II. Brown Skin, White Mind
I’ve always loved my brown skin.
Growing up, when my mom, my sister and I would cuddle on our red couch and melt into each other’s embrace, we’d raise our arms side-by-side up to the sky and just observe. My mom had a beautiful deep caramel complexion, my sister was a sun-tanned cinnamon, and then there was me -- not white, not dark, just brown.
It was clear that I always had the “fairest” brown skin of my family, even though I would often try to justify otherwise and say: “Look Mama, I’m almost as tan as you!” to which my sister would respond with, “No Maya, you’re even lighter than me.”
There was no real purpose to us comparing our complexions, but each time we did, I used to think I was never brown enough. In my eyes, my mom was the most beautiful person in the whole world. Naturally, I wanted to look just like her. I would look forward to the summertime each year, so that I could play outside in the sun all day and activate the melanin in my skin. When I’m sufficiently tan, I feel the most confident -- the most like me.
As I grew older, I came to realize that my people generally hate their brown skin. In Filipino culture, children are taught to keep out of the direct sun as much as possible to avoid getting darker. Papaya soaps and other skin whiteners are sold in every cosmetic store to further encourage this cultural expectation. My family used to tell me stories from when they were in the Philippines, how their elders would scrub them down with skin whiteners (that is, until they more closely resembled our colonizers). When I visited the Philippines for the first time, all my relatives doted on my fairer skin saying, “Maya-pot, ang ganda mo (how beautiful you are)! You could be an aktrez on the TV!” As flattered as I was, it never felt quite right to accept the compliment.
Spain and America are largely responsible for instilling the white colonizer mindset into the Filipinos over several generations. They brainwashed us to believe that our dark brown skin equated to inferiority, poverty, and dirt. How could this be so, when it’s a simple matter of the melanin in our skin, something we cannot control? And beyond that, how could this be so, when brown skin is so undeniably beautiful?
For the most part, the Filipinos’ overt colorism is rooted in colonialism and classism. In society, it especially manifests as a disdain for farm workers who are paid the lowest wages to perform the most taxing labor under the beating sun. Even though the fruits of their labor provide for the rest of the community, the community is taught to look down upon them.
As it turns out, many of my ancestors in the Philippines were farmers. My grandmother (Nanay) once cautioned me that, “No one wants to be a farmworker, apo. Very poor and hard work.” The same ugly truth is pervasive in the United States, where farmer workers aren’t paid enough to afford the very produce they are cultivating. I had a sense that my Nanay was slightly ashamed of this history, and I wanted to assure her that I was proud to come from farmers. Farmers are resilient, skilled and dedicated people. They should be honored and paid commensurate with the necessary service they provide to the rest of the community.
When I think about it, the adoption of the colonizer mindset in the Filipino community must have happened nearly in tandem with our separation from nature. Just imagine a time when all Indigenous people of the Philippines were environmentalists. They grew their own food and tended to the land out of survival. How did people move so far away from that spectrum that they look down on the people responsible for feeding them? This is the poison of the colonizer mindset. When Filipinos try to scrub away the dirt with papaya soap, they maintain their brown skin and adopt the white mind.
As a Filipina American born in the states, I never truly considered how my brown skin would set me apart from other people. I’m lucky that my parents were accepting of their brownness and passed that loving trait down to me. As I grew older, however, I realized just how lonely it was being a brown person in my field of work. Though it took me a long time before I started to question why.
In high school, most of my classmates took the AP Environmental Sciences class because it was rumored to be the “easiest of the APs.” As such, the people who were serious about addressing climate change generally belonged to the Environmental Club. I was the only Filipina there, but I didn’t think much of it. Especially because I went to a predominately white school where there were only a total of five Filipinos in my entire grade. I did wonder if I would be able to find more Filipino environmentalists later in my career…
When I started at USC, I was excited to meet more Filipinos involved in environmental work. Upon arrival, I realized I was once again alone. I had been in this position before, so I wasn’t discouraged by it. I was proud of it. I became the first environmental liaison for my Filipino club, and first Filipino liaison for my environmental club. I organized a collaborative program, where I taught students from both clubs about the ongoing environmental issues experienced by our relatives in the Philippines, and how we could use our privilege as college students to act on climate change. It was empowering at the time, but when I graduated, I knew no other Filipino environmental advocate to take my place.
A few fellowships, internships and interviews later, I eventually landed my current position. By no surprise -- I was the only Filipina on our team. I guess I should’ve expected that, but part of me was sorely disappointed. I’ve experienced bouts of imposter syndrome throughout this path, but this was the first time I felt it completely overpowering my sense of belonging. I started to feel like something was genuinely wrong -- with me or my environment -- I couldn’t tell. Why am I one of the only brown people in every room I occupy? Where are my people? Do I even belong here?
I think what has shocked me the most throughout this journey is that the importance of diversity, equity, inclusion and justice (DEIJ) has only recently become a serious and pervasive phenomenon. Most people trace this back to 2020, after the horrific murder of George Floyd by the knee of a racist cop. I have no intention to minimize the inhumane act of killing a man for the color of his skin, but when people responded to Mr. Floyd’s murder, they treated it as if no other innocent black or brown person had the exact same experience. Racial killings have existed since the inception of America and continue to this day. This is the same country that occupied my motherland of the Philippines for half a century.
