Talk:Asian fetishism/Archive 7

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Archive This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Contents

Deletion of Physical anthropology and testosterone sections

... are discussed in this archive. That issue is closed, and if you wish to continue the discussion, please do it elsewhere. -- Gnetwerker 02:22, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Plan for improving this article

I would like to propose that we formulate a plan for upgrading this article. Here are some factors that I think would be important:

  1. Establish and enforce the norm that Wikipedia policies and guidelines will be upheld in the article and on the talk page. In particular (WP:NPOV; WP:NOR; WP:CIV; WP:NPA; WP:Consensus, and WP:MoS must be respected.
  2. Carry out a thorough edit of the article (WP:HEP), guided by the above policies and guidelines.
  3. Ensure that all material (other than generally accepted information) is supported by approprate references.
  4. Establish that major new additions will be discussed, and agreed to, on the Talk page prior to their introduction to the article.

Please feel free to add to this list and provide comments, as appropriate. I volunteer to work on the edit. Sunray 22:09, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

This issue is something that is discussed at length in scholarly journals, if not the popular press. I think the most important thing that can be done is source the various opinions and take out all the weasel words. PhatJew 12:19, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
Yes, agreed. Sunray 07:08, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Templates

{{cleanup}} and {{NPOV}} are enough; adding {{weasel}} etc. only over-eggs the pudding. --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 22:19, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Like I said in my comment, I think the weasel designation is the most important one. PhatJew 10:24, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
But the weasel one is a subset of the NPoV one; that is, it's a particular way in which the article's PoV, so it's covered by the general template, but is only part of that template. It's thus the less important one. --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 14:35, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
Once again, I must disagree. More specific tags help editors fix the problem. PhatJew 23:36, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

General POV (Redux)

1

Since there was little or no support for my rewrite, I have made some changes, not intended to change the meaning of the page, but to remove obvious POV wording and phraseology. I removed the list of "Sex Crimes", while retaining the section and some references, even though I do not think this section belongs here at all. It is still my opinion that much of this article is original research and what is not is uncited and not verifiable. -- Gnetwerker 19:10, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

The sexual crimes page has already been discussed extensively: Talk:Asian_fetish/Archive_3#The_title_of_the_.22Social_consequences.22_section. You are the only person who seems to think that it should not be kept. --Wzhao553 19:30, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
That is not an accurate statement. The discussion you point to is a short one, and regards the title of the section, not the appropriateness of a long(ish) list of specific crimes to make a point. The reason I don't believe it belongs it that it is, by its own admission, anecdotal. Also, none of the crimes (other than those retained) have citations. Nonetheless, I kept the section, and rendered it more NPOV by shortening it. Otherwise it had undue weight. -- Gnetwerker 19:37, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

And what, Wzhao553, was your reason for reverting the other POV-reducing edits? -- Gnetwerker 19:39, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

All the cases in the section have references at the end of each paragraph. Maybe you just didn't see them. --Wzhao553 19:45, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
Gnetwerker, I strongly disagree with your edits of the sex crimes section. That section is listed under "social consequences of asian fetish" and it's relationship to the core topic is clearly defined. Each crime has a citation/reference and each crime is a clear example of a crime perpetrated against Asian women solely because the perpetrator had a fixation on Asian women. These perpetrators quite literally had "an Asian fetish". I don't see how it can get any clearer than that. In the future, I think it would be nice if you discussed these kind of changes with the community before taking it upon yourself to make such a drastic change. OneViewHere 20:20, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
The section is self-avowedly anecdotal. While it may be clear that there is an "Asian fetish", it is not a clinical diagnosis, and five crimes listed does not make it a trend, or we would have "blonde fetish", a "short woman fetish", and a "big breasts fetish" listing. There is absolutely no evidence whatsoever that "Asian fetish" leads to sex crimes against Asians in higher numbers than would be indicated by their natural occurence in the population. Furthermore, when I suggested the defining language that "Asian fetish" could be defined as "an abnormal attraction" to Asians, I was angrily shouted down by Wzhao553, despite this being, in essence, the textbook definition of a fetish. So you can't have it both ways: is it an abnormal attraction, sufficient (e.g.) to incite crime (a la pedophilia), or is it simply an "unusual" attraction, labelling an interracial relationship that some parts of society frown upon? Come on, make a consistent argument. -- Gnetwerker 22:59, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
P.s. -- There is no section on "social consequences of asian fetish". "Sex crimes" is a top-level section, without additional context. -- Gnetwerker 23:56, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey, guys let's try to stay out of the edit war mode. You have all made significant contributions to the article. However, it still is plagued by original research. If we all try to work together, we can bring it up to speed, but it ain't going to be easy. Gnetwerker has made some valid points, above. I suggest we try to work with him on this. We each have our abilities. If we combine forces, we just may make this an acceptable article. Sunray 15:59, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Unfortunately, Gnetwerker has not only repeatedly admitted that he knows nothing about the subject but has also shown complete disregard and hostility toward the actual cited research and suggestions for introducing it into this article, despite being given numerous opportunities and suggestions for increasing his knowledge by me and Durova. Is it too much to ask that people making major changes to an article actually know something about the topic? One can see why it would be difficult for one to take anything that he writes too seriously. --Wzhao553 20:05, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Calm down... WP:AGF Infinity0 talk 20:19, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

2

With respect, Wzhao553, I feel a great deal of hostility from you. Remember that neither you or anyone else owns this article. You have consistently reverted my content-neutral edits with little or no comment, perhaps because you feel ownership of your own prose. Your "rhetoric" (you word, not mine) contains blatant POV, ascribing thoughts and motivations to "the main proponents" (unstated who they are or how you have identified them as "main") and you state that the "contrary position ... is a misuse and abuse of [your] theory". Sorry, but you are still pushing a POV here. I am trying to conduct myself with civility, and would ask that you do too. As I have said before, one of the central issues is that you are trying to use a page that is partly (until recently primarily) dedicated to a popular definition of a slang term to be about an abstruse academic concept -- one that you are perhaps knowledgeable about. If you wanted to make a page (e.g. Asian Fetish in Post-colonial theory), and make the academic argument there, that would be fine. Alternatively, it would be fine with me if this page was dedicated to your academic theories (as long as they are not original research), and omitted the pop culture and slang references. Finally, I have read the references you have supplied, and commented on them extensively. They either do not bear on the issue of the phrase "asian fetish" as a pop-culture phenomenon, or insofar as they do, the are not secondary sources as required on Wikipedia. -- Gnetwerker 21:20, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Gnetwerker, let's take a look at your edits and comments, and see why I have problems with them.
First of all, the "main proponents" of the theory are the so-called angry Asian men. This is acknowledged throughout the entire article. Among others: (1) "Some suggest that the pejorative sense is used primarily by Asian males, reenfocing the gendered sense." (2) "Others contend that the "Asian fetish" sterotype is a form of social control within Asian or Asian-American communities, intended to discourage Asian women from straying from Asian men." The identification of these main proponents at the beginning of the article is beneficial for the article as a whole.
Second of all, you badly misquoted me. I wrote, and I repeat, "The contrary position is that the term "Asian fetishist" is a misuse and abuse of theory." The contrary position is that Asian men have misused and abused an academic theory to fit their own allegedly misogynistic world-views. This is a well acknowledged and valuable critical viewpoint. I cannot possibly see how you think that I am advocating that the contrary position is an abuse of theory, except that you misread the statement. These are statements of fact. If you want citations, then citations can be provided. But please do not misinterpret statements of fact as statements of opinion, and then change them unknowingly.
Third, you seem to think that postcolonialism is a literary theory. While there are literary postcolonialists (and Said's Orientalism could be considered a postcolonialist text), postcolonialism is a sociological theory first and foremost, and that is the sense that we are using it here.
Fourth, as I said earlier, "the aim of the first sentence [of the sexual crimes section] is intended to be something to the effect of: "While the majority of uses of penicillin occur without any physical harm to patients, the dangers of anaphylactic shock cannot be overlooked." Obviously anaphylactic shock is worth discussing." That is, while penicillin does save lives, the worst-case scenarios involving penicillin still must be considered. Analogously, while the vast majority of cases of interracial marriage involve healthy relationships, the worst-case scenarios (which involve Asian fetish) cannot be overlooked. The "Sexual crimes" section explains this. The argument presented is that while the idea of an Asian fetish is considered benign by many, still there are cases when it is not, and these are worth discussing, an argument which is also found, e.g., here.
Fifth, you seem to think that the term "Asian fetish" is slang. However, basic research would point out that it is more than that. For example, Sheridan Prasso has an entire chapter on it in her book. Moreover, she received her M.Phil. in social anthropology from Cambridge. Her book is described as a "follow-up to Said's landmark Orientalism" by David Henry Hwang. Said was, as you might recall, the founder of postcolonialism. This research suggests an obvious link between the academic and postcolonialist theory of racial fetishism described by Bhabha and others, and the popular (non-slang) use of the term "Asian fetish" as investigated by Prasso, Hwang and others. Simply put, your demand for one or the other uses is impractical, given the literature in the field. I do not understand your hostility toward including both uses in this article, and sincerely wish you would stop. --Wzhao553 21:52, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

The two versions of that paragraph sound like they're talking about different things.

  • There is a great deal of controversy surrounding use of the phrase "Asian fetish". c.f.
  • There is a great deal of controversy surrounding the issue. [asian fetish]

Maybe they're two different things? Also, Wzhao, I don't think "Angry asian men" should be cited as the main proponent of this theory. I'm sure many other people think this too. Infinity0 talk 21:59, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Well, the most vocal proponents are definitely Asian men. This one is starting to get angry. ;) At any rate, it does sound like the two versions are talking about different things. That's why I keep reverting the changes: they completely change the meaning of the paragraph. --Wzhao553 22:03, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

How about adding both of them in? Infinity0 talk 22:11, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

3

Question 1: is "Asian fetish" a:

  • Post-colonial literary theory? or
  • Slang term used to derogate interracial relationships?

There appears to be controversy surrounding the second -- the use of the phrase. There is no evidence presented of controversy (per se) surrounding the academic thoery, unless it is in the more rarified sense of "academic dispute". So these "main proponents" -- are they the academics? No, you say they are the proponents of the "popular use" -- so this is a disjunct usage from the academic one. You say (above) that the "main proponents" are "angry asian men" (of which you are one?),yet a few senstences later you say that the "contrary position" is perpetuated by "angry asian men" -- so are asian men on both sides of the controversy?

The basic issue is this: an NPOV article cannot, as a matter of WP policy, ascribe motivations, thoughts, or ideas to vaguely-defined but large groups. You offer no citations or support for the idea that these purported angry asian men are proponents of anything. That there is controversy seems undeniable, but your ascribing of it seems like original research.

With regard to the balance of your points (in no particular order):

  • The popular use (as distinct from the academic use) of "asian fetish" is slang. It's not a medical condition, it is either an academic term, and it is defined in this very article as actually not a fetish, so what else is it? Nonetheless, I have not identified it as so, merely taken more egregious slang words or slurs and correctly categorized them as such -- most of the references are to Wikipedia entries in the Gay slang section!
  • You may the distinction between this sentence "The contrary position is that the term "Asian fetishist" is a misuse and abuse of theory." and that "Asian men have misused and abused ... theory to fit their own allegedly misogynistic world-views." The first is amore general statement than the second. Do there exist no non-Asians who mis-use the (academic) phrase? Why, there certainly are! And suggesting why they do it -- there you go again, ascribing motivation to a minority, without as much as a citation.
  • Your position on the "sex crimes" section is indefensible. Allergic reaction to penicillin is a studied, statistically relevant, verifiable scientific phenomenon. The "sex crimes" section is more like saying "People who have taken penicillin have died". Well, I can guarantee that 100% of people who take penicillin will eventually die -- the statement, while true on its face, is also misleading and worse than useless (in the absence of study and statistically significant correlation). More accurately, the section is like saying "New Yorkers are likely to commit sex crimes, here are five examples". This section is absolutely, positively the most racist and indefensible part of this entire distasteful article.

I have again tried to remove the POV -- Gnetwerker 22:44, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Gnetwerker, I have already explained to you that you should not rewrite entire paragraphs that you do not understand. This is sensible advice, yet you continue not to follow it. Let's take a look at this sentence one last time:
The contrary position is that the term "Asian fetishist" is a misuse and abuse of theory in the form of a racist stereotype of white males perpetuated mainly by angry Asian men, in which they regard all possible cases of sexual attraction as a form of objectification or fetishism to some degree.
First, you made the mistake of leaving out a "that" clause implying that the contrary position is that Asian fetish is a misuse of theory, instead thinking quite outlandishly that the contrary position itself was a misuse of theory.
Second, the sentence itself clearly states that the contrary position is that the term "Asian fetish" is perpetuated by angry Asian men. However, you again misread the sentence, thinking that the contrary position is advocated by Asian men. The contrary position, in fact, is hostile toward Asian men. This is made very clear and is, again, another serious error on your part.
Third, you replaced "the main proponents" with "some proponents." The first tells you exactly what the principle use of the term means, the second employs a weak weasel word to arrive at some vague conclusion. How this can be viewed as an improvement is beyond my comprehension.
Given your repeated misreadings of sentences, I would advise you to refrain from making any further changes to this article until you fully understand what it is actually saying. I am again forced to revise your vandalism, and it is becoming tiring. --Wzhao553 00:01, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps it is a Wikipedian corallary of Godwin's law that whenever someone accuses an editor of "vandalism", that meaningful discourse is ended and the argument lost. Nonetheless, despite your persistent rudeness, I will carry on. For example, I will be charitable and assume that you are not a native speaker of English, given your criticism of the sentence about a "contrary position". My sentence (The contrary position is that the term "Asian fetishist" misuses the academic theory as a racist stereotype of white men) get it? misuses ... theory ... as ... stereotype. Your sentence leads to the conclusion abuse ... of theory ... by angry asian men. Whether your point is valid or not (it is unsubstantiated), your English is not very good. Perhaps this is why the balance of the article was (and some still is) riddled with run-on sentences, mis-placed commas, and a generally low quality of writing.

Regarding main versus some proponents: again, I was being charitable to you -- none of this is verifiable, so I was giving you the benefit of the doubt. Many of the sources you cite are in fact primary sources of the sort not usable on WP.

So I decline your request not to edit, advise that you learn how WP works, and continue to enjoy the give and take here. Best -- Gnetwerker 02:07, 19 February 2006 (UTC) (edited 07:16, 19 February 2006 (UTC))

Respectfully, when accusing someone's English of being less than stellar, do not insert typographical errors into your statement. It would have in fact been more compelling had your sentence itself been grammatically stellar.
Whether you point is valid or not (it is unsubstantiated), your english is not very good.
It is "your point" not "you point" and "english" should be capitalized. (That one was too hard to resist.) In any event, the main point is that you've coerced me into not being lazy any longer and into adding citations and elaborations to the article, for which you certainly should be commended. The citations will eventually be replaced with more scholarly references, of course, as I was writing on the fly, but they indicate clear progress for an article itself in progress. --Wzhao553 06:27, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
Thank you for your helpful input. The typos have been corrected. -- Gnetwerker 07:16, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

The accusation of language incompetency comes out of the blue and reeks of ad hominem. I suggest that you refrain from throwing extremely nonsensical statement that undermine your credibility. If I were an untrusting, suspicious man, I might be thinking: Were you trying to benefit from some ridiculous racist stereotype?

