Jonah Sahn

https://linktr.ee/jonahsahn

[jonahsahn]

Meiji Jingu Shrine, Tokyo Japan. October 5, 2023

[jonahsahn]

I was the most popular human at the cat cafe once I discovered the 100 yen cat food machine.

[bamf-jaskier]

Thoughts on the interview with Beau DeMayo where he mentions that a lot of the TWN writers dislike and make fun of The Witcher books?

Considering Beau DeMayo wrote the episode where Eskel dies and he was the head writer for Nightmare of the Wolf I find it very hypocritical he would talk about the other writers not liking the games/books and not respecting the lore when his writing decisions go against it quite strongly.

There’s also this tweet from fellow writer Matt D’Ambrosio about DeMayo

Sounds to me like DeMayo knows exactly what he’s doing because he’s always been very active in the fanbase and knows what to say to piss fans off — and let me tell you it worked. Forums and discords and social media is flooded with people now using DeMayo’s words as “proof” the writers are trying to sabotage the Bible that is the games and books. Ignoring the fact the show isn’t based on the games at all and that the current writers routinely talk about how they enjoy the books and games.

People are falling for DeMayo’s hypocritical clout chasing and it’s sad to see.

In addition D’Ambrosio tweeted this as well after DeMayo’s statement.

Which is likely a reference to DeMayo considering this tweet of his:

Which is basically DeMayo defending himself killing off the one gay character he created in Nightmare of the Wolf (which btw this tweet is insulting, historically inaccurate and borderline antisemitic but hey. He’s gay so it’s fine according to him)

Needless to say I’m not impressed by DeMayo’s statement and it seems like a bitter man using the fandom to tear down a show he was taken off of.

[jonahsahn]

POW

[jonahsahn]

My Anecdotal Experience Negates Generations of History

Call: 

“Im brown asian (pakistani) and have dated East Asian guys lmao.. I don't get your point

Literally all gay PoC when they date interracially go for white men why are you acting like its exclusive to asian men?”

Response:

No, they don't. Not nearly as much as Gay Asian men. Whereas everyone *can* go for white men, every non Asian POC will typically mix and match with other non-white POC while Asians are rarely with Latinos, or Black people or even brown people from their own continent. I'll up the ante and ask you to find me any East Asian/ Brown/ Black gay couple and I'll STILL find you ten White/ Asian gay couple to replace it. There are reasons for this depending on the generation, but it's an undeniable fact; whether we're talking about gold diggers, green cards, the effects of white supremacy on the minds of POC, aspiring to whiteness, the model minority myth, simply growing up in an all white area/ not being around other POC, the reasons are there and the dynamic is undeniable, but sure, tell me about your anecdotal experience being one of the view Pakistani people who had an East Asian boyfriend.

[jonahsahn]

As #Twitter falls apart, we are seeing a mass exodus of folks coming back to Tumblr! I am part of that movement. Hi!

[jonahsahn]

These Little Asian Kids are Gonna Work My Last Nerve...

Rant. And some of yall are gonna feel a way and I don't give a **fuck**:I'm getting realllll tired of little Asian kids leaving me comments  (on Tiktok) about the 1992 LA Riots as a justification of why "the Black community owes the Asian community respect" after Asians showed up in 2020 to **start** marching with Black folks as if BLM was a new thing this year.I imagine these collective teens sitting in their rooms, looking for anything to say about Black/ Asian relations, googling "Black on Asian Crime" and finding articles on the LA Riots, proclaiming "Aha! This is it!" and going to town in the comments of these discussions.b/c ALL of them reference this singular event as some sort of origin story for the tensions between Blacks and Asians and I'm like, y'all aren't gonna sit UP here and pretend like MOST OF yalls society isn't antiblack as FUCK, and even if I weren't Asian I would be saying this.

FURTHERMORE you little shits need to recognize that had it not been for the Black community yall asses parents (NOR MY MOM) would be over here in the US (Immigration Act of 1965, part of the Civil Rights movement). ALSO: it's not like there wasn't Black and Asian SOLIDARITY WAY before 1992. Going back to the civil rights era, you can simply google Black Power + Yellow Peril. 

