Saturday, December 25, 2010
A failure to escape.
Monday, December 13, 2010
did i just miss the first snow in new york while smoking indoor?
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
might as well enjoy the chaos.
Saturday, November 27, 2010
this winter is dragging me down
Monday, November 22, 2010
Thursday, November 11, 2010
存在。
Saturday, October 30, 2010
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
a precarious situation of love and everything else
Sunday, October 24, 2010
Friday, October 22, 2010
機會和放棄的總和。
Saturday, October 16, 2010
who defines insanity?
Thursday, October 14, 2010
衝刺。
a blog post me and JOMO wrote in response to the recent anti-queer violence and gay marriage debate
The gay marriage debate has take over all the attention from the queer movement left and right. The right wing is consistently and stubbornly denying the existence of queer folks by saying that it’s an immoral choice of lifestyle. The liberal gay and lesbian organizations are continually pulling millions and millions of dollars to appeal to the state for marriage equality under the rhetoric of “we are all the same.” On the other hand, queer separatists are fiercely combating the liberals with the slogan: “we are totally and absolutely different from the heteros,” and have made good points on criticizing the oppressive patriarchal nature of the institution of marriage and how queers should not seek this type of inclusion (see: against equality). However, these critiques have not necessarily been able to generate an alternative grassroots movement which can seriously take on the demands of those queers who are marginalized--queer people of color, trans folks, working-class queers, queers with disabilities, and third world and immigrant queers--from all of the above approaches.
There has been a series of intolerable queer violence that occurred very recently in the country--torture, youth suicide, school bullying--while the violence is nothing new to queer folks, it is urgently calling for the communities’ response to these issues. Though the liberals are posting heartwarming videos and articles and holding vigils saying that “it gets better” (Dan Savage’s video), we know that the fight cannot end here. As oppressed folks we know that queer oppression does not end when we graduate from high school bullying and move to San Francisco and suddenly become successful professionals who hang out in fancy bars and overcome all of our internal and external conflicts. (QPOC’s responses to queer youth suicides: “It doesn’t get better. You get stronger” and “For colored boys that speak softly”) The liberals see gay marriage as the end of the queer struggle, and have this fantasy that if gay marriage was legal national-wide, then soon it would “trickle down” to the marginalized communities and thus end all queer oppression.
We know for a fact that the gay marriage demand alone is incapable of solving our problems of physical, psychological, and economic violence, but instead normalizes a different though limited type of family under capitalism. Criticizing the approach of marriage equality alone has not helped much with movement building either. The debate overall has clearly not been very productive so far, but instead, it has instigated so much anxiety among the queer communities--many politically conscious queers are having panic attacks just over the moral decisions of choosing to support and/or participate in gay marriage if they had the rights to do so. All this overwhelming anxiety around the gay marriage issue is exactly because that there has not been an alternative queer movement that can channel the energy, and this debate has been monopolized in the framework of “individual choice” and “individual freedom.” Under this liberal ideology, many queer folks think that, of course we should have the right as individuals to choose who we love, who we want to have sex, and who we want to have family with! If straight people do why can’t we?! While queer folks are absolutely discriminated against by the heterosexist state which should not be tolerated, seeking freedom under this individualist ideology has not gotten us too far. Instead of carving out a tiny gay space out of the small stream of bourgeois, legislative rights, can we imagine a kind of sexual freedom that is for all people? A kind of freedom where a single mom is able to bring up her child without feeling obligations to marry? A kind of freedom that no one would be restrained in pantyhose at work anymore? A kind of freedom that as a culture we are finally not tabooed to talk about sex, but does not idealize or professionalize it either? A kind of freedom that everyone would play with gender without shame, and a culture that no youth would commit suicide because of school bullying, or because they might just have a different sexual fantasy? A kind of place that no one would be afraid to walk the streets at night, where none of our body parts-- our brains or our genitals --are pathologized. A kind of freedom that is multifaceted, and does not merely carve out a different shape of box to fit in a particular sexuality, but opens up the possibility to more creative desires for everyday folks.
The mainstream gay movement today has hijacked the revolutionary sexual liberation movement in the 70s and turned it into a short-sighted individual rights agenda. They assume that every queer person has the same class position and desires the same kind of American Dream. Their answer to the queer working-class concern is that marriage can help poor folks get access to spousal benefits such as health insurance--which is fundamentally contradictory. For instance, many of our partners do not have health insurance in the first place because we do not have stable jobs or jobs that offer it in the first place. That said, the issue of gay marriage should not merely be decided by who participates in it. Rather, we should ask--who are the people controlling the movement? Whose voices are not heard? And, what is our alternative? While having equal rights can perhaps open up more space for our struggle, we cannot let the liberals such as the Human Rights Campaign and Democrats define our movement. We also cannot let the queer separatists defeat us and push us out of the struggle.
