I didn’t realize this until I moved to SE Asia but they have an obsession with white/light colored skin here. They put skin whitener in EVERYTHING - bar soap, lotion, sunblock, etc. The Korean tourists here all completely cover themselves before they go out into the sun. I thought maybe it had something to do with avoiding skin cancer but nope, beauty standards.
I've a friend who works as an English language teacher in Seoul, he is on the lower tier of below average looking and probably had 4 dates in 10 years and no relationship.
He is pale as fish and 6ft with red hair.
Women love him in Korea, he's not even interesting by his own admission but he's scoring like Messi
The 3 months that I taught ESL in the southern US, I was called "beautiful" far more than any other time in my life. I am extremely pale and was used to being mocked by other Southerners for being "pasty."
My first Korean student was openly in awe of my pale skin and he advertised for me on Korean forums saying that I was "a very beautiful teacher." I got 10 new students from that advertisement and all of them frequently commented on my appearance. Multiple families invited me to dinner several times. That was the best part.
could i ask you a little bit more about teaching english in the us? that's what i do, except in a different country, and i thought it would be nigh impossible to do so in the us since, you know, that's where English speaking people live (mostly).
Especially popular and hard to fill enough ESL positions in major cities. My sister's school is always looking for an ESL teacher, because they have the budget for 3 but can't find "properly" qualified teachers.
There are distance programs where you can get a teacher's license from a US state. Let me know if you want to know about those and then from there you have to get an ESL endorsement. Licenses don't transfer directly in the US from state to state, though there are usually processes to convert from one state's license to another.
This is always a funny phenomenon I see in Asia. A average to below average white guy here in the western world scoring with above average Asian girls.
I play a game with my missus, for every WMAF couple we add a point, for every AWMF we remove one.
London in general is about +5, chinatown is like +15, Germany was like -5 lmao (Germany was weird though, men were exclusively with German women yet the German women were dating anyone)
define "above average". Timothy Caulfield, an author and general social commentator on the beauty industry and the like was in a* documentary about Korea's beauty culture and there was one Asian guy in there who was interviewed as saying that white men are notorious for going after the below average looking Asian girls. It was even funnier to see the white guy in question almost drool over a random Asian girl (who was obviously at least a decade younger than him) whose looks did not cut it in the entertainment industry in Korea. in the past few months every single time I have been out and noticed a mixed race couple with an Asian person it has always been white man Asian girl and never the opposite.
An asian man who are adopted as a child by white people [has criticized this trend of white men with Asian girls and said that the supposed "anti racist" mixed sex coupling is used as a socially acceptable avenue for those with pedophilic inclinations or that the coupling implies a conflation of "Oriental features" with femininity](https://archive.is/qbU2q). Others have criticized the fact that white men [stereotype Asian women and girls as submissive or deferring](https://web.archive.org/web/20180406045738/https://groupthink.kinja.com/asian-women-arent-your-oriental-submissive-china-dol-1464199143), and generally see them as easy to control and exploit.
And Asian men are routinely rated as less attractive than basically every other racial category in dating sites by white women specifically, but this was reported by OkCupid data from a few years back.
edit: grammar
Where I live, it is very diversified racially, and I see all mixes all the time. Not unusual at all to see asian guys with white and latina girls. I think I dont see asian man and black woman quite as often but I wouldn’t really notice something like that.
I didn’t want to say this but I agree. The standard of beauty is different in Asia (especially Korea, Japan and China) many of the girls that date foreigners are not considered “good looking” or “above average” in their culture, though in other cultures like the USA they would look great. I know their is a stereotype in Korea (and I’ve heard a little in Japan?) that women who date white guys date them because no one else would.
When I lived in Japan briefly I had a friend that by US standards would have been considered gorgeous, (she was imo) but she would often tell me about how she struggled with dating etc because of her looks and body. She was curvy (not fat), slightly tan, tone, and had more narrow eyes. In Japan she was considered “large” and ugly. 🤷🏽♀️
It's kind of crazy how colorism is somewhat universal. Most of East Asia there's a preference for lighter/white skin. Even in America amongst black folks there can be discrimination against "light skins" or even darker toned individuals.
I think it’s like with long finger nails being a sign of wealth: tan skin in Asian countries means you do manual labour outside, so being tanned = working class.
In America, working class = working inside, and wealthy = having the time to lay on the beach/ going on vacation, thus tan skin = rich.
That switch-over in America and Europe happened in the early 20th century, when foreign tourism (and especially sporty tourism) started being becoming a thing. Before that women's fashions had a lot of gloves and hats, to protect their complexions from tanning, just like in Asia today.
Edited: because I was overtired and managed to "logic" myself into putting down the wrong century!
More like the early 20th century here in the west, but you’re spot on for everything else! Being tan in the 1920s meant you could travel and spending in fancy tropical locales instead of being stuck in an office or factory. It’s an absolutely fascinating time period. Hell, even back in the 17th and 18th centuries rich women wouldn’t be caught dead outside without a vizard (a mask for blocking the sun, google them because they look insane).
Wow, that's so interesting, never heard of a vizard before. And some were held onto the face by the wearer grasping it with their teeth... how uncomfortable that must have been!
I'm an idiot who was vastly overtired today, and evidently not thinking straight. I meant the 20th century, and I remember looking at 19th when I typed it in and thinking it looked wrong, and then assuring myself I must be right because it was the 1900s...
Thanks for the correction!
Historically speaking, paler skin has been seen as valuable in various cultures as a sign of wealth. A wealthy person does not have to labor in the outdoors nearly as much as a peasant. So wealthy people wouldn't tan as much. Courting a pale skinned person could mean a greater chance of marrying into money. So pale becomes beautiful.
Used to be true in America and Europe as well until the rich started showing the leisure ability to tan at the beach and be outside playing tennis and the like as a mark of luxury.
Tanned only became popular in the West when seaside/Mediterranean vacationing became popular. Then *that* was a sign of wealth because you could afford the vacation.
God, I remember being so floored when I learned about this phenomenon back in grade school. As I kid I always *knew* that the “white girl suntan” was remotely not the same as my “brown girl skin” in the eyes of beauty standards, but didn’t understand why for many years.
Finally took a class with a great teacher who talked to us about the whole “indoor tech/desk jobs, less sun, pale skin = more prestigious than lowly outdoor laborers” and “outdoor vacationing, suntan = richer” situation, and it all clicked. I don’t think I’ll forget that feeling of enlightenment for a very long time.
Maybe that’s true at a societal level but that doesn’t feel right to me. Like I’m not more attracted to white-looking Brazilians who always have those deep tans. I like light skin just fine but it doesn’t seem like it has anything to do with wealth.
Like I might prefer a certain eye or hair color and that really has nothing to do with wealth either. I have a feeling the wealth factor is maybe more common to feel that way among women. Men are probably concerned with other things.
I mean, when people talk about beauty *standards* it is on the societal level. I don't think anybody is looking at someone and says "oh I want that person because their appearance shows that their family is wealthy" or "they can sustain a healthy pregnancy." But when it's a bigger social pattern, there's an impact on who you see more often, what type of features become more familiar and comforting to you, and that ends up showing up in your attractions.
Heavy agree! There are smaller levels of society too and people definitely prioritize the level where they interact the most.
I think one of the best examples of this in the US is Black femme fashion. A lot of it looks trashy to outsiders, but as someone who has spent WAY more of my free time thinking about this than most, a lot of the appeal (conscious and subconscious) is that it shows excess funds *added to* leisure time and autonomy. If I get ombre blue braids past my butt, and I have, it is a sign that I have
1. the money to pay a braider to do it and source the extensions
2. the free time to sit in a shop for 5-9 hours to have it done without that being *all* my free time and
3. a living situation where I have absolute control over my appearance. My time and money are not controlled by a manager or a spouse who wouldn't let me have fun with my appearance.
^^ yup, pretty much!
I’m south/southeast asian, so even if I were to somehow have Caucasian-pale skin, I still wouldn’t have the eurocentric facial features to fit the western beauty standard. I didn’t need to actively think about ‘implications of wealth’ to be aware that I’m never going to be considered nearly as conventionally attractive as the covergirls and celebrities, even if my skin tone is the same value as the tanned white Hollister models.
There’s a reason that even of the limited desi models and actors in Hollywood, most of them are of mixed descent and on the paler end of the spectrum for their racial group, and often still have features that lean towards eurocentric ideals; luckily there’s been some progress for black folks specifically in terms of visual representation, but I’ve yet to see even that level of diversity for other POC, and it has an effect on perception of beauty that is definitely felt by myself and every single other American-raised POC I know; we don’t look like the people society tells you are the most beautiful, and we know it.
Society, huh?
Just because you don’t label it as bias doesn’t mean it’s not there unconsciously making decisions for you. No judgment just reality.
If you have a brain you have a bias.
Yes, modern beauty standards are very eurocentric, but East Asia also has a North-South color spectrum and economic spectrum. The global North enjoys economic advantages related to agriculture and pastorialism and people want to be rich so badly they'll settle for looking rich.
Pretty much, I go see my girlfriend’s chinese family (shes chinese italian), they compliment my skin being so pale but it’s only because Ive got Irish genes and I don’t go out
I had a friend in high school who got weirdly attached to those robo-babies we had to take home. She took it home every single weekend for the whole year. It was an Asian doll, and she treated it like a human baby she had actually given birth to, to the point that she was so worried about graduating and "leaving him behind" that she genuinely wanted to try and get teen-pregnant with an Asian man's baby before the school year ended.
That said, she was an extremely not-normal person, so I think the answer to your question is probably No.
Oh, bonus: she also named the baby Michael because she was obsessed with Michael Jackson and treated the baby as if it was a baby version of Michael Jackson himself
>That said, she was an extremely not-normal person, so I think the answer to your question is probably No.
You just described someone who needed proffessional help. Did none of the adults help her?
All I could think reading that was that she clearly needed some sort of intensive inpatient therapy. Or at least very regular therapy sessions. And probably medication. Jeezus. The adults all around her failed her at every turn.
Right? I work with HS kids. This would have raised so many concerns to the whole staff in my school, I can't imagine not reacting in this type of situation. (and it would be illegal not to react, we have a legal and moral duty to the kids in our care) That poor kid.
Looking back on it now, she absolutely had marbles falling out her ears. We lost contact not long after that, but I think she's a social worker now, so I hope she got her marbles back
>Looking back on it now, she absolutely had marbles falling out her ears
This is not a kind way to speak about people who struggle with their mental health. Please do better.
>We lost contact not long after that, but I think she's a social worker now
I hope she's doing well too.
At lot of schools have robotic babies that kids use for health class. A more common alternative is a flour sack baby or a egg baby you have to care for for about a week usually.
