Stuff Asian People Like

62 responses so far ↓

• 1 Justin // Apr 15, 2008 at 10:03 pm

  my mom and family calls my sister ugly whenever she gets a tan…and when she studies a lot, stays in doors, they family treats her like gold, a princess…not kiddin!

• 2 Justin // Apr 15, 2008 at 10:04 pm

  another thing: i visited Seoul and saw ladies with umbrellas and mask when it’s perfect weather ?!?!

• 3 Lana // Apr 15, 2008 at 10:36 pm

  No, it’s not about dermatological matters, and yes, a long time ago, white skin was looked upon as ‘princess like’, but the reason for the salivating for white skin NOWADAYS is because of the pressing need to look like white people. Ooops, I mean, ‘western’…yeah that’s the word. The same reason for the double eyelid surgery and shaving the cheekbones to have the less rounded face and the nose job to have a ridiculously long narrow nose: to look white, oops I mean ‘western’.

  The self-hate is ASTOUNDING! I’ll be glad when the day comes when people are comfortable in their own skin, whatever color it may be.

• 4 Porfirio // Apr 16, 2008 at 3:08 am

  Lana…you RAWK!!! However, you forgot the ones who wear colored contacts…ooops, only gay asians do that.

• 5 Anonymous // Apr 16, 2008 at 4:08 am

  I AGREEEEE completely

• 6 YASPY Chick // Apr 16, 2008 at 7:59 am

  If light skin has been seen as upper class and “lady-like” for thousands of years, I don’t see how Hollywood and European colonization has anything to do with it. Light skin was considered “upper class” by westerners until the 1920s (remember Nellie Olsen from Little House and how she’d refuse to go outside for recess? Ditto with Southern Belles, who yes, carried parasols) when Coco Chanel came back with a tan. Then everyone was like “Coco’s soooooo kewel! She’s tanned and has the money to go on vacay.”

  As for the masks….it’s more a pollution thing than a skin thing. Hats and long sleeves and pants at the golf course, on the other hand….that’s the sun thing.

  My grandmother hates my tanning habits.

• 7 fm // Apr 16, 2008 at 12:18 pm

  racism. pure and clear. i can understand the origins of this desire, but we know the uninteded consequences. and for the sake of a better society, get some self respect and accept yourself, your kids, and ultimately your friends for what they are, not how the look like.

• 8 avon // Apr 16, 2008 at 12:58 pm

  all i know is that i look sick (as if i have the flu) when my skin is pale. i’d look like i was dead if my skin was whitened.

• 9 Justin // Apr 16, 2008 at 1:11 pm

  my aunts do the mask thing to stay white versus pollution…but majority people use it for pollution

• 10 Justin // Apr 16, 2008 at 1:27 pm

  1. question i’ve always been curious about: do you think asian movie stars purposefully try to stay white or they are naturally pale?

  2. also, asian girls - were you ever tempted to become paler just to be accepted by the adults/relatives?

  3. haha…other stuff i want to know: anyone heard of those weird creams they sell all around asia? they’re soo bad for your skin…and all those whitening salons when i’ve been there grosses me out - it’s not good for your skin at all, trying to remove natural pigment ack! why do you have to go through all that and end up looking unhealthy, pale, weak and sickly?

  4. guys: what do you prefer the healthy look or the vulnerable, i need you to be my hero, pale look in asian dramas?

  i go for natural!

• 11 Big Chan // Apr 16, 2008 at 5:56 pm

  Man I wish I had Pale skin but I’m way to dark.

• 12 Amy // Apr 16, 2008 at 6:16 pm

  haha, i was wondering when this post would appear.
  Welllll, pale skin. I agree with YASPY Chick on this:
  “If light skin has been seen as upper class and “lady-like” for thousands of years, I don’t see how Hollywood and European colonization has anything to do with it.”

  And i don’t see Asian women, AND some men, going to give up on their quest to paler skin any time soon. It’s exactly the same as the western obsession with tanned skin. Skin whitening & skin tanning products? Different purposes, same evil.

  Another point to add is that your sense of beauty is influenced by your surroundings. If you live in Asia, it’s most likely that you’re bound to think whiter skin is prettier. Although you may or may not feel obliged to bleach your own skin, depending on your self-confidence level.
  If you’re an Asian living in a western country where the rave is all about tanned skin, then you can’t help but getting a bit smug when your white friends go “What a beautiful tan you’ve got!” when you never have to waste a cent on fake tan. (haha admit it!

