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posted : Sunday, March 27, 2011
title : What colonialism has left us (Europhiles please do not read)
Despite trying different mediums of blogging, I can never fully manifest my ideas into anything other than blogger. So here's to you blogger! And this is approximately my sixth year into the creation of this blog. And thank all of you so much for faithfully reading my blog :') Personally, I wouldn't really put up new things here if not for you guys. Oh gosh I sound like some celebrity although I am clearly far from one. Okay I didn't mean for it to sound that way guys. So here we go: Today's topic will be something quite angst-ridden. No, I am not going to word-cry or word-scream nor am I going to CAPS-voice but I am going to talk about a topic that will probably have you guys infuriated. Yes...I think the title is self-explanatory. It is...colonialism! It is okay if the mere mention of the title makes you all shut-lidded. (your eyelids close) The reason why I chose this topic is because I am sick of hearing Westerners/Easterners being all irrationally insulting towards asians along with the stereotypes they have towards asians. The continual use of asians is to emphasize my frustration towards such ignorant people. What I would really love to tell these people first of all is 1) Please learn some Geography Apparently Asians are just Asians. So if you lie within the continent 'Asia' you are supposedly all characterised to belong within the region of China. Okay this is not an assumption that I have in case you guys wonder where I got this hypothesis from. I was talking to ayah who always complains to me about his work and his consistent experience with the inefficacious French (Cue: spitting). So then ayah went on about how the French is very slow in shipping plane parts, like they take months to just do that because of the very relaxed lifestyle they lead. We haven't gotten to the annoying part yet. So then, when they finally received the parts my dad realised that the address wrong. The plane parts were addressed to:  (I thought I'd add graphics to illustrate better and since my posts are normally ranty & long) Such ignorance makes me feel like grouping France within the UK such that it becomes this:  (As you can see, France now belongs in the UK thanks to my amateur photoshop skills) In an alternate universe, this would have been possible because the French and the Brits always fight consistently. 2) Asians do not look the same I guess I can't blame them for this, it's exactly how we see white people and we call them angmoh with no regard for their nationality whatsoever. So I guess it's human nature to stereotype. However what frustrates me is that even our very own asians can't tell themselves apart...it's like how we see the Uzbeks and call them angmoh. Still, with such a notion, we don't hear much "All angmohs look the same" do we?! And we don't characterise all 'Westerners' to be big burly men with hairy legs (or at least I do sometimes) don't we? Here's another map to prove my point. This time, its a map of asia:  Ignore Russia though, it does not choose to belong in Asia. Geographically, the middle-east belongs in Asia BUT middle-easterners are not considered Asians by people and neither do they consider themselves so because they are semitic caucasians. It's just like how you look at a middle-easterner and call them ang moh because of how they have fair skin and thence hold them in high regard. (okay not all people do this of course but some do) It's also like how Easterners and Westerners alike characterise all Asians as having 'squinty eyes' as they call it. You see the kind of superiority people have based on sheer skin colour? What I am trying to say is that this is partly a by-product of colonialism. Okay I think this bit is hypothetical, not sure if this is wholly proven. However though, History says it all. If only the colonisers didn't land on our shores, we wouldn't have them taking away our resources for their own benefit (I bet this part is driving you to sleep already) and hence making them a major superpower. I guess it is partly because of the notion that all asians are ugly which, as expected, I would deject totally because of how (I believe) god has created an equilibrium. If you don't believe this you prolly haven't been watching Miss Universe or completely ignoring the fact that Asians and black Africans have been winning such competitions instead of ang mohs. Bad people are bad people everywhere, good people are good people everywhere. Beautiful people are beautiful people anywhere and well, you get the drift. I think the only thing separating us from them Europeans is the fact that we are struggling to keep up with what is acceptable to them, and they, have of course, set their own standards of what is fashionable and what is not. By fashionable I don't really mean clothes but what's in and what's not, like technology etc. This idea is nothing new however. You see the Amish and Quaker communities in the West being dissed completely because of them not subscribing to technology. It's also like how you get dissed for not subscribing to Democracy or Capitalism or even Chewing Gum in places like *cough* Singapore. Superior people being superior, will expect others to conform to their own set of beliefs. Hence, us struggling to be like them makes it seem like we are paler in comparison. THENCE, methinks that: (This part gets stupid) We shouldn't hold them in high regard because: Exhibit A: They do not even know their Geography Thus suggesting a gaping hole/major flaw in their education and thence we may even surpass them, knowledge-wise. After all, what are we Asians known for? EDUCATION and by EDUCATION I really mean Maths cause I am cool and Americanised like that. (Except that I am not cool and Americanised I am just a ranty/ugly austronesian girl) |
