According to Esther Kao, "an organizer with Red Canary Song, a New York-based collective of Asian and Asian American advocates for massage parlor workers and sex workers," quoted in "Fetishized, sexualized and marginalized, Asian women are uniquely vulnerable to violence" (CNN).
From the article:
The way their race intersects with their gender makes Asian and Asian American women uniquely vulnerable to violence, said Sung Yeon Choimorrow, executive director of the non-profit advocacy group National Asian Pacific American Women's Forum.
The perceptions of Asian and Asian American women as submissive, hypersexual and exotic can be traced back centuries. Rachel Kuo, a scholar on race and co-leader of Asian American Feminist Collective, points to... the Page Act of 1875... enacted seemingly to restrict prostitution and forced labor. In reality, it was used systematically to prevent Chinese women from immigrating to the US, under the pretense that they were prostitutes.
US imperialism has also played a significant role in those attitudes, Kuo said.American service members, while abroad for US military activities (including the Philippine-American War, World War II and the Vietnam War), have a history of soliciting sex workers and patronizing industries that encouraged sex trafficking.
That furthered denigrating stereotypes of Asian women as sexual deviants, which were memorialized on screen. All of those perceptions "have had the effect of excusing and tolerating violence by ignoring, trivializing and normalizing it," Kuo said.Those stereotypes also feed into perceptions of "Asian women as cheap and disposable workers," said Kuo....
ADDED: This analysis functions to characterize the murderer as racially motivated even if it is true that he was, as he's said, motivated by tormenting sexual addiction. Why did he think killing these women had to do with sex? As Kao, puts it, above, it is racially prejudiced to look at these masseuses as see them as prostitutes.
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83 comments:
Now if only she could gin up some statistics about the supposed violence, then she'd really have something!
Did you see the photos of these massage businesses? These were blatantly "happy ending" places. Not that that particularly matters.
The other problem might be that other people in their communities traffic them as sex workers. Like, yeah. People fetishize the other... but maybe the first thing we should do is find a way to keep them from *being trafficked as sex workers* before we start shaming people for their sexual preferences.
Does sex go on in these spas?
Of course they are, isn’t everyone a member of a downtrodden tribe. There may be a few “exceptions”.
So, she’s an advocate for sex workers and massage parlor employees...
But we shouldn’t assume that sex workers and massage parlor employees sell sex?
I’m struggling to get this one.
"Fetishized, sexualized and marginalized, Asian women are uniquely vulnerable to violence"
Love that headline. It secretly hides who is actually bringing a lot of these girls into the country...and it ain't white guys.
"Fetishized, sexualized and marginalized, Asian women are uniquely vulnerable to violence"
I think they meant to say "prostitutes", not "Asian women", because:
"Asians had the lowest rate of violent victimization among all racial or ethnic groups.
Asian males were at a slightly higher risk of violent victimization than Asian females."
And some are human trafficking gold mines.
Yuck, the language in that article is just awful, sounds like it was written by a bot trained on grievance studies papers.
"Did you see the photos of these massage businesses?"
Yes, I was going to put something about that in the post, but it is obvious. This is the image the business owner is trying to project. It isn't subtle. It seems more likely that the killer picked his targets based on the look of the storefront than the look of the women who worked there, but I chose not to put that on the front page of the blog out of respect for the dead.
Contrary to the article's assertion, the more dangerous assumpttion to make about one of these spas is that they are straight massage places.
"...advocates for massage parlor workers and sex workers,"
Wow. Doesn't that link make them one of the badies?
Yeah, it's crazy to look at these sex workers and regard them as sex workers.
In my experience, if you actually want a massage, you call a professional masseuse. I’ve know a lot of folks who do this.
I’ve never heard of anybody going to a massage parlor for a massage.
Democrats are hoping that a major campaign of propaganda sop will get Asians not to notice that it’s Democrats keeping them out of the most prestigious universities so of course the press obliges.
A couple of days ago there was a tweet that claimed that politically incorrect and popular comedian Bill Barr was still a racist even though he has a black wife, whom the tweet characterized as an “owned sex servant” who met a racist fetish for Barr.