What we need is to build an issue-focused working-class movement that centers queer analysis. Our demands should cut across sexuality and gender lines, while fore-fronting and popularizing queer needs. We should demand universal health care that includes access to hormones, gender reassignment surgeries, and an anti-heterosexist health system that does not attempt to pathologize our queer bodies and erase the traumas we face in a violent homophobic society. We should demand asylum for all immigrants and not solely rely on the liberal, imperialist reform agenda such as the DREAM Act that attempts to draft the youth from our communities into the oppressive military system. These need to be our demands because we know that our fate as workers are bound up with the exploitation of the undocumented workers and the exploitation of youth of color. Today, anti-queer violence erodes our sense of community and leaves us feeling raw, vulnerable, and fearful for ours and our friends’ safety. This is a crucial time for queers and allies who distrust the state and the police to come together and mobilize from the grassroots to defend ourselves from homophobic violence. We should take the lesson from the initial domestic violence movement which set up grassroots phone trees, patrols, and shelters to challenge patriarchal violence in the households and in the streets.
Today, we need to resurrect this sense of grassroots unity that links our struggles together and not to rely on the compromised liberals and non-profits, or the homophobic, racist state institutions that divide and assault our communities.
When the gay liberal assimilationists say to middle-class straight folks, “we are just like you,” and the queer separatists on the other say “hell no we are nothing like you” and form their own blocs, we should be the force that says to every day folks who struggle that “we are just like you, and you are actually just like us”--because queer folks have always been part of the working-class and we are not fundementally different from one another. Our oppression as queers is not a fixed pathology. It is a product of the heteronormative, homophobic society, and it does not have to stay that way forever. In fact, the essence of queer liberation lies within the ability for everyone to celebrate and experiment their sexuality, gender, and desire. It is not enough to only carve out another limited category of acceptable sexuality for a certain group of people. This kind of change is not liberation--it is a very limited imagination of freedom. We need to start off with this fundamental vision of uniting the working-class and queer struggles and ensure that not any part of ourselves will be forced to compromise in the movement.
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
existential crisis or something close
Sunday, August 29, 2010
the edge
Monday, August 9, 2010
my new home that doesn't feel like home yet
Thursday, July 29, 2010
倦怠。
Sunday, July 25, 2010
the city of heat.
Monday, July 12, 2010
stolen vacation on the oregon coast.
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
旅途中必要的顛簸。
公寓就快清空了。這我小憩了三個月的地方,其實已經很像家。L和我從未爭吵過,除了有時候我洗碗洗不乾淨,燕麥片黏在陶瓷碗上,或者關於我無法喝完一整杯咖啡/茶/水的壞習慣。也許這跟我的兒童心裡是有關係的?我聽著某首中文流行樂的時候還是會傷感,這幾年來長大的其實是關於面對現實的能力,心裡頭那點想要對一個人非、常、浪、漫的慾望還是沒有減弱太多。而對於延續伴侶溫柔生活的能力,我還在練習著(並且不斷犯著必要的小錯)。剩下一個星期在西雅圖,然後奧瑞剛海灘,接著一路開四天的車到南加州。而後飛行。
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
this is how summer should be like.
Monday, June 21, 2010
the american side of us.
Sunday, June 20, 2010
失眠拆解。
Thursday, June 17, 2010
i've been there many times.
Sunday, June 13, 2010
我在末班南下的高鐵上不斷地想她
另一件勞工死亡的大問題:美商RCA在台灣造成的女工職業傷害
Friday, June 11, 2010
官商勾結,勞工更必須團結。
當中國政府為上海世博慷慨重金砸下最多可至五八億美金,在富士康的中國工人卻一個一個跳出他們血汗工廠的高樓。富士康在中國僱用有六十萬員工,並且身價去年營收高達一兆四千兩百多億,郭台銘還是全台首富,他的員工卻一個月只賺人民幣三百多元,工作時數長達十五個小時一天。這不是現代的血汗工廠,難道是中國政府世博強打的「Better City, Better Life」?!今年已有十二名青年工人跳樓自殺,這不僅僅是薪資的問題,也不僅是管理的問題,更不僅是深圳政府或郭台銘說的:「個人心理和感情問題。」這是資本主義下長久以來的勞資問題和勞動的異外(alienation)。全中六十萬名員工,有幾個可以付得起他們日業加工拼命製造出的iPod!?在軍事化的工廠管理下,他們也無法對於整個產品製造過程有任何控制,或甚至創新。勞動的異化來自於工人賣出的勞力變得沒有意義,甚至成唯一種敵對的關係。
