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I've been talking to some diaspora lately about the meaning MDZS holds for them, the ways in which interacting with MDZS can be a deeply painful experience, and how that pain can be exacerbated by fandom experiences. https://twitter.com/ShuFlyPie26/status/1340107098168860672?s=19
A common theme I've observed across a lot of the diaspora I know is the sense of... having at some point shunned Chinese culture, language, or heritage, and thus becoming alienated from it, only to regret it later.
For a lot of the western diaspora, the shunning seems to come from a young age as a response to racism, basically out of a wish to integrate fully and be accepted by others. They reject the parts of themselves that make them an Other in society.
For me, and for it seems a lot of other queer AFAB Asian diaspora, I feel that after coming to terms with my sexuality, I started to shun my culture because of the ways I was told that I did not belong in this culture as a queer, non-binary feminist.
And across all of us, at some point afte becoming alienated from our culture... We realized that we didn't really fit into the space outside of our culture as well. For western diaspora, there seems to be the realization that after shedding one's culture, one still feels Othered.
For some of us queer Asian diaspora, we got involved in online western queer spaces, only to feel alien and overlooked in those spaces. The discourse is always focused on problems that are outside our social sphere and removed from our social and political context.
That's when the regret sinks in, when you realize you've become alienated from your culture, and now you don't know how to return to it.
I feel in a lot of ways, MDZS fandom has become a space in which diaspora can "come home". It is a vehicle for us to reconnect with culture.
I feel in a lot of ways, MDZS fandom has become a space in which diaspora can "come home". It is a vehicle for us to reconnect with culture.
But interacting with MDZS as a work, reconnecting with culture becomes a deeply painful and vulnerable process, because in reconnecting with your culture, you are forced to confront your alienation from culture. You are forced to confront how much you've lost or thrown away.
Fandom exacerbates this.
Firstly, as Chinese people in a Chinese fandom, we are constantly being asked to reproduce cultural knowledge for non-Chinese audiences who are seeking to better understand the work.
Firstly, as Chinese people in a Chinese fandom, we are constantly being asked to reproduce cultural knowledge for non-Chinese audiences who are seeking to better understand the work.
However, in the process of reproducing this knowledge, we are AGAIN forced to confront our alienation from culture. When we are asked questions we do not know the answer to, we are forced to confront how we've been alienated from culture.
Occasionally we are asked to reproduce knowledge on philosophies or religions that we have knowledge of, but have not?? Grown up being immersed in it?? I can tell you a lot about Chinese New Year from the perspective of someone who does celebrate it.
But I don't celebrate Qing Ming for example, so while I can tell you the facts of it, what it's about and what people usually do to celebrate it— I am acutely aware that I lack the lived experience of ACTUALLY celebrating it. That can be painful sometimes.
I feel you grow to shun culture because you conceive of it of "bad", something to be shed rather than celebrated and treasured. Being in MDZS fandom for a lot of people is the first time others are making you feel that your culture IS something to be celebrated and treasured.
It excites us and makes us want to be "good hosts", to provide cultural knowledge when asked, to invite others to connect with this culture with us.
But a lot of emotional labor goes into being good hosts, into explaining culture. As said, the process can be extremely painful.
But a lot of emotional labor goes into being good hosts, into explaining culture. As said, the process can be extremely painful.
Secondly, when our cultural knowledge is devalued, or when non-Chinese people erase our culture and impose their own on it, it feels as if a message is being sent that: "No, I am not here to celebrate and treasure your culture. I'm not here to share in this experience with you."
"I'm just here for the story, but unfortunately, for me to understand this story, I need you to explain your culture to me. I just want to know enough to write my fic / understand the novel. I am not interested in you, your feelings, or the rest of your culture."
I produce cultural threads. I also tweet a fair bit about cultural erasure and diaspora issues. I have recently seen unhappy sentiments expressed about me by a non-chinese person that they followed me for the cultural threads, not cultural erasure discourse.
I am not here at your convenience to dispense cultural knowledge so I can desperately to convince you to be interested in my culture.
I am a person undergoing a personal journey, one I am sharing with you because it brings me joy and wonder, and I hope it can bring you joy too.
I am a person undergoing a personal journey, one I am sharing with you because it brings me joy and wonder, and I hope it can bring you joy too.
For some, these dismissive attitudes reproduces the painful social reality that caused us to shun our culture in the first place, in the very space where we are trying to learn to love our culture again, in the ONLY place we've found where we can learn to love our culture again.
For me, I have spent the last 9 years (since coming to terms with my sexuality) drifting away from my culture and in a lot of ways from my religion, and my mom. I was raised in a pretty traditional way by my mom, but I now don't remember a lot of what she taught me.
Being confronted with "I don't remember anymore" is extremely painful because I've grown to regret it. I regret that I let bigoted people in my culture drive me away from it, and convince me that people like me do not have a place in Chinese culture, language, media, and society.
Discovering MDZS was wondrous for me, it was like finding a promised land where I finally have a place in Chinese culture, language, media, and society. Here, I get to reconnect with my culture alongside other queer diaspora, other people who are like me.
It has helped me to come to terms with both my queer identity and my Chinese identity, and it is helping me to reconcile the two, and also reconnect with my mom.
That's why MDZS fandom is a deeply meaningful place for a lot of diaspora, and especially for me.
That's why MDZS fandom is a deeply meaningful place for a lot of diaspora, and especially for me.
All my life, I feel like I've been chased from place to place. Wherever I've settled, I've felt alien and shunned, ostracized. In every place, after a short time, I've had to pack up and leave to look for a place I could belong. I've been constantly displaced.
Now that I've found this place, I don't want to let other people take away the wonder and joy I've felt at being here. This is the place I've been searching for all my life, the place where I finally belong. This place was meant for me.
That's all I wanted to say. I am going to log out of main again.
If there are other diaspora who would like to share your journey with reconnecting with culture, I'd love to hear it. If you reply to THIS tweet, I will get a notif from my private account. @asideoftrashpl2
If there are other diaspora who would like to share your journey with reconnecting with culture, I'd love to hear it. If you reply to THIS tweet, I will get a notif from my private account. @asideoftrashpl2
I want to return to the sense of wonderment I felt when I first discovered and read MDZS in December 2018. So for now, I feel that I need to be away from the larger fandom...
Thank you for reading.
Thank you for reading.
