Admin is 25y/o SEAsian Chinese. If you’d like your post to be removed, please DM. If your post is a call-out, it will not be removed unless special circumstances are involved. E/SEASIAN CENTERED BLOG.
🔗📁GoogleDrive Compilation: All of the below essays + books
🔗📄International MasterDoc: Resources, Donations & Resistance [Gaza, DRC, Sudan, Haiti, Yemen, Hawaii, Lebanon] by @seaweedlagoon on X.
🔗📌Anti-Asian Intersection of Race & Queerness
🔗📌Invisibilisation of Asian Struggles & Activism
Quicklinks on Sinophobia History & Struggles Drive
Resources: Intersectional Asian Feminism Drive
Resources: Invisibilisation of Asian Activism Drive
Resources: Afro-Asian Solidarity Activism Drive
Resources: West Asian & Islamophobic Racism Drive
THIS BLOG IS:
DNI/ANTI: Transrace, RCTA, TransID, Radqueer, TransID, Racism, TERF, SWERF, Radfem, Identity policing, Indigemisia, Imperialism, Classism, Consumerism, Colonialism, Anglocentricity, Fatmisia, Ableism and any other bigotries against LIOMOGAI.
I WILL BLOCK/CALLOUT: beansouping. White-guilt/white-tears/white-woman/white-knight/white-saviour. Using Asians and our struggles (including but not limited to those posted here) as gotcha points or "final considerations" in debates that have nothing to do with racial intersections. Using Asians as scapegoats, punching bags or model minorities, especially if you're non-Asian. Weaponising the pan-Asian, Asian or any POC delineation movements that throws any POC under the bus. This harms and subjects Asian struggles to more invalidation and shows us we are not human to you, our pain means nothing to you apart from a stepping stone for your agendas.
ASKS: Please go to @this-is-sinophobia-orientalism or @this-is-sinosexism for any requests, feedback, prompts, topics, news, issues, questions and advice pertaining to this topic. I'm happy to answer on my main @knightfaetality if its personal-related.
PRO: SW rights, Global South, Multiculturalism, Immigrant & Refugee rights, QTBIPOC solidarity, and acknowledges Transandrophobia.
What is Sinosexism
Follow more Asian Activist blogs: @this-is-sinosexism @this-is-sinophobia-orientalism @this-is-orientalism @checkyourasianbias
Sinomisogyny is a term that I presumably coined in this retired post on 02 December 2025. As far as I know, there was no prior known usage. Though please correct me if this is inaccurate.
I have since then coined Sinosexism and fleshed out more Sino-LIOMOGAI terms in recent updates.
Sinosexism is the intersection of race, gender and sex-based discrimination:
Sinophobia [Update APR 2026] — Discrimination against Chinese East & Southeast Asian elements, and anything perceived in association with or proximity to China and/or Sinocultures. More on Sinophobia & Orientalism covered by @this-is-sinophobia-orientalism.
Orientalism—Orientalism refers to the appropriation, exoticisation, weaponisation and/or manipulation of elements from the “East of the Anglosphere” referring to Asia, for the construction of the other cultures.
Misogyny/Femphobia—Discrimination against anything and anyone associated with broadly feminine, girl or woman-aligned elements.
Misandry/Anti-masculinity/Mascphobia—Discrimination against anything and anyone associated with broadly masculine, boy or man-aligned elements.
Exorsexism—Discrimination against anything and anyone associated with experiences with gender that do not conform to any normative gender maps. (please note I do not refer SOLELY to western gender cisbinaries as Exorsexism can be committed against and within different cultural contexts)
Racism—Systemic-level discrimination on the basis of racial groups and their associations, self-sustained by further propagating and perpetuating racial discrimination at all levels. ie “This bullying was an act of racism”.
Racial Prejudice—Discrimination on the basis of racial groups and their associations, that may or may not be at a systemic level.
Xenophobia—Discrimination against people with affiliations to other nationalities. While anti-immigration discrimination is the most current prominent subset of Xenophobia, Xenophobia also targets civilian diasporas.
Sinomisogyny refers to the antagonising of elements associated with E/SEAsian-femness by proximity to Sinocultures.
Sinomisandry refers to the antagonising of elements associated with E/SEAsian-mascness by proximity to Sinocultures.
Both target elements perceived regardless of accuracy, as simultaneously racialised as E/SEAsian, & gendered. The reason I do not express this as solely affecting those perceived as feminine, is because of the way that gender-, sex- and race-based prejudice works to view E/SEAsian-ness as warped-feminine and warped and anti-masculine.
As targets, we/our cultures are misgendered, hyperfeminised, infantilised, fetishised, exoticised, hyperromanticised, hypersexualised, emasculated, objectified, fear-mongered, villainised, dehumanised, exploited, inferiorised, and harmed.
We are viewed as not-really-masculine, masculine-lite, fem-masculine, infantile-feminine, genderfluid, androgynous, xenogendered, hyperfeminine, and trans. We are also sometimes perceived as sexless, genderless people, and may even face a variety of hypermasculinisation.
Under the Sinophobic umbrella of intersectional discriminations against Labels, Identities, Orientations, Marginalized Orientations, Gender Alignments and Intersex (LIOMOGAI) involve but are not limited to: Sinomisandry, Sinovarsexism, Sinointersexism, Sinocissexism, Sinoexorsexism, Sinoaphobia, Sinoamisia, & Sinotransphobia, Sinotransmisogyny and Sinotransandrophobia.
Sinomisandry and Sinotransandrophobia typically but not always portrays E/SEAsian cisheterosexual masculinity as perverted, patriarchal, heavily conservative and tyrannical, while Sinomisogyny justifies the “saving” of E/SEAsian femininity from it. Typically with the help of white saviours, who are rewarded with intimacy from the E/SEAsian Fem/me.
Sinomisogyny views Sinocultural femininity within bodies, lives, personhoods, cultures, emotional, intellectual and most especially intimate labour, as passive objects that should be dominated, possessed, enslaved, harmed or destroyed. Sinomisogynists frequently feel entitled to such.
Yellow Peril, Forever Foreigner, Model Minority, Red Scare/Lavender Scare, and more are all contributors to Sino-LIOMOGAI intersections.
