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Asian Women and Purity Culture - Coggle Diagram
Asian Women and Purity Culture
There is a history of Asian women being associated with sexuality and being seductresses/temptresses
1870 law preventing the landing of Chinese, Japanese, Mongolian women for criminal or demoralizing purposes
1875 Page Act
--> barred Asian women suspected of prostitution of entering the U.S.
Asian women have been envisioned as immoral and lewd because they are sex workers. Many saw them as needing to be contained
a prevention Asian future
Asian women are seen as tempting male purity.
“I was encouraged to give “side hugs,” because full-frontal hugs were very tempting to men,
especially those who enjoyed meeting Asian women
. I realized that I was sometimes perceived as an
exotic
temptress
rather than a China doll. And although I didn’t quite understand why this happened, I felt ashamed of what I assumed was a character flaw.” (Angie Hong, The Flaw at the Center of Purity Culture)
Purity Culture is the idea that one should remain pure—not engage in sex or sexual thoughts—until marriage
Angie Hong writes that she was taught “If we overcame our fleshly desires and transcended the needs of the physical body, we were told, we would have more time and space for receiving God’s grace and sanctification” (The Flaw at the Center of Purity Culture)
Men are taught to hate their minds and women are taught to hate their bodies. Women are told they are the source of sexual sin by simply having a body. For Asian women there is another layer added to this—their bodies are immoral because they have female bodies and Asian female bodies.
“These two characters represent a familiar binary for many evangelical women. We are either temptresses or radiant queens. In my case, as an Asian American woman, this binary exists on several levels beyond the Christian one. Asian bodies are, as the writer Anne Anlin Cheng has noted, ornamental because they’re oriental. Exotic and mysterious. Small and submissive. China dolls or dragon ladies. Lotus flowers or tiger moms" (Angie Hong, The Flaw at the Center of Purity Culture)
This connects to the "model minority" myth. Asians are seen as the "model minority" until they are deemed a threat, and quickly become scapegoats.
There is a history of Asian women being seen as immoral and lewd
“Not once did I consider whether exotification, misogyny, or Asian fetishization had anything to do with my shame. Not once did I consider that these dynamics play into layers of heteronormative patriarchy, male domination, and the subjugation of women.” (Angie Hong, The Flaw at the Center of Purity Culture)
Purity culture is more than just keeping the body pure
Christian Nationalism
Purity culture is a part of Christian nationalism, using purity to hide its expansive reach and effect
Purity culture is not only keeping the body pure of sexual activity and thought, but the nation pure—keeping it a white, puritan nation. That's Christian Nationalism
Purity culture is used to keep the American 'body' pure. Anti-immigration, xenophobia, Christian nationalism and America First all connect to this. White Christian nationalists want to keep the nation's body pure from threats (anyone who isn't a straight white Christian). It's a nation pure of ethnic and racial mixing.
national, ethic and racial purity is also a part of purity culture of the nation.
There is a history of Asians being seen as unassimilable and "infestations" to the American 'body'.
Robert Long who killed 8 people at an Atlanta spa, 6 of whom were Asian women, is an example of Christian nationalism at work. Saying it's not racism but purity, sexual temptation and Christianity is Christian nationalism. It's racism, xenophobia, and anti-Asian violence under the umbrella of Christian nationalism. Covering up the racist systems at play