Love & Politics

…
This is about love.
This is about love turning up its volume ‘til we shake,
until our arms and legs move,
until we shout with multiple tongues and whisper in each others’ ears,
I will never ask you to change your name.
I will never ask you to change your name.
Your name is at home on my tongue.
In this land that wants us blind, deaf, asleep, defeated
We have to make our own music because none of these songs have ever been for us,
For the fight inside of us,
Pounding fist of heart against soul, clashing notes inside of our minds
This is to know what it is like fight to love ourselves.
-Bao Phi
“Yellow Brown Babies for the Revolution”

This past month I have been extra aware of my efforts to reconcile the debate between what can be described as “humanity” and “politics.” I use quotations because the difference is a false dichotomy, as I have come to realize. Examples of this debate takes many forms and touches upon many topics: James Baldwin and Richard Wright arguing over the role of literature—is it art for art’s sake or for political reasons; I think of Bao Phi’s interview in which he explains he has made a conscious choice to love and be in love with other yellow people; there are conversations I have had with friends about art, music, film, careers and love—how much are we responsible for making these projects interconnect with our politics? I think of a friend who often reminds me that love is always the ultimate goal. Yet if love allows us to find ourselves, won’t my love be golden yellow-brown? I remember that my choice to love an Asian American partner is political and requires conscious effort.

I realized a few things today as I wandered around the farmers’ market. I go almost weekly now and spend money on too-expensive squash, greens, and even sunflowers. I recognized that I do not go because I insist on organic foods or even because I fully understand the politics of supporting local farmers. Like Kelly Tsai (see 4:00 in the video below), I go and study happy people. I watch them and their families play, eat, and be in love. These strangers remind me of myself when I am not stuck in the world of thoughts.

In a noetic moment, I understood that the debate between “humanity” and politics” forgets that in an oppressive system, every assertion of humanity is political. There are times when our politics and our efforts to humanize ourselves conflict, but that will always be the case in a world that questions our humanity. For those whose humanness is under attack daily, to “eat, pray, love” are political acts.

I wonder, then, what would truly be humanizing—to forget the politics when those conflicts arise and strive for the pinnacle of humanity OR to recognize the politics and be driven by it? I assume the answer is somewhere in between.