Given the intersection of race, class, gender and sexuality, Sinomisogyny is one of the ways in which a person can be oppressed under the globalised Eurocolonial-Cisheteropatriarcho-Captialistic system. As such, white people are typically the biggest offenders of Sinomisogyny.
However even if you are an East or SEAsian fem or woman, BIPOC, 2SLGBTQIA+—you aren’t exempt from also perpetuating Sinomisogyny.
Historical examples include the Rape of Nanking/Nanjing massacre against Chinese women, young girls, children, babies and elderly women, are some of the well-documented genocides, atrocities and horrific war crimes committed against Chinese fems & women on the basis of anti-Indigenous and anti-Chinese sinomisogyny, racism, xenophobia, colourism, eugenics and ethnocentrism.
It should not be forgotten that Chinese populations and SEAsian populations were already weakened by Eurocolonial Imperialism before Japan’s colonisation. Therefore, this is simply continued & repetitive colonial violence.
Furthermore, Sinophobia does not only occur on the basis of colourism or White-led oppressions, with many ongoing national-level marginalisations & violence occurring under other Sinophobic BIPOC leaderships. Sinocultural persons are recognisably “foreign” from many variables ranging from facial and bodily features, to cultural participation, names and accents, and are thus subject to racialisation EVEN IF they have pale skin and other Asiatic features that overlap with Eurocentric ones.
This does not erase the fact that there is a certain amount of "admiration" and "peripheral membership" afforded to pale-skinned upperclass diasporic non-migrant Asians (ie including SOME ethnic groups of East, Southeast, South, West, North and Central Asian descent) in Western contexts of colourism and Eurocentricity, but that this does not necessarily translate to inclusion, belonging, humanisation nor safety for any other Asians.
To assume so weaponises the pan-Asian identity to harm and invisibilise the diversity of Asians from a range of melanated complexions, more/less "chinky features" or "Jungle Asian features", socioeconomic and ethnocultural backgrounds. Asians have our own intraracial and intra-class disputes, our authorities, leaders and media, do not represent all of us.
One such example occurs within SEAsia, with inequities against Sinodiasporic populations in Malaysian and Indonesian politics, as well as the threat that Malaysian or Indonesian Sinodiasporic fems would be spared only if they offer their intimate labour (coerced sex, sexual slavery, rape) to SEAsian persecutors. Justice has not been served and the threat of recurring violences, including sex-based violence targeting Chinese peoples, has always been globally present and pervasive.
Intersections include:
Intersection of Anti-Indigeneity: Imposing an Anglocentric view on Indigeneity onto Asia, which operates differently.
Refusing to recognise Asian peoples as indigenous to ancestral regions of E/SEAsia, who should be afforded protections against colonisation and Eurocolonial forces and having the right to sovereignty. Refusing to recognise that many parts of Asia including China, has been colonised by Eurocolonialists and the Japanese.
Refusing to recognise the multiple Opium Wars, in which Eurocolonisers used drugs in forced “trade” for natural resource extraction as a method of weakening and corrupting Indigenous infrastructures, including in China and other parts of Asia.
Justifying Eurocolonial political interventions, invasions, sanctions, and manoeuvres of political control due to the assumption that Asian peoples are unable to resolve their internal conflicts without the “assistance” of Eurocolonialists who typically disguise exploitations of international relations as altruistic and diplomatic intents.
Intersection of Anti-Blackness and Colourism: Sexualising darker skinned Asians, mistreating them, alienating them from stereotypical Asian standards of beauty, devaluing them and perceiving them as inferior to fairer-skinned Asians, is a product of Sinophobia & Colourism—Discrimination against skin colour. This is typically on the basis of Anti-Blackness (Colorism was coined by Alice Walker, a Black woman). Additionally, Asian cultures also has colourism tied to classism (ie darker skinned Asians were peasants tanned under the Sun, while lighter skinned Asians were nobility who were typically kept indoors). Where this marginalisation relies on imposed constructs of femininity and masculinity Eurocolonial or otherwise, this also involves Sinomisogyny and Sinomisandry.
Refusing to recognise that there are Asian people who are monoethnic or multiethnic, which differs from monoracial and multiracial. Monoethnic means that they are from one ethnicity, but this ethnicity can span multiple racial groups, making them multiracial. Multiethnic means they are from multiple ethnicities, however, this can be either monoracial, or multiracial. There are Asian people who can also classify as Black, Indigenous, and other BIPOC identities, as the Anglocentric racial classification fails as an absolute categorisation of non-Anglospheric persons.
Intersection of Xenophobia, Forever Foreigner Myth: Viewing E/SEAsian people in countries outside of their indigenous ancestral regions, as forever foreignors. Some of these are immigrants who are still civilians, others are diasporic descendants who have citizenship.
Denying them due citizenship, social treatment and belonging equal to that of other citizens. The Anglosphere has a history of denying Chinese people citizenry rights including voting. These were due to anti-Chinese immigrant laws, and denying Chinese civilians due citizenship until the 1950s, after which Chinese citizens still had to wait for the 1965 change in literacy laws, and the 1975 minority language provisions and bilingual support, so that voting became accessible to them. This is YEARS of delay following the voting rights given to White Women, and the Asian population faced significant delay compared to every other racial group.
Believing that E/SEAsian people will never have a stake in their homelands’ politics and are thus undeserving of solidarity and rights. This is Xenophobic and Sinophobic. Where this is targeted at fems and women, this is Sinomisogynistic.
Intersections of Queerphobia: Sinomisogyny intersects with Transandrophobia, Transmisogyny, Femphobia, Butchphobia, Mascphobia, Homophobia, Monosexism, Exorsexism, Biphobia and more queer marginalisations.
Interactions of LIOMOGAI, Transphobia, Sinotransmisogyny, Sinomisogyny & Sinomisandry: [Femboys & Ladyboys, Fetishising Asian Culture & Whitewashing]
Intersections of Sinomisandry & Homophobia: Viewing E/SEAsian cisheterosexual men as "secretly homosexual" due to a combination of racism & homophobia involving the view originating from 20th century McCarthyism that both asian men and homosexual men are feminine. This involves misgendering, hyperfeminising and emasculating them.
Seeing E/SEAsian men as deceptive, violent, chauvinistic, misogynistic, extremely conservative, manipulative conmen. As passive, weak but sinister infiltrators via emasculating misogynistic rhetoric.
