Since I don’t watch these television shows, it’s a bit dicey to comment on the spate of shows featuring romances between black men and asian women, so I’ll let Rinku Sen do it for me: 
The sugary romance between the excessively noble characters played by Parminder Nagra and Shafiq Atkins on ER follows the much hotter one between Ming Na Wen and Mekhi Phifer that ended two seasons ago. GreyÂ’s Anatomy features Sandra Oh in an up-and-down relationship with Isaiah Washington.
What accounts for such interest? ItÂ’s as though these couples have been pouring out of medical schools and producers decided to capture the trend.
The representations tread the line between cultural authenticity, sometimes considered stereotype, and colorblindness. The women exhibit some level of conflict with their cultures and are slightly neurotic: Ming Na dreaded telling her immigrant parents that she was having a baby out of wedlock; Nagra quit her job in a bout of rebellion against family expectation to work as a convenience store clerk. The men are dangerous but tender. Phifer grew up without a father and has a temper; Gallant went off to serve in Iraq. I did laugh at the effort to bridge cultures, though, when NagraÂ’s character got married wearing a white sari. White is the Hindu color of mourning.(link)
If it’s on TV, is it a reflection of a real sociological trend, or simply a convenient image of happy multiculturalism from television fantasy-land? Sen’s article gets into some sociological explanations for the phenomenon, none of which are terribly convincing (I don’t think these romances have much to do with “American Empire” or colonialism). But she does argue that it goes beyond “submissive Asian woman”/”sexualized black man” stereotypes:
HamamotoÂ’s theory would suggest that such a preference was grounded in a sexual stereotype of submissive Asian women. I am familiar with our so-called seductress image. My Asian girlfriends and I spent our college years snottily rejecting the few white men who came around as “rice lovers.” While I did experience an American man mentioning the Kama Sutra within five minutes of meeting me recently in New York, my adolescent self-image was much closer to nerd than slut. To see all these Asian women who might also have been high-school nerds paired up with the most sexualized actors in American culture has been, I will admit it, a thrill. However, in real life, Asian women and Black men donÂ’t get to be both equally sexy and smart. “ItÂ’s easier for a Black man to get his foot in the door when heÂ’s with me,” said Aarti, “especially if weÂ’re working.”(link)
Class dynamics may be important in the appeal of Asians to some African Americans. And the “bad boy” image (stereotype) may make people of African descent more attractive to children of immigrants traditionally considered too studious and repressed (spelling bee/ math team champions) to be generally attractive.
Or maybe not: since there are no hard statistics, this could be just another Dubious Trend Story in line with infamous New York Times stories about baby gyms in Manhattan, or Ivy League women who decide to drop out of the rat race to become trophy wives. The next time you see an East or South Asian woman dating a black man … it may simply be that they are two people who happened to meet, and fall in love — irrespective of Parminder Nagra, and sociology be damned.
(Incidentally, for Bollywood fans, guess who played Nagra’s parents in a recent episode? Anupam and Kirron Kher, of course.)
P.G.W. Thanx for the honesty. I realize when people are young insecurities abound and when you haven’t yet found yourself in the corporate world and in the work place connecting can happen on a superficial level. I just find it hard to digest coming from 35 year olds. They’ve been in the workplace long enough to know better.
When I told one guy I didn’t have an MBA and wasn’t really seeking one but was there to support my friends he rolled his eyes and asked me why I didn’t have one. I said I was far along in my career and up the ladder for the MBA to really make a dent at this point in my industry. I’ve just moved onto other priorities. I’m older. I was being sincere and honest and the moron turned around and simply walked away. He didn’t think twice about not saying “It was nice meeting you ciao”. See this is what I find annoying about NYC. Not saying women don’t do it. The diva shit is just as annoying.
Excellent point. Never thought of it that way.
Earlier in my career, I did look at myself in the mirror and introspect.
When I look into the mirror, I see a dark man. That upsets me and makes me jealous of all lighter skinned men. I hope and pray that my children are not as dark as me.
May I clarify? It isn’t about the dark skin. The attractive black men I’m referring to have just beautiful bodies, it’s the way they are built. And I alluded to the myth before about black men being very well endowed. Hence women lust. Given the chance I probably may not jump to the opportunity in reality. It’s a fantasy. To me it’s very different from <ignoring and disregarding all other men. To me finding a black man attractive isn’t mutually exclusive from finding a desi man attractive. I like them both. If I only liked black men I can imagine pissing people off.
ok i’m going to post something sappy…. but it reminds us of what’s truly important:
“Don’t look for beauty or colour of skin, But look for the heart that’s fair within, Cause beauty may fade and colour grow old, But a heart that’s loyal can never grow cold.”
awwww. that’s nice, but I’m a bit partial to post #292.