即使富士康跳樓的事件是如此地不堪並且令人憤恨,中國血汗工廠的勞工環境並不靜默勞工階級而反之有組織他們的潛力。在自殺事件之後,富士康的工人得到兩倍多的加薪,而許多在中國南部的工人也開始發動勞工運動。五月十七日,將近兩千名Honda汽車的工人罷工了兩個禮拜之久,要求加薪。即使這一點點的薪水根本不足以償還這些工人在新自由主義中國城市下的勞力和生活開銷,富士康事件和Honda罷工都表現了中國工人的氣勢和全國組織後的勞工力量。同一時間,台灣的十多個勞工團體和香港的學生勞工團體也與中國勞工階級團結,抗議富士康的血汗工廠。富士康事件跨越族群及政治的邊界。喚醒了兩岸三地長久以來的階級問題。
血汗工廠並不只是一個獨特的中國問題,而已蔓延至東南亞及其他發展中的國家。西方的大老闆像是蘋果電腦或者HP會繼續地和中國官僚以及台灣老闆合作,確立他們的利潤不下降並且一再地防止工人的組織,即使這代表謀殺他們的工人或者偷竊他們自己國家的資源。我們聽到在美國和台灣的勞工階級抱怨著工作都被中國人搶走了──但是他們並沒有搶走我們的工作。我們的工作是被那些美國的大老闆,那群和中國官僚牽著新自由主義合約的台灣政府給毀滅了。像是國民黨不斷推動不顧勞工階級反對並且沒有人真正懂得是什麼的ECFA──其實說穿了就是自由貿易協定(Free Trade Agreement)但是少了全部相等的保障,允許大筆資金自由穿梭台灣海峽,並且將減少台灣製造業工作機會以及基本薪資。當台灣和中國官僚說他們支持「兩岸和平」或者「兩岸經濟發展」,他們並不代表他們是真的主張和平、或者反戰、或者製造更多就業機會給勞工階級。他們的意思是,忘掉我們的自主權吧,忘掉台灣中國東南亞的工人奮鬥,統治階級會和企業家團結並且以一塊地剝削我們來繼續鞏固他們的地位。我們的國家都已經被帝國主義者還有資產階級給出賣了太久,而現在什麼都沒有改變,只不過他們學會更多的方式還欺騙我們的勞力,告訴我們:「更好的日子即將來臨!」就像那個極度奢華浪費傷害環境也毀壞居民家園的上海世博。是時候我們該比我們的老闆們更有組織,並且在族群及國家邊界之外,召集國際的勞工團結。
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
成長然後失去的。
Monday, May 31, 2010
戰友
維持這樣的模式
一年一度從我西方的戰場
偷渡回來見妳 帶著零星的行李
一盒火柴 一枝筆
美利堅城市砲火暫息
是因戰事綿綿燎原至太平洋島嶼
妳說妳已在地底埋伏了數年
戰後的美好日子不過是資本政府的謊言
我們在雜亂的草地上排石拆字
談論馬克思列寧主義
以及種種武器的設計感
並交換勞力剝削的憤恨 親情的負擔
禮貌地陳述近來的愛情
妳的熟悉彷彿觸手可及
卻 閉口不提過去
深怕踩踏長年未拆的地雷
(就算那規模的傷害已不再要緊)
多年前因為時代的困難
妳離開了無憂的青春 我離開了家園
在不友善的世界中被迫成長 心壁磨出厚繭
而後妳必要性地離開了我
(留下幾張未洗的相片 和粗糙的詩)
在北方寒冷夜晚孤守一人的沙場
我無法不想起妳
那些流著汗相愛的夏日 即使短暫
妳當年送我的燈
一直都在我的胸腔中暖著
如今妳找到東海岸的寧靜愛情
我也有了不同國籍的長途伴侶
(彷彿是秘密中地約好要這麼錯開彼此)
維持這般戒嚴時期的緊張距離
我卻仍是想兌換我的所有行李
給妳出入我國境的無限期簽證
就算只是肩靠肩地喝一杯咖啡
看場結局模糊的東歐電影
陽台上 捲一支American Spirit的香菸
我真的願意 在這動盪年代
沉默收藏妳美麗的手臂線條
無拘束的髮 那永遠好奇的雙眼
和妳忐忑卻慷慨的曾經的愛情
做妳遠方的戰友
生命薄弱如紙
這空洞繁華的城市
一根菸蒂毀滅的光景
我只願我們都還能夢見 此刻
Thursday, May 27, 2010
i feel perfectly normal in this in-between space
On the train from the airport to taichung i repeatedly listened to the xx's album. A british band with simple emo sex music and it fit with my sleep deprived exhausted arrival perfectly. I've watched too many war movies in a roll during the 16 hours on the plane--the ones completely lacked of any gender or class analysis--maybe that's where i got my bad headaches from...The air is really humid and muddy here. I swallowed some aspirins from my mom. We had taiwanese-german breakfast, milk tea, and talked about PhD programs, the economic crisis, and the smart evil people on wall street. My mom is probably some kind of social democratic and she is worried about me being a communist. But i do wanna talk to her about socialism someday. Instead, we talked about the world expo in shanghai and how flashy the chinese goverment is. She got some special promotion stuff from the airline so we are going to hong kong for three days next week. I hope i will run into wang faye or something. It just feels right to be so close to these places, not seeing them in some random white dude's academic presentation in the US.
I briefly talked about the new york moving plan, and about L. When we got home, she actually said to me, "if you wanna call someone in the US, it's half-priced to call it from the land line." I'm so stoked that she remembers L's name.
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
airport complex
An EVA flight attendant got a phone call and ran to the corner to cry. She sounded confused about what has just happened. I can't really articulate how i feel at this moment either. I only know that it's too big of a emotional change to start reading this new paulo coelho novel i bought about power and fame. I'm not ready to turn off my phone yet even though i already said goodbye to L and she's probably peacefully in bed. I watch the dark night and the flight attendant, trying to locate a precise emotion. I find the bright neon light of the gate number rather comforting.
I started to write a poem for L this early afternoon but got stuck because i was too caught up in my own fear and anxiety of being apart from her. Because how openly we communicate with each other i think i forgot how to describe my feelings beyond using the simplest words. When i say i miss you at this moement, I mean I want to wrap you in my arms and kiss you goodnight, i want you to take care of yourself and think of me when you are in the house, full of our smell and sound. I want you to remember we have a big plan together and i will do anything i can to make that happen. And that this time i won't mess up.
Monday, May 24, 2010
the openness in separation.
