i feel like a really cool detail in the music video is that mitski is kind of the one that everyone is touching up? like she’s the one in lipstick and a pantsuit and the person everyone is trying to fix , like with hairspray and other things. meanwhile the “all-american boy” is just there, in nothing but a grey tank top and some pants, with no one trying to “fix him”. they can’t fix him because to them, he’s already perfect. he’s the standard.
the line “Your mother wouldn’t approve of how my mother raised me, but I do, I finally do” is simply the best thing ever written, and i could do a whole thesis about it
please do! i'm not a native english speaker (poc northen african)so i couldn't really understant fully the meaning behind this line especially the "but i do, i finally do" part, like is she refering as her understanting and approving how her own mother raised her and being fine with her or just approving her partner's mother? i'd love to hear your opinion :D
@@Chewable396 it’s ok we (poc women) don’t wanna date you anyway. I know…. UGH I know… I’m sorry!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! it’s just that we don’t wanna date you at all and so we won’t date you. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. HARAHARHARH.
The thing is Mitski is mixed, so she looks Asian to Americans but when she goes to Japan she looks white to them. Makes you feel like you don't belong anywhere.
i’m not mixed-race, just asian-american, but damn that hit home edit: okay technically i’m mixed race but from two southeast asian areas so you can’t tell from my appearance
the reference of the sun and moon/ day and night is a callback to “Sun and Moon” from Miss Saigon, which is a song about Kim (who is Viet) and Chris (who is white). the line “you’re the sun, you’ve never seen the night but you hear its song from the morning birds” symbolizes how white people never will truly face racism and are lucky to have only hear it from others (the morning birds) . when mitski says that she’s “not the moon” and she’s “not even a star” she talks about how she isn’t even the desirable parts of the night. this verse is also when the white woman appears, dressed in a culture that is not hers, which the white man is interested it, culture being the “stars” and the “moon” in the metaphor of the verse.
i heard the lyric wrong! i thought it was "you're another proof of how my mother raised me" which is a million miles off but also kinda works in its own way....
Well I'm as white as someone could be.. but thanks to my completely messed up family I will always be afraid of the explaining I have to do when someone asks anything about them. Soo this hits in many ways
You can see how she then becomes uncertain again at the end as she switches the lyric back to “I think I do”, it shows no matter how much we love ourselves there is always a tinge of uncertainty
@@killjinxx: Yeah, that’s the way I interpreted the first one, then the “I _finally_ do” to being sure about it, then the second “think” (along with the voice change) to be as per OP said…
i grew up in poverty and especially relate to the “your mother wouldn’t approve of how my mother raised me” because my mother often had to resort to desperate measures to get food on the table and pay bills, and we were often criticized by others for how we looked and acted, we barely took showers to lower the cost of our water bill. thank you mitski, this song means a lot to me.
@@francis4evuh when I first heard the song I related to it purely as a child of European immigrants who felt really othered by the Australian kids I went to school with for my culture and the way that my parents were. I’m queer and all the people at the lgbt+ club would be really rude about my parents for not being accepting or whisper about how it was because they were foreigners. My mum once came to pick me up from school and she was really sick that day so she sounded nasally and was loosing her voice so she was kinda yelling, so that set of a chain reaction of everyone saying that she sounded like H*tler and making n*zi jokes. My mother escaped from East Germany in the 80s. and then I found out this song was about race and I was like “oh” 😭
@@Lara-vo6rp lara i totally agree with you theres no other explanation to this song, but i also agree with mango because social status also counts. but racially thats what she meant. i love the video , the actors and mitski too
I hope every poc girl/woman aligned person that has ever bursted into tears at the line “Your mother wouldn’t approve of how my mother raised me, but I do, I finally do” someday a thousand percent feels that in their hearts. There is nothing wrong with the culture you were raised in just because it doesn’t fit the white American standard. You deserve to be accepted for everything that comes with your identity
As an African, I can’t even dream about ever talking to anyone who isn’t from my country. So even liking a white guy or another person out of my race would definitely be a no from my parents. There is this one guy I like but because of the racial and cultural tension, I’ll have to just give up on him.
I relate to that line so much, because I get so scared of the idea of white friends or a white partner ever coming over, because they won't understand why my dad speaks in a loud way to enunciate his English, or how my mother would often speak with slightly off grammar, and how our house smells like spices and something foreign, or how we have a loud sense of humour, or how we always put on our foreign song channel to listen to our music all day, and how our music and movie industry works, and how we just aren't white. I always tell myself this is irrational, but it's fuelled by when my white friend back when I was 10 years old told how she felt sorry for me to have to live in a household like this, wanting to go outside and offered me a present in pity, or when white neighbourhood kids came over and gave my mother and my home weird looks. Idk if I can lose that part of myself.
what I love the most about her songs is that they start off slow, innocent, and accoustic. Then out of nowhere, they EXPLODE into an emotional, electric guitar whirlwind. She's perfect
I know right?! I discovered this song while looking through one of those "Best ... albums of the year" posts, and I saw Puberty 2 as number 2. So I put this song on while I was doing some work. At first I thought it was just one of those regular indie rock songs, I wasn't looking at the video at all. I had my eyes on the paper in front of me, and suddenly this distortion comes on and all the harmonics, so I look up and continue watching the video until the very end. I was left in tears and that's how I discovered Mitski.
“I wasn’t trying to send a message. I was in love. I loved somebody so much, but I also realized I can never be what would fit into their life.” -Mitski (in reference to this song)
This is sort of out of context. She was responding to an interviewer asking if this song was about her fitting in with the state of the indie scene, given it was overwhelmingly white, which many were assuming when it came out.
@@user-pz4xe3sb6t Indie is overwhelmingly white? I always felt that Indie is the most diverse and open community of like-minded artists and fan's. Unlike rap, which is mostly inner city black and white or country, which again is white. Indie is a vibe and attracts all types of people. Indie goes beyond race, age and background.
@@hellrazor117 All music goes beyond race, age, and background but alternative music is definitely majority white. Nothing wrong with that. Some demographics gravitate to certain genres more than others.
I think it’s so beautiful in the second chorus she says “I finally do”, talking about her accepting her background despite the despair of being rejected for it
I know this was written from an Asian-American woman perspective - but as an Indigenous woman, I can't help but relate to this song so much. I feel like I can never fit into the perfect American image, which is ironic because I am Native. No matter how much I try, I don't fit in their world. But like Mitski, I love myself and I will be okay.
you’ve got this! my grandma is full native and i’m mixed and it took me a long time to accept myself as a woc but our culture is what makes us beautiful :))
i completely get this, as a first generation hispanic woman i’ll never feel american enough and i’ll never feel hispanic enough and i feel strange living in america due to cultural differences such as in the lyric “ur mom would ever approve of how my mom raised me” or something like that
This made me tear up so much. As a Latina, I look like my father, big nose, freckles, coily hair, brown skin, and pudgy. I caught feelings for a lot of white men and it hurts a fuck ton when you are not what they desire because they want to stick to what they know (which isn't always a bad thing). Last white guy I confessed to stopped talking to me and was flirting with a white girl soon after in front of me. I had never experienced such a whirlwind of negative feelings. Self-hate, anger, resentment, sadness, envy and so much more. I wanted to be a white girl so badly. I wanted to have straight blonde hair, green eyes, a tiny nose, and pale skin. But now I'm in the process of learning to love myself the way I am and maybe some will love me too. :)
i can relate to this. I'm half black, and half Indian. my mom is a immigrant and my dad has lived in America all his life. But I have this giant crush on this guy in my class, but he seems to like my white friend. who is blonde and has blue eyes. I'm the only POC girl in my class. I feel so left out sometimes. I just want someone to like me despite not having blue eyes and blond hair. i have curly black hair, and black eyes. and brown skin. I feel very lonely a lot of them time. :(
@@clarehart9353 i don’t think that’s really what it’s abt, i think it’s more about ethnic peoples struggles of living in america and trying to fit in, wishing that they could relate more to white american culture.
i think the girl wearing the "native" clothing and having the fake native tattoo also symbolises how white men (or even our own men) dont like our features when its on us but when its on a white woman, they love it.
Hey So basically I'm just gonna not date POC womynX..... I know…… UGH I know... I’m sorry!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It's just that I'm not gonna date them is all HAHAHAHAHRHAHAHA HARAHARHARH.
as an indian woman who was raised in a predominantly white area, i felt this in my soul. this song actually makes me cry because i feel seen. mitski's lyrics explain the feelings i cannot put into words. i love all of the beautiful woc here
yes!! I also was raised in a predominantly white area, but I am black, it really does make me feel a sense of acceptance knowing that im not alone AT ALL
This is what Mitski had to say about the song: "Your Best American Girl is a love song. A lot of reviews have agreed on a narrative that "she wrote this song to stick it to 'the white boy indie rock world'!" but I wasn't thinking about any of that when I was writing it, I wasn't trying to send a message. I was in love. I loved somebody so much, but I also realized I can never be what would fit into their life. How hard I tried, we were from different worlds, and there was nothing I could do about that. Yes in the musical composition I used tropes from "white indie rock" of my adolescence (the chord progressions, the moment at 2:25, etc), and my mentioning that in interviews was probably what propagated the aforementioned narrative. But I used those tropes to accentuate the point that I could use their methods and act like I was of their world, but I would never ever fit. It's probably silly and unnecessary for me to say this. I completely understand that when writers are writing a piece they have to decide on a theme, they have very limited time and space (and energy with how much music journalist are required to put out!) to get their point across, and they also have to think about what people would want to read based on the cultural climate. I definitely would not be able to do what writers do! So no disrespect here. I just figured I should say what I meant by the song from my mouth, because maybe you've also had a moment where loving someone with all your heart was simply not enough, and I would hate for you to miss a song about that feeling because you were told it was about something else. Thanks for reading all the way to the bottom!"
Well, that wise yet humble comment does make it go down better. The recent NYT magazine piece on the song was annoying, with its ridiculous SJW usage circa 2017 of "white supremacy." That said, the lyric about the mothers is classic--the NYT writer was right about that. CS
Haru Gumbo She also said the following in her Pitchfork interview: "You always want what you can’t have, and that all-American thing, from the day I was born, I could never enter that dream. That all-American white culture is something that is inherited instead of attained. So yes, it’s a sad song, but I wanted to make sure it reflected all of the contrasting feelings. You can be heartbroken about a relationship, but also, from it, realize you are you and you’re okay with who you are, or where you came from." pitchfork.com/news/68089-mistki-breaks-down-your-best-american-girl-on-song-exploder/
George de Montaigne so she's literally said the opposite in one interview to what she said in another, sounds like she's fucking with us. Personally I only felt that it was a love song and nothing more. Also as an outsider from a country with very little mixed population Mitski is exactly what I think of as an "all-american" girl, essentially a melting pot of different ethnicities, nationalities and cultures unified under one flag. That's exactly what being american means as far as I was aware.
it also made me think of like, when you're a kid and starting to feel things, but only white boys and white girls are getting anything going bc poc are considered lesser and don't get asked out or wanted as much, so lonely girls and boys/others of color will just have themselves to hug and feel wanted
The fact that she's kissing the only fraction she has of him in which is the initial waving is sooooooooooo. Love and idealising one aspect of something, over and over is so painfully nice.
