Portrayals of Asian Guys with Latino, Black, White, & Mixed Girls

Asian men are rarely in interracial marriages, according to the US Census. And they're often stereotyped as unmanly, sexually undesirable, or emasculated.

But the media still depicts them in interracial relations. Here are some examples.

Guide:

E - East Asian

SE - Southeast Asian

S - South Asian

"South Asian" means countries like India, Pakistani, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka.

Movies

All My Life - E

American Beauty - E
Anna and the King - SE
As Long As We're Together - SE
Battle Creek Brawl - E
Bel Canto - E

Blue Bayou - E
Bridge to the Sun - E
Broken Blossoms - E
Bullet to the Head - E
Cavite - SE
Cinderella - SE
Cities of Last Things - E
Columbus - E
Combination Platter - E
Cosmopolitan - S
Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story - E
Earthquake Bird - E
Fakin' Da Funk - SE
The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift - E
Fast & Furious - E
Fast Five - E
Fast & Furious 6 - E
Game of Death - E
Harold & Kumar (all 3 movies) - E
Hiroshima Mon Amour - E
In Another Country - E
Japanese Story - E
Johnny Tsunami - E
Just a Kiss - S
Kites - S
Lagaan - S

La Nuit Venue ("Night Comes") - E
Leonie - E
Lion - S

Lost Girls and Love Hotels - E
A Majority of One - E
Mao's Last Dancer - E
Man Up - E
Never Forever - E
Ode to My Father - E
Romeo Must Die - E
Seventh Moon - E
Shanghai Kiss - E
Sophie and the Rising Sun - E

Spider-Man: Far From Home - SE
Stratosphere Girl - E
Subject: I Love You - SE
The Bitter Tea of General Yen - E
The Cheetah Girls: One World - S
The Crimson Kimono - E
The Edge of Seventeen - E
The Hedgehog - E
The Hundred-Foot Journey - S
The Inn of the Sixth Happiness - E
The Jungle Book - S
The Kids Are All Alright - S
The King and I - SE
The Last Godfather - E
The Lover - SE

The Medallion - E
The Night Train to Kathmandu - S
The Ramen Girl - E

The Spy Next Door - E
The Sun is Also a Star - E
Tokyo Fiancée - E
We Were Soldiers - E

TV Series

21 Thunder - SE
2 Broke Girls - E
Alexa & Katie - E
Amber - E
American Vandal (Season 2) - E
Black Mirror - E
Black Mirror: White Christmas - E
Community - E
Crazy Ex-Girlfriend - SE
Criminal Minds: Beyond Borders - mixed E
CSI: Cyber - E
Degrassi: Next Class - E
Dramaworld - E
FlashForward - E
Fresh Off the Boat - E
Fresh Prince of Bel-Air - SE
Giri/Haji - E
Hawaii Five-0 (multiple) - E
Heroes - E
Homeland - S
Into the Badlands
iZombie - S
Last Tango in Halifax - S
Living with Models
Martial Law - E

Massan
Selfie - E
Skins
Supernatural
The Man in the High Castle - E

The Nine Lives of Chloe King - E
The Simpsons (3 times) - E, S
The O.C. (2 times)
The Walking Dead - E
Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt - SE
Video Game High School - E
White Teeth - S

Theater
Allegiance - E
A Majority of One - E
Soft Power - E
The King and I - SE
The North China Lover - E

Books

A Long Way Home
America Is In the Heart
Anna and the King of Siam
Bel Canto
Bridge to the Sun
China Blues
Everything I Never Told You

Lost Girls and Love Hotels
Mao's Last Dancer
On Gold Mountain
State of Wonder
Station Eleven
The Earthquake Bird
The Girl From Junchow
The Japanese Lover
The Lola Quartet
The Lotus Eaters
The Lover
The North China Lover
The Russian Concubine
The Sun is Also a Star
Tokyo Fiancée
White Teeth

You've Reached Sam

Do you know others? Please mention them in the comments.

Intel Core Duo ad controversy

Some people thought this was racist:

This is an actual magazine advertisement from Intel. After people complained about it, the company discontinued the ad and apologized.

