Do Western women in Taiwan want "any white f---er who pops along"? No, so don't stereotype.

Consider these two facts:

There are more foreign women than men in Taiwan. Mostly, they're from Southeast Asia or China and either married to Taiwanese men or working, often as domestic and health aides.

The opposite is true of "foreign professionals" -- they're not all Western, but the vast majority are male. 

Add to that two observations: first, the two communities don't intermingle much, even when it would be beneficial (say, foreign professionals showing up to support foreign blue-collar workers in seeking better labor conditions). Second, while there are social media groups for foreign women in Taiwan, they trend heavily towards heteronormativity. I've heard firsthand complaints from women who don't always fit into expected boxes that there aren't many welcoming spaces for them.

When it comes to love, dating and sex, this is a problem. There just aren't that many of us. In my observation, that means our own perspectives and experiences are simply not heard as much. It also means that there's a subset of expat men who fill that void with pretty brutal stereotypes: that we're all sexless hags (don't click that link, it might be the worst blog post I've ever read and honestly any decent person would take it down). That we're begging for anything we can get, that we're desperate and unwanted, that it's best not to talk to any Western women you aren't interested in. That we're all straight and cis, that we don't date Taiwanese men. Or that it's okay to treat any woman you deem "unfuckable" like garbage. 

Each and every one of these assumptions is wrong. 

Every once in awhile, I even come across someone assuming I'm single (and bitter, angry, desperate etc. etc.) simply because I'm an outspoken Western woman in Asia. This amuses me, considering how public I am about having been married for quite some time. We celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary last year. 

I've written on this topic before but intended to do a new post with more diverse voices for quite some time. So I asked around and found a few women willing to tell their stories, with their full editorial control. Everything here is published with active consent. Together, they dispel the notion that there is any one narrative that can be applied to all of us. Our experiences are varied and unique. They're occasionally heartbreaking or preposterous. They're often fulfilling and fun. They're often far more positive than the stereotypes would have you believe -- and from what these women have said, they're getting it more and better than a lot of the sadsack men filling up the bars we don't go to because we don't need their negative bullshit. 

The best way to learn about what life is like for a community of people is to spend time with them, and hear what they have to say if they're willing to talk. It's not to take generalizations you've already made and apply it to everybody. So, I'll stop here and let the stories stand on their own. 

From "Uma", in an open relationship:

I moved here ahead of my husband to get us set up here — I didn’t come with a job or recruitment or anything like that, and my husband had some things to do in the US. We have an open relationship, so I’d meet people through social events and had an online dating profile. I also hooked up with a few women, sometimes in a group situation. I remember early on before my husband arrived thinking, because he is a great lover — very considerate, doesn’t make assumptions about what someone does or doesn’t want, in touch and likes to please — I couldn’t wait to introduce some of these women to him so they could have that great experience too.


I had some interesting and fun experiences. Most were with other Westerners, though there were some Asian-Americans. No Taiwanese men, which is unfortunate. I think people who say “I’m just not attracted to Asian men” — well, you can say you’ve never been attracted to one before, that’s just telling your story. But to dismiss all of them as a class? If you only feel attracted to certain body types or races, I wonder what your media consumption has been like? If you’ve mostly only ever shown white men and maybe a couple of black men in sexual situations, then yeah, you’re probably going to believe you’re attracted to one type. Or you’ve mostly been shown a narrow stereotype of diverse Asian men.

It’s the same for women’s bodies: if you are only exposed to one type portrayed sexually you’re likely to think you’re only attracted to that type. “What you like” can change if you want. 

Anyway, I had a really good thing going with one Asian-American guy. It was hot chemistry and we were getting into all the kinky stuff you don’t really talk about on those first date like bondage, penetrating him, stuff like that. We both agreed we’d enjoy it until we stopped feeling it, and that’s exactly what happened. It was all healthy, safe, respectful.  


At one point my husband and I had a girlfriend. Some people would say crappy things like “oh, she’s your plaything,” but she was our girlfriend for nearly two years; we were all important to each other and emotionally invested in our relationship. It was hard for all of us when that ended, truly. 


The main thing I want to say is that dating can be hard anywhere — that would be true in Taipei, Tokyo, Paris, New York. I don’t think it’s especially harder because we’re in Taiwan except where we close ourselves off. My sex life here has been vibrant, exciting, passionate, and fulfilling. 

The only personal downside is that, since we don't live in Taipei, you do have to make social things happen in your local community. 

And there are some shitty men — I agree it’s harder to avoid them when you don’t live in Taipei. Entitled sexists, racists, you see a lot of alcohol abuse especially if someone doesn’t have a robust local community or support system. There have been times I’ve wanted to tell them off them but I hate to admit I moderate myself, knowing I’ll see them at the next beach party. I don’t say outright that I think they’re garbage people but it probably shows on my face! I hate this feeling afraid to affirm their stupid stereotypes toward Western women in Taiwan, even though I know it’s ridiculous — like if I get mad, I’m just another “bitter angry white woman.” I just “need to get laid” or “don’t have a sense of humor.” I get laid and laugh plenty and well. Maybe you’re just a lazy, entitled bigot?

 I’m not interested in those men. 

That white Western entitlement, the sort of fat-phobic misogyny that Buxom Babe Abroad has experienced, or the stereotyping they do of Western women where they think we’re sad losers and they’re kings…I mean that’s a boner-killer for me. I don’t want that, nobody with any self-respect wants that, but they think we’re desperate because we don't want THEM? Taiwan deserves better than that.  I may not have experienced it in the same way as Buxom Babe because we have different bodies [ed: this person is white and on the slimmer side] but I know the attitude well.


This stereotype some Western men have in Taiwan that Western women are all bitter, angry, desperate — it’s not true. At least for me, I couldn’t be happier or more satisfied. 

From "Emma", a lesbian woman in a relationship:

I came out fairly late, in my 20s, and actually moved to Taiwan for a girl. I was living in South Korea, and in the town where I lived, there wasn’t much of a gay scene — in fact we’d always complain about just how hard it was to be gay in that society. 