As an adopted Asian. This hit me so fucking hard. I’ve always hated who I was because of the way I was treated. I’ve always wanted to be white, I thought I needed to be white. This hit so hard, thank you so much Mitski.
As an Indian girl, I feel it. Even though all the guys will think I’m pretty, they still fall in love with the white girl because it’s “safe”. I feel like nobody will ever love me, Indian, American, all others, etc. I feel like I’m just objectified or seen as a potential conquest on someone’s list. You’d love to think race doesn’t matter for love, and I don’t think it should, but most of society is still conditioned that way
The society has grown learning from what they saw in films, modelling, tv, and various entertainment industries and tuned as white and slim is the superior beauty.
This hits so hard as an Pakistani man with people not even treating me as an option and the people who have confessed to me say that they're embarrassed by the fact they like me. Feeling like fading into the background and not being seen. This truly does speak to me and wishing I was different but also seeing that through my culture and my own parents giving me skin whitening creams. Thank you for making this song.
I’m really sorry to hear about your experience. White CIS dude here (not the guy in the video). I just wanna encourage you to just be yourself without skin whitening creams and such. I see a lot of mixed couples and I really think there’s got to be quite a few women that will like you for who you really are as a person and will either think that your ethnicity is a kind of nice bonus feature or really think nothing of it at all.
hey Im a paksitani girl too and same. All my relatives are the same as the people who confessed to you. Both my brothers have really fair skin and my tone is a bit darker so ever since i was a young child everyone pointed that out. dont forget you arent alone in this and one day both of us will accept and love ourselves for who we are, along with the people surrounding us
It sucks that all of you here end up feeling that way. I'd be proud to be with any of you. The right person is always out there, no matter what color they are! ♡
this song is the embodiment of the fear and uncertainty you feel when dating outside of your race (and even outside of your economic class), especially dating a white person. you want to be the best you can so you can get the approval of not just his family but sometimes it feels you need your significant other’s approval as well. until finally, you become sick of accommodating, and realize you and where you come from are fine as it is.
As a white girl (I’m not a man so my thoughts on this might be a little different) I think the reason why most of us stick to white people is because we always think of ending up with a white person by default. When I think of my future spouse in my head, he’s always white. I’m definitely not opposed to dating POC but there’s just more complications that come with it. I have an asian friend and I find that I can’t build any sort of acquaintance to her parents and they’re just a lot different culturally. That’s a little bit of an issue with dating so it is much easier to just date someone with a dynamic that you’re used to. I mean it’s a known study that we prefer people that look like us.
dear yt women who think this about white women with blonde hair and blue eyes, please shut up you’re still the beauty standard no matter if you’re brunette, ginger, etc. you’re white, plain and simple.
fr i’m kinda tired of white brunette girls crying about not being blonde bc that’s the “beauty standard” like just dye your hair tf? you are the beauty standard
As a White woman reading all of these stories from WOC makes me sad, I know I will never understand your pain and frustration but I'm here to listen. That being said all the other white women in the comments talking about not having "blonde hair, and blue eyes" you definitely missed the whole point of the song...
@Sheepwy sorry I thought they were those ppl who thought the song was about being a white girl *but* with blonde hair and blue eyes, if you have any other hair, any other eyes, you're allowed relate to the song smh like no ur still white, you're not discriminated against because of ur race I'M SO SORRY IF UR NOT THAT PERSON 😭
If I could, I'd be your little spoon And kiss your fingers forevermore But, big spoon, you have so much to do And I have nothing ahead of me You're the sun, you've never seen the night But you hear its song from the morning birds Well I'm not the moon, I'm not even a star But awake at night I'll be singing to the birds Don't wait for me, I can't come Your mother wouldn't approve of how my mother raised me But I do, I think I do And you're an all-American boy I guess I couldn't help trying to be your best American girl You're the one You're all I ever wanted I think I'll regret this Your mother wouldn't approve of how my mother raised me But I do, I finally do And you're an all-American boy I guess I couldn't help trying to be the best American girl Your mother wouldn't approve of how my mother raised me But I do, I think do
i’ve spent so much time being “embarrassed” because i’m not white. Recently with my dad getting sick, i’ve been wanting to get closer to my culture. i feel so whitewashed and i hate it. i used to draw myself as white. i wished i was white. this song really captures it. I dated a white boy and always felt like i wasn’t good enough because i’m not white. Mitski does such an amazing job of capturing the feelings of being a WOC. I’m only 16 but i hope one day i can be just like my parents
@@theadultsaretalking2582 why are you under every Mexican girls comment? Lmfao, even if their classification isn’t correct I’m pretty sure it’s obvious they are brown Latina judging by the context of the song and their comments. Pls stop being so nit picky on posts where people are just trying to express their emotions and experiences, it’s really not a big deal
the transition from "I do I think i do" to 'I do i finally do" and the way she smiles while looking towards the ceiling really fucks with me. This song is constantly playing at my job and i fell in love with it . The chorus is amazing and the story behind the video breaks my heart.
I like when she's like 'you're the one, you're all I ever wanted...I think I'll regret this.' Its the strange dichotomy of knowing that you'll regret how untrue you're being to yourself and at the same time not caring because you want to fit in that bad. I also love the fact that she portrays herself as the unseen person in the video but finishes it off with herself walking off stage and she's the star of the show with white women in the background.
i understand how beautiful the symbolism of this song is but can we talk about how drop dead gorgeous mitski looks at the start when shes smiling at him? obviously shes always gorgeous but STILLLL
i'm an asian immigrant. and listening to this song just describes everything i've felt for so long that i couldn't put into words. it was just too hard to admit it to myself. i remember reading this story in my english class called "the other family," about a little girl who draws her family as a white family and how her mother reacts to it- and it never truly clicked that that was ME. i am that girl. at 5 and 6 years old, i was living in america, drawing myself as a blonde girl with blue eyes, and i still have those drawings. it feels so invalidating. because no one ever hurt me for being asian. no one ever made fun of me. no one has ever called me a slur. and yet growing up in this world made me, even at 5 years old, feel so ashamed of my own race i didn't even want to be myself. i wanted to be someone else. i can't believe how even at 12 years old, i was still looking at my white friends and myself in the mirror and thinking that i'm pretty, but i'd be prettier if i was white. or that people would treat me better if i'm white.
i promise it’s valid. even without experiencing direct racism, the racist undertones of US society still hurt immensely. i’m sorry for all the pain you’ve gone through.
I can relate. No one has ever been racist to me but I sometimes wish I wasn’t Asian and was white. I also had drawings of white girls and only learned about white people at school...
Oh god this comment cut through my soul. I didn’t even grow up in Western society and yet I feel the exact same way as you- it didn’t even click to me that I did the same thing as that little girl.
this song hits different when ur a woc/poc . a few weeks ago a old white lady told me a backhanded compliment …. “you’re so pretty to be a chinese” umm ok, yes i'm east asian but not her assuming that i'm chinese and tbh that made me so uncomfortable and also made me cry all the night cuz i was finally accepting and loving my ethnicity, culture and features and that lil “compliment” made me again (like when i was a kid-tween) wanted to look white, to be white so bad:( ik that from the non poc vision this sounds stupid but i swear that for me it wasn’t
Even though I am not POC and I may not share the same struggles, I will say however your feelings are valid . Just know that you're beautiful the way you are!
@@nellikharazichvili2838 if you're so mad that white people have an in-group preference why don't you go back to your home country instead of complaining
this song makes me burst into tears everytime i hear it. i wish i felt beautiful in my black skin. i wish i didn’t have to be reminded that i will never be apart of the beauty standard because of my skin. i wish i didn’t have to hesitate to tell a guy that i like him without asking myself “does he even like black girls?” a girl can wish. a girl can definitely wish.
If you take an ancestry test and find out you have Ghanian heritage, Ghana will pay you to move there, and then you can be with your own people, surrounded by a whole society of people who look like you. I'm not sure if this applies to other African countries but it very well might. My friend from elementary school did this and according to his Instagram posts he's never been happier.
@@alexcallender dude are you seriously telling every single poc in this comment section to "go back to their country"? I've seen you underneath every comment I've read so far.
As a black woman in America I felt this even if I wasn’t intended to. For a long time I always felt that I was on the outside in love for any multitude of reasons. To my black counterparts I was too dark skinned or “acted white”, to white men I wasn’t as safe an option and sometimes it felt like they didn’t even see me at all. You can only imagine how it was trying to pursue girls. I for so long just wanted to be what someone wanted. But I found someone who sees me. This song addresses so many ugly feelings that I know a lot of us have swallowed. Love yourself first. Be your own first priority. 🌻
omg i can't stop crying. i don't think the struggle of being in an interracial relationship has ever been described so perfectly in a song as this... I definitely remember saying the exact words "you should date a white girl instead, it would be easier" and wishing I was more american. but then I realized that I shouldn't and self love is so important :((( I love u Mitski :((((
I feel this way too except I'm British. I feel I'm not good enough(?) to pursue a relationship regardless of the dude's race unless I limit the pool to my specific race because I'll never actually be ethnically British. Fucking sucks. Wish I could go back to 12/13 years old when I didn't care about my identity and how my appearance has become so politicized, when I didn't care how some people will inevitably see me & draw conclusions without knowing me based on stereotypes, when I didn't care about wanting to just blend in (and thus be the ethnicity that's the majority here). I used to explain it as wanting to be "desired" cause I didn't understand the feeling but that's not it cause I don't want to be pretty exactly, I just want to blend in and fit in and not worry about overcompensating so people can see the "real me". I just want to feel equal, even if I'm the only one holding me back from feeling that way. sad :/
Super late to this comment but I have to say it, dating men outside of my race has me suffering so much passive aggressive racial bullshit. I've had exes criticize me for my "expensive" East Asian diet to my "co-dependency" towards my mother and how I'm "always so obsessed" with Asian representation.
Although I’m white and most everyone here is POC, I want to say what your going through is valid and I’ve always admired you all because your culture is so different and beautiful, your so strong for living through this
i think it would be harder to date a white girl, as a white man you can get a prettier, smarter and more loving girlfriend if you date across racial lines. that is my experience anyway
I smile knowing that kids all over the world will go from Adventure Time to Francis Forever to this and be introduced to the beauty of self-pleasuring hand-love.
Ngga fgt, I know the song ahaha you misunderstood me. I was just making a joke about how I fell in love with Mitksi and her music because Marceline covered Francis Forever on Adventure Time
I love how it’s clearly about how feeling as though your own culture is holding you back from things others have but there is no mention of any specific race. It’s a song for everyone who’s ever felt that way. It’s just amazing. I’m a rock and metal fan, but oh god I love Mitski.
As a black teenage boy, I really relate to this song. My dad is black and my mom is white but my mom has custody of me. We live in a super suburban neighborhood with 5-6 black people and I often compare myself to white guys because I have no real black parental figure in my life. Even when I talk with other black people im always told that “I don’t act black” and it feels like I have no one to relate to. I get that this song is mainly for POC women but there’s so little stuff talking about POC men’s experience in predominantly white areas.