Yet these little children want to be mad at me because I talk about Joe Tsai (owner of the Nets) donating 50 million to Black causes and how that does NOT give Asians the right to be like "Blacks you owe us respect" Bitch get the fuck out of here. That man makes millions off of the NBA which is LARGELY BLACK, ticket sales, ads, endorsements, concession stand sales ETC are because of BLACK PEOPLE just because these billionaires are playing Monopoly with Teams and companies and industries fueled by Black and Brown folks DOES NOT mean that they can't get MORE money. It's in the nature OF BILLIONAIRES. The man founded ALIBABA and CONTINUES to make money in the NBA and Lacrosse why? Because he likes collecting sports Teams? NO because he can make MORE money. So he gives Black folks 50 million. Ok. thanks. I wish more people would, but YOU little shits aren't going to do is act like 1) The BLACK community owes YALL ASSES ANYTHING 2) That the entire Black community hates Asians. GTFOH.Little fucking kids. 

Gonna raise my pressure. 

[jonahsahn]

AsiansWithAttitudes

We often talk about marginalized people and how they are the most oppressed within a society.

To be "marginalized" means that you do not fit in with the norm; it means that the way you identify is on the outside. You are not center stage and front page. You are, in fact, on the margins of the page.

I'm a supporter of most marginalized communities. I root for the underdog. I care about folks being treated fairly within a democratic society no matter how they identify or how they were born.

But there's one group that I just can't get behind. There's one marginalized group that I refuse to back and support in their endeavors to bring awareness to their cause. I try not to give them my time, resources, labor, or money.

I'm talking about the group known as stupid idiots.

Now, I know what you're going to say. I can hear you from the other side of your device screen: "They're the majority, not the minority, not the marginalized, not the oppressed!" I can hear you screaming that "idiots are currently in control!" or something like that.

And while that might be true for politics and government, I want to focus on another kind of stupid idiot right now. Given that a lot of my focus has lately been dedicated to the relationships between Black and Asian communities, I've come across a lot of discourse that suggests the existence of a group of stupid idiots who believe that a race war between people of Black and Asian descent is coming soon.

The latest round of conversation centers on events that have taken place in Minneapolis Minnesota. An Asian woman was kicked in the face while waiting for public transportation.

In response to that incident an Asian man in Minnesota allegedly (we will come back to that word momentarily) roamed the streets in the middle of the night to find a Black guy to attack.

There is video of both of these incidents.

Now, most people would agree that the attackers in both videos are stupid. The teens were stupid to kick the woman in the face, and the Asian guy was stupid for attacking a random Black person in the streets.

It's the stupid idiots that would try to justify either of these actions. Idiots would blame this pandemic on Asians and justify the teens attacking the Asian woman. Idiots would watch this man walk around a neighborhood in search of "revenge" and think "yeah he's doing the right thing."

It's no surprise that these idiots mainly live in the comments sections of the outlets that post about these stories. You've got NextShark for Asians, The Shade Room for Black folks, and a whole bunch of other fb and ig pages to choose from; some more biased than others; some more antagonistic than the rest.

And my focus here today is actually on those outlets, and one in particular that has gained a massive following on instagram and one that I have had private run ins with in the past. "AsiansWithAttitudes" is an instagram page that promotes itself as being "pro asian", "Asian first", and a "voice of the asian people"

Typically I love this type of action from the Asian community. I'm a strong believer in Asian people stepping up and representing themselves in the media and in the world. For far too long, Asians have been put on the back burner, and so places like Nextshark, Angry Asian Guy, Ricefeed and plenty more pages act as a beacon of confidence for Asian people, young and old.

Unfortunately, these pages don't have huge staff, and so the comments often get out of control when a stupid idiot enters the chat. It only takes one of them to light the flame of racist conversation, whether they're trolling or not, whether they're asian or not, because we know that there are plenty of bots out there behind faceless profiles saying any and everything to start some mess, and suddenly people who align with that high key antiblackness show up in droves. It happens all-of-the-time.

