Celebrating Diversity: New Horizons Character Designing Event

[Firesquids]

Man I love this community so much, so many beautiful and kind souls, makes me so proud.
I struggled a little bit with what I wanted to do for this event. I was thinking back on my life and how my growth was shaped by the people I met by circumstance. I myself am bisexual, but we have a few friends here representing bisexuals already so I wanted instead to represent my sister and her partner who are both asexual. Their identity is important because one can so easily fall into thinking that they are broken or can be forced into a type of relationship they don't want. Asexual people can often feel out of place, not only among the straight community, but among other lgbt folks too, especially when it comes to dating.
With youth lgbt suicide rates so high, it's important to understand that recognizing and accepting people's identities can save lives!

 

[Rio_]

I'm not very creative, but stripes are neat so...

I dressed my islander up in an AroAce inspired outfit! Aro stands for Aromantic aka not feeling romantic attraction, while Ace stands for Asexual aka not feeling romantic attraction. You can be just one or both, and they are a spectrum (shout out to the demis!)

Growing up Aro and Ace, I felt like I was 'weird' and that I didn't fit into any of the categories I'd heard of. But one day while browsing the internet, I discovered these terms and the existence of lots of other people like me! And that helped me feel a lot less alone

(Sorry if anyone has already dressed up similarly- I haven't looked through the other submissions yet )

 

[corlee1289]

TAMAYAAA~ <3

It’s what the Japanese say when they attend a fireworks festival. They were kimonos to show off their vibrancy and they have an uchiwa to help with the summer festival heat.

I decided to choose an Asian ethnic summer festival culture to show that even in the summertime, festivals with food are an excellent way to enjoy a culture

 

[AtomicNyx]

Neurodiversity and Latino inclusivity ♡

Here's my entry for this event! ^.^

I designed this character to represent Neurodiversity and Latinos. The color yellow to represent the happiness that Neurodivergent people bring into the lives of their loved ones. The outfit being something similar that some of my Mexican relatives would wear while working hard in the fields to provide for their families. Though there was only so much I could include, I hope both communities are proud of it too! ^.^

Neurodiversity/Neurodivergent: yellow is a happy color For anyone who struggles with social anxiety, panic attacks and/or atychiphobia, like I do, know you aren't alone. Even when I feel like my own brain is out to get me, the color yellow reminds me to find the rays of sunshine, that bit of happiness/joyous memories and hold onto them.

Latinos: I tried looking for a symbol of unity for Latinos, most of them were too intricate for me to do any justice for, but I still wanted to show the pride I feel in being a Latina. The flag stands for the part of me that is born and raised in the USA and another part of me that grew up surrounded by the beautiful culture and language my Mexican family has passed down to me.

Thank you for this event and the chance to celebrate multiple diverse and beautiful cultures! Also for being able to celebrate the differences that make everyone uniquely themselves ^.^ Everyone's life stories are worth being heard.

P.S I know the US flag has 50 stars but for obvious reasons I wasn't able to fit that many, please don't crucify me lol!

 

[Minou]

A big contrats to @Dunquixote @Koopadude100 @Foreverfox for winning the first round! Everyone’s entries are so lovely! <3 A lot of them are very personal and take a lot of courage to share.

This forum is very special and is full of loving and accepting people. As someone who supports the LGBTQA+ community, is of vietnamese ethnicity, have an autistic brother and have friends struggling with mental health, a lot of entries here speak to me. I decided however to go with the ace stance for my costume, as it speaks to me the most. Although I still question to this day whether I am truly asexual or not, I want to show my support to all aces out there, people questioning about their asexuality and all people from the LGBTQA+ community.

None of the custom designs are mine (it was fun searching since there were so many nice ace designs to choose from!).​

My key take-home message is: No matter who you are or how you identify yourself as, what’s most important is to love and cherish yourself. You are all precious human beings and deserve all the love.

 

[Vsmith]

All the designs are beautiful!! Good job everyone!! I wish had time to create something cool, but this past week was a hard week.
Other than that I want to say Love is love!! And every one of you is special and beautiful.

 

[cornimer]

I wasn't planning on entering this, but I had a pretty big week so I feel inspired to celebrate, especially since everyone has posted such beautiful photos/stories!