Very true! I’m a woc so I can’t fully relate to your experiences but in many ways I still do. I really hope the experiences of all poc situations can be more recognised
no worriess this song is for all poc apparently. also i don't understand how people keep saying you act like ____ race. like you can't act a race??? people are ignorant sometimes
Men of color are really underrepresented. I'm really sorry that you had to go through that. Also wtf why do people say "you don't act black" that makes no sense, it's so ignorant
As someone who’s mixed in the same way you are “not feeling black enough” is the eternal mood :/ I’ve lived in Sweden for almost my entire life and there have been countless times being at an event where my dad and I or just I have been the only non white people there I highly recommend the show “This is us” I recently started watching it and one of the main characters is a black man with adoptive white parents and I really see myself in him ❤️
Crazy how no one talks about the transition in the chorus of "Trying to be YOUR best American girl" to THE Best American Girl. After her line where she says how he's all she ever wanted, but she'll regret this, it feels like she let go of her dream of being his American girl, knowing she really can't compete with the white girl, abandoning that love for him. But she doesn't leave behind the longing of being an American girl, not for him, but to change herself so she'd be loved. She's fully aware that if she stays the way she is, she won't get the love she wants and so, even if she gives up on this love, she can't get rid of the fantasy of her being the best American girl or accept herself fully, which is a great addition to the transition of "I finally do" to "I think I do". Maybe it was too obvious, but I wanted to say it anyways since it's one of my fav Mitski songs and I realte to it on a personal level.
Song seems like it legitimizes a lot of people’s feelings about what it’s like to live in white america as a non white American and that’s beautiful. My girlfriend is a woc and I don’t know if this is how she feels sometimes but I just gave her a really big kiss just in case.
God I love this music video. When Mitski's waving to the boy trying to impress him, the light that shines on her makes her look hair look brown and her skin look pale, just like the American she tries to be. However, the light still highlights her facial features that she can't change. Then when the chorus hits and the light fades, she's alone, and back to loving her self and heritage (maybe um... a bit too much). It perfectly aligns with "I do, I finally do. "idk maybe someone already wrote this but i couldn't help myself.
this song resonates with me in the most agonising way possible. when i was younger, i moved to a different country and went to school with mostly white students, which was already tough as a chinese kid but it only burned worse, because my best friend at the time was a pretty girl with red hair, freckles, and hazel eyes. she was foreign too, but not the kind of foreign that *i* was. she was the type where they'd have glimmering eyes at the very sight of her, and i remember all the times the boy i liked would always look at her when he was talking to us, how she was always considered prettier than me, how everyone always liked her better and flocked to her, how boys always were nice to her when they always made fun of me. they adored her and her lovely hazel eyes while they pulled back theirs at the sight of mine. she was everything. i was so little when id realised that no matter who i was or who i tried to be, i wasn't even a flicker of electricity while she was a hundred fireworks igniting all at once. i wish i never knew her, i wish i never had to be the rough patch in her presence, i wish i *was* her.
@@alexcallender @@alexcallender With all due respect, but this is the worst concusion you could draw from this. People not accepting others based on something as superficial as their ethnicity shouldn't be the fault of the person affected, and they should definitely not be forced to radically change their lifes just because their hair color might be a different shade. The entire song is about trying to fit in while you might be rejected by multiple cultures at the same time. Just going back to the original culture that is probably as rejecting as the first one just isn't an option.
i hope no one i know finds this comment. as a brown girl, i have always grown up wishing i was a beautiful white girl like the ones i saw online and the ones who were called perfect. the ones i put on a pedestal and told myself i could only ever be second place to. i cannot change my skin and body and where my family is from and one day i hope i won’t have to look at them and wish my skin was as light and bare as theirs. to one day love who i want to love without having to feel like i’ll be abandoned for the american beauty standard.
I love you , your skin face and body are beautiful you are beautiful your hair is beautiful we can beat the stereotypes one by one I love you and you got this
Nice Sara icon. Ugh it’s so annoying how woc can’t be part of the pretty and humble American girl icon. How long are they going to be stuck with that, when they’re are so many amazing woc
I don’t understand how they don’t it’s really obvious if they just listen to the lyrics/ even just the song title lol. As a white person even though I can’t particularly relate to this song I still enjoy it, but some yt people twist the message to make it about themselves and it’s low key super annoying
@@jakesalvatore7527 it's legit about growing up in a different culture and not fitting into American society. You can apply that same feelings to multiple aspects.
i’m a mixed asian and this song hits so close to home. constantly being seen as ‘not ____ enough’ by my two ethnic backgrounds, never being someone’s first option. it hurts watching all the other girls with paper pale skin, button noses and glossy blonde hair get into to relationships so easily, loved by everyone around her whilst i never feel desirable, no matter what i do. i can only watch from a distance. i will never experience love the way these girls do. i’m in so much pain.
@@iososop9169 im not them but personally i would say decolonizing what you have been taught is so so so important!! if u have social media follow poc or just people that have similar features to you, slowly accepting and appreciating your features, this last one is a bit more silly but i think to myself, do i really want to look like a colonizer?? hoped this helped
same i grew up in an area with mostly white people and i barely ever saw any poc, especially any west asians or native americans my parents never helped because they thought they were white when they clearly are not.... glad im out of that phase now
@@iososop9169 it's just meaningless You're great the way you are You're loved and amazing World is just a fucked up old place filled with non-existent rules of old privileged apes
I didn't realize I needed this song until now. It shows so many of my frustrations, my insecurities for not being white. And I think it's honestly helped me realize that I don't need to be that.
I’m black so obviously I’m not connected to my original culture that was stolen from me. I don’t even know what it is. but what really hurts is that I don’t even feel connected to my black culture because my dad treats anything having to do with black culture is “inappropriate”evan though he’s black. and I was homeschooled my whole life so I was never really around people. I feel like I don’t 100% fit in with my own people but when I’m around white people I don’t feel like a person. I feel like a *black* person. I love being black and wouldn’t change it for the world though :)
I renember being just a kid , just a 4yo , wanting "princess hair" , blonde straight hair , wanting to be completly white , and later on feeling "not exotic enough" being biracial , "too poc" or "not enough poc"...this song hits diferent
This hits hard as a mexican girl. Though pale, my features are clearly not eurocentric and I definitely do not fit the “American girl” beauty. I know most men will always go for white/american woman no matter what I do or try. They’ll always find them better, but at least I tried. I really did try but I don’t fit the beauty standards.
@@theadultsaretalking2582 she didn’t say it was. But if she’s talking abt how she doesn’t fit the beauty standard she Obviously isn’t white. Ur not woke.
This is a beautiful song about self love over romantic love. As a woc I understand how difficult navigating feelings of "not being enough" can be. This song is incredible and I can't wait to hear the rest of puberty 2. Ty mitski for giving my feelings a song.
as a first generation middle eastern girl that grew up in a prominently white area, i relate to this song so much. i always seeked out white validation, especially white men, i use to be ashamed of who i was and where i came from. but i’m now more proud than ever and i love how empowering this song is :)
istg mitski somehow feels so utterly raw and true and yet incorporates such complex, thought out allegories and symbolism in her lyrics. i adore it. thank you, mitski 🩷
as a black woman in america, my entire life I have felt undesirable for anyone and everyone, im a teen who is surrounded by people who have dated at least 2+ people since middle school, and yet I havent even held hands with anyone yet, I havent been asked out, and the only people who tell me im pretty are other girls and its only when I say something self deprecating. I always thought that the reason why was because im just ugly and weird, but as I have spent time to myself during corona, ive realized that its because 1 Im a dark skinned black woman and 2 im not even a pretty dark skinned woman. I wish sometimes that I were white, not all the time, but even once is too many. I look at my white best friend, who I love shes great, and see that literally everyone and when I say everyone I MEAN everyone wants her, shes stunning and super nice and everything, but there have been times where I have wanted to be her, to feel desired, to feel wanted. and I mean dont get me wrong Im a cool person, Im told often that everyone thinks im chill and super cool and nice blah blah blah, but like thats it, THATS ALL IT IS. all I am to people is a friend, nothing more, no one likes me, no one finds me attractive, no one finds me pretty, not even my own family. I never really knew how to describe to someone why I feel so lonely constantly and why I desire a relationship so bad, probably bc most of my friends are white, so I felt a relieve when I found this song and found out that people feel the same way, so thank you Mitski, thank you a lot :] anyways that was my long awaited rant about whatever all that was, it felt nice to say something and not bottle it up anymore. I hope I come back to this comment in the future and update it on how far ive gone in self acceptance and romance and what not. in the mean time if you read all that, thanks :]
Babes, I love you okay, fellow black girl here and I understand how hard it can be to not feel or BE seen. This comment has been up for a while, but I would just like to say, we are the blueprint. Don’t put down yourself in favour of people who don’t even truly know why they think the way they think. The world can be harsh on us, but I always like to remember, I didn’t choose to be here, so I might as well give myself all the love.
hi, i hope since its been a while since you uploaded this comment that you're being a little less harsh on yourself now..if that's not the case though, i just wanted you to know that your feelings are valid but that does not mean youre ugly or unlovable. its understandable to cave into societal pressure and false beauty standards, but dont think even for a second that those standards are correct, or truthful even in the least! White beauty standards have been imposed on everyone for literally no reason, and honestly i think theyre bullshit. youre worthy of love and you will find it, its totally okay if you haven't yet, everyone's journey is different and you shouldn't compare yours to anyone else's. I really hope youre doing better now and that you have an awesome day
At this point with me being a black woman I'm in the recovering stages and trying to love me and my skin. For the longest time with puberty being school and around mostly white people and feeling ashamed that I don't fit in their ideal image of beauty. I love this song so much.
you don't fit the world's image of beauty. from latin america to the middle east to south asia to east asia everyone is trying to look whiter. dark skin is globally associated with bottom castes and slave races
I've been told by my female POC friends is they feel that white women uphold racism generally and more specifically with romance more than white men. I was terribly surprised by this but in thinking about it completely agree.
@@injectilio Whites/Europeans wanting to be with their own people and continue their heritage so their own children look like them is racism? When other ethnicities do it its seen as beautiful. It's time to stop hating on whites.
Michael VR Not really the same. Asian want to date black people but are forced not to. In this situations it’s because the white person doesn’t understand their culture, not because of familial pressure.
I don't like gatekeeping, but I'm just kind of sad this song is special for POC's yet all the top videos of it on TikTok are made by white women. It reinforces the idea of "wanting to be white." I come here often to its TH-cam comment section because it's a safe space for me. It feels comforting to know but at the same time depressing how we all have that experience of feeling we are never enough just because we aren't white.