Examples of Sinosexism:
Sticking to stereotypes such as the Sexless Nerd, Lotus Blossom, Dragon Lady, Honey Trapper, Sex worker, ABG, KPOP oppa, samurai, warrior, gangster, communist/CPC agent.
Viewing Sinocultural gender & sexuality diversity as "less progressive/queer/feminist etc". Viewing Sinocultures as "backwards" in critical race, gender and sex consciousness. Viewing us as reliant on the Anglosphere for progressiveness, revolutions and movements in identity politics. Invalidating E/SEAsian identities and gender maps, its cultural significance and semantic contexts.
Viewing the Anglosphere as being the ONLY representation of progressiveness. Not recognising Sinocultures as autonomous and proactive in their own versions of progressiveness with identity politics. Rejecting or projecting Western judgements on Sinocultural identity politics and concepts for race, sex, gender, queerness. Treating E/SEAsian embodiments of their cultures as unimportant, nonexistent or inferior.
Sinomisogyny fetishises Sinocultural femininity as The Sexless Nerd, Lotus Blossom & Dragon Lady stereotypes rather than seeing as human beings with dimensional experiences and complex motivations. It normalises and romanticises the sex, child and human trafficking of comfort women, sexual slavery, imported mail-order brides and illegal adoption rings. Given this exploitative, possessive, self-imposing view over Sinocultural femininity, it punishes Sinocultural femininity if it dares be agentic, mature, assertive, resistant, self-possessed or self-assured. Yet any show of pride, dominance and “spiciness” is another flavour for the tastebuds of Eurocolonial fetish consumption.
Sinomisogyny, Sinomisandry, Sinotransmisogyny, Sinotransphobia, Sinoexorsexism and Sinocissexism all play a role in the anti-Asian stereotypes of masculinity as extensions of femboy, ladyboy, girlboy which are typically associated with E/SEAsian sexual tourism. These are NOT 'lesser' forms but they are also NOT the only forms of E/SEAsian masculinity, genderdiversity and sexuality.
The multi-billion dollar KPOP industry and its other Asian affiliates involve the Sinosexist but mostly the anti-Asian capitalisation of Sinocultures and E/SEAsian bodies for mass consumerism and fan service (intimate labour), as well as the cultural appropriation of Black music and Black culture which the KPOP industry has yet to acknowledge and do reparations for.
Believing that “E/SEAsian people are the most sexually attractive” is a compliment or privilege, devoid of a history of sexual violence and slavery, is Sinosexist.
Believing that E/SEAsian fems are incapable of diversifying, transing or being non-conforming in their femininity, contributes to Sinomisogyny and Sinofemphobia. This especially invisibilises Asian fem experiences, when many mainstreams have appropriated and diffused Sinocultural femininity AND obscured E/SEAsian fem autonomies.
Judging E/SEAsian people as arrogant, rude, disrespectful, unfriendly, frigid, "well-behaved", "overly-formal" or robotic due to racist stereotypes. Retaliation when one feels rejected and is not receiving intimate labour and emotional openness from Sinocultural persons. These weaponises Sinophobic entitlement against E/SEAsian peoples’ autonomy. Expecting Sinocultural peoples to “let loose”, be mutually transactional, or reciprocate your “good intentions” and affections, is Sinophobic. Where this specifies gendered elements, it becomes Sinosexist.
Human trafficking, Sex trafficking, "Imported Brides", Sexual tourism, and stereotypes of E/SEAsian people as stemming from these. Ideas such as us being passive objects to buy/sell/possess, that we are "easy" and open to courtship especially to Eurocolonial masculinity. The normalisation and even romanticisation of sex, child and human trafficking even those disguised as White Benevolence—is Sinosexist. [click here for an introduction to White Benevolence].
Promoting violence against E/SEAsian fems and people for not being emotionally available to you, typically feeds off the idea that fems and women, as well as hyperfeminised people owe you emotional labour, which double-traps E/SEAsian fems and hyperfeminised mascs. This is Sinosexist, including Sinomisogynistic and Sinomisandristic.
Depicting Sinocultural motifs as sexual caricatures, wearing our traditional costumes and appropriating their deconstructed elements in modified hypersexual ways to befit your fetish. The portrayal of Sinocultures and/or E/SEAsian bodies in fetishistic and Orientalism ways.
The appropriation of Sinocultural motifs to be racially ambiguous AND/OR combined with outsourcing one’s gender to Asianness as a racialised third-gender, furthers anti-Asian gender and sex-based stereotypes. This also endangers E/SEAsian peoples’ relationship to their own identities under oppressive social impositions.
Viewing E/SEAsians as disposable partners, or only worthy for sexual escapades but not romance (in general). Viewing E/SEAsians as a fantasy for sex AND romance, by hypersexualising or hyperromanticising us, but refusing to humanise us and see us as complex beings with our own bodily, intimate, sexual agency and autonomy. And with nuanced independent relations with gender and sexual identities.
The fetishistic view of E/SEAsian people & its culture as inherently sexual OR as potentialized for sexual pleasure. Viewing E/SEAsian people as dispensers of emotional, sexual & intimate labour. Viewing them as sexual conquests, who are sexually passive & inviting eroticised objects on the basis of their race, gender, ethnicity & culture.
Seeing E/SEAsians as hypersexual beings incapable of facing sexual violence and harassment because we “ask for it”, “secretly want it”, might be sex workers, or that victims enabled it due to cultural or linguistic misunderstandings with sexual aggressors. This has material consequences including increasing the rates of sexual violence committed against Sinocultural people, severe underreporting, and mistreatment by law enforcement and injustices under the legal system who are hesitant to perceive Sinocultural people as autonomous peoples and non-sexually-passive objects. This has history extending from Chinese Exclusion Acts and white-supremacist anti-migration policies since the 19th century.
Viewing E/SEAsians as ONLY an extension of their marginalisations rather than people. Seeing them as only capable of "Yellow Fever" relationships, infantilistic and or pseudo-pedophilic relationships.
