With multiple genocides occurring worldwide and many of us seeing firsthand how the media is corruptly covering it all, it has become clearer the power we all have by simply speaking. They know this and are afraid. They know this and are doing everything they can to get us to laugh instead of demand they listen.

Queerness and Transness make me nostalgic often. I shared recently how Janelle Monae was the most amazing person I ever saw back in 2010 and continues to make me feel seen. I also shared in an interview how the extremely problematic show a Shot of Love with Tila Tequila was the first time I learned the word bisexual and felt like I could finally articulate who I was.

Netflix’s recommendations along with animated shows from my childhood are products of “the Two White Girl Rule” which itself is a product of White Supremacy. It creates imaginary scarcity and pits people who are not White against each other for these usually stereotype-filled roles that often refuse to allow people to exist outside of several binaries. It also almost always doubles down on the big ass racial umbrellas, never giving any depth to the culture, values or traditions of girls featured that are not White because what else is there to know about them other than their skin color and/or eye shape?

These scenes, characters and films make it harder and harder for these behaviors (Blackface, misogynoir, colorism, transphobia, anti-Blackness, etc.) to be labeled as harmful and for those being harmed not to be dismissed or gaslit. It should also be noted that a lot of these underlying behaviors (gaslighting, manipulation, rejection of accountability, stunted emotional maturity, etc.) and narcissism go hand in hand. Harmful behavior does not need to be framed as comical and it most certainly does not need a laugh track.

Last year I was a guest on a podcast focused on racial ambiguity, Our True Colors. I shared that “ambiguity only exists when specificity isn’t present and assumptions are prioritized in exchanges.”

In real life people are proud of where they’re from and who they are. In real life people poke ambiguity with a “stick” often. People, White people, are always asking “where are you really from?”

This leads to one of the top questions around Bonnie being about her ethnicity.

When I first saw Moana, I cried and I was proud. After I was able to process the film for the moldy crumbs that it is, I was then able to see how ambiguous, exploitative and unfulfilling the film is. It’s beyond heart wrenching to know this is the amount of representation we’ll receive and that no other parts of our cultures will be emphasized because of greed.