Lyrics: If I could, I'd be your little spoon And kiss your fingers forevermore But, big spoon, you have so much to do And I have nothing ahead of me You're the sun, you've never seen the night But you hear its song from the morning birds Well I'm not the moon, I'm not even a star But awake at night I'll be singing to the birds Don't wait for me, I can't come Your mother wouldn't approve of how my mother raised me But I do, I think I do And you're an all-American boy I guess I couldn't help trying to be your best American girl You're the one You're all I ever wanted I think I'll regret this Your mother wouldn't approve of how my mother raised me But I do, I finally do And you're an all-American boy I guess I couldn't help trying to be the best American girl Your mother wouldn't approve of how my mother raised me But I do, I think I do
i just discovered this song today for a school assignment and omg mitski is such a gem! I literally can't stop scrolling in the comment section I love how the comment sections for her songs are genuine heartfelt literary analyses of the music! love this 100%
I'll simply never fully overcome what she did here. It's just astonishing how she can write and sing about stuff that's so personal and touch so many people out there. I can see in the comments how much POC/WOC can relate to this. I've broken up with my white partner this year and I unfortunately only noticed that I'd been pushing myself aside for the sake of "us" when it was too late. I sometimes can't help but feel so small, inferior, and self-loathing when I find myself alone again and with them just seeming to feel better about it because they were the one who got bored and tired, and they're the one who seems to be more good-looking, more cherished, and more confident most of the time. And no one apparently can understand you and you just feel like you're going crazy or being overdramatic. Even if I probably am, I'm happy that there's someone who could similarly describe and share this feeling, which I've learnt that shouldn't devastate me because I'm stronger than it. I feel understood, less lonely, and hopeful. I hope I can thank Mitski someday.
hey, i heavily resonated with this. i had to break up with my white boyfriend because south asian culture is strict with dating, and my parents were getting in the way of our relationship. he simply could not understand why they were like that. the fact that the sole reason for our breakup was cultural differences made me spiral the same way: self-loathing, feeling inferior, alone, and angry. i was SO angry that i cannot experience life as a white american girl. my white friends are supportive, but deep down they think i'm being overdramatic, because they can never truly get it. i'm older now so dating is fine, however i still feel thos past emotions. im so happy mitski exists
oh man oh manoh ma found mitski online when i was drunk and then i went to a show and then i cried for at least 40 years cus of that show. i am now an old lady and i'm still crying and then this gets released and i'm now gonna cry till i'm dead. thank you mitksi thank you thank you
You, clearly, can see, with clear eyes, how she knocked this song out of the park. Good on you for calling it like it is...it's as beautiful a song as I've ever seen swell and recede.
“your mother wouldn’t approve of how my mother raised me but i do, i think i do” as a kid with an asian parent who has a shit ton of white friends... this shit hit hard lol
This song has touched me more than any other song out there. Maybe it’s because I relate as an Asian-American - maybe it’s because Mitski’s lyrics and melody are prime - maybe it’s both of these, and a lot more. When I listen to this song, I feel like I’m going to cry and laugh. I love it.
"you have so much to do, and i have nothing ahead of me" is so real. idk what i wanna be in the future, and im 2 years away from graduating. im not even motivated to do anything. i just wanna have freedom and money to escape it all.
as a hispanic, my skin has always been very pale. too pale for my own family, and too hispanic for white people. i felt like i didnt fit in anywhere. mitski's songs are truly a blessing to poc becuase she really just describes how all of us poc feel.
Hi I don't want to sound rude or anything but I just wondered if you could explain your comment it sounds really interesting but I don't really understand haha sorry I'm really stupid and tired
I'm a mixed Filipino-American gay person and this song means so much to me. (Even though I don't identify as female.) I've had crushes on a lot of white guys and one of them actually said to me that he "wasn't attracted to asians." Sending love to anyone here who reads this and has ever felt like they don't fit in. You're not alone ❤️
Hi fellow Filipino, just wanted to tell you that you're beautiful and will always be. there will be someone who will love you, that love which you deserve :)
I am literally in tears right now and this is THE FIRST time I’ve ever heard of this song. Omg I love it so much. It literally is so close to everything I’ve been through. WOC just know that we are valid in every way. I love u all❤️
i feel like a really cool detail in the music video is that mitski is kind of the one that everyone is touching up? like she’s the one in lipstick and a pantsuit and the person everyone is trying to fix , like with hairspray and other things. meanwhile the “all-american boy” is just there, in nothing but a grey tank top and some pants, with no one trying to “fix him”. they can’t fix him because to them, he’s already perfect. he’s the standard.
I hadn't even thought about that that's so clever 🤠
Omg yes thiss
i didnt notice that omg
@@coleford6197 Why are you coming for the actor? He’s just doing his job.
Also let's talk about the white American girl, literally taking or claiming other peoples cultures for her own.
the line “Your mother wouldn’t approve of how my mother raised me, but I do, I finally do” is simply the best thing ever written, and i could do a whole thesis about it
please do! i'm not a native english speaker (poc northen african)so i couldn't really understant fully the meaning behind this line especially the "but i do, i finally do" part, like is she refering as her understanting and approving how her own mother raised her and being fine with her or just approving her partner's mother? i'd love to hear your opinion :D
@@jojipalpopijal1797i think they mean the cultural difference-and how the woc was raised differently so that.
@@Chewable396 what.
Me too
@@Chewable396 it’s ok we (poc women) don’t wanna date you anyway.
I know…. UGH I know… I’m sorry!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
it’s just that we don’t wanna date you at all and so we won’t date you.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.
HARAHARHARH.
The thing is Mitski is mixed, so she looks Asian to Americans but when she goes to Japan she looks white to them. Makes you feel like you don't belong anywhere.
Bro kinda like me, sucks
i’m not mixed-race, just asian-american, but damn that hit home
edit: okay technically i’m mixed race but from two southeast asian areas so you can’t tell from my appearance
the money should help
ah, I get this too. my mums from the philippines and my dads from the uk
I'm black and white and it sucks feeling like no group wants you
“you’re the sun, you’ve never seen the light, but you hear the song from the morning birds” im sobbing
the whole verse is just so beautiful
you've never seen the night*
the reference of the sun and moon/ day and night is a callback to “Sun and Moon” from Miss Saigon, which is a song about Kim (who is Viet) and Chris (who is white). the line “you’re the sun, you’ve never seen the night but you hear its song from the morning birds” symbolizes how white people never will truly face racism and are lucky to have only hear it from others (the morning birds) . when mitski says that she’s “not the moon” and she’s “not even a star” she talks about how she isn’t even the desirable parts of the night. this verse is also when the white woman appears, dressed in a culture that is not hers, which the white man is interested it, culture being the “stars” and the “moon” in the metaphor of the verse.
wow, thanks for bringing this up
that reference totally went over my head and I love Miss Saigon
thanks for sharing the reference and your analysis! sun and moon is a great song, so this was pretty cool to find out about
a beautiful interpretation.
Woaaahhh I had no idea, love Miss Saigon
wait i didn’t even realize omg
"Your mother wouldn't approve of how my mother raised me"
oof as a child of immigrant parents this really hit home
i heard the lyric wrong! i thought it was "you're another proof of how my mother raised me" which is a million miles off but also kinda works in its own way....
Well I'm as white as someone could be.. but thanks to my completely messed up family I will always be afraid of the explaining I have to do when someone asks anything about them.
Soo this hits in many ways
@@aschmitz2915 I'm white and have immigrant parents lmao.. what sucks tho is my parents just. generally suck so ik the feeling
It really does...
@@vc5803 that's pretty cool too honestly
You can see how she then becomes uncertain again at the end as she switches the lyric back to “I think I do”, it shows no matter how much we love ourselves there is always a tinge of uncertainty
I always interpreted the first ‘I think I do’ as indignant
that's so depressing pls stop
Speak for yourself
@@killjinxx: Yeah, that’s the way I interpreted the first one, then the “I _finally_ do” to being sure about it, then the second “think” (along with the voice change) to be as per OP said…
That's the line that hurts the most
i grew up in poverty and especially relate to the “your mother wouldn’t approve of how my mother raised me” because my mother often had to resort to desperate measures to get food on the table and pay bills, and we were often criticized by others for how we looked and acted, we barely took showers to lower the cost of our water bill. thank you mitski, this song means a lot to me.
i think she meant as in different cultural backgrounds of being raised but whatever makes you happy tho
@@Lara-vo6rp music is meant to be interpreted, sure it can be made with something in mind but art is interpretation and inferences
@@francis4evuh when I first heard the song I related to it purely as a child of European immigrants who felt really othered by the Australian kids I went to school with for my culture and the way that my parents were. I’m queer and all the people at the lgbt+ club would be really rude about my parents for not being accepting or whisper about how it was because they were foreigners. My mum once came to pick me up from school and she was really sick that day so she sounded nasally and was loosing her voice so she was kinda yelling, so that set of a chain reaction of everyone saying that she sounded like H*tler and making n*zi jokes. My mother escaped from East Germany in the 80s. and then I found out this song was about race and I was like “oh” 😭
sending you love, and I hope things can get better for you and your family!
@@Lara-vo6rp lara i totally agree with you theres no other explanation to this song, but i also agree with mango because social status also counts. but racially thats what she meant. i love the video , the actors and mitski too
I hope every poc girl/woman aligned person that has ever bursted into tears at the line “Your mother wouldn’t approve of how my mother raised me, but I do, I finally do” someday a thousand percent feels that in their hearts. There is nothing wrong with the culture you were raised in just because it doesn’t fit the white American standard. You deserve to be accepted for everything that comes with your identity
As an African, I can’t even dream about ever talking to anyone who isn’t from my country. So even liking a white guy or another person out of my race would definitely be a no from my parents. There is this one guy I like but because of the racial and cultural tension, I’ll have to just give up on him.
I may just be crying a lot right now
I relate to that line so much, because I get so scared of the idea of white friends or a white partner ever coming over, because they won't understand why my dad speaks in a loud way to enunciate his English, or how my mother would often speak with slightly off grammar, and how our house smells like spices and something foreign, or how we have a loud sense of humour, or how we always put on our foreign song channel to listen to our music all day, and how our music and movie industry works, and how we just aren't white. I always tell myself this is irrational, but it's fuelled by when my white friend back when I was 10 years old told how she felt sorry for me to have to live in a household like this, wanting to go outside and offered me a present in pity, or when white neighbourhood kids came over and gave my mother and my home weird looks. Idk if I can lose that part of myself.
as a black and puerto rican girl it just hits
Awkward moment when I’m mixed but on my dads side LMAO
what I love the most about her songs is that they start off slow, innocent, and accoustic. Then out of nowhere, they EXPLODE into an emotional, electric guitar whirlwind. She's perfect
I know right?! I discovered this song while looking through one of those "Best ... albums of the year" posts, and I saw Puberty 2 as number 2. So I put this song on while I was doing some work. At first I thought it was just one of those regular indie rock songs, I wasn't looking at the video at all. I had my eyes on the paper in front of me, and suddenly this distortion comes on and all the harmonics, so I look up and continue watching the video until the very end. I was left in tears and that's how I discovered Mitski.
"Texas Reznikoff" is a great example of that too 😊
like Texas Reznikoff during the second verse to the last chorus
yes! yes! yes! this!!
⁸
“I wasn’t trying to send a message. I was in love. I loved somebody so much, but I also realized I can never be what would fit into their life.” -Mitski (in reference to this song)
Awwww :(
This is sort of out of context. She was responding to an interviewer asking if this song was about her fitting in with the state of the indie scene, given it was overwhelmingly white, which many were assuming when it came out.
You will never be white. SEETHE. COPE. DILATE.
@@user-pz4xe3sb6t Indie is overwhelmingly white?
I always felt that Indie is the most diverse and open community of like-minded artists and fan's.
Unlike rap, which is mostly inner city black and white or country, which again is white. Indie is a vibe and attracts all types of people. Indie goes beyond race, age and background.
@@hellrazor117 All music goes beyond race, age, and background but alternative music is definitely majority white. Nothing wrong with that. Some demographics gravitate to certain genres more than others.