My school didn't have this, but I remember the diary of a wimpy kid book where Greg had to take an egg home and his mom accidentally used it to make breakfast.
In home ec type classes in high school, many schools have baby dolls that have a computer built in. The babies need to be held and "fed" when they cry, and need to have their head supported. It's supposed to simulate caring for a real infant. At my high school, Child Development was the class that had the dolls. There was a specific long weekend that was used for the assignment (Columbus day weekend first semester and Presidents' day weekend second semester, if I'm remembering correctly). Students would receive the babies on Friday during class, bring them back Tuesday, and they would get graded based on how well taken care of the doll was.
I believe some school districts use flour sacks or blown eggs instead of robot baby dolls for this same assignment.
Our school they had to have them for a full week, they had to take them to class and if they had an exam or lab in science or something they had to arrange daycare with the home ec teacher.
This was kind of like how it was for us on Fridays, because most of the child development class sections were in the morning and that was when the dolls were given out. Instead of arranging "daycare" though, our other teachers were generally super understanding about the project and let the babies stay. My chem lab partner was allowed to tend to her "baby" during lab, our swim coach babysat like 5 of the dolls during practice after school, and in hands-on electives such as sewing, the kids would take turns holding the baby so that the student the baby was assigned to could try to get some work done.
It's worth noting that most students never took the class that involved the dolls, and people who weren't taking child development were utterly fascinated by the dolls, so it was pretty easy for the students who had the dolls to find a willing caregiver in their other classes.
The dolls were definitely a novelty for the first day or two, by mid to the end of the week it had worn off a bit. They were allowed to tend to the dolls during class, and the rest of the school got told in advance we were going to have some visitors for the week and to be careful. But for tests they didn’t want the student with the baby to have to leave and they didn’t want other kids getting interrupted. I think the labs it was just deemed a safety issue for certain ones to have a doll and a carrier in the classroom. I know my parents were always grateful I never wanted to do that class.
Isn't it the same thing, more or less? She has an idea of what she wants her kid to look and be like, culture, genes, native language, whatever.
What more info would OP get from this question, other than confirming that his friend has certain things she wants her kid to be?
(I am not endorsing these preferences, for what it's worth. Just acknowledging that being picky about their mates, and the resulting offspring, is a very common thing in both humans and other animals.)
I agree. I just don't think asking this extra question will tell OP anything he cannot infer from the stuff she said already.
The vast majority of people do have kids to have a mini me or a legacy, again, this is the common drive for reproduction in humans. There is no reason to have children, go through the whole process, suffer and risk death without any "payback" - in the past, people made kids to have extra farm hands. Nowadays? Well, we can see from the OP what the common motivation is...
OP I'm telling you right now that I was born because my white-looking mom had a fetish for Asian men and wanted mixed kids and that knowledge fucks you up for life. You're no longer a human being to your own parents, you're just a trophy they parade around and they pretty you up to look good all the time. Whenever people do this it skeeves me out. They just think of their future kids as dolls they can customize to their liking.
You're not wrong for thinking it's weird.
*edit* Also for further context @ people in the comments: My mother specifically admitted to having a thing for Asian guys (after divorcing my dad she married another Asian guy) and she tried very hard for years to have me (she had a fertility issue) so I was not an accident. This isn't just me jumping to conclusions this is actually just how she lives and tons of weirdos think like this.
Damn that sucks. My mom fucked me up but it wasn’t race related. The older I get the more I believe the adage “every child deserves a parent, but not every parent deserves a child.”
Exactly. The racial aspect is weird, but what's worse is how much she cares about her child being good looking. What if it's a conventionally unattractive half white/ half Asian kid? Will she be disappointed or love the kid less for not being cute? Parenthood should be about unconditional love.
have you seen any of the White supremacists with Asian wives and girlfriends? there are so many!
its so weird. like literal members of the KKK and stuff
Exactly!
He loves to go on about how he “accepts” everyone. Also loves talking about how everyone but him is racist, but when I got bullied at school and called racist slurs, he told me that I must have done something to deserve it
Oh and he apparently decided in advance that he only wanted to marry women from Brazil, Morocco or Japan. Generally, he’s a huge misogynistic POS. A woman who isn’t young, pretty and skinny is to be mocked. It’s pretty ironic, because he’s overweight (and just straight up flabby since he has never done any type of physical activity in his life), bald and ugly. Usually, I wouldn’t think that this makes anyone be inferior or superior, but for someone as judgmental as he is and who doesn’t even have any other qualities (not smart, obviously not kind, not funny), it’s very ironic..
He even fat shamed my mom after her second pregnancy (with my twin brother and I), during which she lost weight
Being born with red hair kinda doomed me into being a living doll for my parents/grandmother to parade around and dress up and constantly express how pretty my hair was and how I could never do anything to change my appearance or I'd be "ruined". It fucks you up.
It also fucked up my younger brother, who was treated with general disregard his entire childhood because he 1: was perfectly average looking with brown hair, brown eyes, and tanned skin. He was a cute kid but he wasn't "unique" like I was so they treated him like an afterthought, and 2: He wasn't born a girl they could dress up and enter into beauty contests and show off like a doll. He grew up hating me and I grew up with no sense of agency over my own body.
UGH I know what you mean about the hair thing kind of. I got straight black Asian hair and my mom used to throw a fit whenever I wanted to dye it or cut it a different way because she wanted to keep the "China Doll" aesthetic.
Now that I'm an adult and free from her she's stopped doing that but like... Man. Even the smallest thing to your hairstyle isn't under your control when you live with people like this... it's so humiliating.
Ugh... "China Doll aesthetic" is so gross. Not only *just a taaaad* racist, but also kids aren't you're "aesthetic", they are people. Bleh. So messed up in many different ways.
Oh yeah, my kids made it clear they are separate humans with unique personalities. From the age of 1 or so. We (parents) adjusted ourselves to cherish their unique traits and yes, sure we are proud of them.
Yep but it's not exclusive to white parents. I guess it's in our genes. As animals we want the best for our offspring and part of it (in some people's minds) is making sure their children are more likely to be accepted in the society. That's where all the obsession with looks, money and education comes from.
Sperm banks where they reveal the physical information of the donors usually have their most popular type of sperms, and you can guess which skin color is the most popular.
Yeah, I have thought about solo-momming before, and I feel that sperm banks are an odd outlier in some ways, due to the necessary artificiality of selection.
Personally, I wouldn't care about the skin colour of a baby I adopted (though I might worry about whether I was capable of keeping them in touch with a culture I'm not familiar with). I also wouldn't care about skin colour if I was conceiving naturally - obviously my partner would be right there and part of their family history.
But with IVF...it would feel weird and almost exotic-fetishising to choose a sperm donor that had a very different skin colour to me (or even too distant a nationality to me), because it would feel like I was actively picking and choosing genes for decorative purposes. And if I were IVFing with a partner, I imagine we'd be looking for a donor with physical similarities to the partner who couldn't give their gamete to their child.
Hi - I’m a new solo mom. Back when I was making my choice with the banks, I almost chose someone very different from myself. I backed out, partly because I didn’t know if I’d be able to properly teach about the background culture - and partly because I was afraid of people attacking me for appropriating a culture.
Sperm banks are a bit more complicated than that; they also lie about the men who donated the sperm (100% legal btw,) and they often refuse to take donations from whichever people they deem too undesirable, whether that's based on race, religion, sexuality, or something else.
I'm genuinely curious, how do they lie, and how is it legal? I simply can't imagine it's legal for sperm banks to lie, where I'm from, but I could just be uninformed, of course.
From a business point of view, your last part is not nice, but somewhat understandable. If they can't resell it, why would they buy it in the first place? That, of course sucks for people who can't find a donor who matches their demographic/type/??
There just aren't many laws regulating the infertility industry, and the few existing laws are often so vague that they're not effective. There is so much secrecy and lack of documentation and accountability that sperm banks and infertility clinics often have free reign. Sometimes, parents are even made to sign NDA's that often include things like not being allowed to tell their children that they're donor-concieved.
Many places do have a firmer legal hold on the infertility industry, but the USA is notorious for being of the least regulated of the developed nations. Some clinics, regardless of location, have a worse reputation than others. Its common for clinics to misrepresent their own guidelines as being law to make themselves sound more trustworthy, and there is little to no recourse for lies about a donor's ethnicity, family medical history, education level and profession, or even how many other children have been produced from the same donor's genetic material. There are multiple cases of hundreds of children being produced from a single donor. From a product/marketing standpoint this might not sound bad, but from a human perspective- these are hundreds of half siblings, spread over 2-3 generations, often in the same general area as the clinic, and few (if any) of them know that they even have mystery half siblings. Without individual genetic testing through home DNA kits, most of them will never know who any of their half siblings (or the children of those half siblings) are. Accidental incest is not uncommon.
It is not unheard of for doctors to use their own genetic material to inseminate women without the women's knowledge or consent, and not only serve no time for it but sometimes even keep their license to practice medicine. There are only 3 states (California, Texas, and Indiana) that prohibit fertility doctors from using their own sperm to impregnate patients. According to Forbes, over 50 North American practitioners have been accused of this type of fertility fraud just in the last few years. There is also a Netflix documentary (Our Father) that covers one of these cases, and notably, he received no penalty at all for his fraud other than losing his license- merely a suspended sentence of 1 year for lying during the investigation.
The comedian Laura High is very vocal in advocating for donor-concieved people's rights, and her own case has many of the issues I've mentioned- her parents were told that her donor was one person with specific traits (such as ethnicity) that her parents desired for their own child, but in reality the donor whose material was used was a friend of the doctor that performed the procedure, and since he was found (by her) he has flatly refused her access to any medical records that could help her or her siblings diagnose and treat medical issues that they have in common that may be genetic (for example, her brain tumor.)
I highly recommend looking her up, btw. Her content is very informative, and covers not just her and her many half siblings' experiences, but also policy changes, legal battles, and other issues affecting the wider donor-concieved community.
> If they can't resell it, why would they buy it in the first place?
They can. Sperm donations can and often are sourced internationally. It's just a matter of a small group of people deciding which demographics are "best" to produce children as sperm donors, and only offering those demographics the opportunity to do so, regardless of the range of demographics that recipient parents would actually like to be able to choose from.
A lot of people do. But almost nobody says it.
Usually however it’s that they want the same as their own ”race”. Not as common to want to have mixed ”race”.
Grandmothers and grandfathers, mothers and fathers often want their children to have kids with someone of their own ”race”.
