2. How did we get here?
Resources:
Corrective note: Phuong references the Beyonce song “Flawless”, where Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s voice is sampled in the beginning. Even though Beyonce does indeed preach sexual freedom, the phrase about “how we teach girls to be less sexual than boys” is attributed to Adichie. The full quote can be found in her book “We Should All Be Feminists”, and is referenced in her TedTalk of the same title.
Transcript:
Phuong: Why were we fighting our asses off for people -- who would not care about us? They would dispose of us and our souls for one corn chip!
[Theme music starts to play in the background]
Lapis: You know you can’t just sacrifice supporting antiracism because you want to fit in...From this -- to being full out anti-feminist by the time I was thirteen, fourteen.
P: -- And now, as a twenty year old, you are a trans woman who’s a leftist.
P: Welcome to The Rising Roses!
L: A podcast that deconstructs concepts and reconstructs stories.
P: We are your hosts --- Phuong
L: and Lapis!
[Theme music ends]
[Recording beep]
P: One of the first questions I asked about politics was to my father, when I was around eight or so? I asked him what communism meant. It was a very big question for an eight-year-old, but I heard it thrown around a lot, especially in reference to the country I came from, Vietnam, right? And I was like, so, I don’t really know what this word means. For a long time my father was a huge influence over my politics, a huge influence over my perspective. Because you know, he really reinforced the idea of moderate, slow changes achieved through working within the system because the system is too powerful to work against. That was kind of the primary idea that was given to me from a very young age [L: Mmm]. And even in the ways that he taught me to interact with my teachers -- I think this ties in very well with the Model Minority Myth and how Asian people as a whole are regarded and treated on a societal level. We’re always told, you guys are the good ones, you follow the rules, you put your head down [L: One of the good ones] and you work hard -- and we are touted as the success in the American dream, or the Canadian dream of coming to North America with nothing, and the rags-to-riches story. But that’s not really true--
L: Built into that idea is that there are those who haven't done that [P: Yes] and why are they not following your example.
P: Exactly. And we have been weaponized against Black people, against Indigenous people, against other communities of colour who are seen as bad minorities, right? My father reinforced this a hundred percent in my upbringing. He told me if I disagree with a teacher -- I should raise my hand and say it in the most polite way possible and not make any trouble. I was taught to always follow authority and to always respect those who were making the rules. That was what I was taught. I was never taught to question or hold authority figures accountable. The way it was framed to me was “You could have your own opinion, you can disagree with authority, but you should never question that authority.” Like, that authority exists regardless of whether you agree with it or not, you know? Like it was never given to me as an option -- that I could simply just not defer to that authority. That I could simply create something else of my own.
L: No, authority is what authority does.
P: Exactly. And the kind of life that I grew up in was surrounded by that very liberal mindset of “Yes everyone has individual beliefs, yes everyone is free to love who they are.” Like my -- my parents were very socially liberal. They were like “We don't care if -- if you're gay, whatever, as long as you're happy.” Which was again, admittedly a great thing to grow up in, I won’t deny the benefits of that. The very evident con of that is they never questioned things structurally. I never learned about a structural analysis framework -- to look at patterns. To look at things beyond myself. It was always -- You’re happy as an individual? You're safe as an individual? That’s all that matters. That’s all we need to think about.
L: Mmhmm, that is a very different experience than what I had with my parents. My mother was a communist in the 1980s in a heavily conservative suburb on the west coast in Vancouver. Now that is not exactly the ideal neighbourhood to be a far lefist. And as a result, she picked up some very interesting opinions about, you know, the people she was living with. And so, I kind of grew up with the idea that suburbs are hell on Earth, they are full of intolerant racist White people and you should basically be the opposite of the suburban mindset. And then on the other hand, we have my dad who grew up in an extremely conservative small town. That for the longest time -- and I think it still does-- paid its teachers the least in the entire province. Some of his political background growing up was the teachers in Brockville demanding a small pay increase and the city refusing, and then just waiting until the teachers starved on their strike in order to come back to work. So -- not exactly a very, you know, good start, per se.