I think it’s so beautiful in the second chorus she says “I finally do”, talking about her accepting her background despite the despair of being rejected for it
Then at the end it goes back to that “I think I do” to show no matter how much we love ourselves there is always a tinge of uncertainty
😖😖😖😖
I know this was written from an Asian-American woman perspective - but as an Indigenous woman, I can't help but relate to this song so much. I feel like I can never fit into the perfect American image, which is ironic because I am Native. No matter how much I try, I don't fit in their world. But like Mitski, I love myself and I will be okay.
you’ve got this! my grandma is full native and i’m mixed and it took me a long time to accept myself as a woc but our culture is what makes us beautiful :))
I relate as a Peruvian guy living in the Czech Republic for almost a decade. I feel you
Me too.
i completely get this, as a first generation hispanic woman i’ll never feel american enough and i’ll never feel hispanic enough and i feel strange living in america due to cultural differences such as in the lyric “ur mom would ever approve of how my mom raised me” or something like that
Don’t try to fit in their world. Yours is so beautiful and so are you.
This made me tear up so much. As a Latina, I look like my father, big nose, freckles, coily hair, brown skin, and pudgy. I caught feelings for a lot of white men and it hurts a fuck ton when you are not what they desire because they want to stick to what they know (which isn't always a bad thing). Last white guy I confessed to stopped talking to me and was flirting with a white girl soon after in front of me. I had never experienced such a whirlwind of negative feelings. Self-hate, anger, resentment, sadness, envy and so much more. I wanted to be a white girl so badly. I wanted to have straight blonde hair, green eyes, a tiny nose, and pale skin. But now I'm in the process of learning to love myself the way I am and maybe some will love me too. :)
love you
oh honey, your natural looks are better🌻
i can relate to this. I'm half black, and half Indian. my mom is a immigrant and my dad has lived in America all his life. But I have this giant crush on this guy in my class, but he seems to like my white friend. who is blonde and has blue eyes. I'm the only POC girl in my class. I feel so left out sometimes. I just want someone to like me despite not having blue eyes and blond hair. i have curly black hair, and black eyes. and brown skin. I feel very lonely a lot of them time. :(
You are beautiful just the way you were born ❤ If anyone fails to see that, it's their shortcoming, not yours :)
be proud of who you are. you deserve it!
as someone who’s getting out of their ‘i wish i was white’ phase this is such an empowering song to hear thank you so much!
If you were white, then you wouldn’t have any flavor, no culture, no anything...
@@johnnythedeceasedrat1835 YES.
hug
@@johnnythedeceasedrat1835 you dont need to put down a whole race to bring someone up?
@@clarehart9353 i don’t think that’s really what it’s abt, i think it’s more about ethnic peoples struggles of living in america and trying to fit in, wishing that they could relate more to white american culture.
cant believe she invented america just for this song thats crazy 🦅🇺🇸🔥
right
fr
Created it as it really is
I SCREAM BRO
you gotta give her more credit, she also invented pearls ( twice ) and fireworks
i think the girl wearing the "native" clothing and having the fake native tattoo also symbolises how white men (or even our own men) dont like our features when its on us but when its on a white woman, they love it.
oh man and its a whole different kind of hurt when youre indigenous, and the boys you like, desire her
@@elisabeth2193 yeah. when i do it im an "india" and a "savage" but when yt girls do it theyre cool and exotic
I feel like it's aimed at the idea of "The All American girl". Every time that term is used they are usually placed on white upper class girls.
I don't see what's wrong with whites wanting whites
I think it's because they like whatever is on the white women, regardless
i wish this song was an hour long
same
fancy seeing u here lol
not only is your content amazing but you like mitski???? i love you
i love u
Hey So basically I'm just gonna not date POC womynX.....
I know…… UGH I know... I’m sorry!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
It's just that I'm not gonna date them is all
HAHAHAHAHRHAHAHA
HARAHARHARH.
as an indian woman who was raised in a predominantly white area, i felt this in my soul. this song actually makes me cry because i feel seen. mitski's lyrics explain the feelings i cannot put into words. i love all of the beautiful woc here
this comment made me cry i love all us woc girls :)))
💞💖💕
yes!! I also was raised in a predominantly white area, but I am black, it really does make me feel a sense of acceptance knowing that im not alone AT ALL
Yup same, I've honestly given up at this point
that's why i love being brazilian
わたしは日本に生まれて日本で生きる純日本人で、mitskiの感じた苦悩を永遠に理解することが出来ないからこそこの歌とmitskiに惹かれました。
叶うならライブで聴きたい。
you’re lucky you get to live in a society where everyone looks like you, in America it’s so painful being rejected for not being white man
@@eternall0ve16that's called being jealous. The Bible says intermarriage should be banned.
@@Nobodydefinitelynotsomebodywoah nothing wrong with interracial
@@inthevoidx there are many things wrong with it.
@@NobodydefinitelynotsomebodyHow did you come to Mitski comment section 😭😭😭😭😭
This is what Mitski had to say about the song: "Your Best American Girl is a love song. A lot of reviews have agreed on a narrative that "she wrote this song to stick it to 'the white boy indie rock world'!" but I wasn't thinking about any of that when I was writing it, I wasn't trying to send a message. I was in love. I loved somebody so much, but I also realized I can never be what would fit into their life. How hard I tried, we were from different worlds, and there was nothing I could do about that. Yes in the musical composition I used tropes from "white indie rock" of my adolescence (the chord progressions, the moment at 2:25, etc), and my mentioning that in interviews was probably what propagated the aforementioned narrative. But I used those tropes to accentuate the point that I could use their methods and act like I was of their world, but I would never ever fit.
It's probably silly and unnecessary for me to say this. I completely understand that when writers are writing a piece they have to decide on a theme, they have very limited time and space (and energy with how much music journalist are required to put out!) to get their point across, and they also have to think about what people would want to read based on the cultural climate. I definitely would not be able to do what writers do! So no disrespect here. I just figured I should say what I meant by the song from my mouth, because maybe you've also had a moment where loving someone with all your heart was simply not enough, and I would hate for you to miss a song about that feeling because you were told it was about something else. Thanks for reading all the way to the bottom!"
facebook.com/MitskiLeaks/posts/1274159965942702 heres the link if anyone is wondering
Well, that wise yet humble comment does make it go down better. The recent NYT magazine piece on the song was annoying, with its ridiculous SJW usage circa 2017 of "white supremacy." That said, the lyric about the mothers is classic--the NYT writer was right about that. CS
Haru Gumbo She also said the following in her Pitchfork interview: "You always want what you can’t have, and that all-American thing, from the day I was born, I could never enter that dream. That all-American white culture is something that is inherited instead of attained. So yes, it’s a sad song, but I wanted to make sure it reflected all of the contrasting feelings. You can be heartbroken about a relationship, but also, from it, realize you are you and you’re okay with who you are, or where you came from."
pitchfork.com/news/68089-mistki-breaks-down-your-best-american-girl-on-song-exploder/
shukran majd
George de Montaigne so she's literally said the opposite in one interview to what she said in another, sounds like she's fucking with us. Personally I only felt that it was a love song and nothing more. Also as an outsider from a country with very little mixed population Mitski is exactly what I think of as an "all-american" girl, essentially a melting pot of different ethnicities, nationalities and cultures unified under one flag. That's exactly what being american means as far as I was aware.
amazed at the symbolism of her kissing and making out with herself showing how she’s trying to love herself in her own skin...
thanks for the likes:)
one of the most powerful images i've ever seen
it also made me think of like, when you're a kid and starting to feel things, but only white boys and white girls are getting anything going bc poc are considered lesser and don't get asked out or wanted as much, so lonely girls and boys/others of color will just have themselves to hug and feel wanted
i thought it symbolised her wanting the guy and wishing she in the place of the white girl. up for interpretation tho.
@@sanahaque2003 that’s such a good analysis
Literally doing thing isn't symbolic.
Pain is temporarry ,
Mitski is forever.
agree
francis forever
Slay
Yes.
THIS.
The fact that she's kissing the only fraction she has of him in which is the initial waving is sooooooooooo. Love and idealising one aspect of something, over and over is so painfully nice.
As an adopted Asian. This hit me so fucking hard. I’ve always hated who I was because of the way I was treated. I’ve always wanted to be white, I thought I needed to be white. This hit so hard, thank you so much Mitski.
same oh my god
me too
hello fellow asian adoptees
@@zy4978 hi
you’re so strong i believe in you sm. you’ve come such a long way i’m proud of you
As an Indian girl, I feel it. Even though all the guys will think I’m pretty, they still fall in love with the white girl because it’s “safe”. I feel like nobody will ever love me, Indian, American, all others, etc. I feel like I’m just objectified or seen as a potential conquest on someone’s list. You’d love to think race doesn’t matter for love, and I don’t think it should, but most of society is still conditioned that way
The society has grown learning from what they saw in films, modelling, tv, and various entertainment industries and tuned as white and slim is the superior beauty.
चल चल हवा आने दे
@@onsight1318 Idiot
exactly :(
@@Crappylowbudgetfilms can't be too white, though.
This hits so hard as an Pakistani man with people not even treating me as an option and the people who have confessed to me say that they're embarrassed by the fact they like me. Feeling like fading into the background and not being seen. This truly does speak to me and wishing I was different but also seeing that through my culture and my own parents giving me skin whitening creams. Thank you for making this song.
i’m so sorry you’ve to go through that !!!!!hope things get better for you
I know right , fair and lovely was so normalized
I’m really sorry to hear about your experience. White CIS dude here (not the guy in the video). I just wanna encourage you to just be yourself without skin whitening creams and such. I see a lot of mixed couples and I really think there’s got to be quite a few women that will like you for who you really are as a person and will either think that your ethnicity is a kind of nice bonus feature or really think nothing of it at all.
hey
Im a paksitani girl too and same. All my relatives are the same as the people who confessed to you. Both my brothers have really fair skin and my tone is a bit darker so ever since i was a young child everyone pointed that out.
dont forget you arent alone in this and one day both of us will accept and love ourselves for who we are, along with the people surrounding us
relate
whenever i feel rejected I just come to this comment section because it’s literally just full of women of color who feel the EXACT. SAME. WAY.
SAME
then theres the few people who are saying "it isnt about race stop making everything abt race its hurting my feelings wahh"
It sucks that all of you here end up feeling that way. I'd be proud to be with any of you. The right person is always out there, no matter what color they are! ♡
Right. I’m new here, and this is just so comforting. I feel safe, heard.
@@CuroLue 😭and theyre always THE BEST AMERICAN GIRL
honestly idk how someone could choose anyone over mitski.
white people apparently
@@warrenkeystone5195 I’m a white gay guy and I’d honestly be straight for Mitski 😭
@@dontdodrugskiddos3892 ikr the straights got it so good 😩
What about Marina tho...?
@@ΓιωργοςΗλιοπουλος-φ1μ mitski and marina own this world
this song is the embodiment of the fear and uncertainty you feel when dating outside of your race (and even outside of your economic class), especially dating a white person. you want to be the best you can so you can get the approval of not just his family but sometimes it feels you need your significant other’s approval as well. until finally, you become sick of accommodating, and realize you and where you come from are fine as it is.
THIS!!!!
