DISCLAIMER: If you’re looking for a fair and balanced report on this story, this isn’t it. Sure, I’ll give you the facts, but my opinion is written all over this. Be ye warned.
OK so by now you’ve probably heard the story, but I’ll rehash it for you just in case, and I’ll try to suppress as much sarcasm as I can.
Girl goes shopping for prom dress, looking for something modest. Girl finds cute dress in vintage Salt Lake clothing store. It’s a Chinese dress. Girl buys dress, goes to prom, takes pictures and posts this on Twitter:
PROM pic.twitter.com/gsJ0LtsCmP
— Keziah (@daumkeziah) April 22, 2018
And then all H-E-DOUBLE-HOCKEY-STICKS breaks loose.
It looks like it started with a Tweet by user Jeremy Lam, who said that “My culture is NOT your (expletive deleted) prom dress.”
One contradicting opinion isn’t a huge deal, but the negative tweet has since received almost 180 thousand ‘likes’ and almost 42 thousand Retweets. A lot of people seemed to agree with Lam, and the story took off.
I love and appreciate diversity and other cultures. I mean no hate. I love everyone ❤️
— Keziah (@daumkeziah) April 29, 2018
People started picking sides. Some are defending Lam, saying the dress, called a qipao, has cultural value that renders it unwearable by someone that doesn’t share or fully understand that culture. Some are accusing Keziah of “cultural appropriation.” Others are defending Keziah’s dress choice, calling it “cultural appreciation.” Many others. Most others. A lot of others. Deseret News quotes Keziah as having said that “For everyone negative, there’s a hundred positive.”
Media attention
The story has gone viral. It’s been covered around the country and has even made its way around to China. What did the Chinese have to say about it? The New York Times did a whole story on it called Teenager’s Prom Dress Stirs Furor in U.S.—but Not in China. They interview one writer and fashion blogger, Hung Huang, who says that, “To Chinese, [the qipao] not sacred and it’s not that meaningful. Nowadays, if you see a woman wearing a qipao, she’s probably a waitress in a restaurant or a bride.”
Keziah recently appeared on Good Morning America where she defended her choice despite the public backlash:
Social reactions
Hero of the week: @daumkeziah for not apologizing just to placate the idiotic SJW mob.
— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) May 1, 2018
It’s a cute dress but that’s not the point. You can’t take everything you like. unlearn that white culture hun. Some things are not for you. this is one of them. Appreciate their culture by not wearing items in which you have no understanding of its history or significance.
— cait ? (@caitlyn_imani) April 29, 2018
I'm Asian and I think you WORK IT GIRL! 😀 That color really brings out the earthiness of your eyes! ♡
— ????? ☆ (@DreamyDarkWitch) April 30, 2018
Hey, thank you for wearing that dress! As a Chinese American, thank you for your appreciation to the beauty and culture that has been deeply cherished by me and my ancestors. And this beautiful, rich culture and heritage doesn't only belong to us, it belongs to the mankind!
— chenyang rickard (@chenyangrickard) May 3, 2018
‘Girl appreciates another culture’ the real headline reads
— Lucas Munday (@lucas_munday) May 3, 2018
In defense of Jeremy Lam (sort of)
6. Whether or not people agree with me I will stand for what I believe, because I feel in my heart that it’s right. I won’t be boxed in with the confines of the model minority stereotype. If I feel disrespected, I will tell you. I will stay angry, I will stay resilient.
— Jeremy Lam (@jere_bare) April 29, 2018
Do I think this dude made a big deal out of something that shouldn’t have been a big deal? Yes. Has he brought an army of haters with him? Yes. But there’s been plenty of backlash towards him, too. Probably more than what Keziah has had to deal with, and for that reason, I feel sorry for him.
It is obviously my opinion that there’s no problem with Keziah’s dress, but in defense of Jeremy Lam, I can see how in some scenarios it would totally be inappropriate to wear certain styles of clothing. For instance, if someone wore our sacred LDS temple clothing to their high school prom, I’d definitely have questions. But for the thousands of people coming to Keziah’s defense, the qipao is far from comparable to temple clothing. This is not that, and I think Lam’s pointed finger is misplaced. But we can agree to disagree. He’s entitled to his opinion.
Another important factor to consider before grabbing your torch and pitchfork is the intent of the “offender.” Was Keziah intending to be offensive towards Chinese culture? Obviously not. Some people claim that the group photo where the pose seems to be an Asian-esque bow is culturally insensitive, but Keziah says the pose is actually a homage to a popular YouTube channel called h3h3Productions (which has since also come to Keziah’s defense).
At the end of the day, we live in a world where genocide, starvation, political instability, and countless other horrors plague our lives. Why are we worried about this girl’s prom dress?
But whether or not it should, the conversation is happening.
