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Not all Asians are monolids. Not all monolids are exactly the same.

So, when Rasilla discovered that renown cosmetic company Maybelline had lumped all of us Asians into a single type of eye shape on their promotional website she was rightfully outraged.

Check out Rasilla’s blog for details.

UPDATE: It looks like Maybelline finally corrected this issue. Ras has the details. Thank you, ladies, for your responses!

Asian eyes as defined by Maybelline. Photo courtesy of rasilla.wordpress.com

I’ve said this before and Rasilla exasperatedly says it again. Many Asians of certain ethnicities have monolids. However, there are MANY Asians who have naturally creased eyelids. We don’t all have to get surgery to acquire supratarsal folds and we’re not all born with epicanthal folds. I was born without a supratarsal fold and I have an epicanthal fold but I don’t represent an entire fucking continent comprising Middle Easterners, Far East Asians, Southeast Asians, Indians, etc… Even within one country that is known for having a population of monolids, such as Japan or South Korea, there are many of those who have naturally creased eyelids.

“Why does this matter?” one might ask. Do you know how it feels to realize that many people never really see us past their own stereotypical assumptions? It’s actually quite dehumanizing.

Any generalization made about Asians is extremely problematic because this generalization is being made about a varied spectrum of ethnic attributes that comprise the world’s biggest continent and take up the majority of the world’s population. What pains me more is how Asian people themselves acquiesce to broad and ignorant stereotypes. Lumping us together based on what continent we come from might as well equate to lumping us together based on what hemisphere we’re from.

I have to give Rasilla a lot of credit for bringing this up in public. Furthermore, when Maybelline refused to heed her objections, she sought other means to spread the word. Calling someone out on racial discrimination or prejudice is not as easy as people might think. It’s not some card we wave around to get special treatment and, believe you me, we could try waving it around but it wouldn’t make life any easier. When we do muster the courage to point out racist behavior, we get shot down and humiliated for it. We are told we are being too sensitive and that we need to lighten up, it’s just a picture or it’s just a joke, etc. Sometimes, we are told this by members of our own ethnic communities. It is SO much easier, yet more damaging, to just sit quietly and let others assume it is acceptable. In our warped society, it is actually more taboo to call someone racist than to actually be racist.

So, when she is trying to bring up this issue with you guys, how about you actually listen, Maybelline?