Who doesn’t like being a hot white guy? You’re pretty much a Greek god in the gay community and there really isn’t anybody you can’t get. For others, you often find “no asians, no blacks” in dating profiles, which shows how racist and white-centric gay dating can be.
You see, there’s a totem pole of races in the gay community, with white people at the very top. It sorta goes like this: White, Latino (honorary whites), Mixed, Asian, Black, Indian, etc. This hierarchy is responsible for all kinds of phenomena in the gay world. Take, for example, the fact that Asian-White couples often consist of an older white guy with a younger Asian. Or at the very least, an Asian who’s substantially more attractive than his white counterpart. It’s never the other way around.
The bias extends to pop culture. When was the last time you saw an Asian Abercrombie model? All of the main characters on Queer as Folk were white. Heck, all the main characters in the latest HBO gay drama Looking are white even though the show is set in San Francisco where a third of gays are Asian. And of course, how can we forget about gay porn?
And so I wanted to find out for myself what every gay Asian knows – no matter how hot or young you are, you’ll suffer the inevitable Asian “discount” that’s applied when you hit the dating/hookup market. What better way than on the most shameless, unapologetic, and narcissistic venue: Grindr.
The Asian vs. White Grindr Experiment
Who’s hotter?
I whipped out two phones, loaded Grindr, and put two similar looking jocks to the test: 28, 5’10”, 170lbs, muscular, 8”uc. What’s not to like? Their profiles were exactly the same except one was Asian and the other white. I carried around the two phones for a week to different cities and here’s what happened.
Raw uncut data
So being Asian my whole life, I finally know how it feels to be a hot white guy for a week. The white guy comfortably gets 1.5 – 2x more messages than the Asian. There’s no other conclusion than it’s great to be white. You’ve got twice as many guys lined up ready to suck you off or get pounded by you.
Another thing you notice is that there are many hot guys who are simply off limits to Asians. Here’s one guy I tried to message as the Asian and it didn’t get very far. Gays love to use the “not my type” excuse as cover for any number of prejudicial preferences. When I message the same dude as the white guy, and I instantly get cockshots, details on how much he wants to pound my ass, and whether I can host.
As a hot white guy, you can expect a near 100% reply rate. In fact, you wind up with the problem that more guys are messaging you in a day than you can realistically sleep with in a month. This explains why as a white guy you can get away with being a complete douchebag. Why would you waste your time with anyone other than the cream of the crop? And why settle down when you can have an endless stream of orgies?
As an Asian, you can only hope to be so lucky to get the pleasure of a response. Just for fun, I sent a fellow Asian a message as the white guy. He thought it was some kind of joke, like I was a white guy coming to the back of the bus.
Conclusion
If you’re a hot white guy, keep on doing what you do best – being white. You’ve got it made until your skin starts to sag. But not to worry, you’ll still have younger Asians flocking to you.
If you’re not white, the only real solution to this problem is to pray to god that you’re born white next time. There’s an inherent bias against us and you need to know for all intents and purposes, you have no realistic chance of dating a hot white guy your own age. Changing the mentality of a whole community doesn’t happen overnight, and it certainly won’t happen in your generation.
I wrote a piece on this from the perspective of a white guy who quite often prefers non-whites…
http://www.dukechronicle.com/articles/2013/11/18/confessions-curry-queen
I wish there was a perfect answer to all these problems in regards to race, gender, sexualities and beauty. My experience is through the lens of someone who is essentially a third generation american racial mutt; native american, european and asian blood runs through my DNA. I’ve gone through the whole gamut of the gender spectrum, and being of mixed ancestry has complicated and confused my identity. I have felt both rejected, deflected and objected. I feel both obsession and depression in this need, this desire to be valued, to validated, because we live in a world where to be worthy of love is to be worthy of sexual desire.
I have no idea if I’ll ever meet people who feel the same as I do. But my world is this: I want to be loved by a man stronger than me, the masculine to fill the feminine in me, and I just want to be in each other arms until our hearts collide. But as the days go on, it feels its more like a fairytale that isn’t coming true. The reality is that there exists a hierarchy of beauty and privilige. Beauty and power are the currencies of modern love. I keep thinking I’ll find emotional love with other men regardless of race. But submission runs through my veins, and maybe I was born to be a slave of the sexual desires, because giving into another mans dominance, power and desire was my only shot at feeling loved in this life.