I basically scoured a popular dating site and was talking to someone in Taiwan. I came to Taiwan on vacation to see her, and I just felt this was a much more chill place. I eventually moved here, though that relationship turned out to be somewhat toxic. She was very family-oriented, though she wasn’t out to her family. I felt like she always wanted a lot from me, but didn’t have any time for me. For example, she would get mad that I didn’t wish her father a happy Father’s Day even though he’s not my father, and he didn’t know we were together. She also had a very serious personality. I think she’s abroad now, but anyway that didn’t last. 

After that I dated another woman, who was more into partying — specifically the EDM scene. We’d go to a lot of shows, festivals and clubs together. When her mom called, she’d have me put on music or something and tell her she was at a cafe with friends. That was actually a lot of fun, but she had a bit of a hard time being serious or taking us seriously. It didn’t last very long, but I have to say it was a lot of fun! 

My current girlfriend is a good mix of the two types — she can be a homebody but will go out if there’s a reason to go out. She’s not out to her whole family yet, but her sister knows. Her mother only knows me as her daughter’s “foreign friend”, or that we live together. This is the first relationship I’ve had here where my girlfriend didn’t live with her parents. She’s planning to come out eventually, so we’ll see where that goes. We’ve been together for more than three years, and we just moved in together recently. So we’re not close to marriage or anything like that yet, though I’m happy it’s legal and possible here. I suppose whenever we do meet, they won’t expect me to be like a typical man in a relationship with their daughter, because I’m very obviously not that at all. 



We met on a dating app, which I think everyone does these days. It feels like that’s the easiest way to do it. I did try to go to some lesbian events or bars here, but there just aren’t many bars or specific lesbian spaces, especially compared to what’s on offer for gay men. There are events, though. It feels like that everywhere: all these offerings for gay men — bars, events, parties, nightlife — and not nearly as many for lesbians. We’ve all heard the jokes, but seriously, I do wonder if lesbians just don’t go out enough to support more robust nightlife? They seem to be into more intellectual things like book clubs, but that’s conducive to, you know, friend groups, not necessarily dating. And when there are events or bars, it feels like Ts and Ps hooking up (’T’ for tomboy, ‘P’ for ‘po’ or a feminine lesbian), and it’s like — you’re either one or the other, and there’s not a lot in between. I do see couples where they’re both one or the other, but it’s not very common. 



Our first year together was wonderful. She stayed at my place usually, because hers was really small. The second was really tumultuous, but we got counseling and that helped a lot. So now, we still have our ups and downs but we’re much better at communicating and the ups and downs are on an upward trajectory, so I’m hopeful about that. It’s interesting because I just mentioned that binary of two types of lesbian women in Taiwan, but I’m clearly neither — not too tomboyish, not too feminine — and my girlfriend looks like a tomboy but if you get to know her, she has a really feminine personality. 



So for me, Taiwan is home. I don’t see any benefit to returning to my home country, and my partner is from here, so obviously this is home for her. And I really like it here, so although I worry about long-term prospects, like health and property ownership, it’s hard to see that far into the future but it makes sense for now.

I used to be way more into nightlife, but COVID has kept me away. 

I stay away from a lot of the expat spots because it does just seem to be weird old white men spouting bullshit, and I don’t really want to be around that. There does seem to be an attitude where they think we all want them, but I definitely don’t — like I’m incapable of it. 

I used to go to more things — I even went to a “find a wife" party for lesbian women once, though I was basically the only foreigner there. I spent a lot of time with another girl at that party, so I was disappointed that we didn’t go home together. 

I do see more white male-Taiwanese female relationships but, eh. I mean there are also just a lot more Western men here than women. I’m not sure why that is, but the disparity in who you see in relationships could be impacted by that. 

It’s just wrong to say Western women are all sad sacks here, and anyway it assumes we’re all straight. 

I’m pretty hopeful. Since my girlfriend and I just moved in together, there’s been some adjustment. She’s a huge neatnik, and she had to get used to my cats. One of them ate her plant, I bought her two new plants to make up for it. But, you know, that’s how it is when you first move in together. She loves my cats now and it’s going really well. We dated for over 3 years before moving in together, so we defied the old “U-haul” stereotype.

From "Alice", a woman of color who dated in Taiwan before getting into a long-distance relationship:

I’ve lived in Taiwan for about four years on and off — I went back to my home country for awhile for family reasons — and had lived in another Asian country before coming here. I really like Taiwan, but I was the only foreign teacher at my school in the other country so I didn’t have to put up with too much entitled white male behavior. 



Here, I have a lot of white male colleagues who are married to Taiwanese women, and they complain at work about how bad their relationship is, their personal lives seem to be a mess. And I think ‘you chose this person, and all you do is complain about them? And you act all entitled — maybe your relationship is terrible because you’re terrible.’ 

It’s certainly not all Taiwanese women, but there’s a subset who will maybe look for white guys to date just because they’re white, and those are the women these guys often date or marry, and then they say ‘oh Taiwanese women are crazy’ or ‘she’s crazy’ or ‘women are crazy’ but no — you’re crazy and she’s crazy and crazy found each other.

The problem is, white guys are also the only guys I’ve really dated in Taiwan. As a foreign woman who isn’t white, Taiwanese guys don’t seem that interested, or they hit on me but it’s clearly not serious. 

Basically, the white guys seem to be the only ones willing to look outside their own community to date. But it’s too bad, because the selection isn’t great. A lot of those guys come here to cash in their white privilege and coast, they half-ass it at work and assume they won’t get called out for it, they might not even be qualified for their jobs, and they talk like they’re these studs who can do anything and get anyone. It’s gross. 



And I don't like that it's so racialized -- as a foreign woman of color, I don't want to just date white guys. Where I'm from, sure, people might make friends along cultural, class, professional or education lines. And that's not great either, there are still boundaries [where perhaps there should not be]. But I generally didn’t feel I was only able to make friends with people who looked like me. 