L: One thing I want to point out about my parents is that both of their parents were atheists and they both found religion, so that is an interesting thing about them. It kind of went the reverse from what normal people do, where it’s their grandparents that were staunchly religious then the parents became atheist, and then the children are atheists. Instead, it was the grandparents staunchly atheist, parents become religious, and their children are kind of left to muddle in the middle. My dad eventually had, I guess, a better outlook --- I'd say that it's pretty easy to have a better outlook than the one that he grew up with-- but he did. I’d say that he is probably your standard like, nineties liberal, in the sense that “oh yes social liberty for everyone but also the free market isn’t that great, that's a wonderful thing that we have here in Canada, and everywhere in the world should have the free market.” But, also you know, very critical of American foreign policy and just America in general. And supportive of stuff like, universal health care, so kind of a weird mix.
L: And my mother experimented with liberalism in the nineties, decided that it wasn't for her and then went back to being a socialist. So generally, she has pretty good politics except her feminism was very much in the second wave, because she became a feminist in the early eighties instead of the late eighties when intersectionality and sex positivity and pro sex work stuff started to come into feminism -- become the mainstream. Her kind of feminism is grounded a lot more in the pornography is bad for women and not really understanding of -- oh yeah well what about the struggles of Women of Colour? What about the struggles of Indigenous people? What about the struggles of trans people? How does this intersect with feminism? No, instead it's very much more rooted in the second wave “Ugh, aren't sex and men bad?”. Which is strange, because she married a man and had to have sex three times in order to have three kids, so I'm not really sure how she manages to figure out that one, but it works somehow. [P laughs] Basically my main inculcating ideas growing up were “Men bad, America bad.” [P: Very interesting] The second one is pretty good, the first one is debatable. [L laughs]
P: I mean -- I would say both have their strengths but of course, un-nuanced. I definitely grew up with kind of the opposite. Coming from a family who had lived through the worst of what a Communist regime was, from a very young age I was taught that communism was just simply something that didn't work. That it was a nice idea, that it was great to think of, but the world is a selfish and bad place, and even though the free market isn’t great either -- it's a lesser of two evils. That’s really what I was taught from a very young age -- was that the world -- there was no such thing as “good”, only a “less bad” essentially. And even though America was bad, it was better than Vietnam, anything was better than Vietnam. Anything was better than the place we came from [L: Mmm]. So for me, it was very much the attitude of “Sure, Canada's not perfect, sure America’s perfect, and they have their grievances, but -- at least it’s democratic. At least I can say things without being jailed right away. At least I can walk around and hold hands with a woman and not immediately be thrown in jail.”
P: It was kind of like the, whataboutism of like “Well, at least -- [L: Lesser of two evils], -- “yes, but what about Vietnam? What about China? What about all these other bad Communist countries? How could you say, or how could you critique capitalism and democracy the way you do Phuong? We have brought you to this country because of the horrible things that other nations have done”. It was a very binary -- the world is either democratic or undemocratic. You were either communist or free market capitalist, right? There was no in between, there was no like “What if we adopted socialism to modern ideas? Or like, what if we adopted, you know, certain ideas of democracy to fit our current definition. There was no type of negotiation between what you could and couldn’t adopt [L: Yeah] It was one or the other [P claps]. And of course, if I was taught that communism was this evil thing that took away people's resources, that made people starve, that put people in a time of hardship -- [transition music starts in background] well of course it doesn’t sound like a great idea to me, right? Like of course I was like “Well, it certainly doesn’t sound great.”