"The contrary position is that the term "Asian fetishist" is a misuse and abuse of theory." This statement describes persons who believe that the characterization and meaning of the term Asian fetish by some other party is an abuse of theory. Straightforward enough. Any other interpretations are misinterpretations by the reader. Such phenomena is known as reading comprehension. Elegance of prose is not something I delight in and wise input can be well received, however you appear to have misconstrued and confused the statement, then accused the writer of incomprehensibility. May I suggest that it is you who asserts the incomprehensible, sir, and it is you who needs assistance in language schooling. One should not be so quick to claim expertise when one is lacking, unless that one wishes to appear the fool.

Writing style has little to do with the positions advocated in the content. Withholding valuable (ostensibly) information on claim of mere illegibility while claiming superior command of the medium and therefore prerogative yet not moving to fix - this speaks of partisan agenda, even if that agenda be sheer laziness. Poor English indeed. Heaven's knight 07:59, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

4

What is going on with this article?

I would like to mention that the edit wars have made this article almost completly impossible to read. The grammer, syntax, and diction have submerged whatever the original point was in very deep and murky waters. The article sounds like Pseudo-academic babble from a graduate student for whom English is a second language. Actually after reading it, I have less of an idea of what "Asian Fetish" is than I gathered when I heard the name. Fix it or delete it. At this rate deletion seems the better option. 68.254.195.210 02:55, 19 February 2006 (UTC)Tango_Down Comment: I agree to Tango_Down, delete this trashy leftist article. Now my predictions fulfil that this articel either is deleted ot improved by real science.80.138.177.147 15:44, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Please DO NOT DELETE this article. As an Asian female, I am forced to experience Asian fetishes in full force on a daily basis. It is important to educate people about the existence of this social phenomenon. "Asian Fetish" is both a social/literary theory and a real thing. As far as citing authorities, the authors may want to check out sociological and social anthropological texts. I know the published material is out there, since I read a lot of it as this area was my major in college. Please KEEP this article. Thank you. 71.139.164.148 01:50, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Credible Citation Sources

As this box points out:

 This article or section needs sources or references that appear in reliable, third-party publications.
Primary sources and sources affiliated with the subject of the article are generally not sufficient for a Wikipedia article. Please include more appropriate citations from reliable sources, or discuss the issue on the talk page.
This article has been tagged since December 2006.

citations in Wikipedia need to be from reliable sources and not from primary sources. Taking the second point first, it says in WP:RS that: We may not use primary sources whose information has not been made available by a credible publication. See Wikipedia:No original research. So what is a credible publication? WP:RS goes on to say:

Partisan political and religious sources should be treated with caution, although political bias is not in itself a reason not to use a source. Widely acknowledged extremist political or religious websites ... should never be used as sources for Wikipedia, except as primary sources i.e. in articles discussing the opinions of that organization or the opinions of a larger like-minded group, but even then should be used with great caution, and should not be relied upon as a sole source.

Whereas credible secondary sources:

  • There is separate editorial oversight. This means that they have different employers, or different editors (but not necessarily different publishers).
  • Have not collaborated in their efforts.
  • May have taken their own look at the available primary sources and used their own judgment in evaluating them.

In this article, the Reference section is mostly primary sources, but some of them credible academic journals. However, many of the internal citations in the article are from ColorQ.org[1], ModelMinority.com[2], AsiaFinest.com[3], AsiaWhite.org[[4], and AsianMediaWatchdog.com[5]. I submit that these sites, by Wikipedia policy, should not be used for citations of facts. I think some of their uses in this article are appropriate -- if attributed correctly. If someone were to make (e.g.) a viable claim that ModelMinority represents a view ascribed to by a broad cross-section of asians, then a statement "According to ModelMinority.com, many Asians believe ..." might be appropriate (depending on the context). A major part of cleaning up this article is to add appropriate citations, or remove the parts that are unsupported. -- Gnetwerker 02:57, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

I have gone through the article and tried to clean up many of the sources. In general, when a source is a primary one -- an activist organization or other party that can be expected to have a POV, I have not removed the reference, but raised the citation so the group is referenced in the text. At least then a reader who doesn't click through to every link can put the claims of various interest groups in context. This is especially evident in the troublesome "Sex Crimes" section. Many of the references here are primary sources, and the secondary sources do not contain explicit references to a society-wide "Asian fetish", but to the derangement of an individual. -- Gnetwerker 06:59, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Delete this biased pseudo-scientific ranting article !

It is leftist trash as usual.I will propose it for deletion !80.138.177.147 15:46, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

This is not "leftist trash". This is a documented and extensively studied area of sociology and social anthropology. KEEP THIS ARTICLE!! 71.139.164.148 01:52, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

The notes and references

After note#5, the note/ref numbers are mixed up. The notes after #7 don't even point to anything. Can someone clean this up please? Infinity0 talk 16:27, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

This leftist propaganda will be deleted !- 40% of the votes for real science were not respected !80.138.152.199 12:15, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Long live the left! If "leftist propaganda" is the best you can come up with, don't be surprised that nobody gives you any credibility. Infinity0 talk Long live Eurasian nationalism, the destroyer of Anglo-Zionist media manipulation  !80.138.185.229 09:52, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

This has got to go down in the history books of bad jokes and other deleted nonsense. The sooner the better. -Will Beback 11:03, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

Wow, this article sucks

Weasels words everywhere, vague off topic sections including a list of disturbing violent crimes which have nothing whatsoever to do with the topic. Being that the Sex Crimes section is the worst of the article, I'll delete that now. You might just as well list a bunch of sex crimes by football players under an article on football, or a list of sex crimes towards blonde haired women in the "blonde" article. --Xyzzyplugh 14:51, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

I reverted your vandalism. The list of sexual crimes has been clearly explained as being caused by perpetrators that had a racial fixation on Asian Women. Therefore the inclusion of this list is entirely appropriate. Also, since you are a newly registered user and did not consult anybody before taking it upon yourself to delete that article, I can only assume that that you are not operating under good faith.
I have also relabeled the "sex crimes" section as "Social Consequences of Asian Fetish". That is what the section was ORIGINALLY entitled, not "Sex Crimes". There have been so many people messing with this article that it no longer resembles it's original form. By labeling it "Social Consequences", it's inclusion in the article makes more sense than simply inserting in random "sex crimes".
If any of you object to that section, then you'll have to make a convincing argument that shows that crimes committed by people with an Asian fetish is not relevant to this article. Making vague generalizations like "disturbing violent crimes which have nothing whatsoever to do with the topic" is not sufficient. OneViewHere 14:14, 23 February 2006 (UTC)
Sorry, but I agree with him, and in any case his edit was not "vandalism". The leading paragraph of the section itself disavows any causal, WP:V link between a handful of crimes against Asians and a differential social trend. Xyzzyplugh's analysis was right, as there is no citation supporting such a link, this section is, at best, original research. I restored his change, while leaving in the weasel leading para and your header change. -- Gnetwerker 17:14, 23 February 2006 (UTC)
Am I missing something here? Some of the crimes cited were examples of crimes perpetrated against Asian women by men who ADMITTED having a fixation on Asian women. How is that NOT related to Asian Fetish? Are you going to tell me that some guy who is married to an Asian woman and goes around pouring his semen into the drinking cups of only Asian woman does not have some sort of racial fetish? I don't see how it gets any clearer than that. And the removal of the section was most certainly vandalism as he did it without consulting anybody nor soliciting any opinions before his actions. The Wikipedia guidelines at the top of the page explicitly state that nothing should be removed or deleted without discussion. You appear to be violating that policy as well.OneViewHere 21:53, 23 February 2006 (UTC)
Look at what I wrote originally. You could just as well list sex crimes against blonde women in the "blonde" article and say, "how is that NOT related to Blonde hair?" Every group of people of any substantial size will include both criminals and victims of crimes, this doesn't mean that every article relating to any group of people should include a list of disturbing crimes. If you want to write up a section about how having an asian fetish leads to sex crimes, then do so, but it must contain verifiable documentation of this, links to mainstream sources making this claim.
The section I removed used weasel words ("some point to recent crimes", "Some see the following cases") with no evidence of who these "some" were, in order to introduce highly POV text into the article. One could use the same weasel words to write up sections to include a list of sex crimes by republicans into the Republican party article, or to list sex crimes by asian men in the Asian article. Unless one can find verifiable evidence that republicans, asian men, or men with an asian fetish are likely to commit sex crimes, it's not appropriate to have such content in any of these articles. --Xyzzyplugh 22:46, 23 February 2006 (UTC)
OneViewHere, the legitimate part of the complaint is that there have been no references provided that link sexual crimes to Asian fetish, which we of course know are quite easy to find. They have therefore been provided in the first paragraph of the section. For this article to improve as it should, we should always receive criticism as encouragement to find more references. --Wzhao553 22:42, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

The Last Samurai

I question the inclusion of this movie in the section "Stereotypes of Asian Women" as an example of an unmotivated White-Asian romance. As I recall, the romance that developed between Nathan Algren and Taka occurred only after several months of Algren living with Taka, who was initially quite hostile to him but reciprocates his feelings after he repeatedly demonstrates local values. Since the premise of unmotivated White-Asian romance is that race is sufficient and the participant's characters irrelevant, The Last Samurai really isn't a good example. JJ 18:41, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree. -Will Beback 22:50, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Previous comment is leftist and wrong

Physical attraction between the two attractive characters including racial attraction according to Hartmann laws makes it a very motivated love.Additionally, Algren adores the traditional Samurais knights fighting for old values in contrast to the American slaughtering of Indians making Algren depressive and an alcoholic.The previous comment downplays the importance of race (of course,as usual!)."The Last Samurai" will be included again !80.138.188.125 22:29, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

40% of the votes are not respected - include serious anthropology again !

80.138.188.125 22:31, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

It's more important for 60% of the vote to be respected. -Will Beback 22:51, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

POV, Meta-POV & A proposal

First, let me say that I think it is wholly appropriate to have a WP page dedicated to the academic research on the Asian form of "Racial Fetishism" (which appears to have little to do with the popular use of the phrase for white guys who sexually "target" Asian women). Second, I also have no objection to a page explaining the popular sense of the term in an even-handed and encyclopedic way.

The serious problems with this page, IMO, are that the two of these positions are mixed together, and also that much of the page, if it isn't directly POV itself (I think much is), is reporting on the POV of various groups, and doing so using primary sources.

I really am not trying to either pick a fight with the historical editors of this page, nor am I trying to claim that Westerners/Occidentals/Caucasions/Whites don't stereotype and stigmatize minorities, including Asians. But much of this page is so far away from what a seriously NPOV reference work would include as to be embarrasing to WP.

I don't know what to do about it -- the argument (leaving out the insane anon's rantings) seems to be intractable. I will propose again that we split this page into "Asian fetish (theory)" and "Asian fetish controversy" or some such. In the former ("theory") we could include the information that is sourced in the reputable, (mostly) academic journals and other publications. In the second, we could report on the controversy itself and include some references to the (potentially legit!) POV of the various interest groups (like www.modelminority.com).

Otherwise, I think this page will permanently stay in a state of near edit war. -- Gnetwerker 23:35, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Did you mean this by "rantings" ?

== Classical anthropology ==

One line of reasoning about the sexual attraction of Asian women has been developed by the German —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 80.138.188.125 (talk • contribs) .

"Lengthy text removed." -Will Beback 02:13, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Made improvements to the Sex Crimes section

I have rewritten the beginning of the sex crimes section, and changed the heading to Positive aspects of the Asian fetish/Sex Crimes. Please discuss these changes here. Reversions without discussion on this talk page are strongly frowned upon. --Xyzzyplugh 03:33, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Two points. #1: Are you German? (This is a serious question.) #2: In general, if you want to criticize a point that is made in a section, then please place them after the original point is actually made, or, better yet, move it to the criticism section. From what you've written, I think it'd be better as a subsection of the criticisms section. --Wzhao553 03:52, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

However this section turns out, it would certainly be best not to have a title that implies there are positive aspects of sex crimes.--ThreeAnswers 21:05, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Stealth edits

As always, this page is undergoing paroxysms of change. I always try to assume good faith in these edits, but Wzhao553 has -- no doubt inadvertently -- removed key explanatory words from the intro paragraph while edit-warring on the "Sex Crimes" section. Please be careful to accurately label your edits in the edit summary box. Thanks -- Gnetwerker 06:09, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Gnetwerker, unfortunately, the statements that you continue to insert are all unsourced, and the ones which you continue to remove are all sourced. Please refrain from removing sourced material and inserting unsourced material. I will change all the edits that are such, and leave the rest. Thank you. --Wzhao553 07:28, 24 February 2006 (UTC)
Also, good to know that you think talking about how Asians are paedomorphous (physically and psychologically childlike) is more important than talking about sexual crimes. People like you, man, what are we going to do? --Wzhao553 07:32, 24 February 2006 (UTC)
As noted in my statements above about appropriate citations, the Sex Crimes section does not contain appropriate Wikipedia sources -- most of the sources there are primary sources. Many link to special-interest websites such as http://www.modelminority.com . Other of your sources don't say what you indicate they do. For example, you cite Nash, Phil Tajitsu, "Depravity Against Women On- and Off-campus", National Asian Pacific American Women's Forum, Apr 29, 2005 with the statement Recently, both Asian Pacific American and feminist organizations have given increased attention to sexual and violent crimes committed against Asian women, centered on fetishism, sexual harassment and violent crimes whereas the real article (http://www.napawf.org/page.php?view=depravity ) says:
Disturbing reports from our nation’s campuses show that violence against women in general and APA women in particular is an ongoing problem that we all, men as well as women, must address.
Clearly the real article addresses violence against women in general, and you appear to be twisting it to suit your POV. Similarly, you use the Yale article http://www.yaledailynews.com/article.asp?AID=29233 to support the statement: Asian American women complain that Asian fetish is considered an annoying but benign phenomenon that does not need to be taken seriously , but fail to mention that the article is an editorial by the co-chairs of the student Asian-American women's organization! That is virtually the definition of a primary source! I could go on and on.
Your comment that my "statements ... are all unsourced" is absurd, since I used exactly your citations, I merely elevated the POV to the article so it could be judged.
Finally, you cast some sort of aspersion to my inclusion of a parenthetical comment about the (purported) "paedomorphous" nature of Asian women. I don't hold that opinion -- and don't know whether you do or not. This article isn't about my opinion, or yours, or anyone's -- it is about verifiable, encyclopedic information. Please try to separate that from your POV. -- Gnetwerker 07:50, 24 February 2006 (UTC)
Gnetwerker, I can tell you have a problem with Asian women discussing crimes committed against them. This isn't something that you can deal with on Wikipedia. Please take it elsewhere. --Wzhao553 08:00, 24 February 2006 (UTC)
Please refrain from personal attacks. I have no problem with discussions about crimes against Asian women! Make a page -- Crimes against Asian women and fill it in to your heart's content. I have no doubt that these crimes occurred, that they were horrible crimes against innocent individuals, and that they were committed by bad people (possibly deranged ones). My problem is that you can't seperate your empathy for these people with the needs of an encyclopedia. -- Gnetwerker 08:20, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

To the anonymous German editor

You will be happy to know that the paedomorphosis paragraph has been reinserted into this article by Gnetwerker and Xyzzyplugh. Everyone knows that I initially supported inclusion of this material into the article, was later overruled by a vote, and that I of course continue to have no objections to the inclusion of this material now. --Wzhao553 08:10, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

For the benefit of anyone reading this -- I disavow Wzhao553's statment. A look at the edit log will show only that I explained the word "paedomorphous". I do not condone its inclusion. It appeared to be sourced, but if it should be deleted, please do so. -- Gnetwerker 08:22, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

100% Eye Rolling Guaranteed!