I'm sad to be apart from L during this stressful time before moving to new york. But i know i have to go home because i might not get to for a while. You think it'd be easier now it's probably the 8th year and 20th time i had to do this. But it never really gets easier. Having separate homes across the oceans. Every time i travel i feel like i lost my language somehow--the words i used to speak to describe my feelings about home. Now i only have a few left--"sentimental," "warm," and "distant." What I want to do at home is to read literature, walk in shorts, drink lots of tea, talk to mom and sis, and hopefully to find peace in all the separation and relocation thats necessary for our growth, instead of feeling stuck or scared.
I remember how i could find the greatest happiness in something dramatically simple like writing a genuine poem for someone, or drinking a beer in chaotic streets at night just watching people walk by. I think when we learn how the world operates and how it brings so much oppression and pain to every day people, we forget about all these simple things, because everything is about a historical, systematic plan to destroy and harm. Especailly in the US i can't help but thinking about most things in a professional, dramatic term, just because that's what i only know and how i relate to this land. But i want to learn to think about the place we live in a humane way sometimes. Like i have this 35% chance of sunshine and i really want to walk to the bookstore, get some natural vitamin D, and read this probably politically incorrect lesbian novel.
Monday, May 17, 2010
WE WILL NOT FORGET PALESTINE
by周世瑀
五月十五日是巴勒斯坦人的浩劫(Nakba)日,也是巴勒斯坦人哀悼以色列宣告獨立翌日,旋即以軍事行動種族淨化巴勒斯坦。
以色列政府自一九四八年迄今一再謊稱巴勒斯坦人拒絕聯合國於一九四七年十一月分割巴勒斯坦領土的建議,係因巴勒斯坦人無意追求和平。以色列於一九四 八年五月十四日甫宣告獨立,旋即遭「心有不忿」的阿拉伯聯軍圍攻。阿拉伯聯軍廣播要求巴勒斯坦人「撤離」巴勒斯坦領土,待阿拉伯聯軍「消滅」以色列後,巴 勒斯坦人即可返回。由於聯軍來勢洶洶,以色列只得死地求生。第一次以阿戰爭期間,阿拉伯人係「自願離開」巴勒斯坦。此為阿拉伯國家發動「侵略」戰爭自食惡 果。阿拉伯人所謂的以色列種族淨化巴勒斯坦、巴勒斯坦難民問題、七十五萬巴勒斯坦人在一九四八年遭以色列軍隊驅逐的浩劫,皆為阿拉伯人捏造。儘管以色列的 建國神話荒誕不經,至今仍有人深信不疑。(read more)
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
my almost last party in seattle
I spent most of April trying to pull off a queer people of color dance party as a fundraiser for the may 3rd strike--it was extremely stressful but too fun to resist! We got the space at Hidmo, awesome qpoc spoken word poets and musicians. Everything just seemed to come together on that night, the poetry, the movie, the music, the people, the space, and the political messages we were sending out. It's weird because you would think that making qpoc the targeted audience you would be limiting who you were attracting. On the contrary, we had almost 200 people showed up that night--and lots of folks can't wait for another event like this. As a qpoc i feel everything we are fighting for--labor, immigrant rights, queer lib--just came together on that night, when i saw a room full of queer folks and folks of color responding so well to the May 3rd strike and March 4th action against privatization of university and its workplace. Some queer folks may see labor as something not concerned them or not related to their life struggle, but i would say labor is as much about workplace as bedroom. I know locally some queer activists are fighting for a grant that can build a cafe shop that would continually hire queer youth. While I understand the work is important, I also feel like we've fought for queer only space for a while, and it's about time for us queers to join the struggle at workplace, fighting for more accessible education, and just workplace for all. This notion of queer vs. class could be really harmful for the working-class and queer communities and would just continually privatize queer issue as something thats only about our sexuality.
On the next day I saw a lot of qpoc from last night at the May Day immigrant rights march. That was the time i felt this is really my community. I felt very honored to work alongside with everyone for queer lib even though we have to fight through so many barriers to come together and to finally get to know one another.
Thursday, April 8, 2010
this is what i mean when i say queer.
when i say queer i mean having sexual fantasies about girls
at the age of 13 and thought i was a human monster, a hermaphrodite, a psycho freak.
when i say queer i mean not even knew that sex was possible,
until i discovered lesbian chat room and was talked dirty
and unpleasantly seduced by an older woman.
when i say queer i mean feeling rejected and being emotionally
shut down in my family for at least 10 years.
when i say queer i mean i did a lot of fucked up things to people i love because i simply did not know how to love myself.
when i say queer i mean my lover committed suicide when i was 17
and i thought about death every day and night for the 3 years after that.
when i say queer i mean i'm not the white power gays who only worry about their cocktail parties, their newly remodeled house, their muscle mass, or their summer exotic southeast asian trips.
when i say queer i mean i struggle to even be recognized as a person with something important to say, because of my skin color, my accent, my gender, my learned defensiveness with most white straight men and my failure
to relate to them or treat their ignorance patiently.
when i say queer i mean strange men yell dyke at me and give dirty looks and threesome jokes when i walk with my lover in the street .
when i say queer i mean i loathed my body because it was too feminine, too masculine, too weak, too small, too awkward, and too foreign.
when i say queer i mean it took me a borderline eating disorder to love my own body.