[Transition music plays for a couple of seconds]
L: Yeah and then the other big influence was, of course, Christianity [P: Huh, of course], ‘cause started going to church around five. So that brought a lot of you know, ideas of Christian morality. And I never really picked up “anti-gay” -- even though the church that-- that is right next to my house was extremely anti-gay, [P: You told me] like fervently anti-gay. But the church that I went to was always, you know, quite socially liberal. But I think even if it hadn't been--- I always had kind of the idea that there was nothing wrong with that. I don't know where I got that idea, [P: That's amazing] it could just be that my parents were kind of, of a liberal ideation and I picked it up from them. But whenever there were people in my life that were like “Oh no yeah, there's something kind of like wrong with gay people” -- No, no, we should treat them equally, there’s nothing wrong with being gay. Unfortunately I wish I could say I had that same enlightened idea about race, but WHOO did I have some very very bad opinions. [P: Yeah that’s relatable] Especially when I was, say I don't know, nine through thirteen I was probably the worst of it. I don't blame my parents for that because they, you know, they did as best as they could to push back on the ideas I was sprouting about you know like “You know, maybe it's not that bad for Indigenous people. Or maybe what's going on for them is their own fault or something, [P: Mmm] or oh why do we have affirmative action that's -- that’s basically racism again, [P: Oh Lord...] and so they would strive to push back on the toxic stuff.
L: And honestly, I think I mainly picked it up from other friends of mine. Who were going -- older friends of the family, and then I just kind of picked up on those sorts of ideas from them. And then it was also because I felt -- like a part of it was -- this is gonna sound super weird. But I wanted to fit in with a lot of the people in my school, and so since a lot of people were saying these things about Indigenous people -- even though I started off being, like really supportive of Indigenous people. This was in grade six, and I wrote a letter with as much enthusiasm as I could to try and convince Stephen Harper. I know this is kind of a weird liberal idea [P: Yeah I remember, I remember this] of getting kids to write letters to Stephen Harper to tempt him to be less racist, [P: Oh Lord...] but I put as much as I could into it. Like, “Okay, how can I really convince Stephen Harper not to be a racist?” and I was really really passionate. But as everyone around me was saying all these things about Indigenous people, I'm like is it not good to support Indigenous people? Am I doing something wrong here? And it resulted in me being so inculcated into the ideas that I actually, like, ripped up a field trip paper that was supposed to be to go to a pro-Indigenous march downtown [P: Yeah you told me]. I like, literally ripped it up and waited in the office for three hours --even though I knew it would be extremely boring -- for my mum to pick me up, because I really really didn’t want to go. Because I wanted to signal that “Hey I'm with the rest of the people in my class, I agree with them.”
L: Because, you know, for the longest time, I had been really badly bullied, but it's still no excuse. There was this -- you know, you can’t just sacrifice supporting anti-racism because you want to fit in. [P laughs] It’s a really weird idea that I had [P: Yeah, yeah...]. Uhm, but I think it's really worth, you know, paying attention to that -- it doesn’t necessarily have to be teachers or your parents who inculcate you into these ideas. Because my parents and teachers -- I remember them being pretty strongly anti-racist, especially in elementary school and even in high school too so, I thought they did a really good job with trying to educate people about these issues. [P: Right] It was really just friends of the family. And when it came to my anti-feminist phase, because of course I had one, I learned about it from the internet. I'm like “Oh I watched this really horrible video.” I think it was like Potty Mouth Princess or something like that [P: Yes] where there was these-- a bunch of women [P: Yes I remember that] in a dress swearing and then they’re like “Give money to our organization by buying these clothes.” I saw that I'm like “Wait this is what feminism is supposed to be?” I went completely against it because of all of the propaganda I was hearing online from all of these people.
L: And I think part of it was at the time -- I have to push back against the femininity that I have in myself -- because it's confusing and I don't want it, ahh! Someone tell me why this, and you know, why am I feeling this way-- no no I'm actually a very manly person, you can see because I am anti-feminist.”And also it was kind of pushback against my mother’s like second-wave feminist ideas, which I felt were wrong -- but I didn't really know how to articulate how they were wrong in a right way at that moment, so I went to another bad idea [P: Yeah...] . And then I just found it so interesting because I was going through my papers in grade five, and I realized I had written this whole essay about how women are better than men [L Laughs] [P: Very intriguing!]. It's just like -- how could I go from this when I was ten -- to being full out anti-feminist by the time I was thirteen, fourteen.
