Khadeja's Internet Wha-pow!

punkistani:

culturalmarxist:

purpletolavender:

And I was like

He told me that I shouldn’t be rude, he was giving me a compliment

what about:

If you swap black for Pakistani, then yes. 

‘You’re Pakistani? You don’t look Pakistani. You don’t act Pakistani. Wow.’ Add he says it in this tone that sounds like he’s trying to give me a compliment. A compliment. Should I be grateful? I don’t know how to react. My racism radar ain’t got much chutzpah as I’ve aged so I’m rather…oblivious to any racism I might encounter. 

And I transport myself to many years down the line. Where I am older, when I am not drinking in a dingy bar, where I am refined, happier. I am in Pakistan. I am in Jamaica. I am in France. I am in Wales. I am in Gujarat. I am in all of these places from which my ancestors stem. And I feel the monsoon on the back of my neck and I can feel the sun and I run barefoot from that courtyard from where I spent time as a child back into that bar or back into that squat because I have something to say to him. 

And what does mixed race look like to you? What does Pakistani look like to you? Should I fucking get an arranged marriage? Should I reply with ‘Yallah’ and look away and refuse to pay because you know how cheap us Desis are. Look away and look down? And shut up. I’d rather throw you down and rather fuck you up. 

And if you see me as that immigrant that takes you; I am not the only exception to this rule. We are all the exceptions of this rule. Like KRS ONE I will use my gift to only uplift and Elvis was a hero to most but I have to fight the powers that be. ‘Cause we are rocking with the best we are rocking with the fresh we are rocking with the rest; but slow down Gandhi, you’re killing them. 

“You don’t look Welsh. You don’t act Welsh. You don’t even sound Welsh”. 

And what is it that a Welsh person looks like? Over 300 years of a port and the oldest surviving ethnic minority community in the UK along with the oldest mosque in the UK and you can’t get over the fact that I got beige skin and I’m from Cardiff? What? How should I act Welsh to you? Should I be rearing sheep? Should I dress a miner, does it confuse you my English has a south-west twinge and my Welsh has a slight Punjabi twinge, or that you thought I wasn’t Welsh after all.

Fuck you. What the fuck do you know about me? What the fuck do you know about my family? What the fuck do you know? And if I could I’d go back to every guy or woman who told me I “look pretty” for a white girl/Pakistani/mixed race. What do you know about colonisation? What do you know about Islam; you watch Sky news so you’re expert? What do you know about my religion; what, you assume I’m a Muslim? What if I told you my great grandparents were originally preachers with the church but I’m neither Muslim nor Christian but identify as something different? 

I look pretty for a brown girl. I look pretty for a white girl. I am beautiful for a white girl and I am beautiful for a brown girl. And so is every other woman. Beauty isn’t a word that can be attached to one ethnicity.   

I am far more awake than possible. And I am beautiful and I don’t need a man to validate this. And each time that someone says that, that I hear that from a man; I forget. I almost forget. I almost forget about the lost women of Asia and how I could have been that and the acid attack victims and how my ancestors came from all corners of the earth so that I could be here and I look ‘pretty for being black/white/mixed race’? Fuck you. 

Punkistani, your response is so awesome I am almost at a loss for words. You are amazing.