The good news is that stupid idiots are the minority. They're on the margins in this specific instance, because I constantly see a lot of Asian folks also calling out the negative double standard and unfortunate situation of being a minority in the position that Asians are in, while simultaneously existing next to Black people, a people with a very long history of oppression in *this* country.

Most people are actually smart. Most people get it, and most people don't try to compare what is happening now with the state-backed and protected murder of Black folks that has existed throughout the history of the United States.

And so, I typically leave the comments alone. Stupid idiots are going to be stupid idiots.

But what do you do when you have a page like AsiansWithAttitudes? What happens when one of the stupid idiots rises and makes an instagram page that amasses a huge following and becomes a haven for people who constantly measure their oppression against the oppression of Black people and blames them for their suffering, instead of pointing at the actual reason for the division?

If you haven't figured it out by now, this isn't all about a single instagram page. Rather it's about a collective of people who think like the person running that page and their followers. These Asians who think they're doing the right thing in their pursuit of social justice by somehow throwing one of the most oppressed groups on the ladder of privilege under the bus? They're stupid idiots.

They may be in the minority, and therefore a marginalized group, but I feel nothing for them and I can't support them in their misguided efforts at fake wokeness; not when they're incapable of doing the simple algebra that it takes to realize that Black people aren't the enemy just because some Black people are attacking Asians in the streets.

But their antiblackness shows. Their disdain for Black people oozes through their words and positions on these matters so clearly that I can't help but shake my head at how idiotic they truly look.

If you're out there and you're Asian and you are looking to do something to move Asian people forward, don't be like these people. Do a lot better.

[jonahsahn]

Haircut

[jonahsahn]

Blue No Matter Who

I will vote for neither Pete nor Bloomberg in a general election for the office of President of the United States of America. It would not matter anyway because I live in New York, but even if I were in a swing state, the same would be true.

I think the Chris Rock and Dave Chappelle skit on SNL the Saturday after the election of 2016 captures the essence of what Black people have been saying and feeling for decades, if not literal centuries about life in this country; and when I say literal centuries, I mean literal centuries of Black lives in the US.

The fact that a lot of you Hwite people just started to feel a slight draft of injustice in 2016 when Donald Trump was elected; the fact that you all were only incensed at something being so wrong at *that* time; the fact that you had to rise up and take action in the wake of the 2016 election... Where have you been?

You've been complacent and blind to the injustice that has surrounded you. Mike Brown was killed and his body laid out for hours in a street in 2014. Trayvon Martin was killed and George Zimmerman found not guilty prior to the election of 2016. HIV rates about Black and Brown communities have remained steady and in some cases have increased.

But "mission accomplished!" So much so that at one point, with regard to a certain national performing arts organization, we were asking the question "are our groups still relevant?" As if there weren't any non hwite issues to be solved. Willfully blind, I tell you.

And now we have this "blue no matter who" foolishness.

I will abstain from voting if the person that Donald Trump's opposition puts up has an awful track record with communities who represent *my* multiple identities. The parts of me that certain other marginalized communities have ignored *just* as much as the enemy.

Black and Brown folks: This is the attitude you need to take. If your hwite friends try to give you shit for having this stance, then they're clearly not listening. Instead, they're only centering their own agenda which has NOT centered people who look like you, for literal centuries.

[jonahsahn]

The Lodge made me feel good, and I had to investigate that with a second viewing.