Well as a fairly attractive white guy living in japan I get the same treatment here.
Only into Asian, Japanese only or just no reply at all.
I think it’s not exclusive to one race but depends on the country you’re in.
I live in the UK, I’m Black, I’m Gay, I’m male, but I have never seen ‘Whites only’, ‘No Blacks/Asians’. I have never experienced that kind of discrimination.
What exact part of the UK do you live in?
Totally agree with you.
Japanese is the most exclusive.
This Article is Garbage …im Asian and my Partner Is a Ripped hot latino ….lol
And the count down begins to when he’ll soon leave you and forget you!
It’s really how attractive you are, not race. I’m Filipino and definitely hotter than most white dudes. Sorry.
But who are you more attracted to? White men or Asians? Who have you hooked with more in the past?
i’m italian american.
my first comment is, why are Asian men only hitting on white men? that sounds pretty fucking “racist” to me according to the standards in this piece of shi… excuse me, this fine, well-researched article.
next, the 2nd paragraph. “white/asian couples always consist of an older white and a younger asian.” what i took from that is that asian men always prefer white men, no matter HOW old and ugly they are. hot black guy? nope. hot mexican guy? nope. ugly old white guy? YES!
last: i attended the University of Maryland for 5 years (double major). UMD is situated in the DC suburbs in what is one of the most racially diverse areas of the US. huge populations of whites, blacks, latinos, asians, pakistani and indians, etc. while at UMD i joined the gay pride alliance where there were tons of gay asian males. and i noticed that EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM would only, only, ONLY date white men. not only that, but the whitest white men: white guys with blonde hair, blue eyes, and fair skinned. i’m technically white but i’m dark haired and have olive skin. this was considered “too dark” or “not white enough” by the gay asians at UMD. gee that’s not racist at all by this author’s standards…
so frankly i think this article is a piece of shit. as another person wrote, the author and many commentators are conflating sexual preference with actual racism. and they’re total hypocrites at that– getting angry for white guys preferring white guys as partners (sexual or romantic) when they themselves are doing the exact same thing.
” and i noticed that EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM would only, only, ONLY date white men. not only that, but the whitest white men: white guys with blonde hair, blue eyes, and fair skinned. ”
This has been going on for YEARS and will not stop any time soon. One must realize that this type of racism is prevalent throughout the Asian culture and Asian Countries…the more lighter/whiter one’s skin is, the higher the perception of one’s status. This is due to the fact that through out Asian history the Peasants, Farmers and poor Laborers usually worked out in the sun toiling all day long and thus becoming darker, whereas the wealthy, royalty and merchants tended to be lighter skinned because of their lack of exposure to the sun. These lighter skinned individuals dressed better and had better skin due to a lack of exposure to sun ray s therefore the Whiter Asians became Classicists and discriminated against their poorer darker country man later this classicism morphed into racism and it continues on many levels today ….in the media especially…and there you have the genesis of why Asians( for the most part) LOVE White People.
I just think your paradigm is outdated. Maybe in the fifties blonde and very fair was in vogue, but as a light blonde I always was not fond of myself and wished I was Italian or Latino.
I cannot understand how someone isn’t attracted to a whole race. There’s clearly a issue. I’m black and I run away like the plague from guys who ” only like black guys” . I have all kinds of friends. All of my cousins are half black / Korean or black/Vietnamese. I find this “Asian” thing absolutely disgusting. People are people. There’s cute guys in every race. If you actually think a whole race is unattractive you have deep rooted issues and should invest in a psychiatrist ! A preference…. Just like racists say they’re ” conservative” or ” All American= white” got to love that….
John,
Stop trying to push your beliefs and rate of attraction onto others. If someone is not attracted to a particular race, SO BE IT! Why does that affect you personally? And there is a difference between finding someone “good looking or attractive” vs being “sexually attractive” to someone. I see a lot of good looking/attractive/handsome guys around but that doesn’t mean I am sexually attractive to them as well. the two do not go hand in hand.