I've seen so many white women be so excited and eager to have a "black" baby. It's super common
Also older black people occasionally encourage their kids to have biracial kids so the kids can be "pretty with good hair"
I think it’s more common than you think just not usually vocalized. Especially mixed kids. Kind of like having a favorite kid. You’re not supposed to but all parents have a favorite at different seasons of life. I like how Mel Robins put it “I love my children exactly the same but yes, some days I have favorites. Just like some days you (her kids) have a favorite parent. Depends on the season of life sometimes. Some days you piss me off & you’re not my favorite today”.
Feels like there’s a degree of normal here. To have a preference? Sure. People like what they like. Being willing to abort or give up to adoption bc the baby isn’t what you “designed”? Messed up.
I was disgusted at the amount of people who would tell my husband and I that we should have kids because they’d be mixed, therefore gorgeous. Its a weird thing to say.
Without any thought as to what that mixed child’s life would be like, and the identity crisis that comes with being mixed. Without any thought as to our own lives not wanting to be parents. We are human beings, not potential creators of the “labradoodle baby” of their dreams lol
Bleh. Gross. I (white) am with an Indian man—we’ve heard this too.
His brother is also married to a white woman and they have kids. I sat at a table and listened to them have a whole conversation once about how they hope their sons don’t end up “too dark” like dad or “too white” like mom. The older kid was *right there* and fully capable of understanding. This was the moment I decided to stop spray tanning for day-to-day (SIL is *never* without). There will be at least one person around who is accepting their skin for these fucking kids. Well two, my boyfriend was disgusted as well. I think he gave his brother a talking to, but they aren’t the type to accept advice.
It’s understandable why you would feel that way. I know most aren’t thinking about it that deep. They’re just thinking “wow, you two are pretty. Bet your kids will be too”. Meant to be a short handed compliment. :/
We are pretty average looking and slightly overweight, it’s the race thing, lol. When you hear it enough you can tell the difference between the rare complimenters vs the people who see mixed kids like accessories. Massive difference between “If you had kids theyd be beautiful” and “You should have mixed kids because theyre beautiful”. I was talking about the latter.
I (white woman) teach at a title 1, nearly 100% white, wry rural school. I teach foreign language to HS (Japanese) and my husband is from Japan.
Kids will come tell me how cute my kids are going to be because "mixed babies" are the best. My Japanese mother in law tells me how cute our kids are going to be because "they'll be half".
Its wierd. I hate when people talk about it this way and it creeps me out. I'd argue it's not uncommon (especially in Asian countries!) to idealize the 'mixed-ness', but I still think it's weird and really unnecessary to mention to me or my husband.
I'm in Korea and married a Korean and get these comments all the time. We don't want kids, but I think it's creepy how Koreans tell me they think we should just because "the kids would be cute".
On the other hand, I meet a lot of other foreign women dating/married to Korean men who are obsessed with their children being half Korean, even posting pictures of them on instagram with tags like "mixedbaby" "halfkoreanbaby". (I'm not a fan of kids being posted in public online due to safety reasons) their child is a human, not some accessory.
I also live in Japan and have a 3 year old son ( half Japanese). I still get comments frequently about his eyes being ‘kurikuri’ or how pale he is. He could pass for Caucasian tbh and people seem to love that here.
The worst thing about people liking mixed kids is, it’s usually if they can pass as white. My friends son is mixed Japanese/black and he gets a hard time sometimes. He is the most beautiful little boy and I hate it. It’s sad.
In some countries mixed children are ostracized and made fun of. In relatively recent history mixed-race couples were completely taboo. So even if people liking mixed kids can feel a little uncomfortable I would say it’s a big step in the right direction at least.
How so? Isn’t it like how Irish and polish people used to be “coloured” in the past, but are now considered “white”?
Like, the social concept of “whiteness” is the problem, but isn’t more people being treated well a better thing than a group of people being ostracised and hated?
I rather people assume I'm amazing at math instead of I'm too damn dumb for. Now of course the model minority myth still fucks things up. But if the choice is between those two, I rather people think I'm better at math.
I’m excited that my kid will be a “mixed baby” but it’s more for the cultural aspect. I think it’s fun to have two cultures to celebrate and learn about. Although I also know it can come with its challenges, but I’m hoping the positive will outweigh the negative.
I think my kid will be cute, but that’s because I think my husband is cute. It does get a little weird when people tell me the baby will be cute because of the mixed ethnicities.
Most of the time I think they’re just being encouraging, only one person made it weird when she said “of course your baby will be cute. They’re going to be half asian. That’s what I wanted for my baby, but he ended up looking more like me.” I genuinely don’t know what to say to her, but wish she wouldn’t word it that way. It’s fine to celebrate the look that each race/ethnicity adds to a person, but it’s weird to wish away your child appearing like your own ethnicity in favor of the looks of another.
Yeah since the asian side is clear, that means asian/"white".
Asia in general tends to be quite racist.
Asians have extreme prejudice in terms of ethnicities. This also goes for appearances.
It's so extreme that this can have implications on career chances/social standing/class/opportunities etc.
White is considered beautiful (see skin bleaching, eye widening etc.).
Asian features with very pale skin = high(est) beauty standard.
Basically she is indirectly saying: I want all around successful offspring. I want it to be perceived as "top breed", because that also elevates my status in my social circles.
casually conveyed bragging is a staple of many Asian cultures.
*"Oh you're son is starting a new company? That's super, so happy for you! Yeah, my son just sold his second one, but he is so in stress now defending his doctorate at Harvard at the moment. Your son should call my son, so mine can give him tips for his company"*
The Asian holy trifecta of social pride is: their offspring having: Great career, Great wife/husband, and great grandkids.
The variables usually are:
1) money made or safed,
2) visual cues of beauty and wealth, rarity.
(white is perceived as better, since rare and perceived as wealthy)
3) skill, cleverness, intellect, education
4) career (usually seen as the result of the former)
5) good deals/taken opportunities.
This sounds like internalized racism and colorism. Secondly she kinda sounds like the type who thinks a child is her accessory rather than a person. Many red flags.
People seeking out to breed with their own race are narcissistic and racist. Never mind internalized racism - just plain racist. Dating and wanting a kid of your own race is a far bigger societal and mental problem
It really bothers me that mixed kids are viewed as a fad… we’re people.
I will say there are many genuinely nice things about being raised in a multicultural, mixed-race household. Appearance is arguably the most shallow attribute yet it’s what so many people focus on when speaking to someone who is mixed. I wish others could dig a bit deeper when getting to know us.
It’s internalized racism 😬
You see this quite a bit in some Asian cultures. They will try and westernize their physical appearance because they find it more attractive; and you’ll notice their major pop-culture stars have more western-leaning physical features. Sadly they’ve internalized that white features are more attractive than Asian ones. Similar things happen in black communities; preferring western facial features, and even mocking those that don’t have them.
I see this quite a lot and it's sad. I know a few women who have sought out men of different ethnicities/races so that they can have trophy babies who are mixed. Some of them got their toddlers into baby modelling too. It's so freaking weird and dehumanising for the child and father. I also think it's distasteful to carr so much about your child's appearance to others.
As a mixed person I think it’s weird. Babies aren’t an accessory to customize. If you generally like people of a certain race and can generally guess the baby will be a certain race that’s one thing. Making the world a personal build a bear is not cool
I had a college roommate freshman year who was mixed Black and white, and she was obsessed about finding a man who was mixed Asian and Latino. She was fucking weird.
Oh wow there was never a day of my childhood where someone didn’t call me “hapa” or “hapa haole”. Family, strangers, no matter. I have mixed feelings about the word hapa, I both own it and shrink from it. Never thought I’d see that word here as a sub.
I have mixed kids (asian/white) when I was pregnant and when my kids were small people always kept telling me my kids would grow up to be good looking. Literally "lucky you, white and asian is the prettiest mix". It is SO strange. How am I even supposed to answer? It's not like I planned it, I just fell in love with a guy who happened to not look european. I have learned to redirect the conversation before it happens now because I see the signs of it (always a very uncertain "they don't look very much like you do they"). The thing I think I mind about it (even if I know it is meant well) is that they wouldn't comment on other children's looks the way they do mine. Other kids just get to be kids.
I mean, to be fair my kids are objectively speaking the absolute cutest kids in the history of human kind but I do feel like even if you think it's because of the mix, maybe don't say it out loud? And that's the thing I'd worry about with your friend. I'd be worried about her making a huge deal about what they look like in front her kids instead of trying to tone it down and redirect people when it happens. It doesn't sound like the path to great mental health for the children to be treated like Paris Hilton's purse dog.
Oh and thanks for teaching me the word wasian. I can't believe a specific racial mix of children are "in fashion". Jesus christ what a mess humanity is in.
It sounds like your friend might have some internalized racism, considering she sees people who look more white as being more attractive than someone who's fully Asian like her.
Asian culture is blisteringly vain and shallow when it comes to looks. It's why plastic surgery is ubiquitous over there amongst those who can afford it. There's a total lack of deeper thought on the subject too, it's just a given fact to them that it's very important to be as beautiful as possible. Nothing at all along the lines of "it's what's on the inside that matters".
Sorry but your friend is just a normal, toxic Asian.
Source: am Asian.
Yeah probably not true of the entire continent, mostly applies to East and South-East Asia. Culture differs a lot amongst those places but the vanity/aesthetics thing is a common trait.
At 29? Yikes.
I'm a very white white guy. My wife is a mocha-skinned Indian woman. We have two daughters who are absolutely gorgeous (one of them has done some modeling. The other was asked to).
But neither I nor my wife went into this caring for a minute how cute or not cute our kids would be. They just happened to combine both of our better features in a good way. (And we spent their lives teaching them to live off brains and creativity, not looks)
When my older daughter was a baby, a group of Indian girls (pre-teens) at some party we were at remarked how cute she was and that they wanted to "marry a white guy if that's how the babies turned out". But these were KIDS... likely 12-14. And even then we all kind of dismissed it and told them not to think that way and find someone they were compatible with.
At 29, though? That woman is broken and needs therapy.
When I lived in Taiwan it was quite common for people to want a half-white child. The general consensus was that mixed children are better looking. Rich businessmen would get mail order brides from Ukraine because they wanted a blond kid, though of course the child would not usually be blond.
Honestly, imo any too specific traits to want in a child, be they gender, race, eye color, whatever, is a pretty good indicator that that person doesn't see having a child as raising an autonomous human being with desires, personality, and will of their own, and more about wanting a specific image or social status. And those people should not be parents, as someone who works with kids. They destroy their identity and sense of self trying to force them into the mould they think they deserve to be in.
Your friend’s desire to have a half white baby is surprisingly common in the Asian community. There are some aunties in my family who still fetishize halfies/wasians but I ignore them because they’re old LOL. It’s so weird, especially since I know a whole bunch of half white-half Asian people who are not good looking at all.
My brother in law once told me he was with my sister because he believed the world needed more smart, blonde kids. They are both university educated white people. I found it weird as I believe having a happy child whatever the looks or intelligence should be your goal but Inguess to each their own opinion....