This article is ludicrous, especially the "Sex Crimes" section. I remember a case in, I believe, Colorado where five male Asian-American college students kidnapped, raped, and tortured a white girl because they wanted to know "what it was like" to have sex with a white woman. I would suggest putting a section about this, and similar crimes, on every page concerning Asian-American men until this article is cleaned up.

I'd advise against doing that (WP:POINT). --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 12:52, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Besides the general idiocy and bias, the article is also poorly written and confusing. Even if the bias and "Sex Crimes" nonsense are left intact, the article needs to be rewritten by someone for whom English is a first language. ChildeRolandofGilead 08:17, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

The article is appalling (and was even worse once), but it survived an AfD (which, sadly, tells you somthing about the AfD process). --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 12:52, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Request for Comment Requested

I have posted this page to WP:RFC -- here is the discussion page: Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Asian_fetish. -- Gnetwerker 08:37, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Thank you , Wzhao533 for informing me on the inclusion of our thoughts again.

The truth cannot be abolished.And I insist on inserting the whole old section.80.138.188.86 17:38, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Consensus reached on article discussing racial paedomorphosis !

Gnetwerker and Xyzzyplugh finally included statements on racial paedomorphosis (see history). Due to the 40% of voters and Gnetwerker and Xyzzyplugh recent consensus to include it , I re-edited our very fine anthro section. Any further summarizing seems not appropriate due to the huge lack of knowledge in even American scholars of anthropology (e.g.wiki user Prof. Steve Rubenstein,Athens , Ohio).80.138.168.9 11:46, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

60% OF THE VOTERS WILL BE RESPECTED!! DELETE THAT CRAP!!

Infinity0 talk 13:07, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

I had nothing to do with that paragraph except explaining the term. Do not include me as a supporter. I think that 90% of this article is unsourced, not-WP:V, WP:NOR BS and that 80.138.x.x should be banned. -- Gnetwerker 18:01, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

Edit warring

After skimming through the talk, I am under the impression that the inclusion of the "sex crimes" section is under dispute.

The title of the article is "asian fetish". Unless the sex crime is directly related to a fetish, and not just a "normal sex crime" (please don't think I'm an asshole for using that phrase, I have nothing better), then it shouldn't be included in the article, since it has nothing to do with "Asian fetish". Infinity0 talk 19:21, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

Good luck, and I support you. As I'm sure you know, I have tried five different wordings and intermediate measures to improve this section, and User:Wzhao553 has reverted every one -- he will not allow removal of the list of specific crimes, won't discuss the specific criticisms of the section here in Talk, and has now stooped to calling me a racist. I also ask that you look at the RfC I posted above and weigh in on the subject there. -- Gnetwerker 20:12, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

Comments for Gnetwerker in response to Infinity0

Gnetwerker, it has already been explained to you many times what the problem with your views on this page are. However, if you've forgotten, then we can provide a simple summary. The simple fact of the matter is that, while you have made several valid points, as Sunray has said:

If we all try to work together, we can bring it up to speed, but it ain't going to be easy. Gnetwerker has made some valid points, above.

you have also made several errors and made several incorrect and mistaken statements which you so far have not admitted. These mistakes make it very difficult to take anything that you say too seriously, so long as you continue not to admit that you're in error a good percentage of the time.

For example, you said earlier on the Sexual crimes page:

Also, none of the crimes (other than those retained) have citations.

It was then pointed out to you that all of the crimes did in fact have citations.

All the cases in the section have references at the end of each paragraph. Maybe you just didn't see them.

Later, you continued to misunderstand a simple statement:

The contrary position is that the term "Asian fetishist" is a misuse and abuse of theory in the form of a racist stereotype of white males perpetuated mainly by angry Asian men, in which they regard all possible cases of sexual attraction as a form of objectification or fetishism to some degree.

It was explained to you by Heaven's knight that this was a straightforward statement:

This statement describes persons who believe that the characterization and meaning of the term Asian fetish by some other party is an abuse of theory. Straightforward enough. Any other interpretations are misinterpretations by the reader. Such phenomena is known as reading comprehension.

You also made a ridiculous statement that I should not be writing because you believed that English was not my first language. Heaven's knight also explained to you why that can be considered offensive and racist:

The accusation of language incompetency comes out of the blue and reeks of ad hominem. I suggest that you refrain from throwing extremely nonsensical statement that undermine your credibility. If I were an untrusting, suspicious man, I might be thinking: Were you trying to benefit from some ridiculous racist stereotype?

Next, back to the Sexual crimes section. OneViewHere has already pointed out the following:

Am I missing something here? Some of the crimes cited were examples of crimes perpetrated against Asian women by men who ADMITTED having a fixation on Asian women. How is that NOT related to Asian Fetish?

One has to wonder, if someone admits to having a fixation on Asian women, and a fixation on Asian women is an Asian fetish, then how could these crimes not be related to Asian fetish?

You however made the statement about the article here (http://www.napawf.org/page.php?view=depravity):

Clearly the real article addresses violence against women in general, and you appear to be twisting it to suit your POV.

One has to then ask: did you even bother to read the article? Every single example cited is about APA women. This article addresses sexual harassment and sexual crimes directed toward APA women, and what has been done about it. A statement such as yours makes it very difficult not to believe that you were arguing against me about an article which you had not even read.

Finally, regarding the Sexual crimes section, this was your final rewrite:

There is no statistical evidence linking crimes against Asian women to an "Asian fetish", nor that relationships between non-Asian men and Asian women are measurably different from any others. Despite the lack of evidence, some point to recent crimes which they allege suggest a link between fetishim of Asian women and sexual crimes. Some see the cases such as the murder of Lili Wang as evidence of a wider social problem. Groups such as the Yale chapter of InSight, an Asian-American women's group, identified the Michael Lohman incident as a case of an Asian fetish. Other groups, including the National Asian Pacific American Women's Forum put these crimes in the context of overall violence against women. Proponents of a link cite several crimes against Asian or Asian-American women, while others question whether anecdotal evidence shows a societal trend.
In general, Asians are much less likely to be victims of violent crime than every other major racial group. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, "In 1998, 110 American Indians, 43 blacks, 38 whites and 22 Asians were victims of violence per 1,000 persons age 12 or older in each racial group"[6]. Some believe that it is Asian fetish -- the attraction to and fondness for Asians by other racial groups -- that accounts for lower crime victimization against Asians in America. According to http://www.humanevolution.net/a/asianoriental.html , Asian women tend to be more "child-like" (paedomorphic) than women of other races. Paedomorphism results in a cuteness response from most people[7], resulting in a positive attitude towards those people who have these paedomorphic qualities. However, it is inevitable that no matter how positively Asians are regarded, some crimes will be committed towards them by disturbed individuals.

Notice that you removed any details about the sexual crimes, and yet you retained the discussion on paedomorphosis. However, as you may have forgotten, you said earlier:

Delete -- Regardless of the weight of the "paedomorphosis" and other cultural anthropology citations, there is no cited primary research establishing the link between this observation and attraction between asians and westerners. As with the section noted below, this clearly violates WP:NOR. This is not an observation on the scholarship of the piece itself, but that the central theme (as opposed to the secondary evidence) of the section is not itself supported by any cited research except the author's. -- Gnetwerker 07:04, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

This led the anonymous German editor to conclude (quite reasonably) that you had changed your position on the "paedomorphosis" section. When you (somewhat angrily) denied this, it is hard to see how this does not damage your credibility even further. You said:

For the benefit of anyone reading this -- I disavow Wzhao553's statment. A look at the edit log will show only that I explained the word "paedomorphous". I do not condone its inclusion. It appeared to be sourced, but if it should be deleted, please do so. -- Gnetwerker 08:22, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

In fact, a look at the talk log will already show that you did not condone its inclusion. However, it appears that you believe that discussing a section which you already voted against is more valuable than the discussion of the point of view of Asian American women. This, you must understand, has left many of us very confused about what you actually think, and makes it very easy to dismiss many of your valid points as the rantings of someone who does not know what he is doing.

Nonetheless, it is true that you have been of great service to this discussion. Otherwise, I would not have said earlier:

In any event, the main point is that you've coerced me into not being lazy any longer and into adding citations and elaborations to the article, for which you certainly should be commended.

and also

For this article to improve as it should, we should always receive criticism as encouragement to find more references.

You are certainly welcome to continue providing criticisms of the article so that it continues to improve with citations to scholarly references in response to the criticisms. But you are also encouraged to fess up to any errors that you have made, so that you might regain some credibility around here. --Wzhao553 21:50, 25 February 2006 (UTC)


Response to Wzhao553

Wzhao553, I am not going to bother to respond to your imprecations of my character or credibility, and I will try not to be baited by your outrageous condescension. "It has already been explained to you" -- good grief, get a grip -- you have your POV and explanations, and ignore anything else. You claimed (in an edit summary that "everyone" agrees with the inclusion of the sex crimes section except me -- clearly untrue. You have, again and again and again edited this article to include unsourced, unverifiable information, when you do provide citations, they are often of primary sources, or you misrepresent citations that are (e.g.) op-ed pieces in newspapers, so they are primary sources while superficially looking like secondary sources. Other of your edits include citations that do not bear on the topic -- often "Asian fetish" is not even mentioned in the referenced articles. From your edits it appears that you feel passionately about this topic, and you have a crystal clear POV. Ironically, I mostly agree with your point of view, but do not believe that POV -- yours, mine, or anyone else's -- belongs in Wikipedia. And so when you call me a racist and associate me with the Asian fetish anon spammer, I can only think that it is yet another manifestation of your biased editing. As a result, it is completely impossible to take you seriously. Your bias is so clear it makes WP:AGF nearly impossible.

You make many specific accusations above, supported by quotes often taken out of context or misconstrued, and facts either not in evidence or actually wrong:

  • "Also, none of the crimes (other than those retained) have citations." -- none of the crimes have (or had) citations that make them relevant to "asian fetish". No one is disputing that the crimes took place, only that their inclusion is relevant to asian fetishism. As another commentator pointed out, shall we add lists of "counter-asian-fetish" crimes?
  • You say "It was explained to you by Heaven's knight that ..." a statement was clear and not poorly worded, except that Heaven's knight is another zealot, probably a sock puppet (one of yours?) and has not edited any WP pages other than this one in his 19 days on WP. I generally don't listen to sock puppets.
  • You say I "made a ridiculous statement that I should not be writing because you believed that English was not my first language." -- This is an out-and-out lie, as anyone who bothers to look above to the reference section will see[8]. If you were offended by my suggestion, I apologize. However, many Wikipedia editors are non-native English speakers, and it has been commented by many others that the overall writing quality of this article is low. With respect, it continues to be my opinion that the quality of your writing is low, regardless of your ethnic or national background.
  • You say "if someone admits to having a fixation on Asian women, and a fixation on Asian women is an Asian fetish, then how could these crimes not be related to Asian fetish? -- the answer to this is the reason you don't understand the objections being made. If someone murders a blonde woman, and says later that they have a fixation on blonde women, does that mean that there is a "blonde fetish"? If six different men murder blonde women because of a fixation or fetish, does that indicate a societal trend? In both cases, the clear answer is "no". This section, the inclusion of the list of crimes, your deletion of the text explaining the complete lack of any statistical correlation, and your movement to a different section of crime statistics showing that Asians are less likely to be victims -- these all indicate that you are blind to any argument that disagrees with you.
  • With regard to this article[9] I said "the real article addresses violence against women in general", and you ask "did you even bother to read the article? Every single example cited is about APA women" (and more). In fact, the article itself says (among other things): "Disturbing reports from our nation’s campuses show that violence against women in general and APA women in particular is an ongoing problem that we all, men as well as women, must address." (direct quote from article). Since the article is from a primary source -- i.e. a special-interest Asian-American women's site, of course it primarily addresses Asian women, but your use of it to support a "diagnosis" of Asian fetish is counter to the article's intent, as it also says: "Whether called a fetish, sexual harassment or sex crime, it shows an attitude of treating all APAs as the same and as less than human." I won't suggest that you didn't read the article, but rather that your POV blinded you to its actual content, which neither opposes your position nor supports it. You say this makes it "very difficult not to believe that you were arguing against me about an article which you had not even read." when in fact you clearly do not understand the concept of WP:NOR, WP:CITE, primary sources, and WP:V. Instead of attacking me, why don't you defend your positions without using primary sources.
  • Finally, you pull a random intermediate edit out of a revert war, and call it my final edit? Here was/is my attempt at compromise with you on the "Sex Crimes" section: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Asian_fetish&diff=40979059&oldid=40977515 . This attempted to retain references the the crimes committed, retains all of your citations, however primary, but identifies the primary-sourced beliefs as such, rather than as WP:V fact (which they are not -- they may be your belief and mine, but that does not make them WP:V). You say that I "removed any details about the sexual crimes" -- yet I linked to WP articles describing them, and I retained your cites! You then complain that I retained the discussion on paedomorphosis. I honestly do not knnow why that you so badly want to tar me with that. As you note, I voted against it, I disavowed any connection to it, and you admit in your note that "a look at the talk log will already show that you did not condone its inclusion." But then you go on to say that "it appears that you believe that discussing a section which you already voted against is more valuable than the discussion of the point of view of Asian American women." -- what a bizarre suggestion! I don't want to discuss paedomorphism. And I only want this page to be WP:V, WP:CITE, WP:NOR and WP:NPOV.

You conclude by saying "This, you must understand, has left many of us very confused about what you actually think, and makes it very easy to dismiss many of your valid points as the rantings of someone who does not know what he is doing." This is perhaps the root of the problem. This page has become so contentious that you (and others) assume a "if you're not for us, you're against us" frame of mind. I am neither for you nor against you.

I will admit here and now that I chose this page as an experiment. I've been on Wikipedia since 2002, but stuck to fields where I am an expert (and I mean by profession, not just something I think I know). But after a big edit war on one of those pages (where it could be -- and was -- claimed that I had a POV, I wanted to pick a controversial page where I could reasonably claim to have absolutely no POV, and see if I could bring light to the argument.

This experience is the record of my failure to do so. At every turn I have tried to steer this page toward what I think a reasonable, educated person might expect to find in an encyclopedia, and supporting verifiable work, citations, neutral point of view, and so on. By doing these things, you and others have concluded that I am a partisan in favor of a particular position, or that I am too stupid to understand your academic arguments, or that I am a racist, or God knows what.

This page and this argument is a signal not only of my failure here, but of a significant failure of Wikipedia -- the hijacking of pages by zealots, or people who have been turned into zealots by the (inverse) zealotry of others. You, Wzhao553, are (on this topic) a zealot. There is no way around it -- you are fanatical about this topic and your defense of your POV here.

