From: jpak@oakhill.sps.mot.com (James Pak)
Subject: Re: Oriental bias against Indians ? How true ?
Organization: Motorola Inc.  Austin, Tx.
Distribution: na
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1992 23:16:28 GMT

In article <1992Apr15.131822.16426@nynexst.com> clare@nynexst.com (Clare Chu Ayala) writes:
>>Personally, I don't doubt Tim or George's anecdotes.
>
>  I didn't doubt them, I just wanted to point out that not all
>  people are prejudiced against you for having an Asian and/or
>  Spanish name.

Clare, I know *all* people are not prejudiced.  I don't think I ever implied
such a thing.  But the fact that *all* people are not prejudiced doesn't mean
there aren't others that *are*.  And it doesn't take a whole lot of them to
mess up the otherwise nice feelings you might get from others.

Give you an example.  Say you're an actor in a play.  Afterwards, ten people
come backstage to talk to you.  Nine of them compliment you to various degrees,
but the tenth tells you that you stunk, you gave a rotten performance, you have
no dramatic range.  In fact, you should give it up before you embarrass your-
self.  Honestly now, what's more likely to stick in your mind, the nine people
who complimented you or the one who insulted you?  If four people tell a person
he/she looks great in that outfit, and the other says it's ugly and it makes
him/her look fat, what's more likely to stick in his/her mind, the many compli-
ments or the one put-down?  Yeah, you can get over it most of the time, but
every once in a while it's going to stick in your craw.  See, it doesn't take
much "bad" to erase a lot of "good."

Now, reverse the numbers.  Say you noticed that, say, 9 out of 10 females you
chat with on some faceless BBS tend to sour their reactions to you when you
reveal to them that you're Asian, not white like they assumed.  Sure, not *all*
of them acted funny, but how can that not make some kind of impression on you?
No, the negative reaction doesn't *have* to stick in your mind, but getting it
out may not be as easy it looks.

>>>  This is the only newsgroup where people have flamed me.
>
>  Someone said I was stupid because I didn't see why Asian guys should
>  feel low self-esteem about getting dates over CM.  I don't see that
>  CM have such an advantage.

Well, I sort of remember this.  I guess at the time I didn't think of it as a
flame, but if you thought it was, then it was.  (My concept of the word "flame"
may be different from that of others.  To me, "flame" is not so much an insult
thrown in my direction as the equivalent of a written SHOUTING MATCH.)

As for the "CMs don't have such an advantage" theory (boy, here we go again;
don't anybody hold their breath :-)), you are probably correct.  However, I can
see how if an AM noticed a markedly different reaction from a woman once she
ascertained his ethnic identity (as happened in the pen pal case and the BBS
case), and it happened more than once (9 out of 10 times was the rough figure
given for the latter case), then the *perceived* disadvantage is going to seem
greater than the actual disadvantage.

>  They said their post was sarcasm (the one about the CM being better) and I
>said that it was not true, otherwise why are there more Asians in the world?
>(e-mail)

Well, the number of children you have isn't very strongly correlated to per-
ceived attractiveness, IMO.  Any married couple can crank 'em out if they're so
inclined.  In fact, many people today (in the US) look at lots of kids as a
financial drain, so they usually stop at 1 or 2 (or even none).

>  I'm not being insensitive to your plight, but I feel that if you
>  internalize this "non-attractiveness" then you have lost already.
>  If someone is not interested, just move on.  If you don't think
>  highly of yourself, no one else will.

Thanks for the advice, Clare, but you needn't feel pity for me.  You're
assuming that because I comment on this issue, I must be speaking from personal
"pain."  Not really.  I comment on a lot of issues here, in case you haven't
noticed.  I get bothered by this issue somewhat, but maybe not to the extent
you might think.  Trust me on this, I don't go home and beat myself over the
head because of this.  There are other issues I discuss here that I "brood"
over more.  (Take a guess which :-))

Oh, and while I'm on this topic, I'm not that big on this notion of "you're
only beautiful if you think so."  My very personal opinion on this whole self-
esteem issue in this country is that it's quite overblown in importance.  Yes,
I think it's nice to have good self-esteem.  On the other hand, I don't believe
"bad self-esteem" is as much of a curse as many people think.  Horrendously bad
self-esteem is one thing, normal "bad" is nothing to get worked over, IMO.
Nothing makes me laugh more than the thought of people looking in the mirror
and repeating, "I am an attractive person.  I deserve love.  I am fun to be
with, etc etc."  In fact, there's a guy on _Saturday Night Live_ who parodies
this (Stuart Smalley skit).  Besides, I don't think perceived attractiveness
and self-esteem correlate as strongly as some people think.  There are lots of
women I wouldn't be attracted to no matter how highly they thought of them-
selves, and there are other women I'd be attracted to even if they didn't have
great self-esteem.  Or it could be the other way around.  See, no correlation
in my mind.  Weak correlation at best.

>  So I feel that all this dwelling on the supposedly "non-attractiveness"
>  issue is self-defeating.  BTW, I know of a CM who think Asian women are
>  ugly, okay?  So what?  There are always those who won't like you and really
>  who cares?  I wouldn't want to date someone with that kind of
>  attitude anyway.  There are plenty of fishes, like they say.

OK, I'll bite on this one.  Of course you're right, BUT... On the other hand,
how many uninterested MOTOS does it take before you start internalizing this
"unattractiveness" to yourself?  If MOTOS after MOTOS tell you to kiss off,
for whatever reason, what are you supposed to do?  Say, "Ahh, but I never
wanted to be with you in the first place."  He he he... self-delusion ain't my
game.

>>  I don't know why I bother, but I guess I do want to keep up with what other
>>  Asian Americans are up to.  :-(

Well, Clare, let me give you some advice.  Not *all* people are out to flame
you.  Why dwell on this "flaming" issue?  It's self-defeating.  There are
plenty of "nice" posters in the sea, etc etc.  See what I mean?  How many
people did it take to flame you before you started trotting out the frowny
face?  Just one!  See how a few negatives (flame) can drown out many positives
(other posters who like what you write)?  Not that easy to ignore the negative
reaction all the time, right?  Same here, but for different reasons.

Jim
-- 
(Do not listen to the address on the header.  My correct email address is: )
jpak@manute.sps.mot.com  or  ...!cs.utexas.edu!oakhill!manute!jpak
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