  People will always vie for what they don’t have. That’s pretty much what it is, be it pale skin, big eyes, tall nose, long eyelashes, hair colours different than black (for the Asians), or tanned skin, narrower eyes, high cheekbones (for the Caucasians), and etc. etc.

  Oh, and did you know, our Indian / South Asian friends also love to have paler skin. My friends from Kathmandu (and other highland regions in Nepal & North India) who have paler skin than people from the Southern parts of India or Sri Lanka, are considered extremely pretty.

• 13 Amy // Apr 16, 2008 at 6:18 pm

  geez, look how i can babble! that bit deserved its own postcode didn’t it? hehe

• 14 sy88 // Apr 17, 2008 at 2:08 am

  This is interesting. My youngest sister is for some reason or the other darker than me or my other siblings. We like saying she’s adopted because of it…yeah it’s cruel isn’t it?

  Eh, it’s all much ado about nothing IMO…

• 15 stuffgirlslike // Apr 17, 2008 at 10:42 am

  It could be that it is a colonial legacy, you know that eurasians were better treated and in colonial times, everyone wanted a better position.

  Kimora is dark skinned maybe in the future darker skins will take precedent as you have more Blasians.

• 16 Lana // Apr 18, 2008 at 1:32 pm

  Yes and India has been colonized by the Europeans who ruled that country for decades to believe that white was better and to this day, that caste system is in place.

  That colonialized ‘white is power because they were/are in power’ mentality is prevalent in non-colonized European colonized nations, as well.

  It can be sugar-coated all day long, but that’s the real reason. Whites directly or indirectly colonized and/or controlled this world. What do you see as the worldwide standard of beauty? Whites with long noses, long flowing (preferably blond) hair, etc. Anything else might be looked at as pretty, but not as good as the standard that has been set as ‘gold’. People see that, and see how they’re treated and want to be it so they can be treated that way, and enjoy the same level of power plain and simple. A lot of Asians feel that ‘white is right’ and ‘black is ugly/wrong, because it’s simply not white. How coincidental is it that ‘whiteface’ comes with those racist thoughts? Not at all, because it was born out of a racist mentality.

  You can be ‘infected’ with ‘whiteface’, sure. Look like a ‘The Ring/Grudge’ extra, if you want. You can make your eyes rounder, shave your face down all you want, but you can bet your plastic enhanced face that for all of you efforts, will still be/look ASIAN, because that’s what you ARE.

  (This goes for anyone, regardless of race. you can try to be any other race than your own if you want. Not only will you NOT fool yourself, you won’t fool anyone else, either)

  Love who you are the way that you are and stop trying to be something that you will NEVER be, people.

  And yes, it is very cruel and racist to say that your sister is adopted because of the color of her skin. I wouldn’t be surprised if she didn’t have low self-esteem and didn’t like you all much for that saying that. Was she treated differently by those in your family as well?

  I remember reading a certain board about this drama titled ‘Hello, Miss/My Lady!’ The younger sister in the drama was tannish. You wouldn’t believe (or maybe you would) the negative comments that surrounded her ‘darkness’. I was taken aback, because if I were to denigrate the other characters because of their eyes or roundness of face, I’d quickly be called a racist and admonished to accept differences…but because she was ‘dark’, this attitude was okay. I’ve since come to see that attitude a lot, esp. towards tanner Asians and Blacks.

  Yes, writers, let’s do a post on the racism that rums RAMPANT in the Asian community. Let’s talk about the crying of racism when it’s committed against Asians, but think it’s perfectly alright and don’t see how it’s wrong to apply those same mindsets/attitudes towards ‘others’ (esp. those of darker hue)….the same mindsets/attitudes that were so ‘wrong’ or ‘not the same thing’ when they were applied towards you.

  Let’s get into that….

• 17 Lana // Apr 18, 2008 at 1:38 pm

  Ooops….I meant to put some Asians in my post. Not all feel that way…

• 18 sy88 // Apr 18, 2008 at 8:12 pm

  “And yes, it is very cruel and racist to say that your sister is adopted because of the color of her skin. I wouldn’t be surprised if she didn’t have low self-esteem and didn’t like you all much for that saying that. Was she treated differently by those in your family as well?”

  It was all in good fun, trust me, it was less insulting than it sounds just there. Hey, her skin colour gives her that permanent tanned look, it’s quite a nice look actually. She knows we’re all kidding anyway, so it’s all good…

• 19 sy88 // Apr 18, 2008 at 8:16 pm

  And before anyone accuses me of racism, let it be known that I’m probably the most racially sensitive person I know. Heck, I’m scared to refer to ‘African-American’ people as ‘black’ sometimes. What if they’re not American, there’s a pickle there, do you just refer to them as African? It’s just the relationship me and my siblings have with my sister, that we’re comfortable with those sort of topics. We were just discussing whether the correct term for us ‘Westernized Asians’ is ‘ABC’ or ‘banana’.