You seem to want me to "fess up to errors" I have made. OK, mea culpa. I make errors all the time. My early readings of the abstruse academic literature of racial fetishism were too cursory. While I received a liberal education, and am married to someone who wrote a PhD thesis on post-modern literary theory, I failed to spend the time understand the nuance of the academic side of the arguments. Did I once fail to remove the ridiculous "paedo" section when I might have? Regrettably, yes (though only once). And yes, I erred in assuming that your poor writing style was indicative of national origin rather than simply, well, poor writing (oh, and I made a typographical error while criticizing you). Indeed, I am chock full of errors (go ahead, take that out of context as well!) But my biggest mistake has been wasting my time arguing with you. As George Bernard Shaw said: "Never wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and besides, the pig enjoys it." -- Gnetwerker 00:56, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Response to Gnetwerker

Gnetwerker, aside from your numerous and unprovoked attempts at attacking me either directly or undirectly, not counting your childish name-calling, I have finally understood what your problem with this article is. You seem to believe that I have a certain POV in writing this article. That is 100% true. In contributing to this article, I have assumed an Asian American POV. That is because this article is on a topic that was coined and is used by Asian American writers. This is a topic that only Asian Americans talk about. This article has an Asian American POV.

However, in editing this article, since you like to cite Wikipedia pages, you are welcome to read Wikipedia:NPOV#Anglo-American_focus. To force your own POV onto this article amounts to committing systematic bias. Maybe you don't realize what a problem systematic bias is on Wikipedia, or maybe you believe that we should maintain systematic bias, but I will explain to you that systematic bias is a recognized problem on Wikipedia, and that Wikipedia is dedicated to ensuring that the viewpoints of ethnic minorities are fairly expressed.

Lastly, regarding your obsession with primary sources, you need to understand what the purpose of a primary source is. For example, you can read Wikipedia:Reliable_sources#Partisan_websites.

Partisan political and religious sources should be treated with caution, although political bias is not in itself a reason not to use a source. Widely acknowledged extremist political or religious websites — for example, those belonging to Stormfront, Hamas, or the Socialist Workers Party — should never be used as sources for Wikipedia, except as primary sources i.e. in articles discussing the opinions of that organization or the opinions of a larger like-minded group, but even then should be used with great caution, and should not be relied upon as a sole source.

This current article is about the POV of an ethnic minority. Therefore, we cite primary sources which represent that ethnic minority as sources for the POV of that ethnic minority. This is, again, straightforward. Note that this isn't a comparison of Asian American primary sources with Stormfront or Hamas by any means, but rather an attempt to explain to you why primary sources are necessary in expression the POV of an ethnic minority on an article about the POV of that ethnic minority.

I would recommend that you spend less energy in name-calling and vitriolic attacks against me and more in working to find more references to improve this article. I have tried repeatedly to explain various points to you, and continue to encourage you to investigate into sources, primary or otherwise. --Wzhao553 02:31, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Whzhao553, if you are admitting that you are editing with a POV and want the article to have an Asian-American POV, then you are admitting violating WP:NPOV. You've also recruited meatpuppets from Modelminority.com and Fightings44s.com. I think that considering Gnetwerker's admissions of his own faults and mistakes it might behoove you to consider some of your own. For all the sniping and near-edit warring, this article has improved greatly over what it was just a few weeks ago.--ThreeAnswers 05:13, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

ThreeAnswers, of course I am admitting that I edit with an Asian American POV. I am also admitting that, being Asian American, it is impossible for me not to edit with an Asian American bias. I would also like Gnetwerker to admit that he has an Anglo American bias, since (I assume) he is Anglo American. However, I don't believe that it follows that this is a violation of WP:NPOV. For instance, it states in WP:NPOV#Anglo-American_focus

Wikipedia seems to have an Anglo-American focus. Is this contrary to the neutral point of view?
Yes, it is, especially when dealing with articles that require an international perspective. The presence of articles written from a United States or British perspective is simply a reflection of the fact that there are many U.S. and British citizens working on the project, which in turn is a reflection of the fact that so many of them are online. This is an ongoing problem that should be corrected by active collaboration from people from other countries. But rather than introducing their own cultural bias, they should seek to improve articles by removing any examples of cultural bias that they encounter, or making readers aware of them. A special WikiProject has been set up to deal with this problem. This is not only a problem in the English Wikipedia. The French Language Wikipedia may reflect a French bias, the Japanese Wikipedia may reflect a Japanese bias, and so on.

The article on "Asian fetish" is intended to be the latter, an attempt to make Americans aware that there is a cultural bias which is unfavorable to Asian Americans in America. This is of course the Asian American POV. A non-Asian American might not think that there is cultural bias against Asians in America, or might think that cultural bias, if it exists, is not that big of a deal. However, Asian American activists strongly believe otherwise. This is why terms like "Asian fetish" were coined in the first place.

ThreeAnswers, I must ask, do you not think that you have an Anglo American bias as well? Is that not made painfully clear for you every time you come onto MM.com? And don't you think that this bias is contrary to WP:NPOV#Anglo-American_focus? At any rate, I do believe that this article needs a much better criticism section to balance the POV of the article. For example, the article needs to discuss the serious accusations of patriarchy and homophobia against some Asian American male writers, and it needs to include a much better critique of AA identity politics.

Nevertheless, I do sincerely apologize to all of Wikipedia for trying to recruit the crazies on MM.com to do my dirty work -- I don't recall doing so on f44's -- although you and I both know that led nowhere anyway. --Wzhao553 05:33, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Wzhao553, I think the charge of WP:NPOV#Anglo-American_focus bears some scrutiny, and an extra measure of sensitivity. However, you ignore the central admonition of the section your quote: "... rather than introducing their own cultural bias, they should seek to improve articles by removing any examples of cultural bias that they encounter, or making readers aware of them." Despite -- and because of your passionate embrace of this issue, you must back down and let non-partisans work on this article, while continuing to raise questions about the bias, rather than introducing your own "counter-bias".
I don't deny having an Anglo-American bias. I cannot avoid it, as I am Anglo-American (strictly speaking, Hiberno-American, but ...) and by definition this bias exists in us all. This does not mean I am ignorant of or willing to ignore the bias here, especially in the use of citations. You quote Wikipedia:Reliable_sources#Partisan_websites (and suggest that I read it -- you will see that I quoted it above a couple of weeks ago when pleading for better citations). The issue is not that we should remove all uses of partisan websites, but that we must state in the text that they are particular points of view, rather than encyclopedic fact. This is the thing you really need to get your head around -- we can represent the Asian-American point of view -- as long as it is clearly stated that it is a point of view. In the end, it is my suggestion to you that a strong but NPOV article will serve the goals of you and Asian-American social activists better than an obviously biased, POV-labelled article that is the subject of endless edit wars. See Creationism for an example. That article fairly represents a particular point of view that is refuted by most scientists. Not that Asian fetish is an unscientific article of faith, but you need an article that clearly presents it as a point of view. -- Gnetwerker 06:19, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Gnetwerker, I will readily admit that I went overboard with my POV several times, for which I apologize, as sometimes happens to inexperienced activists when faced with the accusation of writing non-verifiable BS. I agree that this article needs to be more WP:NPOV, and I believe that more POV-balancing statements should be included in the Criticisms section, just as Creationism#Criticism of creationism contains the bulk of POV-balancing statements in the Creationism article. --Wzhao553 06:40, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Coined

  • The term was coined and is used by Asian American authors to describe a form of racism and sexism which they believe they experience, and is not generally used outside of Asian American literature.

Do we know who coined the term? -Will Beback 04:42, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

I don't have the answer to that. That's one of the most important questions that I've tried to answer, but so far I haven't found anything. It seems to have first appeared in books around the mid-90's. I personally believe that Frank Chin and Jeffrey Paul Chan certainly would have used it in their 1972 article "Racist love" if the term existed then, so my assertion is that it was probably coined sometime in the 80's. This definitely needs more research. --Wzhao553 05:06, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
Let me clarify myself on that one. The phrase "Asian fetish for..." (as well as "Chinese fetish for..." and "Japanese fetish for...") has been used before the 90's to denote a cultural fetish that Asians have (e.g., Chinese fetish for footbinding). The shift in usage toward the meaning of "a fetish for Asians" appears to have caught on in writing around the 90's. --Wzhao553 05:13, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
The testosterone poisoning article may be something of a model here. It tracks the genesis and spread of a in prominent publications. While that and Schadenfreude have a stronger linguistic focus than this article, I think a section that tracks the term's genesis in a referenced manner would be a good addition. Durova 05:47, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Article Name Change or Arbitration?

In light of Wzhao553's stipulation that this article represents a specific POV of Asian-American social activists (one with which I sympathize), but also in light of the centrality of WP:NPOV on Wikipedia, I propose that this article's name be changed to (something like) "Asian fetish in Asian-American activism". While the coinage note goes a some way to explaining the obvious bias in the article to the unsuspecting reader, placing it right up there in the title would be much better.

Failing this, I wonder if Wzhao553, Will Beback, Mel Etitis, ChildeRolandofGilead and perhaps others would join a "friendly" suite to ArbCom to resolve the apparent conflict here between WP:NPOV and the charge of WP:NPOV#Anglo-American_focus. -- Gnetwerker 06:06, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Arbitrate who? I think you mean the Mediation Cabal or a Request for Comment. Infinity0 talk 14:50, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

I have no confidence in the Mediation Cabal (to put it no more strongly), but an RfC might be helpful. As I've said, I'd be happy to see an AfD, in fact. --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 18:33, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

As I noted above, a few days ago I posted an RfC to Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Asian_fetish. Other than a visit from the anon vandal, it has seen no activity. -- Gnetwerker 00:05, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Sex crimes section

I've not been following the talk page. That user vandalised the article twice; I was just reverting it. Infinity0 talk 18:56, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

User:Mel Etitis, respectfully, lists of many crimes, including sexual crimes, committed by Americans are already a part of Wikipedia, e.g., [10] and [11]. --Wzhao553 20:11, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

OK, so those crimes have to do with Asian fetish. But is there really need to report 4 of them? It gives no new information to the reader; this is an encyclopedia, not a news station. Infinity0 talk 20:28, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

There are actually five. Some of them could be shorter, since this article reduplicates some information found in Lili Wang and Michael Lohman. --Wzhao553 20:43, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

The reason I have routinely objected to the listing of crimes is both WP:NPOV#Undue weight and WP:NOR. Listed like they were, they appear to substantiate a pervasive pattern of crime against Asian women by fetishistic white men. While there are certainly examples of race-bases crimes against Asian women, there is no evidence of a pervasive pattern. Indeed, crime statistics indicate the opposite. Listing a reference or two to crimes as a reason for concern and vigilance by (named) Asian-American organizations seems legitimate, as the focus becomes concern about a particular type of crime, rather than an argument suggesting a broadly-based type of crime (and its roots).

Here is a minor edit of the last version I inserted (that always gets deleted by Wzhao553) that I would continue to propose as a replacement:

Asian Pacific American and feminist organizations have recently given attention to sexual and violent crimes committed against Asian women they contend are centered on fetishism[12]. Asian American women complain that Asian fetish is considered an annoying but benign phenomenon that does not need to be taken seriously [13]. Sexual offenses[14][15][16][17][18] which seem to focus on superficial or stereotypical aspects of the victim are sometimes considered by psychologists [19] as sexually fetishistic behavior (in the Freudian sense, not the academic or popular senses). Many Asian and Pacific American women believe that the perpetrators in these crimes were driven by societal stereotypes of them.
However, there is no statistical evidence showing a pattern of crimes against Asian women that links to an "Asian fetish", nor that relationships between non-Asian men and Asian women are measurably different from others. In general, Asians are much less likely to be victims of violent crime than every other major racial group. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, "In 1998, 110 American Indians, 43 blacks, 38 whites and 22 Asians were victims of violence per 1,000 persons age 12 or older in each racial group"[20].

This version preserves the references to the crimes while suffering less from undue weight and POV. -- Gnetwerker 22:24, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree that the section should be reduced down - not all cases of Asian fetish result in a crime, for example. Infinity0 talk 23:41, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

If the section is ultimately kept, what criteria are to be used for determining which crimes are listed? There surely will be more such crimes. What makes these 5 particularly notable? Also, footnotes 22 -- 25 appear to be incorrect. The sources listed don't have anything to do with the sentence they're supposed to support.--ThreeAnswers 06:13, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Aside from some copy-editing, Gnetworker's two-paragraph vrsion seems fine. There's no need to pick out a number of instances for a list. --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 14:41, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Some academic terminology

I've added a section on some of the academic terminology with a cleanup-verify tag; I don't have all the citations I want to use right now, and I think I probably have written at least one wrong thing. I believe there are some Neomarxists on this talk page, so hopefully we can see if the attempt at terminology is acceptable or not. --Wzhao553 01:01, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

I find the third paragraph of the intro close to incomprehensible. I'm sure it makes perfect sense to the neo-colonialist, but
la femme orientale qua the exotic Other, in the context of the reification of cultural stereotypes through commodification of marginalized groups (the postcolonialist subaltern [2]), especially arising in the consumer culture of 19th century Romanticism and thereafter
is going to have a lot of eyes glazing over.--ThreeAnswers 06:16, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Let's improve this article, and Wikipedia

I propose we bring this article into line with Wikipedia's similar articles on the Black fetish, White fetish, Mexican fetish, Armenian fetish, and all the rest. I also propose that we bring this article in line with Wikipedia's articles on its opposite: Asiaphobia.

Here is what a search on these related topics brings: "No page with that title exists."

I further propose that we bring this article up to the standards of real encyclopedias on these subjects.

Here is what you find in a real encyclopedia when you search "Asian fetish":

Search Results > asian fetish No results found.

http://www.encyclopedia.com/SearchResults.aspx?Q=asian%20fetish

Improve Wikipedia. Improve this article the only possible way-- DELETE it.

Those who miss an opportunity to perpetuate racial stereotypes and hatred on Wikipedia by masking them in pseudointellectual babble can easily find find many, many other outlets on the Internet with lower standards than Wikipedia should have. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 172.192.63.31 (talk • contribs).

Your comments and contributions would be more quickly and easily accepted if you were to get a Wikipedia account. -- Gnetwerker 23:06, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Refactoring

This page is over 80Kb long and probably needs to be refactored again. I probably shouldn't do it. Anyone? -- Gnetwerker 07:39, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

New citation style

There is a new citation style, described here: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Cite/Cite.php , that I think we should adopt here. It puts all the references inline, and I think wold resolve the current mess with out-of-kilter references. Please discuss. -- Gnetwerker 23:05, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Some fundamental confusions

The current text starts out with a confusing statement:

The term "Asian fetish" refers to the racial fetishism of Asians, especially Asian women in the western world, especially the United States and Canada.

Adding "ism" to some word "XYZ" makes it "the theory and practice of XYZ". If you believe in and practice communal life you are a communist, if you believe in and practice ideas that value different races differently you are a racist. So a "fetishist" must be somebody who believes in and practices fetishes or something related to fetishes, e.g., takes something unexpected as the object of his/her sexual drives.

The article on Racial fetishism uses the term "fetish" in about the way one would expect: "[It] describes racial fetish to be a fixation on other races." So an "Asian fetish" ought to be a fixation on members of the Asian race.

So what was that intended first sentence intended to mean? Going by what is actually said (and not trying to figure out what the writer may have been trying to express or what I think the author ought to have been trying to express) it says that Asians, particularly those Asian women who live in the western world, have some kind of racial fetish (erotic fixation on some race, presumably other than their own). In other words the face value of the first sentence is to define "Asian fetish" as the fetishes belonging to (exhibited by) Asians.

