Exhausted Not Exotic Dangers of Asian Fetishization

[Applause]

middle school

i don’t know about all of you but

whenever i think about those two years

of my life i can’t help but think

mistakes simply mistakes from the things

i did

to the things i took so seriously that

never really mattered

dances come to mind and some of the

people i surrounded myself with

my best friend at the time and i were

talking about boys because middle school

and we got on the subject about a boy

she thought had liked me then so i asked

her how so

i’m 17 now and i still think about her

response to this day

she said with a chuckle he probably

likes you because he has yellow fever

and just out of curiosity’s sake how

many people on the audience have heard

of the term

yellow fever outside the disease context

okay

is there a number of you um just make

sure everybody’s on the same page

yellow fever is a term used for when a

person has a

sexual or relationship based preference

for asians

more on that later one of the many

mistakes i made when i was in middle

school is how i responded

i laughed along with her and we

continued on our merry way

that was one of my in interactions with

racial federation which is defined as

the sexualization or obsession with

someone’s race and or ethnicity

i will acknowledge that my experience

with it is by no means one most terrific

stories out there

but we have to acknowledge that just as

federalization is a form of racism and

prejudice

prejudice and oppression exist in tears

are fundamentally built on things such

as seemingly harmless comments

like the one my friend felt comfortable

making to me that support that

escalation and behavior that allows it

to potentially become normalized

this isn’t an issue can stand idly by

any longer as

racial federalization has very real

consequences and the way

it extends the reign of racism misogyny

in the lives of women of color

throughout society

in this talk i’ll be focusing

specifically on the federalization of

asian women

and how it’s present in our history how

has relevance now

and what we can do about but this focus

is by no means an invalidation on the

ways

it affects black latino native american

and other communities of color as not

just women but also men and non-gender

conforming people

have are affected by racial

federalization

and misogyny make themselves present in

multitudes of ways and lives of women of

color

some key examples include how

how they could and have been valued for

their bodies and stereotyped as people

especially in the context of racial

federalization

some ways people who probably wear

raised fetishes on their sleeves try to

justify

and explain their soul attraction to

women of color is through how certain

physical features that they possess are

just attracted to them

or they’ll sign certain personality

traits or attributes to them that make

them worthy of phrase

or how they how they’ll put it at least

such as how black women are

stereotyped as being curvy latino women

are seen as being

sassy and asian women are seen as being

submissive

and a glaring issue with the

objectification dehumanization of a

person is how can incorrectly

and dangerously translate into a feeling

of entitlement over that person’s body

or attention

and just to set the record straight

there is a very distinct difference

between having a preference and

raised fetishes as having a preference

and knowing what you like such as

certain personality traits is

understandable

as we develop preferences for the people

we want around us in our lives as we

grow up

however the very nature of racial

federation encourages a climate of the

sexual exploitation

and violence against women of color

through the way it objectifies their

bodies and stereotypes their existence

where these people will equate them to a

body

and like the idea of them simply because

of their racial background

racial federalization like many issues

didn’t just appear out of the blue has

historical context which in this case we

can contribute to

colonialization and imperialism as the

conquest of foreign lands was justified

through white man’s burden

a term coined in a poem by rudyard

kipling about colonies in the

philippines as it was perceived to be

the westerner’s responsibility

to educate and enlighten the people of

these foreign lands

on the way of the west which they

perceived as civilized and right

quite ironic when we consider how

borderline barbaric colonizers were

in the countries they invaded as they

not only exploited the land but also its

people

for women in particular they are often

seen as trophies of colonialization

beings be conquered for the sexual

gratification of the colonizers

one example that comes to mind would be

when the u.s got involved during the

philippines revolt against spain in the

late 1800s and

spoiler alert the us would eventually go

on to occupy the country

and while war waged on american military

forces are responsible for

the killings of 800 000 to over a

million filipinos and it also engaged in

the sexual conquest of the women

as the soldiers perceived philip the

filipino women as

little brown effing machines powered by

rice

and unfortunately cases like these are

present throughout history such as the

brothel systems

and military sexism industries that

begin to flourish during world war

ii the korean war and the vietnam war as

well as how the

mail-order bride industry began to

flourish during

the um when american feminists were

making strides in their movement as

as men sought to have someone more

submissive

in their homes i bring this up as our

history has a great level of influence

into why our world is the way it is for

better or for worse in the case of the

worst

seeing asian women as such as beings to

be conquered came from the mentality of

conquering the land

as colonizers sought strategies to

exercise as much control and power as

they could

with the knowledge we have about the

historical context of racial

federalization

now we have to talk about its relevance

now specifically how it has a direct

correlation with the sexual

violence abuse and exploitation of asian

women

rather than seeing yellow fever as a

preference

let’s see for what it actually is a

smokescreen of way of normalizing the

rampant sexual violence against

asian women how they are stereotyped as

hypersexual

and submissive which has origins from

the history like before

is dangerous as it allows others to

assume that they can take advantage of

them according to morgan dewey the

national network to end domestic

violence communications coordinator

41 to 61 of asian women reported having

experienced physical

and or sexual violence by an intimate

partner at some point in their lifetime

and that’s just reported and that number

actually ended up being

much higher than that of any other

ethnic group within this study

the mistreatment at the hands of those

familiar to them is a direct consequence

of the widespread normalization of how

asian women are dehumanized and

sexualized in the most extreme and grave

cases

this has even resulted in deaths and

immense trauma and with that being said

i’d like to pay

tribute in remembrance of some of the

victims of racial federalization

nguyen was a vietnamese woman and was

raped by two white american men who had

called her a racial service and then

burned her alive

she was 28 and forced to leave behind a

family in the spring of 2018.