Seeing Sinocultural femininity as inherently associated with sex work and sexual objects, as damsels and victims (typically of BIPOC) who need saving (typically by white saviours). For example as portrayed in popular media and high performance arts such as Madama Butterfly & Miss Saigon. The view that E/SEAsian people as a whole "need saving" from their own culture, nations, or from other BIPOC, further villainises E/SEAsian culture as well as perpetuate the racist criminal profilings of BIPOC. It also contributes to this idea of E/SEAsian fems & women as trophies for the White Saviour or the Masculine Saviour who conquers the Terror of Asia/Yellow Peril.
The hyperfeminising, infantilising and emasculation of E/SEAsians and the romanticised portrayals of them as extremely codependent (often to the point of self-destruction and suicidality) which disrespects their sexual autonomies, integrities & gender identities. Thus giving rise to E/SEAsian people being oppressed under the cisheteropatriarcho-normative system. They are misgendered, mis-sexualised, fetishised, held as epitomes of androgyny & femininity despite their own gender experiences, culturally appropriated and more.
Stereotyping and fetishising E/SEAsian body parts as ONLY valuable if it is pale, smooth-skinned, straight hair, small, child-like, feminine, delicate. There are SO many variations of E/SEAsian physical attributes and focusing on this minority as the epitome of E/SEAsian representation is colorism, texturism, Anti-Blackness, Orientalism & Sinophobia. Secondly, that having these physical attributes still DOES NOT mean that we are built for your pleasure or your fetish.
Seeing E/SEAsian men as deceptive, manipulative conmen. As passive, weak but sinister infiltrators via emasculating misogynistic rhetoric. This is Sinomisandry and Anti-Sinomasculinity.
Viewing E/SEAsian cisheterosexual men as "secretly homosexual" due to a combination of racism & homophobia involving the view originating from 20th century McCarthyism that both Asian men and homosexual men are feminine. This involves misgendering, hyperfeminising and emasculating them.
Seeing E/SEAsian people altogether as cheap labourers catering to Eurocolonial gender-based norms, which contribute to workplace violence, harassment, as well as exploitation and underpaying of E/SEAsian people. Where this is coupled with sexism and hyperfeminisation, it views E/SEAsian fems, women, and hyperfeminised men as incapable or incompetent.
QUOTES
Sato said the Page Exclusion Act is a precursor to the dehumanizing narratives and tropes that render Asian woman as objects of sexual fetishization and unworthy of being part of the national consciousness. “In the 1875 Act, we see the ways in which race and gender are beginning to be entangled and codified in the law, and how Asian women were deemed to be bringing in sexual deviancy,” said Sato. “That far back, we can see how racism and sexism were being conflated.” (Source)
“So from the get-go, we've always been seen as temptresses and sexual objects,” she says. “And so the fact that those were the words used by the killer to describe Asian American women cannot be separated from these historical contexts from which we come from.” These harmful perspectives were compounded and shaped further during World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War when the U.S. military’s presence spiked the demand for Asian sex workers, she says. (Source)
In his pioneering 1978 book Orientalism, postcolonial studies scholar Edward Said defined Orientalism as “a style of thought based upon an ontological and epistemological distinction made between ‘the Orient’ and … ‘the Occident.’” Put simply, the “Orient” is a colonial invention. Orientalism is a collection of binaries — between “East” and “West,” foreign and familiar, civilized and uncivilized, primitive and progressive, colonizer and colonized, self and Other. It is a system of representation through which the West produced the East as its opposite, its “surrogate and underground self” — a strange, backward, barbaric land, steeped in mysticism and danger. — (Source)
Tellingly, Orientalism opens with this Karl Marx quote: “They cannot represent themselves; they must be represented.” As Thomas Babington Macaulay, the British politician who imposed English colonial education on India, once infamously stated, it could not be denied that “a single shelf of a good European library was worth the whole native literature of India and Arabia.” Given the assumed superiority of Western culture and literature, it fell to the West to represent the East. Western colonial powers assumed this paternalistic obligation by manufacturing the body of theory and practice that became the “Orient.” —(Source)
Through the colonial project of Orientalism, the “Occident” produced the “Orient.” However, and perhaps more importantly, the “Orient” also produced the “Occident.” Without the East, there is no West. The Orient “helped define Europe (or the West) as its contrasting image, idea, personality, experience.” European culture came into being “by setting itself off against the Orient” — by defining the “self” as what it is not. Edward Said stressed that the Orient “was not (and is not) a free subject of thought or action.” In essence, to be “Oriental” is to be “Orientalized” — to inhabit whatever vessel deemed appropriate for you at any given time, whether that be a bloodthirsty terrorist or hypersexualized yogic fantasy. Fatimah Asghar aptly captures this slippery, shifting state of personhood in a poem: “you’re kashmiri until they burn your home … you’re muslim until you’re not a virgin. you’re pakistani until they start throwing acid. you’re muslim until it’s too dangerous ... you’re american until the towers fall. until there’s a border on your back.” —(source)
In the decades since Said published his seminal text, the term Orientalism has trickled into the mainstream. However, in the process, the concept has been diluted — severed from its radical roots. These days, the word Orientalism conjures up images of glittering saris, Chinese dragons, and cramped, dusty cities. Maybe a snake charmer or two, for good measure. While these tropes are, of course, part and parcel of Orientalism, the heart of Said’s theory is that Orientalism is not an abstract concept — not just an “airy European fantasy” — but instead “a relationship of power, of domination.” The West’s “material investment” in creating and maintaining the structure of Orientalism sanctioned the violence of European imperialism. As Said puts it in another work, Culture and Imperialism: “‘They’ were not like ‘us,’ and for that reason deserved to be ruled.” Orientalism underpins the systems that allowed Europe to “manage — and even produce — the Orient politically, sociologically, militarily, ideologically, scientifically, and imaginatively.” At its core, then, Orientalism is a symbolic and literal battleground, littered with thorny questions around power, profit, and personhood. Who wields power? To what end? Who tells what story? Who profits? And at whose expense? —(source)
From bindis at Coachella to Bridgerton’s romanticized imperialism.
"...white people, Asian people and other ethnic groups don't necessarily have the struggle that [Black people] have, when it comes to, or in relation to hair. So they've never been isolated, discriminated against, or had to encounter/experience racism because of their hair."
