#filipinx nurses

[granadaonline]

Keber Ko Diyan: Pride, Diyaspora, at Kakayanang Pilipino.

Ang paglago ng diyaspora ng mga Pilipino sa buong mundo ay isang patunay ng ating lakas at pagiging malikhain. Habang dumarami ang mga Pilipino sa iba't ibang panig ng mundo, hindi maikakaila na ang kanilang paglalakbay ay nagdudulot ng mas malalim na koneksyon sa kanilang lahi, na nagbibigay ng bagong pananaw sa "Filipino pride" sa ibang bansa. Ang pagbuo ng masiglang komunidad sa ibayong dagat ay hindi lamang nagiging sanhi ng pagpapalaganap ng ating kultura kundi pati na rin ng pagprotekta at pagpapayaman sa ating wika.

Isang kapansin-pansing halimbawa ng epekto ng pagkakaroon ng mga Pilipino sa ibang bansa ay ang viral na TikTok video ng batang naiyak dahil sa hindi siya Pilipino. Ang video na ito ay nagpapakita ng malalim na pagnanais ng mga kabataan na maramdaman ang koneksyon sa kanilang sariling kultura kahit na sila ay lumaki sa ibang bansa. Ang reaksyon ng batang ito ay nagbibigay-diin sa kahalagahan ng pagkakaroon ng malalim na ugnayan sa sariling lahi at sa ating wika, kahit sa kabila ng pisikal na distansya mula sa ating bayan.

Ang mga pagdiriwang tulad ng Manitoba Festival sa Canada ay nagiging patunay ng malalim na pagpapahalaga sa kulturang Pilipino sa ibayong dagat. Ang festival na ito ay hindi lamang umaakit sa mga Pilipino kundi pati na rin sa mga dayuhan, na nagiging daan upang mas maraming tao ang makakilala at makappreciate sa ating kultura. Sa pamamagitan ng ganitong mga pagdiriwang, naipapakita natin ang ating tradisyon, sining, at musika sa mundo, na nagiging sanhi ng mas malalim na pagkakaintindihan at pagpapahalaga sa ating lahi. Higit pa rito, ito ay isang magandang paraan upang i-ankla ang ating mga kababayan sa kanilang mga ugat kahit na sila ay malayo sa kanilang tahanan. Ang ganitong mga kaganapan ay nagbibigay pugay at alaala sa ating pinagmulan at nagpapalakas ng ating koneksyon sa ating kultura.

Sa kabilang banda, maraming Pilipino ang lumilipat sa ibang bansa upang makahanap ng mas magandang oportunidad sa buhay. Madalas nating naririnig ang mga kasabihang "Hindi ka aasenso sa Pilipinas" o "Mas malaki ang kita sa ibang bansa," kaya't hindi nakapagtataka na maraming Pilipino ang nagbabalak na mag-impake at maglakbay patungo sa ibang lugar. Kapag nandoon, makikita natin ang mataas na pagpapahalaga sa mga kasanayan ng mga Pilipino tulad ng nursing, pagiging seaman, at iba pang propesyon na hindi masyadong napapansin sa ating bansa. Sa kabila ng ganitong mga pagsubok, ang mga Pilipino ay nagiging inspirasyon sa kanilang mga lugar ng trabaho, pinapakita ang kanilang dedikasyon at husay sa bawat aspeto ng kanilang trabaho.

Gayunpaman, hindi maikakaila na may mga Pilipino na nakakalimot sa kanilang mga ugat kapag sila ay umaahon na sa hirap at nagpapakain sa wikang dayuhan tulad ng Ingles at iba pang western na kultura. Para sa mga kabataang Pilipino na lumalaki sa ibang bansa, maaaring maging hamon ang pagkakaroon ng pagkakakilanlan at pagkakaunawaan sa kanilang tunay na lahi. Ang mga diskurso na ang mga "Filipinx" ay hindi tunay na Pilipino at ang diskriminasyon laban sa mga tunay na Pilipino ay nagiging bahagi ng kanilang karanasan. Ngunit hindi lahat ng Pilipino sa ibang bansa ay ganito. Sa pamamagitan ng paggamit ng ating wika at pagpapalaganap ng ating kultura, nagiging posible na ipasa natin sa susunod na henerasyon ang pagpapahalaga sa ating mga lokal na konsepto tulad ng pagpapakumbaba, bayanihan, at pakikipagkapwa-tao.

Sa dulo ng lahat ng ito, hindi maikakaila na ang ating wika ang nagbubuklod sa atin kahit saan man tayo magpunta. Ang marinig ang mga salitang "Uy, kababayan" o "Pilipino rin ako" sa isang dayuhang bansa ay nagbibigay ng ginhawa at kaligtasan sa mga Pilipino. Ang pagkakaroon ng kakayahang makipag-usap sa ating sariling wika ay nagbibigay-daan sa mas malalim na koneksyon at pakikipagkapwa.

Ang aking ama ay isang seafarer at nakakasalamuha siya ng iba't ibang tao sa bawat barkong nadedestino sa kanya. Iba't ibang lahi ang kanyang nakakasama, ngunit sabi niya, kahit na aabot na sa daan-daang mga foreigner ang kanyang nakakasama, iba pa rin ang pakiramdam kapag kapwa Pilipino ang kanyang kasama. Ang sense of solidarity at bayanihan na pinagbubuklod ng wikang Filipino ay nagbibigay ng natatanging suporta at pagkakaintindihan na hindi kayang gayahin ng mga dayuhan.

Sa pagtatapos ng lahat ng ito, ang mga kabataan, lalo na ang mga kabataang Pilipino na lumalaki sa ibang bansa, ay dapat nating bigyan ng pagkakataon na mapanatili ang kanilang koneksyon sa kanilang lahi. Ang paggamit ng ating wika at pagpapalaganap ng ating kultura ay mahalaga upang maipasa natin sa susunod na henerasyon ang mga pagpapahalagang hindi kayang irepika ng ibang bansa. Sa bawat hakbang ng ating paglalakbay, dala-dala natin ang ating wika at kultura, na nagbibigay sa atin ng lakas at identidad sa anumang dako ng mundo.

"Hindi mahalaga kung gaano ka-layo sa ating bayan, dahil ang tunay na kayamanan ay ang pagmamalaki natin sa pagiging Pilipino na dala-dala natin saan man tayo magpunta."