There was one guy who told me he’d dated a lot of different women in the past year, and I figured ‘ok so he’s that sort of guy, I’m not into that’ so I turned him down. I didn’t tell him that was why I said no, though.

 When I first got here I dated around a bit, there were some casual no-strings things which basically ended with good feelings, because they weren’t that serious. 

After I came back to Taiwan I decided to just not date for awhile. That was great, actually! I was so happy, I felt good, emotionally healthy. I was in a really good place. So of course I made the typical mistake: I figured I was really feeling great, in a fantastic place in my life, so why not date someone? And I’ll attract better people too because I do feel confident and happy with myself. 

So I met someone through mutual friends. We got along really well, but didn’t trade contacts when we first met. I ran into him again — you know how in Taiwan every foreigner is maybe two degrees separated from everyone else — and this time we did decide to give it a try. He was a part of a very strong community with deep cultural ties, but he didn’t seem to mind that I wasn’t from that community. We got along so well.



Then, not long after we started dating he broke up with me, saying he only wanted a partner from that community. I thought that was a bullshit excuse: he knew who I was before we started dating, it wasn’t a secret, so why go down that road? It seemed like this was his key, his ‘get out of jail free’ card where he could just pull this excuse whenever he wanted. I was a little pissed. I asked him why he didn’t just date women he’d actually partner with and he said he didn’t want to do that here and never dated those women. So basically he was dating women from outside and giving himself this pass to just not tell them this belief until he’s ready to hop out. 

It didn’t last long, though it was very intense. 

Anyway, maybe we’ll be friends someday because we got along so well, but for now there’s still some chemistry there. 

What’s funny is that I started dating another guy from the same community. I hadn't intended to, actually, I’d swiped left on his profile on a dating app because I felt like I'd been there, done that -- I didn't want someone pulling the same thing on me. But he assured me he wasn't like that, and we went out for awhile. 

Partly we broke up because of the soft lockdown. it was too hard to see each other and honestly, I felt he just wasn't making nearly enough of an effort. Then he pulled the same crap — “I want to date someone from my community” and I did think, “you say you’re different but honestly you two are exactly the same. I’ve already been through this, so I don't want to hear it, bye.” 


Plus, he always wanted me to go to events and such with this group, and I kept saying no, because my ex would be there, and I just wasn’t gonna do that. And even if I did, I’d end up looking like a crazy stalker lady who hunted down some other guy to date so I could get invited and stalk my ex, even if it’s not like that at all — so, just no. 



I did go back to the my home country over the summer because I hadn’t seen my family in awhile. I got on another dating app just to meet people, and I ended up meeting someone I really clicked with. What I liked about those dates was how diverse it was; it wasn’t just white guys, or Asian guys. And I think that’s how dating could be, and I wasn’t getting it in Taiwan. 

Neither me nor the guy I met wanted to do long distance, but I had to come back, so we’re trying it. I’ll probably leave Taiwan next summer though, I think I’m ready to go. 

He’s open to living abroad for awhile, and I do love Taiwan, but we’d have to think about job opportunities for him. I don’t know, we’ll see. It would be cool to come back together, perhaps. 

And I found I appreciated dating someone who had a similar cultural background as me. He grew up in my home country although he’s not white either. I didn’t date Taiwanese guys because they didn’t seem interested in me, but I would have dated a Taiwanese American. Having that cultural connection is just one less thing, one less barrier, that you need to worry about and I’ve learned I value that. 


Finally, from "Olivia", a married bisexual woman:

When I first got here I was in one of those relationships that really needed to end. We loved each other and we just couldn’t break up, but we needed to. So we tried to be long distance, and then one day she suggested trying an open relationship. We all know where that goes — that’s the end. 

I decided to just enjoy being single and date around. If you just want to fuck, that’s easy. People think it’s hard to find someone to fuck if you’re a bigger girl, but it’s not really. I never had a problem. But in the past I was always ‘in a relationship’, I was never single for long, so I was using this time to enjoy seeing multiple people non-exclusively. That could be a lot of fun, but it could also be pretty weird — I brought one guy home and he said ‘oh, you have a cat’. I asked him if that was okay, if he was allergic or anything like that, and he assured me he wasn’t. So afterwards, I look at him and he’s breaking out in hives. It turns out he was deathly allergic to cats, but he wanted to get laid so bad that he pretended not to be. He asked me to go to the hospital with him, but I barely knew the guy! 

Another time, I dated this taller guy. My apartment wasn’t very comfortable, so he invited me to his place next time. I got there and he said ‘oh my girlfriend will be here soon’. I was pissed! He kept saying ‘no, no, she’s really cute, you’ll love her’ but I felt like this was a unicorn hunt — like thinking being bi means you’re up for anything including getting together with a couple, but you’re not exactly asked first. I said, well, let’s go to 7-11 first and have a few drinks, but they started fighting in the store so I left. The girlfriend actually chased after me, and they got really weird about it so I just left. 

I dated a Taiwanese guy who turned out to have serious issues. We were together for a year, and lived together. He’d get really suspicious of everything, including accusing me of infidelity at times when he was there to see that nothing had happened. He would claim he was getting treatment then the same shit happened again, so that was that. 

After that I dated mostly expats for awhile, though not always Westerners. One Chinese-Malaysian guy came over, but before we could get down to business he said something like ‘the problem with Malaysia is all the Malaysians’ so I kicked him out immediately. 

Then there were some really strange ones. I dated a guy I thought was really cool for awhile, though deep down something seemed off. He rarely stayed over, and something just seemed…sus. Well, I found out eventually that had been dating — in fact, he was engaged to! — my coworker, someone I literally sat next to at work! He hadn’t realized we were coworkers. She initially broke up with him but eventually took him back. And yet he sent me long, incoherent messages for awhile, until I blocked him. 

