[quote=“Muzha Man”][quote=“Tempo Gain”]more amateur psychology lol. The guy has an innocent belief about the beauty of the local women, or an asian fetish if you will. Living here too long he has let himself become convinced this is objective fact which must as a matter of course influence the lives of everyone else here, thus introducing it into your conversation without realizing how stupid it is. Your response shocked him, facing him with the dilemna of realizing that his beliefs are not necessarily shared by everyone. He went down the easy path of “i’m right,” and joked with his wife later about how you think he has an asian fetish. she interpreted this to mean that he likes her only because she is asian, thus leading her to send you the e-mail.
i will take bets on this against Muzha’s interpretation lol.[/quote]
I’ll take that bet.
Seriously, he did not just innocently introduce the fact that he loves asian women into the conversation. He said living among all these goddess must be bad for SAF’s self-esteem. This is a put down no matter how you look at it. The only question is why would someone put another down like this.[/quote]
Precisely. He’s a compete nutter. A hot hot slim sexy blondie virtually alone among a sea of black hair and unfortunate fashion choices is NOT going to have low self-esteem, I’m guessing.
Now get the hell over to that other thread and list me some fun spots to take me neice and nephew to.
Me, racist? Impossible! I shag both black and white sheep.[/quote]
You can’t pull the wool over almas john’s eyes.
“Pull the wool” probably has a whole other meaning for him, too, come to think of it.[/quote]
Oh God…
Why does it have to be a fetish just because you like someone that doesn’t share the same skin colour or nationality as you?
I’ve never had a “white” girl friend, but it doesn’t mean I won’t look at “white” girls (no, not the pasty white taiwanese ones). Is it wrong as a man to just like girls no matter where they’re from?
Sure, it’s most likely a lot easier to find a local girl here, but so what?
And just because you don’t want to have a girl friend from one or another part of the world doesn’t have to mean that you’re racist either.
There are plenty pretty “white” girls here and I wouldn’t have low self asteem here if I was one of them as I know there are plenty of guys here that would love to be their boy friend (no sorry girls, I’m already spoken for).
They guy must just be a bit of a nutter imho, ignore him…
[quote=“sandman”][quote=“Muzha Man”][quote=“Tempo Gain”]more amateur psychology lol. The guy has an innocent belief about the beauty of the local women, or an asian fetish if you will. Living here too long he has let himself become convinced this is objective fact which must as a matter of course influence the lives of everyone else here, thus introducing it into your conversation without realizing how stupid it is. Your response shocked him, facing him with the dilemna of realizing that his beliefs are not necessarily shared by everyone. He went down the easy path of “i’m right,” and joked with his wife later about how you think he has an asian fetish. she interpreted this to mean that he likes her only because she is asian, thus leading her to send you the e-mail.
i will take bets on this against Muzha’s interpretation lol.[/quote]
I’ll take that bet.
Seriously, he did not just innocently introduce the fact that he loves asian women into the conversation. He said living among all these goddess must be bad for SAF’s self-esteem. This is a put down no matter how you look at it. The only question is why would someone put another down like this.[/quote]
Precisely. He’s a compete nutter. A hot hot slim sexy blondie virtually alone among a sea of black hair and unfortunate fashion choices is NOT going to have low self-esteem, I’m guessing.
Now get the hell over to that other thread and list me some fun spots to take me neice and nephew to.[/quote]
Someone asked me if living amongst all these hunky Taiwanese guys was bad for my self-esteem. I said no, being a middle-aged guy with a receding hairline is bad for my self-esteem.
Seriously though, if I replied with “What hunky Taiwanese guys?”, would I be out of line? I think I’d still take affront to an accusation of racism. You know what’s bad for my self-esteem? Having a Hello Kitty store down the street from my house. The shame, the shame.
Pink fuzzy handcuffs are Hello Kitty enough, if you are really hard-pressed for something to go with the Hello Kitty O’ Nine Tails…
I think if anyone is racist, it’s your friend for putting Taiwanese women on a pedestal (his implying that you weren’t as good as them and therefore might feel inferior). This is racism in the unofficial Tigerman-approved definition of “racism”.
[quote=“douglas@taichungpaws.org”]from dictionary.com:
fet·ish /ˈfɛtɪʃ, ˈfitɪʃ/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[fet-ish, fee-tish] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun 1. an object regarded with awe as being the embodiment or habitation of a potent spirit or as having magical potency.
2. any object, idea, etc., eliciting unquestioning reverence, respect, or devotion: to make a fetish of high grades.
3. Psychology. any object or nongenital part of the body that causes a habitual erotic response or fixation.
[color=blue]I think the key here is that you used the word “fetish” to describe how your friend feels about his Asian partner. Would you also call it a fetish if a white person only dated other white people? Or if someone only dated blondes? I think that fetish is a bit too strong to describe the concept of dating local people in a society. It really doesn’t matter which race of people you prefer, or even if you don’t differentiate at all, but what matters is that the word “fetish” upset your friend. Why is it wrong to date locals? Why is it wrong NOT to?[/color][/quote]
No. I made no comment at all in any regard to his partner. I didn’t even insinuate that he had an Asian fetish. All I said was simply that I do not. (And thus the not thinking I am surrounded by goddesses that give me a low self esteem.)