[joshualunacreations]

(Please don’t repost or edit my work. Reblogs are always appreciated. Support my work here: https://www.patreon.com/joshualuna)

History has shown Filipinx are valued for our labor, not our voices. But the only thing more consistent than our exploitation and oppression is our resilience in the face of it. #FilipinoAmericanHistoryMonth

There are many horror stories about Filipinx being mistreated. Whether working in our home countries or as Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs), we're treated as a servant class no matter where we are—suffering long hours, low wages and benefits, and intentionally dehumanizing treatment.

For example, in 2019, a Filipina maid in Saudi Arabia was tied to a tree as "punishment" by her employers. An animator in the Philippines was fired for demanding a full-time salary for his full-time work. Filipina nurses who tried to quit an abusive New York nursing home got stuck in indentured servitude. Out of 66 US allies in WWII, only Filipino vets were denied payment and benefits that the US promised. Call center employees working as outsourced low-wage labor for US corps who've earned promotions and higher pay are given unrealistic quotas to get them fired. The list goes on.

I even experienced this myself in May, when I lost my publisher of 10+ years for—ironically—talking about the racism and oppression Filipinx and other Asians face. They were happy to publish my stories centering non-Filipinx, but not when I decided to center myself and other Fil-Ams.

In my industry (comics), the exploitation of Filipinx is a well-kept secret. In a recently released video by DC Comics—which was meant to highlight Filipinx creators—they inadvertently admit to hiring Filipinx only to circumvent paying striking American creators better wages.

But Filipinx don't stay silent, we fight back. From legendary Lapu-Lapu, Gabriela Silang, and the Katipunan—who resisted Spanish colonization and fought for independence—to Fil-Am labor leader Larry Itliong, Filipinx have a long tradition of organizing protests and revolutions.

Yet when we do speak up, our contributions can still be erased—sometimes by other POC. Itliong spearheaded a highly effective labor movement in the 30s and 40s when he organized the Delano grape strike and unionized laborers, but his work is often credited solely to César Chávez. A search for Itliong's name will result in articles and books that always acknowledge his collaboration with Chávez. But if you search for Chávez’s name, Itliong is rarely mentioned. This erasure hurts even more so because the whole movement was about solidarity between Mexican-Americans and Fil-Ams.

What this means is Filipinx are seen as exploitable labor by pretty much everyone: whites, other POC, even our own. That's why a major part of the Philippines' economy relies on remittances from OFWs sending their earnings home—one of the country's biggest exports is people.

So on this last day of #FilipinoAmericanHistoryMonth, let's all commit to fighting racial and class injustice, uplifting Fil-Am and Filipinx voices, and recognizing Filipinx contributions all year-round.

If you enjoy my comics, please pledge to Patreon or donate to Paypal. I recently lost my publisher for trying to publish these strips, so your support keeps me going until I can find a new publisher/lit agent.

https://twitter.com/Joshua_Luna/status/1134522555744866304

https://www.patreon.com/joshualuna

https://www.paypal.com/paypalme2/JoshuaLunaComics

[saudade-mayari]

ship your filo moots din boss mommy sel 😢

-tampuhing anak

GIL IS THIS YOU? HAHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHA I love you and ya' know what? im doing all my lovelies in mythos.

disclaimer: suggestive, slight crack but here are the men i'll fully trust my lovely babies from mythos <3

ps: join our server. click here to see hell.

@rokudaddie bakugo. all for the sake of watching gly and katsuki bicker HAHAHAHAHAAHA +she simps hard for bakugo so im giving this to you. katsuki will truly take care of your sweet ass.

@melsun mattsun. i badly wanna see mel dom mattsun, bye HAHAHA. im giving my blessing because i wanna hear from mel that mattsun called her ma'am last night.

@sumebreaks atsumu. a very supportive and clingy tsumu for my lovely maia.

@ninjamomo bokuto. no questions idil is my child and her hubby is bokuto. periodt.

@betheydocrimewrites nanamin. because u love to mock urself on jjk spoilers HAHAHAAHAHA

@sunarent rintarou. obviously. i wanna see two badass lovingly insult together and i wanna hear stories from alice about how their night went.

@vindictivtsumu akaashi. keiji x clumsy devon. i love the dynamic and that shit would be the sweetest thing on earth. keiji always taking care of my baby, devon.

@risumu haitani. he's yours. i want eris and haitani to dye their hair purple then maybe some cute make out sessions.

@strawbearisamu sugawara. sol and suga are my sweetest babies in mythos. seeing them together makes my heart full.

@tooru-luvs daichi. paying full to see my dear zizi x daichi on a cute dyamics. daichi would truly take care of your sweet and loving attitude.

filipinx edition, bardagulan na to bahala kayo jan. ily

@ushisrever wakatoshi. mabait tong bebe nia ko, kaya walang bardagulan. super caring si toshi sakaniya kaya niligawan at nag pursue talaga si toshi. meron na silang blessing ko ni toshi, pwede na magpakasal. i approve.

@laineeey00 kita. tignan niyo naman profile "kita's thighs". headcanon ko kay laine highschool crush niya si kita tapos binulungan ko si laine na sabihin kay kita na "ang laki ng tite mo, kita" HAAHHAHAAHHAHAAHAHAHHAHAHA charot. bagay sila i approve.

@slutbench asahi. di ka talaga bet ni asahi, napilitan lang iyan kasi napaka ingay mo at tingin ka ng tingin sa sakristan asahi tuwing sunday mass. natakot sa'yo kaya wala siyang choice tapos napaka ingay mo raw palagi after misa. HAHAHAHA. baby sub kaya pinilit si asahi maging soft dom. pinilit din si asahi sirain corset niya sa conrad HAHHAHAHAHAHA

@tetsvhoe kuroo. isa rin tong napilitan. gusto ka na kasi madiligan dahil kalahati na raw sa filipinx mga petchay na nadiligan at semi dilig na AHAHHAHAHAHA. win win naman, bibilhan to ni kuroo ng penthouse tapos fuck by the glass rawr.