Those who were offended by this ad thought the men on the floor were Blacks bowing down to a White/European. Last month, I wrote about the advantages of having mixed-race people in advertising, and this ad is a good example. If everyone in this ad looked multiracial instead of monoracial, nobody would say it's racist because it would be unclear what ethnicity the men are in the first place.

If you're unsure about the ethnicity of a person, it's almost impossible to see them in a racial way. The same goes for advertising; if customers see people in an ad and they have no idea what ethnicity they are, they won't see anything racial about it. But the people in this Intel ad do not look mixed-race, so it was clear to many people what ethnicity they are. Some even saw a racist image.


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Ku Klux can't

Here is an interesting example of how your ethnicity has nothing to do with your personality. This guy was a very devoted member of an organization and he was eventually offered a leadership position. This organization was the Ku Klux Klan, and they considered him to be a "loyal Klansman," which is funny because...he's Black!

BLACK SERGEANT WAS 'LOYAL KLANSMAN'

They never found out he was Black, but I wonder what the KKK's reaction would have been if they did find out.


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Black sailor harbors secret

Black History Month starts in America this Thursday. This annual celebration involves a lot of reflection upon African-American people of the past, some of whom were in positions of authority, including the military. The "Black Admiral" was an example of this; it was a painting of an African-American navy leader during the 18th century--which was very rare for a work of art because Blacks were usually shown in negative stereotypes back then.

It turned out too good to be true. Last year, an art restoration revealed: he's White!

'BLACK ADMIRAL' PAINTING FOUND TO BE A FRAUD


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Polite racist people

Last week was Martin Luther King Day and next week is Black History Month. We're in the middle of African-American celebrations and many African-Americans themselves are in the middle of being Black and non-Black (which I explained last week). This gray area of Black identity can sometimes lead to interestingly racist situations. Like this African-American woman who was served at a White-only diner:

KANSAS SIT-IN GETS ITS DUE AT LAST

Carol Parks-Haun was doing a sit-in protest against racial segregation at a diner in Kansas, when, to her surprise, she wasn't discriminated against:

Parks-Haun remembers entering (the diner). She sat down on the center stool and ordered a coke, but didn't think the waitress would actually serve her. [...] "She gave it to me and I said, 'oh my,' and the others came in and they sat and she looked at them -- and she looked at me -- and she leaned forward and she said, 'You are not colored are you dear?'"

"You are not colored are you dear?"? I never knew people could be polite and racist at the same time.

Of course, it's possible that the waitress wasn't prejudiced herself; she could've been just following orders. But I thought the whole point of prejudice was to prejudge people? Not ask them about themselves and then judge them. Can you see why it's weird to ask someone what race they are, just so you can say something racist? If you're going to discriminate someone, at least be confident about it. (Of course, it's better to not discriminate at all).


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Martin Luther King Jr. was Irish

Today is Martin Luther King Day, the only American holiday that honors a Black person. Most people know King was an African-American, but how many people know he was part Irish? That's right, the most famous Black person in U.S. history actually had some European ancestry. According to this page from Stanford University, King's grandfather, James Albert King, was Irish-African (that probably means he was half Irish and half Black) which would make Martin Luther King one-eighth Irish. And in the past, I read somewhere that he was 1/8 Irish. So it's probably true.

Some people might be shocked to know he was part Irish, but it's really nothing surprising. Many African-Americans today have distant non-Black ancestors (usually American Indian or European). This likely explains why some African-Americans are more light-skinned than others (and these particular Black people aren't known to be multiracial). Some examples I can think of are:

Beyoncé
Will Smith
Colin Powell
Michael Jackson

These people are all generally assumed to be "full" Black, but they are rather light-skinned. Colin Powell certainly looks like he's more White than Black (in my opinion). Before Michael Jackson surgically became White, he had about the same light-brown skin color as Will Smith. And I've never heard anything about Beyoncé being multiracial.