All assumptions are racist ...
... unless you are talking about toxic Whiteness.
"And some are human trafficking gold mines.”
I actually saw a tweet last year where an activist who claimed to be working against human trafficking said that she toned down her objections to it because to talk about the truth of human trafficking and the southern border would be an argument for Trump’s wall.
This is the kind of nonsense they need to get people to believe to hold their Rube Goldberg coalition together even though they have to shiv some members to pretend toe help others.
Now if only she could gin up some statistics about the supposed violence, then she'd really have something!
Asian women are the safest people in the US. It's horrible!
I’m struggling to get this one.
They're lying. What's so hard about that?
fetishized and hypersexualized.
Like the wimminfolk in rap videos. Almost!
So, the Dems' message for today is that Trump personally ordered the massacre of those Asian sex workers.
Got it.
I had assumed that the guy knew these businesses sold sex based on his personal experiences as a sex addict. Has anyone actually ruled out that he may have been a patron?
This analysis functions to characterize, without evidence, the murderer as racially motivated ...
If you go to any major metro area and check on stories about massage parlors being closed for various reasons, they are inevitably Asian massage parlors. Many of these places are fronts for prostitution, where sex trafficked women are forced to live in small rooms, poor conditions and are forced to work there. Others are legit operations that just happen to offer 'happy endings'. It's not new. It's very well known. These are not the slick, new-agey spas that you may see in an upscale strip center. But are typically still located in key, monied areas, albeit in lesser strip centers or nondescript buildings.
Just ask Robert Kraft. Was he being racist, or was he just going where he knew he could get a happy ending?
I love massages. But I tend to go to the slick, new-agey places where the massage therapists hate men.
Trump did it. Trump did it all. And all his supporters are guilty...and everyone that didn't vote against him is guilty, too.
Get the trend, Althouse? You are guilty because you didn't vote. It is all true. Can't you feel it?
Of course, because this was published by CNN, we know it is true. If it comes from CNN, you can take it to the bank.
Keep telling yourselves that it's a race problem and NOT a human trafficking problem.
Massage parlor trafficking is happening in plain sight, in businesses that operate as if they are legal massage or bodywork establishments. It persists because we choose to ignore it — as something harmless, as something inevitable, or both: at best, a victimless crime. At worst, a public nuisance.
The women trafficked in massage parlors are typically immigrants from China or South Korea, usually mothers between the ages of 35-55 who are looking for a way to support their families. They are often lied to or seriously misled about the type of work they’ll be doing, by traffickers who know they have debts they need to pay or are otherwise in no position to say “no” to a source of income.
Once they are at the massage parlor, traffickers step up their control with a combination of manipulation and blackmail. A woman who speaks little English, whose identification documents are held by traffickers, whose finances are controlled by traffickers, and who has been transported by traffickers to an unfamiliar place, is told that she has the “choice” to provide commercial sex or to leave and take care of herself. https://polarisproject.org/blog/2018/06/human-trafficking-in-massage-parlors-a-deeply-manipulated-sense-of-choice/
I wish we could all just stipulate that interpreting the true motivations of derranged "lone wolf" type mass shooters too deeply is ultimately a futile endeavor. The media have a tendency to impute all sorts of highly questionable motivations to these lunatics. But unless you can link them to an organized group with a specific agenda that actively supported them (like a terrorist cell or something), I think reading too much into their actions and interpretting them as a failing of our society/culture isn't at all useful and may be harmful.
I mean, there's certainly plenty to discuss around how we as a society deal with the mentally unwell who can present dangers to others. But as to trying to understand why they do what they do, why they believe what they believe, and then using that as some sort of indictment on some group of people? That's just absurd.
"How can it be racist if I like a race?” - Seinfeld.
They are really pushing this stuff too far. Sarah Silverman, who has always been a good guard on the Democrat plantation is starting to object.
For heaven's sake.
No one is defending the murderer.
There is no "epidemic" or whatever the word is today of white on Asian violence.
Just stop the bullshit already.
Having seen footage of violence against Asians, and the perps, Parlors ain't where it happens and Christian madmen ain't top o' the conviction list.