Ok, back to business.
Sahej, has anyone told you that your eyes (probably) look like a fresh and particularly creamy caramel custard? That your wit cuts through the web page like a Russian peasant’s scythe? And that your poetry could melt a heart of stone? Has anyone..?
Alright, alright, something new. Give me a minute. Man, you men are bloody demanding.
Jane,
Jai didn’t restrict his description to exclusively skin either:
Also, I’m a bit confused. Are you implying that those desis which Jai described as having “apparent fetishisation/preference for white women… because of the [former’s] skin colour and perceived greater attractivness”, are ignoring and disregarding other women, perhaps, justifying those women in going “beserk”?
Couldn’t any perceived desi male propensity towards white women, also not be mutually exclusive to finding other women attractive?
Yup that is what I was saying. If a man said “I like all women but I especially love white women” a desi sista may not find it as offensive as saying “I don’t care for desi women instead I love white women” there is a subtle difference but a significant one between the two.
It’s the mutual exclusivity that people find offense with IMO. Regardless at the end of the day people love what they love and get what they deserve 🙂 so it’s no point sweating over personal preferrences.
I had a girlfriend email me yesterday asking me about my friend Brian because she wanted to set up one of her girlfriends with him. Her exact words “I want to set up Brian with my girlfriend Lisa, she’s really into Chinese guys” and I was like WTF! I swear I thought I was the only one being sensitive about it.
Gotcha, but, are you implying desi men in general think the former or latter; or were you not asserting any kind of implication about them at all?
Because that’s only reserved for the really attractive desi men right? I mean, the regular, ugly desis just f*** each other like animals – the enlightened few get to graduate to white.
This is why you’re sick. At no point have you even tried to say that attraction is a universal thing, or anything like that… you consistently make remarks, either “humorous” or not, that imply that you think getting a white woman is the greatest achievement a desi man could make. Including this one.
I like how my remarks are considered hostile but yours aren’t.
As far as desis exotifying other people of color, I frankly think it’s problematic too, but it doesn’t carry the same implications. The power relationship between people of color is completely different; the dynamics of status and gain are just not the same, despite various skin color biases. I think it’s bogus when desi men and women reflect mainstream exotic conceptions of, for example, Asian women or Black men, because it plays into an oppressive stereotype about all groups concerned. Usually people of color are either desexualized or hypersexualized. My experience as a desi man has actually encompassed both those extremes and they are both oppressive.
I do think that there is a qualitatively different thing happening when desis seek out whites, because so many other factors play into it. But maybe that’s just my anger and hate talking. Martin beats Malcolm any day, right?
I’m not asserting anything really. I was simply offering an explaination at the mindset someone offended might be. I’m just glad for ever 20 jerks I meet I know at least 1 and with a city of nearly 9 million the jerks add up. Personally I don’t really know anyone in real life fixated on white women or skinny women or perhaps they are simply not verbalizing it to me out of fear 🙂
Just for the record, the above is actually what I was referring to in my previous comments, although overall my thoughts were in the context of some people jumping all over commenters who stated they like white women for reasons x,y,z (Amitabh getting ambushed earlier is an example), yet it seemed as thought it was okay for desi women to make analogous statements about why they like black guys.
I also think people need to make it clear that they like attractive people from ethnic group A, B, etc, rather than broad statements such as “white women/black guys are really hot”. The latter is quite a huge generalisation and implies that the mere fact that a person is from background A or B is enough to make them attractive to the, er, individual attracted. I know that not everyone meant it in this sense, but it’s worthwhile clarifying it anyway.
I also think that, with all due respect, Yeti is somewhat overreacting to AlMfD’s comments, especially as the latter has been deliberately making ironic statements just to be provocative and push people’s buttons (I thought he was quite funny, personally).
Yeti, I think Amfd was just being facetious…
funny and educational thread you guys have here. off topic but sorta related, any of the ladies here been cubed? If you dunno what it means, dont bother. if you do tho, lemme know.
Rocky theme pumping in the background
Sorry. could. not. resist.