So I, the average well-informed reader from Mars, look at that sentence and expect to see how Asians living in the Western world and expecially in the N. American continent are wild about anything other than members of their own Asian race. Zhang San only chases Swedish women, Li Si only chases French men, etc., etc. Unfortunately, I am disappointed by the rest of the article.

Let me try to be extra clear by suggesting that what the first sentence was probably trying to say was that some subset of non-Asians has a sexual/erotic fixation on Asians. Does the author of that line seriously imagine that non-Asians with such a fixation would not be found in Asia? Why does the fixation have to be described as occuring in only one place? If it is anything it is the cultural/social background of individuals raised in these areas that makes them especially vulnerable to this fixation.

An ancient author said, "If you establish the fundamentals then the right way will flow on from there." If he was right then it is no wonder that the rest of the article has lots of problems. 金 (Kim) 04:45, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

I think you make an excellent point. The previously-accepted opening sentence was:
The term "Asian fetish" is a colloquialism used in the United States and Canada, which represents an intense sexual attraction of a non-Asian, typically a white man, to Asian women, primarily East Asians (such as Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, Taiwanese), to such an extent that it is difficult or impossible for him to form healthy, meaningful relationships with women of his own race, or even non-Asian women in general.
In this[21] edit, Wzhao553 changed it to the version in use today (this was on Feb 18). This followed a long argument on this Talk page (now archived) about what "Asian fetish" really was -- an academic concept, a slang term (or colloquialism), a slur, etc. While I'll let him speak for himself, my interpretation of Wzhao553's comments at the time were that the page should represent primarily the Commodity fetishism (i.e. academic/Marxist) perspective (which the pointed-to page mostly represented at that time). Since then he has also apparently taken the position that it is a "term of art" among the Asian-American social activist community (with a distinct meaning than the academic one). This is (slowly) getting explained in the succeeding paragraphs, but is still, I agree, very murky and confusing. -- Gnetwerker 06:37, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

I'll have to read up on commodity fetishism. I find it extraordinary that same-sex attractions were deliberately (?) left out of discussion. If there is something going on with regard to the so-called races of the individuals, why would it also segregate by sex/gender? The ways that humans get turned on to different kinds of sexuality/eroticism are very murky. The paraphilias are generally selections that make it very difficult for the individuals to gain satisfaction, so, from the standpoint of helping the individuals have wider choices (and, sometimes, keeping them out of jail if the only things that turn them on are illegal) the paraphilias offer great challenges. Being strongly attracted by a member of some group other than one's own can be troublesome, but usually I think the problems have been with things like the miscegenation laws. So you don't very often hear of individuals seeking treatment because they are only attracted to members of some fairly commonly encountered group.

There appears to be very little data and lots of extrapolation on this subject. One thing I'd like to see some data on are whether the individuals who are attracted to, e.g., Japanese who have recently moved here, are equally attracted to American yonsei (fourth generation Japanese living in this country). 金 (Kim) 08:02, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Not sure I'm qualified to chime in on this topic, Kim 金, since I have no degree in whatever subject it is you study to become an authority on other people's romances ("commodity fetishism," is it?). I'm only someone who would probably be called an "Asian fetishist" (i.e., I've always been strongly attracted to Asian women.) Rather than seek help for this bizarre disorder of mine-- whether the experts consider this disorder to be psychological, mental, socio-economic, political, or whatever is beyond me-- I took the easy way out. Asian friends introduced me to a nice lady, we carried on a romance here in America for a while, then for a couple years in Asia, where we were finally married. In spite of our disorder, we've been very happy together for over a decade now.

When you start to take bark off, it is often advisable to look at which tree you're working on. ;-) "Commodity fetishism" isn't my term, and neither is "Asian fetish." And I do not claim to be an authority on other people's romances, although I'm pretty well read on the subject of how people who spend their whole academic lives have come to conceptualize the area of "romances." On top of that, I do not see attraction to anyone of a different race as a disorder. The whole result of lots of the research that has been done to try to get objective about the "horrors" of miscegenation, and the "disgusting, perverted..." nature of the paraphilias, is to show that everybody is different, everybody's erotic preferences are different, etc. The article, as it stands, does not seem to me to (1) stand on any evidence to speak of, and (2) ignores the good work of people like Milton Diamond.

Anyway, my own, completely anecdotal take on your question is this: I'm much more attracted to native Asians than Asian-Americans, whom I consider, basically, Americans just like me, and so, not as interesting as native-born Asians. Part of the attraction is the possibility of learning about a different culture, language, etc. and I have been able to happily indulge in that perversion throughout our marriage. If I had it to do over again, I wouldn't change a thing. Is that sick or what? ;)

The evidence you offer is anecdotal but in close accord to what other people in your situation have told me. As I think I remember saying somewhere above, there may be a strong element of learned expectation. If, for instance, one has had bad experiences growing up in one's own culture and one encounters members of another culture that treat you with respect and affection it is not unreasonable to think you one would form a preference for the members of the other group. If, e.g., a Chinese person is considered odd because of some quirk of personality or appearance (e.g., being too open in the expression of emotion), and meets an American who finds that a plus instead of a defect, there would be some strong reason for bonding and almost imprinting in that situation--particularly if there had been no prior love experience outside the family and maybe even a family that rejected this person. Or, it could be the other way around, the American could have come from a toxic family and a narrow-minded community that rejected a certain part of each generation just so others could have somebody to look down on, then encountering a welcoming situation in Asia might be the first real love that person had ever experienced, and an experience that would leave its mark on future interactions.

Whether other victims of the "Asian fetish" feel this way is beyond me... And, oddly enough, I don't really think it's any of my business.

It isn't anybody's business what anybody else does as an individual unless that individual is hurting somebody. But since somebody has created the term "Asian fetish" and is apparently using it to be critical of people like yourself, it would be preferable, in my opinion, if real research were applied. I find your experience much more credible than the view that implies that if Sami people were hot this year I would automatically be hot for Sami people. Or, let me put it this way, if the most beautiful Asian woman acted like Joan Rivers when she's "on stage," I don't think there are many American guys who would want to establish a long-term relationship with her.

I have a question too-- I wonder if "Asian fetish" can be applied to other Asians-- e.g., the recent vogue of all things Korean in Japan. "Post-colonialism," which seems to be a password in this article, applies in this case, though I get the distinct impression the term is only meant to be applied to white guys.

Now you seem to be on the side of those who would apparently think that a new model of erotic ideal can be marketed the way a new car design can. But according to the thought patterns of the people who seem to have been responsible for much of the content of this article, it would at least be an analog. (They seem to imply that the term should be limited to farangs.)金 (Kim) 03:03, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Human Fetishist 00:18, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

As a "term of art" among Asian-American activists, it would primarily seem to apply to white, western men (or perhaps the subset with an unspecified "unhealthy" attraction). As an academic term as part of a "commodity fetish" it would seem to apply to entire societies. As a term related to Freudian psychology, parafilia, and (perhaps) pornography, it would seem to apply only to those "with an abnormal or extreme" attraction who are "unable to form relationships with members of other races". This would leave lots of people (yourself, it would seem) in normal interracial relationships undescribed by this, other than by the activists, whose broad application of it could be (IMO) rightly considered racism. I do not defend these definitions, merely report them. -- Gnetwerker 00:43, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
I have to agree. It seems to me that there is a considerable sour grape component in these discussions of other people's sexual/erotic attractions. Why should it be anyone's concern if I take up with an Afro-American person? -- unless the person is thinking that if I weren't interested in the Afro-American person I would be interested in the person making the criticism. I've always wondered what it means if a person of the same sex criticizes somebody for being attracted to an opposite-sex member of some other "race", assuming that the critic is not a homosexual, that is. ;-)
Why do people think they lose something if I get turned on by cats? If I weren't turned on by cats, do they have the temerity to believe I would then be turned on by them? On the other hand, if I were turned on by them it would probably be worth the time of a sexologist to study the anomaly. "Extra! Extra! Human abandons erotic attraction for cats in favor of erotic attraction for rats! Extra! Extra!

Read all about it!"金 (Kim) 03:03, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I think we see eye-to-eye, Kim. That Korea/Japan analogy was somewhat tongue-in-cheek.

Human Fetishist 18:59, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Another confusion?

The text says, "In the popular sense, Asian fetishism is a strong and irrational devotion to the stereotypes of Asian women." Is that for real? You mean all this hot air has been stirred up because of nothing more compelling than the analogous attraction of a social climber to the idea that, e.g., "All of Paris is glamorous. Simply glamorous, darling." Stereotypes can be initially compelling sometimes, I guess. If organic food is trendy this month I can imagine some people getting wound up about it. But if they then go out and sample some non-gourmet organic food I find it hard to believe that just the stereotype promoted by Guru Mahanaga or whoever could maintain any enthusiasm or produce any prolonged social effect. I'm having trouble thinking of any case in which a stereotype that isn't just a rationalization of an underlying pathology has had a long-term career in the real world. So what is the sentence quoted actually trying to depict? What happens if everybody recites a million times, "All Asian women are diminutive," and then goes on a blind date with Yao Ming's female cousin? They go to the parade and he says, "Let me give you a ride on my shoulders so you can see over the crowd!" Really? I don't think so. (She ain't heavy, Father O'Mally. She ain't my sister neither. But she's still got 'er feet on the ground!") 金 (Kim) 03:32, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Popular definition

For everyone who's been asking, here's a precise definition that's found in authors like Sheridan Prasso and David Henry Hwang. A person (say, a white male) has an Asian fetish if:

  1. he has an intense sexual attraction to Asian women;
  2. he treats all Asian women as objects;
  3. he believes that Asian women are submissive, promiscuous, etc., and that any Asian woman who is not is a rare exception to the rule; and
  4. he cannot or will not form healthy relationships with women who are either not Asian or who are Asian but do not fit the stereotypes.

If all four cases apply, then that person has an Asian fetish. If any of them does not apply, then it's questionable whether he has an Asian fetish. The second condition is probably the most important. Someone who has an intense attraction to Asian women, but does not treat Asian women as sex objects does not have an Asian fetish, for example. Hwang remarks that a person with an Asian fetish falls in love with a fantasy stereotype, not a person. The objectifcation of women is the crucial point. I hope that clears up some things. --Wzhao553 03:56, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Respectfully, Wzhao553, if any kind of person (white, black, Asian; male or female) has points 2, 3, and 4 about any sort of person-- Asian, African, male, female, whatever-- he is-- to use the layman's term-- an asshole. These can lead to serious issues such as stalking, spousal abuse, etc.-- all of which MAY have racial connotations depending on the case, but don't inherently have race as a cause-- Not that I can see anyway. Because these things do occur with sexual relationships between people of the same race.
I don't see that point 1 means much of anything. Everyone (well, most everyone) has a strong sexual attraction to some kind of person... Big deal.
Just chiming in with my opinions, of course.
Human Fetishist 18:59, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

While I think that Wzhao553's definition goes too far, you cannot deny the existence of self-labelled "Asian fetish" pornography and "dating" services. These do seem to cater to clients more interested in stereotypes than to other aspects of Asian women and culture. Of course, stereotyping is a characteristic of all pornography, not just the Asian fetish kind. One activist argument that I think is supportable is that this kind of pornography objectifies and potentially degrades (Asian) women, and that Asian fetishism adds a racial component to an already distasteful misogynist component. However, it may be that the effect of pornography should be beyond the scope of this article. -- Gnetwerker 19:11, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I think you hit the nail on the head with "stereotyping is a characteristic of all pornography." By its nature, it objectifies and makes fetish/sex objects of people. So, my thoughts are that a mention of "Asian fetish," in an article on pornography puts it in context, and is perfectly appropriate. But pulling it out of this context and making a stand-alone article of the "Asian fetish" is to make it appear to be some sort of unique social phenomenon.
The "Blonde fetish," seems to me to be far more long-lived, and wide-spread in the U.S... and affects non-whites in America, and even exists in Asia too. As great an artist as Alfred Hitchcock made it one of his major motifs. So do we need an article on non-whites with a blonde-fetish? My thoughts are, no. If a black guy or an Asian guy likes blondes, and vice-versa, more power to them. It's none of my business.
Though again, if the guy engages in crimes, stalking or abusing a woman... well sure, that's a crime and should be treated as such... and yes, it may have a racial aspect, depending on the case.
In my own experience in a mixed-race marriage, it is other people (always strangers) who objectify us, by reacting to us as just a white guy with an Asian woman, and not the happily married pair of human beings we are. (These negative experiences have been very, very rare, and both our families have been completely accepting of us.)
Skimming through the long, convoluted, heated discussions that this topic produces-- what it is, what it should be, if it should exist, all tangled up in miscommunications, misinterpretations, back and forth-- seems to me almost evidence in itself that the article is of questionable worth.

Human Fetishist 21:25, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

There's nothing to prevent the creation of articles about other ethnic fetishes. That said, you have made an eloquent statement about the concerns I expressed at the poll and at AfD. Durova 09:38, 2 March 2006 (UTC)
Okay, I've reincorporated your suggestion from the AfD into the article in two different places. I swear that it used to be there before, but I guess it keeps getting lost in the shuffle. --Wzhao553 21:11, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

This article needs pictures

As the popular saying goes, "This article is worthless without pics!" --Cyde Weys 07:43, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

You have got to be kidding. -- Gnetwerker 07:46, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Let's assume Cyde is serious, Gnetwerker. How would pictures serve in this article? I think they would either:
1) Show pictures of the "fetish" (if it is such)-- Asian women. Admittedly, this would please a person like myself (and Cyde, if I read him right.) Beyond that, I don't see it serving much purpose. Everyone knows what an Asian woman looks like (or can find out easily enough with a Google search.) I notice the Foot Fetish article has pictures of feet. I can only wonder why. To show people what feet are? Surely, this isn't necessary. Or is it to give the foot fetishist a quick thrill? Surely, this shouldn't be the point of the picture. (I don't have the stomach to even go to the article on "coprophilia" ;< )
or,
2) They could show stereotypical "Asian fetish" pictures, Cho-cho-san in her kabuki make-up and kimono pining away for Pinkerton, Dragon-Lady in high heels and a whip, "Fortune Cookie Girls Do G.I. Joe," or some-such thing-- none of which attracts me, and I can assure you, I am about as attracted to Asian women as a guy can be. This sort of thing is not what I have in mind when I think of Asian women. A picture like this would seem to serve only to demean and caricature the white/Asian attraction. Though again we get into the definition of the term "Asian fetish." As a matter of fact, browsing articles on the subject in the last few days, it offends me that this sort of caricature is almost universally assumed by Asian-Americans to be the sole basis for white/Asian attraction. But more on that later...
So, no, I don't see how pictures could be of much value to this article.
By the way, as someone too close to the subject to be NPOV, I am refraining from editing the article. But since I have a personal stake in the subject, I hope my comments in the discussion, when time and interest permit, are of some worth. If I were to make contributions to the article, they probably could not help but reflect my own bias. In the article, I'll stick to just helping with obvious, (and group-agreed) vandalism, to patch up typos and to point out what I see as beating-around-the-bush-ism (CCB/'Cracker-Chasing Bitch' for example. If you're going to use an offensive term, spell it out and show it for what it is. Personally, I find the whole slang/slur section to be a gratuitous inclusion of offensive terms. These terms would have value on a list of racially-related slurs, however.)

