Interracial couples means multiracial kids
A couple of Sunday’s ago, the New York Times published a piece in the Sunday Fashion & Style section entitled “Matchmaking, the Ultimate Government Service.” The gist of the article is that governments such as Taiwan run special abroad programs for the children of emigrants of their native countries.
The main idea of the program is to help educate youth about their heritage and culture. I was fortunate to be able to go on the Overseas Chinese Youth Language Training and Study Tour to the Republic of China back in 1995. It is also known informally as “The Love Boat” since young college students go there to hook up meet with other Chinese folks. Parents don’t really know about this other side of the Study Tour. (Or do they? I mean many Chinese folks would love their kids to marry another Chinese person… Hmm… I have my suspicions.)
Anyhow, you can read more about the Love Boat over at 8Asians.com. John writes an extensive piece about his personal experience there, though he does omit the juicy details. Come on John! Why so prude? [I'm kidding.]
Now, I did have a whole lot of fun, but I do have some issues with the program. I don’t want to talk about it too much, but I will mention that I feel that some of the students (albeit stupid ones) give the program a bad name among the locals. They are blatantly disrespectful of the community. Somehow they think of themselves as above the law. To make things worse, they get off with no more than a slap of the wrist. This creates an uncomfortable relationship between the local people and the students who go there. Maybe it is just the stupidity of youth.
What was very interesting to me was this one stat that was mentioned in the article:
According to a study using the latest Census Bureau figures, the percentage of Asian women born in the United States who marry Asian men has declined to 37 percent from 59 percent since 1994. The proportion of American-born Asian men who marry Asian women has also dropped, to 52 percent from 65 percent.
It is not surprising that the proportions have dropped. It is also not surprising that more Asian women than Asian men are marrying outside their race. (I mean who would want to marry a self-deprecating, unconfident, chauvinistic, emasculated man who expects his wife to do all the cooking, cleaning, and child rearing anyway?) [I'm being sarcastic.] Maybe Asian men love their Asian sisters more. [Again, more sarcasm.] (And wait a minute, where are the stats about the queer couples?) But love is personal, so whatever. Whatever your personal preference, the coupling of folks of different race inevitably means more multi-racial folks. Multi-racial folks with Asian blood in their mix.
I think multi-racial folks are in a difficult spot. They are often not “included” by folks of “pure” racial heritage either because they aren’t oppressed enough or because they aren’t oppressive (?) enough. Asian folks aren’t exactly exempt from this exclusionary attitude. On the other hand, some multi-racial folks take the attitude that they are better than the “pure races” because they are closer to being “raceless.” Alternatively, they just forget that they are a person of color and instead, walk around only identifying themselves with the race that offers them the most privilege, be it white or Asian or whatever.
I’ve rambled enough today or maybe the heat wave has gotten to my head.
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Tags: Chinese Americans, Identity, inter-racial dating, Love, social expectations.
10 comments
i think many people may not understand you’re being sarcastic at points there eugene.
i actually am surprised – very surprised – about the extremely low rate of intraracial marriage. i knew it was low, but 37 and 52?
but you can’t talk about being surprised without a lot of people getting very defensive, and in the process very offensive as well. so i’ll leave it at that.
Well, if fewer Asian women are marrying Asian men or vice versa, there has to be some drop in the other case too right?
yeah, but that’s not what i’m surprised about. more just surprised about those extremely low rates. btw, where did you get those numbers? are there similar statistics for other races?
The numbers are quoted right out from the article. The article references the Census Bureau. Maybe you can look there.
that times article is interesting, 1 in that they frame everything on the Love Boat in terms of, well, “love” and “soulmate”…which, i guess, is not exactly what i hear about it.
and 2 in that they don’t mention boston progress as an organization that specializes in hookups – of the “love” and “soulmate” variety. i think our track record has been as good or better than any…
Sadly for me, I experienced no love of any variety. Who needs sex when you got oyster pancakes and stinky tofu? Any spat with food can be easily resolved with imodium or pepto bismal.
I actually was somewhat forced to go on loveboat by my parents the summer before I turned 19. It turned out to be a really fun experience. I’m not sure if I learned anything during the trip but I was able to party for 9 weeks and eat really effin good food throughout.
Notably, it was my first time being around Taiwanese Americans who grew up surrounded by other Asian American folks and it showed in their demeanor. Although the West Coast TAs were different in style from the NYC or Canadian TAs, they all carried themselves with a confidences/swagger that TAs from, let’s say, Kansas, did not have. I had never really seen that sort of cockiness from other Asian Americans before growing up so it was interesting and eye-opening (maybe I did learng something?).
Agreeing with Eugene, I also noticed how many kids on loveboat made fun of the Taiwanese locals. It was a really messed up form of self-hate.
i’ll toast to that.
i actually have a real comment about the rates of intraracial marriage.
i’d be curious to see how the proportions break out in the category of intra-racial marriages – that is how many asian americans are marrying asian americans of the same ethnic background versus different asian ethnic backgrounds. (so chinese americans marrying chinese americans versus chinese americans marrying korean americans)
i think it’d actually be encouraging if more of the intra-racial marriages were between two people of different ethnicities – because it would seem to point towards a more pan-ethnic asian american identity, what with the birth of asian american kids of multiple asian heritages. it’s like the birth of a generation of pan asian americans. =P
PS today (june 12) is loving day – the 41st anniversary of the us supreme court’s decision to legalize interracial marriage. interracial marriage has only been legal in the us for 41 years. that doesn’t seem like very long ago. the supreme court case was named after mildred loving… learn more here.
Eugene – I just noticed that you linked to my Love Boat post on 8Asians – thanks. My Love Boat experience was pretty prudish
– i.e. I’m not the type that really “snuck” out to go clubbing type, and generally, the folks I hung out with were pretty well behaved (i.e. not dissing the locals).