Fyza Hashim

Let’s talk about oppression when kids in school tell you your dad drives a cab for a living or owns a convenience store just because your family is from India or Pakistan.

Let’s talk about oppression when everyone asks you where your “dot” is because they don’t understand that just because part of your family is from India it doesn’t mean that you are automatically obliged to wear a bindi.

Let’s talk about oppression when people say “same difference” when you try to explain that Hinduism and Islam are two very different things and that Muslims are allowed to eat cows.

Let’s talk about oppression when someone tells a white man that they all “look the same”.

Let’s talk about oppression when people come over to your country in boats, rape and pillage your women and your land, murder and push you out of what is rightfully yours until your people are almost extinct and push their religion and way of life on you then try to make up for it years later by giving you reservations and reparations.

Let’s talk about oppression when someone tells you “go back to where you came from” even when you were born and raised in the same country as them.

Let’s talk about oppression when you feel your skin color is too dark for you to be beautiful.

Let’s talk about oppression when your culture is taken and marketed to the masses as “cool tribal accessories” by people that don’t even know the first thing about the culture they’re selling.

Let’s talk about oppression while even when you’re in the “white minority”, you will still get more privilege and opportunity in the blink of an eye than those of us that have struggled for years, for generations, to get where we are today.