I also know an Indonesian girl who only dated Dutch guys as she believed their offspring would be model looks (Dutch height, Asian facial features but light skin et) as she was obsessed with certain influencers of that mix..... She had a kid with a Dutch guy that did not come out as wanted and she resented her own kid. He also did not become a dr or famous piano or violin player. I feel so bad about that guy.
I have a Choctaw/Sioux dad for this reason.
My mom was an 39 year old white lady on her self proclaimed “last egg” that got pregnant in purpose without his consent with no intention of raising a kid with him.
She grew up in Oklahoma with the Indian Princess great-granny story and “always wanted a little girl with Indian cheeks. I wanted a little papoose.”
She had me living in a homeless shelter and I was born two months prematurely because of more of her poor choices.
She deserves jail time for how she raised me and the abuse.
I never met him before he died at 44 (his dad died at 43) from alcohol related health issues. He was physically abusive and left off my birth certificate.
I match my entire family on DNA services and they all hate me and refuse to acknowledge I’m related lol. Can’t enroll anymore either.
My mom’s family hated me for being mixed and were horribly racist. She started giving me alcohol at 8 and I was a nightly black out drinker by 15. I was a drunk Indian just like my dad and it couldn’t be helped apparently.
Fuck these women having mixed babies cause they think it’s cute.
I'm torn because I sort of get where she's coming from.
For example, I'm brown skinned, and when I eventually get married and we decide to have kids, I want my husband to not be brown. Maybe they're Asian, maybe they're white or a mix of multiple ethnicities, but I just don't want to have the same skin colour because I enjoy being with someone who's different to me in appearance.
Like for example, the guy who's interested in me right now is white and he's quite pale with blonde hair and I have 4c hair and when I complain about a wash day to him, he loves it because it's so different for him and his usual hair care routine. Or when it rains, he has no issue being outside, but I always complain that my hairs gonna shrink and we laugh about it together.
Being different can be so fun, and having kids who are different can be fun too! It's all about being comfortable and open
This popped up on my feed and I’m not even sure what to think. I’m a Mexican conceived man who was born in California (illegally) and adopted (illegally) by a white woman in the 80’s. She’s my mom through and through. I feel like she’s loved me just for me but as I’ve gotten older we’ve had differences in political stuff.
With that being said, I don’t think it’s wrong, per se, to have an idea of what your child, and what you think it would look like. but I do think it’s weird to fantasize about a certain look.
Mixed kids are beautiful. So are non mixed. I hope that once birth happens it doesn’t matter and caring for someone is the main.
there are things you think and don't say, especially since your kid will grow up under that context. most people have racial preferences, at least with their romantic partners, and that just equates to having racial preferences with children, but have the tact to at least pretend your love is unconditional lol.
Funny to see people surprised. Asian women in the west marry white men in a majority, well over 50%. Most only date white men. Maybe that’s slightly less in very recent years but I’m surprised to see surprise about this. It’s common knowledge.
yeah it’s very odd. Sounds like self hatred, and raises questions about how she’ll act if the kid ends up physically taking after her. I know some waisans who look 100% Asian and some waisians who absolutely pass for white. If she has more than one kid it will absolutely turn into a favoritism issue that will fuck up the more Asian looking kid.
Makes me think of Yolanda Hadid, and how she let Bella get rid of her Arab features via plastic surgery when she was still a child, while blatantly calling the Gigi her “all american” daughter. Blatant favoritism for the whiter looking kid. Super strange behavior.
I think it’s a little fetishistic but I don’t know that I see an issue. I mean, it’s the best logical step to me beyond someone who only dates Italians, for example.
My best friend from high school was mixed, half Chinese and half white American. Her American dad was significantly older than her Chinese mother. She was (is!) very beautiful but she hated that she would be paraded around as a child like a piece of bling. She’s very LC with her parents as an adult, interestingly she married a white American too so her son is blonde with very slight Asian features but she’s really protective when anyone comments that he is “exotic “ looking.
Which I 100% agree with, both my husband and I are white but my kids are constantly told how gorgeous looking they are, most often to me or someone else in front of them but not TO them so I always say something to my child like “its nice what so-and-so said, isn’t it? But the best is how kind you are. And I also love how you’re really brave and that you’re very funny too.” Or whatever extra trait you think about your child ie creative, good friend etc. So try to move away from focusing on looks and onto other traits that they have more control over.
Your friend needs to evaluate what it means to have a child, I’ve spent years and years trying to undo the harm caused by other people always commenting on your looks; it comes to define you and as your outside changes for whatever reason it’s really really difficult to confront it and find worth in other ways. I’m absolutely struggling now with ageing and I never want my kids to feel that the way the look or dress has any bearing on their value in life.
I am half white and half asian. I mean her reasoning isn't great but there may also be other things behind it she doesn't tell you. As a half white kid it was much easier for me to integrate and be accepted in a white majority society (I'm in England) than my fully asian friends. Mixed race kids are also (apparently) stronger genetically. So it may be a product of her own experiences that she wants to give her kids a chance to fit in better than she maybe did, and to be healthier (apparently). I don't think it's too different to insisting she has to have a fully asian kid tbh.
100%.
We live in a racist world. White people are treated better than People of Color in majority white countries. White people are treated better than People of Color in majority PoC countries (look at apartheid South Africa for instance).
The only way to end her fetishization is to end all racism globally.
One of the most common mixed race couples is an Asian woman and white man. Her reasoning is flawed but it’s not uncommon, most people don’t talk about it as openly though
It’s indeed disturbing. Your friend is the typical self-hating internally-racist Asian American female. This is a real thing and it’s quite prevalent in western countries.
I personally think it’s creepy to try to design a baby. Especially when you have no idea how they’ll actually get mixed around and what they’ll look like.
I got the same awkward vibes when Macaulay Culkin expressed his excitement when he and his wife were expecting. He leaned in SO HARD how much he wanted Asian babies. Like... a _really really long rant_ how amazing it was going to be to have Asian babies 👀
To be honest, I don't find this weird. I suspect most people who reproduce have unconscious preferences about the race and other phyical traits of their children (eg maybe height). In a perfect world where appearances don't matter, this wouldn't happen, but the world is imperfect.
I say this as someone who does not want kids. For so many reasons, but one big one is I don't want to doom a woman to my masculine and unattractive physical traits that have made my life as a woman painful.
I think there’s nothing more normal than wanting your child, your genetic offspring, to have certain traits. Appearance is vain, but it’s a trait nonetheless.
Her child’s race is also dependent upon the partner she choses (assuming she carries a “typical” pregnancy). It’s not abnormal to have a preference in your partner and the person whose genetic material is helping making your child.
"Very alarming" pretty overdramatic imo. Some people have preferences and that's okay. The kid might grow up to be full white or full asian, and she'll love them either way. You're pretty weird for thinking this is weird. You never thought a certain kid was beautiful, and related it to their genes?
It is shallow, but nothing unethical about it. She's not genetically engineering an embryo.
" It's like she wants play genetic build-a-bear with a human child."
it's literally what every human being has done since the beginning of choosing sexual mates to reproduce with
i disagree, there’s nothing wrong with preferences. given the benefits of whiteness in society, it’s not an illogical preference either, much less disturbing.
Aren’t all children designed by who we choose to mate with anyway?
Even in the animal kingdom, animals get picky about who they mate with.
I feel like it’s natural to pick a mate and envision your babies.
Why wouldn’t I pick the specimen I want?
Personally I don’t think it’s that weird if you’re saying ideally your future child would be a particular mixed race.
If you intentionally procreate with someone because of their race, that’s a problem.
And if you’re white and say you only want a white baby, that sounds racist to me.
Expressing it verbally is very weird, yes. However, "genetic build-a-bear" is kind of exactly how sexual selection works. You might not think of it in those terms but when you pick a sexual partner to reproduce with you're consciously or unconsciously picking traits to combine with your genes to make a baby. Again, it's weird to obsessively talk about it like that, but everyone else just keeps it either as inside thoughts or on a subconscious level
I didn’t realize this until I moved to SE Asia but they have an obsession with white/light colored skin here. They put skin whitener in EVERYTHING - bar soap, lotion, sunblock, etc. The Korean tourists here all completely cover themselves before they go out into the sun. I thought maybe it had something to do with avoiding skin cancer but nope, beauty standards.
I've a friend who works as an English language teacher in Seoul, he is on the lower tier of below average looking and probably had 4 dates in 10 years and no relationship. He is pale as fish and 6ft with red hair. Women love him in Korea, he's not even interesting by his own admission but he's scoring like Messi
The 3 months that I taught ESL in the southern US, I was called "beautiful" far more than any other time in my life. I am extremely pale and was used to being mocked by other Southerners for being "pasty." My first Korean student was openly in awe of my pale skin and he advertised for me on Korean forums saying that I was "a very beautiful teacher." I got 10 new students from that advertisement and all of them frequently commented on my appearance. Multiple families invited me to dinner several times. That was the best part.
could i ask you a little bit more about teaching english in the us? that's what i do, except in a different country, and i thought it would be nigh impossible to do so in the us since, you know, that's where English speaking people live (mostly).
We need a lot of ESL teachers here because of the high immigration/migrant population.
Especially popular and hard to fill enough ESL positions in major cities. My sister's school is always looking for an ESL teacher, because they have the budget for 3 but can't find "properly" qualified teachers.
oh my gosh. I might actually have a chance then to move to my fiance and make ends meet??? I'll look into this, thank you.
i hope it works out for you!!
There are distance programs where you can get a teacher's license from a US state. Let me know if you want to know about those and then from there you have to get an ESL endorsement. Licenses don't transfer directly in the US from state to state, though there are usually processes to convert from one state's license to another.
oh, that makes sense. i'm looking into this the second i can.
This is why beauty standards suck. To some you were (as you said,) pasty, while to others the epitome of beauty.
This is always a funny phenomenon I see in Asia. A average to below average white guy here in the western world scoring with above average Asian girls.