And look up the definition of “racism and racist” so you can at least use the word correctly.
meh: Go fuck your mama- that’s what you do best. And no need to reply- you’vebeen banned on this site. Go comment of the site of your own kind
I only date Asians. Here in Europe as well as in Asia. can’t relate to the article at all. It isn’t that black and white and from what I see more people seem to be interested in Asian nowadays.
why is no one mad that this shit is racist as fuck… 😕
It’s Not Racist you asses! You could all be Sexist because you don’t give women a chance!
I did the same experiment and got the same results
This is a sad but accurate truth.
Men who are attracted to white males with white features would be disappointed to find he’s not white . Those attracted to Latino, black, Asian, Pacific Islander, Arabic, whatever, would be disappointed or happy to find he’s not or he is of the group he’s looking for. That’s that. People form attractions to what they like. They don’t put a scale in front of themselves where they list their racial preferences in order of attractiveness. If they like a particular race, that one is just it for them. Those who do, don’t have life experience with much more than that which is familiar. All gay men, even older ones, have not had the same life experience. All gay men haven’t had good sex (which starts in the mind not the penis or ass) . The world is imperfect and imbalanced. When in history has the world been balanced and perfect for every individual or group?! Never. For white men in the gay world life has its own disappointments. Blanket judgements of the internal motivations of gay white men is hostile. I as a gay white (half Latino) male have experienced hostility and assumptions(about me and my life) from every angle, including other gay white males. It’s destructive. We haven’t walked in each others’ shoes to know all the battles and all the details of each others’ journeys.
Bye, Felictia!
How lame that’s all you have to contribute. Bitchy one liners reveal your emptiness
Whatev….trolls have lots to live for on the Web
It’s sad when gays, base everything on looks. As a gay Asian, I have dated guys younger and older. From white collar to blue collar, average to model looks and in the end WE all age and mature. So, when a white guy is not into you, be happy cause he probably lacks social skills, education and financial means. I have been with my partner 17 years, married 8 years ago. He is white, retired professional athlete due to injury and never been interested in an Asian until we meet. I was not interested as well, after we started talking things changed and now we have a wonderful life in Canada.
People say that-people say basing your judgement and behavious toward a person just on appearance is sad but I’ve witnessed it time and time again that the same people are hypocrites themselves.
I am not a racist neither discriminating . But I am white guy and I never but never thought I will find an Asian guy attractive !!! I love white , black , and Latino men !
Who are you trying to convince? Yourself or others?
Hey Dan, he’s not trying to convince anyone, He is simply telling you that he is not attracted to Asians. Do you have a problem with that for some unknown reason?
And to Mike, you are not a “racist” because you are not attracted to Asians. You would only be a racist if you thought your “race” was superior to Asians and clearly you are not.
The very fact that he started his sentence with “I’m not a racist…” to justify a racist statement speaks volumes. Let alone the douche bags who support that brand of microaggresion.
That’s why ur a douchbag.
Great! More Asians for me! I Love Asian guys. They are so hot!
Perhaps it is not this supposed hierarchy of appearance that should be questioned but the bigger question of what gay men lose by using ‘dating’ like Grindr. Patrick Strudwick, the gay journalist who exposed conversion therapy practices within the British NHS a few years ago has just written an excellent article in the guardian about the culture of competition pushed by these apps. It is chilling reading:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/oct/24/dating-apps-gay-men-grindr
I think you should rename your profile backward therapy.
wow. i am kind of shocked reading this. it sounds so whiny. i get it, you have hot fantasies of your own. you wanna do bad naughty things with super hot white guys. a type is a type. just because someone does not find you attractive does not make them racist in a sense. i will admit a lot of the gay community loves the look of the hot white guy but i know plenty of smoking hot Asians who are quite popular and get all the ass they want. the difference is attitude. and if you want to measure you attractiveness by how people on Grindr treat you then you have a lot of soul searching to do. and i always notice this sense entitlement with Asian guys, you want the hottest white guys to like you, but when the regular or not so hot white guys message you, you don’t want them. you have an ego you want to fulfill. you want to finally feel on the top and you can only do it by bagging the “coveted” white guy. get over it. there are plenty of other guys out there that find you attractive. there’s no use whining over the one that didn’t want you because you will miss the one that does want you. I don’t get all upset when people who i think are hot are not interested in me. and i think its rude to be mad at someone who politely told you that you are handsome but they are not interested. doesn’t matter if you are Asian black pink or purple, he wasn’t interested and you wanted to throw a fit. I think asian guys can be very sexy. i love my white guys too. some of the hottest guys i have seen on grindr are asian. and those sexy asian guys are just as bad, they covet white boys, making them “not interested” in most others.