This was said by a Black creator talking about the appropriation of African-American styles of braids by Asian people (which I won't get into the weeds of. All in all, Asian people, listen to and RESPECT what African-Americans are saying about THEIR CULTURE and keep your hands OFF it.)
But to address this specific snippet. The first part is true.
Non-Black people have not faced the discrimination directed towards their hair in the same way that it is directed to hair on Black bodies. Hair that is not 4C has not faced the TYPE of discrimination directed towards 4C hair, especially 4C hair on Black bodies.
And this is also mutual: non-Asian people have not faced the discrimination directed towards their hair in the same way that it is directed to hair on Asian bodies. Hair that is not 1A has not faced the TYPE of discrimination directed towards 1A hair, especially on Asian bodies.
But the latter part is ahistorical.
The racial models created by Linnaeus (the most common and popular one that the West adopted), the Bernier descriptions, and the Blumenbach racial models all involved describing hair from different racialised groups, INCLUDING Asian peoples' hair. The Bernier descriptions fetishised Asian fem slaves (yep, sex slaves) for their features including their hair.
Asian hair has always been racialised.
Later, in US, there were policies created to control, humiliate and override the consent of Asian peoples to their hair; such as The Pigtail Ordinance, which mandated that Chinese men cut off their queue. While it was claimed to control "sanitary issues", the actual reason was that white people knew what hair meant to Confucian values (cutting it symbolises severance from one's ancestors and their gift of life) and wanted to humiliate them into submission.
Racist depictions of white slave masters pulling on coolie rioter queues and subjugating them with violence.
Hell, the chopsticks in hair depictions, the bangs on an Asian fem, the "Indian hair is so oily stinky and gross" issue prior to the "clean girl aesthetic slick-back bun".
Even facial hair on an Asian person was discriminated against whether it was Asian men unable to grow a full beard, the Fu Manchu beard to signify a villain, bushy eyebrows, or beards and mustaches on women.
Body hair on Asian peoples have ALWAYS been stigmatised whether we were nypermasculinised "too hairy with dark body hair", or if we were hairless and hyperfeminised + infantilised + fetishised + emasculated for it.
Sinophobic race-motivated hate crimes have involved Asian hair, including the display of it as trophies post-violence, murder, or other methods of dehumanising subjugation.
A hair for masculine people and on Asian mascs, is typically insulted as non-masculine (which is a form of Sinosexism especially targeting EA masculinity). Hair on Asian fems have been fetishised and exoticised which has led to material harm, this has shown time and time again in media, but also in reality.
Asian peoples have had their hair touched and cut without their consent (I personally can attest to this too).
Head coverings for Muslim Asian women, the fetishising of seeing a Muslim Asian woman's hair, and "liberals" forcing Asian women not to wear their hijabs, is also tied to the control and possessing a sensory experience of Asian hair. You wouldn't see this occurring to white people.
Hair and haircare for MANY Asian cultures is deeply significant, and so tight-knit with our ancestry and love for each other, it plays a role even in our cultural festivals, wedding and coming of age ceremonies. And it also has played an undeniable role in our traumas.
With Asian & Pacific Islander heritage month coming up, and coinciding with May 1st as International Workers’ Day, special mentions go out to AAPI of the working class, those organising on May Day, and those who have been a part of our many AAPI labour rights movements across the world.
Remember our interconnectedness, how collective action and organised class-conscious activists across multiple Asian countries and Asian diasporas across the world, pressured change and reform, and challenged the global north imperialist status quo. Remember our pivotal roles in transcontinental civil rights movements. We have that power.
AAPI Americans, check out AAPI American socialists movements right now. 18millionrising quotes in the below linked video: “May 1st is International Workers' Day AND the start of APAH! Celebrate our history by participating in it: Join the national general strike and attend your local May Day mobilization this Friday. Asian American workers have always been influential in building strong labor movements. During a time of heightened authoritarianism and economic instability, we must continue building upon the working class victories that our elders fought so hard to achieve.”
AAPI Australians, search up your socialists groups.
If you are a migrant or a labour union worker (in any sector), I encourage you to at least check them out and how they are for workers rights (and are arguable more pro-labour than even the Labour Party!)
Out of all other political parties, the socialist networks are entwined with refugee and migrant rights, their policies and attitudes are aligned with pro-migrant & pro-refugee rights and anti-racist, while correcting the labour class’ discontentment to be redirected towards the billionaires hoarding wealth, housing, resources, and their infiltrative influences upon Aussie politicians. Refugee and migrant rights organisations and supporters have many overlaps with the socialists, although I will say right now that there is recognition that the socialists could be more loudly anti-racist and anti-imperialist, and more perceptive of BIPOC workers struggles and how they should be centered in labour rights. This is something that BIPOC members of socialists networks are working on to bring to the table.
In my opinion, the Greens on more than one occasion, have been ineffective in labour rights, and failed to sufficiently humanise and proactively champion against anti-migrant and imperialist policies. This is a product of their complicity in imperialism, their weak-willed cowering in the face of the US and the West’s imperialist actions, all which they chose to display by rebuffing and blocking Iranian activists who were pushing for refugee and migrant rights for the peoples oppressed by the IRGC. Yet still claiming credit for refugee safety when the time came.
The Greens like all political parties have a duty to the equality of all peoples, which means being actively anti-racist and hiking up their vigor in combatting the rising anti-migrant racist shift in Australian politics. But as of now, they are too hesitant to challenge it, too performative to stand for anything that resists the Eurocolonial-imperialist system if it falls out of privileged public favor. Instead of having migrants & refugees’ best interests at heart, the current political system has migrant capital at heart.
The socialist networks advocate for breaking alliances and dependency on the US and its war machines and have a lot of potential to disrupt the imperialist hold that the Anglosphere has on the rest of the global south.
FIND YOUR STATE
Socialists
Socialist Alliance
NSW
NSW Socialists
Socialist Alternative Sydney
( If you’re in Sydney, follow Damien Nguyen, an activist for trans rights Pride in Protest , and labour rights especially of Asian migrant SW rights (Rising Red Lantern, Vixen Workers, Justice for Our Sisters, SWAC, Scarlet Alliance), pro-migrant rights fighting border forces, anti-war rights and more !! He is a crucial figure right now and we should back our Asian activists. )
I see Chinese and Indian motifs here in the props, attires, and gestures. It’s pretty clear what ambience it’s trying to convey through Asian cultures as a prop.