@roanniee romero. ship si ro rito kasi dilf vibes HAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHA pero gusto naman ni romero kasi sub vibes, win win sa sex life kasi nakahakot si romero ng super duper ultra mega sub. complicated nga lang, beware na lang roms HAHHAHA. ex lover si eita. di sila compatible ayon sa readings ko HAHAHAHAHA

@lovemeian meian. sige si meian na since main man mo naman. pero homewrecker arc by gwen pa rin ang paninindigan ko na plot HAHAHHAHAHAHHAA. yandere nature kaya ayaw makipag away ni meian kay lavi may kutsilyo palagi eh. pero sex life size kink goes brr brr kaya ultra mega sub din Ito, sumunod sa ranking ni roannie HAHAHAHAHA. childhood bestie ni iwa, pero nag break sila noon. sinayang ni lavi ang pinangbili na zagu ni iwa kasi nakilala niya sa upd si meian :c masaya na si iwa ngayon ok.

@writewithmarites holy trinity snape, loki at hwajin. mary na mary ang datingan kaya humarot sa trinity niya (di ko nilagay si aizawa pakyu sakin iyon). tignan mo naman type, tirador ng mga early to late 30s. may schedule iyan kada week paano niya imi-meet itong tatlo pero usually kay loki umuuwi kasi ginagawa niyang sub si loki.

@moonlit-island tsukki. pinagbigyan ko lang si raya kasi resident meme master ng filipnx to. gusto ko lang din talaga ma-witness na barahin ni tsukki si raya dahil naiirita na siya dahil sa puro mimiyuuh na memes si raya. sponsor din ni raya si tsukki sa nitro HAHAHAHA

@aizameow kento. gusto na maging housewife neto kaya pls lang bigay niyo na si kento sakaniya (di ko pa rin ilalagay si aizawa HAHAHAHHAA) pipilitin ko mag doktor naman si kento para ma-achieve mo na ang doctor-nurse porn fantasy mo HAHAHAHAHAHA

[diaryofanangryasianguy]

05/25/21

How 3 Filipino American Nurses Found Community on the COVID Frontlines

Despite their work on the frontlines, Filipino American nurses are rarely given the support they need, Antonio Moya, MD, MPH, a Filipino American neurologist who’s a part of the Filipinx/a/o COVID-19 Resources and Response Task Force, tells Verywell. While many nurses were praised by the public for their heroism, the pandemic’s impact on Filipino American families and communities has largely gone unrecognized.

Many Filipino American nurses are in their profession today due to U.S. colonial rule of the Philippines. In the 1960s, when the U.S. experienced a shortage of nurses, Filipino nurses were trained to work in the American healthcare system. Where institutional support fell short, families and communities stepped up to offer a helping hand. “The Filipino community has done its best to take care of each other and also the American community at large,” he says.

[jonahsahn]

Starting Anew

I had Tumblr before.

It used to be a collection of things that interested me.

Anime, art, photography, porn, music, you naaaame it. 

My Tumblr interests were just as jumbled up as I am. And while there’s a uniqueness to that kind of mixed upness, I have come to learn that when it comes to digital marketing, or the selling of oneself as a “brand” on social media, the world seems to like flattened experiences. 

You see, I have been on social media since the beginning. I call myself a vintage millennial. No, I didn’t think of that myself. It’s actually the work of Jaboukie (Young-White (my future husband, but not really because he doesn’t fulfill the “half my age plus 9″ rule)). I have been on social media for a long time, and I have marketed myself as a mixed up person comprised of a whole bunch of different experiences. 

That doesn’t work. Especially not on my social media platform of choice: Youtube. 

My Youtube channel started off as a way for me to upload video that I had taken for my Sinfonia chapter’s Mills Music Missions; groups of guys going around to nursing homes and hospitals, singing songs for the bed ridden and down trodden. From there, I started using Youtube to watch Happyslip, a Filipinx comedian who got her break acting like her parents online. Then I started following LoveBScott; a gay androgynous man who told stories and gave advice from his apartment in West Hollywood. From there, I began doing my own vlogs about my experiences as a Black/ Asian person. 

I saw a lot of growth in the beginning. I was popular most among Filipinx people and Black Gay Queer men, a lot of whom were out online, but not in real life, a subset of the queer community which wasn’t uncommon in 2008, as a matter of fact. It was a prime time to use Youtube as a way to “escape” and I was an escape for a lot of people at first. 

But then, I started talking about being Gay; being part of the LGBTQ community, and instantly many of my Filipinx subscribers turned on me. I received comments from the same people, over and over again telling me that I could still turn back and “return to God” and that they were praying for me, and hoped that I would get right because they had watched my videos for so long. 

And I dug in further. I transformed my youtube channel into a place where Black Queer (Gay) men gathered on a weekly basis to talk about the issues of the day. Mind you, this was 4 months before The Read podcast by Kid Fury and Crissle. I was so into this idea that I even changed the name of the Youtube channel from “blasianFMA” to “Edugaytion.” A complete rebranding and including of my friends. 

Edugaytion had a good run and was the jumping off point for some really interesting things. Garrett McQueen, the host of Edugaytion, went on to work for radio stations around the South, and ended up making his way to American Public Media where he currently works as a host of not only a show, but also a podcast listened to millions of people, and I currently work on a Queer podcast called “This QPOC Life.” 

But what of those people from the Youtube days? The ones I haven’t mentioned? The ones who were my contemporaries, the ones who started around the same time I did, and we might not know each other (or maybe we do...)? 

Plenty of people who started Youtube at the same time that I did stuck to a path. They stuck to one point. They stayed in a lane. Some of those people are now Youtube celebrities; with millions of followers, or household names in certain communities. 

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately, because I’m trying to figure out what happened with me. Why didn’t I make it big? What did I do wrong? Why don’t people latch on to me at as fast a rate as the people who were around me during the beginning? 

I think I know. 

I think it’s because I didn’t stay in a single lane. I changed the name of my channel. I changed the subject material. People who subscribed to me because I made a particular type of video would come back and then I’d be talking about or doing something completely different. One moment I’m reviewing the latest anime to live action adaptation, the next I’m talking about the struggles of being a Queer Person of Color in a largely White performing arts institution. One minute I’m talking about video games the next, I’m talking about HIV awareness. 

I get it. 

At this point it just seems like it’s far too late to even try to get things on one track. I’ve stepped away from Youtube. I’ve stepped back into it. I’ve taken breaks. I’ve done a video a day for a week. I can see the topics that gain the subscribers and the comments: They’re videos about mixed race people - but I don’t want to devote my channel to talking about one experience. I want  to review videos games, movies, talk about queerness, and a whole host of other things. I want to vlog, get things off my chest, ramble, share stories... But the diversity thing isn’t something that audiences want. 