AND I’m super offended that black people are at the lowest rungs of YOUR ladder haha! Black guys get plenty o love and are plenty sought after!
i live in Asia (Japan) and here whites are the kings! As an Afro-Latin mixed raced guy I often get “sorry you are not my type, even though my approach is “I’m looking for new friends” there’re lots of racism, discrimination, and rudeness in our community. 🙁
As I stated before Racism and Prejudice is Rampant in Japan, China and Korea not only in the USA and of course this reflected in the gay community.
I hope you’ve had some good experiences there. Maybe some that outshine the bad ones.
I think many commenters are conflating physical preference, white privilege, and racism. While they are certainly interrelated, they are also separate.
Physical preferences can come from many things – including, certainly, hidden prejudices. However, the most common origin of physical preferences is simple exposure: what people are used to and have seen around them, particularly in their formative years.
I grew up in Texas in a city where people were overwhelmingly either caucasian or Latino. African-Americans and Asians were simply not a part of my experience and were not really in my consciousness. As I hit puberty and began to experience the stirrings of sexual awakening, I was looking at the people around me – my friends and classmates to whom I was close – and those people were caucasian. It didn’t occur to me to have sexual thoughts about any other races; that was just an abstraction to 13-year-old me.
Then, I went to high school in Boston and got to be friends with a group of students from Korea. As got to know them more and more, I started to feel a growing attraction. What had started as merely “a new group of people on my sexual radar” eventually became a preference. However, I’ve lived overseas for 13 years now on four different continents and have had the same experience everywhere: as I get more exposed to and familiar with the local people in WHEREVER (Europe, Asia, South America…), I find that their cultural and physical standards of attractiveness start to become assimilated into my own physical preferences, and my attractions shift or expand accordingly.
Now, that’s not to say I don’t have my own independent tendencies. I remember when I was about 20 years old seeing a Time magazine article with a spectrum of faces that ranged from hyper-feminine to hyper-masculine. I was immediately most drawn to the one in the middle: the androgenous one. “Aha,” I realized, “that explains why I like Leonardo diCaprio, but never Brad Pitt or the other beefcake hunks.” And that does have some relation to ethnicity. I probably tend to prefer Asian faces because those face types and features are more prevalent among Asians. But I have dated people of every race, and attraction can come in many forms.
With respect to the dating hierarchy or “totem pole,” I do agree that it probably has to do with socialization and media images, though I don’t think it’s necessarily conscious in most cases. If one is growing up being bombarded with images of caucasians, it makes sense that one might feel attracted to caucasians. It also makes sense that Latinos might be “second” in the hierarchy (perhaps having more familiar physical characteristics, as many are of mixed European ancestry), or that Asians might be “third” (as there Asians have some physical characteristics that overlap with Latinos). Meanwhile, African-Americans have very distinct physical characteristics, and I’m arguing that people need to “learn” attraction. So besides the clear implications of bias and privilege, there may also be well-intentioned and theoretically open-minded people out there who may not feel instinctively attracted to people outside their race because they simply haven’t had enough exposure: they need more diverse friends, media images, social groups, etc. from an earlier age.
If Asian-Americans are socioeconomically more likely than Latinos or African-Americans to live in neighborhoods and communities with majority caucasian populations, this might also explain the tendency voiced by some commenters for Asians to “chase white people.” I really think how and with whom you grow up sets your preferences – but then it’s up to you to make a conscious decision about whether or not you’re going to try to open your mind and expand those preferences.
Your essay concerning dating is very well written and it models my experience as well.
At first I was only attracted to White, Blacks and Hispanics. However after moving to a place where there were many Asians I started to become attracted to them as well. There is a certain body type that I like and if one fits this type, race and ethnicity does not matter. However as Malangen and Dan have pointed out identity politics and hegemony also plays a HUGE part in this so called “attraction” thing.
Spot on. I grew up around white, black and Hispanic guys (outside the country) in an American community. My American home also shares the same demographics (Dallas, Tx). Asian men are few and far in between. My attraction to Asian men was learned through gay porn. I can’t remember exactly how or why I checked out some videos by this guy, badmanrobin8, but I was mesmerized. I started searching Asian interracial porn. Eventually I sought out Asian men. My attraction though is mostly my age or older gay Asians.