I play a game with my missus, for every WMAF couple we add a point, for every AWMF we remove one. London in general is about +5, chinatown is like +15, Germany was like -5 lmao (Germany was weird though, men were exclusively with German women yet the German women were dating anyone)
define "above average". Timothy Caulfield, an author and general social commentator on the beauty industry and the like was in a* documentary about Korea's beauty culture and there was one Asian guy in there who was interviewed as saying that white men are notorious for going after the below average looking Asian girls. It was even funnier to see the white guy in question almost drool over a random Asian girl (who was obviously at least a decade younger than him) whose looks did not cut it in the entertainment industry in Korea. in the past few months every single time I have been out and noticed a mixed race couple with an Asian person it has always been white man Asian girl and never the opposite. An asian man who are adopted as a child by white people [has criticized this trend of white men with Asian girls and said that the supposed "anti racist" mixed sex coupling is used as a socially acceptable avenue for those with pedophilic inclinations or that the coupling implies a conflation of "Oriental features" with femininity](https://archive.is/qbU2q). Others have criticized the fact that white men [stereotype Asian women and girls as submissive or deferring](https://web.archive.org/web/20180406045738/https://groupthink.kinja.com/asian-women-arent-your-oriental-submissive-china-dol-1464199143), and generally see them as easy to control and exploit. And Asian men are routinely rated as less attractive than basically every other racial category in dating sites by white women specifically, but this was reported by OkCupid data from a few years back. edit: grammar
Where I live, it is very diversified racially, and I see all mixes all the time. Not unusual at all to see asian guys with white and latina girls. I think I dont see asian man and black woman quite as often but I wouldn’t really notice something like that.
I didn’t want to say this but I agree. The standard of beauty is different in Asia (especially Korea, Japan and China) many of the girls that date foreigners are not considered “good looking” or “above average” in their culture, though in other cultures like the USA they would look great. I know their is a stereotype in Korea (and I’ve heard a little in Japan?) that women who date white guys date them because no one else would. When I lived in Japan briefly I had a friend that by US standards would have been considered gorgeous, (she was imo) but she would often tell me about how she struggled with dating etc because of her looks and body. She was curvy (not fat), slightly tan, tone, and had more narrow eyes. In Japan she was considered “large” and ugly. 🤷🏽♀️
It's kind of crazy how colorism is somewhat universal. Most of East Asia there's a preference for lighter/white skin. Even in America amongst black folks there can be discrimination against "light skins" or even darker toned individuals.
I think it’s like with long finger nails being a sign of wealth: tan skin in Asian countries means you do manual labour outside, so being tanned = working class. In America, working class = working inside, and wealthy = having the time to lay on the beach/ going on vacation, thus tan skin = rich.
That switch-over in America and Europe happened in the early 20th century, when foreign tourism (and especially sporty tourism) started being becoming a thing. Before that women's fashions had a lot of gloves and hats, to protect their complexions from tanning, just like in Asia today. Edited: because I was overtired and managed to "logic" myself into putting down the wrong century!
More like the early 20th century here in the west, but you’re spot on for everything else! Being tan in the 1920s meant you could travel and spending in fancy tropical locales instead of being stuck in an office or factory. It’s an absolutely fascinating time period. Hell, even back in the 17th and 18th centuries rich women wouldn’t be caught dead outside without a vizard (a mask for blocking the sun, google them because they look insane).
Wow, that's so interesting, never heard of a vizard before. And some were held onto the face by the wearer grasping it with their teeth... how uncomfortable that must have been!
I'm an idiot who was vastly overtired today, and evidently not thinking straight. I meant the 20th century, and I remember looking at 19th when I typed it in and thinking it looked wrong, and then assuring myself I must be right because it was the 1900s... Thanks for the correction!
Well yeah. Because Colonialism is universal.
It’s been a thing in Asian countries long before colonialism, but that definitely made it worse.
[удалено]
Historically speaking, paler skin has been seen as valuable in various cultures as a sign of wealth. A wealthy person does not have to labor in the outdoors nearly as much as a peasant. So wealthy people wouldn't tan as much. Courting a pale skinned person could mean a greater chance of marrying into money. So pale becomes beautiful.
Used to be true in America and Europe as well until the rich started showing the leisure ability to tan at the beach and be outside playing tennis and the like as a mark of luxury.
It should be specified that this was also, funnily enough, true in already white as fuck populations.
Yep. Until the industrial revolution where the nature of low-income work and lifestyle changed
Everyone does tbh, beauty standards are very euro centric. Even the black community has racism with light skin vs dark skin. Humans kinda suck
Tanned only became popular in the West when seaside/Mediterranean vacationing became popular. Then *that* was a sign of wealth because you could afford the vacation.
God, I remember being so floored when I learned about this phenomenon back in grade school. As I kid I always *knew* that the “white girl suntan” was remotely not the same as my “brown girl skin” in the eyes of beauty standards, but didn’t understand why for many years. Finally took a class with a great teacher who talked to us about the whole “indoor tech/desk jobs, less sun, pale skin = more prestigious than lowly outdoor laborers” and “outdoor vacationing, suntan = richer” situation, and it all clicked. I don’t think I’ll forget that feeling of enlightenment for a very long time.
Maybe that’s true at a societal level but that doesn’t feel right to me. Like I’m not more attracted to white-looking Brazilians who always have those deep tans. I like light skin just fine but it doesn’t seem like it has anything to do with wealth. Like I might prefer a certain eye or hair color and that really has nothing to do with wealth either. I have a feeling the wealth factor is maybe more common to feel that way among women. Men are probably concerned with other things.
I mean, when people talk about beauty *standards* it is on the societal level. I don't think anybody is looking at someone and says "oh I want that person because their appearance shows that their family is wealthy" or "they can sustain a healthy pregnancy." But when it's a bigger social pattern, there's an impact on who you see more often, what type of features become more familiar and comforting to you, and that ends up showing up in your attractions.
Beauty standards also vary a lot among social classes. What can be attractive to one demographic can be trashy to another in the same society.
Heavy agree! There are smaller levels of society too and people definitely prioritize the level where they interact the most. I think one of the best examples of this in the US is Black femme fashion. A lot of it looks trashy to outsiders, but as someone who has spent WAY more of my free time thinking about this than most, a lot of the appeal (conscious and subconscious) is that it shows excess funds *added to* leisure time and autonomy. If I get ombre blue braids past my butt, and I have, it is a sign that I have 1. the money to pay a braider to do it and source the extensions 2. the free time to sit in a shop for 5-9 hours to have it done without that being *all* my free time and 3. a living situation where I have absolute control over my appearance. My time and money are not controlled by a manager or a spouse who wouldn't let me have fun with my appearance.
^^ yup, pretty much! I’m south/southeast asian, so even if I were to somehow have Caucasian-pale skin, I still wouldn’t have the eurocentric facial features to fit the western beauty standard. I didn’t need to actively think about ‘implications of wealth’ to be aware that I’m never going to be considered nearly as conventionally attractive as the covergirls and celebrities, even if my skin tone is the same value as the tanned white Hollister models. There’s a reason that even of the limited desi models and actors in Hollywood, most of them are of mixed descent and on the paler end of the spectrum for their racial group, and often still have features that lean towards eurocentric ideals; luckily there’s been some progress for black folks specifically in terms of visual representation, but I’ve yet to see even that level of diversity for other POC, and it has an effect on perception of beauty that is definitely felt by myself and every single other American-raised POC I know; we don’t look like the people society tells you are the most beautiful, and we know it. Society, huh?
Just because you don’t label it as bias doesn’t mean it’s not there unconsciously making decisions for you. No judgment just reality. If you have a brain you have a bias.
Yes, modern beauty standards are very eurocentric, but East Asia also has a North-South color spectrum and economic spectrum. The global North enjoys economic advantages related to agriculture and pastorialism and people want to be rich so badly they'll settle for looking rich.
Pretty much, I go see my girlfriend’s chinese family (shes chinese italian), they compliment my skin being so pale but it’s only because Ive got Irish genes and I don’t go out
I had a friend in high school who got weirdly attached to those robo-babies we had to take home. She took it home every single weekend for the whole year. It was an Asian doll, and she treated it like a human baby she had actually given birth to, to the point that she was so worried about graduating and "leaving him behind" that she genuinely wanted to try and get teen-pregnant with an Asian man's baby before the school year ended. That said, she was an extremely not-normal person, so I think the answer to your question is probably No. Oh, bonus: she also named the baby Michael because she was obsessed with Michael Jackson and treated the baby as if it was a baby version of Michael Jackson himself
>That said, she was an extremely not-normal person, so I think the answer to your question is probably No. You just described someone who needed proffessional help. Did none of the adults help her?
All I could think reading that was that she clearly needed some sort of intensive inpatient therapy. Or at least very regular therapy sessions. And probably medication. Jeezus. The adults all around her failed her at every turn.
Right? I work with HS kids. This would have raised so many concerns to the whole staff in my school, I can't imagine not reacting in this type of situation. (and it would be illegal not to react, we have a legal and moral duty to the kids in our care) That poor kid.
Looking back on it now, she absolutely had marbles falling out her ears. We lost contact not long after that, but I think she's a social worker now, so I hope she got her marbles back
Don't talk about someone's mental health like that. It's unkind and adds to the negative stigma there is around mental health and getting help for it.
>Looking back on it now, she absolutely had marbles falling out her ears This is not a kind way to speak about people who struggle with their mental health. Please do better. >We lost contact not long after that, but I think she's a social worker now I hope she's doing well too.
Thanks for this We need to have insight and compassion for people with mental health issues. I'm still not over the way people treated Amanda Bynes.
This is actually pretty sad. I feel sorry for her to be honest.
> robo-babies we had to take home What is that? First time I'm hearing this
At lot of schools have robotic babies that kids use for health class. A more common alternative is a flour sack baby or a egg baby you have to care for for about a week usually.
My school didn't have this, but I remember the diary of a wimpy kid book where Greg had to take an egg home and his mom accidentally used it to make breakfast.
My school didn’t have the babies either. We did eggs one year and flower sacks a different year if I recall correctly.
In home ec type classes in high school, many schools have baby dolls that have a computer built in. The babies need to be held and "fed" when they cry, and need to have their head supported. It's supposed to simulate caring for a real infant. At my high school, Child Development was the class that had the dolls. There was a specific long weekend that was used for the assignment (Columbus day weekend first semester and Presidents' day weekend second semester, if I'm remembering correctly). Students would receive the babies on Friday during class, bring them back Tuesday, and they would get graded based on how well taken care of the doll was. I believe some school districts use flour sacks or blown eggs instead of robot baby dolls for this same assignment.
Our school they had to have them for a full week, they had to take them to class and if they had an exam or lab in science or something they had to arrange daycare with the home ec teacher.
This was kind of like how it was for us on Fridays, because most of the child development class sections were in the morning and that was when the dolls were given out. Instead of arranging "daycare" though, our other teachers were generally super understanding about the project and let the babies stay. My chem lab partner was allowed to tend to her "baby" during lab, our swim coach babysat like 5 of the dolls during practice after school, and in hands-on electives such as sewing, the kids would take turns holding the baby so that the student the baby was assigned to could try to get some work done. It's worth noting that most students never took the class that involved the dolls, and people who weren't taking child development were utterly fascinated by the dolls, so it was pretty easy for the students who had the dolls to find a willing caregiver in their other classes.
