Blog Assignment #3

“Americans Have a Different Attitude” Family, Sexuality, and Gender in Filipina American Lives

This article frustrates me. Greatly.

As a Filipino-American myself I feel like I can see through everything that I read and into a mindset that fosters a more positive attitude of Filipino life, American life, and the lives of both men and women of either community. Maybe I can… maybe I can’t, but I do know enough of either culture to say that what Filipino immigrant parents are doing to their children is completely self-limiting and stagnating their children’s development. Not only on does it affect them on a personal level, but also on a cultural level that will influence generations to come.

My parents are Filipino immigrants, but they left the Philippines to literally get away from it. From everything that it stood for and everything that Filipinos did. Both were subject to the cultural restrictions detailed in this article, especially my Mother. She was the victim of so much criticism. From her own culture no less. On top of the traditional views enforced upon Filipina women, she was the victim of prejudices based upon the dark color of her skin and her features. She grew an aversion to her own culture and as a result escaped to America as soon as she found out she was pregnant with my older brother. My parents raised my brother and I as American children would be raised. They gave us American names: Nicolo and Kyle (taking our names from American films they loved) and made sure that we grew up in healthy American communities. They didn’t want us to be subjected to the constraints of a traditional Filipino mindset and fostered individuality within both of us. The only thing they maintained from Filipino culture (other than the delicious food) was the notion of respect for your elders and for your family. They always told me that family comes first and that blood is thicker than water and all that jazz… and looking back on it I thank them for it cause my family is extremely important to me, but they never enforced it to the extent in which it would limit my own personal growth. My parents are very liberal and I suppose they started off pretty liberal to begin with they first raised us, but I’m guessing that they had to further expand their notions of tradition, culture, and religion. Specifically, in my case, because I am gay, they really had to open their minds further than what most Filipino immigrant parents are used to or would be willing to do. Of course, they love me completely and completely support who I am and my lifestyle, and for that I am grateful because I have a healthy view of myself. I don’t believe I could’ve survived or grown into the person I am today had I been raised by more traditional Filipino parents. I would’ve been stifled and conflicted and definitely not as happy. Often times I joke to my parents that we’re Italian at heart, because honestly… I was born and raised in New Jersey, and we live right outside of New York City, my mom cooks Italian food all the time, and just the general family dynamic is very healthy and loving and fosters individuality while maintaining that idea of a home that we can always come back to. My parents don’t disagree when I mention this… they merely laugh and say that we basically are.

Now in contrast, the families in this article are completely self-limiting. It frustrated me when I read this because they think they’re somehow maintaining a better lifestyle than that of the American lifestyle. They think they’re somehow more morally and ethically pure than the people of the country that they wanted to move to. I mean, honestly… why move somewhere if you’re not even going to try to embrace the culture of that place? Not only are you limiting your views of the world but you’re further delineating the concept of racism and prejudice and making the distinctions and walls harder to break down. I feel like most traditional Filipino families don’t see what they’re doing to themselves. They’re just blindly following these traditions because it’s all they know and all they think they should know. They don’t even bother questioning any of it. It doesn’t make sense to scrutinize the roles of one gender over the other. They stress that girls shouldn’t go out and date because they can lose their virginity, but they say that guys can go out to date… that they have nothing to lose. But whom do they think the guys are going to go out and try to have sex with? Other guys? Unless they’re sons are gay (which they do not believe in either and strictly shun) they’re sons are obviously going to try and sleep with their daughters. How does that help their cause of preserving their daughter’s virginity? It doesn’t! It’s mind boggling to me who stupid it all is. They say they want their kids to be successful and to lead great lives, but then they tell them that they should be doctors or nurses or housewives. They limit their children to these arbitrary options simply because it’s what they know… it’s the only thing they know. I always see Filipino-Americans trying to be successful and make a name for themselves or branch out and be individuals, but when you have an entire culture of people limiting you to so many things there’s no way any progress will be made. There’s no way the prejudices will be broken down or eliminated because people are blindly feeding them and people are blindly eating them. It’s like a cycle of self-limiting prejudice that doesn’t help anyone become better people.

I’m happy my parents raised me American. I would not want to be caught up in all of that insanity. I don’t think I could’ve survived.

“Theorizing Difference from Multiracial Feminism”

This article is interesting to me because I feel like it said a lot but I simultaneously feel like it didn’t say very much at all. It felt almost redundant and repetitive in its definition of multiracial feminism. I don’t think I gleaned much from it in terms of new insight to feminism. I feel like race and class is something already present within the ideas of feminism. I mean I think it would be fair to say that they go hand-in-hand affect each other to the point that you can’t really fix one without addressing the other. So I’m slightly confused as to what exactly the writer was trying to say. It’s interesting though to think of the struggles faced by women of different color, race, or ethnicity. I suppose they really are “outsiders within”. I mean what’s the point in trying to unify oneself under a common cause when an extraneous factor limits the influence that you have over the main issue at hand. It’s like saying: “oh you can join our team, but you can’t play… just sit on the bench over there and we’ll call you if we need you.” It is largely unfair… but like I said one issue cannot be solved without solving the others as well, in this case race and ethnicity as well as discrimination against women.

Now, in terms of situated knowledge I believe it definitely hinders one’s ability to see the world clearly. For instance, in terms of Filipino immigrants coming to America, their situated knowledge is based upon the traditions and values they were taught by their parents, culture, and society. However, they do not bother to question these values and instead just perpetuate them regardless of their logic or lack thereof. They’re willingness to follow these traditions without any skepticism prevents them from seeing beyond themselves and thus from seeing the world and the people within it in a much broader and open-minded perspective. Likewise, I myself am probably a victim of situated knowledge, due to the way I was brought up. My mother’s disdain for her own culture was instilled into me whether or not she intended it to be, and despite the liberal perspective that my parents fostered within me I could still very well be prejudice towards the Filipino culture as well. I might be able to see outside of what traditional Filipinos can but that doesn’t necessarily mean I can see inside and fully understand what they are dealing with.