I only speak cantonese at home, for most of contact with society, it was English, when in the US, or during the few early years of my life in China, it was Mandarin. (But now it’s just English, since its the US)
And my parents are… not very nice parents…
Emotionally abusive for my entire life, and, during the early years of my life, used “corporal punishment”, but only stopped because I got older and can defend myself.
But still constantly being emotionally abusive.
And deny that my (diagnosed) depression exists, while accusing me of “faking” it. While simultaneously threatening to hospitalize me.
Also my (older) brother (who also speaks cantonese at home) is a major douchbag, very abusive to me, especially when I was younger.
grandparents are passive agressive
Like, I kinda just hate Cantonese. I mean, almost every interaction in Cantonese is with an abusive person. And with how closely related Mandarin is to Cantonese, I kinda hate Mandarin too. There’s just so much conservative culture that’s attached to Chinese languages, everytime I hear someone talk in Chinese, especially Cantonese, I kinda feel fear, I feel like my parents are nearby and are yelling at me.
I mean, with English interactions, there’s like half good half bad interactions
With cantonese, its like almost 100% bad interactions
So like… 🤷♂️
No, it is not weird to hate something because it is associated with negative experiences.
Nice and succinct
Trauma is not weird.
It’s not weird but please consider therapy, friend
Like, I kinda just hate Cantonese. I mean, almost every interaction in Cantonese is with an abusive person.
I mean, yeah, I think it’s completely valid in your case. I think people are very good at linking together the sound of something and the atmosphere it is being heard in. This is a very mild example, but I heard many many times the story of " I heard the music that used to be my alarm, and jolted in pain for a moment". So even in such simple cases the effect is strong, and you just had to go through terrible things, all accompanied with the same type of sounds. So yeah, it isn’t weird or bad, it’s just your associations with the awful things that you needeed to go through.
I hope that one day you be able to grow much more warming associations with these sounds, or even just letting them go entirely and embracing another language as the powerful language of love.
It sounds completely natural to associate a language with the experiences you had in it.
Would it be weird to hate France if you went, had your luggage stolen, then got mugged, and then we’re diagnosed with cancer while you were there?
Humans brains are just association machines, and that language has associations for you. Maybe try to find friends in that community to make your own, positive associations?
That’s what you get from giving French a chance. Not even once.
Understandable. We all have memories and triggers. Can be pretty much anything. Question is, whether you need to overcome it for some reason, for example to be more happy in your life. That might or might not be important. On it’s own it’s just you having a past.
Totally valid, I have the same thing but with Russian! There’s also an aspect of just being not very good at the language, so when speaking it at home I basically never had a chance to sufficiently vocalize my thoughts or defend myself in arguments - just because I was never taught enough words for that.
I basically refuse to speak it unless directly talking to my own or my partners parents. Though the hope is to break contact with my parents soon 🤞
There’s also an aspect of just being not very good at the language, so when speaking it at home I basically never had a chance to sufficiently vocalize my thoughts or defend myself in arguments - just because I was never taught enough words for that.
OMG I felt this. I could never find the right words to describe my depression, so my mom just keep going with the “Just Be Happy” or “You’re Lazy That’s Why You’re Depressed”
Like wtf, its fucking brain chemicals. But even google translate doesn’t find those right words that make a good argument, like things like metaphors, idioms, or any figure of speech cannot be translated, so yea… (fuck my life) 😓
At a previous workplace one of my coworkers had an abuse trigger of hearing gum chewed - they didn’t explain in detail (and I didn’t ask) but clearly they’d been through a rough enough time that they asked people sitting near them to refrain from having gum in the office.
I, personally, loathe the specific shade of orange associated with Halloween for my own private reasons.
When we have a strong negative experience, especially if that experience is continuous over a long time. It’s perfectly fair to be triggered emotionally by things you associate with that experience - it’s not fair to others to show them hate for traits they share with the people who gave you those negative experiences but your reaction to those triggers are valid. I want to clarify that last sentence, for some people it’s impossible not to feel strong emotions when exposed to a trigger like that - but you should be rationally aware that people you meet on the street who speak Cantonese are not your family members and did not cause you that pain. If you find yourself in a painful situation you should try to remove yourself from that situation if possible or make people aware of your emotions if possible prior to expressing your emotions on someone unaware. With the triggering action being a language that will be especially difficult since it’s likely to be perceived as xenophobia so I’d stress trying to remove yourself from a situation if you’re feeling strong emotions.
Maybe you need to find a warm group of Cantonese speakers (native or otherwise) that could help you make healthy bonds with your mother tongue. It would be a shame to lose fluency in it because of your trauma. But it’s understandable to feel the way you feel.
The only group of Cantonese speakers I find around the US are middle-aged adults, or elderly, first generation immigrants, who probably I can’t relate to (due to generational gap)
I would probably more be able to relate to younger people. But most of those are Hong Kongers, and that’s within the borders of PRC, and especially now after the National Security Act (after the 2019 protests), I don’t feel comfortable going there.
If it were me, I’d find a Cantonese speaking actor with a really nice voice and have them record some positive affirmations specific to me.
Things like “You are better than your family,” or “You deserve to feel better.”
You can probably find something similar already recorded on a site like Audible
Just the opinion of a rando on the interwebs.
Lol
I watched some Cantonese TV shows, conservative culture seems to be so common.
Like the binary gender roles of men and women. How men should be “tough”. As a guy, who isn’t really that “tough”, I kinda hate it. Filial piety is also a common thing, and parents are always portrayed as caring… which just feels like those TV shows are made to invalide the fact that shitty parents exist.
Totally understandable. I hate a particular type of architecture because of a job I had in a building of that style.
Typically the family, never good enough, never everything enough.
I think HK Cantonese is aggressive in much the same way as Boston English is. Speaking HK Cantonese puts me in a whole different persona than speaking Beijing Mandarin. But I’m 1000x more competent in the latter.