This carries over into real life as well and is the reason why I’m able to arrive at the conclusion that I have regarding just youtube. 

All blasians know the feeling of not being enough of one or the other. I guess this whole youtube thing is just another byproduct of that. Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of blasians who have made it by solely devoting their channels to talking about being Black and Korean, with emphasis on anything Korean, and there are youtubers who are blasian who have devoted their channels to just compiling grammatical errors and talking shit about how people can’t spell... and these people rack up millions of views and subscribers. 

I can’t do that. Not because I don’t have the ability, but because I don’t want to. I’m always evolving. I’m always learning something new, and I’m always trying a different thing.

The current thing is Film Making, which I will probably get into more in my next post because I’ve been typing too much already, and I’m behind on this script I’m writing. 

Anyway, I doubt anybody is reading this, but I’m glad I thought it through and put it out into the universe. 

xx blasianFMA 

[nightworkshop]

It was great to join @cyruspenarroyo discussing our films. I greatly enjoed Cyrus' film (Manifest Destiny, 2021, US) dedicated to all the Filipinx/o nurses. My thanks got to the wonderful host Ann Lui at @futurefirm Firm, and to @exhibitcolumbus. 🎉 (at Zoom) https://www.instagram.com/p/CV6cF6otRrH/?utm_medium=tumblr

[wsmith215]

AI Weekly: Dismantle white supremacy for the good of us all

I still haven’t watched the full 8 minutes and 46 seconds of a knee on the neck of George Floyd that an independent autopsy confirms killed him. I skip or pause or turn it off when Ahmaud Arbery’s shooting came on TV in recent months. And I’ve never been able to finish watching Eric Garner’s killing where he, like Floyd, gasps “I can’t breathe.” I can’t watch anymore. It’s torture, and part of a centuries-old struggle against racism sanctioned by the U.S. government.

This week the world saw massive protests against white supremacy in all 50 states, looting, violence against protesters and journalists, and curfews in major cities. For the first time ever this week, the United States now appears on a list of most dangerous places in the world for journalists. Protests are expected to continue this weekend. A march on Washington will be held in August with the Floyd family to demand federal police reform.

More happened this week than it seems possible to keep up with. The Robert E. Lee statue came down in Richmond, Virginia, the former capital of the Confederacy. On Thursday, the U.S. Senate’s only three African American members moved forward a bill to make lynching a hate crime. On Friday, following a week of militarization of the nation’s capital, Mayor Muriel Bowser of Washington D.C. had “BLACK LIVES MATTER” painted in giant yellow letters on the street leading to the White House and renamed the area in honor of the movement.

In business, employees demanded an end to government contracts and staged efforts to fight institutional racism, such as the virtual walkout by Facebook employees on Monday. Recommendation algorithms that companies like Facebook and YouTube use often increase engagement by spreading hate.

VB Transform 2020 Online – July 15-17. Join leading AI executives: Register for the free livestream.

Following President Donald Trump’s tweet threatening to shoot people in the streets and the tear-gassing of protestors for a photo-op with a Bible, former Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis called him a threat to the U.S. Constitution and the first president in Mattis’ lifetime working to actively divide the American people. Other former military leaders also spoke out this week, including General John Allen, former leader of forces in Afghanistan, who criticized Trump for empowering white supremacists and behaving like an authoritarian leader, positing that June 1 may be known as the “beginning of the end of the American experiment.”

We also saw footage of extreme violence and killings by police and against police while simultaneous protests against white supremacy in the United States took place around the world.

After more than a week of protests, protests are expected to continue this weekend, and George Floyd will be laid to rest in his hometown of Houston on Tuesday. After Floyd’s burial, more attention will begin to turn to specific policy proposals crystallizing now. Members of Congress are considering a prohibition on the sale of military weapons to police departments. Former President Barack Obama is calling for community policing reform akin to the kind implemented during his time in office. People from several corners of society are ratcheting up campaigns to defund the police. Some law enforcement agencies have already stopped usage of knee-on-neck restraints. Like the military distancing itself from the president, schools and universities in some places are cutting ties with local police departments.

But racism against black people is rampant, and in this moment the lack of progress toward racial equity and the backsliding after making progress in the past is glaring. In education, the reform promised by the 1950s Brown vs. Board of Education ruling to desegregate schools has not come to fruition; school integration began to backslide in the 1980s. This despite the fact that desegregation is one of the most effective tools for closing scholastic achievement gaps.

In the workplace, a Washington Post analysis this week found that the economic gap between black and white households is the same as it was in 1968.

In business and tech, a majority of VC firms have no black investors, and only a small percentage of venture capital funding goes to startups led by black founders. The couch cushion donation of $2.2 million from Andreessen Horowitz this week, a firm with nearly $3 billion under management, is frankly offensive. Only four Fortune 500 CEOs are black men.

Like tech, newsrooms have a history of sluggish progress on diversity, and this week heard pushes for reform. After the New York Times ran an op-ed urging President Trump to “send in the military,” black reporters publicly called the opinion a threat to their lives. Leadership claims the opinion section vows changes in the future; the episode led to the greatest number of subscription cancellations in a one-hour period recorded in company history.

The Philadelphia Inquirer also saw pushback from black reporters, who protested the front-page headline “Buildings Matter, Too.” Paper editors apologized Wednesday for equating the value of a black life and property in a nation where ownership of black Americans used to be a legal right.

The unfortunate truth is that VentureBeat has its own troubles. With a few exceptions, all AI and games journalists and editors at VentureBeat are white men. VentureBeat hasn’t employed a female reporter since February 2019. I found all of this disturbing and said so. It should have been the responsibility of my white male editors to push for a more pluralistic newsroom, something I called for internally since August 2018. This week, VentureBeat agreed to make its next editorial hire a woman and plans to start a paid internship for journalists of color, though management says due to economic conditions it’s unclear when VentureBeat will hire new writers. Look for more details from founder Matt Marshall in the coming weeks.

History can make it hard to be hopeful, but what gives me a lot of hope is seeing protestors in the street that look like a cross-spectrum of society, and hearing people like Al Sharpton who have spent their entire lives marching against racism say this time might be different.

An anti-white supremacy protest in San Francisco on Wednesday honored the lives of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, and so many others killed by people willing to treat black people as less than human.