For that matter I think the average Punjabi is better looking than the average Gujarati.
That’s bull. Let me take you on a tour of desiland here in America or anyplace else and show you just as many good looking Gujaratis as Punjabis and just as many Punjabi eyesores as Gujarati ones.
Unbiased Rajasthani.
I’ll venture a guess. cubed=menage?
maybe I’m just all riled up from this thread.
Gautham: I’m definitely not saying that at all, I’m trying hard to say something pretty different. Reading your comments I suspect that we would agree on 99% of issues around “inter-racial” dating. I don’t think desi men or women should necessarily pursue desis first. What I’m trying to express (not so well, I guess) is that desis who preferentially pursue whites are a mess, and that they often show a whole host of other characteristics that indicate what may be going on inside. I’m also trying to say that we should be careful about how we view and treat other people of color, in terms of making them conform to certain white-generated stereotypes. But the two things are separate; I’m specifically talking about white people when I refer to issues of “self-hate” and such. Why? Because of the world we live in. If the colonial/historical moment was different I wouldn’t be saying that.
I do not believe these kinds of self-loathing oppressions appear between people of color in intimate relationships. I do think there’s something problematic about, say, a desi man who exclusively pursues East Asian women, but because of a profound range of shared experiences as people of color, as well as lots of cultural things people of color bring to the table, I think it’s quite different.
I also think desi men and women should be held up to the same yardstick when it comes to discussions of race and racism. Although race affects men and women differently in some respects (usually it’s a matter of degree), I think we have much more in common. I can’t tell anyone who to date but I do think that desi men and women who specifically exclude desis have an issue! – but not the inverse (sic), that desi men and women are necessarily self-loathing if they don’t strictly date desis.
On yet another note, hoping this thread will reach into the 1000s, what I haven’t said is that I often find desis who don’t preferentially pursue whites displaying a lot of the same things (specific degradation of desi women and men, elevation of white men/women to a pedestal, incoherent analyses on race) that desis who do preferentially pursue whites once they happen to be in a relationship with a white person. But that’s a whole ‘nother topic.
Hope this angry, rageful rant made sense. PS I know Al jokes, and I know every time I respond angrily, the terrorists win. What can I say, I’m a loose cannon. I’m out of control. I’m wild. I’m livin’ on the edge of my keyboard. Yeah!
Gautham, If you could find a desi woman who would give you a chance, would you drop your current flame without a second thought?
jilted, as far as facial features go, there’s definitely comparable numbers of good looking people in both groups. one difference however is that punjabi guys are noticeably taller and more well built (broad shouldered, etc) on the average.
JANE: Luckily I did meet a few nice Indian boys and what do you know they are outsiders from Canada!
I’ll have to second that one. Desi men I’ve met who are raised in Canada decidedly have an edge over their US counterparts in every aspect i can think of.
PS: And perhaps the fact that Punjab historically had an agrarian economy may have something to do with how tall, muscular people are. Possibly? I can only remember my grandparents physically working their butt off in the fields day in and day out. Of course, if they were alive now, they would’ve commited suicide like other farmers, because they can’t sell what they grow. Meanwhile, I can think of some others(historically) who weren’t exactly “working” to make a living.
And yes, there are Punjabi Muslims, Punjabi Sikhs and Hindu Punjabis (some of them btw like to claim their mother tongue is Hindi on the census, despite having lived in Punjab their entire lives and spoken two words of Hindi). Language binds Punjabis in a big way.
Yeah you seem to have it all figured out. The women who seem to have issues must be all ugly undesirable chicks.
Brotha I can imagine that after reading nearly 500 comments in one sitting it all might seem like a big ass blur but jeez you might want to keep the personalities, people and hell the genders straight. Because not only have you gotten me blatantly wrong you have highly mistaken Yeti and Chitraganda who have taken a lot of time to painfully express a clearer viewpoint. It’s especially offensive when vastly different people with different experiences and different viewpoints get lumped into one group because you disagree with their belief system.
So much for disregarding the girlfriend of a different race. Jeez.
hehe no that\’s not what I meant! I should have said it differently. Any ladies here been asked about the cube? If not, don\’t worry bout it.
it always make me feel special when people tell me i have nice eyes
but no, that is not enough! i’m all flustered now Chitrangada! shame on you! now you know why desi men don’t approach you, you’re just too much for us
I like how my remarks are considered hostile but yours aren’t.
