What are your experiences with race and dating?

[Jayce]

Nobody has ever openly rejected me over my skin colour before (I'm chinese) and my skin colour dosen't seem to actually relate to my dating prospects all that much.

In friend contexts however I have seen this expressed. One time I was talking to a female friend about dating and she told me to not try to flirt with asian women because they want to date European men instead of asian men, she was asian herself so she phrased it as "this is what all asian women want". I was talking with a friend about a woman that I liked, and when I described her appearance to him and said she was Syrian, middle eastern, he made some jokes about how weird my children would look if I ever got together with her. There was this other time where I was talking about dating with another friend, and they tried giving me advice, to not flirt with European women because they wouldn't be interested in asian men. When I told an asian male friend that I liked a Turkish woman he told me that was weird and why would I be into that?  Apart from that there have been a joking remark about exoticness from a male friend, like one time when I said that this women was Macedonian greek, he said ah, going slavic huh?

I have tried hard to not fall into negative stereotypes about asian men though, so I guess in some sense I do see how my skin colour could be a potential weakness.

Those are my experiences with dating and race. What are some of yours, or some things that people around you have experienced?

[Guest]

I've never dated and I've never had conversations relating to racial preferences in dating per se.

That being said, I've never had a strong enough impression that my ethnicity was a boon when it comes to dating. Reading and hearing about popular views of men of my race have, over time, led me to believe that the more 'ethnic' you seem, the greater the onus and pressure to distance yourself from the negative stereotypes associated with your ethnicity, and to acculturate yourself in order to ensure the possibility of platonic and romantic/sexual successes.  

It also doesn't help when your mother culture passively encourages a degree of self racism to begin with.

[Perlandra]

The guys I've gone on dates and/or done BDSM play with could do a United Colors of Benetton ad. I don't specifically seek out men of other ethnicities (I'm mostly Caucasian with 1/8 Asian), I just grew up in a very multi-cultural city/church/school, so it isn't a factor that's particularly important to me. My take on it is that some European and Asian women might not want to date you because you're Chinese, but that's by no means universal for either group.

[Guest]

I grew up in mostly Hispanic, Asian and White communities and that tends to be what I'm accustomed and mostly drawn to. I went to a predominantly white high school, so there was a real lack of diverse choices.

Me, I'm Hispanic, I don't always look like it, but I am. The biggest thing distinguishing me from other Latino dudes is my hair and fair-ish complexion. Though, I'm not the only white-ish Hispanic out there lol.

So far, due to my nerdy tendencies and geeky (read: considered at the time considered "white") hobbies I've had little success with Hispanic women despite being Hispanic. I haven't asked out any Asian women since I've not taken a fancy to any in a very long time, so I'm not gonna force it.

Then there's white women, who, I've found to be the most receptive to me asking them out, believe it or not. What I mean is, I've gotten positive rejections, whereas I've been berated in the past by women of my own ethnicity for looking too white. Well, okay then.

I try not to think about my race or ethnicity when dating. If they're racist... avoid at all costs.

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