EXACTLY
As a white girl (I’m not a man so my thoughts on this might be a little different) I think the reason why most of us stick to white people is because we always think of ending up with a white person by default. When I think of my future spouse in my head, he’s always white. I’m definitely not opposed to dating POC but there’s just more complications that come with it. I have an asian friend and I find that I can’t build any sort of acquaintance to her parents and they’re just a lot different culturally. That’s a little bit of an issue with dating so it is much easier to just date someone with a dynamic that you’re used to. I mean it’s a known study that we prefer people that look like us.
Then dont date white
@@melmelyn3877 racist!!!1!!
but yeah you're also right
“Im not even a star” darling your the damn universe
Hmmm
dear yt women who think this about white women with blonde hair and blue eyes, please shut up you’re still the beauty standard no matter if you’re brunette, ginger, etc. you’re white, plain and simple.
periodt
right 😭
THANK YOU
fr i’m kinda tired of white brunette girls crying about not being blonde bc that’s the “beauty standard” like just dye your hair tf? you are the beauty standard
They can put on contacts or dye their hair, i can't change my skin colour.
As a White woman reading all of these stories from WOC makes me sad, I know I will never understand your pain and frustration but I'm here to listen. That being said all the other white women in the comments talking about not having "blonde hair, and blue eyes" you definitely missed the whole point of the song...
I love this comment so much thank you.
thank you.
thank u this is all we ask for from white women
thank you for this
same.
searching up “most beautiful girl in the world” and seeing a blonde girl with blue eyes. that’s what this song represents to me.
Me
*White women
yes
@Sheepwy sorry I thought they were those ppl who thought the song was about being a white girl *but* with blonde hair and blue eyes, if you have any other hair, any other eyes, you're allowed relate to the song smh like no ur still white, you're not discriminated against because of ur race
I'M SO SORRY IF UR NOT THAT PERSON 😭
@Sheepwy oh ok sorry
WHEN SHE STARTED KISSING HER OWN HABD I WANTED TO CRY TILL MY EYES BLEED
If I could, I'd be your little spoon
And kiss your fingers forevermore
But, big spoon, you have so much to do
And I have nothing ahead of me
You're the sun, you've never seen the night
But you hear its song from the morning birds
Well I'm not the moon, I'm not even a star
But awake at night I'll be singing to the birds
Don't wait for me, I can't come
Your mother wouldn't approve of how my mother raised me
But I do, I think I do
And you're an all-American boy
I guess I couldn't help trying to be your best American girl
You're the one
You're all I ever wanted
I think I'll regret this
Your mother wouldn't approve of how my mother raised me
But I do, I finally do
And you're an all-American boy
I guess I couldn't help trying to be the best American girl
Your mother wouldn't approve of how my mother raised me
But I do, I think do
It would be nice if they could pin this comment
niceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
Tysm
i was searching for you
@@nope7220 true :( i have to search it every time
i’ve spent so much time being “embarrassed” because i’m not white. Recently with my dad getting sick, i’ve been wanting to get closer to my culture. i feel so whitewashed and i hate it. i used to draw myself as white. i wished i was white. this song really captures it. I dated a white boy and always felt like i wasn’t good enough because i’m not white. Mitski does such an amazing job of capturing the feelings of being a WOC. I’m only 16 but i hope one day i can be just like my parents
also i’m mexican and i’m not afraid to say it anymore
@@notreal4253 mexican is not a race
@@theadultsaretalking2582 why are you under every Mexican girls comment? Lmfao, even if their classification isn’t correct I’m pretty sure it’s obvious they are brown Latina judging by the context of the song and their comments. Pls stop being so nit picky on posts where people are just trying to express their emotions and experiences, it’s really not a big deal
@@teeth5840 being mexican doesn't make anyone POC, if they are brown why don't just say it?
@@theadultsaretalking2582 I don’t even understand what you mean. Whatever, it’s really not a big deal
the transition from "I do I think i do" to 'I do i finally do" and the way she smiles while looking towards the ceiling really fucks with me. This song is constantly playing at my job and i fell in love with it . The chorus is amazing and the story behind the video breaks my heart.
What kind of job do you do???!!! I want this song to be played too where I work!!
+frankieinfrance I work at Urban outfitters lol they're always playing all kinds of alternative music
+Aaron Fagama same
I like when she's like 'you're the one, you're all I ever wanted...I think I'll regret this.'
Its the strange dichotomy of knowing that you'll regret how untrue you're being to yourself and at the same time not caring because you want to fit in that bad.
I also love the fact that she portrays herself as the unseen person in the video but finishes it off with herself walking off stage and she's the star of the show with white women in the background.
as a black and indian guy this song just hits all of the right places
Happy to see some men liking this song! Stay strong my dude.
i understand how beautiful the symbolism of this song is but can we talk about how drop dead gorgeous mitski looks at the start when shes smiling at him? obviously shes always gorgeous but STILLLL
i take it back she looks perfect the whole time lol
im sure that Mitski is one of the most beautiful woman.
@@jerryseinfeld4513 do i care?
@@venanciovergas8747 L
she looks prettier than the white woman
i'm an asian immigrant. and listening to this song just describes everything i've felt for so long that i couldn't put into words. it was just too hard to admit it to myself. i remember reading this story in my english class called "the other family," about a little girl who draws her family as a white family and how her mother reacts to it- and it never truly clicked that that was ME. i am that girl. at 5 and 6 years old, i was living in america, drawing myself as a blonde girl with blue eyes, and i still have those drawings.
it feels so invalidating. because no one ever hurt me for being asian. no one ever made fun of me. no one has ever called me a slur. and yet growing up in this world made me, even at 5 years old, feel so ashamed of my own race i didn't even want to be myself. i wanted to be someone else. i can't believe how even at 12 years old, i was still looking at my white friends and myself in the mirror and thinking that i'm pretty, but i'd be prettier if i was white. or that people would treat me better if i'm white.
your race is absolutely beautiful girl, and so are you
i promise it’s valid. even without experiencing direct racism, the racist undertones of US society still hurt immensely. i’m sorry for all the pain you’ve gone through.
I can relate. No one has ever been racist to me but I sometimes wish I wasn’t Asian and was white. I also had drawings of white girls and only learned about white people at school...
Oh god this comment cut through my soul. I didn’t even grow up in Western society and yet I feel the exact same way as you- it didn’t even click to me that I did the same thing as that little girl.
You have an ethnostate to return to if it gets too hard.
this song hits different when ur a woc/poc .
a few weeks ago a old white lady told me a backhanded compliment …. “you’re so pretty to be a chinese” umm ok, yes i'm east asian but not her assuming that i'm chinese and tbh that made me so uncomfortable and also made me cry all the night cuz i was finally accepting and loving my ethnicity, culture and features and that lil “compliment” made me again (like when i was a kid-tween) wanted to look white, to be white so bad:( ik that from the non poc vision this sounds stupid but i swear that for me it wasn’t
i felt this one, and i just wanted to tell you that ur amazing just the way u are 💕
Even though I am not POC and I may not share the same struggles, I will say however your feelings are valid . Just know that you're beautiful the way you are!
I saw yt ppl say that they relate to this and I’m so mad
@@nellikharazichvili2838 fr
@@nellikharazichvili2838 if you're so mad that white people have an in-group preference why don't you go back to your home country instead of complaining
this song makes me burst into tears everytime i hear it. i wish i felt beautiful in my black skin. i wish i didn’t have to be reminded that i will never be apart of the beauty standard because of my skin. i wish i didn’t have to hesitate to tell a guy that i like him without asking myself “does he even like black girls?” a girl can wish. a girl can definitely wish.
If you take an ancestry test and find out you have Ghanian heritage, Ghana will pay you to move there, and then you can be with your own people, surrounded by a whole society of people who look like you. I'm not sure if this applies to other African countries but it very well might. My friend from elementary school did this and according to his Instagram posts he's never been happier.
@@alexcallender Thank you for telling me thiss i need a ancestry test so bad and i’m black
@@alexcallender dude are you seriously telling every single poc in this comment section to "go back to their country"? I've seen you underneath every comment I've read so far.
@@alexcallender 😁😁😁😁
As a black woman in America I felt this even if I wasn’t intended to. For a long time I always felt that I was on the outside in love for any multitude of reasons. To my black counterparts I was too dark skinned or “acted white”, to white men I wasn’t as safe an option and sometimes it felt like they didn’t even see me at all. You can only imagine how it was trying to pursue girls. I for so long just wanted to be what someone wanted. But I found someone who sees me. This song addresses so many ugly feelings that I know a lot of us have swallowed. Love yourself first. Be your own first priority. 🌻
I feel it is for anyone who isn't white. Our culture and race made us be raised certain ways, that white people are not.
you were supposed to. this song is for woc, foreign or not. you're beautiful, in and out, and i'm glad you've found someone who sees that.
Sorry to hear that you’re black, that must be so burdensome everyday.
YOU ALL WISH YOU WERE WHITE WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU GO HOME TO YOUR CULTURE WHERE YOU WILL FEEL CONTENT.
@@jerryseinfeld4513?? RACIST
i’m not living in america, yet as an arab woc, a muslim girl living in germany, a predominantly white country, i relate to this so so so much.
i feel u
Ich fühle mit dir
Kann ich leider viel zu gut nachvollziehen
Felt this
I feel you
2:10 you know it's a banger when mitski whips out an electic guitar and creates the hardest beat drop known to man💯💯🔥🗣️
omg i can't stop crying. i don't think the struggle of being in an interracial relationship has ever been described so perfectly in a song as this... I definitely remember saying the exact words "you should date a white girl instead, it would be easier" and wishing I was more american. but then I realized that I shouldn't and self love is so important :((( I love u Mitski :((((
I feel this way too except I'm British. I feel I'm not good enough(?) to pursue a relationship regardless of the dude's race unless I limit the pool to my specific race because I'll never actually be ethnically British. Fucking sucks. Wish I could go back to 12/13 years old when I didn't care about my identity and how my appearance has become so politicized, when I didn't care how some people will inevitably see me & draw conclusions without knowing me based on stereotypes, when I didn't care about wanting to just blend in (and thus be the ethnicity that's the majority here). I used to explain it as wanting to be "desired" cause I didn't understand the feeling but that's not it cause I don't want to be pretty exactly, I just want to blend in and fit in and not worry about overcompensating so people can see the "real me". I just want to feel equal, even if I'm the only one holding me back from feeling that way. sad :/
Super late to this comment but I have to say it, dating men outside of my race has me suffering so much passive aggressive racial bullshit. I've had exes criticize me for my "expensive" East Asian diet to my "co-dependency" towards my mother and how I'm "always so obsessed" with Asian representation.
Although I’m white and most everyone here is POC, I want to say what your going through is valid and I’ve always admired you all because your culture is so different and beautiful, your so strong for living through this
i think it would be harder to date a white girl, as a white man you can get a prettier, smarter and more loving girlfriend if you date across racial lines. that is my experience anyway
@@Dragonking-fd1qv if its so beautiful why are they getting rejected?
