race, racism, and micro-aggressions: an open letter to white members of the fs community
I was once told by someone in the fs fandom that “America’s POC issues don’t matter in the rest of the world”. This was deeply distressing to hear at the time, and in light of all that’s happened with Y*gudin, recent comments from Kurt Browning, as well as the general state of white fs stan twitter, I felt it necessary to write this. Not as a shady response to that person (whose username I don’t remember) but as a general, open letter to everyone.
America is a microcosm. There, perhaps, more than anywhere else, we see the stark contrasts caused by racial issues. It is the birthplace of the general narratives of how we understand race and racism but racism is not an issue that is circumscribed to America. Nor is race conflatable with nationality. The racial inequalities that exist in America and that you (by now) should hopefully understand are really only a microcosm of the rest of the world – a world whose economical structure and distribution of power is built on centuries and centuries of western colonialism and the oppression of BIPOC.
I can understand why many of you who don’t live in the West, particularly the North American West, don’t recognize your part in these systems. You aren’t brought face to face with racial issues in your everyday life, so it’s easier to view racism as “something that happens over there” and not a scourge that exists in every institution and system on the international scale.
This view of racism as an American-only problem is detrimental, especially in such an insulated community like fs. You fall into the trap of thinking that no more work needs to be done to combat racism in this sport, that this sport is fair. You may even dismiss it when POC bring your attention to blatant and not so blatant acts of racism.
But figure skating is still a majority white sport. Yes, you may see more poc in the audience now but this sport is BUILT on notions of eurocentricity and eurosuperiority. Consequently, it still privileges white skaters and white fans. I’ll speak mostly on the asian, particularly east asian, experience because I am more well equipped to do so but I invite black and brown members of this community to add on to this post with their own perspectives – perspectives I don’t feel like I can accurately articulate without speaking over other people.
That said, let’s defuse some of the myths surrounding racism and its existence in this sport.
Many confuse the currently strong presence of asians, particularly east asians, in skating as a sign that these skaters and poc in general do not face any institutional barriers due to their race. You may think that because there are poc skaters who are considered some of the greatest of all time like Yuzuru Hanyu, Yuna Kim, and Patrick Chan, skating as a whole is no longer prejudiced but fair and meritocratic. In reality, you’re buying into the myth of poc exceptionalism. While Hanyu, Kim, Chan might be considered the “complete package”, many who are less renowned are held back by the biases that have long been associated with Asian people - less emotional, more reserved, not passionate enough, too demure. But consider this: POC shouldn’t have to be the “cream of the crop”, as it were, to break through these barriers. All skaters, on all levels, should not have to face racially motivated prejudice.
And the acceptance of POC skaters is not unconditional. In fact, POC skaters are only embraced when they perform according to white taste, or when they manage stunning, irrefutable technical feats. For example, Yuna Kim and Patrick Chan both have very traditional styles that former white skaters can identify and relate to themselves. Their repertoires (Beatles, classical music, film music like James Bond) are palatable and tailored to white fans. When skaters do not perform/imitate whiteness or heteronormativity, like Yuzuru Hanyu often doesn’t, white cishet fans react by saying they “can’t relate to” or “don’t understand” the program. This is an example of privilege at work because people of colour and LGBTQA+ folk have always had to consume cishet white media and culture. Our world is built on it. Though some things we may not immediately understand, we are forced to learn how to relate to this media because white = classy, white = history and tradition, white = the norm. It is a PRIVILEGE to not relate to something and immediately dismiss it because it is a performance set to a japanese song or because it tells the story of a disaster that happened halfway across the world. At the end of the day, I’m not here to police your tastes. But, white fans, you don’t have to broadcast it every time that you find a POC skater’s culturally informed choice strange, or bizarre, or unrelatable because in doing so you are demonstrating your own privilege and shoving it in the face of poc fans.
This is not even to mention the blatant discrimination in majority-white spaces when you are not viewed as sufficiently “assimilated" or palatable enough to white culture. Folks like Canadian ice dancer Asher Hill have testified that some of their fellow coaches have even said things such as “this is why I don’t work with black kids”. Just because they don’t say it on TV or on record doesn’t mean that many of the older and not so old members of the community don’t harbour these racially motivated feelings, which in turn translates to how they interact with POC skates and fans AND into the commentary they provide. These members of the community are often shielded from criticism by a certain barrier of “respectability”: ex. “I can’t believe fanyus are now mad at Kurt Browning for comparing asian skaters to cars! Kurt Browning! What, are they gonna get mad at Tracy Wilson next? No one’s safe from the fanyus if you say even one remotely negative thing about Hanyu! Ridiculous!” In reality, Kurt is a product of his time. He may not have said it with any malicious intent but that doesn’t negate the fact that his words were upsetting to hear as POC.
Prejudice against POC skaters and fans is now harder to identify because it often manifests itself in the form of microaggressions. Microaggressions are the slights that POC and other marginalized folks face, often on a daily basis, but that disguise themselves are innocent expressions of preference, compliments, or even attempts at allyship. I’ll list some of the recent ones I recall below:
- “She [Maé] looks so EXOTIC”. Maybe it was meant to be a compliment but the constant exotification of POC continues to “other” our presence, asserting implicitly that whiteness is and will remain the norm. Calling POC, especially BIPOC, “exotic” is just a step away from full out orientalism.
