Filipeanut-American
Once upon a time I made a blog about Filipino culture. Or at least I thought it was about Filipino culture. I even started making rap music about it soon after that, thinking I knew what I was talking about.
But I was wrong =(.
What I was really blogging and rapping about was a Filipino-American’s point of view of a society I knew nothing about. So I stopped writing and rapping and started listening for a change. I love how life works that way, you’re doing one thing thinking you’re in the right direction and then you try something completely different and it gets even better.
For a more candid take on what I’ve been hearing so far can be found from a few Filipino-Filipinos contributing answers to my ultimate question:
“What do you dislike about Filipino-Americans?” (Click here to read some of the answers.)
Here are some quotes that stuck out to me the most:
- “The moment they get off the plane in Manila, they instantly lose their pinoy pride and become either black (“bling-bling homie”) or white (“i’m stoked, dude”) when conversing with a local–and essentially spend the rest of their vacation making sure the locals know that they are NOT like them.”
- “Filipino-Americans are way too cliquish.”
- “If you don’t fit any of the stereotypes then you are definitely ‘WHITE WASHED’ and can forget about calling yourself Filipino…..”
- “Filipinos are amazing writers, I wish more Filipino-Americans would appreciate their literary heritage.”
- “THEY USE TISSUE PAPER, WHICH IS MORE EXPENSIVE THEN USING RUNNING WATER.”
- “and i dont even want to get into how many fil-ams got onto the pacquaio bandwagon when the getting was good. and while i understand everyone loves a winner, and he makes u proud to be filipino, barely any fil-ams (except ones that knew boxing) knew (or cared) that he had a less successful brother who’s a boxer as well or knew (or cared) about another successful fighter who came before pacman… luisito espinosa.”
To be fair, having your own point of view helps build an image or change an image of whatever it is you’re looking at. 🙂
You’re right Peter, to add to that, being critical of our own point of view helps build an image closer to the truth. At least i’d hope so.