WTF is wrong with white men?
Why is it the same old story over and over again?
Most of you know I have a curiosity about east Asia It started with an interest in Japan that sprung from zen studies, then to an interest in Hong Kong as a tourism destination, and then as I got to know some people from that part of the world it exploded into curiosity about the entire region.
East Asian politics are complex and occult. In most areas like this of which I am curious I seek to establish expertise. Not so here. I will always be a wide-eyed student of this part of the world. There’s too much to know, and too much is changing too rapidly for me to do anything but watch.
Twitter has been resource for me. I have developed a timeline that supplies me with various points of view that I understand well enough to organize intellectually. Hong Kong is complex enough, but it is really just one roll of God’s dice in the region. Taiwan is also complex, but in a different way. China is as complex and confounding of categorization as human beings are. Korea has it’s own story, and Japan’s recent history puts it in a special place.
Like other places in the world, the US and the UK have had footprints in the region for a while. This gives us “experts” on the region, as if all this was too mysterious and complex to be understood without a guide. These guides, permit me to call them China-watchers, are often deliberate polemicists, which I have no quarrel with as long as they are transparent with their goals and alliances.
One of these China-watchers from the UK, a pro-China westerner, was just outed as a sexual predator of Chinese females by one of his victims. His view on the region (decidedly pro-China and pro-DPRK governments) is not one I particularly favor, but I did want to hear it. It has been shocking to watch others come to his defense. Misogyny and chauvinism have no politics.
The target (who told him she was underage) reported that he discussed possible contribution of her nude photos to a “nude group chat for pro-communist women.” Yes, you just read that, I just wrote it. Read for yourself:
Ms. Batista and Mr. Fowdy are definitely politically resonant. She wrote an interesting essay on Uyghur re-education camps in Xinjiang that is consistent with other pro-China accounts I’ve read. Mr. Dowdy seized on it, perhaps because it resonates with his work, perhaps because he wanted to influence this young woman, perhaps both.
You can read for yourself how it went from there, but it won’t surprise you.
I am a white man. A cis-het boomer raised in Texas. I am single, never married, and childless. I work in nursing and data science. I have younger Asian friends, many are females. I’m a fan of several Asian performance artists and writers. I’m interested in the region.
I’ve been kidded about having an Asian fetish. If I do, I also have a hot sauce fetish. I’ll try any hot sauce, I’ll try hot sauce on any food. I mostly eat with hot sauce. I could live without hot sauce, I just don’t want to. I’m constantly curious about hot sauce. I feel the same way about things Asian. I like Asian food, I like Asian art, ceramics, clothing, literature, movies, TV, some Asian pop culture, and I practice a religion that came to the US from Asia.
I also clearly see there’s plenty of ugly and awful things in Asia. The people of Asia have cleverly solved some of humanity’s problems and made others worse, just like any other area and/or people of the world. That doesn’t feel like a fetish to me.
So, maybe there’s something I just can’t get about Mr. Fowdy because he does have a fetish, but how in the world can one comport themselves to be a outsider ally of the region if you’re going to pursue erotic power plays targeting disadvantaged young women of the region? Where is the love?
There are a number of high profile, physically beautiful, and successful Asian female journalists reporting on east Asia who comport with Mr. Fowdy’s views. Why haven’t any of them emerged with reports of his sexual approaches? Why is it teenagers on Twitter who turned him out?
It is likely because he only approaches targets he has a power advantage over. Hello Colonialism. The hypocrisy this represents is stunning. He is doing the same thing to Ms. Batista that he asserts the UK did to Hong Kong, or that he asserts the US did to Korea. Exploitation is exploitation. What a creep.
Locally, here in NYC leftist political circles, there are so many stories about Asian females being targeted for sexual harassment by white men from within these same leftist political circles that one almost becomes numb to it. Every single Asian female activist friend I know well enough to tell me about it has at least one such story, most have a repertoire.
What the fuck? Did I miss a memo in my White Man Education Camp? Am I supposed to believe something is unique about Asian females sexually? Yes, I’m attracted some of them, but so what? My feeling is I’ve got just as much of a chance with them as I have with any ethnicity. Maybe I have more to talk about with someone from Asia, but maybe not, it depends on what they know.
I don’t feel compelled to hit on Asian woman particularly. I feel compelled to hit on women I find attractive. It’s a pretty rare event for me to approach someone for romance to begin with, so maybe that is why, but I really just don’t get it. There’s an acronym shorthand for it: “WMAF,” white man Asian female, because it is so frequently a topic of discussion online. One online group of Asians with which I am familiar discourages the topic because it seems to overtake every discussion it touches.
I’ve shied from the discussion myself, I feel I have nothing to contribute other than what is in this rant. I suppose I rant about this now because I want it clear that I am not beholden to any notion that this targeting is more acceptable because people I agree with politically are doing it. That’s what has shocked me most about this.
I unfollowed a number of Twitter accounts I had been relying on for a neutral or favorable English-language point of view of the Chinese Communist Party’s rule of modern China because they either attacked Ms. Batista directly or they somehow dismissed her as dramatic or immature. What the fuck is wrong with THESE people?
Argh. I’ve had enough. I”m gonna go put on some Hime (she’s on Spotify too), my fave female Japanese rapper, and have some oolong.