- “It looks like Japanese nationals in the crowd! Welcome to Tokyo British Columbia!” (Said before anyone was holding up flags or banners.) This is an intensely uncomfortable observation because it reminds poc viewers that we will always be singled out due to our appearances. It echoes the “yellow peril” rhetoric of asian people encroaching on white spaces. Moreover, the assumption that all the asian looking people in the crowd were japanese groups all asian people into a giant monolith. Let me put it to you this way: imagine if a commentator said: “Wow! It looks like Spanish nationals here!” because you are in an asian country, Javi Fernandez is one of the competitors, and there are a noticeable number of white people in the crowd. It would be a ridiculous observation when no one is holding up any flags, right? Because it’s assumed you can’t automatically conflate all the white people in the audience as Spanish. The refusal to differentiate our cultures and randomly mixing up different cultural attire, languages, and music is sadly a consistent issue in skating and it is a message to poc that we are interchangeable, our cultures are interchangeable. We’re all Japanese or we’re all Chinese or we’re all Korean depending on the situation. It may not have been said with malice, but that doesn’t mean its effect is negligible.
- “She [Rika] has such small eyes it’s hard to tell her expression and I can’t connect with her”. I shouldn’t have to explain this one but I will anyways because I know some people will take this the wrong way. You CAN criticize Rika’s skating. But some of these comments focusing on her appearance, specifically features that have racial connotations makes you question how much of their inability to connect with her is rooted in an unconscious bias. Let’s be clear, sidelining poc artistry doesn’t just happen in skating. It is a reoccurring trend in all performance sports, from ballet to ballroom. Here’s another example of uncomfortable fixation on our features: “another almond-eyed talent from asia!”. Imagine if I reversed it. “Another pale-skinned talent from Europe!” Now it sounds odd, right? Because it’s not assumed that all people from Europe look the same, as it is of Asia, or Africa, or South America.
And that’s only a few of the hundreds of instances I can think of. As a POC fan, I’ve made my peace with the fact that I won’t ever be seen as a “true” skating fan by some people, especially by older members of this community. But for all of you white folk that consider yourself allies? If you’re not a bigot, it’s easy to reblog and call out extreme examples of racism. Don’t get me wrong, that is the essential work of an ally. It’s harder to take that same energy to your own “backyard”, if you will, and see that the sport you cherish is founded on white privilege and continues to discriminate against POC skaters. It’s harder still to realize that some of the people you put on a high pedestal are flawed and make mistakes. But I hope you guys can be just as eager to acknowledge examples of casual latent racism in this sport as you are to call out acts of blatant racism. This means starting to consider your choice of words more carefully, and examining + questioning your own inherent biases. I understand that it’s a difficult, conscious decision to do so, and that often it would lead to some harsh realizations, but there are three key principles to how you can start:
1. Don’t respond with white (cishet) fragility when POC or LGBTQA+ folks tell you that something you’ve said or someone else said is wrong or offensive (ex: I didn’t mean it like that! Stop being so negative!). Try not to immediately get defensive and take it as an attack on your own character when you are asked to examine your own biases. Don’t police how POC and other folk feel (ex: I don’t think you should be offended by that. Are you sure this has to do with race? Maybe it’s just a coincidence. Stop making everything about race, you’re the one that’s creating divides!). You can give more facts if they don’t know the whole picture, you can add some more perspective but you CAN’T tell POC how to feel because this is not an issue that you yourself are affected by.)
2. Don’t be selective about which issues to care about. Many white people wanted to rage about IAOP this year. But then the same people went mum on Great Spirit, Alina’s “Egyptian dance” program, Evgenia’s straightjacket/asylum dress etc, etc. When this happens, it becomes obvious that you only care so long as it serves your own interests – so long as you can weaponize it to attack the morals of a skater you don’t like. This isn’t true allyship this is just self-serving performative activism.
3. Donate to organizations whose primary purpose is to develop skating in minority communities that otherwise would not have access to the sport. Skating is expensive. I had to quit skating as a hobby because as new immigrants we just, at a certain point, didn’t have the money for lessons and for new equipment. Donating will ensure that A. more people can enjoy this sport and B. the voices in this sport become more and more diverse as new cultures and new forms of expression find their way into the canon history of figure skating. Organizations like Figure Skating in Harlem, or its Detroit program counterpart could always use your help. (If anyone has more, please feel free to add).
I’ve used the word “you” quite a lot in this open letter but I don’t exempt myself from any of the things I mentioned. As an asian fan, I have to be actively critical of the anti-blackness in the asian community. I am learning as you are learning. This open letter’s purpose isn’t to deride anyone. Everything I’ve said I apply to myself as well. It’s okay to make mistakes; it’s okay to recognize that your favourite skater has made a mistake. No one knows everything. What makes the difference between a true ally and a performative activist is the willingness to admit it and change.