I identify as agender, and I personally feel most comfortable with a gender-neutral name. This week I "came out" as being under the nb umbrella at work by (finally) asking all my coworkers to call me by my preferred name. I received only supportive comments, so here's me celebrating the occasion by showing my agender pride!

Other notes about this photo:

• My character is dressed the way I wish I could dress - as long as I'm living at home I can't, but hopefully one day! I definitely feel most comfortable in androgynous/slightly more "masculine" clothes (I don't actually believe clothing has gender, but to my family it does which is why it's an issue haha)
• My accessories represent the asexual (hat) and lesbian (band-aids) flags. Not many people in my life know that I'm on the ace spectrum (and even fewer know that I like girls) which is why these parts of my identity are represented through small accessories - but they're a part of my LGBTQ2+ identity nevertheless!

Spoiler: namecard

I do wish you could change your islander's name on ACNH :')

 

[Nougat]

Thank you everyone for sharing your story and submitting these amazing entries! ❤ I'm a little late for voting so I missed the first round, but I made sure to give every entry a well deserved like And congratulations to the winners in the banner!

 

[Giddy]

Love this~! From the ones I've seen so far, they're all so beautiful. Hope to have time to see some more when I have time.

A little question, I kinda wanted to show two designs, but sadly don't have the flag item in game, would it be alright to have one of my patterns on the floor next to me?~ Or does someone know how I get the held flag?

 

[S.J.]

Love this~! From the ones I've seen so far, they're all so beautiful. Hope to have time to see some more when I have time.

A little question, I kinda wanted to show two designs, but sadly don't have the flag item in game, would it be alright to have one of my patterns on the floor next to me?~ Or does someone know how I get the held flag?

Do you want to hold the flag?

The handheld flag option came with one of the updates (March 18 update), so when you go to your Custom Designs app, you can design a custom flag in the "Pro Designs" section (where you can also make clothes) rather than the normal design section. The fourth tab along (I think) is for umbrellas, cutouts and flags.

 

[Vsmith]

Hello! I am a bit late to this party, but I have loved seeing everyone’s entries! Congrats to @Dunquixote , @Koopadude100 , and @Foreverfox !

mine came out looking more patriotic than intended (meant to try and blend Japanese and American styles):

View attachment 382132
(design by me - the hat says Nikkei haafu - half-Japanese ethniticty)

Here’s my thoughts (somewhat similar to the post I made on the ‘what race are you?’ thread):

What I want to celebrate is the complexity of identity and diversity.


My face did not come with an instruction manual for beauty

I wrote this phrase years ago in an attempt to describe this sense of my inability to conform to the neat boxes we tend to use to define things like race.

What are you? - Throughout my life I have been asked this question or similar questions many times. I am half- white and half-Japanese American (my mother was born in the US). Growing up in a mostly white area, I was always seen as ‘the Asian girl’, and it became a big part of my identity, and also set me apart as someone other - children made slant eyed faces at me, adults asked my father if I was adopted, or if he brought my mother back from Vietnam. I hated my flat little nose by 5th grade - I wanted a cute, pointy, ‘Jane Austen heroine’ nose.

Then I went to college at a school that was majority Asian American, thinking I would fit in, and suddenly people were asking if I was ‘really’ Asian - I didn't grow up speaking the language, which many see as a sign of inauthenticity, (my grandparents were interned during world war 2 and therefore did not want to teach their children Japanese), I ‘grew up white’, didn’t I? In reality the idea of how culture is passed down is so much more complex, but is didn’t know that then and it hurt to think this identity I had held for years might be something that didn’t legitimately belong to me.

It was a big shock, and I spent years feeling like I had to pick which side to be and establish my authenticity as an Asian person in order to ‘count,’ or else ‘give up’ on being Asian and be white.

To make a long story short, over the years, I’ve had to redefine myself and my sense of my race and what it means to belong to a culture or

I can relate I was born in the USA and I am Puerto Rican/Ecuadorian but I don't look Hispanic and asked a lot "what are you?" I was also shamed for not knowing how to speak Spanish.

I love your post!!! And I agree with every bit of it, here's hoping for a better future full of understanding and acceptance.

 

[tessa grace]

Congrats!!