Then there was the guy who really wanted to try group sex. It was just something he was desperate to experience. I said yes to this, and we got a suite at a nice hotel with a few other curious couples. Well, it turned out that basically everyone there was straight but me! The thing is, the two other women were curious about what it was like to be with a woman, and their partners were fine with them trying it out with me, and I was into it. But this guy was so pissed that this whole orgy thing he’d organized wasn’t all about him and his dick. 

There were a few others, but eventually I met my husband through mutual friends, so that’s all in the past now. But this idea that Western women are these sex-starved harpies who want to snatch the D from any white fucker who pops along…no, not really. At least not in my experience. That’s some bullshit they tell themselves.

Someday I'll likely do another one of these -- a Part III, if you will. A trilogy. I hope you've enjoyed the details and learned something about not stereotyping Western women in Taiwan. And please, please remember that we are truly not desperate hags gagging for, ahem, any white fucker who pops along. 

We're just not. Good night.

Not All Western Women Are Sluts, Because Sluts Don't Exist

Guys, I seriously love Jocelyn Eikenburg's blog, Speaking ofChina. The comments can get a little troll-y, but that's the downside to having a very popular blog (so maybe it's a plus that I don't have "a very popular blog!"). And I usually agree with her frank, openminded inquiries and stances on love in China, although I myself never did experience it.

But as a Western woman in Asia, as a Western woman, and as a woman, I have a small problem with the first item on this list of "stereotypes about Western women in China": "Western women are sluts and like to sleep around".

Basically, she says:

It took me years to learn that some Chinese men automatically assume Western women love to sleep around or are simply easy sex for the taking.

I blame it in part on the ubiquitous Hollywood movies and TV you’ll find in China at the local DVD vendor or online, where Western women’s sex lives often turn into a revolving door of one-night stands and disposable boyfriends.

Of course, we’re not all sluts.

I kind of wanted to scream - "if a revolving door of one-night stands and disposable boyfriends is what you want, then what's wrong with that?"

Saying "not all Western women are sluts" implies that there is something wrong with women who do choose temporary companionship over relationships, and that it's okay to judge them. And why shouldn't they? Maybe they have sexual desires like almost everyone else, but don't want or aren't in the right place for a relationship? As long as they're open about that, then that's their and their partners' business. It doesn't make them "sluts". 

So no, I don't blame it on "ubiquitous Hollywood movies and TV you'll find in China", I blame it on puritanical judgmental pricks who think it's okay to dictate what every woman's choices should be.

In fact, a man who takes a woman home, sleeps with her, and then the next day says "I'm just not in a place right now where I can commit to anything serious" would be seen as a cad if he'd led her on, but if he'd been honest with her, then there would be nothing wrong with that (she might be angry, but hey, he was honest with her. She knew what she was getting into). 

That is not to say I have a problem with the blog, and I'm sure Jocelyn didn't mean for it to be taken this way, but, to say "not all Western women are sluts" sounds good on the surface: look, we're multidimensional, and not all of us are Sex in the City-style swinging single women who view sexual conquest as a game or hobby! Woo!

Just a little below that, however, lurks the idea that for this to be true, sluts must exist. And if sluts exist, then it's okay to think of a woman with a longer sexual history than you might deem acceptable as one. It still puts forward only two choices for women: be a good girl, or be a dirty skanky slut. You don't want to be a slut, do you? Nobody likes a slut! Sluts are slutty and gross! Ew! Get your slut-juice off of me! So you'd better be a good girl. That means no sex, or at least, pretending there is none (to admit you are a sexual person is to admit you are a SLLLLLUUUUUUTTTTTTTTTTT). Good girls don't have sex and they certainly don't enjoy it.

So, to say "not all Western women are sluts" implies that SOME Western women ARE sluts, and it's okay to think of them as such, which judges their behavior as wrong (again, I don't think Jocelyn herself meant to do this, but that's how the phrasing comes across). And, it's not wrong. It's just not.

And, following that, it implies that if you're an Asian guy who likes a Western woman, that the woman you like is "not a slut", which implies that in order to be acceptable, she must make a particular set of "not slutty" choices. Those choices need to be similar to the perceived choices of the local women (be they Taiwanese in Taiwan, Chinese in China, Korean in Korea etc) in order to "pass" - those same local women who don't always feel free to be open about their own histories and desires because they face the same sexist notion of what a "good girl" does, or the Western woman automatically becomes an "other". Nothing new in the stream of intercultural or gender discourse, except this time it's a group of people of color, mostly men, telling Caucasian women what choices they must make to be "acceptable". Which is not quite the same as the reverse problem - telling people of color they have to 'act white' - because being white confers privilege that being a person of color doesn't, but it sure shares some DNA with it. (Also, being male confers privilege that being a woman doesn't - as the universe giveth, the universe also taketh away). The whole thing, no matter who you are, never leads anywhere good.

Whereas the real progressive answer here isn't to refuse to stereotype all Western women (only some of them!)  as slutty slut-whores, but to acknowledge that some people make different choices, and some of those choices may be more libertine than yours (or more conservative than yours - that's okay too, as long as those same conservatives don't try to push their choices on everyone as the only morally correct option!) but there's nothing wrong with that as long as everyone's safe and legal (and even if they're not safe, that sucks, but it doesn't make them a bad person). So to me, the person who says "you're not like other Western women. You're not a slut! Now I see that Western women can make the right choices!" is still upholding only one set of choices as acceptable, and that's not good for women generally. That person doesn't get a pass from me. Either you acknowledge that women can make a variety of choices and it's not for anyone else to judge them, or you're a part of the problem.

Basically, forget "not all Western women are sluts". How about NO women are sluts? How about even if a Western woman (or an Asian woman for that matter! Or whatever woman!) makes choices you personally don't care for, that doesn't mean there's something wrong with her?

It does mean a lot to me that this be clear - perhaps if there is a stereotype that "all Western women are sluts", then I have to constantly be proving somehow that I'm not. But the only slightly less constricting "NOT ALL Western women are sluts" isn't really any better, because I STILL have to prove I'm not, only there is now room for the stereotype of a Western woman to include "makes the choices we approve of even if that's not what she'd prefer". How is that better? 

