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Why White Men Prefer Asian Women By Fred Reed Toogood
Reports [Wednesday, October 24, 2001; 12:01
a.m. EST] There is near me an Asian sushi-beer-and-dinner establishment that Iīll call the Asia Spot. The region is urban, so the clientele is a mix of some of just about everything, but the waitresses are all Asian, principally Japanese, Indonesian, Vietnamese, and Thai. The Spot is a neighborhood bar. A large after-work crowd, many of them regulars, gather at happy hour. The social dynamics are curious. It would be an exaggeration to say, as someone did, that the black guys come to pick up white women, and the white men come to get away from them but it would be an exaggeration of an underlying truth. The waitresses are a large part of the Spotīs appeal. A common subject of conversation among male customers is how very attractive these women are when compared to American women. It is not a thought safe to utter in mixed company. It is a very common thought. American women know it. Why are the Asians attractive? What, to huge numbers of men, makes almost any Asian more appealing than almost any American? The question is much discussed by men at the Spot. (I should say here that when I say women, I mean the majority of women, the mainstream, the center of gravity. Yes, there are exceptions and degrees.) American women of my acquaintance offer several explanations, all of them wrong. For example, they say that Asian women are sexually easy. No. American women are sexually easy. The waitresses at the Spot are not available. They date, but they cannot be picked up. Another explanation popular among American women is that men want submissive women, which Asians are believed to be. Again, no. For one thing, submissive people are bland and boring. In any event the waitresses arenīt submissive. Many compete successfully in tough professions. Among Asian waitresses I know I count an electrical engineer who does wide-area networks, and a woman with a masters in biochemistry who, upon finding that research required a Ph.D and didnīt pay, went back to school and became a dentist. Both of these wait tables to help out in the family restaurant. At the Spot I know a woman waitressing her way through a degree in computer security, a bright Japanese college graduate making a career in the restaurant business, and the manager of the Spot not a light-weight job. Submissiveness has nothing to do with their attractiveness. Why, then, are they so very appealing? To begin with, look at the American women in the Spot. Perhaps a third of them are stylishly dressed. The rest of the gringas run from undistinguished to dumpster-casual: baggy jeans, oversize shirts -- often male shirts -- with the tails out. They seem to affect a sort of homeless chic, actually to want to look bad, and do it with more than a touch of androgyny. A high proportion are at least somewhat overweight. (So are the men, but thatīs another subject.) The Asians, without exception, are sleek, well-groomed, and dressed with an understated sexiness that never pushes trashy. Further, the Asians are what were once called ladies, a thought repellant to feminists but very so refreshing to men. Listen to the American women at neighboring tables, and you will frequently hear phrases like, Heīs a f---ing piece of shit. In what appears to be a determined attempt to be men, they have adopted the mode of discourse of a male locker room and made it their normal language. The Asians, classier, better students of men, do not have foul mouths. They presumably know about body parts and bathroom functions, but do not believe that a woman raises her stature by referring to them constantly in mixed company. Men at the Spot, I have noticed, instantly understand that colloquial commentary is not wanted, and donīt engage in it: In the presence of the civilized, men adopt the standards of civilization. Men also tend to think of women as women think of themselves. The Asians, without displaying vanity, clearly think well of themselves. And ought to. All in all, they give the impression that they do not want to be one of the guys. They want to be one of the girls. Here we come to the core of their appeal. Let me elaborate. The default position of American women is what men refer to as the chip, a veiled truculence, mixed with a not-very-veiled hostility toward men and a shaky sense of sexual identity. The result is a touchiness reminiscent of hungover ferrets. There is a bandsaw edge to them, a watching for any slight so that they can show that they arenīt going to take it. They are poised to lash out in aggressive defense of their manhood. As best as I can tell, they donīt like being women. Here is the entire problem in five words. The Asians at the Spot show every indication that they do like being women. They do not seem to have anything to prove. Being happy with what they are allows them to be comfortable with what they are not men. They are not competing to be what they canīt be with people who canīt be anything else. They donīt have to establish their masculinity because they donīt want it. They do not assume, as American women tend to, that femaleness is a diseased condition to be treated by male clothes, gutter language, and bad temper. Iīve spent many dozens of hours chatting with the gals at the Spot, and never seen a sign of the chip. For a man, the experience is wonderful beyond description smart, pretty, classy women, who are women, and are not the enemy. As long as American women carry the chip, the Asian gals will eat them alive in the dating market. Note that the espousal of hostile obnoxiousness as a guiding philosophy appears to be an almost uniquely American horror. It certainly isnīt requisite to independence or self-respect. I recently met a quite attractive blonde who, among other things, was smart, a long-haul motorcyclist, a student of the martial arts out of sheer athletic enjoyment of it, and an excellent marksman. She was also heterosexual, feminine, delightful company, and had no trace of the chip. I was astonished. How was this possible, I wondered? She was Canadian.
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