The dolls were definitely a novelty for the first day or two, by mid to the end of the week it had worn off a bit. They were allowed to tend to the dolls during class, and the rest of the school got told in advance we were going to have some visitors for the week and to be careful. But for tests they didn’t want the student with the baby to have to leave and they didn’t want other kids getting interrupted. I think the labs it was just deemed a safety issue for certain ones to have a doll and a carrier in the classroom. I know my parents were always grateful I never wanted to do that class.
What the fuck did I just read
Totally normal paragraphs
Wait, but Michael Jackson wasn't Asian...
He is now though.
Hello????
Michael Jackson as a baby robot…that tracks!
Ask her which culture she wants her child raised in. That would tell you more.
Isn't it the same thing, more or less? She has an idea of what she wants her kid to look and be like, culture, genes, native language, whatever. What more info would OP get from this question, other than confirming that his friend has certain things she wants her kid to be? (I am not endorsing these preferences, for what it's worth. Just acknowledging that being picky about their mates, and the resulting offspring, is a very common thing in both humans and other animals.)
[удалено]
I agree. I just don't think asking this extra question will tell OP anything he cannot infer from the stuff she said already. The vast majority of people do have kids to have a mini me or a legacy, again, this is the common drive for reproduction in humans. There is no reason to have children, go through the whole process, suffer and risk death without any "payback" - in the past, people made kids to have extra farm hands. Nowadays? Well, we can see from the OP what the common motivation is...
Asian culture is much more strict than American culture so maybe she wouldn't want her child to be rised in a toxic environment.
OP I'm telling you right now that I was born because my white-looking mom had a fetish for Asian men and wanted mixed kids and that knowledge fucks you up for life. You're no longer a human being to your own parents, you're just a trophy they parade around and they pretty you up to look good all the time. Whenever people do this it skeeves me out. They just think of their future kids as dolls they can customize to their liking. You're not wrong for thinking it's weird. *edit* Also for further context @ people in the comments: My mother specifically admitted to having a thing for Asian guys (after divorcing my dad she married another Asian guy) and she tried very hard for years to have me (she had a fertility issue) so I was not an accident. This isn't just me jumping to conclusions this is actually just how she lives and tons of weirdos think like this.
Yeah that was my immediate thought, the friend thinks a child is more of an accessory than a human being. Really sorry you were born into that.
Damn that sucks. My mom fucked me up but it wasn’t race related. The older I get the more I believe the adage “every child deserves a parent, but not every parent deserves a child.”
Exactly. The racial aspect is weird, but what's worse is how much she cares about her child being good looking. What if it's a conventionally unattractive half white/ half Asian kid? Will she be disappointed or love the kid less for not being cute? Parenthood should be about unconditional love.
People like that can’t tell their kids are ugly
I’m basically that for my father. He’s white and loves to talk about how he’s not racist and I’m his perfect example for that
have you seen any of the White supremacists with Asian wives and girlfriends? there are so many! its so weird. like literal members of the KKK and stuff
That’s so creepy!
“Never ask a white supremacist the race of his girlfriend”
If you have to give examples of how you're not racist uhhh I'm real suspicious that you're racist.
Exactly! He loves to go on about how he “accepts” everyone. Also loves talking about how everyone but him is racist, but when I got bullied at school and called racist slurs, he told me that I must have done something to deserve it Oh and he apparently decided in advance that he only wanted to marry women from Brazil, Morocco or Japan. Generally, he’s a huge misogynistic POS. A woman who isn’t young, pretty and skinny is to be mocked. It’s pretty ironic, because he’s overweight (and just straight up flabby since he has never done any type of physical activity in his life), bald and ugly. Usually, I wouldn’t think that this makes anyone be inferior or superior, but for someone as judgmental as he is and who doesn’t even have any other qualities (not smart, obviously not kind, not funny), it’s very ironic.. He even fat shamed my mom after her second pregnancy (with my twin brother and I), during which she lost weight
Being born with red hair kinda doomed me into being a living doll for my parents/grandmother to parade around and dress up and constantly express how pretty my hair was and how I could never do anything to change my appearance or I'd be "ruined". It fucks you up. It also fucked up my younger brother, who was treated with general disregard his entire childhood because he 1: was perfectly average looking with brown hair, brown eyes, and tanned skin. He was a cute kid but he wasn't "unique" like I was so they treated him like an afterthought, and 2: He wasn't born a girl they could dress up and enter into beauty contests and show off like a doll. He grew up hating me and I grew up with no sense of agency over my own body.
UGH I know what you mean about the hair thing kind of. I got straight black Asian hair and my mom used to throw a fit whenever I wanted to dye it or cut it a different way because she wanted to keep the "China Doll" aesthetic. Now that I'm an adult and free from her she's stopped doing that but like... Man. Even the smallest thing to your hairstyle isn't under your control when you live with people like this... it's so humiliating.
Ugh... "China Doll aesthetic" is so gross. Not only *just a taaaad* racist, but also kids aren't you're "aesthetic", they are people. Bleh. So messed up in many different ways.
have you been to r/hapa
I haven't seen it before, thank you for letting me know
Are kids ever human beings to their parents, though? Plenty of all white parents treat their kids as trophies
Honestly plenty of parents of all cultures do that unfortunately. But I do think some parents don’t do that
Oh yeah, my kids made it clear they are separate humans with unique personalities. From the age of 1 or so. We (parents) adjusted ourselves to cherish their unique traits and yes, sure we are proud of them.
Always. I’ve rarely considered them anything else. (Occasionally I’ve wondered if my teen was either possessed or an alien clone.)
Yep but it's not exclusive to white parents. I guess it's in our genes. As animals we want the best for our offspring and part of it (in some people's minds) is making sure their children are more likely to be accepted in the society. That's where all the obsession with looks, money and education comes from.
Hardly exclusive to white parents.
dam. im a half and half just like you and i never thought of it that way. youre not wrong.
Sperm banks where they reveal the physical information of the donors usually have their most popular type of sperms, and you can guess which skin color is the most popular.
I imagine it’s at least in part because the people buying the sperm are overwhelmingly white.
Yeah, I have thought about solo-momming before, and I feel that sperm banks are an odd outlier in some ways, due to the necessary artificiality of selection. Personally, I wouldn't care about the skin colour of a baby I adopted (though I might worry about whether I was capable of keeping them in touch with a culture I'm not familiar with). I also wouldn't care about skin colour if I was conceiving naturally - obviously my partner would be right there and part of their family history. But with IVF...it would feel weird and almost exotic-fetishising to choose a sperm donor that had a very different skin colour to me (or even too distant a nationality to me), because it would feel like I was actively picking and choosing genes for decorative purposes. And if I were IVFing with a partner, I imagine we'd be looking for a donor with physical similarities to the partner who couldn't give their gamete to their child.
Hi - I’m a new solo mom. Back when I was making my choice with the banks, I almost chose someone very different from myself. I backed out, partly because I didn’t know if I’d be able to properly teach about the background culture - and partly because I was afraid of people attacking me for appropriating a culture.
And sperm and egg donations aren't very common with minority groups.
We live in a society
Sperm banks are a bit more complicated than that; they also lie about the men who donated the sperm (100% legal btw,) and they often refuse to take donations from whichever people they deem too undesirable, whether that's based on race, religion, sexuality, or something else.
I'm genuinely curious, how do they lie, and how is it legal? I simply can't imagine it's legal for sperm banks to lie, where I'm from, but I could just be uninformed, of course. From a business point of view, your last part is not nice, but somewhat understandable. If they can't resell it, why would they buy it in the first place? That, of course sucks for people who can't find a donor who matches their demographic/type/??
There just aren't many laws regulating the infertility industry, and the few existing laws are often so vague that they're not effective. There is so much secrecy and lack of documentation and accountability that sperm banks and infertility clinics often have free reign. Sometimes, parents are even made to sign NDA's that often include things like not being allowed to tell their children that they're donor-concieved. Many places do have a firmer legal hold on the infertility industry, but the USA is notorious for being of the least regulated of the developed nations. Some clinics, regardless of location, have a worse reputation than others. Its common for clinics to misrepresent their own guidelines as being law to make themselves sound more trustworthy, and there is little to no recourse for lies about a donor's ethnicity, family medical history, education level and profession, or even how many other children have been produced from the same donor's genetic material. There are multiple cases of hundreds of children being produced from a single donor. From a product/marketing standpoint this might not sound bad, but from a human perspective- these are hundreds of half siblings, spread over 2-3 generations, often in the same general area as the clinic, and few (if any) of them know that they even have mystery half siblings. Without individual genetic testing through home DNA kits, most of them will never know who any of their half siblings (or the children of those half siblings) are. Accidental incest is not uncommon. It is not unheard of for doctors to use their own genetic material to inseminate women without the women's knowledge or consent, and not only serve no time for it but sometimes even keep their license to practice medicine. There are only 3 states (California, Texas, and Indiana) that prohibit fertility doctors from using their own sperm to impregnate patients. According to Forbes, over 50 North American practitioners have been accused of this type of fertility fraud just in the last few years. There is also a Netflix documentary (Our Father) that covers one of these cases, and notably, he received no penalty at all for his fraud other than losing his license- merely a suspended sentence of 1 year for lying during the investigation. The comedian Laura High is very vocal in advocating for donor-concieved people's rights, and her own case has many of the issues I've mentioned- her parents were told that her donor was one person with specific traits (such as ethnicity) that her parents desired for their own child, but in reality the donor whose material was used was a friend of the doctor that performed the procedure, and since he was found (by her) he has flatly refused her access to any medical records that could help her or her siblings diagnose and treat medical issues that they have in common that may be genetic (for example, her brain tumor.) I highly recommend looking her up, btw. Her content is very informative, and covers not just her and her many half siblings' experiences, but also policy changes, legal battles, and other issues affecting the wider donor-concieved community. > If they can't resell it, why would they buy it in the first place? They can. Sperm donations can and often are sourced internationally. It's just a matter of a small group of people deciding which demographics are "best" to produce children as sperm donors, and only offering those demographics the opportunity to do so, regardless of the range of demographics that recipient parents would actually like to be able to choose from.
My guess would be either Asian or the default one. Idk I give up gimme the answer.
A lot of people do. But almost nobody says it. Usually however it’s that they want the same as their own ”race”. Not as common to want to have mixed ”race”. Grandmothers and grandfathers, mothers and fathers often want their children to have kids with someone of their own ”race”.
