I had the pleasure of interviewing Menon for a series about South Asians for Change that I wanted to embark on. I jotted down this idea on a post-it note and let it resonate with me for a couple of minutes, desperately trying to think about which internet or community personality I could interview, when I fatefully stumbled upon Menon’s TikTok account. Immediately, I realized he wasn’t just another South Asian teenager trying to get famous and cater to the dominant discourse by creating meaningless videos-- his page was entirely different. After scrolling through some of his videos, I knew right away that he was the personality I wanted to interview.
2. 56.7 THOUSAND FOLLOWERS AND 4.2
MILLION LIKES. BUT SUJOY MENON
IS MORE THAN THE NUMBER OF
FOLLOWERS HE HAS, OR THE
CUMULATIVE LIKES HE’S RECEIVES
ON VIDEOS. THAT IS, SUJOY MENON
IS MORE THAN JUST A STATISTIC.
3. I had the pleasure of interviewing Menon for a series about South Asians
for Change that I wanted to embark on. I jotted down this idea on a post-
it note and let it resonate with me for a couple of minutes, desperately
trying to think about which internet or community personality I could
interview when I fatefully stumbled upon Menon’s TikTok account.
Immediately, I realized he wasn’t just another South Asian teenager trying
to get famous and cater to the dominant discourse by creating
meaningless videos-- his page was entirely different. After scrolling
through some of his videos, I knew right away that he was the personality
I wanted to interview.
4. The short answer-- a sixteen-year-old Indian-American teenager
who resides in the state of New Jersey. He is one who finds
comfort in familiarity, but also one who looks for new opportunities
and craves risks to feel alive.
So, who exactly is Sujoy Menon?
5. The most unique trait, as simple and arbitrary as it may
sound, that I found in Menon was his empathy and care for
others. He founded In This Together, a nonprofit organization
that aspires to raise awareness regarding problems concerning
mental health in adolescence, with the goal of decreasing
stress and anxiety in teenagers.
6. Menon’s fight doesn’t stop with advocating for individuals
struggling with mental disorders and the neurodivergent
community. His first few videos were about equality for
womxn and combating sexual assault by tackling the exigence
of this epidemic-- rape culture. Though “these videos
didn’t get many likes, I began to get happy with the
message I was sending to my viewers” explained Menon.
Soon after, he realized he wanted his page to be centered
around advocating for minority rights.
7. He began educating his viewers on the Black Lives Matter
movement, and why South Asians particularly should be allies
to, disputably, the most marginalized and silenced racial group
in America today-- the Black community.
8. “In the middle of a basketball game, I was told to ‘go back
to being chained and enslaved’.”After sharing this racially
charged and hateful remark Menon had to listen to while
playing a sport that he loved, he explained that just because
the color of his skin gets darker while he perspires, someone
had screamed this to him.
9. This is what members of the Black community face every
day-- whether they are lighter or darker-skinned doesn’t
matter, because they have afro-centric features that
distinguish them from other, less marginalized groups with
more euro-centric features. Menon put the value in allying
with the BLM movement in simple terms, “we [BIPOC] have
been oppressed for so many years, so if one of our own is
victim to societal and systemic racism.
