Misconceptions on Asian culture

Submitted by Edwin on Mon, 01/12/2009 - 12:32

Steven Lin Topic April 27, 2007 at 8:52pm

I didn't write this, but I'd like to share it.

1) Footbinding was Chinese patriarchal oppression. FALSE.
No man ever forced a Chinese woman to bind her feet. It was an elite women's fashion fad that started from the imitation of Western "ballet dancers," and was eventually passed down matriarchally to lower classes after that. It was essentially the Tang Dynasty version of boob jobs or corsets.

"Tang court women followed Persian and Turkish fashions, wearing dresses with tight-fitting bodices, pleated skirts, and hats with enormous veils. And it was apparently imitation of foreign toe-dancing groups that originally led upper-class Chinese women to bind their feet. At first it was just palace dancers who bound their feet slightly, like ballet dancers, to stand on their toes." - When China Ruled the Seas: The Treasure Fleet of the Dragon Throne, 1405-1433 by Louise Levathes

2) Female infantcide is epidemic in China. FALSE.
Some sex-selective abortions do occur, like anywhere. However, post-birth infantcide is rare and most of the slightly elevated M/F baby ratio is due to underreporting of female births and a higher prevalence of Hepatitis B (which naturally increases male births) - NOT "female infantcides."

3) Sons are preferred in China. TRUE.
...But only because they are seen as beasts of burden in Chinese culture. They are the ultimate providers expected to take care of their parents in their decrepit old age, their wife & kid and their wife's family as well. Parents see them as human 401Ks. Wives as walking paychecks. The country as cannon-fodder and manual labor machines. So, everybody has a vested interest in more sons being born in bondage. But as times change, girls are actually now favored in areas like Shanghai where their looks may help them excel more in business. So really, whoever can provide the highest potential benefits get favored, not necessarily just boys.

4) Chinese eat dogs. TRUE.
...But it's a rare, backwoods novelty dish that's about as popular as rattlesnake or frog legs here. The primary mammalian meat staples in China are beef, chicken, pork and mutton. Dog is only served in a few restaurants in a few areas. Probably the vast majority of Chinese have never even tasted dog, or perhaps only once out of curiosity.

Re: Misconceptions on Asian culture

Submitted by Edwin on Mon, 01/12/2009 - 12:32.

Bryant Kou (UCSD) replied to Steven's poston April 27, 2007 at 8:56pm
I thought the origin of foot binding was some emperor who liked small feet or something?


Yoo-Hyun Oak replied to Steven's poston April 27, 2007 at 9:12pm
1) it can still be patriarchal oppression even if they didnt like put a knife to their throat. the idea of beauty and how marriagable a women was had something to do with fashions like footbinding and the corset, but its not some crazy thing women came up with to torture themselves for no reason. it had to appeal to the men.

3) man this kind of makes the chinese sound bad still. children are more than money assets i hope! that shouldnt be the reason to treat your kids better or worse

4)dog is probably more common in korea. jay leno used to make these dogeating jokes that made my dad so mad. also, whenever he went into my classes to do presentations about korea, the dog question inevitably comes up. actually my parents ocassionally do eat dog, and im told i ate it once when i was four because they lied to me haha. and my friend (who is white) came to korea and he ate dog. its not really that big of a deal. if people care so much, they can becomes vegans. stop complaining about other peoples cultures and critique your own.


David WAn wroteon April 28, 2007 at 3:34am
u know some of these people even if they dont understand, they still have to act like they do by reading a couple random biased references so they can insert themselves into the conversation. Why do we even bother educating these losers. They are not willing to listen, period.


Jessica Lee (UCSD) wroteon April 28, 2007 at 5:42am
for footbinding... it's pointless to argue who "started it" (emperor who liked it or women wanting smaller feet.) It's the society as a whole that continued it like a vicious cycle. Mothers force their children to bind their feet because men would not marry women with normal feet, men that would only marry women with bound feet because of its elevated status policed by the women, etc, etc...


Kao Xiong (St. Cloud) wroteon April 28, 2007 at 12:07pm
God people, only the rich and the wealthy gets to eat dogs!!! >__>


Yoo-Hyun Oak wroteon April 28, 2007 at 12:14pm
thinking back on it, i have no idea why footbinding was emphasized so much in history class. they did also talk a lot about how china was way way way ahead of europe and invented everything.
idk i hated my world history book, basically the only civilizations that ended looking pretty good were india and africa.
interestingly, hardly anyone knew anything about world history before that class, i dont know why american education focuses so much on local history until like 5th grade at least. i started learning world history in sixth grade (earlier on my own), but that was in massachusetts- how about you guys?

i had a feeling that california doesnt teach it until later, or they had crappy teachers. my feeling in high school was that i was repeating 7th and 8th grade for the most part, just a little harder.