 

[-Blue-]

You all did great screenshots. I didn't even know this thing was going on. Congratulations to @Koopadude100 @Dunquixote and @Foreverfox you all did awesome! It was pretty cool learning about all the different members.

I think I missed this. I guess it doesn't really matter as there's nothing I can really add to this. Great job with your representations everyone!

 

[Foreverfox]

Submit your entry by Wednesday June 30th at 10:00 PM EDT and please do not edit it after it has been submitted.

You can still submit an entry @TheDuke55! and thank you for your kind words! It has made my entire weekend seeing my son up there. When I showed it to him and told him, "Look, that's you!" he got the biggest smile ever.

 

[Serabee]

Alright, here's mine! Not nearly as nice as most of these entries but I tried, lol. My dress is for autistic pride, as a rainbow infinity symbol is a symbol for autism. I also worked in the colors of the Pan-pride flag, because that's how I identify! The heart antennae are just celebrating how much love is in the world and how diversity can help bring it out

And the sunglasses and lightstick were just festive and fun ​

 

[Giddy]

Do you want to hold the flag?

The handheld flag option came with one of the updates (March 18 update), so when you go to your Custom Designs app, you can design a custom flag in the "Pro Designs" section (where you can also make clothes) rather than the normal design section. The fourth tab along (I think) is for umbrellas, cutouts and flags.

Ah thank you~ I didn't realise I needed the pro custom design, thought weirdly it didn't have the fan/flag option? Would I need to make something for it to happen?

 

[S.J.]

Ah thank you~ I didn't realise I needed the pro custom design, thought weirdly it didn't have the fan/flag option? Would I need to make something for it to happen?

I'll PM you!

 

[Holla]

Here’s my entry. Some of you may know I don’t actually play as myself in New Horizons but for this photo op I changed the appearance of one of my characters to better represent myself.

My character is wearing a demisexual dress. Last year I started questioning whether I was asexual or not. Before I had always assumed I was heterosexual even though I always knew I was somehow different from most other people. This year I finally found a term that truly clicked with who I am and that’s demisexual which is on the asexual spectrum.

My character also holding an autism awareness flag. My older brother has low functioning autism. It’s been tough on our family as a whole. For me I grew up more akin to an only child, but regardless I still love and care about my brother. I have also made many high functioning autistic friends throughout the years. They are some of the most amazing people I’ve ever met. ❤

 

[Cosmic-chan]

My character is representing a small community that seems to go unnoticed or picked on for no reason. My character is representing Blasians also known as Afro Asians. What is a Blasian/Afro Asian? It is a person of black/African descent who also has Asian ancestry and decent. We do exist. We are valid. We are "dirty" we will not turn the water "dirty" because of our skin. The fact my great grandma married a black man and my Japanese family doesn't even want to associate with us because of this fact is awful. My great grandma has been dead for 30 years and we still get hate. We battle black hate and Asian hate and we feel we don't know where we belong and it should not be this way. We can wear Kimonos and Zoris and Zen hair pins and have curly hair and dark skin and still be Japanese as well. We aren't aliens. We aren't mistakes. We can be black and Asian. We shouldn't be told to speak English just because we're black and and shouldn't be told our hair shouldn't be curly just because we're Asian. We are valid and we are beautiful. Sorry for the rant.


Edit: I forgot to mention that I'm Neurodivergent and I have Autism and ADHD and it makes me act younger than I am and I tend to be into more immature things then I should be. That's why I chose to make my character look "babyish" this is who I am.

Spoiler

 

[princess.looking.for.frog]

for my entry of celebrating diversity, I chose to show my ace pride, my Belarusian heritage and my country I live in, Australia.

As for using the revolution belarusian flag, I stand in solidarity of the oppressed Belarusian people against the dictatorship. I do not identify with the official Belarusian flag. my Australian flag combined with the Belarusian flag represents me and many other belarusians residing in australia that are against the dictator.

the ace faerie from @/okayshima's pride collection on Instagram, and represents my asexuality. everyone in the LGBTQ community is valid and accepted, and despite even pressure inside the community, asexuals are valid. you don't need to like out a 'normal' relationship or try to fix yourself. this goes out to all the other members of LGBTQ as well.

diversity is amazing and beautiful, and we need to treasure it and help it flourish throughout our lives.