An interesting cultural shift ensued, where you were either on the “right” or “wrong” side of history, depending on your alignment with Black Lives Matter (BLM) and parallel social movements. DEIJ training became a requirement at most places of work, where they were previously optional or nonexistent. I’ve been to a few virtual DEIJ trainings, and I’ve been shocked to share space with white people who are early learners of the injustices done to black and brown people. These acts were performed by the hands of their ancestors over the course of several generations -- instead of acknowledging this painful history and helping to pave a new way forward, they furiously displace the blame. Individuals who participate in this behavior are acutely ignorant to their own white privilege and contributions to white supremacist culture.
It was clear that there were some people who were not fully embracing the DEIJ training. I vividly remember a white person saying: “Can we find a different, more inclusive term to refer to white privilege and white supremacy? It’s making white people feel like the problem and turning them off from this stuff completely.” At the time this comment was made, I was dead silent behind my zoom screen. But internally? I felt my throat constricting. My heart beating like a low bass drum. My brown skin standing out like a tattoo. Would I be the person to stand up and defend the existence of white privilege and the indisputable impacts on those without such privilege? I assume this person did not have malintent, but the comment felt so insensitive in nature. I stared at my muted mic, pondering the million responses I could say, and the release I would feel if I could simply unmute.
I wanted to say that the injustices done to Black, Indigenous and people of color (BIPOC) in American society are far more uncomfortable and devastating than a white person’s simple acknowledgement of their privilege. We call it “white privilege” and “white supremacy” for a reason. In our mainstream society, white people are given particular advantages over people of color. Like the privilege to see yourself represented on the TV screen, in history, in the workplace. Or the privilege of inheriting generational wealth and often fast tracking to higher levels of leadership. Or at the most simplistic level, the privilege to exist in a society without the anguish of being treated as inferior, for something out of your control. All the while, white supremacist culture tells us that if we simply work hard enough, we can be the CEO of our own company one day. But what are the realistic steps to ensuring the fulfillment of this “American Dream”? And how much of it has to do with the resources you were given, and your luck along the way? Like the color of the skin you were born with. The same color that my Filipino elders wanted to achieve when they scrubbed their children down with papaya soap. For them, adopting whiteness was a symbol of hope for a better, richer future. For me, adopting whiteness is a symbol of departure from our indigenous roots -- that which has the potential to save us from our climate crisis.
I wish I could’ve said those things, but instead of speaking my mind, I remained a muted box on everyone’s zoom screen. My face would likely be a faint memory after that training, if I was remembered at all. Unfortunately, I’ve always been quiet in situations like this. I’ve been conditioned to take up as little space as possible, for fear that I will take space from someone else. But taking up space is the only way for me to reclaim my identity. I validate that confident and assertive voice today, but I’m still sorely regretful that I couldn’t find my words when I needed them most.
Placing this in the context of environmental work, it should be known that no one’s morality is in question when we discuss the importance of DEIJ. Rather, the question is: what are the goals of your conservation work? Who are you conserving for? And what was stolen from pre-existing indigenous societies to make your conservation work possible? Take for example our National Parks, and their dark history of stealing land from indigenous people to preserve “untouched wilderness.” The problem with the mainstream environmental movement is the fact that it was made by and for white people. It was built on a culture of white supremacy, where resources were preserved for the benefit of white people only. This is why I rarely see my face represented in the people I work with. And why the environmental movement has not been as successful as it can be. We are not centering the true value of nature when we view it as a resource to be exploited and are neglecting to share the benefits with our whole community.
It’s evident that racism in the environmental field is not as overt as colorism in the Philippines. In my field, racism manifests in the lack of BIPOC representation and the failure to recognize white environmentalism. It’s the feeling of invisibility I have every time I look around a room and I’m the only Filipina 90% of the time. It’s the burning fire I feel in the pit of my stomach every time someone ignorantly asserts that the “white way” of conservation is the only “right way.” Most people don’t even realize this nuance until it is pointed out to them. That’s the power of culture. We accept one way of being, and although we leave some room for change and innovation, some things remain the same. Our hurting planet cannot sustain this cultural moment. We must be flexible and adapt to a new way of conservation.
This is exactly why environmentalism must be coupled with decolonization. We must acknowledge as a community that there are many ways to address a problem, and assuming otherwise will only slow down our response to climate change -- thereby shortening our lifespan as humanity on this Earth. We need diverse solutions. We need solutions that center equity. We need to unite people over our similarities and learn from our differences. It’s tiring being a brown person fighting for the basic right to exist, especially when we have an existential climate crisis to combat. Of course the world is not as hyper focused on reducing emissions, conserving biodiversity, and investing in sustainable infrastructure when there are wars brewing all over, all the time. People are exhausted with the way things are, but there’s so much work left to do.
It’s clear that the time for radical change is now, and it has to start with us. So I must ask, will you join me?
