Chapter 5: Acceptably Unbecoming: Model Minority Myth & Asian Sexuality
The model minority was introduced by Sociologist William Peterson in 1966 to describe the success of Japanese Americans ability to achieve success that other minority groups didn't. It was a concept adopted by Ronald Reagan and the right wing to characterize AAPI (Asian American Pacific Islander) as smart, wealthy, and compliant compared to the "welfare queens" of the Black & Brown communities, ignoring the fact that if it wasn't for the Civil Rights Movement and the passage of the Immigration Act of 1965, the vast majority of AAPI immigrants wouldn't be here. Because most of us arrived after 1965, Asians collectively didn't experience Jim Crow, housing discrimination, and lynching. Racism was largely a Black/White problem; the "American Dream" was very much a possibility for us, with some inconvenient micro-aggressions (i.e. slanted eye and karate jokes) along the way. Not only did it successfully drive a wedge between marginalized groups, many AAPI groups, especially SE Asians, bought into the myth. We prided ourselves in our academic achievement and small business ownership because those were rungs of the social ladder we climbed.
You may think a model minority is a positive stereotype, especially compared to the stereotypes given to Black and Brown communities. We aren't demonized as "thugs" and "welfare queens" if you're Black, "drug dealers" and "rapists" as our former president described Brown folx. How can being seen as smart and hard working be seen as a negative? For one, it creates a very limited vision of success that is directly tied to how close you assimilate to whiteness. It's a lot of pressure to live up to and it's one reason why depression and suicide rates for AAPI are higher than for other ethnic groups. It's a carrot that is forever dangled in front of you, but what they don't tell you is that you will NEVER EVER achieve whiteness. They don't want you, unless it's a White male with yellow fever. When there was civil unrest during the 1992 Los Angeles Uprising, Korean store owners were scapegoated with their livelihoods left to burn with the police abandoning our stores to protect the White folx hid and their neighborhoods that were already safe. Bringing our former president back into this debate, excuse me while I vomit inside, COVID-19 was often referred as the "China Virus", leading directly to an exponential increase in hate crimes against all AAPI communities.
Okay, still not buying model minority as a bad stereotype for AAPI? Then, let's get into the desexualization of Asian men. Think about the sexual stereotypes we associate with different ethnicities. There's the hyper-sexualization of Black bodies, both for men and especially for women. Hispanic men are portrayed as "latin lovers" while Hispanic women are painted in a madonna/whore complex, where they are expected to be either virginal or hyper-sexualized. While white men and women may be perceived as clueless and ditsy ("dumb blonde"), they are also our Western standards of beauty as perpetuated by the media. Asian women are fetishized for being docile, subservient, and who'll sexually cater to your every wish (I cringe whenever I hear "Me Love You Long Time" as a joke, it's f*cking racist rhetoric!!!). Even though these stereotypes are all highly problematic and destructive, there are still sexually desired.
Asian men on the other hand received the short stick (pun intended) when it comes to sexual stereotypes. We are portrayed as emasculated, sexually deviant (what's up with all that freaky tentacle sex in Hentai? I don't know either okay, I'm Korean), and sexually impotent. The stereotype of the Asian male with small penises is so common that we hardly see it as racist rhetoric; we just assume it as truth. Research by OKCupid co-founder Christian Rudder in 2014 showed that Asian men are the least desirable racial group to women. Gee, I would have loved to known that before I wasted my time on your app, thanks Rudder. Though I did learn what catfishing was; shout out Svetlana and her sob story about being mugged and losing her wallet and passport while traveling abroad. While we are all entitled to our preferences, it was not uncommon for me to scroll across a dating profile that shared BM (black men) or WM (white men) only or just flat out say "I'm just not attracted to Asian men". It was about as commonplace as profiles with women taking selfies in front of the pink Paul Smith building on Melrose Ave (I swear any Angelo who's been on a dating app in the 2010's will understand). And it's not just white women who expressed that sentiment, several Asian women expressed it as well including several high school and college friends. Betrayed by my own AAPI sisters. Well go run off with Chad and his tribal tattoo. I'll see you at the holidays and watch him struggle to use chopsticks.