Top of mind for speakers on the steps of Mission High School was the hypocrisy of tech companies like Facebook and Twitter. There was a sprinkling of “Black Lives Matter” signs alongside allies with signs bearing slogans like “Latinx for Black Lives,” “Filipinx for Black Lives,” “Queer Asians for Black Lives,” and “Nurses for Black Lives.”

One of my favorites was “Your Kid = My Kid.”

While pondering what policy steps might deliver meaningful change, people need to ask themselves “What is patriotism?” Patriotism is demanding your government applies “Equal Justice Under the Law,” as protesters in all 50 states have done this week. Patriotism is doing what’s right for your kids or the next generation. Patriotism is leadership that recognizes that together is the only way forward.

For people making AI, as I wrote two weeks ago in a story about a fight for the soul of machine learning, I believe it’s a question of how people building systems that work best on white men want to be viewed by history in a diverse world.

As feminists like Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said and Al Sharpton paraphrased at the George Floyd memorial service Thursday: We ask no favor, just that you take your knee off our neck.

George Floyd’s daughter Gianna and the people at protest walks across the U.S. look like the future of this nation. If you’re passionate about solutions to urgent problems we collectively face — global pandemics, climate change, historic economic problems that weigh heavily on black people and the young — dismantle white supremacy and discriminatory systems for our kids.

And please take care of yourself. Love yourself, and if you attended a protest in the past week, please consider getting tested for COVID-19. For AI coverage, send news tips to Khari Johnson and Kyle Wiggers — and be sure to subscribe to the AI Weekly newsletter and bookmark our AI Channel.

Thanks for reading,

Khari Johnson

Senior AI Staff Writer

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[mfaunlv]

Meet the New Class!

It is our pleasure to introduce you to the 17 writers who will join our UNLV community this coming Fall 2020 semester! Congratulations to everyone, and welcome to UNLV!

PHD/BLACK MOUNTAIN INSTITUTE FELLOWS

Dorothy Allred Solomon (nonfiction) was born into a polygamous household to the father of forty-eight children and his fourth wife, but married a Vietnam veteran who said, “One wife is more than enough.” She took her bachelor’s degree in literature, theater and communication and her master’s degree in Literature and Creative Writing from the University of Utah. Her writing has received several awards, including the 2004 WILLA, the Utah State Publishing Prize, three first prizes from the Utah Arts Council,  Distinguished Journalism Awards from Sigma Delta Chi and the American Academy of Pediatrics, and a Governor's Media Award for Excellence. Her books include the groundbreaking In My Father’s House (1984, Franklin Watts and 2008, Texas Tech University Press) Predators, Prey and Other Kinfolk: Growing Up in Polygamy, (W.W. Norton, 2003) Daughter of the Saints, (W. W. Norton, 2004) The Sisterhood: Inside the Lives of Mormon Women, (2007, Palgrave Macmillan) and coming in 2020 from Texas Tech University Press, Finding Karen: An Ancestral Mystery.

Areej Quraishi (fiction) was born in Dubai, UAE. Her fiction explores familial relationships, cultural identity, memory, and their effects on the psyche. She holds an MFA from the University of Washington-Seattle and an MA and BA in English from Rutgers University. Outside of writing, she enjoys food, trying out new recipes, teaching, graphic design, language, and dabbles in drawing and singing. Her stories appear or have been awarded Finalist spots in Entropy, Glimmer Train Press, and New Millennium Writings. She's super excited to attend UNLV and hopes that being raised in a desert has prepared her for the heat.

MFA Fiction

Mark Ranchez discovered the power of stories and storytelling at an early age. Moved from the Philippines to Hawaii in 2013, he finds himself in a constant journey into the unexpected and unknown, from which many of his stories he’s excited to write about were gleaned. By furthering his education and expertise of the craft, he aspires to someday bring these stories into life. His main writing interests involve the Filipinx experience both in the US and the Philippines. Currently he writes for The Hawaii Filipino Chronicle, an ethnic news publication based on Oahu. Hawaii.

 Shani Boianjiu (not pictured)

Marlan K. Smith joins the MFA program as a fiction writer after completing his MA in English at the University of Idaho. A veteran of the video game industry, his academic interests include contemporary and Victorian literature, speculative fiction, and horror. His short stories (written pseudonymously) have appeared in Dark Moon Harvest magazine as well as Space and Time Magazine. As someone moving to Las Vegas during a global pandemic, he accepts that he has basically become a character in a Stephen King novel.

Alycia Calvert was born in Palo Alto California, and has been trying be be close to the ocean ever since. She graduated from UNLV in 2016 with a degree in English, with an emphasis in Creative Writing. Alycia mostly writes flash fiction and is interested in the processes of mothering and childhood in memory. She is the wife to one wildlife biologist, and mother to four curious children. In her “spare time” she can be found running, biking, kayaking, nursing a forest of house plants, tearing through audio books, and half-finishing house projects. She loves learning, and is thrilled to begin her MFA at UNLV.  

MFA Poetry

Ben Socolofsky is a poet currently celebrating the mundane in Las Vegas, Nevada. He received a bachelor’s degree from Hampshire College, where he became a founding member of the Departure Collective, which organizes readings and produces chapbooks. His work has appeared in The Hampshire College Reader, WORKSHOP and Departure Anthology.

Sara Brown grew up in rural, middle-of-nowhere South Jersey on her grandparents’ two farms and on the coast. She started working at age 9 on her grandparents’ blueberry farm and then at a flower nursery while completing her Bachelors in Literature. Due to a very bad/good habit of being interested in everything, she enjoys reading and writing poetry and creative nonfiction, painting, growing plants, experimenting with film and digital photography, running and biking, and making music. She also has a chocolate problem and will ugly-cry when she has to leave her dog in NJ. Sara has spent many hours exploring the Mojave Desert while staying with her family and friends in Las Vegas and is beyond thrilled to start the MFA program at UNLV.

Benjamin Stallings is an American poet and musician who grew up in Beijing, China. He moved to America to attend Lee University in Cleveland, Tennessee, where he graduated with a B.A. in Literature and a B.A. in Writing. He performs as Dagger, playing guitar and writing songs in El Bandito Forever.

John Blake Oldenborg recently graduated from Florida State University with an M.A. in English Literature, Media, and Culture. His favorite pizza toppings are pepperoni and black olives. In his spare time, John enjoys visiting art museums and playing rogue-likes. He is scared of the screaming guy from the band Death Grips

Alice Letowt is convincing her endocrine system to behave. She is interested in light, spent two seasons working on a farm, and hopes to continue farming in the future. While practicing social distancing, she is discovering a fondness for azalea bushes. She can’t wait to stop in Kansas on her drive from Virginia to Nevada.