when i say queer i mean i cried the first time i had sex with a woman because it changed everything i thought about the world.
when i say queer i mean people i love are traumatized by patriarchal violence physically, emotionally, and constantly.
when i say queer i mean i am fed up with being the token lesbian and the token asian and the token immigrant in every space.
when i say queer i mean i am so sick and tired of being polite and politically correct.
when i say queer i mean i am not gonna explain myself anymore.
when i say queer i mean seeing my queer friends find themselves, lose themselves, doubt themselves, risk themselves, and hurt themselves because of shame.
when i say queer i mean fear of not being able to recreate
the sense of community and family we once had.
when i say queer i mean i feel resentful when my straight friends
off to get married one by one. i feel betrayed.
and then i feel powerlessness.
when i say queer it is agony.
it is silence.
it is grief.
but it is also desire.
it is passion.
it is love.
when i say queer it is not about my biology my brain cells my ring finger or aboout social construction or fucked up family dynamics or capitalism or the oppressive human nature.
it is about my life.
when i say i am queer it's not about trendiness or progressiveness or the right consciousness.
it is still about my life.
when i say queer i mean i don't worry about alienating straight folks and being too confrontational, too aggressive, or too shamless.
when i say queer i mean i don't care if the corporates don't get to sell a piece of our oppression.
when i say queer i mean the gay power movement was co-opted by white middle class assimilationists and it's time for us trans folks and queer folks of color to take back the movement.
when i say queer i mean i want to fight alongside other oppressed folks
not because we are all the same but because we have the rights
to live as different as we fucking wish.
when i say queer i need to say it repetitively because our youth are homeless or home beaten up or dissecting themselves with razor blade.
when i say queer i need to say it repetitively because we are divided by borders, by prisons, by hospitals, by marriage.
when i say queer i need to say it repetitively because our trans brothers and sisters are still getting murdered in the street.
when i say queer i need to say it repetitively so it sounds as heavy and urgent as it is.
when i say queer i need to say it loudly and unapologetically
because it is agony.
it is silence.
it is grief.
it is desire.
it is passion.
it is love.
Friday, April 2, 2010
資本生活中的矛盾是被經常過度簡略的挑戰。
Monday, March 29, 2010
My post on Gathering Forces on transliberation.
Street Trans Action Revolutionaries (STAR) was founded as a caucus within Gay Liberation Front (GLF) in 1971 to put forth trans demands in the gay liberation movement. The co-founder of STAR, Sylvia Rivera, was a Puerto Rican trans woman who led the Stonewall Riots in New York City in 1969 along with other trans of color. Yet gradually, the gay liberation movement was co-opted by white middle-class folks who are gender-conforming and became conservative. Gay Activists Alliance (GAA), a New York based gay rights group was founded by ex-members of GLF who did not appreciate its radicalism and wanted to form a single-issued organization that only focused on reformist gay rights. GAA’s conservatism and transphobia showed when they dropped the trans demands while advocating citywide anti-discrimination rights in the 70s. They saw actions put on by STAR and Sylvia Rivera as too “dangerous,” “crazy,” and “extreme.”
Trans folks were not only attacked by mainstream gay rights groups but also in their own neighborhoods. In the West Village, a gentrified gay neighborhood, trans sex workers, who were mostly homeless and of color, were kicked out of the streets by white gay homeowners because they were “low-class, vulgar transvestites” not the usual entertaining drag queens. A real-estate-driven Quality of Life campaign led by the city continually pushed for the closure of clubs where trans folks hung out. Fighting for trans rights is thus a class issue. Rivera, who was homeless herself, saw the link and pushed STAR to organize a community space for homeless trans folks as well as fight for labor justice. They found a building for street gay kids, fed them and clothed them, while the government was cutting the healthcare, taking away food stamps, and putting more people with AIDS, youth, and women on the street. In Leslie Feinberg Interviews Sylvia Rivera, Rivera reiterates the importance of not only doing community work but also fighting against the government and the ruling class. STAR joined the mass demonstration with the Young Lords, a revolutionary Puerto Rican youth group, against police repression in 1970. STAR also built alliances with the Housing Works Transgender Working Group and the New York Direct Action Nextwork Labor Group to form picket lines at a club where a trans dancer was dismissed from work. Fighting for trans rights is a class issue–to resist the rich property owners who push trans folks out of their neighborhoods, to confront the managers that try to fire trans workers, and to fight back against the state that cuts back healthcare...
Friday, March 26, 2010
breaking rules to survive
There is something really problematic with the way psychology categories its subjects. If we wanna study race, we go find 100 African American samples and sometimes Latino. If we wanna study women, we recruit 200 college-educated white women and give them Starbucks gift cards after the interviews, and we would be glad if we had 5 lesbians or 20 women of color and maybe 3 immigrant women to make the sample somehow representative. If we wanna study class, we go to the low-income communities, and we find all sorts of folks--blacks, immigrants, queers, youth--so are we studying class or race or sexuality or immigration or what? Most of us get panic. This kind of categorical understanding of social identity is very limited. We simply can't understand class if we just go out to survey poor people, she says.