Oh please. The killer targeted places he had used for sex. I worked on a CDC grant one year where my job was to try to get into those places and “educate” the employees about AIDS. I found the sites to go to in the sex ads in the weekly papers and I coordinated with the officer in charge of foreign gangs in Atlanta. The Vietnamese and Chinese but especially Korean gangs ran all of these places. And not every woman was there voluntarily. I met some really scary people.
There are a few real massage parlors and big traditional steam baths emporiums in NE Atlanta (far from Acworth) but they are marketed as such and clearly state they are for families. A young white male would be deterred from entering. Every storefront Asian spa — and there are hundreds, if not thousands here, does sex business. Ditto the lingerie modeling studios, the American equivalent. Lots of these places don’t even have massage tables. I suppose some people go in just for massages, and that’s all they get because they don’t negotiate for more.
Miss Kao should contemplate the culpability of her own community tolerating the continued exploitation of women, by her own community, and otherwise shut up. Nobody but the killer is responsible for the crimes. I’m following this case as an example of how activists and politicians and the press are disappearing the three non-Asian victims — a white woman, white man, and Hispanic man who survived several gunshots — in their fanatical quest to make this about Trump and finally have a “hate crime” in Georgia with a white offender before the black guy who announced he was going to kill white men then stabbed one and killed another comes to trial. They don’t want Georgia’s first hate crime case to be black on white. Those people are the real dehumanizing sickos.
The dude was crazy. To a large extent, does it matter if he hated Asian-Americans, hated sex workers, or took his instructions from his dog?
He is bat shit crazy.
But we have a new crisis get out the yellow pussy hats, I'll notify the press. Gotta be some dough in it for "The Leadership".
What we need is a public awareness campaign by celebrities. I nominate Robert Kraft to take the lead.
It seems more likely that the killer picked his targets based on the look of the storefront than the look of the women who worked there,
Maybe he had visited them before and chose on that basis.
Tina Trent is right on about these places.
The attempt to hide the anti-Asian bias of Ivy League colleges is another good point.
Yes, I was going to put something about that in the post, but it is obvious. This is the image the business owner is trying to project. It isn't subtle. It seems more likely that the killer picked his targets based on the look of the storefront than the look of the women who worked there, but I chose not to put that on the front page of the blog out of respect for the dead.
Pretty sure I read he'd patronized those particular "spas" in the past. He didn't have to rely on appearances alone when identifying his targets. He just had to remember where he was when he got handjobs from sex workers.
Sex workers being targeted for violence, for a variety of "reasons", is nothing new - doesn't matter the race. But do let's make it about race cuz The Party That Cares needs to roll more victims into their tent.
No one's mentioned Jack the Ripper?
"it is racially prejudiced to look at these masseuses as see them as prostitutes"
Aren't racial stereotypes part of the business model?
Do we have evidence that relevant clients do not look at non-Asian masseuses in massage parlors as prostitutes?
""[N]ot all massage businesses provide sexual services...
I'm sure that they all don't.
But the ones open at 3am in locations near trucking lanes definitely do.
I've never understood the fetishization of Asian women thing.
But their association with illicit massage parlors is a Willie Sutton thing.
These parlors are where one can go to get a happy ending. Many of them happen to have Asian workers.
Tina Trent said...
The killer targeted places he had used for sex.
That's what I'm seeing in other reporting on the case. He claims to have a sex addiction and felt that the massage parlors were to blame because they "tempted" him. It sounds more like some sort of religious delusion than anything to do with race.
...finally have a “hate crime” in Georgia with a white offender...
Tom Wolfe's Great White Defendant.
Michael K: the killer stated he had been using those places and was on his way to either South Georgia or Florida to shoot up another place he had used.
My grant assignment put me in the position of knowing a lot about Atlanta’s non-English, non-Spanish speaking sex trade. I’d also spent five years working with Vietnamese building and carpet crews, attended their weddings, dated in the community and so on and could read and speak a bit. The Vietnamese prided themselves on dominating the nail salons, rather than the massage sex trade.