Caroline Hugh (Cornell) replied to Kao's poston April 28, 2007 at 12:15pm
really? my parents got to eat dog, and they weren't rich. they were middle class.

also, both their families raised dogs and somehow decided at a certain point to kill and eat them. :( my mother, a child at the time, found it extremely cruel, but she was won over by the aroma of meat. mao didn't let any class have too much privilege (except government officials) so they often had to line up on the streets for packets of rice or tiny slabs of meat.


Caroline Hugh (Cornell) replied to Yoo-Hyun's poston April 28, 2007 at 12:20pm
i don't think i learned much of world history until the 9th grade.
i remember in 7th and 8th grade we learned u.s. history, but i don't know what kind of history was touched upon in 6th grade.

in elementary school, we were taught chunks of history through famous individuals/events. magellan, columbus, the pilgrims, washington, lincoln, the roosevelts, martin luther king... seriously i think that's about it. and occasionally some famous women like eleanor roosevelt, helen keller, marie curie, rachel carson, susan b. anthony, harriet tubman.


Alvin Lin (MIT) wroteon April 28, 2007 at 12:20pm
I think China's history books should write about how Western culture never had many prominent female leaders until recent times, how they had metal chastity belts, had tight corsets, and set up almost 1000 military bases that created brothel cultures for their soldiers all around the world. That would even out the perspective a bit.

I'm not defending the negative aspects in the history of various Asian cultures, but the truth is somewhere in the middle regarding Occidental and Oriental history. Supremecist White guys need to stop talking like their sh*t doesn't stink, to speak crudely.


Yoo-Hyun Oak replied to Caroline's poston April 29, 2007 at 8:59am
learned world history in 6th, 8th, and 10th grade
u.s. history, in 4th-5th, 7th, 11th-12th

for some reason they decided we didnt need a history class in 9thgrade lol


Whitney Schwandt replied to Yoo-Hyun's poston April 30, 2007 at 2:02am
Whenever we talked about history (world) it was usually the Americas and Europe. We never really covered Africa or anything west or Europe. Whenever China/footbinding was mentioned it was always as if China was full of barbarians etc.....and then I would get asked questions as if I was some brilliant historian who knew everything possible about China and it's history.

People are so silly sometimes :)


David WAn wroteon April 30, 2007 at 2:18am
my world history did not talk about chinese history at all other than how it was related to european history, like the opium wars, boxer rebellion etc etc The chinese people were described as a bunch drug addicts, and thats all we talked about.



Jessica Lee (UCSD) wroteon April 30, 2007 at 5:13am
rly I think history books r pretty pc nowadays, they always make the white people (europe) real jerks in world history, hahah. Or maybe it was the teachers not the books, idk I don't read.

Oh and then in American history I remember an emphasis in learning how America pretty much just screwed over Native Americans, Africans and Asians. Pretty much other than stuff like the Revolutionary War it was just one big guilt trip for white people lol

hmm I guess it depends on the teacher actually


Alvin Lin (MIT) wroteon November 13, 2007 at 8:49pm
Nice, don't know how I missed this the first time.


Steve Hojiminy (Houston, TX) replied to Yoo-Hyun's poston November 13, 2007 at 11:00pm
Yes, footbinding is patriarchal and oppressive. What I object to is the idea that it is somehow more patriarchal and more oppressive than the kind practiced in western civilizations. As if whites never oppressed women.

As for the children, you have to remember that much of Asia has been very poor for a very long time. People survived on physical labor, and many still do. When the parents are too old to plow fields, they need children who can do it. No matter how rich Asia gets, this is so deeply ingrained in the culture that it will be around even when the need is gone.


Edwin Hc Lee (Vancouver, BC) wrote9 minutes ago
This topic is old but I was just going through master thread.

I read differently about foot binding so I should add something to this.

The women binded their feet as part of training to walk in slower and smaller paces.

I can't confirm that it was directly enforced by men but the mothers taught their daughter to do that. It did attract men as it made woman walk in a manner that was perceived as elegant and it was practiced amongst the upper class and less by the common people.

Foot binding was practiced during the Han dynasty, not sure if the Tang dynasty participated in it too but wouldn't surprised me if they adopted the idea.

It could be seen as oppressive to us but for them I think foot binding was no different to how our modern women learning to wear high heels or wearing short skirts on freezing cold days.

Re: Misconceptions on Asian culture

Submitted by RebelWerewolf (not verified) on Tue, 01/13/2009 - 13:03.

Misconception #1:

That there even exists such a thing as "Asian culture".

Re: Misconceptions on Asian culture

Submitted by edwinl (not verified) on Thu, 01/15/2009 - 18:55.

Somwhat, I think the term is too generalized

This topic was probably meant to directed at all Asian people but since most of us here happen to be Chinese it's going to end up being about China anyway.

Although a lot of Asian countries do have share some similar customs to the Chinese.

Also there's like probably another hundred cultures that's considered to be Chinese as well.