The hardest part is that in this discipline, researchers who use the classical methods (often white men with good intention studying "minorities") are the gatekeepers and they are the standers of who psychologists are--which means who gets the funding, who gets to publish, and who gets the job. The way to understand social injustice can't be monopolized by a singular method--and this would probably be one of the biggest challenges for me at least in the next 5 years. How can i navigate the classical but also the critical method? How can i estabalish myself as a psychologist thinker but also a serious organizer and revolutinary? At least it seems like my future advisor can very much be some sort of an anti-zionist socialist femnist--that would certainly make my grad school life a lot easier.
(psychology's feminist oral history project)
Friday, March 19, 2010
anxious spring
- Difficulty concentrating
- Difficulty controlling worry
- Excess anxiety and worry that is out of proportion to the situation most of the time
- Excessive sweating, palpitations, shortness of breath, and stomach/intestinal symptoms
- Fatigue
- Irritability
- Muscle tension -- shakiness, headaches
- Restlessness or feeling keyed up or "on the edge"
- Sleep disturbance (difficulty falling or staying asleep; or restless, unsatisfying sleep)
See--i definitely have 5 out of 9! Anyways, there's probably no hope for curing unless i develop some sort of long term strategy to deal with those times i feel like i just get stuck with anxiety. Maybe this vanilla cereal fiber power yogurt is a good start for lifestyle changing. I believe there's definitely something about hiding my life from my family over the past 10 years that has made this anxiety become an essential part of my cognition. Now i've resolved some major conflicts with my mom i just need to eradicate the old anxious cells in my body. I think spring is a good time for that.
Monday, March 8, 2010
我和比我想像中還多的雜物生活了好久。
Friday, March 5, 2010
MARCH 4TH HELLA STRIKE!!!
Some students were dissing my "Queer Struggle is Class Struggle" sign. But brothers this is the worst timing for you to hate on queers because WE ARE FIGHTING FOR THE SAME THING. Get used to it, don't fuck with us!
Video News on Kiro
What our comrades in California and NYC did:
Monday, March 1, 2010
Post-racial soceity? That is white liberals' myth
A climate of campus racism
UCSD & UCLA sit in/occupation
Open Letter to White Student Movement
It turns out that the white supremacists hang out in UC San Diego. Maybe it's because I have been in Seattle for too long, this passive-aggressive city where racism is more subtle, it's hard for me to imagine some people can do such outrageously racist acts near a university campus. But this incident also shows how oppressed people united quickly to respond to the violence. The Black Students Union occupied an administrative building soon after the incident and put out demands for racial justice on campus. Anti-budget cuts activists from UCLA, UC Irvine, and UC Berkeley soon responded by organizing solidarity actions on their campus. March 4th the National Day of Action to Defend Education is coming up. It seems like the movement has a potential to move away from the white liberal occupationist/dance party tendency to a mass movement for racial, gender, and economic justice. As people of color involving in the work that has been dominated by showy white men, we need to keep our demands and presence front and center. The struggle cannot be a mass movement if we don't engage or outreach to women, people of color, queer folks, and folks with disabilities. History has erased us thousands of times and we cannot tolerate to let it happen again.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
moving from the caffeinated city to the city that never sleeps
The social psychology program at CUNY trains its students to be familiar with the classic psychological theories but also the critical. They are pretty innovative about their research methods and encourage students to take initiatives in a variety of projects across disciplines, instead of just cloning your advisor's work for five years and become paper publishing machines. It's good to know that many students remain engaged in the community work instead of entirely detached from it and just crunching numbers throughout the academic life. I think that compared to other social psych programs, CUNY can help me think of research in a different way, to use its resources as my own advantages to access the communities i wanna work with.
Besides the whole school business, i'm just excited to be living in NYC for the next five years of my life. I feel like it's a good time to push myself out of the comfort zone and experience something different. I'm excited to be around the queers and immigrants in the city, and not driving for once. I think new york is such a big place with hundreds of different neighborhoods, it really depends on what you wanna make of it. I'm ready for wherever it's taking me.
Thursday, February 18, 2010
你為何不乾脆做我的女朋友呢,台灣?
留有一些情趣。我們說同樣的語言
卻有不同地域性的腔調
我也遇見過和你相似的女孩,在北美
但是她們都令人失望地中產階級
喝星巴克拿鐵、去時尚沙發酒吧
大概還有Club Monaco的貴賓卡
星期天晚上韓式美容Spa
沒有人理解
我為什麼不能忘卻你,台灣
分開已經這麼多年
你的影像已漸漸變得模糊
但是你的味道,那濕熱,和
那微妙的酸,我無法忘懷
我想要像國中生般牽著你的手
在夜市裡散步
不計較卡路里地吃甜點
我想要和你到屋頂上
看月亮形狀的變化並且談
二二八,那場向國民黨專政
的反殖民暴動。都還不到一個世紀
大多數的人卻已經忘記白色恐怖
像那只是一部紅極一時的好萊屋
恐怖電影
你曾經跟我說過你的前任,那些
多毛的歐洲渾蛋,對待你
像是他們貴族航海旅遊的臨時賓館
還有那個父權的日本鬼子
完全的控制癖,試圖抹除你的身分認同
並且恐嚇殺死你,若是你出軌
你發誓你再也不要和那些外國人交往了
畢竟被物化和被剝削並不是一件好玩的事
你只想要認識一個家教良好的華人男孩
但你從來沒有想到,當民國三十八年
國民黨進入你的生命,你的惡夢才正開始
他比之前的日本人還糟
即使他不斷宣稱你們留著
相同的血液。他殺了你的阿公阿罵
辦了幾場腐敗的選舉還說
這對你是好的。噢台灣,
這是一件經典的家暴案例
而當你向外界求救,那些西方的涉入者
只對你的錢和你的身體有興趣
你開始覺得他們就像你的前任
那些多毛的白人資本主義混蛋
噢台灣,你為什麼不乾脆做我的女朋友
你比自己想像中還來得酷兒太多了。你是如此
充滿生命。我想要打破你歷史創傷
建築的那些牆。
我想要和你一起去伴侶
心理治療。想要帶你去女同志酒吧
喝廉價啤酒
嗑瓜子,談馬克思主義
和那些被銷毀的激進歷史
我想要帶你去所有的派對
向我的朋友炫耀你
我想要和你一起回家。
重建。追憶。和革命。
why don't you be my girlfriend, taiwan?