Harrison Bernard Nuzzo

“i stand outside me and watch myself"

- d.a. levy

 MFA Nonfiction

Michael Hanson, a Minnesota native, has chased warm weather in Hawaii, California, Hong Kong, Australia, and now Las Vegas. When he isn’t winning sailboat races, he can be found camping, reading, or carousing with the local riff-raff.

Emma Hardy is from Melbourne, Australia. Her nonfiction has been published in Voiceworks, The Lifted Brow, the Monthly and Dumbofeather. She's interested in animals, the environment and nonfiction that lends itself towards the speculative and fabulative. She's also obsessed with comedy, and performs improv, clown, sketch and occasionally stand-up.

Journalist Travis Dunn was born in New York City and grew up in New Jersey and rural Pennsylvania. He holds a B.A. from St. John’s College in Annapolis, Md. His reporting has been published by the Center for Public Integrity, WhoWhoWhy, Alternet, Belt Magazine, and the now-defunct Baltimore City Paper.

Claire Mullen is a freelance writer, critic, audio producer, and translator based in Mexico City. Her work has appeared in outlets such as The Nation, Lithub, The Believer, and Ploughshares, and she is currently a National Book Critics Circle fellow.

Patricia Heisser Ph. D is a clinical Psychologist who is also an activist and writer. She has been a play producer one of her plays “The Wedding Band”, received the Los Angeles Drama Critics Award. She consulted on casting for movies, such as "The Color Purple", "Lethal Weapon" and "Planet of the Apes" and had a television talk show on CBS," L.A. Kids" which was featured in TV Guide's' Year of the Child.  Patricia was also selected as a MS. Magazine Feminist Scholar focusing on international trafficking has testified for the United Nations on the Status of Women and Violence. She also was awarded the American Psychological Association accredited Clinical Psychology Fellowship at UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute.

[filipinx-activism]

West and Zimmerman’s article Doing Gender posits that gender is a product of social interaction. It is fundamentally about those interactions and relationships. Doing gender produces, reproduces, sustains and legitimizes the social meanings accorded to gender. Gender is not a role since it is a continuous action, whereas roles are fixed/situated, and insinuating that gender is a display implies something that is not fundamental to human interaction. In order to attain effective change, modification in cultural and institutional aspects of the sex category, as well as the interactional level is necessary. SO again, how does this relate? Without Filipinx Activism, there’s no framework from which to re-examine - as to why conformity to heterosexuality can be damaging, and on top of that identities are excluded. Without the framework to analyze generations of trauma, nonnormative identities will remain culturally unintelligible and therefore marginalized. It’s like an identity politics movement where Filipino communities acknowledge the existence of blended gender identities. 

Speaking of Frameworks, I want to draw on Kimberlé Crenshaw’s piece on intersectionality because, on top of being Fil-Am, I am a middle-class person of color, and a non-binary, lesbian – and as far as navigating the world goes, it is difficult because when facts don’t have a way of fitting into available frames (hint, heterosexuality), people have a difficult time incorporating those facts into their way of thinking about a problem. Crenshaw said that in her Ted Talk about intersectionality. Being one of the few, brown, nursing students at Marquette University, a few years back, was stressful because I didn’t have academic, or financial resources to help me succeed in that endeavor. I failed chemistry and biochemistry and was held back because I didn’t have the prestigious, high school experience a lot of students attending Marquette had. All the microaggressions and the overlapping discrimination is why Crenshaw’s piece is so crucial to this research especially, now, knowing that academia can be inaccessible. This isn’t about getting special treatment, it’s about acknowledging the lived experiences of students like me, of Filipinx identities. Crenshaw said that because the intersectional experience is greater than the sum of racism and sexism, any analysis that does not take intersectionality into account cannot sufficiently address the way marginalized identities are subordinated. It’s a framing problem. The Filipinx Movement is a framework that addresses intersectionality in identities.

Additional Source: https://www.ted.com/speakers/kimberle_crenshaw

[transcriptroopers]

Is an Asian able to serve the USA Army as a recruit, translator or a nurse/medic?

Anon sent me a PM explaining that they were referring to those who were enlisting under the naturalization through military service process and they apologize for the ambiguity of the ask. Because the answer to this question is essentially just “yes,” I’ll explain this process more.So someone who wants to become a U.S. citizen can join the armed forces. These are the following qualifications and specifications from USCIS.gov:-Good moral character,-Knowledge of the English language,-Knowledge of U.S. government and history (civics), and-Attachment to the principles of the Constitution of the United States by taking an Oath of Allegiance to the United States.Such recruits are also exempt from having to have a physical presence in the U.S. or from having a residence in the U.S. Since 2009 we’ve been able to naturalize citizens directly after basic training, although if the service member discharges under anything less than a General Discharge their citizenship may be at risk.The citizen’s family and children are also naturalized, although the application process still takes time.A service member who dies in service before being naturalized can be posthumously naturalized, and that naturalization can count toward their spouse/children.Over 100,000 citizens have been naturalized through this process.When I was enlisted and going through training, the most common recruits looking for this naturalization were Samoans, who don’t have American citizenship upon birth despite being a U.S. territory, even though Puerto Ricans have had this right for over a hundred years. Other common groups of people I saw were Filipinx and Guamanian, although in my basic training we had a recruit from Hong Kong. Some of these recruits knew English better than others. Some had been training to learn English and U.S. History for three years prior to even going through basic. All worked hard and were good soldiers.

-Kingsley

If you felt engaged or enlightened by the above post, would you please consider checking out my Patreon? Your small contribution can make a huge difference for me. Thank you for your support!

[jolligang]

Blog Post 1: Jeila

Hello beautiful people, my name is Jeila Secoquian Palma. My name is a mixture of my mother and father’s names. “Je” for Jefferey and “ila” from Sheila. I am a third-year Pre-Health Education major. I am still in a gray area in what I want to do as a career path but I know that I want to be in community health helping people of similar ethnic backgrounds as myself. I always found it empowering seeing my nurses, doctors, and community leaders Filipinx too so I strive to be as the ones that came before me. I was born and raised in the East Bay. Born in Hayward and grew up in San Lorenzo, a small town near Hayward. I have been in the Bay Area almost my whole life and I could not imagine my life outside of here, we do things a little differently. I attended Arroyo High School and graduated class of 2017. Fun fact, my mom and her five siblings attended Arroyo back in the 90s so some teachers that taught them taught my older brother and me. 