This doesn't even get a pass culturally. I am sure someone will read this and comment angrily that "if a man wants a woman who doesn't have a huge sexual past that's his right, if he wants a virgin then why can't he look for one?" There would be something to that argument if it went both ways, but those same men who claim they want a woman like this generally do not hold other men or often themselves to the same standard. He probably wouldn't judge his guy friends who slept around to be "sluts", nor is he likely to judge himself by the same standard (he may, but my point is he usually doesn't). Only the women they stick it in are sluts, not them. It's okay for men, but not for women, even though for the majority of us, it takes a man and a woman to do the hoingy-boingy dance. And that set of double standards is pretty fucked up. 

Which is really too bad as if men who felt that way about the kind of woman they would prefer to be with held themselves and other men to the same standard, then like could find like. There's nothing wrong with having your set of "traditional" values (although that's a loaded word, too), and wanting a partner with a similar worldview. The key is, you have to have those same values for yourself. If that happened, chaste men could find chaste women and libertine men could find libertine women. Okay.

Libertinism an attitude that doesn't always lead to action, by the way - I am quite libertine in my attitudes but actually very traditional, by 20 and 21st century standards, in my actual life. I don't mean that as an excuse, like, "women who sleep around aren't sluts but I'm definitely not even those women!" - but to point out that progressive thinking can exist within any chosen lifestyle. That's the whole point - we can all choose. Whether you choose monogamy, open relationships, booty calls or no relationships at all, it's all okay.

Plus, there's no cultural pass here because this "NO SLUTTY SLUTZ ALLOWED IN OUR CLUBHOUSE!" attitude is pervasive in the USA too. I'm not just speaking to Asian men, here. I'm speaking to everyone.

It's not "not all women are sluts". It's not "not all Western women are sluts". No women are sluts. No people are sluts. Sluts don't exist.

Fact and Fiction: on the love lives of Western women in Taiwan

Not long ago, this ended up on my Facebook page. It was an amusing use of the Batman-slapping-Robin meme, and it was definitely channeling general sentiment (and general assumption) about what it's like to be a foreign woman in Taiwan.

But it also got me thinking - how true is it really? I suppose that could be easily answered with "of course it's true, everyone says it's true, articles and blog posts focus on it, women themselves will tell you it's true", and case closed.

I thought about my female friends, though (focusing on unmarried ones), who live or have lived in Taiwan, and my conclusions were that it's...actually...not true. In fact, I could think of very few who suffered or were suffering from a dead dating and sex life.


As a married woman, I wasn’t sure what I could contribute to that conversation and I wanted to explore this more from other perspectives, so I reached out to all of my unmarried friends. I asked all of them for their input, and some kindly agreed to talk. What I found instead shows issues far more complex. I've included responses from several women (rough ages included because, while it shouldn't matter, sadly, in Taiwan it does).



First, I found that pretty much every woman has chances to date casually or to have a sex life. Of course, that might mean casual hook-ups, and not all women want that (I sure wouldn't if I were single). So in that way this picture is wrong: sex isn't the problem.

Dating - real relationships that last, especially - is the problem. Here, options are limited. We all know why so I won't delve too far into it: the classic points that "the male expats aren't men we're interested in, and anyway they aren't interested in Western women, they're here for Asian women which *can* in some cases be kinda racist/fetishist but isn't always", "Taiwanese men don't go after us” and "Taiwanese men are a possibility but the culture differences in terms of how women are supposed to act and what they are expected to do in a relationship make it harder/impossible”. I'm not a fan of any of these narratives and just don’t want to have that discussion because it's too fraught with stereotypes.



To quote a friend: "I wouldn't ever feel like it's impossible for Western women to find love and, yes, sex in Taiwan. But, I certainly believe that Taiwanese men are much more shy, hesitant, and reserved than what you might be accustomed to in the West. So, I believe if you want it, you'll have to go out and get it.”



The common refrain was "it's easy to find hookups. It's hard to find guys to date."

 Of course, dating and pursuing real relationships is a problem all over the world. This is hardly unique to foreign women in Asia! It may be a little harder here, but it's certainly not very easy in our home countries, either. I see a degree of difference, but not an insurmountable one. And if someone like me, who is not conventionally pretty (I don't think I'm straight-up ugly, just not 'candybox pretty') and not thin, can garner interest (and I do) most women can. Even in Taiwan. Even in Asia.



I found from my friends that experiences attracting interest varied wildly, from "it happens sometimes - it's not so unusual that it'd shock me" (me), to "I get hit on ALL THE TIME" to "it's rare, or I am just approached for hook-ups" to "I feel invisible". But then, isn't that true back home, as well?

Interestingly, a lot of people I know - including women -  "a lot of Western women don't like Asian men", but while they all say that this is a "thing", it's all pegged on these "other women" who "don't like Asian guys" - - but I've truly yet to meet many such women. Either women saying this are trying to disguise their own feelings, or it's an assumption that is not nearly as true as people think.



I also found that the vast majority, when they did date, stuck pretty much to Taiwanese guys. In fact, looking through my friends, I couldn't think of any who'd hooked up with or dated, let alone married, a fellow expat (ed: I've made more friends since this post came out, and that's changed.)

This might be where the stereotype comes from - a few women complain about decreased opportunities (true - but that doesn't mean no opportunities). Then foreign guys notice that they and all their buddies are dating local women, single expat women they meet aren't dating anyone they know, and they know this is an issue in other countries in Asia, and so the assumption that "foreign women can't get none” is born. Without that many foreign women in Taiwan to refute it, it becomes canon.



Add to that the assumption by many expat men - and upheld by foreign women who (as discussed above) don't actually feel that way - that Taiwanese guys aren't desireable, it's easy to see why this idea is so firmly entrenched in the expat community.


