the ch!cktionary

    9 Nov 2009

    Asian American Female Sexuality Panel We went through a whole slew of topics at tonight’s panel on Asian American women and sexuality. Some of the interesting points of discussion: The origin of sexual stereotypes: I attributed the image of the meek, submissive Asian woman to the history of Western colonization and occupation in the East, where forced and “voluntary” sex trade was rampant.  Since the majority of encounters were transactional, women occupied subservient roles. Prostitution aside, interactions between Asian women and male foreigners nonetheless tended to be inherently unequal due to the economic privilege of the latter group. Campus social scene: The presence of MIT frats in Boston allows for a much more diverse social atmosphere. When I went out to Halloween parties with Christine, we danced alongside students from Emerson, Northeastern, and BU. Harvard is completely insular (a bad thing, in my opinion), and Harvard girls are wary of outsiders, especially if they’re Wellesley students, who are viewed as potential competition. I also pointed out that at Harvard, like at many colleges, people speak of a pervasive hook-up culture, even though the numbers don’t add up. (A 2003 survey by University Health Services found that half of Harvard students had never had vaginal sex.) Yellow fever and Asian fetishes: The panelists were in agreement that the large Asian populations in schools like Harvard and MIT meant that non-Asian guys would be more likely to come into contact with and date Asian women. We talked about the difference between a fetish and an aesthetic preference and discussed whether Asian women have reverse fetishes on White men. I imagine I’ll be discussing this topic more in-depth on Friday (see below). Family, parents, and sexual instruction: Christine aside, the rest of the panel and audience commenters indicated that their parents had told them very little about sex beyond saying that they should not have it under any circumstances until marriage. I told everyone that my mother was slow to come around, but once I moved away from home, she had to deal with the inevitable (and I wasn’t about to maintain an illusion for her sanity). Recently, I mentioned to her that the Pill was killing my sex drive and she expressed concern that Patrick would become dissatisfied. So, things change. There was a great turnout and audience participation (always better than just letting speaker ramble). Since I already knew the other panelists, alum Vivien Wu and MIT’s Christine Yu, I felt a bit less of a super senior out of touch with the rest of Harvard. It also helped that my friends came — all, uh, five of them. At least they’re loyal. This event was part of Asian American Awareness Week, which culminates with a charity dance on Saturday. There will be events throughout the week, and I’ll also be a panelist for Friday’s Interracial Dating Discussion happening at 4:30pm in Lowell House’s Junior Common Room. I’ve written about my thoughts on intra- and interracial dating in the past, but it’ll be interesting to share these ideas in the context of a conversation. Send me questions if you can’t make it!

    Asian American Female Sexuality Panel

    We went through a whole slew of topics at tonight’s panel on Asian American women and sexuality. Some of the interesting points of discussion:

    • The origin of sexual stereotypes: I attributed the image of the meek, submissive Asian woman to the history of Western colonization and occupation in the East, where forced and “voluntary” sex trade was rampant.  Since the majority of encounters were transactional, women occupied subservient roles. Prostitution aside, interactions between Asian women and male foreigners nonetheless tended to be inherently unequal due to the economic privilege of the latter group.
    • Campus social scene: The presence of MIT frats in Boston allows for a much more diverse social atmosphere. When I went out to Halloween parties with Christine, we danced alongside students from Emerson, Northeastern, and BU. Harvard is completely insular (a bad thing, in my opinion), and Harvard girls are wary of outsiders, especially if they’re Wellesley students, who are viewed as potential competition. I also pointed out that at Harvard, like at many colleges, people speak of a pervasive hook-up culture, even though the numbers don’t add up. (A 2003 survey by University Health Services found that half of Harvard students had never had vaginal sex.)
    • Yellow fever and Asian fetishes: The panelists were in agreement that the large Asian populations in schools like Harvard and MIT meant that non-Asian guys would be more likely to come into contact with and date Asian women. We talked about the difference between a fetish and an aesthetic preference and discussed whether Asian women have reverse fetishes on White men. I imagine I’ll be discussing this topic more in-depth on Friday (see below).
    • Family, parents, and sexual instruction: Christine aside, the rest of the panel and audience commenters indicated that their parents had told them very little about sex beyond saying that they should not have it under any circumstances until marriage. I told everyone that my mother was slow to come around, but once I moved away from home, she had to deal with the inevitable (and I wasn’t about to maintain an illusion for her sanity). Recently, I mentioned to her that the Pill was killing my sex drive and she expressed concern that Patrick would become dissatisfied. So, things change.