It is possible that these people have more European ancestry than Martin Luther King did (since King was known to be part Irish, and he was darker than most of them). I can understand why he's considered to be full Black instead of mixed-race (1/8 Irish is very small), but I wish more people would know that "full Black" doesn't necessarily mean "100% African heritage." In fact, "100% American heritage" would be more accurate, keeping in mind that "American" is not a race or an ethnicity, it's an identity that transcends both of those.


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Tiger Woods could die

There's this drug, which was approved in the U.S. last year, that was designed to treat heart problems. But get this, this drug was also designed--for Black people. "Bidil" is the only drug in America that is made for a specific racial group; in this case, African-Americans. As usual, this got me thinking. How Black do you have to be for this medication to work? And by "how Black," I mean: how much of your blood has to be African? When they tested this drug, they said it worked best for people who self-identitified as Black, but I don't think this will work when prescribing it, because not everyone who self-identifies as Black is going to be genetically Black enough for this drug to work. (A drug can't know your personal identity!). Whoever designed Bidil most likely didn't have mixed-race people in mind.

However, I can understand why people would want a drug like this. There are some diseases that are very common among a specific race. Like sickle-cell anemia and glaucoma, both of which affect Black people more than other ethnicities. But I don't think it's as easy as marketing a drug to people of a certain race...because there are people who aren't a certain race.

If you're reading this because of the strange title, then I won't disappoint you...I was imagining, what if these racial drugs were used in emergency rooms at hospitals? This could prove to be a disaster because race isn't always clear. If someone like Tiger Woods was rushed to the emergency room, the doctors would think he's Black just by looking at him; so they'd give him the drug for African-Americans...but he'd die anyways because he's only a quarter Black (many people assume he's all African-American). If these race medications were necessary, they'd have to give him the Asian drug because that's what most of his heritage is. Or better yet, give him an accurate dosage:

1/8 European drug
1/8 American Indian drug
1/4 Black drug
1/2 Asian drug


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Would half-White people live?

This week is the 175th anniversary of Nat Turner's slave rebellion. Turner was a Black slave in Virginia, USA in the early 19th century who organized an uprising against White slaveowners. During the rebellion, he told his followers to kill all White people. And indeed, they travelled all over town; freeing slaves while killing White people--not only the slaveowners, but they murdered women and children as well.

How did they determine if someone was White? Obviously they just looked at them and then thought "Black or White?" before killing them or not killing them. This would be much harder today because not everyone looks completely Black or completely White. (What if Nat Turner encountered a Latino, Asian, or mixed-race person?).

What's also interesting is that during the rebellion, Turner encountered a White slaveowner who was protected by his slaves. His slaves thought of him as being a good master, and they were actually willing to fight Turner and his men.

What's even more interesting is that one of the White people in town was a childhood friend of Nat Turner, and he (Turner) told his men to spare the guy's family. But wait, I thought he said "kill all White people"? hmm...I guess that White guy was lucky that he knew Turner personally, huh?

One of the victims was a White woman who was known to be a kind person to Black slaves. So why did they kill her? hmm...maybe because Turner never had the opportunity to meet her. C'mon race obviously has nothing to do with your personality!

Black doctors or death?

This is an interesting picture. It shows African-Americans doctors operating on a Ku Klux Klan member!













For those who don't see the irony in this photo...a White supremacist (who hates Black people and usually wants to kill them too) is being saved by Black people!

How awkward would it be if you were an African-American paramedic and then you had to treat a clansman? This is just so tragic and funny, I don't know where to start. If the doctors failed and the clansman died, how would the KKK community react?? If you were the clansman (not that I want you to be) would you rather die than be saved by Black doctors? Or do you think something this traumatic would make you put aside your racist ways--permanently?

This picture is a perfect example of how absurd racism can be. Whether it's a real picture or not doesn't matter. Something like this could always happen in real life; someone dedicates their life to hating a group of people, and then their life ends up being SAVED by that same group of people! It's just sad that some racist people in this situation will continue being hateful; even the threat of death might not be enough to make supremacists renounce their bigotry. What if the clansman in the picture was saved? Would he commit suicide later, because his life from this point on was made possible by African-Americans? I hope he would at least thank the doctors.