Except for the Ameriasian kids, who were denied an education in Vietnam and often lived as street kids. They were drug mules and street prostitutes working out of motels because they were despised “half-breeds.” I went to certain motels to find them. A LOT of the male ones were exploited by older American gay men and died of AIDS. One kid told me his “boyfriend” told him you could only get AIDS from sleeping with women. He said a lot of his peers were told that.
An elderly, white, female, church ESL volunteer turned us onto that exploitation after one of her clients told her about it. I guess she’d be denounced as a Karen today. So we made comic books in Vietnamese to warn the street kids about sex with men and prostitution and disease — few could read because they weren’t allowed to enroll in school in Vietnam if they had foreign fathers. Bush One passed a law saying any such child could come to America regardless of the origin of their father. It was called Operation Homecoming. Terrible racists, those Republicans. Unfortunately, lots of the “Amerasians” were brought here by people who snatched them off the streets to get to America themselves then abandoned them as soon as they got their papers.
You learn a lot about American decency and the evils of communism working with refugees.
"Love that headline. It secretly hides who is actually bringing a lot of these girls into the country...and it ain't white guys."
Just as the thousands of women and children being smuggled over the southern border to be sex slaves aren't being trafficked by white guys either.
The baby, they say. Keep women appointed, available, and taxable.
find a way to keep them from *being trafficked as sex workers*
As sex workers, mules, citizenship gateways... across the border, too.
How queer. Do they twerk for a national audience? Perhaps offer a private performances on a couch. Take a knee? Get raped, but not rape-raped, in special sessions?
Keep women and girls appointed, available, and taxable. Abort.
Titus asked...Does sex go on in these spas?
Probably, but no Asian hog. That's your bailiwick.
Why did he think killing these women had to do with sex?
If you're asking doesn't it mean you don't know? So how do you conclude racism is the explanation?
It seems plausible he frequented these places for sex and the targeting is based on his experience.
Does sex go on in these spas?
Bill Clinton says no.
Shorter CNN: another group found uniquely vulnerable
Althouse said...
This analysis functions to characterize the murderer as racially motivated even if it is true that he was, as he's said, motivated by tormenting sexual addiction.
Judge: How do you plead?
Defendant: Me so horny.
US imperialism has also played a significant role in those attitudes, Kuo said.American service members, while abroad for US military activities (including the Philippine-American War, World War II and the Vietnam War), have a history of soliciting sex workers and patronizing industries that encouraged sex trafficking.
As if soldiers seeking out sexual services or more "honorable" forms of female companionship is a specific feature of the American military, as opposed to something that every army has done ever since there have been armies.
Democrats care about dead Asian masseuses when they have a gun control bill to pass.
There's some tension between the article's "Americans think Asian women are submissive, hypersexualized prostitutes" and "American men overseas spent most of their spare time frequenting Asian brothels" (paraphrasing, not quoting). Apparently the idea that there are a lot of Asian women in "sex work" in this country is racist imagining; but when men actually interact with Asian women in Asia, it's because they are prostitutes.
The press handling of this case so far as been very bad. The non-Asian victims are, for practical purposes, invisible. And the "hate crime" the guy has been accused of is peculiar. That he targeted women would seem to be incontrovertible, b/c sex addiction was his stated reason for doing what he did. It would surprise no one if this were described as an anti-female "hate crime." But it has to be an anti-Asian hate crime, b/c of all the other random killing and assaulting of Asians that has been going on recently. Unfortunately, most of those murders and assaults have been carried out by Blacks, which poses quite the problem to Op-Ed writers. (There have been several aggrieved, hand-wringing pieces on this very subject in the WaPo and the NYT in recent weeks.)
So they've been pleading, "don't pit one minority group against another!," which leaves unanswered who's doing the "pitting." I'd have thought the people assaulting their fellow-citizens would, er, get first shot at the blame there, but no. Can't you find a nice white mass murderer of Asians to distract us from all the Black ones (and from other things, like the efforts to address "racial discrimination" in top high schools by drastically lowering the number of Asian students allowed in them)? And, whaddaya know, out drops this dude. Who looks like your basic sex-obsessed, non-racist weirdo to me, but maybe he'll fit.