Because my remarks were in jest.
I’m a bad, bad man.
…except for the ability to pronounce the letter ‘o’
What’s the problem here? He’s stating that attractive women are approached more. Isn’t that the definition of attractive? To attract? And I’d say all desi women are fair game for exoticization, regardless of their “ranking.”
And since when did “less attractive” = “ugly”?!? That’s a pretty steep equivalence that’s being attached.
Aw, Sahej, your bashfulness makes you even more appealing. Modesty AND virtue, sigh…
O and Gautham, before you tell me to get my unattractive little paws off Sahej, and stop wooing him like some hideous Cyrano under cover of the Net – I’ll have you know this: I’m beautiful. If I wasn’t, I wouldn’t have been puzzled at the lack of desi attention. I’ve got it all: 5″6, 125 pounds, fit, large eyes, regular features, long, thick hair, full lips, long legs, stellar ass if I do say so myself. (Alright that made me nauseous too, I’m over myself now – just bear with me for the sake of argument). If desi guys are using extremely narrow-minded criteria (ie fair skin, look ‘white’, look like Aishwarya Rai etc.) that’s THEIR problem.
Finally (and here the last is indeed the least) Dert, you’ve developed a pattern. You select one female as your cyber-prey, then irritate her and argue with her ad infinitum. This is not an effective seduction technique. Try flowers, alright. Leave JOAT alone.
Chitrangada,
A little humility is usually an attractive quality to aspire to, in order to complement the self-assurance one may (rightfully) have.
Ha what an interesting thread. Very very revealing of our underlying stereotypes.
Golly Gosh. What a bunch of racists we subcontinental types can be. 🙂
Thanks for showing me how argumentative I am.
Off to take my medicine now.
Tailgate wisdom from india would be apt on this thread
make love not war
we two ours two
Om Shanti
you with the eye so evil, may you have a dark face; and you get your ass reamed, by your kids and your own race.
you with the eye so evil, may your butt be bored by the wood weevil
may your gonads hang long and free, over pakistan and across the sea
chitraganda and dertie sitting in a tree, k-i-s-s-i-n-gee.
<
blockquote>Aw, Sahej, your bashfulness makes you even more appealing. Modesty AND virtue, sigh…
has anyone told you that you’re beautiful when you sigh like that? you sound like a gazele in the serengeti gazing serenly over the savannah.
(this is all i could come up with). no please stop flirting with me, you’re giving me the vapors
Chitragandha and other ABCD women could you honestly say that there isn’t a little part of you that secretly hates your parents. Those “uncool” immigrants from India who could never fit in. Those who tried to recreate a little bit of Bombay, Chennai, Jhumri Talaiya or whaerever they came from in the middle of the USA. Admit it-you gals were ashamed of them. No matter how cool, how white you tried to become, when you would get home, there would be two living and breathing reminders of how you could never really fit in…how you would always be an outsider. You can marry white men, speak with New York accent…yet you will never ever be what you want to become. Peace.
Desi_sage it’s Friday and a little too early in the morning to be condesnding nasty. All teenagers hate their parents when they are going thru growing pains because parents are a pain in their asses and want to make sure they don’t do drugs, screw someone in the back of a car or romp around half nakkid. I don’t know a single friend who didn’t go thru this in EVERY race. But lets keep perspective, we aren’t teenagers here. We are adults and those issues of hate have been long resolved. If anything I find the fact that we are so emotionally close to our parents because we are desi ridiculously endearing. And ABCD’s have seen their parents go thru hell and back to make it in this country and give them a good living so we could take a lot of things for granted today so no one appreciates their parents struggle more than that particular group.
Jane, surprised to see you’ve recovered so quickly from my constant barrage of hostile, irritable, and combative arguments, all one of them. I thought I had you on the ropes. Onwards to your statement, which I totally agree with, but I would just add that, the issues of “hate” (I think it’s more resentment and frustration, but I know it wasn’t your word) perhaps take longer to resolve (if they’re resolved at all) for someone who didn’t grow up with many Indian people around them.
