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I have a completely 100% opposite perspective than the OP. I am Asian American but I was born and grew up in Louisiana outside of New Orleans and have always felt most comfortable in a small town, Southern, and conservative culture. I live around Baltimore now in a blue collar suburb that has a rednecky reputation and I am very comfortable here and have made friends quite easily. I AM the kind of person who listens to country music, goes to church, votes Republican every single time and I have a Confederate flag shirt and have a Confederate flag in my window. I don't really care about race or think about it much. However in terms of culturally and mentality wise I feel most out of place in
- Washington DC area
- New York
- New Jersey
- Los Angeles
I feel very alienated when I'm around the Prius, Whole Foods, Starbuck, North Face crowd. Some of them have openly looked down on me and made snide comments about my patronage of Walmart, Waffle House, and Cracker Barrell and about my wearing cammo pants at times. The interesting thing is while some Asians complain about being mistakened for foreigners or new immigrants I dont really remember that happening to me. Far more often is that I come across as so American that people are surprised I can speak Chinese fluently and I speak Chinese with my parents and older relatives. In fact, Asian values like having good vales and morals are simialr to small town Southern values, more so than the kind of culture in Long Island or New Jersey or the DC area.
And my family history, my ancestors fleeing from Communist China, also shapes a lot of my worldview and mentality to be honest and has a big deal to do with why I am a conservative Republican. THere is only one racist incident that remains sharply in my mind it was the most blatant racism I faced, and this was in Baltimore City. I was stopped at an intersection this was in the summertime and I had my windows down. This ghetto woman in the car next to me yelled at me after seeing my McCain-Palin bumper sticker and said that I should take it down because obama is president, and said "there is a black man in the White House now, if you got a problem with that you can go back to China."
I have a completely 100% opposite perspective than the OP. I am Asian American but I was born and grew up in Louisiana outside of New Orleans and have always felt most comfortable in a small town, Southern, and conservative culture. I live around Baltimore now in a blue collar suburb that has a rednecky reputation and I am very comfortable here and have made friends quite easily. I AM the kind of person who listens to country music, goes to church, votes Republican every single time and I have a Confederate flag shirt and have a Confederate flag in my window. I don't really care about race or think about it much. However in terms of culturally and mentality wise I feel most out of place in
- Washington DC area
- New York
- New Jersey
- Los Angeles
I feel very alienated when I'm around the Prius, Whole Foods, Starbuck, North Face crowd. Some of them have openly looked down on me and made snide comments about my patronage of Walmart, Waffle House, and Cracker Barrell and about my wearing cammo pants at times. The interesting thing is while some Asians complain about being mistakened for foreigners or new immigrants I dont really remember that happening to me. Far more often is that I come across as so American that people are surprised I can speak Chinese fluently and I speak Chinese with my parents and older relatives. In fact, Asian values like having good vales and morals are simialr to small town Southern values, more so than the kind of culture in Long Island or New Jersey or the DC area.
And my family history, my ancestors fleeing from Communist China, also shapes a lot of my worldview and mentality to be honest and has a big deal to do with why I am a conservative Republican. THere is only one racist incident that remains sharply in my mind it was the most blatant racism I faced, and this was in Baltimore City. I was stopped at an intersection this was in the summertime and I had my windows down. This ghetto woman in the car next to me yelled at me after seeing my McCain-Palin bumper sticker and said that I should take it down because obama is president, and said "there is a black man in the White House now, if you got a problem with that you can go back to China."
very interesting. are you for real? just joking.
I've always been aware of race and race dynamics, call it playing the race card if you want. But it's a reality in America. I'm an extremely American-ized Asian- dont even speak any Chinese- raised and have lived in the big west coast cities- traveled across America and internationally. I also am a fan of Cracker Barrel and am aware of some of its (racial) controversies in the past.
However, there is just this consciousness that comes up when I am in certain areas. It may just be my own racially-driven social construct playing up.
As a Puerto rican man born and raised in Philadelphia.. I felt somewhat out-of-place when I briefly lived in Baltimore.. I thought because Baltimore was so close to philly the two cities would be verryy similar.. but they werent that much similar.. in fact the only thing that these cities have in common was rowhouses.. I went from living in a city with a very large Puerto rican community to living in a city with very few Puerto ricans at all. I stuck out completly in Baltimore.
I'm European descent caucasian, I sometimes feel out of place in Philadelphia depending on where I am in the city. i definitely feel out of place in Camden though.
As a "human leopard" (i.e. orange hair and "spots" on white skin), it seems like people of all skin colors like to regularly make disparaging comments about my hair or my freckles, and often like to break my ribs for no apparent reason no matter where I am.
Detroit, East Cleveland, parts of San Francisco, parts of LA, and that's about it. Detroit and East Cleveland are overwhelmingly black, and people there often stare at me. In San Francisco, people often spoke different languages, for example I heard a lot of chinese there, and in LA I stopped for gas in a hispanic neighborhood.
Honestly it is SOME blacks that have really racialized Obama's election, along with the media and the liberal crowd in terms of having a "black president" etc. I have never cared and do not care about his skin color. That is the least of my worries. Even a small handful of people I've run into who ARE racialy prejudiced against Obama point out to his upbringing as a possible explanation to how he turned out. So it is not that they really hate him because of his background. Its that they hate him, and bring his background in as an explanation on how he became the way he is. I don't care how Obama became the way he is. I hate him for who he is now and for the things he has done as president I do not really care about where he was born or any of that debate.
Honestly it is SOME blacks that have really racialized Obama's election, along with the media and the liberal crowd in terms of having a "black president" etc. I have never cared and do not care about his skin color. That is the least of my worries. Even a small handful of people I've run into who ARE racialy prejudiced against Obama point out to his upbringing as a possible explanation to how he turned out. So it is not that they really hate him because of his background. Its that they hate him, and bring his background in as an explanation on how he became the way he is. I don't care how Obama became the way he is. I hate him for who he is now and for the things he has done as president I do not really care about where he was born or any of that debate.
Hate is a pretty strong word. Do you truly hate him as a person or do you just hate his views and what he has done as president? I thought George W was a horrible president. I hated just about everything he did as president sans his immigration policies. But I certainly never hated him as a person, I thought he was a good man just a God awful president.
I'm a 6'3/160 lbs, dark blonde haired, blue eyed, suntanned caucasian from the Netherlands.
Traveled a lot but the only cities I felt out of place were Colon, Panama + Cartagena, Colombia and some parts of Miami, USA and Tokyo, Japan.
Are you mixing city-data up with a dating site?
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just joking.
