On Feelings & Judgement/Justice (TDOR 2020)

    I am an emotional being and I must honour that - as softness brings strength and as we've survived by becoming soft so we don't break...

    Being a person/femme of feelings for healing is often not understood with dominant societal performative behaviours/attitudes of niceness and "wokeness" displayed/emerging/practiced. However, I am not interested nor invested in niceness but kindness, as being "nice" interpersonally and socio-politically has proven itself to be more of a submissive people-pleasing trait for survival, as well as a navigation of conflict avoidance without mutual accountabilities. All my life I have been shamed/misunderstood for my ocean of emotions, for diving into sensuality, and for my strive of justice through empathy. Many would say I'm less of an intellectual or logical thinker/decision-maker when I'm so emotionally driven but I whole heartedly disagree, as my feelings are indeed research for a clearer and more compassionate judgement of collective considerations. I don't aim to feel for myself but to feel for the world: for the trees, for the clouds and the sky, for the flowers and rain, for those feeling never enough and those searching to feel whole.

    I am firm, in the reminders of softness that we are full no matter the phase. Yet through hyper-awareness and constant reflections for change I come to understand, that it is cruel to force feelings upon those who are not ready - as who am I to unpack traumas when all I can offer is a soft/safe space for a revolution we still have to dream of... Sometimes, I don't know how to preach healing when the pains of living become greater than our desires for medicine and my humble words of support/solidarity. How does a tired/sad one prove and explain to a colonial-capitalistic society that softness is worth it ? How can I convince a starving Black queer man that mutual-aid is enough, how do I promise a homeless trans refugee that it gets better ? What can I do but to be there - to cry and starve but rejoice for the ways we survive together, only to grief of the abundance that we deserve... As feeling it all does not bring justice but sets a foundation for transformative justice, for collective healing with the empathy of no one being left behind. I've come to realized that when I center/honour my feelings, boundaries, and emotional capacities while embodying the future I dream of, I find myself breathing beyond survival but within an abundance of grace and worth by community. Thus the justices we seek around us and socio-politically need to be led by the justices we demand internally/interpersonally...

    Especially after trans day of remembrance/resistance/resilience while surviving a year full of grief in solitude (quarantine/lockdown), the urgency of self-preservation and care is crucial in honouring our feelings no matter the weight/ways of process. It is (un/re)learning to be soft with ourselves that we can offer the same for others, and it is affirming our diverse and complexed emotions that we honour our humanities as divine and deserving. When we must demand for our roses while alive and pray to rest/sleep in peace, where we grow our own flowers tired of waiting - there becomes a softness goldenly brewed and patiently breaking.

    I write poems just to feel alive: waiting on cheques via mail wasting on delivered meals while waking up to cold fries for lunch and crying for dinner. I lie anxiously between bedsheets and blankets lying to myself of how a body can sustain without food, I scream into pillows with how a mind suffocates. I try to work without becoming cold, I stay soft so I can stay alive as I meditate for another breath...

bodies and earth as one:
i dare to dream of freedom - of feelings
to believe in a liberation through softness
i dare to dream of abolishing the police and state
to rejoice in community in reparations and justice
i dare to dream of
remembering as resistance
in healing and sustaining our resilience

On Racial Belonging & Solidarity

    Home is wherever water flows - as being immigrant and trans have layered my experiences, feelings, and navigations around/to the concepts of home and belonging...

    I remembered at the age of 11 turning 12 - moving countries again and again before settling in 'Canada', across the globe and far away from my East-Asian Island home. It was a contrast compared to living in Singapore and Malaysia as well, where flights to/from Taiwan were only 4-5 hours long. Yet I remembered being excited to leave and begin again despite the uncertainties of distance and language/cultural barriers... I wanted to start over and do/be better, socially as a feminine "boy" tired of being bullied at every school I went to. I told myself that I must learn to fit in and make friends, forcing myself to be more masculine and thus why I tried hanging out with many cis-guy classmates in grade 7 when I first came. And fast-forward to failed attempts of learning cis-masculinity, repressing queerness/trans-femininity, and toughing out against endless gay/fat jokes, which resulted in me finally coming out as a queer teen. However, the lessons and trials of assimilation for socio-political survival doesn't end there as traumas of being asked to eat dumplings outside a portable classroom also made me stopped eating Chinese food at middle-school and fighting with my mom weekly about what to bring as lunch... Coming to what we know now as 'Canada' as a child who already was marginalized socially in different Asian countries/cities/schools, was a violent game of cultural-assimilation and self-whitewashing with my deep desires to being understood/loved/accepted to be exploited as drive for mental submission. I still think of young times of solitude as a child growing up and playing alone, without trying to be anybody else or ever compromising my identity/expressions for others' understandings nor validations. I remembered not having any words/analysis/reflections nor explanations of why other boys and girls wouldn't play with me or laughed at me; I remembered crying about people not being nice but sometimes being okay with it as well... I softly remember and gently treasure those innocent and youthful memories of enjoying/embodying/embracing myself - memories I miss/grief/recall for our hurting humanity. 