Saw "The Lodge" again tonight after less than a week. There were some things I needed to see again, not from a film making perspective, but from a processing trauma/ psychological perspective. Spoilers for "The Lodge" from this point on. The movie is about a family bringing in a new woman/ step mother after the original father and mother divorce, and the mother completes suicide in a very violent way due to not being able to deal with the finalizing of the divorce and the new woman marrying her ex husband. The kids, mastermind a plot of revenge against the new woman by depriving her of her medications, which keep her mental health in check as she has a very traumatic and religious past. The father decides it's a good idea to leave this woman with his two kids in a remote lodge during the snow storm season while he completes works, with the intent of joining them on Christmas. The kids's plan works, and they drive the woman to the point of insanity, triggering all of her past traumas and causing the woman to harm herself and believe that they're all already dead (in purgatory). Dad returns just in time, as the woman is about to kill the kids, she kills him instead, the kids try to get away, they get caught up and it is implied that they are also killed by the woman. ---- Through all of this I was rooting for the kids. Even when it was revealed that they were behind all of this (because you don't find out until near the end that it was actually a masterfully created plan by the kids), that they tortured this woman, that they made her see ghosts and the demons of her past. I was sad that the kids didn't make it. I wasn't sad that the dad was killed or that the woman (it's implied through elements in the story) killed herself as well. I really had to investigate why this was. I wasn't ashamed or scared of my position; rather I was surprised. Growing up, my own dad often sided with a woman who was not at all good for him or me. Unlike the kids in the movie, I never plotted against her (or her daughter) despite the fact that they made my late childhood and teenage years a miserable, living hell; a hell that would see me become homeless, lose all of my belongings, have to repeat the 8th grade because of instability, my dad going to jail twice, moving to the South to escape her, and then doing it all over again because he kept welcoming her back in. Even after /that/ chapter was over, he continued to entertain other women, put them and their families before me to the point where I had to tell my dad off on Christmas one year to which he said "I'm your father" and I said "Then fucking act like it." (I received a self righteous slap to the face for that, on Christmas day, but it was that day that my position with him was solidified). It wouldn't be until long after he got out of jail, for /yet/ something else, that I would begin to let him back into my life; thanks to a talking to by my cousins in Memphis (with whom I was living after college). Right now, we're fine, but when I do visit, and see that he keeps pictures of certain folks next to pictures of my own mom, I take pause. He has very poor judgement. So yeah, that's that. If you see "The Lodge" and you say "FUCK THEM KIDS" I don't blame you. They do some Home Alone level fuck shit to that woman on a mental, psychological, and religious level. They /really/ mess her up to the point of no return. But I was on their side because I understood the hurt they felt; and ultimately, it was the dad's fault. And that movie triggered all of this.

[jonahsahn]

RE: Black, Gay, And Dating Outside Our Race FT. Darren Young 1st Openly Gay WWE Superstar

No doubt, if you’re here reading this, then you’ve already seen the video by Derrick Gordon (sorry to this man) featuring openly gay WWE super star Darren Young. 

In case you have not seen that video, I will summarize it for you here:

Two Gay Black Men spend half an hour talking about how they don’t find Black men attractive while simultaneously claiming that the qualities they find attractive in White and Asian men are universal qualities that can be found in all men, including Black men, but somehow arrive at the conclusion that they like what they like and that just happens to be non Black men, period... Don’t question it. 

The video starts off innocently enough. You have your “it’s ya boi” introduction, we get a bit of history about the guest; we get some touching stories about how being a Black gay man in the WWE can be a heroic position with regard to helping other gay men accepting who they are etc. 

Then, at right before 8 minutes, the subject comes up: Darren only dates Asians. Darren takes that opening to talk about his past relationship and how he is still able to work with his ex, a Puerto Rican/ Filipino person named Nikki, for a few minutes. 

Unrelenting and determined to get to the part where we talk about dating non Black folks, Derrick wrangles Darren back in at about 10:30 with: 

“what made you want to date only Asians? Why not white? Why not Black as well?... Why specifically only Asians?”

Darren responds that he dates anybody, but it wasn’t until he dated nikki that he came out. 

“He was my first Asian Experience... Filipino and Puerto Rican”

Now, earlier in the video, Darren says he’s not the sharpest knife in the drawer, and because of that, I’m questioning whether he believes that Puerto Ricans are Asian, but that’s beside the point. 