As I’ve mentioned before, there are issues with third-gendering POCs and utilising them for access to exoticised genders incl. but not limited to femininity or masculinity.
And while Orientalism doesn’t apply to Pasifika, there are probably a couple things to be said about Pacific islander motifs being appropriated here too.
UPDATE: I’ve finally set up our tumblr community for lgbtq+ Asians! There is also an additional existing community, queer Asians on tumblr
A community safe space for ALL lgbtqia+ Asians on tumblr!
Thank you so much for everyone that showed interest in the initial posts, it means a lot and made me realize that there’s others like me out there! I’ve tagged and invited everyone that wanted to join (if I missed you I’m sorry 💔)
I’m open for requests/comments relating to helping create it - especially as it’s for ya’ll and not just for me!!
Also let me know if you’d like to be a moderator, I have a feeling I’ll need help fending off the bots
To my non-Asian mutuals/followers, I'd appreciate if yall would like to share the post around so Asian queer mutuals can find each other and be aware there's a space for us ^^ Thank you <3
originally I had planned to transcribe our interview and post it here, but my computer did not catch the interview audio :(. So I will be posting my interview notes in its place.
Liyou (she/her) is my close friend who is also a student at UW. She is Asian American but has lived in both America and Japan. She lived in Japan up until high school. Liyou is also a cosplayer who posts on social media.
_start of interview_
_asked her to first talk about some experiences she has had related to Asian fetishization_
Liyou recounted a time when a guy asked her out. She politely declined because she was not interested and the guy gave her a creepy vibe. When she rejected him, he told her that he only liked her because she was Asian. She thought he had only said that to hurt her, but he started dating another Asian girl two weeks later.
Liyou discussed how men, specifically a certain type of men which she describes as "white guys who like anime", seem to take more interest in her when she would mention that she had previously lived in Japan
Liyou describes the reasoning for men's hyper interest in Asia and Asian women as superficial and stereotypical as they assume Asian and Asian women are like how western media portrays
Liyou describes how she feels Asian women are oversexualized in media. She specifically mentions that Asian women are portrayed as freaky yet submissive, like a sort of sex slave.
Liyou describes her disgust with the normalization of the troupe of a sexually deviant and submissive Asian woman. She describes how western media takes pieces of culture and sexualizes them using the example of a Japanese school girl
Liyou does not like the usage of Japanese school girl uniforms in a sexual manner because she associates those outfits with children and her own experiences of going to school in Japan
I asked Liyou if she felt these stereotypes have effected her dating life and outlook on romance
Liyou says yes because when guys approach her or ask her out she is weary that they only like her for her race due to her experiences
Liyou mentions that these experiences are also not just related to her, she has seen it happen to her mom and friends.
We also discuss modern sites for asian fetishization. has it gone away? or has it just taken another form? I mention ABGs.
Liyou brings up that she feels people have taken to social media to fetishize and objectify not just Asian women, but also Asian men.
Liyou points to Kpop as an example as female fans take their obsession with male kpop idols to a next level by expressing that the only want a Korean guy as a boyfriend.
Liyou finds this ironic because she describes the culture in Korea as one that tends to put first born sons on a pedstal, causing some Korean men to be spoiled and rude. She uses this example to explain that not every Korean man is going to be just like your favorite kpop idol
Liyou also points out how western social media tends to take more of an interest in things simply because they are Asian/from Asia. She uses the example of makeup.
Liyou also feels that social media and the representation of Asian women sets untenable body standards. She feels the need to be shorter and skinnier
Liyou also recounts that people have commented on her boobs and curvy body shape and compares these features to other Asian women, "you have big [insert body part] for an Asian woman" "you are so [body descriptor, ex curvy] for an Asian woman"
Liyou also feels that Asians are used for a sort of appeal due to the sensualization in media. She describes how social media guides for "cute selfies" or "cute poses" will only use East Asians for pose examples. The poses might not be even cute or relevant to the topic but users use East Asians for that sensualization factor.
Liyou also mentions disturbing comments she gets on her social media posts as a cosplayer, with people "faceclaiming" her, or expressing that they want to be Asian like her
I express my confusion for some "faceclaiming" lingo and Liyou describes a whole transracial movement on social media that I've never heard of before
Liyou explains that this transracial movement has users doing facial exercises and manifestations in hopes of making themselves look "more Asian"
According to Said, Orientialism is “"systematic discipline [my emphasis] by which European culture was able to manage - and even produce the Orient politically, sociologically, militarily, ideologically, scientifically, and imaginatively during the post Enlightenment period”. Orientialism is an exotized and exaggerated fantasy of what is defined as the “East” or “Orient” in reference to Asia and North Africa. The “Orient” doesn’t exist, it isn’t a person nor does it replicate people. The Orient was created by the West to oppose their own image of the “Occident”. And because the West gets to define what is and isn’t “Oriential”, they impose power over the “Orient”. What is problematic about Orientialism is not just how it is an stereotypical representation of Asian and North African cultures, but how it inherently strips away the voices and cultures of the people it tries to represent, true to its imperialist roots. According to both Burney and Chong, this opposing image of the “Orient” only serves to other the groups it supposedly represents. As perpetual foreigners, the “American” in Asian American falls flat as Asians will never be American. They are “inherently” different.
