As a child, I was taught that you should treat everyone with the same respect and kindness that you would want to receive, but as a female, I was taught that men, specifically Black men, always have bad intentions and to expect that they are up to trouble. This created a lack of trust in my mind between me and the male gender. An example of a repercussion of this is that when it comes to most guys, I have a massive personal space bubble around me and even without touching me, if you are standing within that imaginary bubble, I will automatically take a step back and start angling myself away from you even if I am talking to you. When it comes to females that personal space bubble automatically disappears. Even if I know that a specific girl is unreliable or a liar or thief, I don’t end up judging them as harshly. Additionally, this taught notion developed a lower standard of expectation for men as a whole. The crazy thing is that these two ideas that were conceived from the same idea are so contradicting. Despite the fact that I have higher expectations for women, I get less mad knowing they have failed to meet my expectations of what it means to be a morally good human being. This may be associated as well as enforced by the fact that in my household, my dad straight out refuses to contribute in many ways. I will to my face say no if I ask him to spend time with me in small ways as in going for a walk around the block or even going to the grocery store with me. I actually asked him earlier this year what his problem is. Why doesn’t he want to spend time with his own daughter, but if my mom was to ask the same question 2 seconds later there was about a 60% higher chance that he would say yes without hesitation. His response was “That’s my wife. You’re my kid” He simply did not care at all about the way I felt. Even though he is a little more willing to do things for others when it comes to my mom, making decisions off emotion is not ingrained into him as it is in me. In addition to this selfish nature, he can't multitask very well. In his words, he, "only has a certain amount of brain power and attention, so he must focus all his energy on one thing. Therefore, if you ask him to do a task for you while he is stressed it usually ends with a reluctant answer and you feeling that it would be less disruptive if you tried to do the task without involving him. Coupled with a temper that can be triggered easily by specific things, I feel that a precedent was set in my head that there is a consequence for upsetting a man and that it was my job as a female to deal with it in a calm, ladylike manner, just as my mom did.
Outside of the household, there is a very prominent idea in my family’s religion of Hinduism that the female’s main role is to take care of the men. Even in our Americanized family that emigrated from Fiji, if you attend even one house party, you will see very quickly and clearly the roles that everyone plays. For example, usually, the men all sit around the pool table talking about whatever is going on in their life like their jobs or medical problems, while the women are consistently in the kitchen either preparing setting up or packing up the food. There is almost no time during the party they simply relaxing and sitting down. When it’s time to eat, the men continue to sit while the women take out food for the men and serve them. I feel that this is a large contribution to why I have such a hate when I am associated as Indian because this idea is something I am heavily against. If I am forced to bring food to the elder men, I feel so out of place and uncomfortable even though I grew up in that role.
Deeply ingrained in me from my mom is the idea that no one will ever stop me from doing anything I want to do. So every time I get a gut feeling that a new Indian family member I meet, or any person for that matter, assume I am someone who passively sits there and lets anyone, regardless of what sex they are, have any control over me, I make it very clear that no one controls me. I make my own decisions and no one tells me what to do. I may take someone's advice, or do something for another person out of kindness, but it is my decision to do so. Even if I run the risk of coming off as a spoiled brat, I feel there is no option. I must show that I am not like the others.
As it states in the diagram from the Cycle of Socialization article, often as a result of the first socialization in combination with institutional and cultural socialization, one can feel self-hatred. I definitely identify with this idea every single day of my life from the moment that I wake up to the second I go to sleep. It’s not an “I hate my life” self-hate. It's an "I hate who I was born" self-hate. As I speak to myself in my head and even out loud, I perceive myself to be white, but the second my hands come into view and I see the tan complexion of my skin I automatically feel disappointed. In all honesty, I have tried everything from exfoliating my skin once a day to lightning lotions and soaps that would chemically burn my skin leaving scabs on my face.
