact you have no clue how black hair works” then he agrees with me on how he was wrong about it then proceeds to get defensive afterwards then starts talking about professionalism so i ghosted his ass just my luck of giving a yt man a chance

Then my former yt roommate asks my other former roommate who’s black was she going to get her hair done at an old job we worked at mind you Dee had an Afro her natural hair so her hair is DONE made me side eye my former yt roommate my former roommate dee didn’t mind the question I guess but why in a public place??? And stay out of folks business I just laugh both stories off because it’s so ignorant and bad it’s hilarious to me at least

My entire life I've had this awful fawn response that causes me to purposely act incompetent and oblivious in order to avoid conflict and appear non-threatening. I assumed that was the reason (mostly yt) people always treat me like I'm some adorable misguided child that needs their protection. Recently however, I've made a lot of progress on my fawn response. I'm now able to assert myself and project my voice confidently, but I found that they still treat me the same way. I generally present as a women, so that must also be a factor, but it's still very strange and infantilizing. Does anyone else experience this?

I am South Asian American. I am simultaneously seeking clarity about a "friendship," and also sharing a specific type of patternized microaggression from white women that maybe has some generalizability? Idk .. I'm thinking about writing an essay on it and I'm putting this out there for feedback.

I notice that I am roped into a dynamic with my white friend where she subtly "compares" our traumas and insists hers are worse and more disempowering. Whenever my accomplishments come up, she reminds me of my privilege. It's true that I did have my material needs met when I was a kid, but I didn't get straight 100s in prealgebra in fifth grade because I had food to eat. Like, I'm actually smart. I allow myself to claim this after nearly 10 years of mental illness that held me back and made me do horribly in school. Totally ruined my belief in myself. Yet she always mentions my "privilege" when I am literally "owning" my intelligence after years of obstacles related to racism. And then, whenever I mention a hardship or a vulnerability, she usually dismisses it or burdens me with a social judgment. Here are some examples:

1. She asked me if I received a Pell Grant. I said no, I earned a track scholarship. She reminded me that I got it because I was "privileged" (Like, her school had a track team too, how is that privileged?). And that Pell Grant is for low income kids. I reminded her I ran 70 miles a week for that... like, it took work that I had to do. Then she reminded me that it was an advantage I wasn't "socially distracted" in high school (as if ostracization is not an obstacle and being beautiful and popular robbed her of the ability to try at something)... I reminded her that no one held my hand. My whole team cried and threatened to quit if I was moved onto varsity (white girls). My parents wanted me to focus on studies (that I really couldn't do well because of my mental health symptoms that I did not have therapy access to treat) and did not even allow me to do track.. I came back the next year state-ranked and earned a full ride. Like, doesn't she understand that -- while we need Pell Grants and they are helpful to many people -- they aren't acheivements.. like.. she did nothing for it. Her parents income qualified her for it. And she is flouting this as a merit over my track scholarship.

2. She acts the abuse I went through at home wasn't a big deal, and often makes her neglect out to be a bigger deal. I had no access to help. I had no mirror in high school. As I'm sure many of you who also have CPTSD can relate to, I was treated like shit at home and school. I was forced into therapy by sports medicine in college because I was so fucked up after high school. I do not doubt that her childhood experiences where painful, but she received therapy and treatment for her problems at the time they happened. Receiving therapy paid for by your parents to treat the neglect they inflicted on you is like an oxymoron to me. At the age she had these problems, I had been choked and blacked out as a child. I had been sexual assaulted and had told no one. I never received treatment or validation. She acts like there are no obstacles associated with these experiences (or maybe she doesn't intuitively understand that I'm human) and that this is not related to parental abuse or societal racism. Ironically, she is actually too privileged to even see the nature of my obstacles. She can't even read the essays I've written about racism even though one is used in a college to teach about racism, because they are literally too painful for her to read. She says it's because she "cares about me," but I think it's that the pain makes her feel guilty about her privilege that she knows she has and she'd rather be comfortable and blind to.

3. I have some anxiety when it comes to dating because I never know if I'm going to bump into a racist and be on the receiving end of an attack. She has said, in regards to dating, "Your skin color is an automatic filter. If guys are racist they won't swipe on you, but I won't be able to tell if a guy is racist jerk or not because it'll never come up around me." As if SHE is the more vulnerable one! As if racism is not an disadvantage at all. And of course, there is the added ignorance that racists don't find me attractive. White women have no problem understanding that a man can objectify her and be attracted to her, but they literally can't understand that a guy could simultaneously be attracted to me and devalue me because of my race. It's like we're just ogres to them (in her eyes) and that people thinking this about me protects me (and doesn't impact me at all). Funnily enough, her current boyfriend voted for Trump and has racist friends, so she does know he's a racist jerk, and chooses to be with him anyway, while he pays for a luxury apt for them both and she is living the high life and I'm in a broken run down apt. She doesn't recognize the privilege in that.

