#Standing on a hill screeching that Arabs are not a one size fits all at the top of my lungs

[stuckinapril]

No I find that so rude tbh and I get told similar things a lot like I get asked if I’m East Asian a lot (I’m white, i have no clue why people ask this) and last weekend a girl told me she thinks I’m “pretty because (I) look Asian and Asian girls are always pretty”. Like… way to be kind of racist and also backhandedly insulting at the same time??

Idk why people say things like that if you want to call someone pretty just say so

No I agree. Idk if this is the same in all Arab spaces, but amongst Iraqis it’s usually a compliment if someone tells you you don’t look Iraqi (??). I routinely get fawned over by my Iraqi relatives for “looking Lebanese” “looking European Spanish (literally specifically from Spain, basically their way of saying I look exotic lmao)” and never just that I’m pretty bc I’m Iraqi.

I won’t pretend I don’t look racially ambiguous/white passing, bc I absolutely do, but it’s also weird to say that looking that way is not synonymous w looking Iraqi—and that looking Iraqi in the first place is a bad thing. I’m not rly sure how people think Iraqis in general look to begin with tbh, bc for me my family is very diverse. It’s a mix from being fair skinned blondes like my mom to tan skinned w dark hair like my dad to darker skinned still like my aunt’s husband. We are literally so incredibly diverse so I don’t think I “don’t look Iraqi” I think I just don’t look like the stereotyped Arab blueprint a lot of people seem to have lol