    There was a great turnout and audience participation (always better than just letting speaker ramble). Since I already knew the other panelists, alum Vivien Wu and MIT’s Christine Yu, I felt a bit less of a super senior out of touch with the rest of Harvard. It also helped that my friends came — all, uh, five of them. At least they’re loyal.

    This event was part of Asian American Awareness Week, which culminates with a charity dance on Saturday. There will be events throughout the week, and I’ll also be a panelist for Friday’s Interracial Dating Discussion happening at 4:30pm in Lowell House’s Junior Common Room. I’ve written about my thoughts on intra- and interracial dating in the past, but it’ll be interesting to share these ideas in the context of a conversation. Send me questions if you can’t make it!

    Tags: Harvard. race. feminism.

    2 Jul 2009

    “Claiming that you “just happen” to prefer the blonde-haired, blue-eyed type (or whatever yours may be) ignores the biases we’ve each inevitably formed as a result of living in a society that promotes very specific beauty ideals. What many deem a “preference” is informed by their exposure to stereotypes, such as those depicted in television and movies. (The hypersexualization of black males and Asian females, the emasculation of Asian males, and the masculinization of black females are just a few examples.) Incredibly divergent interracial marriage rates are also a testament to the fact that physical preferences are really stratified by race.”
    — Sexy Time: Check Your “Type” At The Door, today’s column on College Candy
    Tags: race.

    4 Mar 2009

    Pacific Ties >> The Dialogue Issue: "Blogosphere: The New Frontier?"

    The latest edition of Pacific Ties, UCLA’s Asian American Pacific Islander newsmagazine features a cover story on bloggers, written by my friend Evelina, who was my co-editor-in-chief in high school. (Congrats!)

    The blogs covered include:

    All of the above sites are worth checking out if you want to learn more about AAPI issues. I actually met the Disgrasian girls last spring in Boston when they were speaking at Harvard, and they’re really insightful and funny (pretty much exactly how they come off on their blog — minus the snark).

    The Dialogue Issue of Pacific Ties is available now at UCLA newsstands and by request (just shoot an email to pacties@media.ucla.edu for a free copy). The entire issue can be read online here.

    Tags: race.

    2 Jan 2009

    “Does Lena Chen date Asians?”

    “Does Lena Chen date asians/has she ever?”, asked an IvyGate commenter. “If she does/has, I will save my vitriol-laden ‘self-hating asian’ spiel for another day (and another year). If she doesn’t, well, what a tool she is.”

    Just to clear the air on the topic, Asian guys are totally part of my repertoire, though commenters have often attacked me for only being interested in white men. Any regular reader of my blogs can probably deduce that I have no motivation for limiting my pool of potential bed partners. My sex life would be approximately 50% less interesting for it.

    I think the reason so many people are under the impression that I exclusively date white guys is because I go to Harvard, the supposed playground of the privileged white male. So though I don’t reveal the identities of the guys I blog about, it’s just assumed that they’re 1) Harvard students and 2) not racial minorities. I actually don’t have a type. My last real crush was on a non-Harvard Asian guy, who I obsessed over for weeks (a fairly painful experience for my friends), and besides his lack of interest, the only reason I forgot about him is because I met Patrick. Of course, no one realizes that because I don’t give physical descriptions of my blog subjects (nor do I blog about everyone I’m interested in), so people extrapolate from public information and make yellow fever/Nazi jokes about the guy they do know I’m dating.

    It’s a little insulting, because race is so insignificant a factor in compatibility that I get pretty outraged myself when people express any preference for it at all. Class (and education) is more of a factor than race. Political affiliation, religion, even nationality matter more. (Patrick being German, for example, does make a difference in how we relate). To be honest, I don’t even necessarily put a lot of emphasis on looks so skintone is totally irrelevant. Previous to Patrick, my friends openly lamented that some of my interests were simply unpresentable (think: geeky) or were too lazy to make themselves presentatble (think: slackerish). And it’s true, many were just not conventionally attractive by any standard, but that’s not why I was into them. Ironically enough, the only physical preference I’ve noticed over the years is my lack of attraction to blondes and men with lighter features. But since I’m currently dating the physical epitome of all that is Aryan, I’m clearly open to making exceptions.