Human Fetishist 21:01, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I've added an image. So shoot me. Regards, Durova 22:37, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I've removed the image for two reasons: first, it was irrelevant to the article, being a DVD cover of a film that's not about fetishism, but about a relationship that happens to be between a "Western" man and an "Eastern"... well, man; secondly, it was a fair-use image, which may be used by us only to illustrate an article on the film.

Leaving aside the general poor quality and dubious status of the article, let's at least try to avoid the sillier end of things. I've had two Chinese, one Japanese, and one Thai girlfriend; does that make me an Asian fetishist? I suppose then that I must also be a Spanish fetishist, a Jewish fetishist, a Cypriot fetishist, a German fetishist, an Italian fetishist, an American fetishist, a French fetishist, etc., etc. (I've never been out with anyone from Luxembourg, so I suppose that I'm OK there.) --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 22:57, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Bravo on a valiant attempt to avoid both of my points, Durova. Too bad Mel had to come in and throw a wet blanket on the proceedings by pointing out it didn't really have anything to do with the "Asian fetish."
I tend to agree with you on the dubious quality and value of the article, Mel. Though a look around the Internet shows that an "Asian fetish" (i.e. strong sexual attraction to Asian women) certainly exists in some white men, and I admit to suffering from this disorder myself. Also, it is obviously a genuine concern among some people-- Asian-Americans in particular. The attempt to link it with criminal behavior, abnormal psychology, etc. seems to me an attempt to demonize a (normally) perfectly healthy relationship by people who, basically, simply do not approve of interracial relationships. Browsing the online literature on this subject over the past few days, I've come across almost nothing but baseless rants, gossip, attempts to stereotype entire racial/sexual groups (while accusing those they stereotype of doing the stereotyping), anecdotal evidence being used to paint all interracial relationships as demeaning to one or the other... It seems to me that it is the people who have problems with the romantic lives of other people more than likely are the ones who are the problem.

Human Fetishist 00:15, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Mel, I attended the Broadway production of M. Butterfly and it was brilliant: the central thesis of the plot, as David Henry Hwang explains in his introduction to the printed version of the stage script, is that this French man's fetishism completely overwhelmed his common sense. He thought the perfect mistress was a beautiful submissive Chinese woman. He deluded himself into believing he had found her and refused to acknowledge anything that differed from the fantasy, even though the fantasy was an utter sham that ruined his life. What could be more relevant? Durova 02:22, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
Durova, I think the point is that the article should include a discussion and maybe a citation to M. Butterfly before it contains an image. I haven't read the play or seen the movie though, so I hope you'll be able to insert that discussion in there somewhere. --Wzhao553 05:12, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
I'll think about it. My head's wrapped around another article I'm editing that's in FAC. Not sure where and how to integrate a description into the main text of this article. Regards, Durova 08:06, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
  1. That someone is obsessed with one person doesn't a fetish make. Even if the obsession is in part fuelled by a stereotype, we still don't have a fetish. Does the script use the term "fetish" or "fetishism", or is that your interpretation?
  2. Even if the work were relevant to the article, the image would still not be usable under fair-use conditions.
  3. Attraction to a certain type – whether to redheads, Asians, or whatever – doesn't constitute a fetish. The term is being used so loosely in this article as to be virtually empty. --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 12:49, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
Mel, your comments lead me to suspect that you haven't seen this work of art in any of its forms. It won the Tony Award for drama in 1988. If you refuse to familiarize yourself with the material then you should at least take the effort of Googling and browse the dozens of unique hits for "Asian fetish" + "David Henry Hwang," or else trust the opinion of editors who know the subject. I have an FAC to check and a featured list to maintain. Regards, Durova 16:46, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
I'm a little worried that you're unfamiliar with Wikipedia policy on citations and original research. It's not up to me or anyone else to do the work to verify your claims; it's up to you to do that. If you're too busy to provide the required evidence and explanation, then don't add the image. --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 17:05, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
Mel, I have already explained the matter by any reasonable standard. If you're concerned about my research abilities then please double-check the 70 footnotes I added to Joan of Arc and weigh in at FAC. Currently the responses are 7-0 in favor of FA status (which would make it the second most heavily cited biography FA at this encyclopedia). If you don't like the picture, just say so. This looks like game playing. Durova 20:19, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
As you are either unable to understand the issues or unwilling to address them, I'll bow out of the discussion. --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 23:32, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
Sorry to see the turn this thread has taken, Mel & Durova. But I would like to congratulate you, Durova, on the great work you have done on the excellent and very interesting Joan of Arc article.

Human Fetishist 00:28, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

The issue I understand is that you declared a decision and deleted an image without asking for feedback or knowing a topic, then set an unreasonably high standard of evidence while you refused to perform the most basic fact check. Now that your posts here have as much as confessed your unfamiliarity with this story, you pretend to bow out of the discussion while you take a parting shot at my supposed state of mind. I assumed good faith when this dialogue began, but I wasn't born yesterday. Just say you don't want the picture. Is it that hard? Durova 00:09, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
As you point out, Durova, "M. Butterfly" is a work of theatrical art. As such it can be used to comment on any number of human situations. I think you hit close to the them with: "French man's fetishism completely overwhelmed his common sense." I see the play as making a point about perception/prejudice/fantasy versus reality. As such I could even see it as a metaphor for a leader of one country who wants to invade another based on a pre-conceived notion that that other country has WMDs, only sees 'evidence' when and where it validates his preconceptions and doesn't see anything that questions it... I think you see where I'm headed, and I'm getting off track...
Hitchcock's "Vertigo" deals largely with a man with a blonde fetish, and some hints of necrophilia. Do I see this as some sort of treatise on either of these two subjects? No. And, in fact, to see it as such is to lessen it, I think. I see it as a great work of cinema art with many, much deeper meanings about humanity than the sexual preferences of its main character.
Anyway, since more than one person in this discussion puts David Henry Hwang forth as an authority on the "Asian fetish," I did Google "Asian fetish" + "David Henry Hwang"-- right after Wzhao553 gave his 4-point definition of the "Asian fetish," and attributed it partly to Hwang.
What I found disturbed me very much, and I meant to comment immediately, but got side-tracked reading other literature on "Asian fetish," with my other, unrelated work on Wikipedia, my own artistic endeavors, my family, work, life, taking the dog for a walk, etc., etc., etc.
Anyway, here's what I find with this Google search: 57 pages, counting this one. When I browsed through the article list, that number went down to 47 (counting this one.)
I browsed through those articles and did not find one that could in any way be considered academic, scholarly, or even unbiased, nor did they even pretend to be. Most were of an obviously blog-like nature, and most importantly-- this I need to emphasize-- not ONE (1) of them mentions "Asian fetish" and "David Henry Hwang" in the same breath. They just have the two items on the same page.
I find this sort of sloppy attribution of sources very troubling.
Not only this article, but the entire subject of "Asian fetish" seems to be built from the ground up from this sort of sloppy scholarship which seeks to validate a preconceived, baseless opinion by seeking out anecdotes, and with pure conjecture. Who is closer to M. Butterfly and the nameless WMD leader? Those who have an attraction for people of another race-- no matter where that may originate from-- and then have real, human relationships with them? Or those who, with NO real evidence, attribute their own preconceived, stereotyped agenda onto these people?

Human Fetishist 19:43, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree, in general. One symptom is arguing from an opera to some kind of conclusions that could have statistical validity. For what it is worth, the opera is about a Japanese woman who gets involved with a Western man who does not want a Japanese wife to complicate his life when he goes back to France. The man is perfectly able to get it on with a French woman. He is just a cad who takes advantage of a Japanese woman for the period of time he is in Japan. But, anyway, it is just a tragic opera. The phenomenon is probably one that has been observed in more than one time period. In the 60s when I was in Thailand one of my Thai acquaintances commented about the behavior of U.S. troops, "We do not care if they have sex with Thai women. We would just like the soldiers to take their women back to the U.S. with them when they go home." Unfortunately, in many cases the women and children were abandoned.


If you're referring to the opera Madama Butterfly, Kim, the cad is an American sailor. And sure, the opera blatantly stereotypes Cho-cho-san as a submissive, tragic Asian woman. But it also stereotypes the arrogant, deceitful American sailor. (It was written by an Italian, for an Italian audience.) And it's the Japanese woman we cry for, and the American we despise. But, after all, it's an opera, and operas deal in stereotypes even broader and more simplistic than Hollywood movies.
Right. I read too rapidly and didn't realize how many versions of this story have come into existence. "Hwang’s Butterfly borrows the iconic name for his play about a French man who has a long-running love affair with a Japanese woman - and who commits suicide when he eventually realises his lover is a man." Interesting. I can see that two ways. Was the French man truly in love, but unable to adapt to the sexual surprise? Or was he a racist pig who found somebody he couldn't dominate as he had expected? Is the Japanese (or is s/he truly of some other nationality) a cruel pretender who has led the French man on just to see the look on his face when, as Archie Bunker put it, "The mystery is gone!"? It would be delicious if they were both cads, and tragic if they were both sincere but the French guy couldn't conceive of a relationship with an other-gender person as other than homosexual and therefore unacceptable/shameful/off-turning and the Asian guy couldn't see that his "just being herself" was going to require some retrofitting at some point. And why the need for the suicide? That reminds me of the Lawrence of Arabia movie in which the two gay teenage Arabs suffer a totally gory end that in no way served the plot -- something that isn't even hinted at in the book. Maybe directors as well as doctors both think they are God. 金 (Kim) 05:16, 9 March 2006 (UTC)
Hwang's purpose in 'M. Butterfly' appears to be to subvert the Madama Butterfly stereotype-- i.e., poor, innocent Asian girl cruelly misused by verile, Western playboy. He makes the Western man the victim, and the Asian "woman" the user. He bases this ironic (or "deconstructed") take on Butterfly on an actual event-- a French diplomat who had a 20-year affair with a Chinese female-impersonator who worked as a spy for the Chinese government. The Frenchman claimed he never knew that she was a he. When trying to explain how he could never have seen his "girlfriend" naked, the Frenchman said, "I thought she was very modest. I thought it was a Chinese custom."
Hwang, in his afterword to the play, states, "I... concluded that the diplomat must have fallen in love, not with a person, but with a fantasy stereotype. I also inferred that... the Chinese spy... must have played up to and exploited this image of the Oriental woman as demure and submissive... I suspected there was a play here. I purposely refrained from further research, for I was not interested in writing a docudrama. Frankly, I didn't want the "truth" to interfere with my own speculations."
(Note, situations such as this are not entirely unknown within races-- "The Crying Game" comes to mind, and it seems Hugh Grant had a run-in with a similar misunderstanding... though I don't know the race of the s/he in this case. But Hwang is using this particular case as a metaphor for the West's stereotyped ideal of the East, and the Asian woman in particular.)
It's a fine play, I enjoyed reading it. Often in a work of literature with an obvious axe to grind, the ideas can over-take the human drama and result in a shrill or stilted piece of writing. Hwang manages to avoid this. And I can see where Asian-Americans (men in particular) would get considerable pleasure in up-ending the Butterfly story, and making the white man the Butterfly.
All perfectly fine as art and drama. But as a reference work on the "Asian fetish?" Note Hwang's statements that this is based on his own inferences, his own suspicions, his own speculations. There is absolutely nothing wrong with using these as the basis of a work of art. The trouble comes when trying to use it as a source for a definition. It might serve as an example... but, again, Hwang's stated injection of his purely personal speculations, even refusing to find out the actual facts of the case (and not even knowing the plot of Madama Butterfly before starting the play) makes even using it as an example of any real-life "Asian fetish" dubious. (Not to mention, the case fails the 4-point definition of the "Asian fetish" right off the bat, since the Frenchman is in a long and relatively successful marriage to a French woman.) Human Fetishist 00:56, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
M. Butterfly is heavily intertextual and comments on the opera's stereotyping. In the stage version one Western character also gets blasted for confusing Chinese and Japanese nationalities. To presume that a Hollywood film propogates any stereotype is to reach a judgement without adequate evidence: in other words, prejudice. Durova 02:32, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
Respectfully, Durova, to presume that a particular film propagates any stereotype before seeing it (which I did not do) is to reach a judgement without adequate evidence: in other words, prejudice. To state that Hollywood films deal in stereotypes... well let's use your own "Henry David Hwang" + "Asian fetish" Google search test (which, if I recall, produced 46 hits, not one of which proved the valid)... a Google search on "hollywood stereotypes" produced "about 17,500" hits. Must be an awfully lot of people prejudiced against Hollywood stereotypes for absolutely no reason out there... Human Fetishist 05:10, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
Just thought I'd comment on "blasting" the Western character for confusing Chinese and Japanese nationalities, Durova. When I lived in Asia I was often assumed to be Russian or French. Here in America, my wife is often assumed to be from another Asian country-- often by Asians themselves. I did not "blast" the Asians who mistook me for someone else, and neither do my wife or I "blast" the Asians and non-Asians who take her for someone else. We have a laugh, and explain the situation.
A saying about lighting a candle rather than cursing the darkness comes to mind. Might the tendency to "blast" rather than seek to enlighten point out part of the problem with the people who have this obvious anger about Asian/white relationships? It's a thought. Human Fetishist 18:31, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
When I lived in Asia too, I didn't get anywhere near the opposition to our marriage on racial grounds as I see in reading Asian-American writings on mixed-race relationship. As you said, those who were concerned about our union were usually concerned simply that I, as an American male (with all the stereotypes they had about American males-- usually stemming from the U.S. military) would abandon my girlfriend/wife. Human Fetishist 00:55, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
To me, love has always involved a strong element of complementation, a finding of a person whose characteristics can fill out what I am missing and make me a better person. Some of the things that I find I am short on are, or seem to me to be, related to the shortcomings or over-emphases of my own culture. I tend to expect certain negative characteristics in members of my own group, characteristics that really "step on my corns." I may find analogous negative characteristics common to, or frequent among, members of another culture, but often these are offensive factors that I only encountered after becoming an adult, so I can pass over them or deal with them realistically. When there are problematical issues with members of my own culture then the trouble is that I was sensitized to these issues as a child and they may activate or reinforce areas of my own negative self image. Let me give an example. As an adult I came into contact with a colleague who evidently had lots of issues that provoked him to attempt to hurt other people. Once, out of the blue, he scowled at me and remarked what a strongly negative characteristic it was for a person to have small eyes. His eyes were rather large (not to say that they bugged out). He thought he had scored a wounding point on me. Having grown up in a culture that has nothing to say about eye size his "zinger" did not affect me in the intended way. In fact, when he made his damning comment my eye size had never come to my attention. His attack did, however, give me a useful insight into his character and warning about it. (Always forgive. Never forget.) If he had come from a culture that cast aspersions on people with large eyes, then he might have found some welcome relief in interacting with people from a culture that either values large eyes or has no negative attitude toward them.
If there is indeed some subset of the U.S. or the western population that reacts erotically/sexually to the appearance of submissiveness in potential objects of their attention, then the details of other superficial characteristics involved aside, it would seem to me of great interest in understanding the phenomenon to analye the general etiology of these feelings. Adler would probably be more interested than would Freud. What I am probably going the long way around to say is that my guess is that these individuals are pathological first and attracted to some subset of humanity only secondarily. If an equally submissive-appearing individual of the same race were present, would that individual be equally attractive? Or do the Asian-specific characteristics play an essential part? If so, then what is really going on? How could something of the power alleged to be present actually occur in just the context of mass media representations of Asians? To tease apart the actual causative factors would require real research, something that seems to be notably lacking in these discussions. 金 (Kim) 23:17, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

What Wikipedia is Not

I encourage everyone to go take 1 minute and read WP:NOT. I was vocal in my reactions to editors who (appeared to) want(ed) this page to be a soapbox for Asian-American activists. But I also don't think this page should be censored, or even accused of it. I hope that there are a handful of things we can all agree on:

  1. A perusal of the darker (pornographic) side of the web will, without a doubt, find the term "Asian fetish" in abundance, giving the impression that at least the Freudian sense of the term might come to play in some (deranged) individuals;
  2. Asian-American social activists have also captured the term for their (perfectly reasonable, IMHO) battle against racial stereotyping;
  3. A branch of literary theory has also adopted the term, albeit as a minor spin on a more generic Racial fetishism, and it appears to be supported in notable academic literature;
  4. And that there are many, many interracial couples for whom none of the above may apply.