  Again, I’ll say, much ado about nothing…

• 20 CoolDustin82 // Apr 19, 2008 at 12:19 pm

  I thought it was weird for my aunt to walk around in the sun with an umbrella, but it’s not uncommon to see black women here in New Orleans do the same thing. So I’ve only seen Asian and black women do it, but I know parasols used to be used in Europe.

• 21 solong // Apr 19, 2008 at 2:21 pm

  Koreans definitely do a lot to get paler skin xD But I always thought that the masks were just for pollution. They became a trend after net idols (ulzzangs) started decorating the masks during the whole SARs epidemic, I think.

  I just learned about how Asian people want pale skin so bad after I got into K-Pop 2 years ago. I seriously thought everyone wanted to be tan because Americans are always tanning xD

• 22 halfie // Apr 20, 2008 at 4:54 pm

  my family always told me that the pale skin was a sign of social status because the rich didn’t women didn’t have to work in the fields/rice paddies all day, therefore they didn’t get all the sun exposure
  has anyone else been told this?

• 23 Justin // Apr 20, 2008 at 6:04 pm

  i’ve heard this as well =)

• 24 M3 // Apr 20, 2008 at 6:27 pm

  Lana you sound like you were made fun of because of your dark skin. Hopefully that rant provided an emotional outlet for you.

  The pale skin is related to upper class social status because if you have it, it means you didn’t have to work in the fields like all the other commoners (ie. Lana). An example of this can be seen in Japanese women. Why do you think Geishas (the pinnacle of Japanese beauty) have always had “white” colored faces. It was originally a white lead mask, then it became rice powder. And please don’t give me that crap about how white people influenced it, because it has always been the tradition. The same thing can be seen in chinese and korean culture.

  So in conclusion, this pale phenomenon is nothing new and the crap about how it is racist is coming from (ironically) white washed asians.

• 25 Twinkie Girl // Apr 20, 2008 at 11:51 pm

  Halfie - Yes, I’ve heard the same story as well. I guess I believed them because I haven’t sunbathed since I was 20 & wear long-sleeves & big hats when I hike (and believe me, in Arizona you definitely get weird looks for the long-sleeves!). I’ll probably be pulling out my old parasol from the box it shares with all my old kimonos. Somewhere in the next life, my grandmother is laughing hysterically.

• 26 nanheyangrouchuan // Apr 22, 2008 at 11:13 pm

  Would it surprise any of you to know that white dudes consider darker skinned girls to be more exotic? They grew up with white chicks their whole lives (and white girl mentalities).

  Also, pale skin on a white person is equated with either severe sickness, a mental case/shut in or the terminally lazy.

• 27 YASPY Chick // Apr 23, 2008 at 7:24 am

  But Nanheyagrouchuan, pale skin on white people was historically a beauty trait. Why else did southern belles hide under parasols?

• 28 Anonymous // Apr 25, 2008 at 7:00 pm

  This is pretty funny. I went to Japan and in their purikura booths they have options as to how light you want your skin to appear. You can get it reaaallly ghostly white it’s not funny.
  But conversely you can get your skin really dark in those purikura too.
  Really it depends. I saw girls in Japan walking around with a really heavy tan as well as girls with white skin.

• 29 Stephanie // Apr 26, 2008 at 9:51 am

  Umm Southern belles hide under parasols? Last time I went to the south, everyone was tan and didn’t give a crap about hiding under shade. This whole wanting to be as pale as possible is such bs.

• 30 Natural // May 1, 2008 at 9:31 pm

  There’s this trend of bleaching your skin with soap and stuff and its everywhere….I really see it a lot in southeast asian countries because its probably the fact that they are darker than their east asian counterparts and have the same biased tendencies of thinking about the whole rice paddy thing and the richer you are the less likely you’ll e outside doing god knows what. Iknow this because whenever I go back to the Philippines I see almost all the products on tv and magazines are on how to acheive paler skin. I personally think trying to be ‘paler/fairer’ is one of the stupidest things ever.

• 31 Lana // May 6, 2008 at 1:37 am

  M3, no I was never made fun of because of the color of my dark beautiful skin, (believe it or not) I just really hate racism, because you’re hating a person over something that notihng can be done about. And it really burns me up when I see self hatred. And this ‘whiteface’ is as self-hating as you can get.

