I watched an episode of "Real Time" with Bill Maher where he and another guest host debated the idea of reparations with Charlemagne tha God (not familiar with Mr. Charlemagne's work, but he struck me as hard to take seriously due to his name alone, although in music circles it's definitely catchy like "Bad Bunny" or "Lil' Wayne." Charlemagne's point was that American's original sin was the taking of slave from Africa, so the African American descendants of those slaves deserve some sort of cash reparations, whereas Bill's point was that the money would be going to descendants of slaves who aren't the one who suffered from the atrocities of the time of slavery, and the money would be better served supporting education programs and things like healthcare which would disproportionaly benefit the African American community and help them advance in society. They also addressed the political infeasiblity of reparations in that there would never be enough votes in Congress to pass it, but also related to that is how unpopular reparations are in America: giving a straight cash handout to a select portion of the population based on their race (ideally reparation would be targeted towards those who are direct descendants, but how do you determine through family trees what percentage of their bloodline was a descendant) might actually cause more racism towards African Americans due to the
Personally, I've always appreciated the logic of a "let's not see race, let's just see people for who they are." I seem to remember being taught that as a child, but nowadays society seems to be shifting away from that message to help "equalize" the races by pulling some up for historic discrimination.
I also belong to a group that's been historically discriminated against: ugly/not good-looking/ aesthetically challenged/insert euphemism here people. I've been discriminated against for being Chinese/ Asian as well, but no one talks about the discrimination against ugly people because it would require ugly people to identify themselves to gather together, and not many brave soul want to "come out" as ugly.
The color of one's kin is one of the first things others see about a person, but so is his/her appearance. I'm no exception; I evaluate how attractive someone is within the first few seconds, it's part of the "first impression." Admittedly, being ugly doesn't have any seriously negative effects like being profiled by the police or having one's life in jeopardy due to violence, but in so many minor ways it matters a lot. Especially early on in one's life, one gets picked on, or in dating when being "matched" on a dating profile, or sitting at an in-person interview, studies have shown that between equally qualified applicants for a job the more attractive person is much more likely to be offered the job.
I distinctly remember the time when my friend invited me to meet with a "matchmaker service," and the matchmaker told my friend (good-looking guy) that he was the right kind of person she wanted to set people up with, and then didn't talk to me afterwards at all. Or how law school colleagues hesitate to have me go with them to bars in LA except as a designated driver. (People want to associate with better-looking people as a social status statement, just like rich people want to associate with people richer tham them). No one ever said anything direct like "you're just not attractive enough," but that's one of America's (and really, the world's) biggest unspoken prejudices: we just don't want to do with you because you don't look good. I went to a Big Brother casting call (back in my reality TV aspirations day), waited 2 hours in a long line to be "evaluated" by the casting director, was asked one question, and was sent out the door immediately in less than 30 seconds.) There's tons of other lessons I've learned throughout life about being judged for how I look, but that was the most jarring and representative.
One of the big thing about the racism conversation is a non-black person will never know how a black person feels, which makes sense: I can only imagine, or read stories about, but I won't ever have to live that experience of being a black person and being profiled. I feel the same way about U-G-L-Y: attractive people will say "you just gotta have more confidence" or "act indifferent, don't try to care so much" without acknowledging that part of their "confidence" or "game" is just how they look. Confidence is gained by having something succeed before, and often U-G-L-Y people never achieve success, thus not able to gain the confidence that is supposedly required. And playing the "game" of dating or interviewing for jobs or other social interactions doesn't reset when you fail or wake up the next game: you get deal the same hand every day of your life, and you can never feel what it's like to be that exotic-looking guy with great genes who guys and girls all want to talk to just because he exists, and he'll never know what it's like to be U-G-L-Y. You won't read any articles in the newspaper about appearance discrimination or be hailed as the leader of the anti-appearance discrimination movement, even though it exists and permeates every social interaction humans have.
Luckily, though, it's not all bad news for U-G-L-Y people: eventually all people become U-G-L-Y in their old age (Joe Biden was very studly, I'm told, in his youth), there are certainly worse things in life to be born of like alcoholism, serious diseases, and other genetic diseases, and if you eventually meet the partner of your dreams who doesn't care how you look (MJ is one in a million!) you can live a great life! And as a fellow U-G-L-Y representative, I feel I've developed into a well-rounded person who has perspective on life without being conceited or buy into all the social pressures, all while understanding what's important in life. Also, I'm told that P-R-E-T-T-Y people have to brush away a lot of "flies" and it gets exasperating having to reject people and turn them away, and they eventually have to settle down with just one person anyway (I won't get into open relationships).
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
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