 I live with my mother Sheila, older brother Crisz, and dog Bella. My parents divorced when I was very young so my dad is not in the picture as much as before. I love my family dearly and they are a really big factor in my life. Something that I inherited from my mother is a love for traveling. I have not gone to that many places yet but I would really like to travel around the world. My mom has been to so many different places and I am so jealous. Something I like to do in my free time is hanging out with friends, trying new places to eat, and listening to music. music genres that I enjoy are R&B, hip hop, rap, reggae, and lofi. Listening to some chill music and having deep talks with good company is the best. I wear my heart on my sleeve so it is very easy for me to feel connected with others even if we just met. I really like trying new places but there’s nothing wrong with sticking to what works well. Some of my favorite places to eat are KBBQ, Boiling Crab, sushi, Texas Roadhouse, and a bunch of other places. I enjoy drinking places like boba, smoothies, or milkshakes too. I love food so much. I also like expressing myself in different ways such as tattoos, piercings, paintings, etc. I’m not the best at it but I try sometimes. I have two tattoos and nine piercings. My mom would kill me if I got anymore but I love them a lot. 

Going back to talking about forms of expression I was honored to be apart of PACE’s PCN 47 last semester. I did two cultural dances and really learned about my ancestor’s histories and struggles. I learned a lot about myself as an individual too.

I am really excited to take this class, I cannot wait to see what it has in store. 

[joshualunacreations]

The reason America hates wearing a mask is because it prefers showing its true face. For some, this spike in anti-Asian racism comes as a surprise, or seems like it's the first time it's happening. But that's because the Model Minority Myth—created by white people—has tricked both white people and POC into thinking Asianness is a privilege. (For more info, see my comic “Asian American Monomyth” https://twitter.com/Joshua_Luna/status/1107709119992119297) But history shows what America really thinks. The Page Act of 1875 legally codified Asian women as immoral, disease-carrying prostitutes in order to ban them from the US and extended that ban to Asian men with the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. These sentiments have never left. This is why Asian Americans are always portrayed as the perpetual foreigner—we "don't belong here" and can be removed on a whim via ongoing deportations or mob violence, such as the 1930 lynching of Filipino men in Watsonville and the 1871 lynching of Chinese in L.A., and the current COVID-inspired attacks. Trump calling COVID "the Chinese virus" has the same intent—to distract from his violent negligence, stump for war with China, and put a target on Asians so we'll bear the brunt of COVID frustrations instead of him. Over 2,500 anti-Asian incidents have been reported since March. As if anti-Asian violence weren't enough, structural racism means COVID is more deadly to POC. For example, Filipinx nurses comprise 4% of nurses in the U.S., but make up 31.5% of all nurse deaths. Also, many Fil-Ams live in multi-generational households—which increases risk. Trump and his supporters know COVID is deadly, but sabotage efforts to stop its spread because their goal is eugenics—the same way the U.S. infected Native Americans with smallpox, or how the Reagan administration ignored HIV since it disproportionately killed LGBTQ and Black communities. But right-wingers aren't the only racists. If you’re wondering how a man who wants to “Free Hong Kong" hates Asians, it’s the same reason why racists claim to support Uyghurs yet don’t care about Trump’s Muslim ban, U.S. atrocities in Iraq and Afghanistan, or oppression of Palestinians. It's the same reason the U.S. "supports" Taiwan, South Korea, Philippines, Hawai'i, and Japan, and why U.S. soldiers took Asian wives via the 1945 War Brides Act (a loophole to anti-immigration laws). It's not because they like Asians and Pacific Islanders—they see us/our lands as strategic assets or spoils of war. This shows how diasporic Asian lives are always inextricably linked to the fate of Asians abroad & vice versa. US imperialism has murdered millions of Asians via war in the Philippines, Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia & Laos & left a multi-generational impact. (For more info, see my comic “Detonasian” https://twitter.com/Joshua_Luna/status/1181638490120957952)

So it isn't enough to stop the spread of COVID—we have to stop the spread of anti-Asian racism too. That means rejecting the lies of the Model Minority, speaking out against anti-Asian COVID attacks, and acknowledging just how pervasive and deeply embedded anti-Asian racism is. (Please don’t repost or edit my art. Reblogs are always appreciated.) If you enjoy my comics, please pledge to my Patreon or donate to my Paypal. I lost my publisher for trying to publish these strips, so your support keeps me going until I can find a new publisher/lit agenthttps://twitter.com/Joshua_Luna/status/1134522555744866304 https://patreon.com/joshualuna https://www.paypal.com/paypalme2/JoshuaLunaComics

[damescarletaznable]

💙 Great LA Air Raid 💙 Still can’t believe I made a WAVES uniform from scratch. My next project is a navy nurse uniform. Since I wore my WAVES uniform to the LA Air Raid, I ended up getting a new tie and I’m looking at shoes from @allheelsonduty. I like that my first impression I’ve created is coming together! 🥰Hope to see you at Fort MacArthur Days! #waves #wavesuniform #filipinx #filipinxrepresentation #usnavy #navy #greatlaairraid #sewing #sewretro #retrofashion #1940s #asianpinup #vintage #vintagestyle #vintagestylenotvintagevalues #fortmacarthur #sanpedro #oldcar #ww2impression #livinghistory https://www.instagram.com/p/BvzKzAYA0QT/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=te1o68gmxnul

[juxtaflowz]

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A post shared by JUXTAFLOWZ (@juxtaflowz)

#er #filipino #filipina #filipinx #dr #nurse #aboutthatlife (at Norwegian American Hospital)

[nchntrss-a-blog]

not being funny but why are you salty that danny rand, a white guy, is being played by a white guy when we've already had a seminal luke cage series with an almost entirely PoC cast as well as rosario dawson as night nurse, simone missick as misty knight and colleen wing confirmed to be appearing in iron fist and played by an asian actress??

my eyes landed on the word salty and it just escalated from there. i was afraid you weren’t even joking, but here we are.

like,

you saw l*uke c*age, right? you saw how there was literally only one white named character was there? and he died before the series finale? 

that’s a reversal of the shit i see when i look at the mar*vel series. all the straight white men survive with nary a scratch, and anyone who isn’t white, or male, or straight, or even a combination of the three get wrecked or don’t ever make it. you can literally pinpoint their characters by what they are (i.e. the black guy, the girl, etc., etc. ) and the whites get their ~~character development~~ 

and what happened in l*uke c*age is what we asians want.

we want a reversal of what’s there.

we want to see anything, ANYTHING, that makes us see that we are powerful in our own right. we want to have the representation that we have been waiting for for centuries. yes, centuries.

because asians are the punching bags of media !! we’re ~~cool~~, and we’re ~~wise~~, we have ninjas!! fortune cookies~!!! we have the stereotypical fu manchu villains!!! we have dragons hurr durr, rice and chopsticks and the ching chong bing bong blah blah blah blah

well, you know what?