I smile knowing that kids all over the world will go from Adventure Time to Francis Forever to this and be introduced to the beauty of self-pleasuring hand-love.
yas and I'm very grateful
Hahahahaha! XD
I was one of those kids...sadly
Me: shit what song is Marceline covering it's so good
*falls down hole*
Ngga fgt, I know the song ahaha you misunderstood me. I was just making a joke about how I fell in love with Mitksi and her music because Marceline covered Francis Forever on Adventure Time
I love how it’s clearly about how feeling as though your own culture is holding you back from things others have but there is no mention of any specific race. It’s a song for everyone who’s ever felt that way. It’s just amazing. I’m a rock and metal fan, but oh god I love Mitski.
as a black women whos still in her "i wish i was white" era i adore this song with all of my heart
As an Arab man who’s been in it ever since I could remember and hasn’t left it yet, this song really touched me
me:(
Same girl
Praying that you get out of that era soon
I've been there too except it came early on for me :( i hope u start to love urself for who u r soon & i wish u the best❤
As a black teenage boy, I really relate to this song. My dad is black and my mom is white but my mom has custody of me. We live in a super suburban neighborhood with 5-6 black people and I often compare myself to white guys because I have no real black parental figure in my life. Even when I talk with other black people im always told that “I don’t act black” and it feels like I have no one to relate to. I get that this song is mainly for POC women but there’s so little stuff talking about POC men’s experience in predominantly white areas.
Very true! I’m a woc so I can’t fully relate to your experiences but in many ways I still do. I really hope the experiences of all poc situations can be more recognised
how fucked up.... "act black" what is it to act black???
no worriess this song is for all poc apparently. also i don't understand how people keep saying you act like ____ race. like you can't act a race??? people are ignorant sometimes
Men of color are really underrepresented. I'm really sorry that you had to go through that. Also wtf why do people say "you don't act black" that makes no sense, it's so ignorant
As someone who’s mixed in the same way you are “not feeling black enough” is the eternal mood :/ I’ve lived in Sweden for almost my entire life and there have been countless times being at an event where my dad and I or just I have been the only non white people there
I highly recommend the show “This is us” I recently started watching it and one of the main characters is a black man with adoptive white parents and I really see myself in him ❤️
Crazy how no one talks about the transition in the chorus of "Trying to be YOUR best American girl" to THE Best American Girl.
After her line where she says how he's all she ever wanted, but she'll regret this, it feels like she let go of her dream of being his American girl, knowing she really can't compete with the white girl, abandoning that love for him.
But she doesn't leave behind the longing of being an American girl, not for him, but to change herself so she'd be loved. She's fully aware that if she stays the way she is, she won't get the love she wants and so, even if she gives up on this love, she can't get rid of the fantasy of her being the best American girl or accept herself fully, which is a great addition to the transition of "I finally do" to "I think I do".
Maybe it was too obvious, but I wanted to say it anyways since it's one of my fav Mitski songs and I realte to it on a personal level.
Song seems like it legitimizes a lot of people’s feelings about what it’s like to live in white america as a non white American and that’s beautiful. My girlfriend is a woc and I don’t know if this is how she feels sometimes but I just gave her a really big kiss just in case.
that is beautiful
So sweet!! If I ever fall in love with an "All American Boy", I hope he's as sweet as you :))!!
that’s so :((( i love that
aww🥺💓
I relate to the concept of the song as a Peruvian living in the Czech Republic :(
God I love this music video. When Mitski's waving to the boy trying to impress him, the light that shines on her makes her look hair look brown and her skin look pale, just like the American she tries to be. However, the light still highlights her facial features that she can't change. Then when the chorus hits and the light fades, she's alone, and back to loving her self and heritage (maybe um... a bit too much). It perfectly aligns with "I do, I finally do. "idk maybe someone already wrote this but i couldn't help myself.
I've just discovered her.
Completely fell in love.
Madly in love.
same here, but 1 year late :(
same here, but 2 weeks later :(
same here 14 hours after that :)
Oscar Lundell 3 weeks after you
please get off of my account Thomas 3 weeks after you
this song resonates with me in the most agonising way possible. when i was younger, i moved to a different country and went to school with mostly white students, which was already tough as a chinese kid but it only burned worse, because my best friend at the time was a pretty girl with red hair, freckles, and hazel eyes. she was foreign too, but not the kind of foreign that *i* was. she was the type where they'd have glimmering eyes at the very sight of her, and i remember all the times the boy i liked would always look at her when he was talking to us, how she was always considered prettier than me, how everyone always liked her better and flocked to her, how boys always were nice to her when they always made fun of me. they adored her and her lovely hazel eyes while they pulled back theirs at the sight of mine. she was everything. i was so little when id realised that no matter who i was or who i tried to be, i wasn't even a flicker of electricity while she was a hundred fireworks igniting all at once. i wish i never knew her, i wish i never had to be the rough patch in her presence, i wish i *was* her.
Brutal. This is why it's important to live amongst your own people.
@@alexcallender youre missing the point yet again white people always miss the point im not suprised
@@alexcallender especially you too why don't you go back to europe and off native american land
@@alexcallender @@alexcallender With all due respect, but this is the worst concusion you could draw from this. People not accepting others based on something as superficial as their ethnicity shouldn't be the fault of the person affected, and they should definitely not be forced to radically change their lifes just because their hair color might be a different shade. The entire song is about trying to fit in while you might be rejected by multiple cultures at the same time. Just going back to the original culture that is probably as rejecting as the first one just isn't an option.
@@keizerkuzco6459 a poc "trying to fit in" with white people makes more sense than a poc fitting in with their own race..? what?
I COULDNT STOP LAUGHING BUT THEN I CRIED AND I DONT KNOW HOW BUT MITSKI I UNDERSTAND
so sexy how she shreds on that guitar!!!!!
OMG ARMY!
STILL streaming this faithfully
Samee
ITS THE SAME FOR ME AHHWHSHDHHDHDHC
i hope no one i know finds this comment. as a brown girl, i have always grown up wishing i was a beautiful white girl like the ones i saw online and the ones who were called perfect. the ones i put on a pedestal and told myself i could only ever be second place to. i cannot change my skin and body and where my family is from and one day i hope i won’t have to look at them and wish my skin was as light and bare as theirs. to one day love who i want to love without having to feel like i’ll be abandoned for the american beauty standard.
I love you , your skin face and body are beautiful you are beautiful your hair is beautiful we can beat the stereotypes one by one I love you and you got this
you are beautiful.
As a fellow brown girl, I relate to this so much
you're alr beautiful just the way you are right now, you don't need to change to please no one
Wonder bread really chose midsommar over Mitski??
they always do
it’s always like that :/
BAHAH WONDERBREAD
Lmaooo
God bless you
There is something very relatable about a beautiful, talented woman feeling like she's falling short. Mitski is an absolute dime.
all the yt people not getting the message of this song is infuriating
Nice Sara icon. Ugh it’s so annoying how woc can’t be part of the pretty and humble American girl icon. How long are they going to be stuck with that, when they’re are so many amazing woc
they never understand, they’re too privileged and self centered to listen to poc and our struggles.
I don’t understand how they don’t it’s really obvious if they just listen to the lyrics/ even just the song title lol. As a white person even though I can’t particularly relate to this song I still enjoy it, but some yt people twist the message to make it about themselves and it’s low key super annoying
@@jakesalvatore7527 it's legit about growing up in a different culture and not fitting into American society. You can apply that same feelings to multiple aspects.
@@vampy5831 yup
i’m a mixed asian and this song hits so close to home. constantly being seen as ‘not ____ enough’ by my two ethnic backgrounds, never being someone’s first option. it hurts watching all the other girls with paper pale skin, button noses and glossy blonde hair get into to relationships so easily, loved by everyone around her whilst i never feel desirable, no matter what i do. i can only watch from a distance. i will never experience love the way these girls do. i’m in so much pain.
you're probably in a wrong country
@@poki580 Well no shit Sherlock
god i relate to this so much
How are you? Sending you much love.
you're probably just ugly
the forever 21 flower crown girls are shook at this- they are quaking !
Wig
yeah
Why do you say that?
Do you think that's what she really wanted to happen?
@@ladymaiden2308 what
@@ladymaiden2308 it's a meme
i really don’t cry easily at all. but this song has made me sob quite a few times. “but i do i finally do” really hits hard
I spent most of my life wanting to be white, I’m so happy that I’m finally coming out of that phase
As someone who still feels that way, how’d you get outta that phase?
@@iososop9169 im not them but personally i would say decolonizing what you have been taught is so so so important!! if u have social media follow poc or just people that have similar features to you, slowly accepting and appreciating your features, this last one is a bit more silly but i think to myself, do i really want to look like a colonizer?? hoped this helped
same
i grew up in an area with mostly white people and i barely ever saw any poc, especially any west asians or native americans
my parents never helped because they thought they were white when they clearly are not....
glad im out of that phase now
@@iososop9169 it's just meaningless
You're great the way you are
You're loved and amazing
World is just a fucked up old place filled with non-existent rules of old privileged apes
same :)
This really captures how it feels to be a poc girl
Yess
I didn't realize I needed this song until now. It shows so many of my frustrations, my insecurities for not being white. And I think it's honestly helped me realize that I don't need to be that.
Just say woc (woman of color) “poc girl” doesn’t make any sense lol.
Desiree Domingo but if it’s a guy
*poc girl who goes after white guys
I’m black so obviously I’m not connected to my original culture that was stolen from me. I don’t even know what it is. but what really hurts is that I don’t even feel connected to my black culture because my dad treats anything having to do with black culture is “inappropriate”evan though he’s black. and I was homeschooled my whole life so I was never really around people. I feel like I don’t 100% fit in with my own people but when I’m around white people I don’t feel like a person. I feel like a *black* person. I love being black and wouldn’t change it for the world though :)
Girl, I feel you I'm black and I struggle with the exact same thing
Oh crikey you just explained my life story. That was seriously uncanny haha. Love you. We’re doing great :)
Sounds wonderful. Most black culture is invented by the music industry so I can see how it's inappropriate.
your tribe chieftan sold your ancestors lmao
@@poki580 and white ppl made us suffer the most so wat abt it
I renember being just a kid , just a 4yo , wanting "princess hair" , blonde straight hair , wanting to be completly white , and later on feeling "not exotic enough" being biracial , "too poc" or "not enough poc"...this song hits diferent
This hits hard as a mexican girl. Though pale, my features are clearly not eurocentric and I definitely do not fit the “American girl” beauty. I know most men will always go for white/american woman no matter what I do or try. They’ll always find them better, but at least I tried. I really did try but I don’t fit the beauty standards.
I can relate to this a lot.
Same
Yea me too
mexican is not a race, you can be white mexican
@@theadultsaretalking2582 she didn’t say it was. But if she’s talking abt how she doesn’t fit the beauty standard she
Obviously isn’t white. Ur not woke.
This is a beautiful song about self love over romantic love. As a woc I understand how difficult navigating feelings of "not being enough" can be. This song is incredible and I can't wait to hear the rest of puberty 2. Ty mitski for giving my feelings a song.
as a first generation middle eastern girl that grew up in a prominently white area, i relate to this song so much. i always seeked out white validation, especially white men, i use to be ashamed of who i was and where i came from. but i’m now more proud than ever and i love how empowering this song is :)
i feel u girl. im armenian and was raised in a majority white area. if no one has told u recently I’m proud of you
you have to go back
@@poki580 ?????
