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Sexual Preferences and Racism

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The abstract is indeed about the differences between how men and women perceive visual sexual stimuli, however, their findings are very relevant to this discussion. You see, in order for them analyze the differences between the two, they had to analyze the concept of sexual attraction itself (and did this for both men and women) and how visual sexual stimuli relate to that. The abstract then goes on to explain what constitutes sexual stimulation. Essentially, many physical features of the human anatomy would fall under this kind of stimulation, as well as certain kinds of behavior. It's not explicitly about race at the DNA level, but that was never my argument. My argument has to do with physical characteristics (which may or may not indicate a certain race by virtue of a race having a variety of physical characteristics). So again, my argument isn't about excluding actual races, just people with features that are typically classified under a certain race.

It's very comprehensive, and it'll take me some time to pull all of the relevant quotes from it, but I can definitely accommodate you by doing so, in an effort to elucidate and support my argument.

See the OP:

4. Do not attempt to derail by blowing this out into some larger abstraction that's impossible to discuss in corporeal terms. Re-aligning the discussion toward "people can't choose who they're attracted to," "we can never discuss this without at least one group getting hurt," etc. have a modicum of interest in discussions like these, but attempting to constantly force the thread in that direction and allowing for only "purely factual" objective reasoning more or less tie threads like these to the railroad tracks. It's happened on several occasions on GAF, such as with "would you date a transgender individual" threads.
 
I'm interested to see what you pull. A few things though. The abstract does not say the bolded. Maybe you mean the intro but that is definitely not in the abstract. Funny enough the abstract does say this

Additionally, this review discusses factors that may contribute to the variability in sex differences observed in response to visual sexual stimuli. Factors include participant variables such as hormonal state and socialized sexual attitudes, as well as variables specific to the content presented in the stimuli. 

For some reason I am not surprised they felt a need to talk about societal influence.


The abstract is indeed about the differences between how men and women perceive visual sexual stimuli, however, their findings are very relevant to this discussion. You see, in order for them analyze the differences between the two, they had to analyze the concept of sexual attraction itself (and did this for both men and women) and how visual sexual stimuli relate to that. The abstract then goes on to explain what constitutes sexual stimulation. Essentially, many physical features of the human anatomy would fall under this kind of stimulation, as well as certain kinds of behavior. It's not explicitly about race at the DNA level, but that was never my argument. My argument has to do with physical characteristics (which may or may not indicate a certain race by
virtue of a race having a variety of physical characteristics). So again, my argument isn't about excluding actual races, just people with features that are typically classified under a certain race.

It's very comprehensive, and it'll take me some time to pull all of the relevant quotes from it, but I can definitely accommodate you by doing so, in an effort to elucidate and support my argument.

When you have time pull the data. I'm curious though.
 
See the OP:

Fair enough. It was a tangential discussion for me, but I can understand why'd you'd want to avoid it.

I'm interested to see what you pull. A few things though. The abstract does not say the bolded. Maybe you mean the intro but that is definitely not in the abstract. Funny enough the abstract does say this



For some reason I am not surprised they felt a need to talk about societal influence.




When you have time pull the data. I'm curious though.

OP is considering this derailment. I'm inclined to comply. How about I PM you the details later?
 
Fair enough. It was a tangential discussion for me, but I can understand why'd you'd want to avoid it.



OP is considering this derailment. I'm inclined to comply. How about I PM you the details later?

Down like dinner haha. I wanna read the article actually. Its pretty interesting on a pure knowledge level.
 

Gonzalez

Banned
*googles this*

what the fuck....I'm so tired of this shitty world
The before, and afters are really unnoticeable.

Also is it really a Westernization, or is it an Animezation?

doubleyelidsurgery.jpg
 

Usobuko

Banned
Asians DO have naturally occurring double eyelids (like myself,and I can trace my Asian heritage back many generations). Double eyelids are popular because they give the appearance of bigger eyes... and bigger eyes are associated with YOUTHFULNESS

Yep, everyone in my family has double eyelids.
 

Llyranor

Member
I didn't say anything about having white-looking eyes. It's just the standard of beauty, not about looking white. A lot of pressure might come from within the Asian communities themselves.