The 'analysis' is just the latest reworking of Madama Butterfly as the stereotypical Asian woman, now casting these Asian women in Atlanta as updated versions of Cio-Cio San, with the Atlanta killer in the role of Pinkerton. Edward Said's Orientalism started that all off some 40+ years ago. It was fresh and interesting when he wrote that book; not so much anymore.
Contra Said (and Ms. Kao and perhaps AA), 'submissive and sexualized' is not what leaps to my mind when the topic of Asian women comes up. You could just as easily decide that Turandot provides a better stereotype for Asian women, with Calaf as the replacement for Pinkerton. Or perhaps use Lakme and its very different portrayals as the jumping-off point for the ideal stereotype. But it's always fun to search through opera conventions from 100+ years ago, if looking for stereotypes is your thing. (If it is, you are an ideal candidate for the Harvard admissions committee.)
Or better yet, just forget the whole stereotype thing.
For me, the stereotype is rooted in a Stanley Kubrick movie I saw when I was too young, and the 2 Live Crew drop that used it as the chorus of an equally age-inappropriate popular rap.
Diversity dogma (i.e. color judgment), including she's a feminine female, and social liberalism including a she's a masseuse with "benefits", let's fuck without responsibility, has consequences.
Interestingly, I think Fresh Kid Ice was probably the first big-time Asian rapper in America.
A masseuse with "benefits", without responsibility, service without burdens. A colorful clump of cells with a hole triad. An object of diversity dogma (e.g. person of color, person of white).
Man, they used to rhyme sloooow.
According to Esther Kao, "an organizer with Red Canary Song, a New York-based collective of Asian and Asian American advocates for massage parlor workers and sex workers,"
I'm sorry, but you can NOT "advocate for massage parlor workers and sex workers", and then complain about people "confusing" the two.
You've decided to lump them together. Everyone else gets to do the same.
If you don't want people to lump them together, then pick one to advocate for, and only advocate for them.
I note that she's a racist who doesn't care about "white" massage parlor workers and sex workers
Shouting Thomas said...
I’ve never heard of anybody going to a massage parlor for a massage.
I have done so. This was back in the Yellow Pages days. I looked for a place in the right part of town, with the right kind of name.
I'd injured my back, and since my heuristics were correct, I got the happiest possible ending to my massage: I walked out with my injury fixed
Doreau: According to his file, he likes to hang out at massage parlors.
Hammer: Do you realize how many of those places there are in this city? It'd take us forever to search them all!
Doreau: No, I think he actually goes for massages.
Hammer: Oh. Well, there's only like two or three of those places.
Forget the racial aspects of this event, which even the perpetrator denies. Racism is just a bit of icing on the cake of anti-gun demagoguery the Democrats are always poised to dump on us when when national news reports multiple murders. Democrats can't help but spout racism boilerplate when they speak about anyone other than white supremacists, but they have to have a crisis, an atrocity, or at least an ATF program like Fast & Furious to push their anti-2nd Amendment efforts.
Seems that when they aren’t bashing men for fetishizing Asian women, they are bashing them for not fetishizing black women, and if they do fetishize black women, well it has to be racism.
"World War II and the Vietnam War), have a history of soliciting sex workers and patronizing industries that encouraged sex trafficking. “
Read Hemingway about WWI and Italian prostitutes. War impoverishes people where the war is happening, and makes the friend of the publishers of the Washington Post and New York Times very rich. Any mention of the rape camps the Imperial Japanese Army set up?
Al Gore found a massage service that didn't offer sex, famously.
Any mention of the rape camps the Imperial Japanese Army set up?
Those are comfort women.
And today they're using legal processes to get paid. Apparently the Japanese men just skipped out.
The rejection was always devastating. Perhaps this tragic event was caused by this young man's rejection and his idea to "get even", but like someone said above, you really can't figure out crazy.
If there are no massage sex parlors, he won't any longer be obsessed by going to them. Probably nothing against the women. He's just clearing up a problem.
