Re: Foreigners Taking Ugliest Filipina Girls

InspiredPoet wrote: 
Have you heard Filipino people ask you: "Why do you
,"foreigners", take all these ugly girls?" Or has anyone ever
told you: "We are not jealous when we see a "foreigner" with a
Pinay, because they take the ugliest girls, and leave the pretty girls
to us".

Here is my take on that and why this particular phenomenon takes place:
Assuming that this thing about foreigners applies to Americans mainly,
this is how this happens:

1) Filipinos have been taught for the longest time that a beautiful
person is someone who looks "Spanish". In the Philippine culture,
which was dominated by the Spaniards for centuries, the Spanish look
came to represent power, authority, nobility, riches and beauty. Poor
Native Filipinos would look at rich ruling class Spaniards and would
often want to attain the same status as them. Also, the "Indios",
as the Malay Filipinos were then called by the Castilians, were
repeatedly told by their colonial masters that they were "ugly"-
their noses were flat-how ugly!, their eyes were slanty-how ugly!,
their skin was brown- how very ugly! Therefore, many a Pinay in those
times would dream of marrying a tall, white Spaniard and creating a
family that would become "white", and "high-nosed" after three
generations. The Mestizo class in the Hispanic times was richer and had
a higher position than the predominantly Asian-looking, native
"Indio" class; and being half-Spanish became a thing of status.

One will also agree that when we search for love, we subconsciously
look for "beautiful" lovers in order to "improve our species". So,
for many Filipinas/-nos, finding a long-nosed husband/wife, with a
bigger body and whiter skin, became an important requirement when
looking for a worthy marriage/ life-time partner.

Spanish Mestizos still have a high status in the modern Philippines.
Many own huge agricultural estates, factories and corporations. The
Mestizo look means: money, power, rich (wo)man, handsome (wo)man,
famous actor/actress, a noble person coming from a land-owning family.

When the US Army was in the Philippines, many Mexican-Americans
reported an interesting occurrence- Filipinos would turn their heads
when they walked down the street, say "Gwapo" and "Pogi" to
them, and tell them that they looked like some famous actors/actresses.
Many Filipinos would say that a person who looks like that ( the
Mexican look) was " a wealthy man" in the Philippines.  And it is
true. Watch a few Filipino movies- the people who are portrayed to live
in big houses and have estates with Malay/Asian maids do have that
near-Mexican look.

It must have been a pleasant shock to many Chicano guys, whose parents
were often very poor Mexican immigrants who toiled for years to have a
better life in the US, and to whom being in the US Military was a way
to make something of themselves in the American society. In the
Philippines they suddenly found themselves to be "high class" in
the eyes of the natives. These, still relatively poor children of,
sometimes, illegal Mexican immigrants, were now confused with the
"hacenderos" - the land -owning class of the half-Spanish
Philippine aristocracy. Filipina girls would flirt with them and people
would admire them as "burgeses"- the moneyed bourgeois class.
Because, you see, in the Philippines, the Asian look is often seen as
being less glamorous than the Hispanic look.

2) Now, North Americans would form different associations when it came
to what a beautiful person/woman should look like. For centuries,
American men were attracted to the exotic "Oriental" women. During the
20th century in particular, with the US military involvement in Asia,
tens of thousands of American men brought home Korean, Japanese, Thai,
and Vietnamese war brides. These women were seen as beautiful,
faithful, feminine and exotic. Movies about the Marines in the South
Seas falling in love with brown- skinned native women, as well as
Elvis's escapades with lovely Hawaiian ladies in "Blue Hawaii"
left deep imprints on the American men's minds as to what precious
treats these Asian women were.

There are not so many Asians in the US ,so finding and marrying a
beautiful Asian woman is a difficult task- many American men would vie
for her and she would have the pick of the crop. Young Asian girls in
the US often have lots and lots of guys fawning on them all the time.
Finding a Mexican girl is much easier as there are so many of them.
Hence, such scarcity of Asian women affords them a certain higher value
in the American men's mind. Often even when in the Philippines, the
American man still carries with him the concept of that Asian woman
"scarcity" and continues valuing every Asian woman he meets.

Also, it is said to say but the Spanish Mestizo look in the US is not
connected with being "high class" and a way to "improve one's
species" and standing in society. Oftentimes, it is associated (
subconsciously so) with Mexican and Central American laborers and
maids.  While a modern American male claims to not be racist, he will
very often, and without realizing it, place the Asian look of a female
on a higher pedestal than the Hispanic look. Hence, when in the
Philippines, an American man has the concept of female beauty which is
opposite of the Philippine concept of the same.

 So, when an American male is in the Philippines, he starts courting,
dating and getting involved with the women that he came to the
Philippines for- the Oriental-looking ones- yup!, the ones with small
noses, yellowish/brown skin, the petite bodies and sweet and modest
behavior. Why travel all the way to the "Exotic Orient" to look for
a girl that looks just like so many Mexican and other Latin women in
the US? If he wanted to find a Hispanic girl, a trip to Tijuana would
be sufficient. And, the conclusion is: to Americans, the Asian look is
seen as something more glamorous, exciting, attractive and more
precious than the Hispanic look.

And thus, we see all these tall American guys proudly parading around
Manila and Cebu with Malay ( "Indio"-"Pure Filipina") girls,
who, in the minds of Americans, evoke old images of Hawaiian and
Tahitian beauties, someone as warm and as vehemently passionate as the
wild and sultry maidens from Paul Gaugin's paintings.

The Filipinos, who curiously observe the mixed couples, see it
differently- "Here is a rich foreigner, he is white and handsome; he
is an American. A millionaire! So why did he get involved with a
flat-nosed, "ugly" girl?" Why is he in a poor neighborhood,
wooing the girl that sells barbecued chicken? Why is he head-over-heels
in love with a young woman that looks like she had spent her entire
life on a rice paddy?

Isn't it interesting how people, depending on their own cultural
baggage of references and associations, can look at the same situation
and see two completely different things!

Having read all the foregoing yada-yada, I agree that many Filipinas in the States who married American husbands are dogfaced. Many Filipinas married to servicemen or former servicemen were formerly employed in red light districts.

The pretty Pinays I have come to know (don't read anything into this) are married to Pinoys, with very few exceptions.

Of course I'm just talking of physical appearance. What's inside these ladies are another set of volumes.

Julio Pig Iglesias
"To all the girls I loved before....."
.

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