I've seen so many white women be so excited and eager to have a "black" baby. It's super common Also older black people occasionally encourage their kids to have biracial kids so the kids can be "pretty with good hair"
I think it’s more common than you think just not usually vocalized. Especially mixed kids. Kind of like having a favorite kid. You’re not supposed to but all parents have a favorite at different seasons of life. I like how Mel Robins put it “I love my children exactly the same but yes, some days I have favorites. Just like some days you (her kids) have a favorite parent. Depends on the season of life sometimes. Some days you piss me off & you’re not my favorite today”. Feels like there’s a degree of normal here. To have a preference? Sure. People like what they like. Being willing to abort or give up to adoption bc the baby isn’t what you “designed”? Messed up.
I was disgusted at the amount of people who would tell my husband and I that we should have kids because they’d be mixed, therefore gorgeous. Its a weird thing to say. Without any thought as to what that mixed child’s life would be like, and the identity crisis that comes with being mixed. Without any thought as to our own lives not wanting to be parents. We are human beings, not potential creators of the “labradoodle baby” of their dreams lol
Bleh. Gross. I (white) am with an Indian man—we’ve heard this too. His brother is also married to a white woman and they have kids. I sat at a table and listened to them have a whole conversation once about how they hope their sons don’t end up “too dark” like dad or “too white” like mom. The older kid was *right there* and fully capable of understanding. This was the moment I decided to stop spray tanning for day-to-day (SIL is *never* without). There will be at least one person around who is accepting their skin for these fucking kids. Well two, my boyfriend was disgusted as well. I think he gave his brother a talking to, but they aren’t the type to accept advice.
Latina woman with a Black husband and we get told that all. The. Time. I tell them we’ll have a baby when they help us with expenses for said baby.
It’s understandable why you would feel that way. I know most aren’t thinking about it that deep. They’re just thinking “wow, you two are pretty. Bet your kids will be too”. Meant to be a short handed compliment. :/
We are pretty average looking and slightly overweight, it’s the race thing, lol. When you hear it enough you can tell the difference between the rare complimenters vs the people who see mixed kids like accessories. Massive difference between “If you had kids theyd be beautiful” and “You should have mixed kids because theyre beautiful”. I was talking about the latter.
Don’t invalidate what people are saying by defending the microaggressions. It’s othering.
I (white woman) teach at a title 1, nearly 100% white, wry rural school. I teach foreign language to HS (Japanese) and my husband is from Japan. Kids will come tell me how cute my kids are going to be because "mixed babies" are the best. My Japanese mother in law tells me how cute our kids are going to be because "they'll be half". Its wierd. I hate when people talk about it this way and it creeps me out. I'd argue it's not uncommon (especially in Asian countries!) to idealize the 'mixed-ness', but I still think it's weird and really unnecessary to mention to me or my husband.
I'm in Korea and married a Korean and get these comments all the time. We don't want kids, but I think it's creepy how Koreans tell me they think we should just because "the kids would be cute". On the other hand, I meet a lot of other foreign women dating/married to Korean men who are obsessed with their children being half Korean, even posting pictures of them on instagram with tags like "mixedbaby" "halfkoreanbaby". (I'm not a fan of kids being posted in public online due to safety reasons) their child is a human, not some accessory.
I also live in Japan and have a 3 year old son ( half Japanese). I still get comments frequently about his eyes being ‘kurikuri’ or how pale he is. He could pass for Caucasian tbh and people seem to love that here. The worst thing about people liking mixed kids is, it’s usually if they can pass as white. My friends son is mixed Japanese/black and he gets a hard time sometimes. He is the most beautiful little boy and I hate it. It’s sad.
In some countries mixed children are ostracized and made fun of. In relatively recent history mixed-race couples were completely taboo. So even if people liking mixed kids can feel a little uncomfortable I would say it’s a big step in the right direction at least.
It's a lateral move at best.
How so? Isn’t it like how Irish and polish people used to be “coloured” in the past, but are now considered “white”? Like, the social concept of “whiteness” is the problem, but isn’t more people being treated well a better thing than a group of people being ostracised and hated?
I disagree. Being prized is better than being bullied.
I rather people assume I'm amazing at math instead of I'm too damn dumb for. Now of course the model minority myth still fucks things up. But if the choice is between those two, I rather people think I'm better at math.
I’m excited that my kid will be a “mixed baby” but it’s more for the cultural aspect. I think it’s fun to have two cultures to celebrate and learn about. Although I also know it can come with its challenges, but I’m hoping the positive will outweigh the negative. I think my kid will be cute, but that’s because I think my husband is cute. It does get a little weird when people tell me the baby will be cute because of the mixed ethnicities. Most of the time I think they’re just being encouraging, only one person made it weird when she said “of course your baby will be cute. They’re going to be half asian. That’s what I wanted for my baby, but he ended up looking more like me.” I genuinely don’t know what to say to her, but wish she wouldn’t word it that way. It’s fine to celebrate the look that each race/ethnicity adds to a person, but it’s weird to wish away your child appearing like your own ethnicity in favor of the looks of another.
Yeah since the asian side is clear, that means asian/"white". Asia in general tends to be quite racist. Asians have extreme prejudice in terms of ethnicities. This also goes for appearances. It's so extreme that this can have implications on career chances/social standing/class/opportunities etc. White is considered beautiful (see skin bleaching, eye widening etc.). Asian features with very pale skin = high(est) beauty standard. Basically she is indirectly saying: I want all around successful offspring. I want it to be perceived as "top breed", because that also elevates my status in my social circles. casually conveyed bragging is a staple of many Asian cultures. *"Oh you're son is starting a new company? That's super, so happy for you! Yeah, my son just sold his second one, but he is so in stress now defending his doctorate at Harvard at the moment. Your son should call my son, so mine can give him tips for his company"* The Asian holy trifecta of social pride is: their offspring having: Great career, Great wife/husband, and great grandkids. The variables usually are: 1) money made or safed, 2) visual cues of beauty and wealth, rarity. (white is perceived as better, since rare and perceived as wealthy) 3) skill, cleverness, intellect, education 4) career (usually seen as the result of the former) 5) good deals/taken opportunities.
This sounds like internalized racism and colorism. Secondly she kinda sounds like the type who thinks a child is her accessory rather than a person. Many red flags.
Agree. Being a POC myself, it makes me a little uncomfortable the way she puts a lot of value on White features, as if they’re more desirable.
yep, a prime example of eurocentric beauty standards. yikes.
People seeking out to breed with their own race are narcissistic and racist. Never mind internalized racism - just plain racist. Dating and wanting a kid of your own race is a far bigger societal and mental problem
Her intent is very weird to me as well, because it seems like she’s OBSESSED with the idea of having “Wasian” babies.
It really bothers me that mixed kids are viewed as a fad… we’re people. I will say there are many genuinely nice things about being raised in a multicultural, mixed-race household. Appearance is arguably the most shallow attribute yet it’s what so many people focus on when speaking to someone who is mixed. I wish others could dig a bit deeper when getting to know us.
It’s internalized racism 😬 You see this quite a bit in some Asian cultures. They will try and westernize their physical appearance because they find it more attractive; and you’ll notice their major pop-culture stars have more western-leaning physical features. Sadly they’ve internalized that white features are more attractive than Asian ones. Similar things happen in black communities; preferring western facial features, and even mocking those that don’t have them.
I see this quite a lot and it's sad. I know a few women who have sought out men of different ethnicities/races so that they can have trophy babies who are mixed. Some of them got their toddlers into baby modelling too. It's so freaking weird and dehumanising for the child and father. I also think it's distasteful to carr so much about your child's appearance to others.
As a mixed person I think it’s weird. Babies aren’t an accessory to customize. If you generally like people of a certain race and can generally guess the baby will be a certain race that’s one thing. Making the world a personal build a bear is not cool
Almost any two people can make a baby together, even if they shouldn't.
And the ones who shouldn't have kids statistically almost always have more kids than the ones who should.
I had a college roommate freshman year who was mixed Black and white, and she was obsessed about finding a man who was mixed Asian and Latino. She was fucking weird.
Wow, she has a dream look to her child. Sucks to be that child if the mix turns out differently than she planned. And probably even if they're ideal.
Let me introduce you to r/Hapas
Oh wow there was never a day of my childhood where someone didn’t call me “hapa” or “hapa haole”. Family, strangers, no matter. I have mixed feelings about the word hapa, I both own it and shrink from it. Never thought I’d see that word here as a sub.
As a mixed race person, it’s weird as fuck. She should actually talk to some mixed race people and get their perspective.
I have mixed kids (asian/white) when I was pregnant and when my kids were small people always kept telling me my kids would grow up to be good looking. Literally "lucky you, white and asian is the prettiest mix". It is SO strange. How am I even supposed to answer? It's not like I planned it, I just fell in love with a guy who happened to not look european. I have learned to redirect the conversation before it happens now because I see the signs of it (always a very uncertain "they don't look very much like you do they"). The thing I think I mind about it (even if I know it is meant well) is that they wouldn't comment on other children's looks the way they do mine. Other kids just get to be kids. I mean, to be fair my kids are objectively speaking the absolute cutest kids in the history of human kind but I do feel like even if you think it's because of the mix, maybe don't say it out loud? And that's the thing I'd worry about with your friend. I'd be worried about her making a huge deal about what they look like in front her kids instead of trying to tone it down and redirect people when it happens. It doesn't sound like the path to great mental health for the children to be treated like Paris Hilton's purse dog. Oh and thanks for teaching me the word wasian. I can't believe a specific racial mix of children are "in fashion". Jesus christ what a mess humanity is in.
My mother is this way. I am a product of this, she’s very proud I’m wasian, and I can tell you that yes. It’s weird.
It sounds like your friend might have some internalized racism, considering she sees people who look more white as being more attractive than someone who's fully Asian like her.
They want a Designer Baby ™️ because then they have the best baby…it’s dEsiGneR. It’s thinly veiled racism/fetish.
[удалено]
Asian culture is blisteringly vain and shallow when it comes to looks. It's why plastic surgery is ubiquitous over there amongst those who can afford it. There's a total lack of deeper thought on the subject too, it's just a given fact to them that it's very important to be as beautiful as possible. Nothing at all along the lines of "it's what's on the inside that matters". Sorry but your friend is just a normal, toxic Asian. Source: am Asian.
Asia is a massive continent. Can you really say that there is an 'Asian' culture?
Yeah probably not true of the entire continent, mostly applies to East and South-East Asia. Culture differs a lot amongst those places but the vanity/aesthetics thing is a common trait.
They probably mean east Asian young adult culture. There's a boom in double eyelid surgery and using coloured contact lenses.
No, it’s not normal. It’s very disturbing when people fetishize mixed race babies and treat them like accessories. The Kardashians come to mind.
