The 1-2-3 of the Inter-racial Disparity Debate
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Now that this latest round of inter-racial disparity drama has come to a close, I thought it might be useful to lay out the broad structure of the IR debate so that we can locate and more precisely understand where we’re positioned, and, because I can’t help it, why I (dis)agree with you.
As I see it, and this is by no means exhaustive or definitive, the structure of the debate breaks down something like this:
1. Is there an inter-racial marriage and/or dating disparity with regard to the North American (East) Asian population?
I accept that there is, skewed toward the white male/ Asian female (”WM/AF”) combination. Analysis of census data confirms a disparity, at least where marriage is concerned, with females out-outmarrying males at ratios of 3:2, 2:1, or 3:1, depending on who you ask. I also believe in the scientific veracity and entertainment value of the “IR Punching Game.” (Hint: the house favors the WM/AF spotter, unless you’re playing the Bizarro version, where you get punched every time you spot your designated combination. The Fighting 44s does not recommend playing the Bizarro version of the IRPG if you’re spotting WM/AFs unless you’re a sado-masochist, in which case, give your fellow player brass knuckles or at least a roll of quarters.)
If you don’t believe the disparity exists, you are divorced from reality and probably the product of an unloving and abusive marriage.
Also, with regard to the disparity itself, I wanted to share a few other thoughts, which are merely opinions and which I don’t stand particularly strongly behind, as the evidence is scant.
First, whatever the marriage disparity rate is, I think the dating disparity rate would be higher. Of course, I’m not even sure how we’d measure this: we’d have to define “dating,” we’d have to decide whether we’d look at, for example, the number of people out-dating at a particular time, or out-dating totals across a longer time span, how various races and half-races would be broken down, and the like. It would, overall, be a pretty boring topic which I hope no one would bother tackling, but then, there’s always a weirdo for every job.
Secondly, and this dovetails into a much larger topic, when we’re talking about Asians out-dating, we’re only talking about East and South-East Asians, and even then, we’re only talking about specific groups, the major one being the Chinese. As far as I know, the Japanese out-date at roughly equal rates between males and females, and they have a significantly different socio-economic/ cultural/ historical background. Any Japanese who immigrated here generations ago were largely forced to assimilate, and the ones who have come recently have come for entirely different reasons than Chinese or Koreans, because Japan is doing great: they are, after all, the second richest country in the world. Koreans, as far as I can tell, seem pretty tight, what with all their K-pride and K-rage, and so I would think the majority of disparity-related out-dating is being done by the Chinese, with a smattering of Filipinos and Vietnamese. There are, obviously, significant differences (like level of colonization and class distinctions) between these groups as well (oh the ignominy of being colonized by continental Europeans! I spray some eau de toilette in your honor). Essentially, I feel that if the Chinese could just get their acts together in terms of self-esteem and self-respect, it would go a long way toward resolving the IR disparity in general. Damn Chinese.
Finally, and I’m not going into this in great detail, but there is indeed a soft “hierarchy of appropriateness” when it comes to race/ gender combinations in politics as a result of patriarchy, colonization, and the existence of a push for a united Asian political voice in North America. I’m not going to go into my opinion on what combinations are more acceptable than what, and I’m sure you all have your thoughts on that. An interesting game might be to write down what combinations you think might be more or less socio-politically acceptable than others and compare your list to those of your friends. It’ll be like a party game, but instead of ending in a big drunken orgy it’ll ruin your relationships and force you to re-think how you view yourself and others (so maybe it will be like a big drunken orgy!). I’ll give you this one for free, though: in race politics, any sexual combination involving a WM is gonna tend toward the “inappropriate” end of the spectrum …. (oh I can hear the haters getting ready to stomp their deformed bound feet over this one!)
2. Given that there is an IR disparity, is it a “problem”?
I accept that the existence of the IR disparity is a social problem, related to white patriarchy, colonialism, economic development, and self-esteem issues in the Asian American community.
If you don’t believe the disparity is a problem, you are in a WM/AF, have gigantic feet, a daddy who didn’t love you, and you deserved it (the gigantic feet, that is; no one deserves an unloving daddy unless daddy was a pedophile, in which case thank your watchful ancestors your various sphincters are still functioning normally).