to be erotic. we speak the same language with distinctly
geographical accents.
i've met girls that remind me of you, here
in North America, but they are so disappointedly
bourgeois. drinking Starbucks,
frequenting fancy bars,
have membership at Club
Monaco, Sunday evening
Korean spa.
no one understands
why i can't get over you, taiwan.
after all these years being apart
your image has become a bit fuzzy
but your smell, the heat, and the subtle
sourness, i can't forget.
i wanna hold your hands like middle schoolers
take a walk in the night market
eat sweets without calculating
calories. i wanna get on the rooftop
watch the moon change its shape and talk about
228. the anti-colonial uprising
against the KMT. it hasn't even been a century
but people already forgot about the White Terror
like it was just another Blockbuster horror movie
you used to tell me about your exes, those
hairy European assholes, treated you like a motel
of their royal voyage. and the patriarchal Japanese,
the control freak, who tried to erase your identity
and threatened to kill you if you cheat.
you swore you were done with the foreigners then
it's not fun to be objectified and exploited, after all,
you just wanted to date a good Chinese boy
but you never expected that when the KMT
arrived in your life, your worst nightmare began
he was eviler than the Japanese
even though he claimed to have the same blood
as you do. he killed your grandpa grandma
held a few corrupted elections and told you
how it was supposed to be good for you.
oh taiwan, it's a classic domestic violence case
but when you ask for help, the Western interventionists
were only interested in your money and your body
you start to think that they are just like your exes
those hairy white capitalist assholes
they are all the same
oh taiwan, why don't you be my girlfriend
you are so much queerer than you think you are
so full of life. i wanna break those walls
you built around yourself from past traumas
i wanna go to couple's therapy with you
take you to a lesbian bar, drink cheap beers
nibble on watermelon seeds
talk about Marxism, and all the radical history
that has been erased. i wanna take you out to every party
and show you off to all my friends
i wanna go home with you.
rebuild. recollect. and revolt.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Where was/is the Taiwanese Left?
我最近在讀兩本書,Tony Cliff的《Lenin》和陳芳明的《殖民地台灣:左翼政治運動史論》革命性地改變我對左翼運動的看法。在充滿著反共意識的台灣長大,我對於台灣的左翼沒有一點概念。究竟是台灣的左翼不存在,還是這些歷史都被扭曲殲滅了呢?陳芳明的這本書回答了我一部分的疑問。一九二八年台灣共產黨,在第三國際的指導下成立。初期的主要領導,謝雪紅和林木順等人,都曾去莫斯科留學,修習馬克思列寧主義的革命理念和方法,並在台共的黨綱中強調,在日本殖民之下,反帝國台灣民族獨立運動對於全球階級革命的重要性。他們認為,若是殖民地能夠發動獨立革命運動,就能夠有效推翻帝國主義的基礎並動搖殖民母國的經濟體制。這種殖民地革命具有民族革命以及階級革命雙重效力的想法根源,即是列寧的主張。雖然台共才生存了短短三年,在中共的干涉,和新美帝國主義的破壞下瓦解,台共留下許多今日的左翼行動主義者可以學習的策略,比如聯合陣線、刊物發行、反殖民及民族運動在階級運動中不可妥協的必要性。在西雅圖做巴勒斯坦反殖民和勞工運動後,讀起這些厚重的歷史我漸漸有了較深的理解。台灣的左翼運動在日本殖民者、中共官方、和國民黨的邊緣化之下,被歷史描寫地微不足道。而現今的政府仍以經濟為藉口,向中共靠攏,中國意識和台灣意識混亂不清。就如陳芳明所說的,這些都代表著台灣尚未進入後殖民的社會,能夠去釐清殖民者錯誤歷史解釋。而現今的左翼人士該學習的,就是那些被抹去的運動歷史,並隨時保持著批判的和不斷改進的精神,反抗統治者的專權以及民族和階級的壓迫。
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
bottom up mind shift
1. My relationship with my family, especially my mom, has drastically changed. I still can't comprehend what CONCRETELY that looks like. But i already feel the warmth and openness from both her and myself. I feel like I am finally not running away from them anymore.
2. I believe that revolution is necessary in order to change the lives of the oppressed. What I mean by revolution is a class struggle from below. Yes, social service is important, but it cannot change the structural violence that causes many of us to end up there for support in the first place. Yes, workshops are good. But you can only raise awareness and educate people to a certain extent. Folks don't learn through being what to do or what not to do by others. Folks learn through fighting for our own living.