That, in a nutshell, is what I think the article should say, but of course no one owns it. While everyone has a POV on everything, I will stipulate that while I sometimes find Asian women attractive, I never dated one and am happily married (to an Irish woman), but I have many Asian friends of both sexes, and even that I send my (Caucasian) daughter to Chinese immersion school, though not out of Sinophilia (?), but in anticipation of socio-economic change :-). So I'm just as mixed up as everyone else.

But this article is not about love and/or normal relationships. I think we should be open to all suggestions about how to make that clear. If Asian-American activists think M. Butterfly is an example, then (with the appropriate sources found) put a quote to that effect in that section. It doesn't matter whether we think they are right or not. Same with the academic view -- it doesn't matter whether one thinks (as I do) that post-colonial theory is claptrap -- it is an opinion that should be represented -- in the appropriate context -- i.e. as academic theory.

So let's get off the social-policy discusssion, and make this page something that doesn't embarass anyone. -- Gnetwerker 03:58, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Okay, I added an initial disclaimer. At this point, I think that removing the NPOV tag is the highest priority. It's already been proven that deletions of mass portions of the article only leads to edit warring, so I think specific comments about why specific sentence or paragraphs are overly POV to some readers would be most helpful to correct POV problems. I think the main problem for me is that sometimes I mix up statements of fact with statements of opinion unknowingly, so I might write
"The French diplomat in M. Butterfly is an example of a man with an Asian fetish"
when I really mean to write
"David Henry Hwang intended for the French diplomat in M. Butterfly to be an example of a man with an Asian fetish."
The first statement being a statement of opinion and the latter being (as far as I am aware) a statement of fact. --Wzhao553 04:28, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
Your second statement is fine here if: 1) it is sourced; and 2) in its context it is not WP:NPOV#Undue weight. I don't know about the former, and think the latter is probably not unduely weighted, if appropriately placed. -- Gnetwerker 04:53, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
Wzhao553, I appreciate your disclaimer, and trust it is genuine on your part. However what I have seen in the past few days, browsing online literature on this topic, including links from this page, follow a similar pattern. They first state, "We've got nothing against healthy interracial relationship," then they name a few (or as many as they can) abberrant white against Asian sex-crimes, and finally (this is usually the bulk of the article) they go on to rant against interracial relationships.
If I were particularly eaten up by Asian male/white female relationships, I suppose I could hunt around and find a few disgusting incidents, state upfront, "This article is not about healthy Asian male/white female relationships... But get a load of these sickos!..." too.
We know that some white men and some Asian women have strong attractions to each other. This is not disputed, and this is what is going to come to most people's minds when they hear the term Asian fetish. But you are stating that this is not what the article is about. You are saying it's only about aberrant, fetishistic, demeaning, criminal behavior.
Well, how wide-spread are these white against Asian sex-crimes? Where are the statistics? Why are they so prominent as to need to be separated from the subject of sex-crimes/fetishism in general? I have read several times over the past few days that the Asian/white mix is the most common interracial relationship (yet, with no numbers presented)-- So where are the statistics on what percentage of Asian/white relations are "fetishistic" and lead to criminal behavior, and what percent are "normal?" And where is the comparison between and within other racial groups, showing that it is the "Asian fetish" in particular which leads to criminal behavior significantly enough to require its own article? Where are the numbers on how many white women are victims of sex crimes by white men, compared with Asian women victims of white male crime, compared with Asian women victims of Asian male crime, and showing that it is the white male-to Asian female set-up that uniquely leads to these problems? In other words, does an "Asian fetish" (not a healthy attraction that some people seem to want to demonize, but an "Asian fetish" as narrowly spelled out in your 4-point definition) even exist to any significant extent?
These are the sort of things I think would lend some validity to the article-- and I would be as concerned about this issue as the next guy, if not more so, because my wife is Asian. But as it stands now, despite any number of disclaimers up front, it seems to be an effort either explicitly or implicitly, to taint all interracial relationships-- specifically white male/Asian female relationships. Human Fetishist 06:17, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

== I == consider it my duty towards the scientific community to endlessly re-edit the anthropological section written by Wzhao533 and me.It is by far the most important contribution to the topic on the whole web by now as anyone can check spending his time in detailed analysis of the matter 80.138.175.185 16:46, 5 March 2006 (UTC)Science does not intend to flatter some people/ peoples, it is based on truth seeking.80.138.175.185 16:46, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

User:80.138.175.185 reminds us of one of the most important reasons that Wikipedia is not a publisher of original thought and of the value of its policy of No original research. User:80.138.175.185 shows us how pseudo-science can be used to "prove" any number of crackpot theories, which Wikipedia does not seek to promote. User:80.138.175.185 also points out that the hard data this article needs must come from objective, reliable sources.

The sensitive nature of this subject, and its tendency to attract those with extremist agendas may make finding truly useful data difficult. Nevertheless, as User:80.138.175.185 reminds us, we can all recognize obvious nonsense when we see it.

Thank you, User:80.138.175.185 Human Fetishist 18:20, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Asian fetish Vandal

The anonymous user who comments above that (he) "considers it my duty ... to endlessly re-edit the anthropological section" is nothing other than a vandal, who continuously adds anti-Semitic and racist material to this and other pages. He originates from a particular German ISP -- please join me in encouraging the admins to block this range of IPs to prevent him from disrupting Wikipedia and wasting everyone's time. The relevant posting is on vandalism in progress. -- Gnetwerker 18:34, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing that out, Gnetwerker. I'll do what I can to help in this matter too. Human Fetishist 18:42, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Please help add all his IPs in User:Infinity0/Vandal report. -- infinity0 19:23, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I've just range-blocked the IP addresses involved for a week. None of them has been used for anything but this vandalism, and the vandal has been evading blocks persistently. --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 12:03, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

It doesn't appear to have taken (or maybe it was reversed). The vandal just posted from 80.138.193.176 which is in the /18 subnet he's been posting from. Sigh. (And I don't really mind being called a leftist computer scientist, though I did take some anthropology in college :-)). -- Gnetwerker 23:14, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Major Flaws - An Outside View

Sorry to be harsh, but this article seems to have becomes so embroiled in dispute that the strains of accommodation have rendered it almost entirely unintelligible, incredibly convoluted, awkwardly otiose in sections (particularly the academic use). The POV disputes strike me at this point irrelevant - as it stands this article is of value to no one outside of the contributors themselves whose internecine bickering has obviated any larger encyclopedic value. Eusebeus 19:05, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I think you're absolutly right, Eusebeus. Human Fetishist 00:12, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Slang terms

We are repeatedly told that this article does not refer to healthy Asian/white relationships.

To repeat Wzhao553's 4-point definition of the "Asian fetish"

"A person (say, a white male) has an Asian fetish if:

  1. he has an intense sexual attraction to Asian women;
  2. he treats all Asian women as objects;
  3. he believes that Asian women are submissive, promiscuous, etc., and that any Asian woman who is not is a rare exception to the rule; and
  4. he cannot or will not form healthy relationships with women who are either not Asian or who are Asian but do not fit the stereotypes."

It is emphasized that all four points must be present for an "Asian fetish" to exist.

The urbandictionary.com site is used as a reference for one of these "Slang terms," so let's look at what it has to say about others.

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=rice+king

Rice King

A white male who only dates Asian women.

Breed is marked by very distinct characteristics, including monochromatism of hair and skin, pronounced Adam's apple, lanky physique, complete lack of fashion sense, and inability to carry on a conversation with any woman who has her own opinions and is capable of expressing them.

Joe Manning at Stanford is a card-carrying Rice King: he imported a wife from Shang-hai.

Setting aside the obvious racial stereotyping, and (apparently) personal attack-- It is obvious this refers simply to a white male attracted to Asian women. Only point 1 of the 4-point "Asian fetish" definition.

rice chaser

Strictly speaking, a person who seeks romantic relations with Asians.

Cmmmonly, a short or scrawny white male lacking self-esteem and/or assertiveness who seeks power in interpersonal relationships by attempting to date Asian females whom he perceives to be submissive and obedient.

Also, a white male with a prurient but ironically inaccurate fascination with what he perceives as exotic.

Man, Michael is such a fucking rice chaser -- he keeps going to Thailand to get laid.

Again, cutting aside the snideness, this definition is basically, a white man attracted to Asian women. Stereotypes, racial and otherwise, are then applied to him without any basis-- scrawny, lacking in self-esteem, etc., a condescending explanation is given for his attraction to Asian women. Finally, it is implied that white men attracted to Asian women are frequenters of prostitutes in Asia. (Some, no doubt are. But no mention is made of frequenters of same-race prostitutes (Asian or white). The obvious point of mentioning this is to demean Asian/white relationships by bringing them down to a prostitute/john level.)

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=ccb

CCB

(N.) CCB - "Cracker Chasing Bitch"

An acronym used to designate those women (usually of the asian persuasion) who prefer to choose caucasian males and/or females as sexual/relationship partners.

Daaaamn fool, look at them gold-diggin' ccb's, all up on that cracka's nuts like cheese on pizza.

(This definition is linked in the "Asian fetish" article.) It seems obvious to me this term refers simply to Asian women who are attracted to white men, hence only point 1 of the 4-part "Asian fetish" definition. If it refers to points 2-4, where?

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=sellout

7. Sellout

(1) A person who dates interracially or conforms only to affairs of another race because, they believe thiers is inferior, or for selfish personal gain.

Again, simply a person involved in an interracial relationship, with demeaning, insulting reasons applied by someone who doesn't approve.

Asiaphilia (undefined) asiaphile

Typically a fat white loser in his 50's who trolls around South-East Asia for a slim, submissive young May Ping Pang who wants him for his money and will want to cement their relationship with a child ASAP.

Look at that sweaty, red-faced asiaphile, he can't get a quality woman at home so he goes to Bangkok instead

Need I even comment?

It occurs to me that this one probably does deserve a comment. The obviously crude stereotype led me to just ignore it as unworthy of a Wikipedia reference. But since this site is being used here, we should look at it.
Unlike the above definitions, the white male who travels to Asia to engage in prostitution obviously is not someone involved in a normal relationship with an Asian person. So finally we get past point #1. So is the "fat white loser" using prostitutes in Thailand the subject of this "Asian fetish" article? Not if we apply all 4 points of the "Asian fetish" definition.
Point #2 in the "Asian fetish" definition applies here ("he treats all Asian women as objects"). Though "all" Asian women is questionable. How do we know he treats all Asian women as objects? And, back to #1-- How we know "he has an intense sexual attraction to Asian women" in particular, rather than just engaging in prostitution? True, he's travelling to Asia for this purpose, but how do we know he hasn't engaged prostitutes at home? Data is needed.
Point #3-- "he believes that Asian women are submissive, promiscuous, etc., and that any Asian woman who is not is a rare exception to the rule" is again conjecture. Do all men who engage Asian prostitutes believe these stereotypes about all Asian women? If not, how many do?
Finally, Point #4-- "he cannot or will not form healthy relationships with women who are either not Asian or who are Asian but do not fit the stereotypes." Again, how do we know this about any particular "fat white loser" who frequents Asian prostitutes? Without real statistics, this is pure guess-work.Human Fetishist 03:42, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Most likely some of this is meant to be taken in a humorously, non-PC way, but again, this site is being used for reference in this article. This article isn't meant as satire, is it?

Again, sprinkled liberally throughout the article, and right at the top, we have disclaimers that this article does not refer simply to Asian/white relationships. Yet every one of these slang terms, as far as I can see, does just that. It refers to Asian/white relationships and intentionally insults and degrades them. Human Fetishist 00:12, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

External links-- On Asian fetish-- "Racial Fetishes"

This is the first article in the External links section of the "Asian fetish" article. It comes from Punchandus.com, which describes its goal on the homepage as "Providing comic relief to an overly politically correct America." A rather ominous mission statement for a reference source for an encyclopedia article.

The author of the piece is Ms. Hien Hoang. Though she titles her piece "Racial Fetishes," she quickly brushes over any discussion of racial fetishes by describing it as "this elite group of people who can’t get enough of ethnic ass." (Note promiscuity is not mentioned in Wzhao553's 4-point definition of the "Asian fetish.")

I should clarify here-- Promiscuity is not mentioned as being part of the "Asian fetish," but as part of the stereotypical view the "Asian fetishist" may have towards Asian women. ("#3. He believes that Asian women are submissive, promiscuous, etc., and that any Asian woman who is not is a rare exception to the rule") It's not specifically stated that the "Asian fetishist" himself is promiscuous, though I suppose it can be implied if that is one of his reasons for attraction to Asian women. So, point #1 being assumed, this blog entry might also be read to agree with this portion of Wzhao553's 4-point definition of the "Asian fetish."Human Fetishist 21:54, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

She then spends the rest of the article describing her very subjective, and completely unsupported by outside sources, view of racial stereotypes in America (and, at one point, Japan).

The only stereotype whose validity she openly questions (though a questioning of stereotypes is implied by the entire article) is-- surprise-- the Asian woman stereotype, using herself as a non-example. She then, humorously, describes the over-sexualized Asian woman stereotype, and the de-sexed Asian male stereotype. No sources, statistics, references are given, and none are asked for-- this is a humorous blog entry, after all.

She starts out her view of the white woman stereotype with this sentence: "Everyone knows that black men (and mostly all other "ethnic" men) love white women."

"Everyone knows?" Has anyone here tried starting a sentence of an academic paper with those two words? Someone hand in a Master's Thesis starting with those words, I dare you. I don't meant to criticize Ms. Hoang here, I mean to criticize those who would use this as a reference in an encyclopedia article.

She continues to white men: "On the plus side for the Aryans, I can’t really say anything about white guys beyond the usual stereotypes you see in black movies."

She names off a few stereotypes she's learned from these unnamed "black movies," and some of it is mildly humurous, I'll give her that. But scholarly? No, of course not. That is not her intent.

She starts out her article on blacks with this statement: "The term 'diva' was coined specifically for demanding, headstrong, and dare I say, bitchy, black women in the entertainment industry."

Well this is simply, and very provably wrong. (see: http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=diva and: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diva)

But why should I criticize her misinformation about the origin of the word 'diva?' After all, this is admittedly a comic blog entry. To criticize even blatant error of fact and blatantly biased, personal suppositions would be a peevish and inappropriate way to judge a light-hearted blog entry, wouldn't it? I have no problem with it as a comic blog entry, I do, however have a problem with using it as a reference in a serious Wikipedia article.