Sure, youthfulness. But, you don't think there's any self-hate at work here? The classic racist caricature depiction of Asians is squinty eyes. It's the go-to physical trait mockery racists love to use against Asians (and it's the type of pose for photos which make the news sometimes, like those basketball teams). It's a 'haha your eyes are dumb and worth mocking'. There's no widespread eyelid cosmetic surgery in such a way with any other race.

I'd like to say there's no racist component to it, but when it's a feature favorite among racists, and it's a surgery that is principally performed on one particular race, I don't really believe that myself. And when Asian representation in (Asian) media is cosmetic surgery central, it only helps to perpetuate this beauty standard.
 
Do you see Asian women getting surgery to get huge ass noses,

I thought this was a thing from stuff I've read online. Quick google found this on a Korean plastic surgery site.

"A tall and high nose can improve the overall impression of a person’s look. Unfortunately, most Asians have a flatter, less defined nose bridge than Caucasians so it’s not surprising that Korean rhinoplasty has become one of the most popular cosmetic procedures in Asia today."

https://www.seoultouchup.com/rhinoplasty-korea-nose-surgery/
 
Why not do this test?

A man and a woman go on a blind date. They meet each other and talk between a curtain so that neither one can see the other. They talk for about an hour and both get along with each other very well and both initially feel that they want to date the other person. The curtain is then removed so that their appearances are revealed. Assume that both people are attractive in the kind of way that most people would find attractive. This is a subjective feeling, but there are many "attractive traits" that people can have that are more objectively considered attractive to human sensibilities. If one person then says "oh I didn't know you were X race. Sorry, I don't date X people. I just don't find them attractive", is that person racist?

Hmm, that's sounds kind of racist. What would the motivation be to even say something like that out loud? I don't know if it ever would go down like that. As a black male that's gone out with other races, I've often had the experience that people are too weak to go against what their family and friends think. A woman could be very attracted to me, but she may be just testing the waters. If the hivemind of her friends or family don't like it or if she finds another guy who she kind of likes that's her same race then it typically never goes in my favor. Oh well. There are those that can deal with it. Life's too short to be worried about those that can't. It doesn't lead to personal happiness.
 
So what if it's racist. When it comes to sex, people have the right to choose who they want to fuck for whatever reason. There is no affirmative action for sex, there is no equality, you can't make someone have sex with someone they don't want to.
And there it is. At least you're honest with yourself.
 
I brought this up in another thread, but I happened to have been subject to racism when dating most of my life. How I fought it was just dumb.

For background, I am a 6'8" African American of medium build who played sports and has a bachelors degree and a successful career. I should have had no problem getting a girl, right? Well basically, up until about age 24, I never had a serious relationship, not even a real girlfriend, even though I was interested right out of my senior year of high school. I lived in El Paso Texas for high school and Austin Texas in college when I attended the University of Texas at Austin.

All this rejection can really bring a brother down, and for the longest time I thought something was wrong with me. Maybe I was a little overweight, or maybe I like games too much, or maybe somehow I was too dorky. Well, I started to take matters into my own hands and started dating on Match.com and True.com (this is around 2005). My experience on those sites led me to believe in this "sexual racism" like never before. I don't know if these sites still do this or not, but they would have in someone's profile their preferences. More often than not, the girl, typically non-black, would say that they would not date a black man nor would they date someone over 6'4". If this is true, and this is how most girls are, then I can now see why I've had so much difficulty through all the years. Just to see if this was the case, I would reach out and try to talk to these girls, just to see if maybe what they put in their profile was a mistake. Not one time when someone had these details in their profile would they consider talking to me. As a black man, this sucked hard because there were virtually no black girls on these sites in my area.

I then found two white girls who actually didn't care if their date was black or tall, and guess what? They both reached out to me and started we dating. One of them, who is 5'3", is still my friend to this day.