P: And now as a twenty year old, you’re a trans woman who’s a leftist. That's quite a journey --
L: I know, it’s -- [P: That’s quite a roller coaster!] I would describe my political life as a massive roller coaster that just shifts and turns and goes in bizarre directions that are not good for me or anybody else. [P: Yeah]
[Transition music for a couple of seconds]
P: Something that Hollywood likes to trick us -- is that change happens in a blink of an eye. The girl takes down her hair, takes off her glasses, puts on lip gloss and suddenly -- she's a model you know? The guy brings his boombox outside your yard and suddenly goes from the douchebag that rejected you to like, someone who's trying to win back your heart. Change happens instantaneously and that’s just not true real life, right? I can't remember when was the moment that I shifted because it happened so slowly, it happened with every new piece of information I got. It happened with every question that I asked myself about my beliefs and where I stood. And it kind of slowly brought me to where I was today. But I will definitely say -- there was one moment that fundamentally challenged everything that I was taught from my childhood. It was when I went to Kuujjuaq when I was fifteen years old and I did the exchange with Canadian Roots, an organization that facilitates trips with Indigenous and non-Indigenous youth to kind of see how the other person lived.
P: The Kuujjuaq youth came here, they came down to Ottawa and I went to Kuujjuaq. And that was the first time that I saw Canada that was not the Canada that was shown to me my whole childhood. It was the first time I saw with my own eyes, the fact that there were people living in conditions that were far worse than any I could imagine. Not only that, but the fact that it was their land to have begin with, right? I think that’s what really stuck with me, was the reality that oh, everything I was taught in history about “Oh like, Europeans and Indigenous people working together” was false. And that everything that we had gained and everything we had built came from a willful and purposeful subjugation. And that was what really opened my mind, I think for the first time -- was that experience when I was fifteen. And then everything else kind of slowly came after in waves. I would say my journey is less of a roller coaster than yours, I think mine was more like spinning teacups? Oh it went from a spinning tea cup to like one of those towers where you know, like you go up and then you drop down. But then I've been on that tower since, I don't think I've really gone through as many twists and turns as you [P: laughs].
P: I don't think I ever had an anti-feminsit phase. I had the opposite, I fell into the performative aspect very fast. I was doing it because I wanted to be a good person -- so the opposite of you. You know, how everyone around you was pressuring you to go against your instinctive beliefs of equality. For me, it was, I didn't necessarily know what I was talking about, it just sounded good. It just made me sound like a good person cause everyone else around me was doing it. Everyone on ~Tumblr~ was doing it. I was like oh, well, I guess this is how you be a good person -- you just loudly proclaim that boys are annoying and that they should learn to respect girls, and that the world is a horrible place, and I shall be the one to fix it. That was me prior to the age of fifteen, it was not a good time. [L: Mhmm]
[Transition swoosh]
L: Before I had a good woke phase, I had a bad woke phase as well, [P: Yes...] and as Phuong remembers. One of the biggest moments for me I'd say was watching or, like, hearing about the Iraq war from my parents [P: Mmhm] and just hearing them talk about how horrible it was -- and how horrible Bush was. All of these things about torture, and it was just like, a lot for someone who is really young at the time like four, five, six. In my mind, that ingrained idea --when America goes abroad horrible things happen to other people-- and America is the main demon in this world. Invading other people and making their lives miserable. And I remember I was visiting in the States, in Florida --and I was so surprised how anyone could think that George W. Bush was a good person-- and that they didn't know about what was going on in Guantanamo Bay. And I was just blown away by it-- I’m like “Oh my goodness, all these people in America they’ve been brainwashed.” I just -- I saw it as the worst thing that I had ever seen. And that kind of blinded me from necessarily being able to look at how Canada was also complicit in a lot of the things that America was doing in other countries. Canada participated in Afghanistan. Canada sells weapons all over the world, thanks to Trudeau in part -- also to Saudi Arabia.