  And, yes I can bring you that crap about white colonization, because whites have influenced how Asians in general look at the world in the 21st century. Now that stuff ya’ll talking about with parasols, rice fields and such, yeah that was THEN. Now it’s a whole new ball game. You see your star/idols looking totally ridiculous with pastly white faces and tan necks and arms, then you wanna look like ‘oppa’ or ‘unni’ or whoever. Well, where do you think they get it from? From the White stars who come over with their media onslaught of commericals subliminally telling the masses that white looks better than everybody. ‘Be white like us!’ A lot of Asians have tied status, money, education all into the ‘precious’ white skin. That’s what it’s about NOW, in this century. And what’s really interesting in the quest for whiteness is the ‘Jim Crow’ attitude that comes along with it. For people that weren’t under direct Jim Crow rule, a lot of ya’ll sure do have that mentality down PAT! The almost worship of the white man, his language, his status, and his color is really…disturbing.

  Yeah, let’s talk about THIS CENTURY, modern times, please, not way back when, because the things that influenced ‘whiteface’ are not the same as the were, oh, back in 1940-1980.

  People, just learn to love the skin you’re in. Don’t look like some of these nuts out here with pastly faces, tan bodies, trying to act, look, speak like they think they’re beloved white person would. Goshdarnit! BE YOU! BE YOU! BE THE BEST YOU YOU CAN BE!

• 32 yoon // May 8, 2008 at 6:28 pm

  I’m so happy some people appreciate pale skin. here in the states, everyone makes fun of me for my paleness. I love thou, so I dont give a shit what they think. and since my husband is from south korea, he loves it also.

• 33 Annie Get Your Fun // May 15, 2008 at 1:31 pm

  Um, so. I think these posts are supposed to be slightly irreverent, yes? So the whole thing about the Japanese skin being the palest and most likely to hold up? That’s… a **** JOKE, right?

  I’m white, and I had an interesting time living in Asia, where people were extremely jealous of my pale skin (Tibetans were especially prone to poking me in the arm and then patting my cheeks to see if I was real). I found the whole obsession rather nauseating, as well as perplexing, because I get teased here in the US for being white enough to glow in the dark.

  That said, I’d like to remind everyone that the idea of pale skin as “beautiful” was not purely a Western concept. Being pale used to be a sign of being welathy- if you were tanned, you were likely out toiling in the fields all day, so pale people were the ones who could afford to sit around inside and read books while their servants toiled outside. This was the case in Europe as well as Asia - Chinese culture valued pale skin long before Westerners arrived. Just read some old Chinese literature or Indian love tomes. Anything praising a woman’s beauty is likely to refer to her “fair” skin.

  In Western nations, the image of a wealthy person with oodles of leisure time has shifted from being pale and plump to being tanned and thin. Being tanned means that you have time and money to jet off to tropical locations during the winter. If I’m not mistaken, Jackie Kennedy ushered in this new era of thinking when she married Onassis and spent her days sped boating around the Mediterranean or wherever the hell she was.

  This is currently the case in most industrialized cultures (tanned = rich enough to travel). This isn’t the case in China or India yet, because they aren’t yet First World countries. You will see tanning as more widely accepted in Japan, and less so in Korea (for reasons I can’t quite explain).

  It’s not that I don’t think that racism plays a role in the obsession with white skin - I have many an Indian friend who can’t marry well because of their “wheatish” complexions. I find it aggravating and insulting. But originally, the whole “pale” versus “dark” issue stemmed more from economic differences (pale = wealthy) than from purely racial ones.

  On a side note, if we’re going to get all divide-y up-y about race, people from the Indian subcontinent are largely considered Aryan.

• 34 Lizzie // Jun 4, 2008 at 3:59 pm

  This is crazy! I’m from England and there having a tan is consider to be a huge bonus! Everyone I know fake tans when they want to look good for an event, and are upset if they don’t get a tan from their holidays… I’m naturally very pale with very dark hair (almost black) and don’t tan at all, I get teased about this all the time, especially on holiday. But I don’t care! I was born like this and I’ve accepted it! The colour of someone’s skin should never define their beauty or worth… women have spent far too long damaging their health by trying to change what was naturally given to them, enough is enough!

• 35 avalon // Jun 10, 2008 at 7:11 pm

  “Yes and India has been colonized by the Europeans who ruled that country for decades to believe that white was better and to this day, that caste system is in place.”

