I have lived here in Taiwan for over four years. Overall it’s been a great experience. However, I wanted to share something that’s a bit less talked about: the case of white privilege in Taiwan.

When I studied Mandarin here, I got a stipend from the government. I was told rather jealously, by a Taiwanese-American classmate that the same scholarship was unavailable to him despite the fact that he was born and raised in America, and was also learning Mandarin as a second language. At first I did not believe him, but sure enough, the all three of the government-sponsored scholarships explicitly state that ‘overseas Chinese’ students (i.e. students of Chinese or Taiwanese descent) were not eligible. [Note: To be fair this scholarship was available to people from other Asian countries, as well as from South America or Africa so it’s not strictly white privilege. But it does illustrate the alienation that some Taiwanese feel towards certain policies.]

The scholarship money allowed me to have a studio apartment not to far from the city center. Meanwhile, a Taiwanese friend of mine not only took classes full time, but worked part-time three days a week just to be able to afford the rent on a dorm room!

When searching for jobs, most expats will opt for tutoring or teaching English. I have heard some expats complain that the only jobs available to foreigners in Taiwan, are English teaching jobs, yet these very same foreigners often lacked Mandarin proficiency and had no real qualifications other than hailing from an English speaking country. Yet, the benefits of working at such “cram schools” are — a wage three times higher than that of many bachelor’s graduates, as well as participation in a top notch National Healthcare Scheme — far outweigh the value that many expats provide.

To be fair, there are some expats employed in local Taiwanese companies or in branches of companies from their foreign countries. But often, such positions paying “foreigner salary” may be implicitly out of reach for the average Taiwanese local, no matter how good his English is or how he might otherwise be qualified. Moreover, it’s not unheard of for expats to be given token positions while in Asia. In my first non-cram-school job, I worked as an office assistant in one of Taiwan’s largest OEMs. While I can’t say for certain that I was picked due to my skin color, I felt that it was quite likely. I was often picked to show up at company events, or represent the company at trade shows, having nothing to do except stand there and smile at Taiwanese customers.

Another expat, a white guy from a European worked there as an engineer. After making several failed attempts to ask me out, he would literally brag to me nearly daily about how he had essentially bluffed his way into the company, how he didn’t do any work, and how he was still getting paid more than the locals. When I attempted to bring this up to my superior, they shrugged it off. “Paul?” they asked. “Oh, that’s our white guy. Don’t worry about him. He makes our company look more international.”

Locals are not to blame for White Privilege

At this point, some people might be thinking — “All these examples are due to how Taiwanese people treat foreigners. White people can’t be blamed for that.” Maybe so. But there is also a problem with the way that expats and foreigners act both towards each other and towards locals.

Some foreigners who have been here long enough will take advantage of having some familiarity with Taiwanese culture to promote themselves, while at the same time, feigning ignorance when convenient. Have a friend back home who needs a job? (After all, making a middle-class salary at a boring job in Taiwan beats being unemployed in the US) Use your guanxi as cram school assistant-manager to get your buddy hired, because “that’s how you do it in Taiwan”. Got a traffic ticket? Abracadabra! You’re American again. Pretend you can’t speak Chinese and shout at the police officer in English until he backs down.

When I spoke Chinese, I garnered praise from the Taiwanese around me. “Ni de Zhongwen hen hao!” — Your Chinese is very good! — they’d tell me. When I told them I was from America, I had people who wanted to practice English with me. Not so with my Taiwanese-American friend who spoke Chinese, English, French, Japanese, and German, all with varying degrees of fluency.

Another issue is that of politics. Taiwan prides itself as the freest country in the East Asia. They are especially proud of the vibrant political scene and their wide ranging freedoms when compared to their next-door neighbor.

Dating is another issue that came up in the expat circles. Expat men would frequently brag about how easy it was to “score” Taiwanese or Asian women simply by “pretending to be rich back home”. The reality was that many of them were nothing of the sort, but their passport and skin color accorded them a certain credibility. Fetishization of Asian women and other creepy behavior by expats of all colors (including, frankly, some Asian-American men) was a problem in the dating scene here, but that in and of itself is another essay.

For the most part, most foreigners here are supportive of Taiwanese Independence and of the Democratic Progressive Party. I for one believe that everyone is entitled to their opinion, but on countless occasions I have seen white foreigners trying to shout down Taiwanese KMT supporters in public. While politics of Taiwan are complex, and I don’t have time to cover them here, I do think that locals ought to have the right to their own opinions regardless of what they support. It is quite arrogant for foreigners to come to Taiwan and claim to be more well-versed in the politics than the locals, and give them lectures when they disagree.

In one case that I remember, a group of expats ganged up on a local Taiwanese co-worker because they heard he was a KMT supporter. The supervisor, who also was an expat, promptly fired him not soon after he started reporting incidents of harassment and bullying at work.

In another case, a certain expat, a self-described “feminist,” reported a Taiwanese-American expat to the government. She had heard that the Taiwanese-American expat had participated in a rally with his church to keep gay marriage illegal, and believed the Taiwanese-American expat was oppressing the LGBT community in Taiwan. The feminist expat reported the anti-gay expat to the government for violating rules against trying to influence local politics. Eventually the anti-gay expat was fired from his job, fined and deported. All of this despite the fact that the feminist expat actively participated in all manner of politics, had a blog that exclusively dealt with Taiwanese internal politics, and had even been tapped to write guest columns in a major English-language newspaper. [Note to be sure, I found the anti-gay foreigner’s views reprehensible. But, I in theory at least, respect his right to not be arrested or prosecuted for it.]

A lot of these situations would be unthinkable in America, where Asian-American immigrants struggle with discrimination, and have little to no political voice.

Reverse Discrimination?

There are many expats who might accuse me of being unfair. “What about reverse discrimination?” they ask.

Indeed, there are many people that will cry “racism” at the slightest provocation: Someone didn’t sit next to you on the subway? That guy must be a racist! Taiwanese girl won’t break up with her boyfriend to date you? She must be a racist! Someone looked at you the wrong way? Racism!

The problem with this argument is that they reinforce white privilege by essentially denying it. In Taiwan there are undoubtedly xenophobic people, just as there are xenophobic people in America or England or Germany. However, an Asian or Taiwanese person would not necessarily benefit from moving to America or England or Germany and acquire status based on:

His skin tone

His mother tongue

His percived wealth or class

The prevalence of the his country’s popular culture

Such people are basically blaming the very people who have allowed them to live in Taiwan and gain the privilege in the first place.

Conclusion

If you’re an expat in Taiwan — especially a white, English speaking expat — you should acknowledge that you do have a degree of privilege as a guest in their country. You should be candid and open about it. Be polite to people — talk with people and not at them — and acknowledge that you aren’t an expat on their culture or political systems.