Pixar's short film 'Bao' is a sweet story almost anyone can relate to — and the confusion around it is baffling

• Some audience members are having trouble wrapping their heads around new Pixar short "Bao"— and the chief issue seems to be a lack of basic imagination.
• Other Twitter users are calling out cultural ignorance and praising the universal tale of a mom who is dealing with empty nest syndrome — with an anthropomorphic dumpling of a son.
• Our dumplings may be different, but our basic human emotions are the same — this powerful short should probably hit a nerve for most moms everywhere.
• Spoilers ahead for certain plot elements of Bao.

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Even if you haven't seen "The Incredibles 2," you've probably heard about the new Pixar short "Bao" that's playing right before each screening.

The short film is written and directed by Domee Shi, a Chinese-Canadian animator who also made history as the first woman to ever direct a Pixar short.

Though many have had a positive reaction to the film, some people — mostly white — have tweeted about being thoroughly confused after viewing Pixar's newest short, ‘Bao.'

For me, this wasn't exactly shocking, though it was disappointing.

As a biracial Asian-American kid who grew up in Chicago, I was an avid reader before I was into anything else. I eventually grew to love all kinds of pop culture, but I fell first — and hardest — for books. My grandfather — the white one, not the Asian one, who had unfortunately passed away before I was born — instilled that love in me from a very young age. 

Growing up, I read anything and everything that I could get my hands on. I read the super bloody and terrifying Grimm stories when I was probably about 6 or 7, and treasured every horrific word.

Those stories were full of talking animals among other things, and child-me just went with it, not even requiring the medium of animation to let my imagination run with the story.

You want me to believe that horse head can still talk, even though the horse is dead and the head is mounted on the wall? No problem.

Of course, well-meaning family and family friends also tried to give me Chinese fairy tale books. They usually had great stories, but also featured what I would later come to realize were horribly racist illustrations. The same extended to a certain animated adaptation of the Chinese Cinderella story of Yeh-Shen — on one hand, I was excited that it existed, but I was also absolutely horrified by the character designs.

Of course, child-me couldn't articulate why those illustrations made me uncomfortable, but they definitely did. Only later did I learn about the ugly undercurrent of "yellow peril" stereotyping that flowed through those illustrations. As any kid from anywhere can tell you — when someone takes the time to draw something that bashes people who look like you with every single ink stroke, it sucks.

Although it's been slow, representation has improved incrementally over time. As just one example, my heart absolutely soared upon discovering book number 7 in Ann M. Martin's The Babysitters Club series — titled "Claudia and Mean Janine."

Here was an American girl like me — who also looked like me — just trying to live her life. It was indescribably powerful, and the more I learned about Claudia Kishi, the more I was hooked. Even if she was Japanese-American and I wasn't, it was still a step closer to seeing myself in a book than I'd previously experienced.

When you read a lot, you grow accustomed to identifying with all sorts of heroes, anti-heroes, villains, and everything in between. You quickly learn that well-written characters are anyone you can connect with — no matter what they might see when they look in the mirror.

Still, it's nice to feel seen once in a while. If you're part of the dominant culture and have always been seen, you've probably never had to think about this before — but please just try.

That kind of representation is why stories like "Bao" are important — and really shouldn't be that hard to relate to.

Storywise, this short has all the elements of about a zillion other fairy tales with counterparts all over the world. If anything, it is a modern fairy tale exploring the pain a mom feels when all her kids have moved out and no longer need her every day, something that is pretty much universal to moms everywhere.

It's not meant to be literal — although cute anthropomorphized foodstuffs have been a staple in Asian pop culture for ages. Just look through your Sanrio history books and read up on Cinnamoroll— or head over to cute-stuff-space competitor San-X and check out characters like Kogepan, Yogurukun, or Nyanko.

Also, it's worth noting that most cultures have some kind of delicious dumpling going on, and I will gladly stuff my face with all of them.

Also, it's not like people don't love animation as a medium for all of its specific storytelling tools that simply don't work in live-action movies — such as those in a certain scene from the beloved Pixar full-length feature "Inside Out."

Or those in a certain scene from another beloved Pixar full-length feature, "Toy Story 2"— the second in a trilogy of films about a bunch of toys that come to life on the regular like it's no big deal.

The point is, animation is pretty much never meant to be taken literally. Creators impart morals and lessons and metaphors though their characters — which yes, sometimes aren't human — to tell stories that we can all take something from.

Our cultural signifiers might be different, but basic human emotions are an experience that spans all of us as humans on this planet. The more that we work to understand each other, and the more that we ensure everyone is represented fairly and respectfully in media, the more we can continue to create and share stories that can resonate with everyone.

Humanity has a long, beautiful, and varied culture of storytelling — and this Pixar short is just one of the latest chapters.  

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