  Rubbish. The Indian caste system is ancient and a thoroughly Indian creation. White colonization did not create the caste system.

  “Well, where do you think they get it from? From the White stars who come over with their media onslaught of commericals subliminally telling the masses that white looks better than everybody.”

  So Asians are so mindless and robot-like that they will blindly follow any white celebrity who tells them anything? My, what a lot of power those evil white people have.

• 36 Oneya // Jul 2, 2008 at 12:55 am

  5 I am black,but comely, O ye daughters of Jerusalem, as the tends of Kedar, as the curtains of Solomon 6 Look not upon me, because I am black, because the sun hath looked upon me:my mother’s childrens were angry with me; they made me keeper of the vineyards; but mine own vineyard have I not kept.
  Songs of Solomon 1:5-6

• 37 Sunmi // Jul 9, 2008 at 1:00 am

  i always find it funny that western ppl want to be tan and asians want to be pale. not saying everyone in that race exactly does. but every time i go to korea, the girls there have pale skin and do nothing much to cover themselves up. so i always thought they just dont tan (unlike me, i live in california so im completly tan).

• 38 y // Jul 16, 2008 at 8:21 am

  This segment about pale skin, for some parts is unfounded dribble. yes, it is true that pale skin is widely desired by any asian cultures. and there are the links to historical social bearings.

  ‘5. Japanese skin has the best condition (least deterioration with age), while Indian skin has the worst.’ < also, i notice many, many of my korean friends r all naturally pale- not yellow. actually, most of my japanese friends and family r dark.

  anyway, its good to protect you skin from the sun- not to prevent tanning, but more importantly to prevent premature ageing.

  also whitening products- should be trashed- u should learn 2 love ur natural skin color .

• 39 cuteyhoney // Jul 23, 2008 at 12:07 pm

  that’s why I love Lee Hyori so much. A Korean pop star who tans!! she’s like “in your face, I’m still hot!”

  regardless of why people are doing it, they should do what makes them feel good and sexy and all that jazz. don’t do it for someone else ladies and gentlemen and don’t judge others for what they are or what they like!

• 40 Brittni // Jul 24, 2008 at 6:26 pm

  *le sigh*
  Well being extremely pale and living in the USA, I get alot of crap about my skin color.
  I’ve gotten COUNTLESS “OMG you’re so pale” comments.
  Yes America, I’m very aware. I have seen myself before, lol.
  I wish people could just leave it alone and appreciate what they have, find the beauty in what they were given by genetics.
  We’d all be so much happier that way, not constantly comparing ourselves to others and other to us.
  And I mean, really, everyone prefers something different from the next person.

  I cant do anything about my color because I have the white skin that wont tan at all, so I’ve learned to deal with it and appreciate myself as being out of the norm.
  Hey, at least I dont have to worry about farmers tans! =D

• 41 LMAO // Jul 25, 2008 at 12:34 pm

  Lana you are an idiot. You must think all asians are one race and look exactly the same dont you? Even the oriental asians have sub-races. Facial features vary from region to region you fucking retard. 70% of cantonese have double eyelids. 70% of koreans have single eyelids. And so on and so forth. Who gives a shit? Stop generalizing and getting upset when an asian doesn’t look the way you expect/want them to.

• 42 Let's get one thing straight // Jul 25, 2008 at 12:38 pm

  White people are PINK and get sunburn easy.

  Pale asians are IVORY and don’t.

  And another thing, tanning regularly (salon retardation) ages the skin quicker and increases the risk of skin cancer. So if any of you want to jump on the trend of being a walking melanoma then be my guest. Because THAT’S being white for you, oh I’m sorry “western”.

• 43 Well... // Jul 25, 2008 at 2:59 pm

  Who here has seen a pale white person? Here’s a crude example:

  http://www.shabooty.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/gaffiganphoto-250×300.jpg

  I can see why most white people like to tan. They don’t want to look like this guy. White people tend to have somewhat rugged skin; kind of hairy too; and they’re pink . Most whites (not all) just look better tanned, especially the ones with light hair (better contrast?), or they just risk looking like a pasty and sickly q-tip.

  In any case, asian skin looks nothing like caucasian skin. It’s more of an actual white+ocher(yellowish)+greyish than pink+peach. The majority of north asians (Okinawans vary) have always been fair. They don’t go out of their way to achieve paleness as the creator of this article would have you believe. Maybe some do, but I doubt it’s as widespread in places like Korea or Japan as it is in India or the Philippines, obviously.