So I tried another test. Since most girls won't date a tall black man on these sites, and there weren't any black girls who at least couldn't use the black excuse not to date me which would cause them to be racist to their own race, I decided to go to the MySpace (remember, this is nearly a decade ago when MySpace was still cool) and specifically targeted both tall and black girls. I found two, dated both of them, and one of them, who is 6'2", ended up being my wife (now married for 6 years).

While I am happy of the outcome of my partner, it's really hard to shake off all those years of rejection simply because of something so trivial as my skin color and my height.
 

mantidor

Member
The prevalence of double eyelid surgery in some Asian countries to attain some sort of (Western?) beauty standard is also telling. Internally identifying their natural physical traits as something inherently negative.

As far as I know big eyes have always been preferable in asian cultures, not to mention height is also a problem and people go to extremes to get taller. Nothing offended the chinese more than when Japan's average height surpassed theirs. It's not necessarily a western beauty standard.

For instance in some places in the west a tanned complexion is desired and being too pale is seen as bad, in asian cultures it goes the opposite, the fairer the skin the better.

I think the issue of sexual attraction is just too nuanced and has so many different variables that the study in the OP is just too simplistic and offers no real, solid conclusion in what is the origin for this sexual discrimination, yes it correlates, you are also very likely to correlate it with wealth for instance, correlation is not causation, and Grindr users aren't exactly a good sample for a study.
 

M3d10n

Member
I think this discussion is a fantastic launching point to discuss all sorts of broader, larger issues, many of which have already been mentioned.

1) How do we draw the line between racism and preference in the modern, more subtle world? Racism is almost never as hit-you-in-the-face obvious as it may have been in 1920; the number of people actively, consciously thinking about keeping black people down are very few. Instead, modern racism is really the result of many people being a little bit racist, producing a significant effect because "a little bit racist" x 200 million white people produces a significant effect overall.

Typically, "a little bit racist" is really hard to identify. If I have 10 girlfriends in my life and 0 of them are black, is that racist? Really, really hard to tell. I may meet very few black women in the first place, for instance. If I'm a boss and I only hire 1 black guy out of 20 employees, is that racist? Well, maybe. I did hire 1 black guy, after all, so clearly I'm not 100% unwilling to hire any black people. Maybe I just didn't get many good black candidates. Maybe in the close cases where it could have gone either way I chose the white guy instead. Maybe.

2) How do we handle "a little bit racist" when that little bit is often subconscious? How do we fault someone for behaving in a racist way when they aren't consciously choosing to? The subconscious is, by definition, mostly out of our conscious control.

It was thinking about this that I came to the conclusion that representation quotas are a "necessary evil" in order to induce a long term perception shift, even if it sounds forced and hamfisted. In the hiring example that means being forced to have a minimum % of the employees being black, even if it means having to turn down good white candidates. Of course, it's not possible to enact "dating quotas", but the dating bias will fix itself over time if representation equalizes in other areas.
 

number47

Member
I brought this up in another thread, but I happened to have been subject to racism when dating most of my life. How I fought it was just dumb.

For background, I am a 6'8" African American of medium build who played sports and has a bachelors degree and a successful career. I should have had no problem getting a girl, right? Well basically, up until about age 24, I never had a serious relationship, not even a real girlfriend, even though I was interested right out of my senior year of high school. I lived in El Paso Texas for high school and Austin Texas in college when I attended the University of Texas at Austin.

All this rejection can really bring a brother down, and for the longest time I thought something was wrong with me. Maybe I was a little overweight, or maybe I like games too much, or maybe somehow I was too dorky. Well, I started to take matters into my own hands and started dating on Match.com and True.com (this is around 2005). My experience on those sites led me to believe in this "sexual racism" like never before. I don't know if these sites still do this or not, but they would have in someone's profile their preferences. More often than not, the girl, typically non-black, would say that they would not date a black man nor would they date someone over 6'4". If this is true, and this is how most girls are, then I can now see why I've had so much difficulty through all the years. Just to see if this was the case, I would reach out and try to talk to these girls, just to see if maybe what they put in their profile was a mistake. Not one time when someone had these details in their profile would they consider talking to me. As a black man, this sucked hard because there were virtually no black girls on these sites in my area.