He goes on to say that he learned and continues to learn a lot about himself from his ex boyfriend on all sorts of issues ranging from transgender people to fashion to having patience with bringing issues up and talking about what he’s feeling... because it’s part of the culture... The Asian culture.... To talk about your feelings and not bottle it all up..... Side note, which asian culture is he talking about because just about every Asian I know, Filipinos included, my own family included, the families of my friends and loved ones included have issues with talking to each other. I digress... He says that this is part of the culture and why he is attracted to his Filipino (and by this time he’s just left out the Puerto Rican) boyfriend.

he cheers for couples that are interacial gay couples because that’s how it should be in our community. Then he says something weird about how they’re public figures and having their backs against the wall and having to share their own story and explain themselves; I’m assuming that’s the story of why they don’t date black men.... as public figures. Ok. 

The only problem is... They never really end up explaining themselves. By this point, we’re 13 minutes into the video and we still have a good 14 minutes to go. 

So after Darren talks about himself, Derrick is given the opportunity to “explain” himself. Out the gate he lists the names of famous Black gay men who are dating, have dated, or are married to White men, topping the list of with “Bobby Porter” who he really looks up to (He meant Billy Porter). I’ll let you decipher those tea leaves... 

He then goes on to name three white actors that he finds hot, Daniel Craig, Hugh Jackman and Robert Downey Junior.

Look, I’m all for the different strokes for different folks methodology of living your life. I too can be attracted to white men. That’s not the issue here. But just for the record, those three white men wouldn’t be the white men I’D be attracted to.  

Derrick cites the reason why he likes those three white men as “because they have a physically mature and masculine look...” Ok... “By all means I can look at someone black and say he’s handsome, but he does nothing for me sexually” to which Darren channels his inner Jada and Will Smith at the red table “likewise yes yes” as if what this man is saying is hitting on anything other than blatant self hate and antiblackness. 

I’ve spent too much time on this. Watch the video yourself and realize that you can like what you like without putting any other group down, but least of all the group that you represent. 

[jonahsahn]

Rice Queen Potato Queen

I have truly wanted to talk about this for a long time but I never had the first clue as to where I would begin. Even now, I’m not really sure how to begin tackling this huge subject or how to go about breaking it down.

But the longest journey starts with just the first step and so today I want to talk about Rice Queens, Potato Queens and how their nasty and vicious cycle impacts and affects my life, spirit, soul and very existence. 

And to be clear, MOST things have little to no impact on how I go about living my own life. I recognize that being able to say that comes with a mountain of privilege in and of itself, and I’ll save you the laundry list of privileges I’m talking about. 

Instead, I’ll start by defining the terms rice queen and potato queen for those of you who managed to click on this video out of sheer curiosity verses those of you who came to this video with your tea cups out and ready to receive this scalding chai matcha latte mix. 

So just really quickly: A rice queen is a person, who is usually but not limited to being white and specifically and almost exclusively only dates asian people. Thusly, a potato queen is an Asian person who solely and exclusively dates white people. 

There’s actually a documentary on youtube all about it if you want to check it out. Just search the term rice queen. I tried watching some of it for this very essay, but by god, I just can’t stomach it. 

“but why?” you might ask. Why are you so obsessed... why are you so in the business of who other people love? If you were trolling me, you might even say “you’re gay and there are plenty of people out there who don’t agree with who you love but you go on about your business and they kick rocks” right? 

Well if you’re reading/watching this on a friday, which there’s a one in seven chance that you are, then I can say “false equivalency friday!” If not, then it’s just a regular false equivalency. 

You see, because I’m Asian, more specifically, because I’m Filipino and was raised around hello Filipino and other Asian folks, growing up in southern California, and just because a whole bunch of them are so fucking attractive, I am attracted to Asian men. 

I feel like I I have to make that clear because white supremacy, which we will certainly address in more depth as this goes on, has tried to keep Asian men, both straight and gay, under its boot for the past few centuries by calling them feminine and undesirable.

