Do you fetishize East and Southeast Asian women? If so, the Cute Asian Girls iPhone App will provide endless wank material, my friend.
A post at Racialicious brought this to my attention. The description says:
Cute Asian Girls gives you HUNDREDs of photos of the most beautiful asian girls you have ever seen. Whether you’re looking for asian girls with weapons, or girls in maid uniforms, or even just the casual girl in a summer dress, we have them all!…
I’d love to see some Asian girls with weapons, but not for the same reason Cute Asian Girls customers do.
The fetishization of Asian women is a great example of the double-whammy of racism and sexism in action. Exoticization of Asian women is extremely prevalent in the West, as is a general exoticization of “the Orient.” Asian women are desirable to many men because they are stereotyped as demure and eager to please. Some men see Asian women as the ideal subservient sex objects. They want to be with a generic Asian woman; her ethnicity is the only characteristic that matters because it’s assumed she’s only good for her sexual submissiveness anyway.
Fetishizing an entire race of women is damaging to members of that group. It’s dehumanizing, and to me it represents a sort of colonization. The fetishist appreciates an Asian woman for representing a racial stereotype, rather than for her unique attractiveness.
The iPhone isn’t inherently sexist or racist. No technology is. But sexist and racist apps like this abound because they tend to be designed by – and for – mostly white men.
Related: iGirl app
Yeah, there’s also this about Western tourists harassing geishas in Kyoto.
It’s worth noting that in these apps and in these stereotypes, the women are without fail seen as extremely tiny creatures, the better to be overpowered by the Western men. This never fails to incense one of my two best friends — a beautiful and voluptuous woman who is the daughter of Chinese immigrants. Along with the racism and sexism, there’s some pretty heavy body type fetishization.
GROSS.
I suspect this is aimed at fans of manga and hentai. Cartoon images of Asian women with ridiculously big boobs, eyes and impossibly long legs and hair is par for the course in those genres. This sounds like a g-rated version for when enthusiasts can’t be at home, wanking to hentai porn.
Yeah, re: what SOALG said, check out the terrifying scrawny arm on that “hot Asian chick” in the artwork, too. She looks like a damn famine victim. I guess the undernourished don’t have the strength to fight back, right? HAWT!
I was first introduced to this stereotype about two years ago at my best friend’s wedding. I was the matchmaker for my friend and her now-husband, so at the rehearsal dinner, the groom’s mother came over to introduce herself. This woman actually said to me: “Thank you so much for setting them up! You know, my son dated a few Asian girls in the past, and I always told him, ‘You won’t be happy with someone so submissive!’”
W. T. F.
w/r/t what s.o.a.l.g. said about the women being extremely tiny creatures, Asian women also often look young. Especially petite women. The fetishization of youth as beauty is a little yucky to me. I don’t think this holds water for the cartoon in the picture, but when you think about manga, the pictures all feature very young-looking faces and, of course, as Becky said, the legs that go on for miles and the basketball-sized breasts.
Guys with Asian fetishes squick me out, but I had never quite been able to put my finger on why before (other than racism, I mean).
Ugh.
@ Dangermouse: I know, me too. I think it’s because they are insecure and have little peens so they have to try and exert dominance over a ‘small’ ‘helpless’ person.
The only upside to this app is that you’d know to stay far far away from any dude who used it.
“Asian girls with weapons”? Calling Dr. Freud!
I’m not asian. But I find that a lot of men do this with ethnic women in general. I’m russian and really american guys sometimes talk as if I just came off the boat to be their mail order bride. This does not amuse me.
As a (half) Asian woman, this makes me LIVID, for oh-so-many reasons.
@ DangerMouse: I think that (other than the straight-up racism), the squick factor has to do with the particular stereotype that is assigned to Asian women. We are assumed to be tiny, juvenile, helpless, submissive, subservient, brainless, giggly, and cute. These traits are all suggestive of children. Any man that wants to be with a woman that is childlike in mind and/or body is one to stay far away from.
I also have a friend(ish) who pretty much only dates Asian women because he thinks that their children will be more attractive. Seriously.
I’m SO glad you wrote about this! The acceptability of this fetishisation/ objectification in the mainstream (to the point where – no joke – there is a toiletries range called “Miso Pretty” with references on the label to “loving you long time”)shows the intersections of racism and sexism at their most insidious. I’m currently doing some research into porn and ethnicity and I have to say that amid all the horrible stereotyping across the racial/ cultural board, I think Asian women are amongst the worst victims.
I know a guy who would love this app *barf*.
Tiny D: It’s been at least a decade since I heard him talk about it, but you might do a JSTOR search for work by Prof. James Moy, who did a study on the intersection of race and sex by placing erotic personals written as women of different ethnic backgrounds and assessing the responses he got. Really gross. (I don’t actually know if it was published, but it would be pretty easy to find out.)
Yeah Golublog, basically any nationality or race of women seen as submissive, or untouched by evil modern feminism, gets fetishized by skeezy men who want to be dominant in their sex lives/relationships.
@SarahMC exactly which is why you have the whole Asian women are delicate Lotus Flowers stereotype. It’s not that they prefer Asian women it is that they are looking to express white male privilege and these women quickly become more of a trophy than a life partner in their eyes.
@PhDork: Thanks for the reference. I’ll look into it.
oddly, my brother generally dated asian women-of course, he was living in japan at the time. he then married a british woman of japanese descent. the children are very pretty, of course. though, i don’t think that was the point. but who knows, i don’t actually know him very well.
[...] The Narrative SarahMC: Orientalism 2.0 TR: Ally failitudes and [...]
I would not even consider getting this app as it’s clearly meant for that bizzare kind of “people” who are into cartoon porn, etc. However, about the asian fetish thing, I can say that I’ve been to Japan, hope to move back there permanently, and honestly I wouldn’t even consider dating/marrying a non-Japanese woman. I know the “submissive geisha” thing is a stupid Western myth, but gotdangit, Japanese girls on average, to my eyes, look a lot prettier than women of other races. Does that make me a monstrous racist?
this is gross.
but i don’t think it’s just been limited to stuff like apps, even in past decades asian women have been subjected to various stereotypes, eg. Kamasutra, just take a look at some of the romanticized “orientalism” novels and look at how the women are portrayed. then apply it in the social context of that time and see how stupid it looks.
i have to agree, this reeks greatly of all the hentai manga crap that’s so freely available these days.
[...] may recall that one of those complainers was SarahMC, who almost a year ago posted about the creepy, objectifying and racist “Cute Asian Girls” app. “At the end of the day, [...]
i think you need to separate the Gary glitter type sleaze that formulate the back bone of the market these apps adhere to, i have an affinity towards Asian wimen on the basis that there facial make up is different and far more appealing to me,Shimon hit it on the head, but I’m an animator! im not some sick hentai crazed lascivious monster i was raised in a time wile anime was the new thing and because of this iv built an appreciation for Asian culture, art and fashion… labeling every one under one category is unfair and i think you should look towards the older generation…