The causes of the IR disparity merit a detailed and complex examination, and can’t simply be chalked up to “media representation” or “white patriarchy” or “economic status” or “ugly Asian males,” though they’re all contributing factors (god I hate ugly Asian males, especially the ones with the scrawny limbs and scrunched up faces and beady eyes under thick Mongoloid eyebrows … do the rest of us a favor and go back to Outer Mongolia you half-aborted freaks! William Hung, I don’t count you ’cause you’re fucking adorable and you did the best you could with what you had, which wasn’t much, not to mention your admirable and earnest performance with the “Hung Jury” in the series finale of Arrested Development). Suffice it to say that any population which has a significant number of one gender outdating and outmarrying is not a very psychologically balanced or healthy population.
3. Given that the IR disparity is a problem, what should we do about it?
Here’s where things splinter all over the place, and there could be hundreds of varying responses across varying subject areas (advocacy, media, personal behavior, physical attractiveness, individual vs. group responsibilities, etc.), which I won’t attempt to classify or organize. With regard to the specific subject of addressing the sexual behavior of our own population, I’d say it splits into four very broad and possibly overlapping camps (depending on the time of day/ month):
a. Apathetic.
b. Date your own.
c. AMs oughtta outdate more/ AFs oughtta outdate less.
d. It’s none of your damn business, fuck off to your porn.
What I tried to do was integrate these into a coherent and sensible position, that is, you’re free to do as you wish, but if you wanna be an awesome advocate, you oughtta stick with an Asian.
Now, as I’ve said already, I fully acknowledge that what I’m suggesting isn’t going to be heeded by all that many people, and that’s totally fine. I’ve already said that I don’t expect or even particularly want advocates to hang up their hats or get divorced, which is a ridiculous thing to think about anyway, and seeing that happen certainly wouldn’t give me any huge satisfaction, though it would be more entertaining than a Broadway musical on the life and times of Cho Seung Hui (which, now that I picture it, would be pretty fucking entertaining … “I’m just an evil Asian Raaain Man / I want the world to feel my paaain, man / Them 9 milla Glocks are off the chaaain, man / “My folks’ll be glad to dry clean out the staaain, man ….”). No, if I had any goal other than my own entertainment and the praise and edification of the unwashed masses, it was just to spread the awareness that it wasn’t just misogynists and racists who might have an issue with an IR relationship in a certain context. I wanted to show that there was a sane and considered and compassionate perspective on the issue that didn’t consist of crying “all freedom, all the time, I love humanity (*cough* white men *cough*) and humanity (*cough* white men *cough*) loves meeeee!!!” ad nauseum.
At the very least, people might grudgingly acknowledge that the IR disparity is a problem, and they might also acknowledge that contributing to it while advocating for Asians might be taken as a somewhat awkward or, god forbid, condescending position. And that if they simply acknowledged it and didn’t viciously bite back at the people they were supposed to be representing, that might make things a little better for everyone.
Was that so bad? Was that so wrong? In the current state of things, if you bring up the point to an AF advocate (or something similar, like AFs might have it better in Western media than AMs), she’ll react like you just grabbed her ankles and tried to strap those ginormous American beef hormone-enhanced feet into size 1 clods while drowning her blue-eyed daughters in the wash basin. It’s ridiculous and faintly offensive. I just wanted to add some sensitivity to the discourse and see if we all couldn’t get along. I wasn’t adding to the social/ political fragmentation; I was addressing it and trying to find an integrating common ground. If I’ve spread just a little more sensitivity on the issue, I’ll consider my attempt a success.
So this, very briefly and very broadly, is the breakdown of the IR debate as I see it. I’ll post a few more closing thoughts on the matter and then move on to something much more exciting: the place of ethnocentricity in forming a hyphenated trans-racial identity.
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Scowl
12:40 pm | Aug 19, 2007[”And that if they simply acknowledged it and didn’t viciously bite back at the people they were supposed to be representing, that might make things a little better for everyone.”]
That really would make things better. Yeah, we all know about the ultra bitter Asian guys who can’t be reasoned with, but treating all Asian guys who say anything at all about IR with the same kind of venom is very alienating.
Discussing it is no guarantee that you’ll get anywhere, but an outright dismissal tends to leave a bitter taste in the mouth. I mean, if you’re supposed to be representing my interests to any degree at all, why would you be so quick to alienate me right off the bat when I do not approach you in the same way?
nightshade
2:08 pm | Aug 19, 2007Oh, dude, this piece could be a stand-up comedy routine. Cho Seung Hui musical, the fucking adorableness of William Hung, haters stomping their deformed bound feet.
aznbro
10:38 pm | Aug 19, 2007An excellent piece once again.