The foreigness and fantastical imagery of the “Orient” is constantly projected onto the Asian American woman and her sexuality. There will always be something “special” or “unique” about us because of the exotic representations of our cultures. Our bodies, like the “Orient” are exotic spaces, foreign and meant to be conquered and tamed.
honestly im very tired of peoples inability to recognize stereotypes that stem from sax rohmer novels i think white people especially owe it to asian people to do a cursory reading of the premise of fu manchu novels and read the characters are associated with them just so they can get their heads out of their asses and stop blindly reading fu manchu and fah lo suee reskins without any critical thought
like an asian daughter trying to get away from her evil dad or trying to usurp her father with the help of white men is a anti asian stereotype i need yall to know that. the daughter who is actually good and is just a helpless victim of her father and she needs help from a white man to either get away or kill her father is a racist stereotype. Id take it a step further and say that even if its not a white man getting help from any outside force to usurp or run from her father is in fact racist. An asian woman falling in love with a white man and that white man basically making her realize that she shouldn't be following her father is racist it comes from Daughter of the Dragon. It comes from Sax Rohmer. We need to recognize that its a thing. We need to be critical of how we talk about characters that fall into that trope
honestly im very tired of peoples inability to recognize stereotypes that stem from sax rohmer novels i think white people especially owe it to asian people to do a cursory reading of the premise of fu manchu novels and read the characters are associated with them just so they can get their heads out of their asses and stop blindly reading fu manchu and fah lo suee reskins without any critical thought
like an asian daughter trying to get away from her evil dad or trying to usurp her father with the help of white men is a anti asian stereotype i need yall to know that. the daughter who is actually good and is just a helpless victim of her father and she needs help from a white man to either get away or kill her father is a racist stereotype. Id take it a step further and say that even if its not a white man getting help from any outside force to usurp or run from her father is in fact racist. An asian woman falling in love with a white man and that white man basically making her realize that she shouldn't be following her father is racist it comes from Daughter of the Dragon. It comes from Sax Rohmer. We need to recognize that its a thing. We need to be critical of how we talk about characters that fall into that trope
Happy AAPI month! I really wanted to talk about the Orientalism and East Asian fetishization that comes from young people who claim to be so anti-racist. If you're non-Asian and consume a lot of Asian media (or even if you don't) please take the time to read through this, and reflect on what ideas about East Asians you may have been digesting. Thank you.
transcription bc the colors are difficult to see @lapin-noire @lunarquartzdoll
Orientalism: Next Gen
How the mass consumption of East Asian media of the teenagers of today has led a new generation of East Asian fetishtization.
What is orientalism?
Orientalism refers to the fetishization of the ¨Far East¨ from the Arabian Peninsula to Indonesia. For centuries Asia has been painted as a strange and extremely exotic place that Westerners love to ogle and point at. Without going too far into it, Orientalism is incredibly dehumanizing as it reduces Asians to nothing more than a peacock on display: the aesthetics are nice but the thing that goes with it doesn't matter too much. The orientalism of today's youth revolves around the surge in popularity of East Asian media-- namely anime and K-pop.
The downside to the anime girl:
Media has always been interlaced tightly with our perception of reality. While the Japanese cartoons display characters that look nothing like your average Asian (snow colored skin, brightly colored eyes and hair). Western teenagers have created a heavy link between Japanese (and other Asians) in the real world and the cartoon character who share the same name and culture. The most popular waifus are often teenage girls with high voices who play submissive roles to the male lead, which is an exact replica of the stereotyped and fetishized Asian woman.
The Western audience of anime largely consists of teenagers, and they absorb this portrayal of Asian women right up. Well they're not real, so how does it matter? As a racial minority (only 7% of America), these characters are sometimes the only exposure to Asians some people get.
Feminization + infantalization of East Asian men.
A society's perception of what is masculine is what makes a person masculine, Asian beauty standards are different than Western beauty standards, especially when it comes to men. While body hair is a sign of masculinity in Western countries, in East Asia it's considered undesirable and ugly (on both men and women). It's common for male celebrities in East Asia to shave regularly. This a sense of body hair, a long with the smaller stature of Asian men, have resulted in this idea that Asian men are undesirable. While Asian women are often hypersexuality, the opposite happens to Asian men.
The fan base of idols groups such as BTS, which largely consists of teenage girls, treats the members like they are little toys, little children, They are pure and innocent who can do no wrong. This is racism. By seeing full grown Asian men as children you are effectively dehumanizing them.
EA-Baiting
While yellow face has historically been used to mock Asians in cinema, a new trend has arised: non Asian people manipulating their features (usually with eye liner or eye tape) to make themselves look East Asian. Sometimes it's more subtle, with elongated eyeliner (EA baiters often defend it by calling it 'dolly makeup') paired with EA makeup styles and fashion. Another version of EA baiting involves wearing school girl uniforms and advertising/creating NSFW content, where the sex worker often acts submissive.
This is obviously incredibly harmful and disgusting as a full grown woman is wearing children's clothing and profiting off the fetishizations of East Asian women while further pushing the idea that Asian women are purely sexual objects to dominate.
It's not just pop culture
Along with the rising consumption of Asian media, the interest in Asian culture has grown as well. Suddenly, everyone wants to wear a kimono, hanfu, or a hanbok, Many websites sell highly sexualized version of traditional clothing because, once again, Asian cultures are treated as an aesthetic rather than attributes that are unique to a particular group of people.
Perfect Paradise
After being introduced to Japan and Korea through television and music, more and more Americans are moving there to live a life in what they see as a paradise. East Asian cities, especially Tokyo, are heavily romanticized. People are taking trips to gawk at the sights and report back their friends (and usually their Internet following): I love it here. This place is amazing! The culture is so... different. Think about it. What is so different, so exotic about East Asia? What is it that draws you there as opposed to other cities? To NYC? To London? To Paris? Why is it different?
To Conclude
Just start recognizing Asian people as actual human beings and stop being gross. Thanks.
Yuko was a 62-year old Asian migrant woman who was murdered in her home.
She was a beloved member of the Asian migrant SW community in Naarm, and a legal employee at her place of work.
Allegedly, the suspect is Michael James Chalmers, a 36 year old white Australian man, who was charged with Murder, Rape and 3A Murder (unintentional killing in the course of a violent act).
He was was discharged of the Rape count and thus the 3A count due to “insufficient physical evidence linked to injuries” despite CCTV footage showing him putting Yuko in a headlock, pinning her to the bed, and leaving 30 mins later with Yuko unconscious (or dead) on the bed.
The way the media has been reporting the murder of Yuko, was often sanitised, especially in refusing to use her chosen name. As such they described and introduced her in an objectified way; “sex worker”, “woman’s body”. The dehumanisation reduced her to a mere specimen, an article to be as sensationalised and dissected as evidences from her murder has been in court.
“This is not a debate about the length of the sentence. This is about truth-telling,” said AMSWAG spokesperson Damien Nguyen in a statement on Tuesday. “The past 18 months have seen an incredibly dehumanising debate inside the courts, with anti-sex work arguments and victim-blaming rhetoric made by all sides involved.”