    Obviously, I’m not advocating that we all begin dating people we can’t bring ourselves to kiss. I think “types” are fine if you’re flexible about them and aware of why your preferences are what they are. However, I continue to find it strange when people claim that a certain race “just isn’t [their] type”. It’s even weirder when they make that claim for members of their own race (black men who refuse to date black women, etc). I’ve come across a lot of people, even Harvard kids, who as a rule, do not consider “x” group of people attractive. You do realize that your preferences are not organic but socially ingrained, right? We don’t magically exit the womb with a natural inclination to pursue those who look like Abercrombie models. To say that you simply can’t help your lack of interest in one race is to say that you fully accept the extent of your media-assisted brainwashing. So, the completely non-introspective statement “not my type” is not an acceptable excuse to rule out an entire portion of the human population. Maybe it’s not exactly a racist attitude, but I still think it’s extremely close-minded.

    30 Nov 2008

    Racism is the new snark.

    So I know I already mentioned this Gawker piece but I just went back to read the comments, and holy shit:

    “Asian is the last stop before Gay.” #

    “My wife already knows when she’s tired of me and kicks me out that my next wife will come from Korea or Sri Lanka.” #

    “Mr. Butterfly Champion gets his Madame Butterfly*.” #

    “He so horny**!” #

    “White nerds dating Asian girls is a trend. I don’t think it’s offensive to point it out.” #

    SERIOUSLY?!

    • My friends and I make plenty of offensive comments about each other’s race/sexual orientation/etc. but we do so in private. So though I’ve been referred to as a Madame Butterfly, these things are said in jest and directed toward me specifically by my friends specifically, not directed at an entire group of people by anonymous commenters who don’t know them.
    • Some argue that there’s truth to some stereotypes like “Asians are the last stop to Gay”. However, I can think of lots of stereotypes out there (“Blacks are thugs,” “Gays are diseased,” “Fat people are lazy”, etc.) that shouldn’t ever be said out loud. Why? Oh, that’s right. Because they’re stereotypes, which by definition, means that they have no empirical basis.
    • Interracial relationships are not “trends”. Trends go out of style. I’m pretty sure this isn’t just a hot commodity for the season.
    • People have no filter on the Internet, especially not on websites like Gawker, because they mistake “being offensive” for “being controversial”. A racist remark isn’t snarky humor, it’s just racist.

    Call this an overreaction, but I’m seriously disturbed by some of these comments. The Gawker article is offensive, sure, but considering the website’s habitual outrage at other people’s displays of ignorance, I’m going to chalk this up to a poor attempt at humor. The commenters, though? I guess they demonstrate that some people out there — educated or not — clearly need a crash course on racism and its seemingly harmless manifestations.

    * For those unfamiliar with the opera, Madame Butterfly depicts the relationship between a condescending American and a self-sacrificing, exoticized Japanese woman, who gets abandoned (after marriage, mind you) for a new and improved American wife.

    ** A reference to the Vietnamese prostitute in Full Metal Jacket. Everyone’s heard “Me so horny. Me love you long time”; no one ever knows where it’s from. Now you do.

    Tags: race.

    1 May 2008

    According to Gossip Girls, there are exactly two minorities on the Upper East Side.

    So I know everyone loves Gossip Girls and everything but has it occurred to anyone else that this is just another in a long line of television shows about White high schoolers with their fabulous/dramatic White American lives? There was 90210, then The O.C., and now there’s Gossip Girl. And unlike the other two shows, there are at least stock minority characters on Gossip Girl but um, they don’t actually speak. Ever. Instead, they run around alongside their Queen Bee and let the pretty White girl do the talking for them. Maybe I’m making a big fuss out of everyone’s favorite guilty pleasure but what bothers me is that the guiltiest part of this pleasure is something no one seems to have picked up on: Blair Waldorf’s reign over her two minority minions stinks of colonialism.

    (Apparently, though, there’s a new Asian girl on the block and she occupies the incredibly stereotype-busting role of a … geek. Revolutionary.)