I’ll hazard a guess as to why the guy who said that was being so rude. A lot, an awful lot of white men who come to Taiwan have a chip on their shoulder and latent hostility towards white women. All those years of rejection and failed relationships with white girls builds a lot of anger and pain. So he comes to Asia and gets the “star” treatment from Asian women because of his foreign exoticism, and he develops an unwarranted ego. When white women treat him as just another ordinary joe and not some sort of supercool blue-eyed waiguoren stud, he feels slighted and hurt, and thus takes his anger out on her.
These kind of anti-white-women attitudes are very, very common in the white male population here, though probably less so in Taiwan than in Thailand or the Philippines, which attract the real misogynist sexpat scumbags.
The guy put SuchaFOB down because he was feeling smug and wanted to put her in her ‘place’. He’s happy if white women in Asia are considered unattractive and have a difficult time finding a date in Asia*, because to his logic those are just desserts - the tables are turned and now she knows what it feels like to be a man like him in North America. He takes a perverse delight in his ‘revenge’.
I know the psychology well, because there are many, many guys here in Taiwan with such bad attitudes. The whining about white girls gets really, really tedious the first 100 times you hear it.
(*Of course that’s not really true; white women are considered as exotic and desirable by the local population as white men are. Especially if they are blonde and blue-eyed vixens)
[quote=“Quentin”]I’ll hazard a guess as to why the guy who said that was being so rude. A lot, an awful lot of white men who come to Taiwan have a chip on their shoulder and latent hostility towards white women. All those years of rejection and failed relationships with white girls builds a lot of anger and pain. So he comes to Asia and gets the “star” treatment from Asian women because of his foreign exoticism, and he develops an unwarranted ego. When white women treat him as just another ordinary joe and not some sort of supercool blue-eyed waiguoren stud, he feels slighted and hurt, and thus takes his anger out on her.
These kind of anti-white-women attitudes are very, very common in the white male population here, though probably less so in Taiwan than in Thailand or the Philippines, which attract the real misogynist sexpat scumbags.
The guy put SuchaFOB down because he was feeling smug and wanted to put her in her ‘place’. He’s happy if white women in Asia are considered unattractive and have a difficult time finding a date in Asia*, because to his logic those are just desserts - the tables are turned and now she knows what it feels like to be a man like him in North America. He takes a perverse delight in his ‘revenge’.
I know the psychology well, because there are many, many guys here in Taiwan with such bad attitudes. The whining about white girls gets really, really tedious the first 100 times you hear it.
(*Of course that’s not really true; white women are considered as exotic and desirable by the local population as white men are. Especially if they are blonde and blue-eyed vixens)[/quote]
Quentin, yeah. Surprisingly well articulated rationale for the most part. But the thing is, I don’t think he was intending to put me down. I don’t think he intended an insult. I think he just has such a fetish that he assumes everyone thinks the women here are more desirable than other women. I think that he was trying to be sympathetic to something that he assumed I MUST be going through. I can see his thinking (sort of): If I really WERE living in a country where everyone around me was some sort of goddess and I was average (not by the standards of the goddess country, but by normal average standards), than my self esteem WOULD be pummeled.
Truth be told, sounds like the guy was projecting onto you. It’s a strange comment to make in the first place. Why would he come to a conclusion that a grown woman doing her thing would be intimidated by local beauty? Or at least, affected by it? It’s almost like implying that women are in competition with each other.
You should have told him that you have no time to be concerned about the local goddesses because you’ve been too busy fending off your own worshipers.
[quote=“SuchAFob”]
I just got an email from my friend’s girlfriend. From the email I don’t gather that he added anything to my statement. In the email she says that my comment about not having an Asian fetish was insensitive and racist and that she was surprised that such a racist statement would come from me.
…
Would anyone care to explain the logic of how not having an Asian fetish makes me a racist?[/quote]
There might be a completely different explanation: The girl is a bit immature and has a streak of insecurity, as you will find that a fair bit of the young local lasses have.
If you then add a little bit of well, not racism, but shall we said pride of being Chinese, and you have someone innocently thinking that the world should look up to her and her kind.
[quote=“SuchAFob”]Someone please explain this argument to me.
Not very long ago I was having a conversation with a man who said that living amongst all these goddesses must be horrible for my self esteem. Not the first time I’ve heard it but it still always makes me double take. I told him that I don’t have an Asian fetish so I don’t really see myself as surrounded by goddesses. And that I don’t judge myself by the Asian standard, so no. It isn’t that bad.
I just got an email from my friend’s girlfriend. From the email I don’t gather that he added anything to my statement. In the email she says that my comment about not having an Asian fetish was insensitive and racist and that she was surprised that such a racist statement would come from me.
[/quote]
I think this whole thread is bizarre. SuchAFOB is being disingenious.
The man didn’t make a good statement, for sure (we are not informed if this was a small part of a longer conversation, nor are we informed whether he is a great guy, or struggling…). His thoughts were racist stereotypes and poorly expressed. However, it’s not the case that SuchAFOB responded positively and set him right. Instead, it sounds probable that both the content and style of her reply were haughty enough to give the guy reason both not to improve his ideas, but to resent you and report your comments as a put-down. The TW girlfriend gave a reasonable response.
So, SuchAFOB, instead of starting a thread of conjecture, why don’t you keep your own reflexive comments to yourself and show some grace. Turn the situation into a positive in real time, and in real life with the guy you were talking with, and stop gossiping (behind his back) about silly little situations that astound you.