I don’t know what people are getting so angry about? It’s an opinion piece that actually only reiterates the truth about gay men who try to socialize with other gay men. They are instantly rejected and white men are protected and always at an advantage with their white privilege. If you think this article is only about race you’re wrong. It’s about identity politics and hegemony.
Why the hell are racist Latinos commenting on this article? This has nothing to do with them! Nosey fuckers! Get a job!
Since it won’t happen in my generation then until racism ends I vow from now on to make a lifetime commitment to ban white men from touching my body!
What alarms me about the findings of this little experiment is are the majority of white people out there who control important resources wishing Asian people didn’t exist?
What still stings and hurts is encountering other Asian, gay, men kissing the feet of white supremacy.
Where is it coming from? White men defending white privilege makes is a given but do Asians they think they are not integrated and assimilated into modern North America if they aren’t conforming to white supremacy?
There are other options!
Just take a look at what other non-white communities are doing! What is the Black community doing to resist oppression in productive ways? Read the literature. Bell hooks. Frank H. Wu. A sociology text book!
At the end of the day they will be on their front lines and you will be on yours!
Listen, current Euro-centric standards of beauty and attractiveness are purely a result of history. You can get angry but making people feel bad about that is futile.
I like that Angry Asian points out the hypocrisy and inequality in gay culture. We need to acknowledge this as a real issue and not dismiss his flippant, irreverent posts as puerile and bitter. I myself know the pain of being treated like a pariah of the gay dating realm. I’m sure we can all agree that whilst not being attracted to someone isn’t wrong (all is fair in love and war after all), treating them with disrespect is. ‘I’m not into Asians’? Oh yeah well I’m not into backwater fucktards.
But it is 2014 people! Times are changing, as is our perception of attractiveness. I guess not vying for the love of a man who isn’t that into you (be it white or otherwise) takes respecting oneself to not do so in the first place. My advice is to let go of this notion of white beauty because a society that makes every other race inferior to white is fucked up. Like really fucked up.
I am writing another paragraph because I don’t like going for triology. Insert Rupaul catchphrase, can I get an Amen up in here?!?
Whoever you are I love you! *hugs*
Even though I have a problem with people named Peter but I still love you!
Love me you dragon toting game of thrones princess! weloveannanetrebko@googlemail.com
It’s easy to say that the answer to all of the problems could be solved by such blanket statements like, “Black should date Black, White-White, Asian-Asian, et cetera…” when that seems like such an obvious solution, right?
Take me for example. I’m as White as they come. English is my first language. German is my second. My last name is Ukrainian and my family is a large Italian one. I grew up in the backwoods of Pennsylvania on hunting, fishing, and Christian-American holiday celebrations.
But…what if the package doesn’t match the wrapping?
That’s right. I identify as White. 24 of my 25 years have been spent in White American culture. But…I’m adopted. I’m 3/4 Filipino and 1/4 mixed (possibly African). So, telling Whites to date Whites puts me in a rough situation.
Because that’s exactly what I try to do. Date within my culture.
The problem is that White guys expect me to have a thick Asian accent and want them to buy me Prada or whatever. So…95% of the time, I don’t get the chance. Hell, the White Europeans whom have nothing in common with an average White American gay would be given a chance before I would – simply judged on appearance, itself.
So what am I supposed to do? Suddenly start obsessively studying and trying to integrate myself into a culture I have no connection to, just so I don’t have to deal with the White/Asian disjunction? That’s as absurd as telling a White American guy (whom happens to be French, genetically speaking) to start learning French and dating French people, only.
My point is think about how absurd you could sound if you really just think that real world problems are just people being angry. That’s like saying racism and sexism aren’t real and people are just being nitpicky.
“It’s easy to say that the answer to all of the problems could be solved by such blanket statements like, “Black should date Black, White-White, Asian-Asian, et cetera…” when that seems like such an obvious solution, right?” …
You made some good points. In addition, those of us of mixed parentage are put in an awkward place in the whole “date your own kind” mentality. I’d love to do a survey of whom people such as us go for. In my family, we all have gravitated to those who don’t look like us. This makes sense, because that’s the model we group up with.