as the title dares to suggest,

kinda racist.

There have been microaggressions...

- Oh my god, I am totally darker than you.

I could be Asian.

Look, I could be Asian.

I could totally be Asian.

Look.

- As well as some macroaggressions...

If you wanna act, you absolutely should act.

- Yeah, but if I decide to go into acting,

I'm just gonna take away so many parts from women of color,

(record scratches)

and I don't wanna do that.

- That's, um.

(splutters)

- And some things that are just, well...

- Oh wow, what's your background?

- I'm a mutt.

I'm just a mix of so many different backgrounds

and cultures and tribes as well.

- What? Dude, no you're not.

You're white.

You are straight up white.

100% whitey here.

You are straight up whi-

- With everything going on in the world

and the rise of Asian hate,

I just feel like I really can't keep quiet

about this anymore.

Look, my friend,

to be clear-

great person.

She is a good person,

but she's kind of racist.

And I think that describes a lot of people:

good, inherently good,

but kind of racist.

And it's especially heartbreaking

because I know she's trying really hard.

She told me...

- I joined a white girl book club.

We're focused on educating ourselves about race issues

so that we don't have to have our BIPOC friends

do the labor for us.

(dings)

- And I believe she genuinely wants to do good,

but in order to do good,

we also have to acknowledge the fact

that there's a specific racism among white people:

Exotification.

White people who are pretending to be people

of color when it's convenient and profitable for them.

Like, white women who want to be seen as more ethnic

because they hold the racist belief

that being ethnic is "exotic" and sexy.

White men who want to be seen as more urban

to make them seem edgy and cool.

White people who want to try on our looks and our culture,

but discard the struggles that come with our identities

and treat our skin color like an accessory

or as an aesthetic.

And what I've come to realize is that racism is evolving.

It's more nuanced.

It's more subtle.

It's always been pretty systemic, but now it's also sneaky.

So, for example,

we know cultural appropriation is bad.

And when we think of "bad cultural appropriation",

we think of what?

White girls wearing Native American costumes for Halloween.

But do you also think of how a non-black person

wearing a black hairstyle is racist?

So, I had some friends who were white

who went to Burning Man and decided to wear cornrows

and got called out by the Black community.

They got very defensive and they were like

"This is to protect my hair.

"I should be able to wear my hairstyle

"in a way that's going to protect it."

But the Black community pointed out the inherent problems

with this decision and this argument.

And I admit, I did not fully understand this evolution

of racism until I saw Amandla Stenberg's 2015 video essay

"Don't Cash Crop On My Cornrows"

in which she examined the parallel rise of Black culture

being appropriated in the music industry

by white artists and being lauded for it

alongside the rise of police brutality against Black people.

- Police brutality against Black people

came to the forefront

in an incredible movement ignited by the murders of

Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown,

Tamir Rice, Eric Garner, and many others.

People began to protest institutionalized racism by marching

and by using social media.

Celebrities spread awareness and shared condolences,

or at least some did.

- And this disparity, how some people take so much

from Black culture, but refuse to stand

up against the racism that comes with it,

is where the issue with cornrows

and other forms of cultural appropriation lies.

So, black and brown bodies are used as props.

Their culture adopted to seem edgy,

and white people profit

off this image without any obligation to deal

with the struggles that that culture faces like, seriously.

Some people are out here wearing a grill

but they can't tweet or donate

or march on behalf of Black Lives Matter.

Stenberg also has a crystal clear, amazing definition

of when what we're witnessing is cultural appropriation.

- That itself is what is so complicated when it comes

to Black culture.

I mean the line between cultural appropriation

and cultural exchange is always going to be blurred

but here's the thing,

appropriation occurs when a style leads

to racist generalizations or stereotypes where it originated

but is deemed as high fashion, cool,

or funny when the privileged take it for themselves.

- So it's not that white women can't dress

up as Native Americans or wear cornrows or dreads.

The problem is two-fold.

The first issue being when the creators of the culture

are seen in a racist light,

but the person doing the adopting is praised for it.

It's like if someone copied my essay word for word

including "written by Anna Akana"

and then I got an 'F' and they got an 'A+'.

And we can't deny that Black women who wear Black hairstyles

are vilified for it.

They are discriminated against in the workplace

and the world.

I witnessed firsthand on a pretty big movie.

This black actor was yelled at because her hair frizzled

when it rained and the white hairstylist demanded

that she come to set with her hair fully straightened.

And she didn't understand

that my co-star did that every single day.

She woke up two hours before her call time

every single day to straighten her hair,

but obviously rain is going to f**k with Black hair.

And even though my white friends who did go

to Burning Man are good people,

they can't wear cornrows without acknowledging

that they're going to be thought of as cool

while the same people who need that hairstyle

as a method of maintenance are being thought

of as unprofessional, ghetto,

trashy, or thugs.

The second issue is if you are taking

from a culture that you're actively silent

about in times of that culture's need,

thereby, only using it when it benefits you.

So for me, it's like if a Weebo who's obsessed

with anime and Kawaii culture decided

to do a photo shoot where she dressed up

as a Japanese geisha, and when I ask her,

"Hey, when you post that photo,

"can you please maybe consider

"using the hashtag #StopAsianHate

"because Asian hate crimes are at an all time high

"and clearly you love Asian culture?

We could use your voice."

And instead of doing that, they decided to block me

and post their photo with #ilovesushi or something.

So, the answer to cultural appropriation

is first respect the culture,

understand the context of what you're adopting,

give appropriate recognition,

and please actively be anti-racist.

And I know it sounds like a lot, but really it's not.

You probably put way more effort into

choosing a filter or thinking of a funny tweet.