Intimate Relationships as an Asian American Womxn - JUN 30, 2020 (Patreon Archive)

Great article and nuance on the subject: Kellie Chauvin and a history of Asian women being judged for whom they marry. This article is primarily about Asian womxn dating white men but it goes for Asian womxn dating any race men outside of their own race really.

Womxn are constantly judged for one thing or another. How a womxn dresses means they’re a “slut” or “asking for it”. How a womxn chooses to not have children makes them “not a real womxn” or “there’s something wrong with them”. 

My issue with judging who a womxn is in a relationship with is steeped in the idea that womxn are still property, as mentioned in the article, and that we aren’t allowed to make our own path. Toxic masculinity is in any race, Asian men are not exempt from that . There are so many intersections between all of these nuances in anti-racism work as well as not being a misogynistic sexist. Just because you date within your own race, doesn’t mean you’re not anti-black or that you don’t still perpetuate white supremacy. The idea of only dating within your own race is in itself a type of supremacy, still is kind of racist.

Now, don't get me wrong. There are still people who very much date/marry certain people for superficial or status seeking reasons. No one is denying that. But again, people feel the need to lump all Asians as a monolith, all Asian womxn as a monolith for their choices and Asian men projecting their insecurities and toxic masculinity back towards us instead of them looking at white gatekeepers instead. Emasculating Asian men and fetishizing Asian womxn were created by white men. 

I've dated plenty of Asian men. In fact, I've only been in a relationship with one white man, my current partner and now husband. Most of the Asian men I dated had notions of some kind of "ownership" of me, a "trophy wife" was what they were looking for. Someone to sit pretty and not do much except to follow the course of "society's standards" of get married, have babies, and be a parent, and don't forget the fatphobic expectation of "don’t get fat".

I'm extra annoyed at this notion that Asian womxn date white counterparts as "worshiping whiteness" or that the Asian womxn is gaining something from being with a white person. I can not speak for others so I'm speaking from my own story (because, again, we’re not a monolith). I forge my own path, earn my own living, and make my own decisions. I pay all the bills and the rent. I "bring home the bacon". I have a successful career, holding a leadership role, and still able to carve out time for my own creative work. We moved across states for MY career. We changed our whole lives for MY endeavors. It is absolutely dismissive of my experiences and my work for people to amount my success and accomplishments to the fact that I married a white man. That is a complete insult to all that I have done, WITHOUT the help of a man, let alone a white man. It erases all the progress of saying womxn can do it all and then some. Every time someone implies that I need some kind of approval from my male partner or that as a womxn, I'm more "fussy" about certain things, I want to punch them. Femininity is not defined by a gender, masculinity is not attached to a gender. I have very masculine traits while my male partner has many feminine traits. Doesn't make us any less who we are. 

As I embark further into a life with my white partner, I am sure to be very clear that I think for myself. My white husband does not represent me. I represent myself. I’m strong all by myself and I sure as hell have my own thinking and dreams and goals.

Being able to speak for myself and to show up as all of me despite what people think of me, like that my white partner owns how I think. That in itself is anti-racism and fights off white supremacy thinking that I am not allowed to do those things. My own freedom from these covert white supremacy tactics is anti-racism healing.