Jimin
Greycel
★
- Joined
- Apr 29, 2019
- Posts
- 63
The Asian men I never knew
"Why did my Japanese American mom and so many other women in her circle choose to be with white men?"
www.salon.com
As a kid growing up in Berkeley in the 1970s and '80s, I was surrounded by Asian women and white men. All wonderful human beings who unconditionally loved and cared for me, a half-Asian half-white only child who oddly preferred the company of grownups to other kids. But there was always an absence at our social gatherings, one that I never fully noticed until I was older. There were no Asian men. Not one. So, despite the joy, I received a clear, if unconscious, message: for Asian women to find love, happiness, and security, they must be with white men.
As a girl, I never allowed myself to consider Asian boys as options for dating. I never thought, "I'm not attracted to Asian boys," or "My mom chose a white man, so therefore I will." And yet I remember, when I saw Asian boys in elementary and high school, feeling a strange sort of clamping sensation in my gut. I remember quickly looking away and looking instead to my mixed race and white friends. Even now, the memory of this sensation makes me sad and sick. I'm trying to remember the conscious thought connected to this sensation, but the closest I can come is not so much a thought, but more of a confusing, ghostlike outline of an absence.
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