No money. No one around. Friends that live too far. Parents without love who sabotaged me. No partner. No siblings. No executive functioning. No evidence of a year that's passed besides time I won't get back again. 26. "Femcel material." Happy birthday to me.
No siblings. No loving parents. No partner. No money. No friends physically close to me. Just another year. A step closer to dying. Alone most likely.
Nice format where the interviewer (Trevor Noah) and the guest (Vic Mensa) are both biracial (B&W) and coming at each other with a non hostile, open-minded perspective. Vic touches on his experiences with not being "racially ambiguous" so much as his racial background/heritage being perceived completely differently when in South Africa and Ghana compared to Chicago, Illinois with Black South Africans referring to him as Coloured, Ghanaians referring to him as a generalized White translation deeming him Western first and foremost and 'an exalted foreigner' on that basis, and the general monoracial populations of Chicago (mostly Black & White population) referring to him as Black almost exclusively or else treating him what he considers to be 'Black.' He also mentions the term "Biracial" came later in his life and I think that's worth spotlighting somewhat. Mensa was born in 1993 and like most people his age was called "Black" in the US much longer than "Biracial" and more consistently until this most recent shift to push black-biracials out of blackness.
That said, I think any mixed person can relate to what he's saying to some degree.
Curious to hear anyone's comments and personal anecdotes regarding their experiences while traveling and how their racial perception changes while traveling compared to their home country or home region more specifically (state/province/etc). Each country has their own racial classification system and each environment reflects it's own demographics and exposure specifically impacting how people are seen if they're mixed race.
It's nice to see that acknowledged in an interview that isn't 'loaded' or political and to simply watch this conversation take place in the mainstream without anyone jumping on either biracial person speaking on their experiences with race and how the perception of their racial identity changes from place to place and without anyone blaming them for that occurring or assuming this is a point of admiration or shame for the mixed person just existing in the world going from one place to the next. Not only is the interview deeply refreshing but so are the comments (non-defensive and civil for the most part). Is the tide possibly turning? I'd like to believe so but I'm also realistic and won't hold my breath honestly. Good conversation nonetheless and I'm glad monoracials are being mostly normal towards biracial people in more organic 'low stakes' settings where no one is encouraged to defend themselves or view each other as political opposition (because the truth is our existence is often taken as a political statement/inherently political). Maybe Trevor Noah has cultivated a good audience specifically or exercises some control over his channel, blocking the hate comments. It's sad how reasonable people are being stands out to me but it does on some level.
Interested in hearing more from us regardless.
What was the last country you visited and how were you perceived there compared to other places? Both socially and on the government level (eg: labeling on forms). Then when traveling within the same country that technically holds the same racial classification system - have you noticed a mild or drastic change in perception from region to region? Has time impacted that change in racial perception at all (say pre-2020s decade vs. now)?
In fact, Hayley is my favorite character and yet it's my favorite death scene in the entire TVDU... People are right to say it's unfair and tragic but it also feels true to the character and her evolution in a way a lot of the other deaths don't. Hayley started off as a lone wolf desperately craving a pack, a family, a tribe, devotion, and acceptance. She was a born warrior since being abandoned. The most truly animal of all of them, sometimes savage and rabid. Hayley at first is ruthless, selfish, honest, pure, simple, instinctual. Then once she becomes a mother she is also patient in comparison to before, nurturing, introspective, fair, diplomatic - while still being all those other things she was before. It's truly character development done right. Done natural, gradual, and in a way where you recognize the character's essence the whole time and understand why she has realistically changed and the course of events that inspired it.
By the time Hope is a teenager, Hayley had been a mother for several years though still not in the relationship she long desired to have with Elijah making things bittersweet and better than she could've imagined her life being when she was a homeless teenager but still with some things left desired meaning she still has more to live for (finding the love of her life, convincing Klaus to get closer to Hope, discovering all she can be when not in survival mode/strictly being there for her dauguter starting to get older and showing the capacity to protect herself with the strengthening of her powers). She at this point in life is someone with dreams left unfulfilled but also someone who had built a life for herself from nothing and long solidified as a Mikaelson as much as a Marshall-Kenner giving her the long aching sense of belonging she spent more than the first half of her life searching for. By the time she dies she had formed an unshakable bond with all of them. Fully integrated into the Mikaelson family and accepted as one of them and even more defined by the family she formed with Klaus and Hope who she put her love and faith in completely. She wasn't alone anymore and she wasn't just defined by fighting her enemies. She found purpose, she achieved security, and she gained a legacy.
Klaus himself being intertwined with all of those things, and so it's right for Klaus to be there in the end. It's right for her to glance over at him while she's dying and realize this man she started off not trusting at all was the one she would come to understand and trust most and the only other person she could ensure would fight to the ends of the earth for their daughter in this life and the next. It's right for her to look at Klaus after her harrowing realized disappointment Elijah isn't Elijah and there to save her. Standing quietly in the hopeless moment taking that in while recognizing that Klaus himself can't save her but also won't make her feel alone while she's dying and not let Hope ever get in the position she's in now where she's suffering and in danger. She sees him and she sees her family and it gives her the strength and courage to make the one desperate shot to save her daughter she has that she accepts within seconds will mean not only never making it to 40, never having Elijah, and never watching her daughter grow up, but burning alive and dying painfully and in a way that can't be reversed. It's the kind of selfless sacrifice you could never see the Hayley of TVD making yet reflecting the kind of strategic, quick thinking Hayley always had as a competent leader leading herself without role models before going on to advise others. She is familiar there, her younger self and matured self bridged together. And she maintains full autonomy in a way the female characters of TVD rarely do: Hayley is not a prop or a symbol or the pinnacle of beauty when she dies but the epitome of motherhood, love, tragedy, and courage. She is entirely herself and makes the informed decision to be a necessary martyr for Hope and Klaus on her own. She makes the decision to take her killer down with her on her own. Vengeful and ruthless and cunning and loving as ever. Hayley is a wolf till the end and I wouldn't want it any other way for her. If she were to suddenly be a damsel saved by a man in some romantic gesture - she wouldn't be Hayley and she wouldn't be choosing her own destiny and going out on her own terms. Hayley was a lone wolf and a pack animal, a destined queen and accidental mother, a lover and fighter, alpha and hybrid, capable of healing others and maiming them. All of that is there in the end: her strength, loyalty, leadership, love, and answered cruelty. You threaten her and the ones she loves and you're going down with her. This is the Hayley who rocked Hope in her arms every night and ripped Francesca apart. The Hayley who's anger is never aimless but accomplishing. Anger and instinct forever at the core of her. Anger and instinct and resolve intrinsically at the depth of her.
People debate on whether or not she had to die but putting aside whether she should've died or had to, there was no better way to portray her death even if it hurts to realize she didn't get to enjoy her dream of family for very long. Hayley and her ultimate dream of a forever family was still self-actualized, making it a satsifying conclusion to her arc. Her living a shorter lifespan than most humans is also fitting because it emphasizes her wolf core and purity in contrast with her being tainted with vampirehood that never suited her the same. Hayley dies the opposite of a vampire and dies in a way that contradicts everything vampirehood stands for such as being an immortal. She'd rather die fighting in the sun, surrounded by the ones she loves than live indefinitely, cursed with the desire for blood above family. Especially when she gets to reunite with her pack in the afterlife while still watching over said family because she always saw herself as part of her pack, part of Klaus' family, Hope's mother, and a primal creature roaming in the day and night that is an extension of nature that fends for itself rather than a creature of darkness or a caged animal. Hayley appropriately died a wild animal instead of a damsel in distress for Elijah to rescue. No death suited her the same.