So yeah, Asian men are a type of men that I’m completely into; rightfully so and very much within my right. But to be clear, I’m into all types of men; so let me stop you before you come at me with the “well I’m white and I’m into Asian men and you’re making a whole essay about me and that hurts my feelings” thing. 

So, because I’m into Asian men and because Rice Queens and Potato Queens, a match made in Heaven (or hell depending on your stance) have a dynamic that is so prevalent in gay society, along with the way Anti Blackness is set up, I, a person of Black and Asian descent, am often left out of the mix when it comes to who Gay Asian Men are willing to date. 

I don’t make this claim lightly at all. I have been waiting years to say something about this, and aside from maybe one public instagram post and a few rants dancing around the topic on instagram stories, which have all disappeared and no longer exist except in my personal archive, I have yet to speak directly and confidently about this; but it is a thing. It is SUCH a thing. 

And because it is such a thing, I’m often left out in the dust. While gaysian men everywhere are just living their lives and having their preferences which almost always exclusively lean toward white men, I’m on the side lines taking notes. 

When the topic is raised within gaysian communities, just so that you know I’m not the only one who complains about this; yes non rice queen gaysians take issue with rice queen gaysians as well; there will undeniably be that moment when one gaysian says to the rest of the group, either digitally or daringly in real life, that who one dates is none of anybody else’s business and that we  should all be able to like, love, have sex with or be attracted to whomever we desire.

We are, after all, individuals. 

But when you’re stuck on the sideline for so long. When person after person is seen with a white man, when white men who objectively do not look as good as you do KEEP on scooping up the guys; there is a problem. 

And just for this moment I want to remove the non rice queen gaysians from the equation as I was just using them as a way to show you that while I am mostly ranting about something that annoys me, this dynamic has an impact an entire other community within this LGBTQ community. Removing the non rice queen gaysians because they don’t have the added layer of Blackness that I do.

Let me stop those of you out there who are about to pounce on the fact that I’m attributing struggle to my Blackness: I love being Black and I wouldn’t change that for anything. 

That being said, it IS an added layer of challenge for ME when considering who to date where Asian folks are concerned. Not only do I have to ask myself “Is this gaysian a rice queen, I also have to ask are they a racist POS” as well. 

There’s a lot swirling around here and so I want to wrangle it all in while I’m on the note of my Blackness and talk to you about a little thing called White Supremacy and how it’s basically the cause of all of my woes and the driving force behind why potato queens prioritize white men when they could do so much better. 

That sounds harsh, but I challenge you to just pay attention to some of these couples; and I say some of because when I talk about looking better than these white men, I’m talking about those relationships that usually involve older white men and younger asians. 

There are entire organizations and circuits that have developed in the United States, devoted to enticing young immigrant gaysians with a promise of wealth and luxurious lifestyle by older white men. And plenty of gay asian men play into it. 

And while that is a conversation under the umbrella of both white supremacy and rice queen/ potato queen relationships, I do want to consider another vein of this same discussion; one that involves all parties, myself and people like myself included, being just around the same age and how white supremacy plays a roll in the decision making, where white men are concerned, of gay Asian immigrants’ as well as Americans of Asian descent. 

I feel like all of the puzzle pieces are there, but many of us involved in this conversation never spend enough time to actually put them together. I see plenty of Gay Asians who pontificate and preach about the oppression of Black and Brown people, but are dating white men and not realizing how their small contribution to this dynamic reinforces the grip of White Supremacy. 

Did they ever consider going on a date with a Black or Brown person? Or has the white beauty standard, which has tricked all of us, the entire world over, colonized their desires as well? 

Have potato queens had their heads buried in the sand so long that they truly cannot see how common it is to find a White/Asian couple whilst they chant “Black Lives Matter” at their local Gaysian collective meeting?

By now, I realize that my gripe is more with the Asians than it is with the White folks, because white folks gonna white folk. They’re going to continue to be mediocre in both the things that they can and can’t control and they’re still going to get rewarded for that mediocrity. 

I just wish that Gaysians would clock that, and do better. 

[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