The culture that I come from breeds a certain kind of passivity. It says that if you’re a woman you...

The culture that I come from breeds a certain kind of passivity. It says that if you’re a woman you bow to the wills of those around you. You say yes because you’ve been taught to bend over backwards to please other people. You say yes because you’ve been taught obedience. When your parents say ‘jump’, you jump. You don’t speak back. You don’t get too loud. My best friend is the perfect example of a passive, compliant woman who is engaged at 20 to a man she’s barely spoken five words to because her parents told her to and she listened because that’s what being a good daughter is. The fact that this kind of thing is happening right now, still, in 2014 to girls who have been brought up in western culture makes me furious. Now that’s not me saying western culture is the shining pinnacle because it’s really not. But there are some aspects of it, independence of thought being the biggest, that I support fully.

I’m fucking rejecting this culture. I’m rejecting it for myself and for any future children that I might have. I’m not going to enforce unfair rules on the people I love.

I’m not going to be complicit in the widespread silence of brown women.