L: All of this kind of made me have a really simplistic and bad understanding of foreign policy and of how the world worked. And I didn't really see that there could be anything wrong, in countries that had been a victim of this sort of thing -- because you know it was all justified what they were doing. Because oh I mean, look at who they're fighting it's America. Of course they have to adopt these measures. America is evil, you know? I’d think “Wow, the government of Vietnam is really cool because they were against America,” or “Wow the government of Cuba they're a really great model of socialism because they've been fighting America.” All of these countries I just began to see as well, they're opposed to America, so there must be something good to them. And if America's against them, so there must be a secret good side that everyone’s not seeing. Because we need to get both sides of the story.
L: I remember that happened when Russia invaded Crimea. I was like “Well this used to be Russian territory back in the 1960s”. And maybe this whole referendum business -- well the Russian media says that this referendum business was accurate. The Western media says that it wasn't. Maybe the truth is somewhere in between. I had all of these ideas about how the “real problem” always had to be the West. It could never ever be anywhere else -- it always originated in the West. And more specifically, America. As a result, I had this really weird tendency to kind of idealize countries that I had never visited, I didn't know very much about. But because they were opposed to America -- “Hey I'm going to praise all of their leaders, I'm going to adopt the aesthetics of these countries”.
L: Uhm, and for people who actually had lived in these countries and gone through what they were actually like -- that was not a fun time being around me, because they were just seeing someone who was parroting the state department talking points of their own nations. And who was absolutely failing to apply the critical lens that they had applied to America --and in part their own country-- to countries that they had lived in. And as a result it was extremely frustrating to have to deal with me, I'd imagine, because I was constantly engaging in basically what amounted to propaganda for the other side.
P: Yeah wow, I do remember that, ‘cause that’s when I became friends with you. And I'm sure it was as equally annoying to hear me prattle on about the-- how men were so messed up and how cultural appropriation is so bad. And when someone is like “Hey Phuong, and what about that time that you wrote an entire poem from the perspective of people who weren't yours? I was like “Ahah.. ahah..I can't read suddenly, I don't know.” [L: I’m such a good ally, I don’t see it] Right? Exactly, I’m like “What are you talking about? I am #woke, I did nothing wrong, I can do no wrong because clearly I have good intentions,” right? So like, I definitely concede it must have been equally as annoying for you to have to interact with me -- a person who was ignoring the impacts of her words. Actually by talking to you, it also showed me the ways in which I was also spitting out propaganda, right? But for the opposite, for the West, and the ways in which I grew up with a highly critical lens of communist countries or communist regimes and the kind of, dictatorships.
P: But faced with the hypocrisy of you know, the West’s regimes and their uh, failings, I would look away or I would justify it as “Well at least it's not as bad as dictatorships in China, in Vietnam”, right? So in and of itself, I think we both were just spitting out propaganda for the other side if you will, right? [L: Mmhm] Like here you had who were so staunchly like “Oh, let me imitate the talking points of the VCP, essentially.” [L laughs] And here I was, like, not to the level of Fox News, of course, but here I was being like MSNBC, CNN like “America or Canada, greatest country in the world, of course, we have our failings, but at least we’re not Russia am I right?” And I think it was of a nice fate that we met each other, so we could both realize both sides were shit!
L: Hey, we’re both reciting propaganda, aren’t we? [L laughs]
P: Yes, that too! Yes, we kind of woke that up in each other. And I think that, that was also integral in my politics shifting. I definitely became more lefist ‘cause I met you, and you stopped being an annoying tankie because you met me. And I definitely think that [L: Yes] that is for the better -- that we have reached the place we have now. [P and L laugh]
[Transition swoosh]
P: I think we both realized, in and of effect, these two regimes we were fighting so hard for -- they were both sides of the same coin! They were both crap.