I then found two white girls who actually didn't care if their date was black or tall, and guess what? They both reached out to me and started we dating. One of them is still my friend to this day.

So I tried another test. Since most girls won't date a tall black man on these sites, and there weren't any black girls who at least couldn't use the black excuse not to date me which would cause them to be racist to their own race, I decided to go to the MySpace (remember, this is nearly a decade ago when MySpace was still cool) and specifically targeted both tall and black girls. I found two, dated both of them, and one of them, who is 6'2", ended up being my wife (now married for 6 years).

While I am happy of the outcome of my partner, it's really hard to shake off all those years of rejection simply because of something so trivial as my skin color and my height.
How do I say this politely... You're a giant.
 
Do white people get facelifts to look like they have more Asian skin (smoother and tighter), or that white people tan to look more like Asians (darker skin shade)? (Obviously no) -_____-

There is this Brazilian dude who made 10 cirurgical interventions to look more asian, though:

Xiahn-Nishi.jpg

(after/before)

Obviously I know he is an ultimate exception (he is obsessed with Korea's culture) but just to add to discussion. lol
 
How do I say this politely... You're a giant.

I'll add this on to the original message I made, but the one person that dated me that's still friends with me was 5'3", and us dating worked, we just had different ambitions that took us to different places.
 
I brought this up in another thread, but I happened to have been subject to racism when dating most of my life. How I fought it was just dumb.

For background, I am a 6'8" African American of medium build who played sports and has a bachelors degree and a successful career. I should have had no problem getting a girl, right? Well basically, up until about age 24, I never had a serious relationship, not even a real girlfriend, even though I was interested right out of my senior year of high school. I lived in El Paso Texas for high school and Austin Texas in college when I attended the University of Texas at Austin.

All this rejection can really bring a brother down, and for the longest time I thought something was wrong with me. Maybe I was a little overweight, or maybe I like games too much, or maybe somehow I was too dorky. Well, I started to take matters into my own hands and started dating on Match.com and True.com (this is around 2005). My experience on those sites led me to believe in this "sexual racism" like never before. I don't know if these sites still do this or not, but they would have in someone's profile their preferences. More often than not, the girl, typically non-black, would say that they would not date a black man nor would they date someone over 6'4". If this is true, and this is how most girls are, then I can now see why I've had so much difficulty through all the years. Just to see if this was the case, I would reach out and try to talk to these girls, just to see if maybe what they put in their profile was a mistake. Not one time when someone had these details in their profile would they consider talking to me. As a black man, this sucked hard because there were virtually no black girls on these sites in my area.

I then found two white girls who actually didn't care if their date was black or tall, and guess what? They both reached out to me and started we dating. One of them is still my friend to this day.


So I tried another test. Since most girls won't date a tall black man on these sites, and there weren't any black girls who at least couldn't use the black excuse not to date me which would cause them to be racist to their own race, I decided to go to the MySpace (remember, this is nearly a decade ago when MySpace was still cool) and specifically targeted both tall and black girls. I found two, dated both of them, and one of them, who is 6'2", ended up being my wife (now married for 6 years).

While I am happy of the outcome of my partner, it's really hard to shake off all those years of rejection simply because of something so trivial as my skin color and my height.

I remember you writing this, and I still get goosebumps seeing it again today. I don't think many people understand how it shakes you up mentally when you start reaching out in that regard. Because you start to really question peoples politeness and "niceness" when they're around you, and it's very easy to become bitter or think negatively if you don't catch yourself. It's utter bullshit, but as another poster said "Who cares". It doesn't affect them mentally the same way because they don't have to live it.
It was thinking about this that I came to the conclusion that representation quotas are a "necessary evil" in order to induce a long term perception shift, even if it sounds forced and hamfisted. In the hiring example that means being forced to have a minimum % of the employees being black, even if it means having to turn down good white candidates. Of course, it's not possible to enact "dating quotas", but the dating bias will fix itself over time if representation equalizes in other areas.