That's not to say that negative Asian male stereotypes meant that I never went on dates. I've been fortunate enough to date women of all ethnicities, a decision I consciously made to cast as wide a dating pool as possible. But it's hard to feel like you're attractive or desirable when the media insists you are everything but. And it doubly hurts when you're told "I didn't feel a romantic connection", because that is a specific critique of me as damaged goods than a broader critique on Asian men as undesirable. Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, and Jet Li were AAPI heroes in my adolescence but none of them were allowed to be sexual beings. Yes, Keanu Reeves has AAPI ancestry and is still one of the most attractive men in the world, but I didn't know we could claim him until well after The Matrix trilogy. We had Russell Wong and Daniel Dae Kim's legendary cheek bones, that's it! Seeing Steven Yeun in The Walking Dead was an important step, the attractive male leads in Crazy Rich Asians was a revelation, as was the TV Series Warrior, a martial arts crime drama series that features a ridiculously attractive AAPI cast. Simu Liu showing off his abs in Shang-Chi felt like the moon landing, but he was still a mostly asexual character. The biggest boy-band in the world is a K-Pop group and they are sex symbols to their beloved BTS Army. These are all recent, and long overdue representations we needed to begin changing the narrative.
My journey in becoming has been unbecoming my stereotypes. Accepting that I'm a "bad Korean" for failing to live up to model minority myth expectations. The concept of "failure" is very subjective; there are American standards and Korean "let me brag about my child in front of company" standards. Graduating from high school with a 3.6 GPA is very good; but it's definitely not good enough for my parents to brag to their church friends about. The UC schools are among the best colleges in the country; UC Irvine is a middle rung UC and very much NOT UCLA or Cal Berkeley. I didn't major in Computer Science or Business, something that would theoretically set my career path; I majored in Sociology, I couldn't even pick a more practical and marketable Social Science subject like Psychology. I didn't go the corporate route and find a financially stable 9-5 job like a good Korean; I entered non-profit which does not translate well in Hangul. When I tried to describe to my parents my job, it definitely wasn't anything they could brag to their friends about. Oh, so your son is... poor? Actually my job title was Managing Director and now Case Manager.... but yeah, they're kinda right. Not POOR poor but definitely not 501(k), investing in a bunch of cyrptocurrency (let's see how MF dated the concept of crypto will be in a few years) rich either. I was raised in a Protestant church but stopped attending Korean churches in 2008 after Prop-8 passed, a ban on same-sex marriage that a Korean Christian newspaper put out a front page editorial encouraging people to vote to support of the ban. I'd rather be a "bad Korean" than a religious homophobe, and I'm pretty sure God was with me on that one. I didn't allow my dad to set me up with one of his friend's daughters, to which I might be married with children by now (and let's be honest, a good chance of divorced and paying child support); instead I decided to find love on my own, sign up for one dating app after another, and have no marriage, no children, but plenty of trauma to show for it. VERY BAD KOREAN and owning it.
Unbecoming the unfavorable stereotype of an emasculated, sexually deviant, and sexually impotent Asian man is another matter. I've never regarded myself as attractive and or sexually desirable, and I'm always surprised if a woman sees me as so. On a good day I feel like I'm a 7/10 on the Asian male scale, which translates to about a 4/10 on the White male scale. I was once described as "oddly hot" and that was one of the better compliments I've ever received. It's not false humility either; how much of the "I'm just not attracted to Asian men" had I internalized so that I can't even find myself attractive? I have my own body dysmorphia but what about racial dysmorphia?
During my photoshoot with Zachary Lee, there was a lightbulb moment that occurred when this photo was taken. It was that moment I felt comfortable in my own skin and fully present. I wasn't thinking about internalized stereotypes; I felt attractive and sexy, and not just "sexy for an Asian man". I know I'm not alone feeling this way. It's a message that many of my AAPI brethren had internalized. But we won't shed a negative stereotype and change the perception of Asian men until we begin to own our beauty. Not sexy in spite of being Asian, but sexy because we're Asian men.
The quicker we unbecome all those racial stereotypes, the sooner we can be who we were meant to be and that is anything we f*cking want to be, even if it's a "bad Korean" who maybe be oddly hot.
Portrait Photography by: https://www.zacharyleeportrait.com
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