Rip issue 5 Nov. 4, 2020 final

Features
Page 6
The Renegade Rip www.therip.com
Wednesday, November 4, 2020
Bakersfield College hosts a panel on the
experiences of interracial couples
By Mark Armendariz-Gonzalez
Reporter
BC hosted a Zoom panel,
where three women discussed
the positive and negative experiences,
they’ve dealt with
being in an interracial relationship
on Oct. 21.
The online panel was organized
by the Latina Leaders
of Kern County and the BC
student organization Latinas
Unidas.
The panel was moderated
by BC Director of Communications
and Community
Relations Norma Rojas-Mora
Ṫhe three women who
took part in the panel discussion
were Sandy Woo-Carter,
Maria Wright, and Carla
Barrientos. All three women
spent the panel answering
questions and telling stories
of how being in an interracial
relationship has affected
them both good and bad.
Woo-Carter is a Chinese
woman who comes from immigrant
parents and married
a white man.
Racism is something she
has dealt with her entire life.
Over time, she has learned
that it is okay to relax and set
up boundaries.
She says she has experienced
racism everywhere.
Whenever she is out with
her husband, she says they
are constantly being stared at
by other people. With these
stares, Woo-Carter can feel
and sense their critics and
thoughts.
“Can we see two people
of different races as equal?,”
Woo-Carter asked.
2020 has brought a lot of
pain on a national scale for
her, due to the treatment
of Asian Americans. Many
Asian Americans are being
targeted and blamed for the
pandemic.
This type of treatment has
made her afraid to go buy
groceries with her family or
even just go walk outside.
Even though 2020 has
been hard for her, she is happy
that this year has brought
racism and many other issues
to light.
“We have progressed, but
we still have many miles to
go,” Woo-Carter said.
Barrientos is an African
American woman who is
married to a Mexican man.
The couple has been married
for 10 years and in this
time have experienced racism
from others.
When the couple bought
their home, they were told by
a neighbor that they should
have checked the neighborhood
demographics before
moving in.
Although Barrientos has
faced her share of racism,
this has not stopped her in
life. She has an incredible
support group of family and
friends that support diversity.
“You need to filter noise
and know you are there for a
reason,” Barrientos said.
The biggest hurdle in her
relationship has been the language
barrier.
The majority of her husband’s
family speaks Spanish
and although she can speak a
little, she can’t hold deep conversations
with them.
This hurdle has made her
even more motivated to learn
to speak Spanish.
Barrientos’s advice to
young interracial couples is
to be open with one another.
It is important to share your
culture and learn a new one.
“They can face whatever
comes their way due to the
love they have,” Barrientos
said.
Wright is a Mexican woman
and is married to an African
American man.
The couple met during
high school and have been
married for almost eight
years.
She was asked once by a
coworker what did her father
think of her husband due to
the fact that he was African
American. Wright thinks it is
unfortunate that people still
have this type of mentality.
Wright is a former undocumented
citizen and racial
tension is something she has
experienced throughout her
life. She knows that there will
come a day when she will
have to have a conversation
about racial tension with her
own son.
“I feel like I’m fighting an
uphill battle to change the
status quo,” Wright said.
One positive though is that
she sees more interracial couples
now than she saw in the
past.
All three women did express
the faith they have in
future generations and these
generations need to keep the
conversation going.
Activist discusses domestic violence
By Sydney McClanahan
Reporter
Bakersfield College Student Government Association
(BCSGA) hosted a webinar with distinguished
guest speaker Beverly Gooden, on Oct 27.
Gooden is a social activist best known for creating
a movement against domestic violence on Twitter,
back in 2014, with the viral #WhyIStayed hashtag
after escaping an abusive relationship.
Alyssa Olivera, BC’s campus advocate and the
prevention education services supervisor for the Alliance
Against Family Violence, said, “Gooden simultaneously
increased awareness while providing
a role model for victims and survivors.”
Gooden shared her story of domestic violence
and the difficulties of escaping the toxic environment
she experienced.
She described a morning where her then-husband
got excessively violent and she started to fear
for her life.
“This time I realized something for the first time,
which was that he could kill me. It never crossed
my mind that I could die in this marriage,” Gooden
said. “I decided that I wanted to live more than
I wanted to be with him.”
As a survivor, she explained how difficult it was
to come to terms and discuss the emotional and
physical abuse she had gone through.
“At the time, I carried a lot of guilt that I had
placed on myself and that I think society places on
people who survive these types of relationships,”
she said.
That guilt she felt lead her to tweet about the reason
for staying with her abuser, following with the
hashtag #WhyIStayed.
Unexpectedly, it created an entire movement to
bring awareness to on a topic that was not often
discussed.
“Issues often trended, but domestic violence
wasn’t one of them,” she said. “It was kind of one
of those things that happened, you heard about it,
you got your victim blamed again and then you
went on about your day.”
Gooden highlighted some of the key reasons why
victims often stay in these types of relationships
based on the responses she read from on Twitter.
These include dependence, fear or threats, and
love.
“I knew who he was the first few months of our
relationship and who he had been to me. I believed
that person was the real person who could come
back, so I was waiting on that.”
She explained that most experience dating violence
before the age of 25 and how many do not
report the violence and abuse that occurs.
“One thing we do know for certain is that 57%
of college students who report experiencing dating
violence said it occurred in college,” she said.
She encourages people to keep and save the Alliance
Against Family Violence and Sexual Abuse
24-hour Crisis Hotline: (661) 327-1091
“We don’t live in a just world. I believe we can
work to make the world just, but as it stands it’s not.
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The Renegade Rip
EDITORIAL BOARD
Editor-in-Chief.........................Haley Duval
Digital Editor.........................Mariah Arviso
News Editor......................Marina Gonzalez
Photo Editor............................Collin Koch
Adviser.........................................Erin Auerbach
STAFF
Reporters/photographers:
Mark Armendariz-Gonzales,
Nicholas Covello, Joselyn Green,
Amaya Lawton, Hugo Maldonado
Garcia, Giselle Manzo, Sydney
Mcclanahan, Victoria Meza,
Hector Morales, Logan Odneal,
Selena Paiz, Thalia Pimentel
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