  These whole attributions to wealth and other half-ass theories as to why fairskin is coveted is ignoring the elephant in the room, that smooth, milky cream skin can look really good, just like how some people think that tans look good. It can go both ways.

  And to the person who wrote this article, I have a question. About those pictures above with the women wearing masks. Are you sure those pictures weren’t just taken during the whole SARS epidemic and they’re wearing masks to protect themselves from infection? Because I really don’t see how just covering your mouth (while exposing your arms, neck, shoulders, and the rest of your face) keeps your complexion light.

• 44 miko // Jul 28, 2008 at 11:49 pm

  umbrellas, yeah. but masks? useless! they only cover the lower half of your face. they’re probably not for protection from the sun but to keep from breathing in pollution, etc

• 45 kim // Jul 29, 2008 at 8:02 am

  I’m Asian, Filipino, and I’m very blessed to have pale skin compared to the other PURE Filipinos. But, because of that, people always ask: are you laos? OR, are you have Chinese?

  It kinda bugs me.

• 46 Rjk // Aug 4, 2008 at 11:51 pm

  To Lana above - you need to stop looking at everything from a white racial perspective. Most Asians in Asia could care less about white people. Not everything is relative to how white people are or how white people think.

  Asians that desire white skin have nothing to do with white people. It is a long standing tradition in Asia long before White people even showed up in Asia.

  What Asians desire is a different shade of white comparing to what most white people have. White people tend to have pinkish white skin while Asians tend to want different shade of white skin.

  Also, in Chinese culture people with a lot of body hair is considered closer to the animals. So, I doubt most Chinese people in China want white skin with bunch of hair like most white people. People with no body hair with light skin are considered more high class for centuries.

• 47 edna // Aug 17, 2008 at 8:42 pm

  im sort of pale like my face legs but not my arms they’re darker by a little bit and consistently other people(asian friends, family, other friends from different races) ask me why am i so pale for an asian or they ask did you know your pale? its just really annoying but i guess in asia they praise for paleness.. i wish i could be a little tanner so these people would stop commenting!!

• 48 calisto // Aug 20, 2008 at 4:53 am

  i hate brown asians, they look like mexicans

• 49 kvietgrl // Aug 20, 2008 at 10:45 am

  @calisto, that’s a pretty prejudice/discriminating comment regarding dark skin looking like mexicans.

• 50 D // Aug 20, 2008 at 10:06 pm

  If a person were light skinned because they didn’t get much sun, their skin in natural. Not affected by outside forces(sun or chemicals). My relatives say my skin is ‘white’ just ’cause its not brown, but it is not white like what you see in the ads above. It’s a little darker than what it was when I was a kid. Maybe it’s just me, but I view it as keeping it natural, more so than having the sun change it.

  As long as the person doesn’t use skin whitening chemicals, I think it’s totally fine to keep one’s skin color from getting darker.

  A tan is basically your skin’s reaction to the sun. I’m not sure, but it keeps you from getting a sunburn?

  It is one thing to be born dark, and another thing to become darker through the sun. Fake tans are better than real ones. Sunlight causes skin cancer and 90% of wrinkles. Not saying that it is good to live underground for the rest of your life. Just wear sunblock and all is good.

• 51 D // Aug 20, 2008 at 10:24 pm

  umm, ignore the 90% thing. i recall reading that ‘fact’ somewhere, but it seems too high.

• 52 D // Aug 20, 2008 at 11:22 pm

  Ah, I did remember correctly. Sun exposure indeed is responsible for 90% of premature aging. The rest is attributed to hormone effects, muscle use, gravity, smoking/air pollution.. I’m thinking genetics would be a factor too, but I didn’t see it in that article.

  When I was younger, I would get tans in the summer and they’d go away in the winter. But now I keep my color cause I use sunblock when I go out.

  In Vietnam, women wear gloves to protect their arms from the sun when they’re on their motorbikes. I’m surprised it wasn’t included here. I think the masks are mostly for pollution. I went to Japan recently in dec 2007, and once in a while i’d see a person wearing a mask. My relative who was living there, said she thinks it’s because they’re sick and didn’t want others to get infected.

  I asked my parents who is prettier if both girls were identical twins and one was darker than the other. They said, the lighter one was prettier of course. And what if the darker one had prettier features? They said it would be a close one.

  Vietnamese people are pretty racist. Or maybe it’s just my family. One time in Vietnam, there was a rare spotting of a black man in Phan Thiet. One of my aunts said something like, “did you see that? De so!” I’m not sure how to translate “de so”, but literally it means easy scare. Like it’s so ugly it’ll scare someone easily.