I don't agree with this in practice. We can't change whats been done, but we shouldn't put one group down to elevate another. The best way to go about this is to treat people as people, it sounds simple but that's all it is. Don't write characters for the masses that are stereotypes, and don't focus on characteristics that people are simply born with as being determining factors of good or bad. We all have preferences, and that's perfectly fine. Maybe you just like white people only, okay that's fine. But you've got to be careful that you're not being drowned in a "This is what's good" pit from day one. I'm not coming at this from the angle that people can't have preferences, because I have my own. But I'm also not oblivious to the fact that there are centuries of belittling minorities and raising up whites, that I grew up in a racist place, that I consumed media and entertainment with only white hero's for so long, that all my classmates were white, etc. Mentally, you are going to be locked into a certain way if that's all you know. And so when people talk about actual diversity in classrooms, work, etc. That's why it's important, not because we hire people simply for their colour(or not) but that we hire the *best* people period, and that we view them as people all around. We start doing that and everything else falls into place naturally.
 

Rest

All these years later I still chuckle at what a fucking moron that guy is.
The prevalence of double eyelid surgery in some Asian countries to attain some sort of (Western?) beauty standard is also telling. Internally identifying their natural physical traits as something inherently negative.
The idea that that is to look western is a myth. Eastern countries have considered the double eyelid lines to be attractive for centuries, if not longer.
 

wildfire

Banned
Is it bad that I laughed at 'No rice, no spice, no curry?' It's just so... catchy. Would be a horrible culinary decision, but damn if it doesn't roll off the tongue.

As for the article, I don't doubt that our sexual desires are rooted in social mores. I don't doubt that someone with racist thoughts is going to have 'preferences' that stem from their racist beliefs. Where you lose me is in saying that these people need to be inclusive, because it starts to sound like people are 'entitled' to sleep with people who fundamentally don't want to, for the sake of political correctness. It starts to sound like policing what people can do or refrain from doing with their bodies.

It's not about telling people who to sleep with. It's not about telling people to think a certain way to avoid making offense, aka political correctness.

It's about telling people their sexual preferences can be influenced by regressive beliefs. It's about telling people they should start thinking in a new way so they aren't limiting their options and it would help them better understand how silly it is to stereotype people for physical features.
 
While I am white and prefer my partners be people of color, I also find the attitude in some people very ugly, regardless of the person over all.

It is not the same thing as being gay, as having sex with the same gender/sex as yourself is not a mere preference.

I don't know if I am more offended at the inherently racist nature of it, or how it just absolutely reduces people to something to be consumed.

No Coke please, I only drink Pepsi products.
 
This is unfortunately the nature of apps like Grindr which prompted this study.

I think it is a pervasive social attitude all around. I see this type of behavior from all people of all walks of life. :(


Also, I don't get the "Who cares if this is racist, I'll do what I want" attitude, it's pretty sad, selfish, and honestly a bit juvenile. The idea that when sex is introduced into an equation, all societal norms are void, is wrong.
 
I think it is a permissive social attitude all around. I see this type of behavior from all people of all walks of life. :(


Also, I don't get the "Who cares if this is racist, I'll do what I want" attitude, it's pretty sad, selfish, and honestly a bit juvenile. The idea that when sex is introduced into an equation, all societal norms are void, is wrong.

I think you mean pervasive. Permissive suggests the behavior is perfectly acceptable and agreeable.

And you can't really fault people for their individual inclinations that only pertain to their private life. This is a problem that gets solved on a societal scale. Normalize minorities and interracial relationships in media. You can't force or shame people into liking you, you can only fix the culture that brought them up the way they are.
 

M3d10n

Member
I don't agree with this in practice. We can't change whats been done, but we shouldn't put one group down to elevate another. The best way to go about this is to treat people as people, it sounds simple but that's all it is. Don't write characters for the masses that are stereotypes, and don't focus on characteristics that people are simply born with as being determining factors of good or bad. We all have preferences, and that's perfectly fine. Maybe you just like white people only, okay that's fine. But you've got to be careful that you're not being drowned in a "This is what's good" pit from day one. I'm not coming at this from the angle that people can't have preferences, because I have my own. But I'm also not oblivious to the fact that there are centuries of belittling minorities and raising up whites, that I grew up in a racist place, that I consumed media and entertainment with only white hero's for so long, that all my classmates were white, etc. Mentally, you are going to be locked into a certain way if that's all you know. And so when people talk about actual diversity in classrooms, work, etc. That's why it's important, not because we hire people simply for their colour(or not) but that we hire the *best* people period, and that we view them as people all around. We start doing that and everything else falls into place naturally.

