Let It Begin with Me

By: Tina Kim Philabotte

Outlets: 603 Diversity

Published: August 1, 2025

Words: 1,012

Last Updated: 5 months, 3 weeks ago

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After graduating from West High School in 1995, I left Manchester and did not return for 27 years. It was an era of colorblind racial politics that amounted to well-intended white folks expressing how I was “the spitting image of a perfect little China doll.” Somewhere later in the conversation, they’d add, “I don’t see color.”

As a trans-racial Korean-adoptee raised by French-Canadian parents, I did not see another face like mine in most rooms, …

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