  As for me, I find skin color similar to hair color. Some people look better with it darker, while some look better with it lighter. But for a lot of people, it doesn’t matter either way.

• 53 Anonymous // Aug 28, 2008 at 4:48 pm

  I came across this website by accident…I’m actually white/western, from the UK. I have very dark brown hair, nearly black and pale skin which is very unusual for western people. I do the opposite of all of you….i spend my time trying to get a tan!! Asian people seem to want their skin to be whiter and western people want theirs to be darker…. maybe we should all just accept what we were born with. Everyone’s skin colour’s beautiful as the concepts of beauty vary so widely. If we all looked the same the world would be a very boring place!

• 54 Lux // Aug 28, 2008 at 11:53 pm

  Lol don’t mind Lana. She’s just some uppity black woman who needs to feel better about getting her hair straightened all the time.

  You can tell she’s a racist herself with all her stereotyping. She doesn’t just hate self-hating asians, she hates asians period. I’ve been seeing more and more of these psuedo-intellectual, pseudo know-it-all “nubian” types trying to stir up crap among other minorities. Perusing asian websites and leaving obnoxious ethnocentric comments is just Lana’s way of compensating for her own shitty racial experiences with white people.

  She’s just a disgruntled, bitter ugly woman with an ugly attitude who craves for others to be as miserable as her.

• 55 Kai // Sep 4, 2008 at 11:45 pm

  D,

  Please don’t generalize your own people by the actions of some.

  What about the people who make cracks about someone for being pale? How come that’s not considered racist? Why does a double standard even exist? I’ll tell you why. It’s a black-white thing; white guilt and all that bullshit. Why should asians, who are also an oppressed minority, have to take part in their white guilt? It seems like certain whites would love to even pass their guilt onto us for some very odd reason (Example: Dozens of white people in America have shot up their school, but then Cho Seung Hui comes along. Then a couple more white people shoot up their school, but it’s still, all about Cho). And let’s not overlook the numerous buffoons in here who seem to take great joy lampooning others’ cultures with some patronizing self-righteous attitude. Get off your high horse, hypocrites.

  We never enslaved the blacks. Whites came to a non-white country (America, among others), proclaimed themselves as the only humans worth a damn, and practiced apartheid and genocide. You just can’t expect a pretty homogenous country like Vietnam, where, like you said, blacks are rare, to be held at the same standards as a 300 year old melting pot nation like America that has gone through a series a civil rights movements. At least nobody went over and lynched him. It’s not liking throwing bananas or making monkey noises at black soccer players during the World Cup is it? *cough*. De so/easily scared? That’s not racist. It could be applied to anybody. Sure it was used in a vulgar context, but is there even an equivalent for ‘n word’ in the Vietnamese language? Surely being surprised at the unfamiliar is better than a bunch of westerners that still think East Asians are some kind of alien race. For example, I’ve heard some Greek guy call us reptilians. There was also this black afrocentrist that said we were zeti reticulis. lmfao. whatever.

  And for the last time, caucasians are typically shades of pink. How many times must we tell you people, we do not want to be fucking pink. It’s not just about being light or dark; there’s the actual shade of color to consider.

• 56 Tabitha // Sep 9, 2008 at 9:16 pm

  Dear Lux,

  Bitter much?!?!?

• 57 Anonymous // Sep 11, 2008 at 1:34 am

  Um I’m black and I read this article.. then I scan accrossed Lux’s comment..

  It’s judging someone saying something racists.. but in turn he seems to making a racist comment as well..

  Hypocritical statements are very much not appreciated…. black people don’t stir up trouble between minorities.. nor do I think Lana is trying too.. and no one ever compare asians to black people.. asians are most like white people from my understanding… if not they are allways trying to compare with them and get with them… I just wanted to say its sad.

  I straightened my hair yesterday cause I thought I’d like the look.. its so straight that it’s “asian” straight.. I don’t see myself trying to be asian.. my hair before was very curly and made me look masculine and seemed to not grow much. I did it to enhance my features and in turn I like it very much. Every “CULTURE” (not race) does some custom that in turn damages their body in order to form a cool, desired outcome.. everyone seems to make things racially shared.. but its not..

  Black people don’t share the same ideas.. just like Chinese and Japanese don’t.
  ex. chinese and Japanese are both asian.. they don’t share the same exact features physically.. They were once enemies (may still be) now lets narrow it down.. to Japanese.. there are different cultures in Japan.. a person from Osaka isn;t going to even speak the same Dialect as someone from Tokyo.. lets go further into the society.. there are some Japanese who like to perserve their tradition… and then there are Japanese people who are into the American way of living.

