I Thought You Would Care

A few weeks ago I started messaging this cute Filipino guy on a d*ting a**. He told me that he grew up in “the boonies of California” and I liked him because of his sense of humor, his weirdness, and our perceived sexual compatibility. At one point in our text conversation he said “I’m 5’8”, kinda average, what about you?” I told him my height, 5’6”, and I asked him if he cares about guys’ heights.

“No I don’t,” he texted back, “I thought you would care.”

“I feel like height is pretty superficial tbh,” I wrote. “Like I’ve met a bunch of guys who are tall and also lack emotional availability and/or basic active listening skills.”

“If you have a face to [REDACTED],” I added, “you have a face to [REDACTED].”

“:) Where have you been all my life,” he sent.

Damn, I thought to myself. The bar is truly below the ground and on its way to the earth’s molten core.

–

This exchange triggered some feelings of sadness and anger within me because I have come across so many men who do care about the height of their potential sexual and romantic partners.

Black Lives Matter

Hi everyone! This isn’t one of my usual posts. I’m gonna keep it short and not say much about me. I always joke that no one reads this blog, but just in case someone is, I’m here to say that Black lives matter, and we should all take action to show it.

This letter an acquaintance of mine posted on Facebook speaks to the importance of Asians and Asian Americans showing up for Black Lives Matter. There’s a solid list of tangible actions at the bottom of the article if you want to skip to that. As written in the article, we Asian Americans often side with whiteness and white people over Black people and we need to cut that shit out.

Here’s a quick Twitter thread with 10 steps to non-optical allyship, and here’s a list of books you can read to learn about being anti-racist. Please feel free to comment with additional actions and resources, or reactions. Until next post.

The Very Serious Function of Racism in Academia

I feel so hurt and I feel so scared.

I feel hurt because in my professional life I have encountered awful experiences of racism as of late. I feel scared because if I share these experiences, people may hurt me further. They may gaslight me and say I exaggerate. They may stereotype me as the angry queer academic of color, when my anger, a justified anger, stems from having experienced racism. I feel sad, too, because I wish I could share specifics about what has happened on this blog like I often do, but right now, my fear of retribution – that someone will find this blog and attack me for my sharing – makes me unwilling to provide specifics.

This processing takes up time.

Self-Love Will Help You Grow Wings and Fly Far Away from the Patriarchy (basically)

So I went on a date with this really cute guy named James and we talked for two hours and he had a gorgeous smile whenever he laughed and seemed to reject capitalism and I sort of wanted to see him again. We had some honestly mediocre because he’s a white man who hasn’t been socialized to communicate effectively decent text exchanges before he told me that he would like to see me again but not romantically because he hasn’t been into guys lately. Here are some thoughts I could have had, if not for my queen Audre Lorde:

A Lot of Girls in Chicago

I entered the Toyota Camry a confident gay man; I exited it a confidant man still, but one whose gayness had been put to the test.

To Come Out or To Not Come Out… That is the Question

As requested by an individual who commented on this blog, here is a post dedicated to answering the question: should I, or should I not come out? Before I begin, let me make it clear – just because I am gay does not mean I can control what other gay people do, or the outcomes of their actions. This is simply my two cents on the somewhat sensitive subject matter. Heck, if you’re straight, you should try coming out too! You might earn a few blank stares, but at least it won’t be because you’re so ugly you turn people to stone like me. In fact, I think it is a worthy endeavor, because you would be forcing yourself into the shoes of those who have to announce their sexualities.

Let me reiterate that this is an umbrella post designed to give a general idea of whether one should come out or not. There are many factors that play into a decision like this, even if the decision shouldn’t be a big one at all. Please don’t hesitate to comment or message me with individual concerns or questions, or to suggest that I write about anything else – related to homosexuality or unrelated to homosexuality.

An easy way to structure this would be to split up my post into pros and cons. I’ll start with the cons, because everyone knows that seeing the rainbow is worth standing in the rain.