I used to think exactly like this, but the fact remains that the gap *is* already there. Blacks were severely handicapped in the past and they won't catch up by simply treating everyone equally, because in the collective subconscious things are *not* equal. Humans are very good at perceiving patterns in everything and when they see the vast majority of well off people are white and the worse off are black, it's very hard for them to not internalize that without even realizing it. Therefore, for an effective change, I believe sacrifices are required and that includes a period of reverse racism.
 

PillarEN

Member
I like these two posts from "backslashbunny". It points out that some people get a little too comfortable and on a roll thinking they have it all figured out and apply thinking only from their perspective without actually knowing or considering that things can be seen completely differently from a different group. It's slightly teetering on the "America=world" thought process.
 

Cagey

Banned
If I see this stupid fucking idea one more time I will put my fork through my monitor.


Okay, I won't, but no. It's not because Asian women want to look like white people. What the fuck. I know some of y'all like to think that y'all are more attractive than all the other "races", but guess what... not everyone thinks so.

Asians DO have naturally occurring double eyelids (like myself, and I can trace my Asian heritage back many generations). Double eyelids are popular because they give the appearance of bigger eyes... and bigger eyes are associated with YOUTHFULNESS.

*edit: The whole thing about "big eyes like white people" is a stereotype. It's not about wanting to look like white people. Some of y'all probably don't know this, but one common stereotype for westerners is that they have "big noses" and are fat. Do you see Asian women getting surgery to get huge ass noses, or reverse lipo to get huge bellies? No. When someone says "like a white person," they're referring to the stereotype associated with a particular race, but it is not about looking like THAT race. It's just a notPC way to trying to describe what you want in a manner that stereotypes other races.


Do white people get facelifts to look like they have more Asian skin (smoother and tighter), or that white people tan to look more like Asians (darker skin shade)? (Obviously no) -_____-
Good post. My wife had the surgery done before I had ever met her, and when she told me and I asked why, that was basically her answer. "Look younger". There's an immense conceit into assuming that her answer must be a lie, or not fully formed, or that subconsciously she wanted to conform to looking not-Asian (in this instance, the eyelid surgery doesn't bring one to whiteness since it's not a trait unique to white folk).

The idea that that is to look western is a myth. Eastern countries have considered the double eyelid lines to be attractive for centuries, if not longer.

This poster hits on the two-pronged arrogance from what I'll call "enlightened outsiders" that comes up whenever there's a discussion of beauty or attractive features. First, that everyone must want to look like the West when any sort of aspect of beauty has any overlap with anything in the West. Second that these cultures -- which have existed for millenia -- had no such standard (or any standard besides what these enlightened outsiders deem as "normal" for them, based on their observation of what appears normal in these cultures to said outsider, which has an amusingly racist tinge to it) until the West showed up.

Which gets to...

I like these two posts from "backslashbunny". It points out that some people get a little too comfortable and on a roll thinking they have it all figured out and apply thinking only from their perspective without actually knowing or considering that things can be seen completely differently from a different group. It's slightly teetering on the "America=world" thought process.

Well said.
 
The brain is wired to survive, not to be right. The need to be right is important for survival.

Thoughts are beliefs, and beliefs create reality. It depicts what you see, hear, taste and experience. Study your perceptions, and where the unconscious mind outputs bias.
 
Honestly different races haven't existed long enough for us to have some inherent preference for one without another factor. On one hand I can completely understand how it really isn't many peoples fought that they have preferences for a partner. On the other hand it really hurts being Black and pretty much being ignored on dating sites because of your race or being told you seem cool but aren't there type. The situation seems like it will only fix itself when most people are some mixture of races
 
I think you mean pervasive. Permissive suggests the behavior is perfectly acceptable and agreeable.