  One race of people do not obligate that race to having the same intention.. so please..not every black woman is a know it all.. some simply observ and think on a solution. (sorry for any typos, please bare with me) and that’s not typically an African American trait.. I have been greeted with “I’m better than you”attitude by many white and asian and spanish people.. not an Indian as of yet.. but that doesn’t mean that I never will. Anyways I said enough.. being racist isn’t restricted to a race, every race is guilty for having racist pricks.

• 58 Lux // Sep 11, 2008 at 2:06 am

  Bitter? Love the originality. I guess parroting what I just called Lana is all you could come up with.

  Look, I’m not the African-American going to Asian sites deliberately stirring up trouble here. We all know how deep the self-hatred in the black community goes so the fact that Lana was even in here posting essay long responses about Asian self-hatred is just ironic.

  If anybody’s bitter its Lana for sticking her nose where it doesn’t belong and spewing her anti-Asian garbage in such detail. Yes, I said anti-Asian. She’s not fooling anyone with her pretentious diatribes. Just because we don’t worship black people doesn’t mean we’re white wannabes. That moron seriously needs to get a clue.

  Please understand my reaction, Tabitha. I didn’t mean to offend you. It’s just that I’ve seen one too many of these afrocentrists types deliberately trying to put us down, passive aggressively or otherwise. They even go as far as claiming Chinese history. And I was simply warning my people to watch out for people like her. Afrocentrists is not synonymous with all black people.

• 59 lisb // Sep 15, 2008 at 3:49 pm

  like someone had mentioned. pale skin is not a western concept. whitening of the skin has always been popular in asia before westerners came in contact with asia or any influence had taken place. and no. i still think dark or tanned skin is pretty as well with pale skin ( i have pale skin). and lighter skin was a status symbol or beauty symbol in many non asian countries. many african nations have had similar notions as well too as well with middle eastern, etc.

• 60 Francis Xavier // Sep 26, 2008 at 9:58 pm

  Yeah I’m Mexican and some of my fellow beaners feel this way. I find light skin with non-white features to be very disgusting actually. If you don’t have white looks then you should not have white skin. Asian and Mexican women who bleach their skin look like zombies or diseased freaks. YOU ARE NOT WHITE! Get a dark tan, it looks way better on non-white people than fake white skin. I’m naturally light but I go outside alot shirtless cause I hate my light skin. Luckily I tan easy so I’m nice and brown now. (PS I like white people, just not unnatural skin tones)

• 61 Carrie // Sep 28, 2008 at 1:37 pm

  I personally hate fake skin tones too!
  I’m from the UK, 16 years old and know a lot of people who are always trying to tan themselves (even if they didn’t need a tan in the first place). Well…not so much now as we have had brilliant sunny weather!

  I had a point were I wanted to tan my skin a little to make myself look better. Tans suited me more than paler skin. Although, I wouldn’t say my skin was exactly pale anyway haha!

  There are loads of Asian people in the UK and I don’t happen to know any that want to whiten their skin more. Would this be because most western people want to tan?
  I don’t think so.
  I think it’s probably to do with the pressure in the country they live.

  At the end of the day, people are always going to want to change the way they look.
  But really, white people (well here, anyway), don’t give a damn what you look like.
  As long as you look healthy and whatever your features are, in a reasonable shape, you are beautiful.
  I feel it’s what you do with the beautiful you have got.

  (Unless your god damn ugly) hehe!!!!

  But really, confidence is what makes you most attractive.

  So if your unhappy however you look, you’ll still be ugly after trying to pretty yourself up

• 62 anonymous // Oct 1, 2008 at 4:49 pm

  I think it’s funny how white people want to have golden skin color (like asians), and asians want to have white skin color (like europeans). Why don’t we just switch!

  I am white and definitely have extremely white skin. When it’s cloudy and dark outside my skin reflects and looks pretty much transparent. I always wished that I had gotten the Olive skin tone gene (even though both my parents are pale and my sisters are pastey). But then I had come to realize that I am pale, and tanning is bad for you anyways. I think my pale skin looks cool in a way because I have dark hair and dark eyes, so it makes me look kinda creapy. Haha. But it’s my heritage and all my family has it, so I should except it. I can totally understand why Asians want to come close to the same skin color as me, but they need to learn that they are who they are and that’s not going to change. And if they haven’t noticed, golden skin looks more normal on asians. white skin on asians looks fake in a way because their hair is soo black and their eyes are like little black pebbles.

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