    So here’s the thing: yeah, the OMFG posters are totally hard to decipher and everyone on this show does look alike, because White women are the only ones who get roles of any significance and degrees of paleness get pretty hard to differentiate. Thank Josh Schwartz (the same man who brought you the impressively homogenous cast of The O.C.) who apparently decided that he couldn’t even find a Black or Asian chick who was funny enough to deliver zingers. So a major character role? That’s out of the question for chicks with melanin.

    Sure, television is escapist and everyone knows that there are minorities in New York even if they’re not on Gossip Girl New York, but this is the kind of shit that leads to minority girls growing up wishing they looked white. This is what perpetuates the idea that all Black people are thugs and all Asian people are nerds, because those are the only roles they ever occupy in popular entertainment. And Gossip Girl is the most insidious kind of messaging because it seems harmless and it’s high school and therearecuteboysomg! But just ask yourself, how fucking weird would it be if Blair were Black or if Serena were Asian? Put the face of a Black woman on that OMFG poster. Would that jolt you in the least? Would the show be less popular? Would you find it harder to relate or get invested in these characters? Because I can relate to White actresses better than I can Black actresses and that doesn’t make sense because I’m ASIAN. And as much as one loathes to admit it, as much as I don’t want to admit it, there’s something about a pretty White face that sells.

    This is why I don’t watch television.

    Reblogged: rachelhills

    20 Jan 2008

    Time to be controversial: do white men get it easier when it comes to interracial dating?

    Not sure I agree with this interpretation of the movie, nor do I think this was Spike Lee’s intent:

    “Jungle Fever portrays the relationship between a black man a white woman as doomed to fail in contrast to the potentially successful relationship between a white man and a black woman. The ‘success’ of one relationship and the ‘failure’ of the other suggess that one type of interracial relationship (when the man is white [dominant partner] and the woman is black [exotic Other]) is more acceptable than another.” — Diana R. Paulin, “De-Essentializing Interracial Representations: Black and White Border-Crossings in Spike Lee’s ‘Jungle Fever’ and Octavia Butler’s ‘Kindred’” in Cultural Critique

    HOWEVER, it brings up the very interesting point: are white male/minority female couples the most accepted form of interracial dating? I kind of think so. Why? Well, maybe this is a vast generalization, but there’s kind of a historical precedence for white guys being able to do and get whatever they want without ever getting shit for it. Want to get educated? College was made for white guys. Want a sammich? Someone will make them one. Want to wage war? Sure! Whenever they feel like it. So if they want to date someone of a different race, no one’s going to stop them. That’s totally NOT the case for non-white men and definitely not for women. Black male sexuality is totally feared, Asian male sexuality is totally ridiculed, and women — white or otherwise — don’t get much say period.

    Also, there’s the double standard of “dating down”. White women aren’t supposed to date non-white guys because it’s a downgrade. Those who do are whorish and looked down on (Angie in “Jungle Fever” gets a pretty shitty rep). White men, on the other hand, have been sticking their junk in just about everyone since just about always (whoo, colonialism!), and their behavior is very much still encouraged. It’s not a downgrade if you’re pumping the colored gal full of yummy Aryan spermies!

    Maybe my theory is totally wrong and white guys have just as tough a time as everyone else when they cross colorlines. From my personal experience at least, I don’t think this is true. My white boyfriends/fuck buddies/whatever have all done substantially less thinking about the matter of interracial dating/tension than … well, just about everyone else. Which is why, even if white men think that their experience dating interracially is no easier than anyone else’s, they still need to consider their romantic relationships in the context of the rest of their white, male privilege. If they undoubtedly have it easier in every other respect, what makes sex and dating exempt? It might not be easy per se, but it is probably EASIER on them than others.

    This is probably coming off as very bitter, crazy liberal, DOWN WITH THE WHITE MAN right now. But this is all more of an intellectual observation than anything else. I’m not bitter, nor do I hate white guys, as evidenced by my prior dating history and the fact that my best friend at Harvard is both white and male. Though he’s gay as well, which kind of brings up a host of other considerations.

    Oh, and I’m aware all of this is very heteronormative, but analyzing interracial gay couples would make my head EXPLODE right about now + I do not know nearly enough about the research on the subject to voice an informed opinion.

    Back to writing the actual paper instead of musing over random stuff!

    Tags: race.
    ss_blog_claim=2e43b69a85ddf3d9e1b2923415211607