Flavor of Water.
Professionalism is the flavor of water—bland, neutral, impossible to define, yet somehow praised as the standard of excellence. It’s supposed to mean competence, but I’ve seen enough “professionals” scream at service workers to know better. Professionalism isn’t about what you do; it’s about how well you blend into a mold. And that mold? It was built for the light-skinned, the straight-haired, and the people who can speak without reminding you of their roots. Everyone else? We’re too spicy for the recipe.
Take me, for example. I’m racially ambiguous and homeless, which makes me practically invisible in a world obsessed with categories and addresses. People don’t know what to make of me. My whole life, I’ve been every race except the one I actually am. Black? Hawaiian? Samoan? “Exotic”? People treat me like I’m some kind of Racial Guess Who game. Does she have curly hair? Yes. Speaks Spanish? Sometimes. Okay, but does she tan or burn? The only thing they know for sure is that I’m not white, and apparently, that’s enough.
One time, I was waiting for a parking spot when a white lady tried to swoop in and take it. When I didn’t back down, she screamed, “F*** you, you N-word!” I just blinked at her, stunned. Ma’am, what? I’m Mexican. If you’re going to be racist, could you at least try to be accurate? She was so confident, too, like she’d nailed the insult, and I was just sitting there wondering what racist handbook she thought she was following. The whole thing was so ridiculous I couldn’t even be mad—I was just confused.
That’s the thing about being racially ambiguous: people spend so much time trying to figure out your flavor, but they’re also quick to decide you don’t belong anywhere. Professionalism works the same way. It’s this nebulous idea everyone’s supposed to strive for, but if you’re not already part of the system, it’s impossible to achieve. It tells you to shrink yourself, straighten yourself, and blend in, but no matter how much you try, you’ll never be the right flavor of water.
I saw this play out at a marketing event I went to in downtown Chicago. A white VP gave me the ticket—and the red cloak I wore—because he liked how honest I was about his whiteness. He didn’t say it outright, but I think he wanted me to shake up the room. And boy, did I. Everyone else was in navy blazers and beige pumps, looking like they’d just stepped out of a LinkedIn photo shoot. Then there was me, curly hair doing its best halo impression, dressed like I’d just escaped from a fairytale.
The panel was a masterclass in tokenism. Light-skinned, straight-haired Latinos sat on stage talking about “representation” in vague, corporate terms, like they’d Googled “Latino culture” five minutes before walking on stage. At one point, someone in the audience asked about Afro-Latinidad, and I swear the panelists looked like they’d just been asked to solve quantum mechanics. One guy said, “Afro-Latinidad is… um… complex,” which is corporate code for, “I have no idea what I’m talking about, but I hope this sounds smart.”
I couldn’t take it anymore. I said, “Afro-Latinidad isn’t something you market to—it’s who we are. And the fact that no one here can speak to it shows that this event isn’t about us.” Afterward, a woman came up to me and thanked me. “You just showed them we’re not a monolith,” she said. And while I appreciated her words, I couldn’t shake the exhaustion. The fact that I even had to say it felt like proof that these spaces aren’t about celebrating us—they’re about containing us.