I hate being brown and muslim

I know I’ll always be less than human for them and this isn’t a new realization. I’ve practically grown up watching it play out time after time again, but I thought people would have some empathy towards my lost cat.

I know being brown and Muslim in Canada means being treated like dog shit and less than human, but I still had hope from the community. I thought they’d give for an animal at least. My baby has been lost for so long and even though I reached out to people where my cat was seen, they didn’t care. Today, all my community lost cat posts were deleted. Everyone else has theirs up. Even the ones from 2017 are still available but they deleted my posts. I was threatening, bullying, or being annoying at all. All I said was please keep an eye out, here’s a picture of my cat, and here’s my number. Suddenly, they deleted them all. Even the ones my mom posted in the group.

I worked a part-time job once and I remember a lady struggling with finding her order number. She had her entire phone on the counter, so I asked if it was okay if I could zoom in? And I distinctly remember she said, “I’d rather not have your kind touch my things.”

I knew things were bad but it’s already bad when you’re a woman. Home is hell for most of us and we go out to escape it. Outside is just as bad. I can’t go to the store without being followed by workers. I came straight from work in my suit. I had no reason to steal a freaking dish sponge from Dollarama but they followed me for that too. Personally, I’m going through things that have absolutely wrecked me emotionally. All of this is just a thousand times worse. I’m genuinely considering getting whitening injections and changing my name just so I can be seen as a person and not a go-to casual racism punching bag. I’m born and raised Canadian and remember how kind people were. If I smiled at them while passing by on the street, they’d smile back. Now they just roll their eyes on look away.