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My name is Cory Quach and I’m from Houston, Texas. The story that I want to talk about isn’t so much a specific story, it’s more about my experience as an Asian-American male, growing up in the U.S. and my experience in the gay community and dating in general.
On a lot of occasions, I get a lot of backhanded compliments of how cute I am for an Asian guy. Or I have to be part white or mixed race or something like that, you know, because of the way that I look.
There was this one time I was on a gay dating site, if you can call it dating, but I kind of did this social experiment. I created a profile and I posted my photos and a bio, and in the ethnicity section I put that I was Asian. I did that for about a week and monitored the number of hits I got. And after that I changed that ethnicity section to read “other” or “mixed race” or whatever it was and I noticed there was a remarkable increase in the number of hits I received. The reason that I wanted to do that was because of the experience that I’ve had being a person of color in the gay community, especially in a community that’s used to facing discrimination. You go to online sites like that and there are people out there who outright will say that they do not date Asian guys or they do not date black guys or whatever it is. And I understand preference and that people have certain preferences but when it comes to race, race is such a huge qualifier, that how can you possibly determine what a group of people look like or what you’re attracted to in a group of people, when in reality you haven’t met the whole population in that group.
Living in the society we live in today and being gay and having to face that level of discrimination, and then having to face that discrimination again within the community, it’s just one of those things where you think that, it’s 2009 and something like that doesn’t happen anymore, but it definitely does.
Tell it!
That’s horrible. I love people of color. I love people of different religions, ethnicities and other diversities. Variety IS the spice of life.
I’m glad you did that experience, Cory, though I’m sorry that what we thought was proven.
This reminded me of an experience recently. I was out with friends at a club, where I met a guy that I spent most of the night with. The next day, my friends asked me which of two guys they saw me with I hung out with the most, and I responded with “the Asian guy”. The immediate response from one of my friends was “Ew”, and my jaw hit the floor. Mind you, she’s Latino. I couldn’t believe that even in my circle of extremely liberal, open minded friends, one of them would make such a disgusting comment like that. Yes, I have a preference- I like short blonde white guys. But that doesn’t mean everyone else is off the table. I can find you people of every race and ethnicity that I like, both physically and emotionally, and I can also find you short blonde guys that I don’t care for at all. If you drop those rules to who you will date, it will allow for a richer experience by meeting so many different types of people.
And yeah…. I bitched her out for that one!
I’ll give another perspective. I am a white guy living in a city that is predominantly Asian, somewhere on Canada’s west coast: :
1. an Asian sees me talking to another Asian and comes up to me and says, “oh you like Asians (meaning, oh you will like me because I am Asian)” – or -
2. an Asian i talk to in a bar says, “you like me only because I am asian, so fuck off”. I have to think, oh, gee, I suppose you are , but I saw a lot more than your ethnicity.
Both attitudes indicate something, but I am not sure what.
Hey Dexter. I think your experience is another reason why we should be looking beyond race and look toward the individual. We often get trapped in these perceptions of how and why people respond to others based on our experiences. Whether it is exclusion or objectification, it does not feel good to be judged on race when we as individuals are so much more.
Gay Asian guys are doubly hit over the head: first, white Americans may turn Asian guys into The Other because Asians may be seen as not fitting the sexually-desirable model white Americans may have for what a gay man should act like and look like; secondly, those white guys who prefer Asian guys also turn Asians into The Other, by making them excessively sexually desirable for what their race may be. No wonder Asian guys get pissed off.
I should note that my response is partly informed by KEVIN K. KUMASHIRO’s essay “QUALITATIVE STUDIES IN EDUCATION: Supplementing normalcy and otherness: queer Asian American men reflect on stereotypes, identity, and oppression”, 1999, VOL. 12, NO. 5. I agree with part of the essay, but find much of it to be generalized beyond what is reasonable. I have a fond memory of going into the huge disco Tchaikovsky in Taipei many years ago. Of 310 people in there, 300 were Asian locals, and the rest of us were either dancers with the company of that famous American woman from the 1930s – what’s her name, and me. A Chinese guy came up and said to me, oh you must be very happy – so many Chinese men here for you. My reply was, well, I think perhaps 5 of them are attractive, and of them I’d ask 2 or 3 to come back with me. That got rid of him. It takes more than skin colour to turn me on. Personality is the second and more significant marker.
The whole matter has always been confusing to me.
You are really cute. The first thing that came to my mind when I saw your video was, ” I will really like to know this guy!!” well, best wishes from Singapore. =)
Cory would only be a “person of colour” (what a ridicululous expression!) in the US; most of the rest of the world, certainly the gay world, wouldn’t give a shit.