It’s 5’6, with curly brown hair, olive skin and green eyes. Nope! We’re not playing Cranium; we are describing the features of my appearance. My family tree looks like a recipe for soup. Two parts this heritage, one part that and a splash of olive skin with a zest of green eyes. I am what the dog world calls a “mutt.” (But the kind that you would adopt because the coat is striking). On an average day, I am stopped in the grocery store, or even the coffee shop at 7:00am when my RBF is too strong to laugh off ignorant comments. These are the moments when the dreaded question surface…”What ARE you?...you just look so exotic.” To that micro aggression, I respond with “A human.” With men, they think this is being flirtatious or original in their approach to striking up conversation, but let me challenge you on why you should stop inquiring about what people are, like the spice you can’t quite put your finger on while snacking on a gourmet quiche from one of your frequented top restaurants.
The issue of being ambiguous is that people no longer see you as a human; they see you as an object because you represent a social status of progressive mindset. I was once told in a delightfully cheerful manner, that I perfectly fulfilled someone’s need for “more brown friends.” And this was by an individual who saw no issue with that statement. If you personally saw my skin tone, you would realize how far removed this individual was.
For the majority of my childhood, I was told that my family was Italian. To be honest, I had suspicions that we were different. I remember my father being darker than most of our friends and wondering why people always gawked over me with my frizzy hair and easily tanned skin. Finally, pieces of the puzzle came together at my Grandfather’s funeral. A speech from his closest friend toasted a life well lived to “his big Italian Goombah.” A last name change and a whitewashed story later, you have the setting for my confused childhood. In college, I researched where my true last name originated from; the one my Grandfather had before he changed it to his step-father’s. It was definitely not Italian. This was all put to rest when I sent off for a genome test result to finally know the truth. I no longer have to play my favorite game of “guess what ethnicity Josie is.” However, knowing what I am hasn’t helped me feel comfortable in my own skin. There is still a part of me that feels like I have to stand up for myself to people’s preconceived concept of my identity.
Growing up in a rural area, you often don’t encounter many progressive mindsets. This is partially due to a lack of general education, life experience and exposure to diverse groups of people other than the stereotypical white. During high school, I was called many derogatory slurs and was told that my family “probably worked in the tulip fields.” Or my favorite, I had a “Jew nose and black girl hair.” I learned how to poke fun of myself and the irony of being “white” but not looking “white.” From my earliest memories, I recall being treated like a toy or a doll by random strangers, even. The most humiliating moment I remember was the day I went to the movie theater and the attendant singled me out demanding I show my ticket (I had thrown it away on the way into the theater, because no one had asked me before), I couldn’t prove my purchase so I was escorted outside and in front of a line of other people waiting to watch "Eat Pray Love." My integrity was questioned to the box attendant. She confirmed I had paid with a confused look on her face, and immediately the man let go of his tight grip on my arm.
On the average day, I am greeted with one, or often more of the following questions. However, some people are more tactful and eloquent than others in subtly slipping micro-aggressions into casual conversation.
“Can I play with your hair?”
“You probably hate your hair.”
“You look so exotic”
“You look like you could dance”
“What ARE you?”
“You’re probably (insert ethnicity here)”
“You’re definitely not white!”
“Are you sure you’re not the mail man’s child?”
I used to respond with jokes, similar to “Yeah, I must be adopted.” But after a while, that joke is exhausting and to be honest, it hurts. These questions led me to have identity issues and feel like I never fit in.
Appearance cannot be deduced down to a punchline, a fetish, a statement of your progressive mindset as a picture on your Instagram, a story to tell your friends about that “cultures” you or a costume. This all too common misconception is why I have enough material to even write this article. My appearance is not your segway into communication with me, and it’s this very experience that I believe to be why my grandparents lied about their identity and sought to look and act white. The only difference between their childhood and now is that it’s no longer politically correct to speak division in culture. (Unless you are running for President). Whereas now, people will post photos with babies in other countries to show how forward thinking they are, attached to the hashtag of #iloveblackbabies. This is all to appear more open-minded. It’s the same basis of a “Us vs. Them” opinion, but masked in a different approach. Sorry, I am not going to pat you on the back for being friends with people of other races, you should be anyway.
From my experience, I understand why people bleach their skin, or go to unhealthy measures to soften their natural features in effort to look more like the models in mainstream media. I do not support this, but I can empathize. If you are someone who actively goes out of your way to make the different looking person in the room feel seen, yes…you are the issue I am talking about. It’s not your progressive-seeming topic of conversation to tell your white friends about the exotic girl you saw at dinner the other night. Or my personal favorite “It makes me so happy to see inter-racial couples.”…just stop please. What you don’t realize is that your “curiosity," might educate your sheltered experience and ease your creeping thoughts of superiority, but it creates feelings of division. “What ARE you?” is another way of saying “You don’t look like you belong here.” What you are saying when you call someone “exotic" is that they ARE different, and it doesn’t make them feel accepted. Stop asking me what I am because I will only respond with “A human being.” Because that is how you should see me.