Anyway, enough from me. I'm just a boring old married lady who's never actually dated a Taiwanese guy. Instead, listen to a sample of women who have. You'll start to notice a few patterns - you may even think I hand-picked these responses to fit with my theme. Not so - I asked pretty much every Western female friend I have in Taiwan (including Taiwanese/Chinese women born and raised overseas) and these are the responses of those who wanted to contribute. Other than the fact that obviously my friends will fall into the demographic of "older than early 20s" and "people I like and get along with", they're about as close to a random sample as you could ask for.


Enjoy!


"I came to Taiwan married, and am still in Taiwan. As I believe from my first-hand experience that it's easy for western men to find sex here, I found my way to the door of divorce court. And as a newly single American woman in Taipei, I opened myself up to new possibilities.

Over the five years that I've been here, I have been approached several times by random Taiwanese men asking me if they could "be my friend." The first time I naively said yes to Mr. Yikes, thinking, I was married and friends are acceptable. I explained that I was married and living with my husband in Taiwan. This man said it was okay, he was just looking to be friends. Not so! Mr. Yikes proceeded to grow increasingly affectionate over MSN (at the time) and then he began to profess his love and longing for me. Needless to say, I was married, so I stopped using MSN all together! No more "friends" for me."


"After my separation and divorce, I ran into Mr. Handsome, the guy I'm now dating. He worked under my former company. In the beginning, I went back to his company to look for him, but he wasn't working those days. So, I chatted with his friend/boss. We became friends. He was cute and I thought there definitely could have been something more there. But, anyway, I was looking for Mr. Handsome.



Mr. Handsome was finally there one day after I had gone back several times looking for him. He, unlike Mr. Yikes, was much more shy, reserved, and tender. I was the first to make a move. He was busy acting cool or shy, not sure which is was, so I just told him directly that he was indeed Mr. Handsome! He replied in kind, and we hit it off. We exchanged numbers, went on dates, and quickly feel in love and into bed!"


- from a friend in her late 20s/early 30s, American. She, like most of us, realizes it's not necessarily as easy as back home to date, but that no, you're not totally bereft of possibility.



“Dating in your late 40s and early 50s is challenging in most situations, but doing it in another culture, let alone another country, can be either down right hilarious or one of life's greatest disappointments. 

“Take Chinese culture for example, Taiwan specifically, most men in this age group are quite set in their ways and lack the spontaneity and energy I require.  I’m not your mother, cook, maid, personal assistant or spiritual advisor.  

I was recently “spending time” with a guy in his mid-40s, divorced, a 13-year son, owned several properties.  In the beginning, it was a nice experience, easy and relaxing, but after a few months of movies and dinner, I wondered out loud why we didn’t eat near his house.  His response was that his son might see us and be upset. 

Well, you know how that went down, but wait, maybe you don’t. Turns out the kid is very jealous of the father’s time since the divorce of a few years ago. 

Things cooled a bit after this discussion, but revved back up about 3 or 4 weeks later. 

He suggested we might want to take a trip.  Yeah…this is pretty much the equivalent of a sex weekend and I don’t give free samples, but I do love creativity and imagination.  So I declined the weekend, but suggested phone sex instead. Thought he was going to faint.  Out came this little, feeble, old man response of not doing that in his culture. What’s the difference? Really, I mean foreplay is foreplay, come on, get in the game. 

It’s not that I really intended to follow through with this, but just wanted to gauge his willingness. 

I don’t need the fountain of youth, but I do need someone who can keep up with me on my 40km bike rides and is willing to jump the culture divide for some fun and play. 

I’ll keep on looking around, but remain disappointed in how constrained the duality of women’s roles remain in many societies.  You can have a job, but you’ve got to come home, cook, do the laundry, take care of the kids, maintain the house and more.  Watch out world, women are making their own money, have their own apartments and with electricity and imagination, men may become obsolete.”


- from a friend and coworker in her early 50s, American, who was previously married to a Chinese man. 



“I came to Taiwan solely for career reasons. I had lived in Thailand for a year when I was younger and dated a guy there so I certainly find men of all kinds attractive (lucky me!).

When I first got to Taiwan I lived in Hsinchu and ended up dating an international student there briefly who was from St. Lucia. Then, after I moved to Taipei, I dated another international student for a little while from Belize. I should note that, for career reasons, I only ever planned to stay in Taiwan a few years at most and that made me a little shy of getting involved with anyone, especially a Taiwanese guy (not that I saw many opportunities). Most of the time, the interactions I had with Taiwanese men were kind of bizarre and bordering on harassment, but that can be true of dating in any big city.


I met my boyfriend through mutual Taiwanese friends and he was really well-traveled and highly educated which I think did contribute, to some extent, to his open mindset. I think we had some minimal conflicts related to culture, class, and language misunderstandings (Chinese and English) but mostly it was good. He was a wonderful person and very good to me and we had an enjoyable relationship until he went to Guatemala for the Taiwan military service and I came back to the U.S. I guess we just really were able to relate well and our personalities really fit. I do not think I fit American cultural norms and I don't think he fit Taiwanese cultural norms and our personalities were more similar than any of those differences.

I still think it was more difficult to date in Taiwan and maybe I had less of a selection, but that might be "my fault" too in that I felt way more self-conscious and less relaxed in Taiwan. I found, overall, that it was much more difficult to meet people and create friendships in general so, for me, dating was just an extension of that. I also worked in an office full of white men who were terribly misogynistic so that soured some of my day to day thinking about men, lol. Overall, it wasn't that there weren't any opportunities, just that I knew I didn't want to stay permanently. Back in the U.S., I feel much more relaxed and can meet people much more easily.”

- from a friend in her 20s, American, who had an office job here for a few years and has recently moved back to the US. She's absolutely right that it's harder, you have to be more proactive, there isn't as much of a selection etc. but note that in the end she did have a Taiwanese boyfriend after dating a few international students. The pattern holds: it's harder, but not impossible, and "Western women don't like Taiwanese men" isn't nearly as true as people think it is.


