I take a week off, and this week I am republishing a column that first appeared on January 13, 2016. I wish you a happy and safe Pride. Please, be careful. – Dan
Warning. The language of this column is direct and explicit.
As a non-white queer man – I’m Asian – I feel hurt every time I come in contact with gay men in New York, Toronto or any other city where white gay males are the majority. Gays, especially whites and Asians, reject me because of my race, and no one admits to being sexually racist. I realize that for many, sexual attraction is an unconscious thing, but it’s not fair for an Asian gay like me to be constantly marginalized and rejected. I also fight for gay rights. I also believe in equality. I also suffered from my homosexuality in high school, and felt the same fears coming out. Why is there no acceptance, no space, no welcome in this completely whitewashed gay community? I am eighty-five by seventy-two pounds, athletic and very attractive. What should I do? At this point we might as well become a monk and give up sex forever.
—Enraged Dude Details Infuriating Experience
“I recognize myself in a lot of what EDDIE expresses,” says Joel Kim Booster, writer and comedian from Brooklyn. “The double weapon of living in a city with a large gay community is that that community can be so large as to finally give us a way to marginalize someone.”
Jeff Chu, another Brooklyn-based writer, also associates: “In the gay community, just like in society at large, racism is still very much present,” he says. “Many Asian Americans like me step out of the proverbial closet to enter a strange bamboo cage where they treat you as a fetish or ignore you. A lot of times when I go to gay bars, I see people throwing their nice interracial sex tape over their heads, with me in the pocket Chinese side. Others (the ones that interest me, to be honest) behave as if I were wearing an invisibility cheongsam ”.
Chu believes that there are many faults to be distributed for this sad situation. “It’s the gay media,” he says. “It’s Hollywood. Even with all the LGBT characters that are now on TV, what image do we get of the Asian Americans? It is the fact that LGBT rights associations have not yet diversified enough, especially at the top. And we are all of us too, when out of laziness we do not face the prejudices that we ourselves have ”.
Booster and Chu are right: racism is a problem in the gay community, there are people who are unjustly and cruelly marginalized, and we all have to face our prejudices.
You too, EDDIE. You cite your stature (tall!), Your weight (thin!) And your appearance (very attractive!) As proof that the rejections you receive come only from your race. But there are short, stout, normal-looking or unconventionally handsome guys who are rejected because they are not tall, slim or “good” in the standard sense just as you are rejected because you are not white (the cultural heritage and preconceptions that fuel a preference , which I know, for tall guys, they are much less deleterious – of course – than those who feed a preference for white guys).
“Being the classic Chinese bass, my first reaction on reading Eddie’s letter was: one eighty-five! God, what an envy, ”says Chu. “And that is also a bit of the problem. Like so many others, I too have internalized an ideal: tall, fit, etc., but above all white “.
Booster was also impressed by your measurements: “I find it hard to imagine that someone five feet tall, athletic and very attractive could have problems with towing,” he says. “On paper, we are talking about the ideal gay! I, who don’t consider myself any of these things, have an absolutely decent amount of sex. ” Booster, who in one way or another manages to have a lot of sex even in New York’s “completely whitewashed gay community”, has some practical advice for you. “If the app man gets too negative, then EDDIE should stay away from it,” he explains. “If dating apps make him feel frustrated, take a break. Feeling doubly minority can cause a sense of isolation, but living in a big city also has great aspects. There are meeting possibilities and clubs and activities for all tastes. Join a gay volleyball team – which is where Asian gays really go strong – or seek out one of the many Asian gay nights out in the city’s gay bars. Because they exist “.
And in New York, Chu was also successful on the sentimental front. “I felt like EDDIE too, despite being shorter, less athletic and less attractive, yet I found a husband,” she says. “I didn’t have the vocation for the monastery, and I would say to the nose that neither EDDIE has it”.
A little word to white gays too: having preferences is fine. But we have a duty to analyze them by reflecting on the cultural influences that may have helped shape them. A good idea would be to make sure that these preferences are really ours, rather than the limited and limiting “tastes” that are instilled in us by TV, cinema and porn. But if having preferences is legitimate (and non-white gay males do too), nothing justifies infesting Grindr, Tinder or Recon – but even just bar chatter – with dehumanizing insults like “no Asian”, “no blacks “,” no effeminate “,” no fat “and so on (while” no republicans “is always good).
The last word goes to Booster: “Known for ‘rice queens’, or gays with a fondness for Asian men, who will no doubt write in response to this man: we’re glad you like us. But liking you exclusively for our race can be embarrassing at best, and quite creepy at worst. Experience teaches me that certain preferences are also fine to keep them hidden, while you have to begin to get to know each other a little better as human beings “.
Follow Joel Kim Booster on Twitter (@ihatejoelkim) and don’t miss his amazing latest movie Fire Island, now streaming on Hulu. Jeff Chu is the authorDoes Jesus really love me? A gay christian’s pilgrimage in search of God in America. Follow him on Twitter: @jeffchu.
I recently moved to the southern United States, and I am noticing that there are many more racist messages on Grindr’s profiles, sometimes even explicit like “no blacks” and “no Asians”. I wonder what I can (or should) do as a chat user. Is it enough to block these people? Or is it better to report their profiles? Or am I writing to them directly asking them to change the text?
– Grinding Endlessly Against Racism
Gay “Everyone Has His Taste”: disgusting.
Gay OHISGs pop up everywhere, of course, but in politically conservative areas they are more prevalent. And while it is true that they are found among white gays aged 30-50 (and over), sometimes the impression is that they tend to dominate among younger white gays. The latter – who have often just come out and come from predominantly white areas – attack the internet and start shooting racist bitches. As long as they stay in Kansas or Utah, GEAR, nobody reacts that much. But as soon as a gay OHISG moves to Chicago or Los Angeles, reactions suddenly come. Other gays – sometimes redeemed themselves OHISGs, or who never were – start pissing them off for their unacceptable and harmful attitudes.
Good gays – of all ages and races – find this “taste” bullshit desperate, because it never seems to end. But that’s not true: at some point she ends. When gays with a bit of salt in their nets (and humanly better) kick the ass of an OHISG, it can happen that the latent moral imagination of the latter is activated. Maybe the OHISG begins to wonder what it would be like to be the recipient of certain crap, maybe he remembers some golden rules learned in the catechism, such as “Do not judge and you will not be judged”, and maybe he will make friends with some non-whites and will listen. And he might even begin to question some of his priceless tastes (are they really his? Or has he just assimilated those who gave him Hollywood and porn without thinking?). And then maybe – hopefully, hopefully, hopefully – he’ll stop being an OHISG. And even if he eventually realizes that yes, in fact he is mostly attracted to white males like himself, he will understand that he can put his tastes into practice – fuck the males he likes to fuck – without having to insult others for free.
What happens after that? Well, what happens next is a little depressing. Another young and / or idiot OHISG arrives in town, and the whole “someone has to kick his ass” procedure starts all over again. In short, GEAR, when you see an OHISG that in the profile writes “no blacks”, “no Asians” or “no effeminate”, you react. Tell him he’s a dickhead. Re-educating OHISGs is slow work, one person at a time, but you can contribute too.
(Translation by Matteo Colombo)