I want to talk about this trend that was popular earlier this year. If you are active on Tik Tok or Instagram and is interested in beauty culture, you probably encountered something called the "fox eye challenge". Models like Kendal Jenner and Bella Hadid have this distinct facial features, often referred to as "lifted face" Lots of people envied that feature and face life surgery became pretty popular. However, not everyone can afford or is willing to get plastic surgery for a trend. So the fox eye challenge started. The fox eye challenge is putting on makeup or doing a pose that stretches their face to give the "lifted look" The challenge got popular super quickly because it is easy to follow and the effect was instant.
If you are an Asian person or have smaller eyes, people probably have done this to you; where they stretch their eyes sideways, usually comes with these kinds of phrases 'Ching Chong', 'I'm Asian, I have small eyes!', 'Can you even see anything with your eyes' (If not aw lucky you) Asian people have been mocked for many years for having "smaller eyes". For a disclaimer, not all Asian people have small slanted eyes. Plus there is nothing wrong with having eye shapes like that. The focus of this is that people have been mocked for this. And when they tell them to stop or say that they are offended, people say it's a joke, and they should learn how to take everything not seriously. Lots of young Asian people grow up hating their beautiful features and themselves.
But not having "slanted eyes" is a trend! Some say the fox eye trend is not to mimic the Asian eyes, and it is just a makeup trend. I agree with that. I personally do not really see the resemblance between the makeup and Asian eyes. HOWEVER, I do think the pose is very offensive. People have been mocked and got oppressed with the same pose. The pose reminds me of all the bullies at school, strangers on the street that made fun of my eyes, furthermore my identity. It is really sad to see people doing the pose for aesthetics. It is almost like (I said almost.) doing blackface/(or too much fake tan because not many people do blackface for aesthetics/Lip injections. Black people have been mocked for those features, and now people love to get tanned and have plumped lips. It is very ironic when it is a hideous feature that people make fun of becomes a "trendy feature" on other people.
I would not call this trend as a racist trend. Even though it offended people, I understand that the intention was not to mock Asian or any people. However, I still think it is culturally insensitive. It can be seen as an act of ignorance about the discrimination many Asians have faced for their features. I also want to acknowledge how people telling people to "stop being so sensitive". If you have not gone through what they been through, you do not understand. And even if you have been through and you don't see the problem, you cannot bash people for finding it offensive because everyone's opinion is valid. I am not saying you should not say a word, but you should know if you think your opinion is valid, other people's opinion should be treated equally.
Thanks for sharing this - this particular social media trend passed me right by (fortunately). You have made some really interesting points about the way the appearances get stereotyped, mocked and appropriated.
ReplyDeleteThis a really good explanation of what it's like from the perspective of someone who's gone through this. Being half-Asian myself, I was lucky enough to avoid being mocked for my eyes (I guess they were big enough?) but I was often told to "go back to my country" despite being born here and felt isolated/unwanted from the rest of my white family and classmates. The flippant eroticisation coupled with the antagonism we get treated with is absolute bs.
ReplyDeleteIts such a difficult topic to be taken seriously by the wider population I feel. Typically us Asians have not been as vocial historically about these things and as soon as we do... we are not taken seriously
ReplyDeleteI believe this is such an important topic to bring awareness of because it is a "trend" and to many people trends aren't such a big deal. it important to highlight because it is a form of racism and people do get made fun this and with social media jumping on the bandwagon its also important to call people out on this.
ReplyDeleteI also think this trend is really important to critique. It is a version on cultural appropriation. I don't understand why girls think pulling their eyes back with fingers has no correlation to the bullying tactic a lot of us witnessed in primary school.
ReplyDeleteBeing South East Asian I've had a different (but equally bad) relationship with the way my eyes look. I used to get asked why I had big eyes if I was Asian, and so the way they looked became a means of invalidating my Asian identity, if that makes sense?
ReplyDeleteMaybe pulling their eyes is a 'trend' and how they are doing it unconsciously but don't realise that it can be a controversial issue. I do think that this action is very stereotyped and unnecessary towards Asians particularly.
ReplyDeleteThis is a very good point, initially I didnt think of it as possibly offensive from an Asian perspective (as I am half), instead I just interpreted it as a trend followed by people who wanted have the same look as Bella or Kendall. Thanks for the insight!
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