over 90 chinese immigrant students at

the university of southern california

were assaulted by school gynecologists

who took advantage of their

immigration saudi status socioeconomic

background and their racial identity

in addition in in 2017 yin zhang a

visiting chinese scholar at the

university of illinois

was raped and murdered according to law

enforcement who’d actually looked into

the murder search history he had visited

an infamous fetish website and

researched how performing kidnapping

beforehand meaning not only

had he been thinking about it and the

crime was premeditated

it also came from a federalization

mindset

and then with a conversation about how

asian women are impacted by sexual

violence today

we also have to talk about human

trafficking in a view and view

in tangent with sexual harassment and

domestic violence and other issues as

they can’t be viewed separately

human trafficking which has been dubbed

the new slavery harms an unimaginable

number of people

all over the world on a daily basis and

unfortunately most human trafficking

revolves around women and their sexual

exploitation

as kimberly mullen orizoco author and an

expert witness on human trafficking

civil and criminal court cases wrote

asian women are highly sought after

because they are perceived by american

men as being more

submissive in my interviews with

commercial sex consumers and through

research into the forums

they talk about their dislike of

american women who they perceive as more

recliatran to their sexual and social

demands

it’s really hard to see a simple

preference as just that if it comes from

an inherent

desire for dominance and control and the

issue grows even more concerning and

alarming

when we get into the numbers on those

targeted by human trafficking as

according to the un international labor

organization 2016

there was an estimated 3.8 million

adults and a million children who were

victims of forced sexual exploitation

and out of those individuals more than 7

out of 10 of them were asian

this report as well as moment or zoku’s

research gives us insight into the issue

and sheer scale of human trafficking as

well as it

illustrates exactly how a dark history

of colonialization the systematic

stereotyping dehumanization

objectification

of asian women has influenced and

largely con

contributed to the number of them being

sexually exploited

and mistreated and with these issues in

mind we have to talk about the emotional

trauma and insecurity

women who have suffered through such

conditions may experience

for many asian women it can cause them

to doubt the true intentions of their

romantic partners as they could be

genuine about their feelings and like

them for them

or they could find her attractive solely

because of their yellow fever

that kind of treatment can cause a

disorienting image of themselves and

their self-worth if they are valued

for the generalizations based on their

racial identity

and not on the essence of their being i

know that fear was instilled in me the

moment my friend made that comment to me

finally the mental health consequences

become even more concerning when we

consider the fact that asian people are

three times less likely to seek out help

according to the american psychological

association

there are multiple factors that can

explain this such one being how

mental health is a often stigmatized and

somewhat of a taboo subject in

asian communities and it is great that

we are now in a time where we are

talking about mental health

more than ever before and we are

developing treatments and resources but

we also have to consider

opening up access to those that may need

it the most

with all that i’ve talked to you about

today i can’t help but think about all

those i have lost their lives i’ve had

trauma to heal from

and it just makes my head spin and my

heart ache for all the asian women out

there who had to go through this

and it’s frustrating so frustrating to

see

how downplayed racial federalization is

as it has very real

consequences and harms so many people

out there

and it begs the question on how many of

their lives have to be taken

and ruined before people with these

dangerous beliefs who believe that women

of color

are beings to be taken advantage of

before our society comes to a practice

consensus that harming women

women of all backgrounds should be

unfathomable

i am angry simply put beyond a doubt

but that isn’t the reason why i’m

standing here talking to you all

because instead of anger i am motivated

by

a desire to hopefully foster change and

express

love for the asian community and i’m

confident

and gradual painful but necessary change

to happen

racial fantasization doesn’t have a

simple cause and won’t have a simple

solution either

so combating it requires us to tackle

issues such as racism sexism a climate

of sexual violence

and exploitation among others

individually we must act and speak up

against the wrong doings we see don’t

let some harmless comments about

objectifying women go unchecked because

when those comments are left

unchallenged

they reinforce a culture in which women

are seen as bodies not people

holding people accountable for their

actions and words is important because

it helps us better ourselves and our

society because

simply put and honestly we have to

expect better from people

even if we don’t directly say or do

something wrong ourselves we become

complacent

in our science and in action if we just

watch and let it continue

in addition to considering our actions

as individuals we also have to think

about ways society and institutions

could change for the better as it takes

both societal and individual action to

make change happen not one

not the other but both whether you’re

new to or knowledgeable about these

kinds of issues

there are still endless horizons for

ways we can continue to learn something

new and take

meaningful action with the knowledge in

hand

there are all kinds of things we as

communities and individuals can do

for the sake of a better future we are

all entitled to fair representation

autonomy over our own bodies as well as

safety and peace of mind and it deeply

saddens me that i have to say that at

all as it should just be assumed

and universally agreed upon but it’s not

as there are people out there that

believe that it’s

okay to violate those things

for other people based on their identity

as if they’re conditionals

things to be taken away from we have to

do all that we can not just for

ourselves

but for future generations in order to

get closer to a world where this is a

standard accepted by everyone

thank you

you