She continues: "Latins are horny. They are like the Pepe LePews of the world." Well, I got a little chuckle out of that line. I don't dislike Ms. Hoang's blog entry. What I don't like is seeing her light-hearted blog entry being mis-used as an external source of reference on the "Asian fetish."

Ms. Hoang's effort to openly express her own perception of racial stereotypes in America is perfectly acceptable as an attempt at creative writing. It is even admirable in trying to openly speak about things that we usually keep unspoken. She is taking out her own stereotypes, or those she sees in America, looking at them, and laughing at them. This is perfectly healthy. But, as far as I can see, this can in no way be considered a legitimate reference either on racial fetishes (which it doesn't really adress at all), racial stereotypes (which it does address, in a purely subjective way), or the "Asian fetish." Human Fetishist 02:32, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I think you made some very good points. I moved the Op-Ed articles to their own section and labelled them as such. There is still an argument about whether they should be there at all, but as a first-step, let's make sure everyone knows they are opinion. -- Gnetwerker 23:58, 7 March 2006 (UTC)
Thanks, Gnetwerker. I think labeling these articles for what they are-- op/ed pieces-- is a step in the right direction. (Now I don't have to go through the other "sources" with a fine-toothed comb.) Isn't it interesting that all but 1 of the 9 "External links" on the "Asian fetish" are easily seen to be statements of personal opinion? Might this tell us something about the nature of the article itself-- if not the entire subject? Is a ratio of 8/1 op-ed/based in reality pieces appropriate to an article like this? Or is this ratio actually a good reflection of the nature of literature on the "Asian fetish?"
Mentioned in the article is the idea that some people are beginning to question the validity of the concept of race itself. Could it be that, as with religion, people have the strongest opinions about, and cling hardest to those concepts that have the least basis in provable reality? Maybe this is why this sort of topic inevitably attracts either highly personal opinion, or (as our friend 80.139.xxx.xx-- repeatedly shows us) outright quackery. Human Fetishist 22:48, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
The links in the External links section are currently just the leftover articles that we couldn't figure out how to cite in the article itself. We encourage you to look into the books cited in the reference section if you want to investigate the secondary literature. --Wzhao553 09:20, 9 March 2006 (UTC)
Thank you, Wzhao553. I will take your suggestion and look at the Reference section entries as soon as I have time next. Human Fetishist 00:58, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

An outsider view II

I'm responding to the RfC.

Like the previous section entitled An Outsider View, I agree the article is flawed. I have never heard about this term before. Reading the lead section is just confusing for me. Please read Wikipedia:Lead section. This article appears to misuse the lead section.

When a good lead section has been written, I'll read the rest of the article.

Fred-Chess 22:30, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Another attempt at a rewrite

I have put a second attempt at a rewrite at Asian fetish/rewrite. Feel free to hack on it. If it gets sufficient attention, maybe it could replace the current version. Its primary attribute is that it deliberately divides the three senses of the term: popular, activist, and academic. I am sure that it will please no one, so maybe that makes it an improvment :-) -- Gnetwerker 03:02, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

p.s. -- I still think there could be three pages Asian fetish pornography (probably just a part of Sexual fetishism or some such), Racial fetish, and Asian fetish in Asian-American social commentary. -- Gnetwerker 03:02, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

References - "Deconstructing "Asian fetish"

Starting at the top of the list, I was unable to gain immediate access to a copy of Sheridan Prasso's article. I went to the second reference: "Deconstructing "Asian fetish" - the appeal of physical appearance and/or cultural traits."

This article is written by a "D.M." D.M. makes the job of checking his/her references very easy by not giving any, other than two tangential articles on how the East and the West view the world differently. Again, we have an article based entirely on personal opinions unsupported by any sort of studies, censuses, polls, or anything with any pretense to being objective... not even verifiable anecdotes. Is anyone else noticing a pattern here?

C.M. begins the article with a chatty discussion of what s/he feels the "Asian fetish" is, coming to the conclusion, "we have defined (at least for the purposes of this article) the 'real' Asian fetishists as people who seek out individuals with specific physical attributes based on allegedly linked cultural traits..." (How this fits in with the 4-point definition of the Asian fetish given above appears to be of no concern to anyone by now.)

Once this has been established, we get to the body of the article, the point of which is to enumerate the personality traits of the non-Asian who is attracted to Asians. By sheer coincidence, all of these are negative personality traits. What are the odds?

The first personality trait is, "Sensitive nature or fragile ego." This personality trait is said to be attracted to Asians because, "in East Asian/Southeast Asian cultures, people are less likely to criticize others openly."

The only evidence given for this conclusion is, "To give an example, one of my Asian sources mentioned meeting a black professional who could not handle anyone disagreeing with him or suggesting something contrary to what he wants even in an amicable, constructive way. This ultra-sensitive man happened to be married to a Korean woman."

Now, first, my own personal experience leads me to believe that the "sensitive" personality type is likely to have extreme difficulties with Korean people and Korean culture. I've found Korean people, except when dealing with a "superior" or "elder," to not hold their opinions or feelings back at all. I've seen loud, boisterous arguments between Koreans, and between Korean and non-Korean too. The Koreans I've spoken with consider this honesty, which they contrast with what they see as the duplicitous nature of the Japanese. The Japanese, on the other hand, take pride in going out of their way to avoid confrontation, and see the Koreans as being crude and ill-mannered. Could it be the author is applying stereotypical Japanese characteristics to Koreans? Surely not.

But let's get beyond personal, anecdotal experience, which, though fun to share with Korean and Japanese friends over a beer, should have little place in a discussion like this (though, apparently, even these low standards are excused for "Reference" articles on the "Asian fetish.")

The popularity of bi-racial (African-American/Korean) athlete Hines Ward has shed some light on Korean attitudes towards African Americans.

"In interviews with the media here, Kim [Ward's mother] said she did not move back to South Korea because of discrimination against herself and her child. When she visited in 1998 to attend her mother's funeral, she told the Chosun Ilbo newspaper, people spat at her because she had been married to an African American.

"Even in the United States, Korean immigrants excluded her son from their gatherings because of his racial background."

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-ward13feb13,0,825796.story

An article on another bi-racial athlete in Korea mentions:

"This year, Jang pulled off a rare feat for mixed children in South Korea when she graduated from high school." http://english.kbs.co.kr/news/newsview_sub.php?menu=7&key=2006021029

Obviously Korea is not the most welcoming place for an African-American. But then let's assume (though the "Reference" article does not explicitly state this) we're talking about a Korean-American/African-American relationship.

Professor Edward Taehan Chang (http://ethnicstudies.ucr.edu/people/chang/chang.html) has made a large part of his career studying Korean-American/African-American interactions. He states: "Cultural misunderstanding between the two groups plays an important role in fueling and sometimes escalating the confrontations. African American customers often complain that Korean merchants treat them disrespectfully, and say the merchants can’t communicate with them."

He names several myths that "have played an important role in fueling and escalating the confrontation between Korean and African Americans," including: "Myth 2: Korean Americans are rude and disrespectful to African American customers."

http://www.oah.org/pubs/magazine/asianamerican/chang.html

Gee. Given this warm, welcoming state of affairs between blacks and Koreans, is it any wonder the "sensitive, fragile" African-American would seek out a Korean mate? But seriously, doesn't it seem just a little suspicious that a "sensitive, fragile" African-American would choose to put himself into this potentially very difficult relationship?

None of this actual background to African-American/Korean relations is mentioned in the article, of course. We are only told that the author's friend knows a "sensitive" African-American who married a Korean woman, and then the author-- without even taking the trouble of meeting the couple-- presumes to tell us why.

Yet in the face of the reality of Korean hostility to African-American/Korean unions, in the face of a clearly negative stereotype that African-Americans themselves hold towards Koreans and Korean-Americans, we are expected to simply accept the author's supposition that this "sensitive" African-American chose to marry a Korean woman because he subscribed to the "submissive Asian" stereotype. With no evidence, and pure guesswork, the author expects us to believe that this black man-- whose own ethnicity has suffered as much, if not more from Western colonialism and stereotyping as the Asians-- has rejected the predominant African-American stereotype of Koreans, and instead married his "Madame Butterfly" fantasy.

It appears obvious to me that it is the author who has fixated on this submissive Asian stereotype and has ascribed it, with absolutely no evidence, to this African-American/Korean(-American?) marriage.

Instead of assuming condescending motives for his marriage to a Korean woman, shouldn't he be praised for trying to help bridge the gap between these two groups in the best way possible-- by building a family? Isn't this author, instead, figuratively spitting on him?

All the preceding aside, again in this "Reference" article we have a chatty, blog-like entry giving us the author's personal opinions with absolutely no basis given for them, the only evidence-- if it can even be called that-- being an anecdote from a friend. Can anyone really think this is suitable as a source of reference?

The article continues on in this fashion, naming off "Personality traits," ("Know-it-all attitude," "Verbally competitive, always has to win the argument," "Uncommon selfishness" and "Tendency to externalize problems") and then finding anecdotal ways of ascribing them to people involved in interracial marriages. Dare I suggest... Might there possibly be a POV agenda at work here? Human Fetishist 01:19, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Human, I really think you are taking this too far, and in the wrong direction. The article you (successfully) destroy above is cited soley as a reference to the sentence "There is a great deal of controversy surrounding ... the use of the phrase by Asian-American interest groups.". And indeed, the first sentence of the article is "The so-called 'Asian fetish' ... has long been a hot topic of debate in interracial dating forums.". That sentence provides a reference to the point. The rest of the referenced article could be POV as hell -- but the rest of the article is beside the point, since it is not used to reference anything else!! I do not understand why you are going to such lengths. I get that you don't like the use of this term, and think it is bogus -- no problem. I propose that you are better served by an article that highlights the (perhaps) artificial or biased use of the term by activist groups than by .... I dunno, I have lost track of what you think a better solution would be. -- Gnetwerker 07:57, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
The Big Lebowski: What in God's holy name are you blathering about?
The Dude: I'll tell you what I'm blathering about... I've got information man!

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0118715/quotes

Yes, it does seem I'm just beating my head against a brick wall here, Gnetwerker, and everyone else is waiting for me to render myself unconscious. Thanks for the feedback anyway.
With respects to the article I "destroyed" above-- I looked at it because, after pointing out the POV nature of an External link, Wzhao553 suggested I look at the articles in the "References" section. You seem to agree with me that it's a completely biased, POV, unsourced piece of writing. I don't object to the writer expressing his/her personal views. I don't believe in censorship, and I believe the Internet is a wonderful forum for all points of view. However, I don't see how such an article can be used as a reference for an encyclopedia. You point out that it is used as a reference only for one statement in the "Asian fetish" article, and that we should ignore the nature of this Reference, and the rest of the article itself. But shouldn't the blog-like, unsourced nature of this reference cause some concern? The statement is made with no back-up evidence, and we're supposed to just accept it? Is this anonymous article supposed to be of sufficient authority as to not need evidence? After all, the site itself issues a disclaimer that the views are "solely the opinions and perspectives of individual contributors..."

http://www.colorq.org/Articles/aboutA.htm

My point is that "Asian fetish" article is built from the ground up on this type of extremely poor, extremely biased, completely unsupported sources.
Why have I been going to such lengths? Partly because I care about Wikipedia standards and think this article fails to attain those standards (to put it mildly), and partly because I have a personal stake in this subject. Personally, I couldn't care less what strangers think about interracial relationships, but it does bother me to see purely POV conjecture passed off as valid information. I see this as a form of propaganda. I felt that instead of making bald, unsupported statements ("This article sux!"), I could make my points better with real examples from the article and from its sources. This takes time and space.
To summarize a few of my points:
1) The article is POV
2) The article tries to hide its POV with a veritable catalog of weasel words ("claim... allege... There is no statistical evidence, However... Some contend... Others contend... Yet others contend... Another criticism...")
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:WEASEL
3) The article is built upon POV, unsourced articles.
4) The article refers to interracial relationships, and consistently cites sources on interracial relationships, then claims not to be about interracial relationships.
5) The editors of the article have made no effort to evaluate their sources with regards to, "Do they have an agenda or conflict of interest, strong views, or other bias which may color their report?"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources#Evaluating_sources
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources#Evaluating_secondary_sources
6) As I think I've shown by now, there is more than enough ammo in this article for me to go on and on and on...
But bear with me for one final piece of evidence with regards to the POV nature of this article. Wzhao553, one of the main editors of this page, and the one who claims to have the definition of "Asian fetish" (which, mysteriously, I was never able to verify...), openly states his intent to push POV in the article.
On his talk page, he rhetorically asks a question concerning Wikipedia policy, "Wikipedia seems to have an Anglo-American focus. Is this contrary to the neutral point of view?"
He does not give the answer, which can be found here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Npov#Anglo-American_focus
"Yes, it is... This is an ongoing problem that should be corrected by active collaboration from people from other countries. But rather than introducing their own cultural bias, they should seek to improve articles by removing any examples of cultural bias that they encounter..." [italics mine]
Instead of trying to remove obvious cultural bias, and in direct opposition to Wikipedia policy, he openly states, "In editing the article, I have assumed an Asian American POV..."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Wzhao553#3rr_on__Asian_fetish

According to Wikipedia founder Jimbo Wales, NPOV is "absolute and non-negotiable".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Neutral_Point_of_View

In conclusion, the article does not live up to, nor even make much effort to live up to Wikipedia policies and standards.
As far as a solution to this problem, I can only recommend completely erasing the article and going back to square one. Considerable thought over a few questions should occur before starting work on the article-- Do we need an article on this subject, and, if so, what purpose should it serve? How can it avoid blatant, or clumsily hidden biases, agendas and POV? How can it avoid edit wars with crackpot vandals?
Having tried to point out these things for a week or so now, and these problems apparently being of little concern to the main editors of this page, I suppose my best option is to stop beating my head against the wall, and leave bad enough alone. The editors of this page can continue making cosmetic changes to the article ignoring the fundamentally unsourced, biased POV at the heart of the article and its sources, then scratch their heads wondering why the article offends some people so strongly, and causes unconcerned parties to drop in to just point out that's it's a bad article. Human Fetishist 21:08, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, a few things:

  1. It was me who requested a "time-out" for Wzhao553, and I think he ended up better for it. We had a good conversation after the heat of the moment had worn off;
  2. If you want to RFD this page, go ahead, maybe the result will be different this time. It probably will destroy any residual claim I have to be unbiased, but I would probably vote to delete it, but suspect I (and you) would be on the losing side;
  3. The article is certainly full of weasel-words, many of which I put there to turn the POV down a notch or two. Yes, they should be gone, but that is not going to happen while this page is a war zone;
  4. The last thing I want to be in the world is the de facto caretaker of this page. I am imagining that I'm being an unofficial mediator here, but I might be deluding myself;
  5. If you think my proposed rewrite (see above) is just as bad as the current page, then I don't know what to recommend.
  6. I feel that the rights and positions of both you and Wzhao553 need to be listened to on this -- if they are incompatible, then I suppose frustration and ennui will win, regrettably.

-- Gnetwerker 21:47, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Refactoring (again)

On 27 February I proposed we refactor this talk page, as it had grown to 82Kb. It is now over 150Kb, and really needs to be refactored and archived. If you have a problem with this, speak now. -- Gnetwerker 08:01, 11 March 2006 (UTC)