“We will gather to demand an end to the conditions that led to Yuko’s passing in the first place. We dream of a future where survivors are no longer silenced, where migrants are no longer fearful of visa cancellation and deportations, where sex workers are no longer fearful of criminalisation and discrimination daily,” Nguyen continued.
The understanding is that whilst sex work decriminalisation has led to better legal and health outcomes for those who work in the profession, the stigma and the legacy of criminalisation still lead to unjust outcomes for sex workers, which includes the dismissal of crimes against them. [Source]
There are also broad issues with the way in which law enforcement has been approaching Asian migrant sex workers ever since the Australian Border Force launched Operation Inglenook in 2022. The initiative is supposed to be about human trafficking, but results in young Asian women being racially profiled at the border and being sent back to the country from which they came.
This is how Asian migrant women are treated. This is Sinomisogynistic femicide, this is violence committed against Asian migrant SW women.
Asian sisters, brothers and siblings have gathered to send her off at her vigil, burned incense for her and offered her her favourite foods and snacks. Yuko’s injustice is close to every EAsian migrant’s heart.
More cases of the murders and sexual violence against Asian women and SW in Australia, constituting Femicide, SWERF / violence against SW, anti-Asianness, Sinomisogyny, Sinophobia, Xenophobia, Anti-Immigrant violence.
It is a racialised crime against an Asian woman. This is Sinomisogyny, Sinophobia, and anti-Asian. And checking Mimi's status, she misses her family in China and was most likely a Chinese migrant too, which adds xenophobia on top of it. This doesn't just need the lens of feminism.
It's intersectional feminism that would tell you why Asian women are killed; and why this would disproportionately affect women and queer sex workers who are Asian migrants. There are both cultural pressures and systemic pressures that affect why the statistics of both reporting as well as investigating it as a hate crime or sexual violence is even lower for Asian women, leading to it being seen as a non-issue.
And this demands a look into Australia’s policies against Chinese migrants, Chinese WOMEN especially, and SW, which informs why sexual violence ESPECIALLY race-based sexual violence tends to go unreported when the target is an Asian migrant woman. See Operation Inglenook
In 2020, a German backpacker strangled a Tasmanian sex worker, then fled with her mobile phone and cash. His version of events was accepted
i feel like we're at a really interesting point in time right now, particularly in regards to the shift in american consciousness + changing world order, so i thought it would be fitting to document my thoughts about the xhs situation as a chinese american. however, please note this post is NOT speaking on behalf of any community, and i am only speaking to my own personal opinions.
the good
american propaganda is getting dismantled in real time. there's so much cross-cultural communication right now in relation to america's political issues, everyday life, and what china is really like
im already seeing people starting to learn the language, becoming interested in visiting china, etc. and i truly haven't seen this kind of mass interest in chinese culture in a long time
to be precise, the last time there was really "chinese soft power" in america was during the mid-to-late 2000s. notably this time period included the 2008 beijing olympics which was monumental for china on the global stage, as it showcased their prosperity, openness ("北京欢迎你"), and equal footing in the modern world. ive seen people compare the xhs phenomenon to this event and while both are drastically different, i do think this is an apt comparison (though obviously this xhs thing is on a muchhh smaller scale...)
so many new friendships and connections are being made!
the bad
to add on to what op said, theres definitely a difference between just generally understanding that as diaspora, most people around you will hold sinophobic views about china and chinese people VERSUS actually having empirical evidence that most normal people didn't see chinese people as human before. its jarring to say the least. like everyone is praising chinese people on xhs now, but just last week everyone was fearmongering about us?? really reminds you that in the eyes of the public, favor for any asian culture (and by extension, its people) is fleeting and will often change easily with the season
and yes, its definitely weird to see people talk about chinese people as if they've never seen a chinese person in america before. like obviously there's a HUGE difference between mainlanders and diaspora, but there's also international students that come to america to study so... ??
the memes are funny, and i like how the people on xhs are playing along with them, but something about the "chinese spy" memes rubs me the wrong way. tbh, most mainlanders actually have a positive view of westerners and america, and if they don't study abroad themselves or know anyone that went abroad, they will never truly understand what it's like to be discriminated against simply for being chinese (there's a difference between knowing and understanding ofc; not saying that they're ignorant & don't know anything lol). this is just the honest truth, just like how i'll never understand what it's like to live and grow up in mainland china since im diaspora. anyways, i kind of question if mainlanders are actually aware of the loaded context behind those words. while americans are using the "chinese spy" memes as jokes now in reference to why tiktok is getting banned, it doesn't change the fact that many other americans truly do believe that there is mass chinese surveilliance/planted chinese spies in america (i.e., see modern-day mccarthyism, like how chinese researchers are often stripped of their titles/reputations, interrogated, and then silently deported). like language and framing does matter, and it has actually affected chinese people in america, but now you guys are treating it like a joke?
anyways, even with all of the bad there's still overwhelming good that has come out of this, and i do feel like its better to be more positive than negative about these things in the long run! who knows where tomorrow will take us but at the very least i hope everyone actively continues pissing off the american government 💖 amen
This is Sinophobia, eating the other, and Orientalism. We are just disposable novelties to you, and even then it is something YOU want for YOURSELF, not something you’ve ever appreciated on Chinese peoples when in exclusion, inaccessible or deemed “inferior” to you.
I was actually just sharing a news article where in Australia, they arrested some Chinese peoples and banned them from communicating with their embassy under allegations of them being potential agents, even though the court did not find them having any substantial evidence of surveillance activity. At most, their activity was that of a curious student according to this article.
And I’m not even going to get into how some of you behave disgustingly, with predatory race fetishising behaviours towards Chinese peoples regardless of gender, and you justify it as “they ask for it” and “they’re actually a very sexual peoples”, when Chinese people have expressed that it is incredibly uncomfortable when foreigners do this to them and disrespect their virtual platforms.
There are different values, etiquette, and even personal autonomies to be considered here. Someone posting gym videos online is not an invitation for YOU, especiaLLY non-Chinese, to be fetishising and sexualising them. It’s a completely different context here.
Was the Atlanta spa shooting and all the cases of mass Chinese rapes abroad not enough to convince you that your actions and stereotypes have material consequences for Sinodiasporas who are ethnic minorities??
