I always felt these memes were a bit racially motivated. Lemme explain (sorry for submitting a thesis on a fuckin meme):
Many societies (not all) in this internet age exhibit patriarchal sexism, and the manifestation is different based on culture but it generally leads to the sexualisation of and entitlement to women’s (and fem’s) bodies.
South Asia has hundreds of cultures but most of them are of this form. As a result, sometimes a brown guy will sexually harass a woman online! It’s terrible but unfortunately expected.
However, these cultures aren’t the only ones in which (some) men are pigs! In fact, it happens in Western countries too, and even in other highly populated regions with unmitigated internet access, English language education, and patriarchy (e.g. most Asian countries meet all four requirements, people in China have VPNs, Brazil, etc.)
So, assuming women are probably facing sexual harassment from all angles, why South Asian men? Yes it’s the most populous of the named regions with unrestricted access, but why so many jokes when Western sexism is taken more seriously?
I think these memes serve 3 functions:
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Paint South Asian men as inferior and emasculating them (and almost infantilizing them as well). “Oh look, they’re harassing a Western woman? No chance in hell that’ll work.” Leading me to
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Stereotype South Asian men as uniquely sex pests (as opposed to unremarkable sex pests)
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Make fun of the intelligence of ESL speakers. All the memes rarely focus on the sexual harassment and largely focus on a misspelling or grammar mistake.
I think I’ve made my case pretty well, it’s OK if you disagree, but then the question is: is this a real problem and if so what do we do about this?
I don’t want to be the fun police so keep doing the memes, but maybe we also try and have a separate place where we take all forms of sexual harassment more seriously, and make fun of the audacity and grossness of all sexual harassment (even from women and other genders, which I didn’t even touch on)!
Tl:dr; meme is low key racist, you can still do it if you wanna but I do suggest that we make fun of other sexual harassers as well* (*preferably in a funny way).
Sorry for the essay once again ik I’m a buzzkill
As a South Asian male, I am a lot more concerned at how perverted many South Asian men are, and at how often the police ignore or help cover up crimes against women. And we are racist too - Delhi and the 2-3 states around it are considered the least safe for women, so many people from other parts of India make similar jokes about ‘Delhi men’, ‘Haryanvi men’ or ‘UP men’. There were even news reports of women from other parts of India refusing transfers to these regions.
Not a buzzkill, but definitely a little narrow in view on this issue. You named ‘why’ South Asian men get the brunt end of these memes in that they have a high population of partial-english speaking men with unrestricted internet access and a culture that tends patriarchal but then immediately ask why they get the brunt end?
In what way is this painting all South Asian men in an infantilizing light and what lead you to read so deeply into this particular image that suggests there’s a dynamic of “ew, nasty foreign brown man could never get white western perfection”? That just seems like some insecurities put to page and not a genuine reading of the situation.
People absolutely make fun of other sexual harrassers, why the penchant to point out this one? Why do they need to be funny? Sexual harassment doesn’t have to be mocked with a positive intent, we SHOULD call out sex pests, and when people get mad about calling out sex pests we should call those people out too.
Your whole comment gave off a patronizing vibe. It sounds you you explain away the behavior exhibited from those shitty dudes by saying it’s their society and “sorry women, it happens from all angles though so why not take that frustration and be sure to distribute it evenly”. That kind of of attitude is so detrimental to the overall ending of the exact situation happening in the meme.
As a side note, purely anecdotal, MOST of the goofiest, silliest-ass cat calls I’ve ever seen have been from that part of the world. Not to say it won’t be said in Italian, German, Russian, Japanese, Spanish, Czhechian, or whatever, but they seemingly have the good sense to say it in a language they can properly contextualize so they don’t become the next Show Me Your Bobs.
Glad you were able to provide such a detailed reply! I’ll try and elaborate on what I mean:
I haven’t seen a single Anglophone man get called out and made fun of in the way South Asian men are made fun of for the same predatory behaviour. If you have examples, I’d love to see em. But there was an entire subreddit on reddit basically dedicated to specifically South Asian men, and IIRC there wasn’t one that was generally making fun of gross people online (or maybe I just unfortunately saw the wrong circles).
Also to clarify, I get why South Asian men might show up in larger quantity, but my question is primarily: why is the emotion primarily ridicule as opposed to disgust (or sadly, occasionally defense), as we tend to see with Western men making the same creepy advances? Once again, this doesn’t even scratch the surface of other genders!
I’d also like to say that I’m not South Asian (but I am a man, and I am Anglophone). I just notice this and it kinda ticks me off bc I feel like I wanna be angry at these guys for sexually harassing women but I also feel like the fact that people solely posting about brown guys is trying to sell a narrative that only brown guys are creepy and that they’re creepy in a harmless “open bob show vagene” way when some of those very same men might be doing real life harm to people.
Also yea I agree we should probably prioritize just calling out sexual harassment, but in terms of “meme culture”, funny is currency (hence my focus on comedy, trying not to be a total buzzkill just a partial one!)
I was worried of coming off in a patronizing way and I apologize that I did so. My goal was to try and pinpoint the ideology of sexism in different cultures rather than justify it or brush it off, with the larger goal of trying to discuss the interplay of cultural dialogue, western notions of race, and aforementioned sexist behaviour. It seems that I was unclear; that’s totally on me. My bad!
I do think that your last paragraph kind of points to one of my exact issues: we tend to diminish the intelligence of ESL speakers if they get the grammar incorrect. Those South Asian (S.A.) men were fully harassing you! They were being gross! But they are getting brushed off for what white supremacy (as an ideology) might call “sophisticated countries”. I think these memes diminish the severity of sexual harassment while also seeking to emasculate S.A. men. It’s like an oppression double whammy where no one wins.
Anyway, sorry for essay #2; glad to hear your thoughts on the matter! I just hope this discussion at least gets people to be more mindful of what they post more generally.
The biggest part of the stereotype is the lack of “normal” connectivity western Internet folks have with South Asian folk.
So often times the only time a western women is chatting with a South Asian man is when he is oddly in a group not commonly having many international folks, such as a US city subreddit, a US dating website, etc.
So the ESL, the forward disposition, the comical lewdness is all the more ridiculous due to how unexpected it is.
Also racism.
I think it had to be said, but you are right, it is low key racism. I mean, where are the Italian men for this meme?
Imo, from my experiences on Grindr, while I’ve been hit on by pretty much every ethnicity, the people who disrespected my boundaries the most were white guys. This isn’t to call all white guys bad ofc, but just to say that the “creepy Indian man” experience just isn’t universal
Thanks for sharing.
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Huh, at least /r/196 didnt let crap like this on.
I feel this strongly in my LinkedIn inbox…
