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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First White child

In Australia, the first baby with European ancestry was born on January 26, 1788. In the US, the first was in the 1560s, and in Canada, it was probably in the early 18th century. During colonial times, people in European colonies would often celebrate the birth of the "first White child" in their settlements. There was once an American postage stamp that celebrated the first European baby in North Carolina, USA (picture above).

When I learned about this, my first reaction was "that's racist!" If anyone celebrated something like that today, it would be the Ku Klux Klan or Neo-Nazis. And then I thought, "is it really racist?"

Celebrating White/Caucasian ethnic heritage is a lot more controversial these days because many people will think it's White supremacy or racism. A really good example of this is when Lisa McClelland (picture at left), a high school girl in California, tried to start a "Caucasian Club" 4 years ago, and it became a national controversy.

There's nothing wrong with being proud of your White/European heritage, but Whites/Europeans have been overrepresented throughout history and Eurocentrism has historically been a "normal" thing, so people might misunderstand you. Non-European heritages should definitely be celebrated because they've always been ignored, but celebrating Asian, Black, Latino, and indigenous cultures should never mean looking down upon European heritages. That's what Whites/Europeans have done to other people throughout history, and doing that to them would just reverse the hatred, when there should be no hatred in the first place.


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Crossing the White line

This is something I always think about. People from WHAT part of the world can be considered White? It's easy to say White people are Europeans, but it's not as simple as that. Where does Europe end and the non-White part of the world begin? Countries like Greece and Turkey are at the very edge of Europe. Do people in these countries count as White? Middle Eastern people are sometimes considered White, and I guess that makes sense, because another word for White person is "Caucasian", and Caucasian refers to the Caucasus Mountains, which are in the Arab part of the world.

An interesting thing I've noticed is, some Europeans will hesitate to call themselves "White." One time, this guy on the train was telling me about his ethnic heritage, and I asked him if he was White. He said, "well I wouldn't say 'White'" and then he listed a bunch of ethnic groups--all of which were from Europe! If he's full European, why doesn't he identify as White? I think it's because not all European ethnicities fit into the common idea of what a White person is. Another time, I was talking to a girl about one of her friends, and she said her friend was half Japanese. And then I said, "is she half White?" She hesitated for a moment and then said "half Greek." She didn't say "yes" or "no" to my question of "is she half White?" That probably meant she didn't know if Greek people are White. And it is kind of hard to tell what Greeks are exactly; Greece is located at a global crossroads (it's in the middle of Europe, Africa, and the Middle East). The same thing goes for countries like Armenia, Iran, and Iraq. Are they Asian countries? European countries? Are people from those countries White?

Sometimes I wonder if Italian people are White. I once thought they're Hispanic because some of them look Mexican and Italian sounds like Spanish, but they're obviously not Hispanic because they don't have a Spaniard history. Some Italians, Portuguese, and Spanish people have darker skin than other Europeans, so I never thought of them as White people. But technically, they ARE White? I guess the general idea is: if they're in Europe, they're White. But again, where does Europe end?

My conclusion is, the people who are usually thought of as being White are: British people, Scandinavian people, and people from German-speaking countries. I noticed, the more southern or eastern a European country is, the less likely the people in that country will be considered White.

Another good question is, where does Europe end and Asia begin? Arab countries are in the middle of these 2 continents, and not surprisingly, many Arabs look like a mix of European and Asian.


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Tom Cruise might be Asian

When I saw pictures of Tom Cruise's new-born daughter, Suri Cruise, the first thing I noticed was how Asian she looks. That's remarkable if you consider that neither of her parents are known to be Asian, and I'm not the only who thinks Suri Cruise looks Asian, as you can see from this news website in China:

WHERE DID SURI CRUISE GET HER "ASIAN" FEATURES FROM?

Since she's the daughter of well-known Hollywood stars, it's likely that she will become famous herself. And it certainly looks like it, since she's only 4 months old and she's already on the cover of Vanity Fair and even has a whole issue about her. Whether or not she does become famous, maybe she will make people think twice about what it means to be "White" as well as what race and ethnicity mean.

People who haven't seen pictures of Suri would assume that she's just another White baby, and what kind of image does "White baby" create in people's minds? Certainly nothing that looks like Suri Cruise. As you can see on comment #13 on this page about Suri, which says:

Now I understand completely why her name is Suri. It's short for surrogate. Suri is part Asian and there is no doubt about it. Check out those eyes and head of hair. Not a Caucasian baby you can't fool me.

"Not a Caucasian baby"?? "There's no doubt about it"??!! Then what does a Caucasian baby LOOK LIKE!? Obviously, whoever wrote that comment has some stereotypical image of White people in their head.

Now a part of me wants Suri Cruise to grow up and become very famous, so that her Asian features will be in the minds of every American some day. And the fact that people will know she's the daughter of Tom Cruise (who looks White) will hopefully make people think more about race and ethnicity; make people think more about the diversity of White people.

It's rare people like Suri Cruise, who isn't mixed-race (ostensibly) but still looks like a different race than her parents, who will hopefully make people think twice about what race looks like. Hopefully she will become so famous that she destroys the stereotype that White people can't look Asian. And at 4 months old, it looks like she's already started.

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!

"Americans" are NOT White!

"American" does NOT mean "White person"

Have you noticed when people talk about Americans, they're usually thinking of White people? This is an insult to people in the USA who are NOT European. I noticed a lot of people ouside of America use the word "American" is if it's an ethnicity. As in: "are you half American?" or "are you full-blooded American?" or "I'm 1/8 American!"

Can people PLEASE realize that there is no such thing as "American blood" and that Americans can be from ANY race, because "American" is not an ethnicity!

I notice many people think this way:

1. African-Americans are "Black"
2. Asian-Americans are "Asian"
3. Latino-Americans are "Mexican"
4. Native Americans are "Indian"

BUT...

Euro-Americans (White people) are "American"

C'mon, I mean, a man who just came here from Europe last month will "look more American" than a woman who's a 3rd or 4th generation Japanese-American. Why? Because he's White and since most people think: "American = White", the American of Japanese descent will look like a foreigner to most people, even though her family has been in the United States for a century!

I wish people would realize that nobody "looks" American, because Americans don't HAVE a "look". We're diverse. We're not all White. You can't tell if someone is American just by looking at them.

And American people who are mixed-race? Don't get me started!