TikTok is increasingly discussing transracial, better known as RCTA. This is an acronym that stands for “Race Change To Another”. Several users claim to identify with an ethnicity different from their natural ones. Asian is currently the most popular one, on the wave of Eastern pop culture’s growing popularity, from manga to K-pop. Generally, these people just use make-up to modify their natural somatic traits. Their hair and outfits do the rest. However, there is also someone who resort to cosmetic surgery.
A famous case is that of British influencer Oli London, who underwent over thirty surgeries to ‘become’ South Korean. At first, Oli had eighteen surgeries to look like Jimin, a member of South Korean boyband BTS. Later, after coming out as a genderfluid trans woman, Oli underwent other surgeries to look like South Korean singer Rosé. Finally, he announced that he would go back being a man, but continued to have plastic surgeries to have an increasingly Korean look.
Oli London’s example is interesting because it brings together two concepts: transgender and transracial. On the one hand, many users criticise RCTA, accusing those who practice it of cultural appropriation. A practice they consider disrespectful towards ethnic minorities and the racism they face. On the other hand, transracists defend themselves by calling into question transsexuals. They claim that if it’s possible to identify with a gender other than the biological one, the same must apply to ethnicity. The motivation is the same: being born in a body perceived as wrong.