Nately's whore is the prototype of GI falling for a prostitute, in Catch-22.
"World War II and the Vietnam War), have a history of soliciting sex workers and patronizing industries that encouraged sex trafficking. “
One-child, too. Selective-child, probably. The CCP has normalized work with "benefits" to compensate for male and female deficits following their poorly conceived Planned Population schemes.
Correction: normalized workers with "benefits" to compensate for female deficits following their poorly conceived Planned Population schemes.
In the last day I've seen three articles / videos showing confrontations between Asians and others which seems quite a spree. At least two of these included references to "Communist" China - something which strikes me and probably the rest of the public as odd.
In a possibly related event I was approached recently (maybe last Friday) by a Chinese woman asking me to sign a petition about "Communist" China. I didn't even read it as I was walking into a grocery store. But the oldest trick in the book is approaching someone under false pretenses and intentionally inserting something odd into discussion. They then edit out the prompt so the comment seems to reveal the speaker is fixated on the issue. This is a 60 Minutes staple.
Is this a coordinated plan by Dems in response to Asians' dissatisfaction with the Dems racism toward them?
tim in vermont said...
Seems that when they aren’t bashing men for fetishizing Asian women, they are bashing them for not fetishizing black women, and if they do fetishize black women, well it has to be racism.
My first wife is Black and I dated Asian women before and after I met her. Neither was a result of a fetish, but of living in a multicultural city like Chicago. People who talk about sexual fetishes seem to be projecting.
I should add that the various stereotypes about the sexual behavior of women of different races, religions, ethnic backgrounds and political persuasion are ridiculous based on my (admittedly extensive) experience.
"Apparently the Japanese men just skipped out.”
So Japan lost the war due to the curse of the unpaid whore.
"That furthered denigrating stereotypes of Asian women as sexual deviants..."
Didn't we just spend the last four years hearing about how Trump allegedly hired Russian prostitutes to perform a golden shower show? Talk about sexually deviant. I mean, I guess they could have been from the Asian part of Russia, but still.
Maybe the issue is that for a lot of women in poor countries or in bad situations prostitution is the best way to make a living.
You can't swing a dead cat without hitting one of these sorts of massage places here in SF. To a one they look sketchy; some out in my end of the city try to market themselves as day spas so as to perhaps avoid being lumped in with the happy endings crowd but the storefronts don't look that much more upscale. The ones in and on the edge of Chinatown/the Tenderloin are especially skeevy looking.
As Greg said above at 12:31pm, it would behoove Ms. Kao to clarify just who she advocates for. Somehow I don't see her being too awfully concerned if the sex worker involved was a ginger named Eileen from County Clare.
It adjoins a strip club. Sometimes a brothel is just a brothel.
Uniquely.
As usual, the hot takes come out before anyone knows any of the facts. Frankly, they don't care about the facts. They have a narrative and they are sticking to it. Or they are searching for clicks.
Do we know if the killer frequented these places? The story so far has been sexual addiction driving the man to despair, which then led him to violence. It is quite plausible that he would go after the people who he thought were ruining his life. We generally don't think of prostitutes as the targets for such a revenge motivation, but it makes logical sense in a twisted way.
Has anyone looked into the fact these women might have been sex trafficked. If so, they were likely trafficked by Asian men. That doesn't fit the white supremacy narrative though.
Yellow Fever could be the lever to better pull Asians into the intersectionality fold.
Also, I may or may not have once overheard: "Nonsense. Some of my best wives were b/Black."
Of course there are "massage parlors" that are legit. Google "Massage Envy". I joined and had over 100 massages in two years.
The attacks on Asians in major cities have been conducted by black men. Unprovoked. Evil, IMO.
Since Bob Kraft got my Orchids of Asia shut down (Jupiter Police really screwed up that one), I have been frequenting a Korean Foot Spa. There are a few here in Palm Beach County. They do offer full body massages, but no happy endings. I still go. Once a week. I have circulation problems in my legs (three marathons, back in the day, and the training that went with them) as well as the typical back problems. I feel like a million bucks when I leave the spa and tip accordingly.
THEOLDMAN
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