And you can't really fault people for their individual inclinations that only pertain to their private life. This is a problem that gets solved on a societal scale. Normalize minorities and interracial relationships in media. You can't force or shame people into liking you, you can only fix the culture that brought them up the way they are.


Yup, thanks.

And also, this isn't exactly private life. The whole reason we're having this conversation is because people are very publicly othering entire races.
 
Yup, thanks.

And also, this isn't exactly private life. The whole reason we're having this conversation is because people are very publicly othering entire races.

Okay. I think we might be talking about slightly different things since this thread has discussed both for its duration. You seem to be talking about publicly decrying a certain race or subset of humanity, and I agree that that's wrong. At best, it's tacky. If a guy writes on his profile "ugly girls need not message me" or "don't bother if you don't love Pokémon", it's super off putting and I won't pursue him, even though I do like Pokémon and I consider myself attractive. I don't want to date an openly or severely racist person either, so I'll also abandon ship if someone says "no black chicks" or something like that.

But what I was talking about is merely having preferences. I don't owe anyone a relationship or sexual gratification. My body and my personal life is my own. So when people have a preference for one race or another, and that manifests in pursuing or accepting advances from mostly people of that race, it doesn't bother me. It might be representative of a larger problem, but I'm not going to tell them they're wrong to feel the way they do.
 

Llyranor

Member
The idea that that is to look western is a myth. Eastern countries have considered the double eyelid lines to be attractive for centuries, if not longer.
The two are not mutually exclusive. The origin of such a standard may have started centuries before, but to ignore that the Western standard of beauty has any impact on perpetuating and inflating it is something else.

Oh, hey, thanks for ignoring everything I just said how it's NOT about looking white.

By the way, you don't have to explicitly say "it's not about looking white," because you talk about there being a racial component in the rest of your post.
(Note that I am not saying that the racial component is the only aspect of it, and the following articles also mention that it's not all Western influences. I'm just pointing out that we shouldn't handwave that there are ALSO Western influences.)
When I mention the Western standard of beauty, I do not necessarily mean looking 'more white', but becoming more appealing to the Western eye.

http://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2014/11/17/363841262/is-beauty-in-the-eye-lid-of-the-beholder
This article seems to catch that sentiment. These two paragraphs particularly caught my eye in terms of Western influence:
Look to the 1960s in Vietnam, and you'll see newspaper reports that indicate the needle was swinging toward plastic surgery because of American occupation there. A Time interview with two Vietnamese surgeons says Vietnamese bar girls sought blepharoplasties to catch the eye of American soldiers.
On the CBS show The Talk last year, host Julie Chen revealed that she'd had the surgery earlier in her career. Chen recalled something an old boss told her when she was a TV reporter cutting her teeth at an Ohio news station. "He said ... because of your heritage, because of your Asian eyes," Chen said, "sometimes I've noticed that when you're on camera and you're interviewing someone, you look disinterested." (Chen notes that her career took off after she changed her eyes.)

http://www.npr.org/sections/codeswi...many-stories-behind-the-double-eyelid-surgery The second part of the article goes into why people would go for that surgery:
"It's Ye-Kyung Song, but I like going by Yekki," Song tells me over the phone. She got the surgery when she was 17 and a senior in high school. She grew up in Houston, where she lives now, and tells me she'd internalized a lot of what happened when she was younger, a lot of things that people — non-Asians — told her.

"I was made fun of a lot for my small eyes ... and I didn't really like how I looked," Song says. When I email her later, asking who made fun of her, she tells me it was her white and Latino classmates. "And I always thought, well, if I didn't have these small eyes, maybe then I would like myself better."
And yet, Joanne Rondilla, a lecturer at Arizona State University, says it's more complicated than that.

"Here's the thing that you hear a lot," Rondilla points out. " 'I just want to be a better version of me.' What does that even mean? 'I just want to be a better me'? Who said that you, as you are now, is flawed?"

Rondilla says that when we think about these "beautiful Asian women" — they're all women who seem beautiful to Western standards. They're of a higher class, of a different class, she says.