    And then one night in the last year of high school on our way home, my mother asked in conversation if I think I'll ever and fully be seen/treated as white Canadian after years of cultural-abandonment and conditioned self-assimilation... I responded no while remembering the stares of cis white parents, the betrayals/neglect/misunderstandings/tokenizations from cis white peers, and even if queer but cis + whiteness: the normality of privilege and ego comfort. Looking back: from sitting in front of the TV repeating sentences in practice to soften my accent to me being the only trans person of colour in social-circles to me pleased to be a cis white girl's "gay best friend" to how no one cared for a trans friend at the end - I understand that it was all but a game of trying to be seen, felt, and wanted while navigating character/identity realizations/development/actualizations. Many other Asian/immigrant peers called me "banana" and joked about my whitewashing back then as well, but I forgive and hold myself dearly for the ways I had learned for survival. Especially as a queer/trans person in a suburban town like Waterloo, I now understand how my lightskin and me speaking the colonizer's language was what had saved me from further social-antagonization/alienation and extreme/violent discriminations/marginalization... Yet I remember not long after, it was a friendly stranger's kindness/softness: an older non-binary Black femme, who's an immigrant-islander as well who sent me money after hearing stories of transphobia at school. It was also around when I started attending community poetry slams after losing most friends at school, thus again a new beginning of social-searching for belonging. Though this time, it was of queer/trans Black, Indigenous, and people of colour who were artists as well. I remembered being in awe of coloured femme bodies together, in support and solidarity, being unapologetically ethnic and feminine on their own terms. I remembered feeling free, and accepted, even when I've just met those people yet now I understand that its the linage and connections that we have as femmes of feelings for healing...

    Black people have taught me love as Indigenous people have taught me life. I have painted myself as a lost/abandoned mermaid at shore for a self-portrait before as I've often referred to my journey of interpersonal/socio-political belonging to being a mermaid. Thus through growth and reflections, I really believe that my blossom here as a settler-immigrant in Turtle Island (North America) could not have been if I didn't cross paths with certain mentors, chosen-families, and community members - if it weren't for the teachings, generosity/grace, and specific moments of reaching out/empathy - I would not be the flower I am today. It is from Black/Indigenous women/femmes that I relearn how to grow a home internally while communities externally; and it is with Black/Indigenous queer/trans folks that I unlearn for collective rest, self-preservation, and intercommunal joy: like an adopted mermaid at shore, I will forever hold gratitude and give back for the ways this land and its land/water protectors have helped me breathe.

    Though I was also afraid of repeating same mistakes - of mistaking bodies as homes, as belongings and acceptance my inner child still craves... As domestic violence and physical abuse was the normal exchange between families of blood that I still seek of chosen-families by waters for cleanse. Yet I must belong deeply to myself, like waves extending/embracing out and back to themselves; I must feel safe with the rivers within even if I become/represent the in-betweens of belonging - perhaps both, perhaps none, perhaps all but still one and at peace. I must cry oceans wondering of home, to wander across seas for blood just to drink and cry more... So I understand, that there needs to be no belonging for solidarity as empathy is not required for support either. We don't need to be included to love and care, to re/unlearn and to do/be better. I am a Taiwanese lightskin immigrant, an East-Asian islander, and a transgender-woman/femme always in support/solidarity while searching for softness and belonging. Though no matter my positionalities of "home" or belonging, I shall defend the homes of others as well as the homes of our collective future. 

On Fetishization (Sexualities & Fears)

fetish (noun.) : "a form of sexual desire in which gratification is linked to an abnormal degree to a particular object, item of clothing, part of the body, etc."