@@Luna-rw3ij??????
istg mitski somehow feels so utterly raw and true and yet incorporates such complex, thought out allegories and symbolism in her lyrics. i adore it.
thank you, mitski 🩷
as a black woman in america, my entire life I have felt undesirable for anyone and everyone, im a teen who is surrounded by people who have dated at least 2+ people since middle school, and yet I havent even held hands with anyone yet, I havent been asked out, and the only people who tell me im pretty are other girls and its only when I say something self deprecating.
I always thought that the reason why was because im just ugly and weird, but as I have spent time to myself during corona, ive realized that its because 1 Im a dark skinned black woman and 2 im not even a pretty dark skinned woman.
I wish sometimes that I were white, not all the time, but even once is too many. I look at my white best friend, who I love shes great, and see that literally everyone and when I say everyone I MEAN everyone wants her, shes stunning and super nice and everything, but there have been times where I have wanted to be her, to feel desired, to feel wanted. and I mean dont get me wrong Im a cool person, Im told often that everyone thinks im chill and super cool and nice blah blah blah, but like thats it, THATS ALL IT IS. all I am to people is a friend, nothing more, no one likes me, no one finds me attractive, no one finds me pretty, not even my own family. I never really knew how to describe to someone why I feel so lonely constantly and why I desire a relationship so bad, probably bc most of my friends are white, so I felt a relieve when I found this song and found out that people feel the same way, so thank you Mitski, thank you a lot :]
anyways that was my long awaited rant about whatever all that was, it felt nice to say something and not bottle it up anymore. I hope I come back to this comment in the future and update it on how far ive gone in self acceptance and romance and what not. in the mean time if you read all that, thanks :]
Babes, I love you okay, fellow black girl here and I understand how hard it can be to not feel or BE seen. This comment has been up for a while, but I would just like to say, we are the blueprint. Don’t put down yourself in favour of people who don’t even truly know why they think the way they think. The world can be harsh on us, but I always like to remember, I didn’t choose to be here, so I might as well give myself all the love.
hi, i hope since its been a while since you uploaded this comment that you're being a little less harsh on yourself now..if that's not the case though, i just wanted you to know that your feelings are valid but that does not mean youre ugly or unlovable. its understandable to cave into societal pressure and false beauty standards, but dont think even for a second that those standards are correct, or truthful even in the least! White beauty standards have been imposed on everyone for literally no reason, and honestly i think theyre bullshit. youre worthy of love and you will find it, its totally okay if you haven't yet, everyone's journey is different and you shouldn't compare yours to anyone else's. I really hope youre doing better now and that you have an awesome day
Girl doesn't get the boy and that's OK !
She gets a kick ass guitar instead. This girl has her priorities straight🙌👍🙅
+Justin Time best comment!
You know (for once), I agreed with you.
Justin Time PRIORITIES, PRIORITIES
but the guy is pretty cute lol.........
Turns out the guy wasn't someone you'd want to date anyway!
At this point with me being a black woman I'm in the recovering stages and trying to love me and my skin. For the longest time with puberty being school and around mostly white people and feeling ashamed that I don't fit in their ideal image of beauty. I love this song so much.
no one does it like black women, y’all the best ❤️
you don't fit the world's image of beauty. from latin america to the middle east to south asia to east asia everyone is trying to look whiter. dark skin is globally associated with bottom castes and slave races
why don't you go be with your own people in africa if you want to be "the ideal image of beauty"
As a kurdish-laz girl living in Türkiye and who has feelings for a russian boy, this song does speak to me. Thank you Mitski.
That look the white girl gives her cuts me to the core; she knows she’s won. She will always win and it fucking kills me
I've been told by my female POC friends is they feel that white women uphold racism generally and more specifically with romance more than white men. I was terribly surprised by this but in thinking about it completely agree.
@@injectilio Whites/Europeans wanting to be with their own people and continue their heritage so their own children look like them is racism? When other ethnicities do it its seen as beautiful. It's time to stop hating on whites.
@@Shwonkz I never said that. Please read more carefully.
@@injectilio they're not entitled to a white boyfriend, cry harder
Again. Not the point troll.
every poc girl can relate :') its hard when you know someone you like can't understand you bc of your cultures and vice versa
Michael VR
Not really the same. Asian want to date black people but are forced not to. In this situations it’s because the white person doesn’t understand their culture, not because of familial pressure.
i recommend you using woc instead of poc girl because poc girl doesn't make any sense
This captures frustrations of what it's like to be an American girl who is not perceived as an American girl because she's a person of color.
You're white
@@nanayawberko3212 so?
@@getoffmyhotspot I don't know I make the comments I don't interpret them
What are you talking about? It's just a fun song.
Faust Von Barley no the song literally is abt something along the lines of that lol
One of the best songs I’ve heard in recent memory. Harmonically, lyrically and musically. Raw yet beautifully composed. Amazing talent!
I don't like gatekeeping, but I'm just kind of sad this song is special for POC's yet all the top videos of it on TikTok are made by white women. It reinforces the idea of "wanting to be white." I come here often to its TH-cam comment section because it's a safe space for me. It feels comforting to know but at the same time depressing how we all have that experience of feeling we are never enough just because we aren't white.
you’re so valid and I feel the same way too :/
Come here whenever you need :)
I am sorry that you have to go through this
Sometimes gatekeeping is needed
Mitski songs have different meanings for everyone
Lyrics:
If I could, I'd be your little spoon
And kiss your fingers forevermore
But, big spoon, you have so much to do
And I have nothing ahead of me
You're the sun, you've never seen the night
But you hear its song from the morning birds
Well I'm not the moon, I'm not even a star
But awake at night I'll be singing to the birds
Don't wait for me, I can't come
Your mother wouldn't approve of how my mother raised me
But I do, I think I do
And you're an all-American boy
I guess I couldn't help trying to be your best American girl
You're the one
You're all I ever wanted
I think I'll regret this
Your mother wouldn't approve of how my mother raised me
But I do, I finally do
And you're an all-American boy
I guess I couldn't help trying to be the best American girl
Your mother wouldn't approve of how my mother raised me
But I do, I think I do
From "yelling 'nobody' over and over again"-to "making out with your hand"-
-How lonely are you on the Mitski scale?
burying my head in the sand
my AI bot sent me here. where does that fall on the scale?
@@salvadorcorona-virus7854
Beat me to saying the same thing
@@salvadorcorona-virus7854 mine to, it's on a replika app.
Im not alone if Im with my hand
i just discovered this song today for a school assignment and omg mitski is such a gem! I literally can't stop scrolling in the comment section I love how the comment sections for her songs are genuine heartfelt literary analyses of the music! love this 100%
I'll simply never fully overcome what she did here. It's just astonishing how she can write and sing about stuff that's so personal and touch so many people out there. I can see in the comments how much POC/WOC can relate to this. I've broken up with my white partner this year and I unfortunately only noticed that I'd been pushing myself aside for the sake of "us" when it was too late. I sometimes can't help but feel so small, inferior, and self-loathing when I find myself alone again and with them just seeming to feel better about it because they were the one who got bored and tired, and they're the one who seems to be more good-looking, more cherished, and more confident most of the time. And no one apparently can understand you and you just feel like you're going crazy or being overdramatic. Even if I probably am, I'm happy that there's someone who could similarly describe and share this feeling, which I've learnt that shouldn't devastate me because I'm stronger than it. I feel understood, less lonely, and hopeful. I hope I can thank Mitski someday.
hey, i heavily resonated with this. i had to break up with my white boyfriend because south asian culture is strict with dating, and my parents were getting in the way of our relationship. he simply could not understand why they were like that. the fact that the sole reason for our breakup was cultural differences made me spiral the same way: self-loathing, feeling inferior, alone, and angry. i was SO angry that i cannot experience life as a white american girl. my white friends are supportive, but deep down they think i'm being overdramatic, because they can never truly get it. i'm older now so dating is fine, however i still feel thos past emotions. im so happy mitski exists
oh man oh manoh ma found mitski online when i was drunk and then i went to a show and then i cried for at least 40 years cus of that show. i am now an old lady and i'm still crying and then this gets released and i'm now gonna cry till i'm dead. thank you mitksi thank you thank you
so relatable omg
me too
You, clearly, can see, with clear eyes, how she knocked this song out of the park. Good on you for calling it like it is...it's as beautiful a song as I've ever seen swell and recede.
i'm crying till i'm dead
dude i found her drunk as well omg she's amazing
“your mother wouldn’t approve of how my mother raised me but i do, i think i do” as a kid with an asian parent who has a shit ton of white friends... this shit hit hard lol
2:32 "I finally do"
Disregard boys, become rock star.
Not at all what I I think this is about
Hell yeah!
Roses N rain
The context implies it.
This song has touched me more than any other song out there. Maybe it’s because I relate as an Asian-American - maybe it’s because Mitski’s lyrics and melody are prime - maybe it’s both of these, and a lot more. When I listen to this song, I feel like I’m going to cry and laugh. I love it.
WOW OK
eu também tive essa mesma impressão!
wooop! join the club ^^
gunnarolla h
Omg you like Mitski?!! Nice
@@viniciusmoura4373
aaaaaaaaaaa
Não imaginava br aqui
"you have so much to do, and i have nothing ahead of me" is so real. idk what i wanna be in the future, and im 2 years away from graduating. im not even motivated to do anything. i just wanna have freedom and money to escape it all.
This song brings me to tears, the lyrics hit so close to home sometimes. But it also helps me realize I’m fine just how I am. I love Mitski.
as a hispanic, my skin has always been very pale. too pale for my own family, and too hispanic for white people. i felt like i didnt fit in anywhere. mitski's songs are truly a blessing to poc becuase she really just describes how all of us poc feel.
Same
Same
Same, but in my country I am OK and live well. You can too.
same
Same
this song makes me feel proud to be a poc and not try to fit in into the standards set by society of how a person or a minority should act or look
Same I love this song, it somehow perfectly described the feeling I had for years growing up.
The scene where she realizes that the hand she's spent waving for others could be used as the artifact to see her self...
I wept.
Hi I don't want to sound rude or anything but I just wondered if you could explain your comment it sounds really interesting but I don't really understand haha sorry I'm really stupid and tired
day 236 without sex: hand started looking just fine
me @ my hand: how you doin?
hand: u///u
Day 237: hand is pregnant
I can usually go for a few days before my hand becomes good enough
No more hair in your palms?
hey I mean Kira would agree
I'm a mixed Filipino-American gay person and this song means so much to me. (Even though I don't identify as female.) I've had crushes on a lot of white guys and one of them actually said to me that he "wasn't attracted to asians." Sending love to anyone here who reads this and has ever felt like they don't fit in. You're not alone ❤️
@@coleford6197 I agree with you, but what do you mean specifically by "the right reasons"? Thank you for the kindness and support ;)
Hi fellow Filipino, just wanted to tell you that you're beautiful and will always be. there will be someone who will love you, that love which you deserve :)
@@neodoyyoung awwww thank u, you too
Ngl I'm getting some nasty incel vibes from this comment.
You must be one of those 'ricecel' folks
@@coleford6197 "the right reasons" ??? 🤨🤨🤨🤨
I am literally in tears right now and this is THE FIRST time I’ve ever heard of this song. Omg I love it so much. It literally is so close to everything I’ve been through. WOC just know that we are valid in every way. I love u all❤️