Early last winter, my best friend added me to the Subtle Asian Traits (SAT) Facebook group. Initially, I didn’t think much of it. The first thing I saw was a generic meme about bubble tea; it didn’t exactly touch upon the intricacies of being Asian American.
But then the SAT group suddenly exploded in popularity and it seemed like no one could get enough of it. Its iron grasp over my friends’ lives demonstrated that it was not some viral exploitation of the Asian-American experience — clearly, it had touched something buried deeply in the Asian-American psyche.
The premise of SAT was like that of many other Facebook groups: a virtual space to bond. As The New York Times reported, “The concept was simple: Share jokes about the traits, subtle or otherwise, that characterized the Asian-Australian experience, from cultural clashes with parents … to the groan-worthy pickup lines from white men on dating apps.”
This logic has allowed for the curation of artful and profound content ranging from Pikachu memes to detailed accounts of attacks on Asian-American manhood.
SAT is a “third space” for us cultural hybrids to comfortably exist and continue working on ourselves. SAT’s members are self-selecting, diasporic Asians. As a result, the content is, as the name of the group suggests, subtly Asian. The memes are absurd manifestations of the in-between identity that so many of us are still trying to reflect upon and figure out.
It is precisely this experience of being excluded both in the place we call home and in our country of origin that makes SAT so much more than a Facebook group.
Its comical relief provides an outlet for all of the confusion we’ve grappled with; for many of us, it’s the first time we don’t have to make space for ourselves. It’s the first place where there’s a mutual understanding among its million members and we don’t have to explain ourselves. Everyone already understands.
But shared experiences don’t make up the entire picture. Asian-Americans are still flocking to the group because it’s a safe space for self-reflection and serves our in-between status. Knowing that there are already common threads among our experiences provides us with a more critical lens to view ourselves through.
This group allows us to examine the forces that shape our identities and sense of belonging. Each lighthearted post and its thousands of likes are a heartwarming reminder that I’m not alone in the way that my Western upbringing has otherized me.
SAT offers a sense of solidarity for people realizing our identities as bananas, coconuts and whatever else people like to call us and it is nothing to be ashamed of.
I worry that the moments of transnational connection are fleeting because of the social media platforms like these may come and go. But for now, SAT feels like looking at my reflection. It is a portrait of a generation learning to be unapologetically and diasporically Asian.