“My husband is quite unique and was not the norm at all. I made a huge effort to win over my hubby at the time. There is also the fact that lots of Western women are not attracted to Asians. I was different because physically my husband is not typical in that he is broad and has body and facial hair that I find attracts me to a "guy". And, my husband's family is not traditional and does not influence him so him so he had freedom to date me.

Let's also not forget that it is easy to "hook up" and hard to seriously date. If Western women approached Taiwanese men aggressively there would be lots of success stories. All I can tell you is that if a girl is assertive and takes the lead the guys will follow. It is true that the Asian men are intimidated and probably won't make the first move.”


- from a friend in her 30s, American, who came here to study, came back to visit, and on that visit met the Taiwanese guy she'd later marry.



“I have lots to say about this. My experience is pretty different from what I hear a lot of Western women talk about. Overall, I feel like I get hit on or have guys ask me out in Taiwan on par with or maybe even more than in the U.S.

Just last night, for example, I went to a small local bar I'd never heard of because a Taiwanese female former colleague invited me there to chat. Over the course of a few hours, the Taiwanese bartender started chatting me up, we played the dice game (I'm not sure what it's called but something akin to Bullshit), he asked me if I'm married multiple times, told me I'm beautiful and otherwise flirted with me, walked me out to a cab and stopped just short of trying to kiss me. Another guy, an ABC, who we had barely chatted with, came up and quite directly asked me if I wanted to go home with him. This kind of thing doesn't happen every time I go out, but it's not terribly unusual. This isn't just in bars - I've had students aggressively hit on me in the middle of class, dudes approach me in coffee shops and someone ask me out on the MRT.


I'm not sure what to attribute this to, but I have a few ideas. I think I generally have an attitude of not really giving a fuck, that is to say, I don't put out the vibe that I'm looking for someone. I think that this is pretty attractive to some people. I'm also fairly outgoing in a social situation and will be friendly and shoot the shit with strangers, which I think can put people at ease a bit. I tend to go to more local places, as opposed to places that cater mainly to foreigners, and a lot of people I have met seem really pleased about that and tell me I must be Taiwanese at heart.


One Taiwanese guy I dated told me that a main reason he was attracted to me initially was because I am "manly" (his words). He went on to explain that I don't act super "feminine," meaning that I don't seem obsessed with my appearance, am not submissive and very different from most Taiwanese girls. (These comments could generate another very lengthy discussion entirely).

I'm certainly not the bee's knees, either. I'm 34 (with no husband or kids!), which basically makes me useless to society. I think I'm pretty charming and brilliant, but I'm not a knockout that people would trip and fall gawking at on the street. I've dated 2 Taiwanese guys in the last year and I've had guys ranging from 20's to 50's ask me out and at least 3 local girls ask to make out with me.”

- from a friend in her 30s, American, who has been here for a little over a year. Since she's been here she's dated two local guys and garnered interest from others. Her experience truly is a bit atypical in that she's had more luck than most Western women, but the pattern still holds: Western women do date Taiwanese men, they do like them more than is often assumed, and they do have opportunities. We're not all chaste nuns over here, jealous of Western men swaggering around with women hanging off their arms. In fact, we're not even dating those men for the most part. We're not interested. 


"I've observed this from afar as someone who's been attached entire time living in Taiwan, HK and Indonesia. The general quality of guys who move to Asia compared to the standard of women they believe they can get is something of a contrast. But after five years in Asia I know a few happy expat couples who met here. Yes there are a lot of horrid little men who date Asian girls and believe they must also be a serious catch for Western women. But lets not fight over them, ladies. Quality guys are few and far between. But its also very difficult to identify quality single guys aged 30 to 40 in London.

 Taiwanese men are often lovely, aren't they? Must be the aboriginal mix? Tall and handsome often. Life is a bit harder for Western women in HK.”


- from a British friend in her 30s who has since left

“I was warned before I came here, but did not take it seriously because I thought I would be an exception the rule. Maybe others experiences are different than mine, or maybe the warnings were just not specific enough and not in enough first person voices to convince me that they applied to me too. For instance, I have the impression that Western men outnumber Western women by a large margin. Off the top of my head I can think of 9 Western women I know personally here. Two are married to Westerners, one is in a relationship with a Taiwanese woman, and the rest appear to have been single a long time. Through others, I know of a couple Western women married to Taiwanese men, but not well enough to know their names. If you wanted to look at patterns, age is probably a factor in how things play out too.

Age matters. I have met impressive local men, but they were younger than me and in marriages with small children. There's a definite stigma against older women with younger men that some of the younger men who seemed interested in me could not stand up to. The other issue being the importance of having children to Asian men. So the large number of chronically single western women I know here tend to be in their late 30s and older.

There is a crop of men who become available in their 50s here, after their children have grown up. Some are divorced or some just permanently separated from wives. Many of the divorced guys are not educated, or don't have money. The separated guys I've met are sometimes quite wealthy, but are rather old school and sedate, with or have well established habits in terms of what they expect of a woman. One issue I find with retired men is that they are at a different stage of life from me.


I feel more of an affinity - and probably share more assumptions in common - with specific younger Taiwanese men than I do with older ones, men in their 20s and 30s, but I am nearing 50. "Lao niu chi qing cao," (老牛吃青草) one man in his 30s who flirted with me constantly said, indicating that he did not have the strength of character to stand up to the stigma. Moreover, he did not want to disappoint his mother, who expects grandchildren.


My advice to a young American woman who majored in Chinese and asked me if I am making my life here and what I think about her moving to Taiwan - my advice was to put a time limit on it. If you don't want to teach English and don't find a job doing something else within one or two years, then leave.”


This is from an American friend who is in her 40s (I believe - I've never asked) and hasn't had the same luck, and feels overall her love life her has been a negative experience. She's right that age does matter.


She agrees with a lot of my other friends that there are men you can hook up with, and Western women are generally more interested in dating them than one might think, but it's a lot harder. She's invited male friends over to her apartment - as friends - and had them act really weird about it, or show up and be "nervous", until she realized that they just assumed it was all about sex. It hadn't occurred to them that she had friendship in mind. One, she said, would not cross the threshold from her patio to her apartment out of "respect", and one said he was surprised she'd invited him and he had to gather the courage to come over (indicating he thought more was intended by the invitation).