L: Yes, and both of them were awful in many of the same ways!
P: That too! That too, and that they would dispose of us and our souls for one corn chip! You know that meme of like the bird saying “I would sell your soul to satan for one corn chip”? Like both these countries would do that. So why were we fighting our asses off for people who would not care about us, right?
L: Also the cognitive dissonance got exposed a little [P: Yeah, fully]. All of the things that you were ignoring to justify our Awww [angelic sound] of one particular side [P: Haha, for sure] wasn’t worth it anymore. And we began to see the cracks in our way of thinking.
P: And we both agreed that, it was not about countries against each other. It was the people versus their country. It's always been the people versus the state, it didn’t matter which state. It was that they were willing to dispose of their people to hold on to their power by any means necessary [L: Yes]. And so now, as people, as a person, from one to another --as friends-- we were like “We now have a common enemy.” It is no longer each other. [L: Mmhm] We’ve realized that divided us for a reason and they have made us think this way so that we would not form solidarity with each other. And that we would not question both of these respective forms of statehood.
L: And you know, there was nothing that we could think of beyond what the state propaganda had delivered to us [P: Exactly] whatever state that was. It prevented us from actually thinking for ourselves, and articulating what our vision of the world was. What our vision of what these countries are doing was. It was instead, you know, it had to be a lukewarm version of somebody else's ideas.
[Transition music plays for a couple of seconds]
L: One last thing I will say is that you also help me shake off my weird anti-feminism/pro-life/anti-sexwork/anti-pornography[P: Wow]/anti-sex in general. That was a weird thing that I had. That one probably came a bit from Christianity, and also my mom having these ideas [P: Right] about what women were like.
L: We were walking down Florida one day, and there was all of these, you know, women wearing just like, bathing suits and my mom was like “I think it's really sad that they feel like they have to walk around like sluts.” I’m like oh, is that what it is, you know, women who wear revealing clothing they're not making a choice for themselves, they're trying to appease somebody else. It was such a sad mentality -- that no one could ever enjoy sex because they wanted to. No, it had to be the desires of some other person. And basically, whenever people were speaking out about their own experiences about abortion or sex or what have you, no, it's always some sort of phantasm.
L: The real truth is something only you can discern for yourself, not what other people tell you so basically -- “Don't listen to other people's voices, listen to what you think of the other people. Listen to your judgments of others.” And that is a really unhealthy way to look at the world --and thanks to you and the conversations I had with other people-- I realized that being judgemental was something that didn't help other people and it didn't help me either.
P: Yeah, I could feel like you were a good person with good intentions. And before when people have disagreed with me it was always -- they just simply didn't think that equality was important. And I was very used to being very angry and being very frustrated, and just kind of yelling my points without actually explaining what they were. And you also taught me how to approach people with good intentions but just might be misinformed, and how to approach people who could be on my side, who were still on my side. But just had like, misconceptions of things, right? So I think you also taught me something very important about that.
P: And that's why when you -- when I heard your anti sex-worker beliefs, I recognized that “Wait this is something I could have very easily believed, I could have bought into if I didn't stumble across the same sources I did, if I didn't -- I’m not even kidding to you. If I hadn’t listened to that Beyonce album [L laughs] when I was thirteen years old. Where she told me “We teach girls to be less sexual than boys” and I was like, “Wait a minute we do, that’s messed up right? If I literally didn't listen to the gospel Beyonce at the age of thirteen, I would not have made that connection too. So I thought if I just did-- if I just sat down and spread the word of Beyonce to you in a way that was reasonable and calm, maybe you would listen -- and maybe we could come to a compromise.
[Theme music in the background]
L: Up next, we’ll discuss our aims for the Rising Roses and for ourselves.
L: Both of us are constantly learning. [Theme music starts to fade out] Just because we have a podcast it does not mean we are the gurus of leftism.