    As a transgender woman/femme of colour navigating this patriarchal society: I have interpersonally and socio-politically understood fetishization through experiences of exploitive intimacy as well as conditions of always being desired sexually but never loved physically/mentally. Yet also as a body/sex-positive/affirmative assault-survivor in processes of healing, I not only wish to understand the violences of fetishization but the roots of such drive for dehumanization as well as the complicities among us all who are impacted by the colonial constructions of sexual/physical values of exchange... I often wonder of the differences between 'kink' and 'fetish', of how they intersect and challenge each other's ideals and notions of sexual/physical norms as well as their relations to our diverse roots/triggers of pleasure/desire. From reading, communicating, and reflecting: I have understood kinks to be "abnormal/non-conventional" physical/sexual practices/concepts/fantasies, while fetishes are usually described as sexual fixations and psychological needs for a specific/certain object/act. Some explains it in simple yet confusing matters that "all fetishes are kinks but not all kinks are fetishes"... And such conversations first bring me to the needs of discussing our understandings of kinks as a colonial impact, as some would have suggested that intersex/queer/trans bodies and sexualities are kinks by historical/cultural/educational marginalization. Especially when we know that "kinky" hair have also been used to describe coily/twisted/curly hair often with Black/Afro-Indigenous hair as abnormal, non-conventional, or a social spectacle in hierarchal comparisons to settler-European standards and norms of non-textured/straight/wavy hair. So with hair as an introductory, layered, and intersecting matter between both understandings of 'kink' and 'fetish', I wonder what the differences between having a "hair kink" and having a "hair fetish"... Through analysis and thought I come to realize that perhaps having a hair kink is of being physically/sexually/mentally hyper-aroused/attracted to the visuals/concepts of certain/specific hair, while having a hair fetish requires certain/specific hair to be physically/sexually/mentally satisfied. Even with the example subject/object changing, ie. feet kinks vs feet fetishes, the analysis remains sound and I can understand how partnerships of safe kink/fetish play can work out in both favours with one having kinks of hair being gripped/pulled and another having hair fetishes (ie. sensory fixations of touching/grabbing/smelling/licking hair). While one could have roleplaying kinks of being worshipped/served with another having the feet fetish to focus on and be at one's feet... Kinks are interpersonally and socio-politically shaped by what we have been taught, considered, and understood to be non-conventional intimate practices/concepts/fantasies between bodies, which is heavily historically/culturally based in the normality of perceiving sexuality as purposes of human reproduction. And embracing open/diverse sexualities and intimate physical expressions/practices/desires is decolonizing our perceptions of what is sensually/sexually "normal". Yet while I can be easily kink-positive and accepting, it takes more to unpack fetishization as it also often feeds into the colonial-patriarchal notions of physical/sexual normality with slippery slopes to hyper-sexualization, objectification, and dehumanization.

    Fetishes still can be expressed and practiced healthily with the focus to be objective and direct. And while I think it is dehumanizing to the root of objectifying certain body parts or requiring specific features to be satisfied sexually to the sight/mind/touch, I still have witnessed and heard community testimonials of healthy practices/expressions of fetishes of hair/feet/toes/armpit/nipples/anus...etc. Though what causes the red flags for me is the slippery slope of giving into colonial-hierarchal categories of exotic/forbidden desires and the fetishization of identities. When the focus is no longer objective and direct, it places the subject in a dehumanizing position during such exchanges/shares of physical/sensual intimacy while the fetishizer focuses and emphasizes on their sexual satisfaction/release. Thus I come to understand that kinks are rooted in sub-cultural, anti-conditioning desires/fantasies while fetishization is deeply rooted in psychological repressed attractions/needs for a physical/sexual relief... And when transferring realizations to the lived aggressions/experiences/violences of being fetishized, I console myself on the fact that I will never escape the socio-political/sexual realities of fetishization when the slur "tranny"'s history begins as a porn category of sub-dehumanization. Even now in 2020, people still ask what "transgender" means and if a trans woman means to have boobs and a dick at the same time, because that's what most have seen/witnessed/understood through mis-notions/representations of an entire group of people through fetishizing media like main-stream pornography. And while the situation can still be non-violent and sensually/sexually safe if the fetish focus is on "the feminine penis" as many cis-men are attracted to women/femmes with dicks and it all works out fine, but when such mental fixation conflicts with one's colonial-patriarchal cis-heteronormative constructions/definitions/understandings of being, then it often leads into violence towards others and internal struggles within the self/ego... As kinky concepts and fantasies (should) have consent and consistent communications between participating partners, many hold fetishes as psychologically personal and private thus not unpacked and often acted upon urges or intended self-serving satisfactory. Needlessly to say/state that all is but our humanities navigating through sensuality, intimacy, and sexuality, and though both kinks and fetish are socio-psychological evidences of colonial-hierarchies of the body, fetishization remains deeply in relations with repressed fixations, control, and fears.