3. I have an awesome partner who supports all of these things I believe in not only emotionally but physically. This has freed me from the myth that i need to have a middle class lifestyle in order to live happily in my life. I cannot verbalize what a radical change it really is in my mind. But it really is. Love after all is really almost spiritual in a way. It's not about what kind of house we will be living in or what kind party we will throw. I feel secure, content, and excited about what we have and what's gonna come in the near future.
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
the dark age of trip-pop
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
FUCK I AM TOTALLY OUT TO MY FAMILY
10 years of fear and agony are suddenly resolved in a 10 minute conversation. I think we were all dying to talk about this. The hardest part was to overcome my own guilt and defensiveness. I meant to communicate with them but I was just too afraid. Too afraid that I have built up my defense walls for so long that they could not open me up anymore. But I decided that it was the time for me to change my relationship with my mom. I know if I didn't do it then I probably would not do it for another 10 years. She said, you are an adult now, and whatever you choose to do, it's your own responsibility. That's exactly what I wanted to hear from her.
One more layer of homophobia is torn apart, in my personal life at least. Just wait to see how much energy I have now to fight against the rest.
Monday, February 1, 2010
is it guilt or is it really homophobia?
Sometimes I really feel like I have nothing to say to my family. Because everything I say would just be attacked, rejected, or I would reveal too much about myself. And the thought of it is really, really frightening. "What have I done wrong? I never beat you or punish you," my mom says, "you never wanted to tell us about it since you were 13." I didn't say anything back. I don't know why I have always scared of my parents. They are always so serious. I don't remember ever having fun with them. The society's homophobia, of course, also made me feel like I'd be the worst daughter if I told them I was gay, especially when I was that young. "You never gave us chance. We always found out when bad things happened," she says. It is true. They have known about it for a long time. But there was no acceptance. There were doubts, verbal attacks, and financial control. But I don't want to talk to my mom about this again. It's simply too fucking hurtful. I can't believe that she doesn't remember it anymore, her and dad, asking me to choose whether if I want to be their daughter and be supported throughout college or I keep being homosexual and be disowned. Maybe I never forgive them about what they said then. Maybe they wouldn't even acknowledge that they threatened me that way, or they forced me to break up with my girlfriend, one after another.
And now, she's pushing me to open up again. But I feel so uncertain if I should tell her anything anymore. Maybe she's trying to save our relationship because she knows that I can and will be very, very far away. When I look at her serious face, I only have an unquantifiable amount of fear, and guilt.
Monday, January 25, 2010
媽媽打電話來擔心我加入恐佈組織。
Friday, January 22, 2010
WE TOOK OVER THE STREET!
We pulled off three rallies on the same day over only one week. Around 80 students and workers came out to protest against the budget cuts. The cops were quieter and maybe too embarrassed to interfere our action so much this time. It's great to see that the workers' demands are front and centered with other students' demands. The next goal is to reach out to more people on campus and stress the urgency of fighting against the privatization of UW.
My arm is hella sore from holding the bullhorn and i totally lost my voice. But it was worth it.
See the Daily's article on the protest.
Watch the action led by International Workers and Students for Justice against abusive manager.
Monday, January 18, 2010
my Chinese, superstitious, Buddhist, or the psychologically repressed hesitation of joy.
I got this amulet thing specifically for school when I was in the Old Streets in Tainan last month. An old man who smelled like temple incense handmade it which made it seem very legitimate. I don't even understand the difference between all those tiny stones in the bag. But somehow having them in my bag makes me feel safe and protected. If it's the Higher Power's will to make me be as queer as I can even in academia for at least the next 5 years of my life, then I guess I should not resist.
Just let me go to NYC already, please!
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Protest abuse against UW custodians!
On Tuesday, January 13th, 30-40 students and workers came out to support custodians facing abuse by management and the cops! Protests targeted the abuse of Andre Vasuqez. Basically, he is a racist jerk manager who collaborates with cops to screw over the immigrant custodians. He is WANTED by the UW community for the unjust abuse!
Check out the VIDEO of action here put on by Democracy Insurgent.
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
a potential ally sister, maybe that's the point of the dream.
In the morning while I turned on the radio and made tea, I realized how much guilt and anxiety I still have about my queerness when I think of my family. I'm glad that on top of all the stresses of being a teenage girl my sister understands and accepts me. I really don't know where I was going about writing down this dream. But it seems to sum up my unanalyzable feelings so far.
Friday, January 8, 2010
unemployed and gay
This is it. Under the Capitalist structure it is hard to feel like a decent human being without a job. The funny thing is, no one around me who has a job loves working anyway. We are all just trying to get by, probably with some hope of upward mobility.
But fuck I can't just go back and live in my parents' guest room now pretend that the world is still a cute and fuzzy place with lots of good street foods. They almost make it sound so easy for me and I hate the misguided feeling of comfort. I hate this nasty rain in Seattle but it always reminds me that life is a struggle. There are things needed to be fought for. I feel calmer living with this state of mind than pretending that the world is made for us. And that there will always be warm meals on the table at 6:30pm when you go home.
But hey can you just freaking call me back, H&M??!! I would even try Banana Republic but i might just be too Asian or too queer for them.
Jane mee's awesome article on queer liberation and class struggle:
Queer Liberation is Class Struggle