"You can't create a standard without recognizing who's in power," the novelist An Na says. She wrote the young adult novel The Fold I mentioned before, which is about a Korean-American girl who has single eyelids and an aunt encouraging her to get an Asian blepharoplasty. "I think that question of, you know, bigger eyes comes from wanting to emulate people who are in power, who have control of the media, who have control of different structures of a certain race."

http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/asiapcf/05/19/korea.beauty/ This CNN article about a 12-yr old that got it:
She lacks confidence, explains Min-kyong's mother, a problem she hopes will be solved when her pre-teen undergoes plastic surgery, to westernize her eyes.
"If I get the surgery, my eyes will look bigger," explains Min-kyong. Everyone, she says, points out her small eyes. It's why she doesn't think she's a pretty girl. A surgery which cuts a fold into her eyelid to create a double fold will widen her eyes. The effect will also be to give her a slightly more western look.
Though it's unclear from the wording whether the westernization is something the girl/mother had overtly stated, or just the author implying it.

However, this is less vague:
The definition of pretty, explains their plastic surgeon, is not the standard Asian face, but closer to a Caucasian face. Dr Kim Byung-gun is the head of Seoul, South Korea's biggest plastic surgery clinic, BK DongYang. The clinic is a dozen stories tall, with all of its operating rooms full on the day of Min kyong's surgery.
Dr Kim says his clinic, one of the most successful in a city dubbed the "plastic surgery capital of Asia," performs 100 surgeries a day, ranging from eyelid surgery to nose reshaping to facial contouring.
The Chinese and Korean patients tell me they want to have faces like Americans
--Dr Kim Byung-gun
"They always tell me they don't like their faces," says Dr Kim, explaining what his patients request prior to surgery. "They want to have some westernized, nice faces. They want to have big eyes like westernized people, high profile, nicer noses.
"The Chinese and Korean patients tell me that they want to have faces like Americans. The idea of beauty is more westernized recently. That means the Asian people want to have a little less Asian, more westernized appearance. They don't like big cheekbones or small eyes. They want to have big, bright eyes with slender, nice facial bones."
Again, maybe the surgeon is just putting words in the patients' mouth, but it's worded in a way that makes it sound like that is what the girls are stating.

---

If you still want to argue that it's solely an Asian standard of beauty and that there are zero Western influences, we will have to agree to disagree.
 

Ocelotte

Neo Member
When I mention the Western standard of beauty, I do not necessarily mean looking 'more white', but becoming more appealing to the Western eye.

When it comes to Western standards of Asian beauty, I actually find them to be very different to Asian standards of Asian beauty.

In Western media, a beautiful Asian woman has strong cheekbones, defined and sharp features, and usually monolid eyes. Asian women with these features (like Lucy Liu and Yana Shmaylova, though she is mixed, to give you an idea) are what's considered to be exotic and desirable in the Western world. If you look at Asian celebrities in Western media, they all have that sort of sharp look.

In Asian (referring to the East specifically) media, soft features, round faces, large rounded eyes are considered to be desirable. Look up Asian celebrities in the Asian world (such as Vivian Hsu and Hyuna) and you'll see that they have a completely different image compared to what you see in Asian celebrities on the other side of the world.

I have looked at the articles you linked though and I don't really know why all those writers are saying Asians are trying to go for a Caucasian look. I feel like just looking at Asian celebrities in those countries shows a lot about their differences in beauty standards.
 

Rest

All these years later I still chuckle at what a fucking moron that guy is.
The two are not mutually exclusive. The origin of such a standard may have started centuries before, but to ignore that the Western standard of beauty has any impact on perpetuating and inflating it is something else.

Well, sure, that's possible. But it isn't the case here. The only people who say that plastic surgery to have over folded outer eyelids changed to layered outer and inner eyelids is to look western or white are white people from the west. No Asian person I've ever met has stated, suggested, or implied this. Articles online written by white people say it's to look white, and cite that the surgeries originate in the last century, while books by Asians say it's to look attractive, and cite many years of Asian culture, including books, poems, and paintings.

I'd wager that the white people are wrong in this case.
 
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