    As an immigrant and East-Asian islander, I have also felt the racial fetishizations forced upon me physically/sexually as focuses of exoticism as eroticism in degrading positionalities. From men guessing my ethnicity as ways of flirting to non-consensual nicknames/catcalls of "Ling Ling"/"Panda"/"Fortune Cookie"...etc. and while I'm still trying to settle my feelings around being called "Bubble Tea", many still don't know that bubble tea is Taiwanese or where Taiwan even is. Though such experiences only has led to more socio-political analysis and reflections for collective accountability, as I have noticed my own attractions/interactions with men of colour to be even more critical in understanding intersections of raciality and sexuality. Despite growing up queer/trans and learning how to repress interpersonal truths/desires/pleasures, I began practicing/expressing sexuality/sensuality after coming out and coming to what we know as Canada. And such journey of a trans-woman/femme being exploited/fetishized for her body in discretion began with white men as I navigated through Kitchener-Waterloo as a queer teenager. Yet along the way and after moving to Tkaronto (Toronto), I not only have found belonging to queer/trans racialized chosen-familites/social groups/communities, I also find myself less sensually/sexually attracted to white/European-descent peoples/features. I've often joked about "decolonizing my pussy" and decentering from our attractions to whiteness especially as an immigrant who knows/understands the powers/corruptions/violences of both white supremacy and settler-colonialism, but I've also wondered privately about my sudden increase of interests after being rap*d twice with both times encountering men of colour... I find myself to be the best investigator for my own feelings/behaviours, thus it's also part of my psychological responsibility to constantly unpack and unlearn while calling for socio-political accountabilities. I often question my own complicities within discourses of anti-Black racism and racial fetishization even as a POC who experiences racism, xenophobia, and racial fetishization as well, but I must align myself with such constructions of violent hierarchies due to my lightskin and participating on settling on stolen lands. It is continuing difficult conversations within and around that pushes us to do/be better. And I couldn't help but wonder if my preferences of raciality can be a form of fetishization instead of realizations/growth away from the colonial-patriarchal whiteness... From talks with another trans sister/femme of colour on our lives being fetishized on a daily, we critiqued of how such attractions based from internal conflicts/fears only feed the egos of normality; while some searches/obtains empowerment from participating hyper-sexualization, some finds empowerment/healing from desexualization (especially after sexual violences). I personally know many fabulous queer/trans racialized sex workers who can testify to their challenges against femme/trans/fat/racial fetishization/dehumanization by turning the table and still profiting/monetizing as reclaiming power. However for myself, I ask if I can build my own tables and grow intimacies on my own terms of balancing between sensuality/sexuality through softness... And when asked about removing/detaching myself completely from such societal-obsessed sexualization and hierarchies of fetishization, my friend suggested that I dedicate myself to demisexuality -

    So there it is, not demisexuality to be exact but empathy: my weapon/shield against the violences of such fetishization both within and around, is hyper-humanization. Which is also what I believe in when we speak of decolonizing human intimacies and relations, as not exchanges of power but a sharing of powers. I dare to dream of loving/caring for each others bodies/minds while exploring/honouring our pleasures. I can only dream of a world without hyper-sexualization/fetishization as representations in media with understandings of consent blurred and cheated on. I dream of un/relearning sensual and emotional intimacy, by hyper-humanizing and empathizing with all bodies/identities/expressions that we encounter, interact, and access. I want to not only combat our fears with compassion, but filling the gaps of difference by creating safer spaces of intercommunal desires/pleasures as well... On the socio-psychological and political spectacles of fetishization/sex/fear, it is through a collective effort of transforming mindsets/relations to honour our bodies, humanities, and souls for freedom. As my powers birth from growing gardens of revolutionary justice, not from the games of colonial-patriarachy and its tools of desirability as poetics of hierarchal violence.