Whether we actually “progess” on this very much talked-over topic is a different matter. It seems to me that those on Dialect’s side (and mine) always want to debate the impact of IR on the North American Asian community as a whole. Arguments, “facts”, philosophy and statistics would be brought forth to support “our side”. However, the “other side” would either 1) ignore our side or 2) steer the topic towards their own or a generic “individual’s” situation. They respond with “how can my (white) BF and myself holding hands in public be so detrimental to the whole AA community?” or “race has nothing to do with our relationship”. Their reponses may have merit … for individuals anyways.
But were we talking about individual situations in the first place?
Usually at this point, some of the more hard-lined AMs would openly question the responses of the individuals which leads to retaliation with words like “misogyny”, “loser” and “dickless” and meaningful debate is over.
CJF
10:48 pm | Aug 19, 2007funny you talk of Koreans because I read that Korean women marry whites at the highest rates in the US.
tkguy
11:54 pm | Aug 19, 2007Finding a common grounds will be very hard by the fact that the american society treats AM and AF very differently. I believe AF are more privileged than AM in america. Unfortunately, this privilege makes them blind to see things from the AM perspective. One can say that AM may be blind to the AF perspective.
It’s like getting a rich kid to value money as much as the poor kids. The other day my less well off friend was telling me I should not take the toll roads because there are ways to get where I want to go for free. But I being better off financially would never think twice about the tolls I am paying. I can not see what the big deal is. And with that I can not truly see this situation as my less well off friend sees it. Going with the same line of thought an AM and AF will always have a hard time seeing things eye to eye.
I think that this is all fine. But the most important thing is to realize that asians are not the one to create this disparity, it was generated by others. And the root of this different treatment is of course, racism.
Dialectic
2:28 am | Aug 20, 2007Thanks for your comments, tkguy. I won’t go so far as to say that AFs are more privileged than AMs in North America, as there are all sorts of other aspects of male privilege which we still enjoy. I would, however, agree that they are more privileged in certain domains.
Finally, it would be more accurate to say that, while the root cause of the disparity is colonialism/ white patriarchy, that created enough of a disruption inside and outside the community that now it is being caused by both others and ourselves.
Ike
11:49 am | Aug 20, 2007Get William Hung to star as Cho Seung Hui in the musical. =)
nskripchun
1:36 pm | Aug 20, 2007If William Hung stars as Cho Seung Hui in a musical, it won’t be Glocks killing people… just Hung’s singing.
Great “summation / synthesis” piece, D.
realist
10:47 pm | Aug 21, 2007I think there are three parts to the problem:
1) As I mentioned in the “bright side of AF/WM” thread, there’s evidence to show that there’s a spectrum of men, with the “conscientious”, “provider,” “intelligent” men on the low-testosterone side and the “bad boy,” “player,” aggressive men on the high-testosterone side. (Some citations about this spectrum are in that thread.)
Asian men tend to fall on the low-testosterone “provider” side of the male spectrum. In the past, this was a good thing. Over the last several decades, however, feminism, the pill and economic independence have given women (of all races) the freedom to choose men from the high-testosterone “player” side of the male spectrum. This is one factor reducing Asian male attractiveness.
2) At the same time, as feminism has increased, white women have become less attractive as wife candidates to white men. Asian women tend to still have stronger families and values and are thus are seen as better, more faithful wife candidates. This means that a large number of white men (larger than the number of Asian men) are now competing for a relatively small number of Asian women. Even if the average white man is not more attractive, because of sheer numbers, there will be enough attractive white men to make the competition much more difficult for Asian men.
3) As Dialectic stated, there is some aspect of colonialism. Women are naturally attracted to power and as long as white men are in power, that will generally benefit white men. However, I think this impact is much less than the first two influences.
As far as I’m concerned, the problem isn’t with Asian men. In fact, by most statistics Asian men are generally overrepresented in their contributions to society. Statistically, they also have more stable families. Objectively, these traits should be more highly valued by women and society than they are.
The problem is with modern American women of all races who put a higher value on emotional attraction (which is irrational and relatively short-lived) than they put on a man’s ability to provide for a strong family and contribute to society in the long-term. The increase in divorce, single motherhood and other evidence of family decline over the last 30-40 years indicate to me that women in general are choosing the wrong men more often. I see feminism, the pill, the sexual revolution and the resulting social forces causing the vast majority of problems that Asian men face in the dating and marriage arena.
