Picking your battles

I know it's important to pick your battles ... especially if, like me, you are passionate about a lot of things. There's just no way to fight them all. My problem is knowing which ones to fight. Should it be only the ones I think I can win?

In class yesterday, I got really upset. Just as close-mindedness and culturally self-centered attitudes drove me nuts in the States, they drive me nuts here. For example, any Asian person is a "chino" (like Chinaman) in Chile. It's like calling all South American's Brazilian because Brazil is the biggest country. It really annoys me, but at least people generally admit that it's not accurate (even though they don't see that as a reason not to do it). However, when I see people pulling their eyes to make them slanted as in "you know, like a chino" , I almost lose it. Well, this happened in class yesterday. I tried to explain why this was so incredibly offensive, but the students didn't get it -- and not because of language. If kids sing songs in Kindergarten with corresponding motions and one is making a "chino face" ... is it a lost cause??????

I realized that a big part of why I was so upset is that I feel lonely when people don't agree with me. This is the first time, really, that I focused on that ... and that maybe I'm in the wrong, even if I'm in the right. If I need people to agree with me in order to feel comfortable, accepted, and happy, I will never be any of those things. So do I stop fighting battles? Do I start fighting more with myself? Hmmmmmmmm ... I'm at a loss.

BUT, just for the record, I'm not the only person who thinks making a "chino face" is off-the-charts offensive:
http://sports.yahoo.com/olympics/beijing/blog/fourth_place_medal/post/Another-Spanish-team-discovered-making-eye-slant?urn=oly,100968