She's noticed that it's different from China, in that in China men were interested in sleeping with her because they assumed American women were “easy” or out of sheer curiosity and intrigue - whereas here they're more just shy. This doesn't mean they're uninterested, just that they don't have quite as strong assumptions about American women and they don't act on their thoughts. 

In keeping with that, pretty much every Taiwanese male friend I've had has admitted that the idea of a Western girlfriend intrigues him, but he's either already in a relationship or too shy to act on that interest. As she said above, the older men aren't on her wavelength or are already married (although some become available in their 50s following divorces) and the younger one too put off by the stigma of dating an older woman.

She also noted that there seems to be a cultural space for "pink friends" - friends of the opposite sex (or that you have some attraction to if you're bi) with whom there is some chemistry, and to whom the married of the pair of friends can pour out, as to a confidante, all his (usually his) marriage misery. Sometimes those relationships turn sexual, other times not. She's not interested in them, having been through it once. 


* * * 

Looking back on these responses, all I can say is this: sure, stereotypes about Western women in Taiwan exist, mostly negative ones. We're sexless, female incels. We're not attracted to Asian men. We can't compete with 'local women' (oh man that statement is so fraught with racist/sexist stereotypes that I don't know where to begin).

But hear this: Western women in Taiwan have their own stereotypes of the typical male expat here. You know - horrid little misogynists who think they're hot shit because they can get here what they couldn't get in their native countries. Charisma Men.

These stereotypes are not always true - many of my friends are Western men who are super cool guys, whether they are single (which not many are these days, a function of age and my social circle settling down), married or dating and whether their partners are foreign or Taiwanese. But there is a basis for them, and I've met a few Charisma Men as well.

But then, I wouldn't necessarily say it's harder to meet good men here (though admittedly I haven't tried). Not because it's easy, but because it was also hard to meet them in the US. Before I married, I might have had more dates in the US, but that doesn't mean the men were any better or any more worth my romantic time. Most weren't.

I, and most foreign women here, avoid them. We live our own lives, make our own friends, hang out with the cool guys, form local friendships and in some cases relationships, and are basically normal people living normal lives.

So, expat men. If you think we're angry celibate shrews just because we're not dating you, then perhaps you just don't know enough expat women and perhaps you just don't know much about our experiences, because you haven't lived them. 

Some Links

A few links for ya:

Myth Busting the Gender Pay Gap - if one more person tries to tell me it's because "women have children and then work fewer hours so it makes sense that they'd earn less", then Imma Get Violent.

It reminds me of a discussion with a local friend that someone related to me once: she (the local friend) was earning about 20% less than her male colleagues for the same work at some company in Taoyuan. Not only was she not a mother, she was single. My friend (a foreigner) asked if there was anything she could do about that, or if she might complain or work to change things.

"No, I can't. I'd get fired, and then they could go and tell the other companies not to hire me," she said (in short - blacklisting). "There's nothing I can do, that's just the way it is."

Schools Blasted Over Sexist Uniform Policy - apparently, some schools were trying to force girls who wanted to wear pants to provide proof of gender identity disorder. Leaving aside the aesthetic qualities of most school uniforms, especially in Asia, it's ridiculous to decide that a girl who wants to wear pants (because, hey, pants are more comfortable) must provide medical proof of a "disorder". That's not only ignorant toward those who are dealing with gender identity issues, but toward the simple fact that it's not weird for a girl to want to wear pants.

In Chinese: Taiwanese Woman Must Go to India to Wed Her Indian Fiance - aaaaaaannnddd apparently India is an "extremely high risk country" when it comes to international marriages, so Taiwanese who wish to marry Indians must, if this is taken as precedent, go to India to do so. First, why is India an extremely high-risk country in terms of marriage? Sure, it's not as developed as Taiwan, or even China (although, to be honest, I enjoyed my time in India far more than China and while it was pure chaos in India, the process of how things worked wasn't so maddening. I didn't find China to be that much cleaner than India, either, but I lived in rural China). But I don't exactly see massive numbers of Indians trying to marry their way into Taiwan for a better life, so what gives? I realize that around the world there are problems of "marriage for a visa" and "mail order marriage" - the second one being a tricky and complex issue in Taiwan - but come on. Secondly, this exposes a problem worldwide - in a sometimes-overzealous attempt to crack down on bride-buying and marriage-for-visas, a lot of couples who love each other and just want to get married have to jump through a lot of labyrinthine and migraine-inducing paperwork, go to some very expensive lengths (often including periods where one person can't work in the country in which they live, or one has to go abroad for awhile regardless of whether they can afford it), and at the end, risk being denied the right to marry. Any country can do this - it's not just a problem in Taiwan. Shame on you, Taiwanese government, but also shame on you, too, governments of the world.

 Amazon reviews for "binders" (full of women).

I realize that the actual phrase R-Money used was just as poorly stated as Obama's "You didn't build that" and he was trying to say he was interested in hiring more qualified women to his cabinet. I'm not hating on the idea that he tried to source qualified women because he didn't know where to find them already. The problem is, he didn't - he didn't ask for those binders, they were given to him, and his admittedly not bad stats on appointments of women after he was elected governor didn't stick around - they slid to levels lower than when he initially took office.

In the end, though, trying to have a conversation and effect real change in how women are treated, how bad the pay gap really is, and how underrepresented we are in the higher, more influential levels of business and politics has done nothing. As the Department of Labor blog notes, it's been 50 years since the first push for equal pay, and we still don't have equal pay. It's not working, or at least not well enough. So...it's time to get snarky. Maybe then people will wake up and realize what we're trying to say.

I LOVE MERYL STREEP

And finally - apparently Next Media is outta here. Sad. For all their occasionally ridiculous coverage, I liked 'em. Does this mean no more hilarious cartoons on international news topics?