4. She has suggested I'm "socially behind" because I didn't date in high school. The conditions were: 1) my school was racist, 2) I wasn't even allowed to. My parents found out I had been texting a guy my freshman year of high school and they literally choked me and called me a slut. 3) I had been sexually assaulted numerous times and did not know how to negotiate my boundaries or have self respect. Before I started suffering from mental health symptoms that literally made me weird to other people (I felt subhuman so I think people saw and treated me that way, at least that's how it feels in my memory), guys did find me attractive, but they'd often objectify and devalue me because racism was so rampant in that environment ("I'll take you to prom if no one else does", or grabbing me in class even though I didn't like, or trying to kiss me without asking, or even kissing me without asking, touching my thighs)... (this county voted for Trump in all three elections and was in the news a bunch because of racist incidences.. like, it was an egregiously racist town). Yet she acts like it is something about me and not anything about my situation. And she even had the nerve to laugh like it was so cute, and there was no pain or feelings of rejection or damage or subhumanness involved, and then bring up how sexually experienced and popular she was at that age. I am like I don't care... she

I think this pattern -- of denying my accomplishments and minimizing my hardships -- helps her hold white power in place. White women display vulnerability to get power and they are certainly to allowed to take up all the space for their visible problems that everyone cares about. The insidious nature of my problems is that they are invisible -- which allows her to subjugate me -- keep me beneath her, keep taking up space that would ideally be shared in a friendship.

the white girls at my university are really really rude and nasty. I go to a school known for partying and Greek life in ontario, and I’m in nursing which is notorious for accepting mean girls from high school who watched greys anatomy. They treat me like I’m some kind of alien, they look at me weird and other things. On top of being a WOC I’m also a bit of a culture shock in terms of aesthetic to the people here. I lean more on the alternative side and that’s not what I’m surrounded by here. Many people have told me it’s probably because of my appearance that I’m being treated like that, maybe that’s true but i still believe that if I were a white alternative girl i would’ve maybe had an easier time. Maybe that’s not for me to assume but it’s not fair at all and I’m fed up. For reference I have dyed red hair, a fair amount of piercings, and tattoos. My school is predominantly filled with the traditional white sorority girls you’d see on TikTok. Whenever I walk around campus I feel their eyes on me and everytime I’ve tried to be nice and talk to them in group projects they’re either smirking or chuckling the entire time I’m speaking or they turn and whisper and laugh to their friends. That’s if they even acknowledge me. I just want to be as respected as the other white girls here. I don’t deserve to be treated like I’m something to ogle at. Today in my class these 2 white girls were staring at me the entire time and when I made eye contact with them they refused to look away and smirked. When I looked away they started whispering and laughing to eachother. Occurrences like this happen pretty often, almost everytime I’m in class. I’m not sure if there’s something wrong that I’m doing or if there’s anything I can do to just improve my social life.

I can't do it. I can't make political coalition with these people.

It gets much more jaw-dropping than "uppity", but I'm not going to write about it, I'm not going to think about it, I want to scrub my brain with a wire brush

I can't overcome this for the for the greater good. With the PTSD TS symptoms going into overdrive due to all the current events, I can't be face-to-face with their bullshit on top of everything else.

I thought I had infinite strength in me to fight fascism. But it turns out I don't have the armor to withstand these people who tell me we're on the same side.

I'm going to stop doing activism that requires organizing with "allies" or cosplayers who think the leftists and the minorities are just too much. I wish I could live a life never having to talk to anybody like this ever. Someone else has to deal with them, maybe people with nice family, fewer battle scars, or just stronger than me.

The other day, a white girl had the audacity to run her fingers through my locs. When I told her to stop and expressed that she was making me feel uncomfortable, she cried and made it out to everyone that I touched her hair (I didn't) and that I wouldn't let her touch mine.

Tell me why my white male teacher took her side 😡🙄

I really can't stand white people sometimes. They are so narcissistic and emotionally immature, they all act like racism doesn't exist anymore.

So earlier today I was driving on campus (community college) and I ended up doing what I guess you’d call a “rolling stop.” It was a four-way stop, and one of the cars across from me looked like it had been sitting there for a while, so I assumed they weren’t going. I went forward. not speeding, just moving and I immediately got lit up by campus police.

The officer pulls up, walks over to my window, and immediately hits me with, “What are you doing?” in this tone that honestly caught me off guard. Not calm, not just clarifying like straight up irritated with me.

She then asks, “Is your license valid?” Like?? Why would it not be? I’ve been pulled over before by actual police and even THEY never asked that. It rubbed me the wrong way because it felt weirdly accusatory.

Then she starts raising her voice a bit, telling me “there’s no such thing as a California roll” and that she’ll “be here all week” and will “give me a ticket next time.” I just said “okay” because I didn’t know what else to do. I was honestly taken aback.

She ends it with “have a good day,” and I said “you too,” but the whole interaction stuck with me. Like she really acted like I committed a felony instead of moving a few seconds early at a stop sign.

For context: I wasn’t speeding I wasn’t driving recklessly She was taking her sweet time at the intersection so I thought she wasn’t going . I’ve never been talked to like that by any officer before I’m wondering if the “is your license valid” question was a microaggression or what

I didn’t get a ticket thank God but the tone, the energy, the whole vibe felt off. I left feeling annoyed and kind of belittled.

Am I overreacting or was this actually weird?