Dert I didn’t realize you were trying to exhaust me. I think a few other people here have been mistaken but I haven’t really taken any controversial stand about this. I am comfortable speaking from my own prolific experience with meeting the opposite sex and navigating the single scene in NYC which may not be a good representation of culture elsewhere in the country or the world but cannot be disregarded on it’s own merit. Besides I don’t really need corroboration nor justification. I’m an adult with my own life experiences and opinions as anyone else here. There are so many gray areas in life and this attempt at making everything black and white is silly. 🙂
Two things I can confidently say about women… As they get older they make ground rules for relationships based on experience. Ground rules are important because they help you weed out potential failures and maintain your self worth. However when a man that appeals to all our senses comes along all those ground rules go out the window. Without chemistry there is no discussion about requirements. With chemistry the requirements don’t matter.
Jane, I wasn’t trying to exhaust you. It was a joke. I was poking fun at the guardian angel that swooped to your rescue:
Apparently I realized a certain someone was simply unattainable, out of my league, hell, a different sport., and moved on to trying to be your Tarzan. How do you feel being drawn into this little love triangle?
Love it. The more the merrier 🙂 I get bored easily so it’s a good solution.
The way I see it, a lot of people’s feelings on this topic are post-facto justifications of either attitudes they hold or the average reaction that members of a given group have towards them.
For men the former includes a fair amount of primitive tribalism (“one of our women”), but for both sexes it sort of makes sense that over time one starts to have more positive feelings towards members of groups who normally find you attractive.
FWIW, in the UK statistics indicate that asian women are slightly more likely to marry out than asian men. A fair amount of this is probably down to men being more likely to be getting brides from ‘back home’ – but perhaps another factor would be that european women are probably further from their (putative) asian mother in laws experience than european men are from their father in laws (a lot of this is more down to knowing how to act in a certain way, of course).
well at least now we’re getting to people’s feelings versus random generalizations or condemndations.
I don’t know, though if this works out right either. There is a good amount of (south) asian women who have carved out a prominent place in their family and financial lives. I would think any young woman would look up to another older woman who has been able to establish themselves in a new country. For a lot of south asian women who started families in the US/UK, there was a lot of effort spent trying to understand their new culture. In fact, as long as certain sas-bahoo (mother and daughter and law) tendencies from the old country are put aside, the relationship could be really engaging. There are probably a lot of South Asian mom’s who look forward to being mother in laws for good reasons, and are able to relate to their daughter in law regardless of ethnicity. once an initial adjustment is made maybe
BTW,
Chitrangada, I apologize for the clumsiness of my response, i’d have liked to have said something more charming as it would have made for a pleasent further exchange. But, for me, being called a Shere (lion) is a huge turn-on (not that it happens often), so I thought, lion, gazele, it works.
Not that I want to pry you away from your SO, far from it. But it might have lightened the mood. Feel free to teach me better lines in the future!
“I don’t know, though if this works out right either. There is a good amount of (south) asian women who have carved out a prominent place in their family and financial lives”
I wouldn’t claim that it’s the only factor – I think it is a factor though. The labour market participation of south asian women is lower than that for native brits – quite a bit lower in some communities where the figure is as low as 25% studying or working. There are plenty of very aspirational families, but they are actually a minority – something easy to forget if your social circle consists mainly of families of that type.
(and apologies – the quoting function doesn’t appear to be working correctly).
No, its not easy to forget really. I was speaking for the other said, of families in which the mother and father have work experience, of which there are many in the US and UK. Maybe in those families in which truly the set-up is as you suggest, you are right.
post-script on more thought; it occurs that your statement implies in actuality that its the mother and father in law who are closer to the experience of their new son or daugher in law. That would be much closer to the truth in terms of the adjustments of culture that need to be made. The parents themselves have adjusted to the new culture almost full-scale in comparision to any other adjustment.
To expand on the other point of view, there’s a case to be made that the new father in law, as a man with experience living in India and the US/UK, has a significantly different life experience than a new son in law, even taking into account, presumably that he has been working in the US/UK. The father in law, think of if he was born in pre-47 India, has had a life experience that is beyond the ken of anyone, of any color, without significant thought as to what his life is like. Sure, he could act as if he knows nothing to very little about his previous life before he was a working-man in the US/UK, but in reality, he would possibly just be keeping a lot of things to himself. Unless the son or daughter in law were interested, in which case the presumable father in law would be able to share his full life experience.
I want to be the 500th commenter.
guess you just missed your life’s calling…
if anyone deserves to be the 500th anything
its me.
guess you just missed your life’s calling…
Grrrr. I am going to get you!
this thread has been crap-tastic. there’s not much else to say, other than i should have stayed the hell out of it.
crap-tastic!