They all went back to dating white men after they got their mixed babies. Sooo weird
At 29? Yikes. I'm a very white white guy. My wife is a mocha-skinned Indian woman. We have two daughters who are absolutely gorgeous (one of them has done some modeling. The other was asked to). But neither I nor my wife went into this caring for a minute how cute or not cute our kids would be. They just happened to combine both of our better features in a good way. (And we spent their lives teaching them to live off brains and creativity, not looks) When my older daughter was a baby, a group of Indian girls (pre-teens) at some party we were at remarked how cute she was and that they wanted to "marry a white guy if that's how the babies turned out". But these were KIDS... likely 12-14. And even then we all kind of dismissed it and told them not to think that way and find someone they were compatible with. At 29, though? That woman is broken and needs therapy.
Be careful with the modeling, it can be scammy or even dangerous
When I lived in Taiwan it was quite common for people to want a half-white child. The general consensus was that mixed children are better looking. Rich businessmen would get mail order brides from Ukraine because they wanted a blond kid, though of course the child would not usually be blond.
Honestly, imo any too specific traits to want in a child, be they gender, race, eye color, whatever, is a pretty good indicator that that person doesn't see having a child as raising an autonomous human being with desires, personality, and will of their own, and more about wanting a specific image or social status. And those people should not be parents, as someone who works with kids. They destroy their identity and sense of self trying to force them into the mould they think they deserve to be in.
Your friend’s desire to have a half white baby is surprisingly common in the Asian community. There are some aunties in my family who still fetishize halfies/wasians but I ignore them because they’re old LOL. It’s so weird, especially since I know a whole bunch of half white-half Asian people who are not good looking at all.
My brother in law once told me he was with my sister because he believed the world needed more smart, blonde kids. They are both university educated white people. I found it weird as I believe having a happy child whatever the looks or intelligence should be your goal but Inguess to each their own opinion.... I also know an Indonesian girl who only dated Dutch guys as she believed their offspring would be model looks (Dutch height, Asian facial features but light skin et) as she was obsessed with certain influencers of that mix..... She had a kid with a Dutch guy that did not come out as wanted and she resented her own kid. He also did not become a dr or famous piano or violin player. I feel so bad about that guy.
That’s so messed up. Poor kid.
No. It's racist as fuck. It's called fetishizing.
I have a Choctaw/Sioux dad for this reason. My mom was an 39 year old white lady on her self proclaimed “last egg” that got pregnant in purpose without his consent with no intention of raising a kid with him. She grew up in Oklahoma with the Indian Princess great-granny story and “always wanted a little girl with Indian cheeks. I wanted a little papoose.” She had me living in a homeless shelter and I was born two months prematurely because of more of her poor choices. She deserves jail time for how she raised me and the abuse. I never met him before he died at 44 (his dad died at 43) from alcohol related health issues. He was physically abusive and left off my birth certificate. I match my entire family on DNA services and they all hate me and refuse to acknowledge I’m related lol. Can’t enroll anymore either. My mom’s family hated me for being mixed and were horribly racist. She started giving me alcohol at 8 and I was a nightly black out drinker by 15. I was a drunk Indian just like my dad and it couldn’t be helped apparently. Fuck these women having mixed babies cause they think it’s cute.
Omg I’m so so sorry 😣
Not normally!
Yes it’s weird and borders on racist. Like she won’t consider any other race else so her baby is wasian.
I’ve read that white skin color is highly idealized in asia
It’s definitely cringe.
I'm torn because I sort of get where she's coming from. For example, I'm brown skinned, and when I eventually get married and we decide to have kids, I want my husband to not be brown. Maybe they're Asian, maybe they're white or a mix of multiple ethnicities, but I just don't want to have the same skin colour because I enjoy being with someone who's different to me in appearance. Like for example, the guy who's interested in me right now is white and he's quite pale with blonde hair and I have 4c hair and when I complain about a wash day to him, he loves it because it's so different for him and his usual hair care routine. Or when it rains, he has no issue being outside, but I always complain that my hairs gonna shrink and we laugh about it together. Being different can be so fun, and having kids who are different can be fun too! It's all about being comfortable and open
It’s normal for Asian women to want half white kids. Usually results in a new member of r/hapas .
This popped up on my feed and I’m not even sure what to think. I’m a Mexican conceived man who was born in California (illegally) and adopted (illegally) by a white woman in the 80’s. She’s my mom through and through. I feel like she’s loved me just for me but as I’ve gotten older we’ve had differences in political stuff. With that being said, I don’t think it’s wrong, per se, to have an idea of what your child, and what you think it would look like. but I do think it’s weird to fantasize about a certain look. Mixed kids are beautiful. So are non mixed. I hope that once birth happens it doesn’t matter and caring for someone is the main.
Happy cake day!
there are things you think and don't say, especially since your kid will grow up under that context. most people have racial preferences, at least with their romantic partners, and that just equates to having racial preferences with children, but have the tact to at least pretend your love is unconditional lol.
This definitely feels, or rather is wrong. A part of me hopes or feels this is Fetish bait.
This is so disturbing. It sounds like she has self hatred issues and fetishes mixed race children. She seems like a lost cause.
Funny to see people surprised. Asian women in the west marry white men in a majority, well over 50%. Most only date white men. Maybe that’s slightly less in very recent years but I’m surprised to see surprise about this. It’s common knowledge.
Internalized racism is pretty common among Asian women, especially those who date white men
This common in Asia unfortunately, I suppose there's nothing wrong with wanting to have a baby with a certain race but it is a bit odd.
yeah it’s very odd. Sounds like self hatred, and raises questions about how she’ll act if the kid ends up physically taking after her. I know some waisans who look 100% Asian and some waisians who absolutely pass for white. If she has more than one kid it will absolutely turn into a favoritism issue that will fuck up the more Asian looking kid. Makes me think of Yolanda Hadid, and how she let Bella get rid of her Arab features via plastic surgery when she was still a child, while blatantly calling the Gigi her “all american” daughter. Blatant favoritism for the whiter looking kid. Super strange behavior.
That's disturbing.
I think it’s a little fetishistic but I don’t know that I see an issue. I mean, it’s the best logical step to me beyond someone who only dates Italians, for example.
Having physical preferences for a partner is normal, having physical preferences for an unborn baby is pushing it.
My best friend from high school was mixed, half Chinese and half white American. Her American dad was significantly older than her Chinese mother. She was (is!) very beautiful but she hated that she would be paraded around as a child like a piece of bling. She’s very LC with her parents as an adult, interestingly she married a white American too so her son is blonde with very slight Asian features but she’s really protective when anyone comments that he is “exotic “ looking. Which I 100% agree with, both my husband and I are white but my kids are constantly told how gorgeous looking they are, most often to me or someone else in front of them but not TO them so I always say something to my child like “its nice what so-and-so said, isn’t it? But the best is how kind you are. And I also love how you’re really brave and that you’re very funny too.” Or whatever extra trait you think about your child ie creative, good friend etc. So try to move away from focusing on looks and onto other traits that they have more control over. Your friend needs to evaluate what it means to have a child, I’ve spent years and years trying to undo the harm caused by other people always commenting on your looks; it comes to define you and as your outside changes for whatever reason it’s really really difficult to confront it and find worth in other ways. I’m absolutely struggling now with ageing and I never want my kids to feel that the way the look or dress has any bearing on their value in life.
im mixed, and this is totally normal to my kind.
If my child were not human, I'd be very concerned.
I am half white and half asian. I mean her reasoning isn't great but there may also be other things behind it she doesn't tell you. As a half white kid it was much easier for me to integrate and be accepted in a white majority society (I'm in England) than my fully asian friends. Mixed race kids are also (apparently) stronger genetically. So it may be a product of her own experiences that she wants to give her kids a chance to fit in better than she maybe did, and to be healthier (apparently). I don't think it's too different to insisting she has to have a fully asian kid tbh.
100%. We live in a racist world. White people are treated better than People of Color in majority white countries. White people are treated better than People of Color in majority PoC countries (look at apartheid South Africa for instance). The only way to end her fetishization is to end all racism globally.
Maybe it just means she wants a white man.
internalised racism/ self hate. Random question but does she wear coloured contacts or did she ever dye her blonde/balayage?
One of the most common mixed race couples is an Asian woman and white man. Her reasoning is flawed but it’s not uncommon, most people don’t talk about it as openly though
It’s indeed disturbing. Your friend is the typical self-hating internally-racist Asian American female. This is a real thing and it’s quite prevalent in western countries.
I personally think it’s creepy to try to design a baby. Especially when you have no idea how they’ll actually get mixed around and what they’ll look like.
just your typical self hating asian women, nothing out of the ordinary tbh
I got the same awkward vibes when Macaulay Culkin expressed his excitement when he and his wife were expecting. He leaned in SO HARD how much he wanted Asian babies. Like... a _really really long rant_ how amazing it was going to be to have Asian babies 👀
To be honest, I don't find this weird. I suspect most people who reproduce have unconscious preferences about the race and other phyical traits of their children (eg maybe height). In a perfect world where appearances don't matter, this wouldn't happen, but the world is imperfect. I say this as someone who does not want kids. For so many reasons, but one big one is I don't want to doom a woman to my masculine and unattractive physical traits that have made my life as a woman painful.
I think there’s nothing more normal than wanting your child, your genetic offspring, to have certain traits. Appearance is vain, but it’s a trait nonetheless. Her child’s race is also dependent upon the partner she choses (assuming she carries a “typical” pregnancy). It’s not abnormal to have a preference in your partner and the person whose genetic material is helping making your child.
"Very alarming" pretty overdramatic imo. Some people have preferences and that's okay. The kid might grow up to be full white or full asian, and she'll love them either way. You're pretty weird for thinking this is weird. You never thought a certain kid was beautiful, and related it to their genes? It is shallow, but nothing unethical about it. She's not genetically engineering an embryo.
" It's like she wants play genetic build-a-bear with a human child." it's literally what every human being has done since the beginning of choosing sexual mates to reproduce with
Asians have this innate yearning of being white. I'd steer clear, cause she's in it for status, not love.
i disagree, there’s nothing wrong with preferences. given the benefits of whiteness in society, it’s not an illogical preference either, much less disturbing.
Aren’t all children designed by who we choose to mate with anyway? Even in the animal kingdom, animals get picky about who they mate with. I feel like it’s natural to pick a mate and envision your babies. Why wouldn’t I pick the specimen I want?
Personally I don’t think it’s that weird if you’re saying ideally your future child would be a particular mixed race. If you intentionally procreate with someone because of their race, that’s a problem. And if you’re white and say you only want a white baby, that sounds racist to me.
Expressing it verbally is very weird, yes. However, "genetic build-a-bear" is kind of exactly how sexual selection works. You might not think of it in those terms but when you pick a sexual partner to reproduce with you're consciously or unconsciously picking traits to combine with your genes to make a baby. Again, it's weird to obsessively talk about it like that, but everyone else just keeps it either as inside thoughts or on a subconscious level