I’m not even Chinese. Or Japanese. I’m Southeast Asian. You know what racist idiots call my people? The Mexicans of Asia. Surprise, bitch. I’m Filipino. hey, seen any filipinx superheroes or supervillains lately? no? well, that’s because we’re busy being casted as maids, or a white person’s one-note lover, or just flat out extras who do nothing but walk by while the whites run around and do white shit.

did you know that there’s a filipinx superteam called ‘The Triumph Division’ in the m*arvel comics? no? yes? well they die. because of a bomb. in their first appearance. it was in an i*ron ma*n comic. they. fucking. died. because of a suicide bomber, from the ma*ndarin, i guess. the details are fuzzy. bottom line, they get replaced by their next of kin and just —— they are just there for tony’s backup. no real names. no character development. they’re just filipinx people in costumes. the whole of asia is under their care, but who gives a damn, because they aren’t even written well, apparently !!

casting a white man as da*nny ra*nd is Bullshit. they could have picked from a number of asian actors. mar*vel. had. a fucking chance. to pick an asian actor. who studied martial arts. for 15 years.

FIFTEEN FUCKING YEARS. DO YOU THINK THIS IS A FUCKING GAME? ANOTHER WHITE MAN, LEARNING FROM ASIANS, TAKING THEIR CULTURE AND MAKING IT HIS OWN!! D*OCTOR STR*ANGE DID THAT. NOBODY CARED. IR*ON FI*ST IS DOING THAT NOW. DO YOU CARE?

DO YOU?

l*uke c*age was just one series. just one. but everybody praised it. i loved it. i couldn’t believe it. i am filipino, born and bred, and i loved it. i wanted more of it. and then we got i*ron f*ist right after that. do you know how painful that is? do you know what that does to asians, particularly asian-americans? do you know what that will do to asian kids who don’t think they’re anything special besides being attached to the stereotype that every asian kid knows kung fu? who see white kids putting the thumbs of their hands on the creases of their eyes and pushing it to the side so that they emulate how narrow the asian kid’s eyes are? how painful it is that all the others can dress up in hero costumes of their white faves and he doesn’t even have someone who he looks up to? someone he can relate with?

black people can be superheroes and be well-rounded characters like in l*uke c*age, but asians still stay the stereotypes assigned to them by white media? that’s just laughable. so laughable it’s not even funny.

anyway i’ll be over here making my FILIPINX doct*or st*range roleplay blog, a half-filipinx, half-american who has tried her whole life to be seen as white and to surpass every halfwit white man who came before her, and still have to go through the humbling journey that makes her into the sorcerer supreme. i’m thinking fancasting m*ichelle ye*oh as the anci*ent o*ne. 

excuse me, salamangkera suprema. that’s ‘sorcereress supreme’ in tagalog.

tl;dr l*uke c*age isn’t enough. it isn’t enough. it is the year of our lord 2017, and mar*vel just took away a chance to have an asian superhero for what might be the first time in decades. shame on them. shame. on. them.

[another-recovering-poet]

Identity-less and Belonging-less

51/356, Essay No. 1 of X

Self. Identity. Belonging. In-group. Out-group. Rejection. Isolation. Individual with inadequate similarity. Humans are creatures drawn into tribes, terrifically clever at constructing and delineating categories which do not exist except in our minds and institutions.

As a Filipinx-American, I defy typical categories of race. I am hardly ever identified as Filipinx except occasionally by other Pinxys, and sometimes not even then. I am as likely to be identified with other APIs as I am Latinx peoples depending on my location’s social perceptions. We are from an Asian archipelago close to our Malayan cousins, long influenced by Chinese trade, conquered by Catholicism and Spain, exchanged to capitalist America. I live in a nation my people have been led to idealize, with values I am told to aspire to, while simultaneously being denied belonging and my existence by that same ‘good object’. I do not get to see myself in media, neither good nor wicked but naught. As far as America is concerned, my ethnic identity is unaccounted, unacceptable except as your nurses, nannies, and service workers. As far as the world, Filipinxs are in diaspora, finding a few of each other transgressing every border and wall. No one knows who I am, and perhaps my own people do not know either.

As a Filipinx-American, I am lost afloat in the oceanic richness and angst of cultural exchange and mental colonization. The blood of a fishing-people pumps through me; their anticipatory adrenaline is palpable as I wait to catch a thing to sustain me. My life on a line. A bit of this group, a bit from that, but never enough from any one to be accepted, acceptable by anyone. I find coves for my racial identity in other peoples of color but have no harbor in their communities. Scraps. And if I diet exclusively from my ancient past unadulterated by colonial holdings, I find myself in even smaller waters with no respect to the world which has been opened and ingested hitherto. Those old waters are only a part of the gestalt of my present, and something complex within me is yet unfed. I would deny a pluralistic world to which my immigrant parents saw hope to send me.

As lines are drawn and tribes are formed in today’s racial dialogue, I find the experience of myself and my forebears invalidated. This conversation cannot contain me, my people! Who are we who can so fluidly adapt, adopt; who are we chameleons of culture? Who am I? My Self, my Identity, my Belonging in a global society. Or am I always the temporarily lucky voyeur given momentary accommodation? Where is the world I fit into? Is there one? Many ones?

Given one’s internal multiplicity and the trillions of shifting self-states a mind is prone to having, perhaps identity is not where we find the self, find ourselves. Rather than a single fishing line, I am a million sheer threads embroidered, and it would be a pittance to locate myself in a single one.

But the world does not accept such complexity, so I am adrift. I still do not belong, and who is there to match and mirror me in my reflection here?