P: Exactly, exactly. And that's what I tried to promote on my Instagram page too. That this Instagram page isn’t just to raise awareness to the immediate people in my life, this Instagram page is to hold myself accountable. It’s to hold a record of the things that I’ve said, and the things that I’ve tried to do --and it is as much an invitation for other people to come onto this journey with me-- as it is me introducing and opening up this journey for other people, right?
P: Like once I’ve opened the door for you I want you to come with me. I don't want you to, you know, barrel your way through without me -- but I also don't want you to take it as me always leading the way, yeah.
L: Yeah like we have to drag you like a deadweight through the door.
P: Yeah, oh my gosh yes. Like you're like a pesky toddler that wouldn't listen at the aisles of a grocery store, you know? Like we are not here to parent you, we are here to stand beside you and support you. As a friend and in solidarity. But we are not here to babysit you. You have to walk on your own two legs still. [P laughs]
P: Something I've been personally working on is just limiting my time on social media. Which sounds counterintuitive, ‘cause that's where I get most of my information-- that’s where I get most my resources-- but I noticed in myself-- the more I spend on social media, the less I spend reading books, the less I spend donating money, the less I spend actually doing the offline work that I so passionately speak about, right? To do offline work more, it makes logical sense to limit my time online. So I've been trying really hard to delete my apps and social media --and just go through the day seeking out resources in other ways --
L: But of course, that doesn’t mean you should Spotify and stop listening to us! No!
P: Yes, yes of course, that’s not what I meant! I just meant take breaks from Instagram and stop scrolling through the explore page, that's what I meant. But yeah, please listen to us, [P and L laugh] we’re trying our best!
[Transition swoosh]
P: I just wanted to hear what you were working on, since I was telling you something I’ve been personally working on to try and do better.
L: Oh, this is so intimidating [P: Yeah]. Uhm, let’s see. Knowing the functions that are going on in my personal community. [P: That’s a good one] Not going on in the world, in Canada, my personal community. And going to them and making my presence felt. Being there for the people in my community who need me. And not just you know, kind of likeYes, good things, I'm in favour of good things” on social media. And being too exhausted and apathetic to do anything else.
L: No! I think of it as like a reorientation. I am moving away from pursuits where it's, just you know, yes it gets me validation in forms of likes and retweets, but it doesn't actually do anything material for the people who need it. Reorienting myself from that kind of activism and one that is more centred in the physical and the visible and the material.
P: One hundred percent, I definitely agree and that's something-- I mean you articulated it a hundred times better than me-- but that's what I meant and was trying to do by spending less time online. I understand that people have their own limitations, you know. That people -- especially in this time of pandemic, it's harder to go out, it's harder to kind of participate physically. [L: Yes] But as you say, materially, right? Sending a donation online you can do from your own home, watching a documentary you can do from your own home. Reading a book that's free on a PDF, you can do from your own home. Literally they're so many things you can do right? And as you say that type of action does so much more than just scrolling or posting .
L: Thank you for joining us for this episode of The Rising Roses.
P: In the next episode of The Rising Roses…
P: Perhaps something, maybe we would both like is to not just have our names known by the people in our lives, but to have our names reflected in the official documents that we are forced [L: Mmhm] to use.
L: Yeah, legally recognized and not have our reality constantly questioned by the “higher authorities”. [P: Yeah]
[Theme music continues to play]
P: Be sure to check out our website, www.therisingroses.ca for show notes and other resources.
L: This episode was produced and edited by Vu Hai Nguyen
P: The theme music was composed by Oscar Abley
L: All other sounds are from zapslap.com
L: Cover art was designed by Bridjet Lee
P: Until next time!
[Theme music fades out]
[Recording beep]
L: I have to say I hate the spinning teacup it is — it is torture device.
P: It is really weird, I don’t understand why it’s marketed towards children. It is very strange and it’s kind of scary having a teacup with a face just spinning around when you’re inside it. It’s kind of whack if you think about it…
L: I went in one of those when I was seven or something [P: Yeah] and I felt sick for days, bleugh! [P: Haha, oh my gosh]