AfroIndo
7:35 am | Aug 22, 2007@ realist: man, I can concede some of your points, but you left me an emotional, befuddled mess when you wrote “The increase in divorce, single motherhood and other evidence of family decline……………..indicate to me that women in general are choosing the wrong men……….”. BLOODY WHAT?!. Tell me you aren’t placing the “blame” squarely on my fellow sisters’ shoulders and I’ll say something nice about your posts…….
realist
3:39 am | Aug 23, 2007Hey AfroIndo, I guess I wrote that without enough context. BOTH men and women have evolved a combination of civilized and antisocial instincts and emotions in their mate choices. One example of male irrationality is our greater instinctual desire to cheat and have multiple partners, even when we consciously know that it’s wrong and the cost to our relationships and children is is not worth the momentary emotional thrill. Men are also more likely to value physical appearance. This made sense in evolutionary times of high birth mortality, when waist-hip ratio, clear skin, healthy hair, etc. were good barometers of a woman’s ability to successfully bear a child. That preference is fairly irrational in civilized society when infant mortality for any woman is very low.
Throughout history, successful civilized societies evolved a set of rules and customs to control the lesser instincts of men as well as women. Required commitment to lifelong marriage and unwillingness to have premarital sex were two of the primary rules that women enforced on men. Those rules encouraged men to invest in their families and children, since they couldn’t easily run off and have more children. In recent years, the rules for both men and women have been greatly loosened. Men and women are now free to make choices based on instinctual, irrational, evolutionarily obsolete emotions and “chemistry.” I believe this leads to a situation where “bad boys” will have increasing success over “good guys” in the dating arena. I also believe that in the long-run, I believe this is bad for women, men, children and society as a whole.
Xian
1:47 am | Aug 24, 2007[quote]First, whatever the marriage disparity rate is, I think the dating disparity rate would be higher. Of course, I’m not even sure how we’d measure this: we’d have to define “dating,” we’d have to decide whether we’d look at, for example, the number of people out-dating at a particular time, or out-dating totals across a longer time span, how various races and half-races would be broken down, and the like. It would, overall, be a pretty boring topic which I hope no one would bother tackling, but then, there’s always a weirdo for every job.[/quote]
This is a great point. There were a couple of other things I can’t remember if are backed by research–the IR rates among groups for instance–but I’m absolutely sure you are right on this.
There is just too big of a group of people who IR date because it makes them feel good about themselves, and then chuck it when it comes time to make a life-long commitment.
In fact, this is one of the reasons why people tend to react so irrationally to constructive, thoughtful approaches to the IR issue such as your own. Building a good IR relationship is hard. And it’s even harder if you are an unintentionally fetish based relationship. If it’s intentionally, both parties probably don’t care. But I would say most are trying their based at making their racist relationship into a good, lifelong one, and we can certainly see how that would be frustrating.
What do most people do when they have a major, nearly unsolvable obstacle at the center of their life? They project, they lash out, they blame others.
I think that’s what’s occurring most cases. I’m not justifying it–if you are irrationally lashing out and attacking people who are working constructively on the issue, that’s unacceptable.
But if we want to actually impact change, I think we need to understand and be able to attack this dynamic.
I would ask you to add one more group to your taxonomy:
It is vital to have a fifth strategy–to destroy the institutions that create the disparity. The disparity is a symptom, not a problem unto itself.
If tomorrow, the disparity was completely obliterated by a mass marriage ceremony, it wouldn’t fix all of the problems.
That is where we need to break into media, reclaim our literature, and change the sexist/racist imagery. Shawn Wong’s book did more than any desired couplings ever could.
RebelAzn
3:02 pm | Dec 19, 2007Interesting article. However, some data is not accurate. The biggest disparity of IR dating within the Asian community is not with Chinese Americans. The Asian community that has the biggest disparity is the Filipino and Japanese community. Anyway, I hope we all realize the real reason for IR disparity is racism.
arirang
1:39 am | Dec 27, 2007This is just ridiculous. I say this b/c the end game isn’t marriage people. The end game is the next generation and the next one. As in how the children identify themselves and frankly if ‘asians’ who are pissed off at married out asians are making it clear that way, then there a bunch of kids who grow up as adults who will NEVER identify with part of their own background. Why is that a bad thing, you ask? Well maybe it’s because it’s not a healthy thing for a kid to feel that they can’t feel whole because someone or some group has decided to cut them off. And as a practical matter, today it might be some random chick, tomorrow it’s YOUR child, or YOUR GRANDCHILD. Do you want your kids to suffer? No. WELL then it might be time to open our hearts collectively and redefine what is an “Asian”, what is “Korean”, “Chinese”, “Japanese”, etc. etc.