Boba liberal is a term mostly used within the Asian diaspora communities in the West, especially in the United States. It describes someone of East or Southeast Asian descent living in the West who has a shallow, surface-level liberal outlook. It is also occasionally used to describe conservatives who weaponize their East or Southeast Asian identity. The neologism emerged among the Asian American leftist community on Twitter who accused "boba liberals" of only holding their liberal beliefs to appear more White adjacent, by engaging in progressive social movements or viewpoints, while at the same time disregarding and trivializing issues concerning Asians.[1][2][3][4]
The Asian identity of boba liberals has often been accused of being shallow and superficial since it goes directly against their goal of removal of aspiration to Whiteness, and so uses surface level stereotypical Asian traits such as "liking boba tea" to bolster their Asian credentials. Hence, the emergence of the term boba liberal.[5][6]
Controversy
editThe term "boba liberal" was coined in 2019 by Vietnamese American Twitter user Redmond (@diaspora_is_red) to analyze a form of Asian American liberalism through a Marxist lens.[7][8][9] Redmond has criticized the misappropriation of their neologism by stripping away the Marxist framework by failing to discuss "socialism, communism, the capitalist system, imperialism, and the diaspora bourgeoisie" and conflating "boba liberalism" with the flawed concept of "East Asian privilege".[9]
United States
editOne commentator described boba liberals as supporting policies that primarily benefit upper-income Asian-Americans, and not necessarily the Asian-American community as a whole.[4] Therefore, while the word "liberal" is used in the term, it is not mutually exclusive to one specific ideology, as it may also extend to conservative-aligned Asians in some areas, as they would often take advantage of the "model minority" label by defending such measures.[10][11]
See also
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References
edit- ^ Frias, Lauren (6 May 2021). "Boba liberalism: How the emergence of superficial activism could cause more harm than good to the AAPI community". Insider. Retrieved 13 February 2022.
- ^ Rosen, Laura (18 February 2021). "The Quad: Bursting the bubble of boba liberalism amid the COVID-19 pandemic". Daily Bruin. Retrieved 13 February 2022.
- ^ Yukiko, Sarah (24 December 2021). "Boba liberals: The meaning of the term used to describe the Asian Americans everyone loves to hate". NextShark. Retrieved 13 February 2022.
- ^ a b Quach, Cindy (27 February 2021). "What is Boba Liberalism?". Retrieved 13 February 2022.
Boba liberalism thrives in a capitalist and neoliberal society because neoliberal policies primarily benefit wealthier communities. Typically, the faces of boba liberalism are Asian Americans that are part of the middle and upper economic class. As a result, boba liberals disregard the negative effects of capitalism because they profit from it. For instance, boba liberals tend to focus on advocating for Asian representation in White spaces, or discussing whether or not wearing chopsticks in one's hair is culture appropriation. These topics are popular within boba liberal circles, all while dialogue regarding inequality, globalization, and racial injustice are purposely neglected.
- ^ Fan, Jiayang (29 January 2021). "Chronicles of a Bubble-Tea Addict". The New Yorker. Retrieved 13 February 2022.
- ^ Zhao, Yingying (5 February 2021). "Bubble Tea, Boba Liberalism, and Capitalism's Effects on East Asian Diasporic Identity". The Yale Herald. Retrieved 13 February 2022.
- ^ "What is Boba Liberalism? – FEM Newsmagazine". Retrieved 2022-03-03.
- ^ Zhao, Yingying (2021-02-05). "Bubble Tea, Boba Liberalism, and Capitalism's Effects on East Asian Diasporic Identity". The Yale Herald. Retrieved 2022-03-03.
- ^ a b "Socialist With SE Asian Diaspora Characteristics". X. Jul 28, 2020.
- ^ Zhang, Jenny G. (5 November 2019). "How Bubble Tea Became a Complicated Symbol of Asian-American Identity". Eater. Retrieved 13 February 2022.
While bubble tea itself is neither inherently political nor bad, per se, some Asian Americans are critical of the dominant strain of Asian-American politics, called "boba liberalism," that the drink has come to represent in certain circles. Boba liberalism — is the "substanceless trend-chasing spectacle" that is mainstream Asian-American liberalism, derided as shallow, consumerist-capitalist, and robbed of meaning.
- ^ Vo, Mai (19 October 2021). "How did we get from bubble tea to boba liberalism?". Trinitonian. Retrieved 13 February 2022.
"Boba liberalism" obscures the diversity present in the community. It effaces the stories of working-class families, stories of undocumented immigrants, and stories of people who are fundamentally vulnerable in the community. Another issue with "boba liberalism" is rooted in its prevalence among middle- to upper-middle-class East and Southeast Asian communities and how they maintain the dominant voice within the Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) sphere.
Further reading
edit- Phruksachart, Melissa (1 March 2020). "The Bourgeois Cinema of Boba Liberalism". Film Quarterly. 73 (3): 59–65. doi:10.1525/fq.2020.73.3.59. S2CID 214411799. Retrieved 13 February 2022.
External links
edit- Why I Hate Subtle Asian Traits by Sarah Mae Dizon (30 August 2020).