Okay, I’m not really into the whole “woke” thing, nor am I constantly looking for “representation.” In fact, I’m kind of tired of it, because I KNOW I never will find true representation. People might ask me: “why don’t you read so-and-so’s book/watch (or stream) XYZ? The writer/creators are East Asian! Ummm, that’s not enough, hon. Do you not get that? Almost every single book I’ve read written by someone of East Asian heritage has some aspect of what I’ve termed “Wah!! Wah!!! I’m an immigrant/child of immigrants and look how I suffered!!!!” Looking back at my almost 41 years of being on this planet, I don’t think I can really say I suffered at all. I mean, I that one year in Bermuda really lowered my self-esteem and perhaps triggered a bit of depression/mental health issues I still carry on and off to this day, but truly bad experiences? I don’t think I can say that I’ve had any.
Perhaps the closest representation would be Claudia Kishi from The Baby Sitters Club (I recently bought the tin box above. I no longer have my original copies, and didn’t want to buy graphic novels. This was the best I could do if I wanted original covers!). She was normal to me. There was nothing weird/wah-wah about her family at all. Her parents were white collared professionals. They lived in the suburbs. There really wasn’t anything underprivileged about the Kishis – the 1980s/1990s version I read OR the 2010s version of the Netflix series. However, Claudia was just one character in a series targeting girls between eight and 12. Once you get to middle school or above (including adults) well, there wasn’t much out there. No one like mine.
You get the other end of the spectrum – Kevin Kwan’s Crazy Rich Asians trilogy as well as his new book (which I have yet to get my hands on). While I prefer THAT over the “Wah! Wah!” books, they’re ALSO not representative of my upbringing. Sure, I understand A LOT of it (namely the so-called brand name schools thing), but I’m also not from THAT kind of family. I know my family history – government people/diplomats on my dad’s side and farmers or business owners on my mom’s. I know that at least some of them grew up in privilege, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t THAT kind of privilege. In other words, they had help, but they didn’t live in glamorous mansions like the Youngs.
So why am I not write something myself? I’m NOT a fiction writer! I wrote ONE novella 13 years ago, and I have zero intention of writing another. It’s not my lack of connections – self-publication is a thing – but it’s difficult to promote something when you don’t have any real connections or a large number of followers on social media. I’m just some random 40 year old woman from Toronto who shares pictures of food and her son. Sure, I co-host a podcast, but that’s clearly not enough. Not yet, anyway.
I KNOW there are many people out there who’re just like me. And clearly not enough of us are voicing our opinion. We may be busy, but just one lady with a blog isn’t enough. It’s considered anecdotal and usually dismissed as “just an exception to the rule.” Is that even fair? I can tell you that I am NOT the only one. And it can get annoying. Especially when critics just call you an “overprivileged brat.” Is that the best they can come up with?
I feel like there’s zero way of changing this. Well, unless SOMEONE says something. And this person has to be much higher profile than me. I suppose someone like Lainey Liu can – I think she’s from a similar background – but people already want her “cancelled” (what’s up with that, anyway?), so it’s unlikely. I just feel like I’m…alone.
