Editor’s Note: David Bond is a vlogger known for his controversial videos showing him traveling all over Asia picking up women. The opinions expressed in this piece are solely his own.

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Growing up as a hardcore video game player, I was on the internet a lot. Between watching online porn, usually involving Japanese school girls, and playing Quake 3 Arena, sometimes I’d post on forums. I’d browse video game forums, digg, 4chan, and many others — one thing I’d hear from time to time is that “girls in Asia love white dudes” or “Asian girls are easy for white guys.”

Being a “white dude” who had a thing for Asian girls, this always sounded pretty cool, and for years it was something I assumed was true for no other reason than people said it a lot.

Fast forward to my first time actually going to Asia, and this “it’s easy for white guys” mantra was even said by the manager (a Japanese man) of the guest house I was going to be living in. I actually have the entire conversation on video. He basically said, “You’re lucky because you’re white, and girls in japan love white guys.”

This was music to my ears at the time. The internet said it and now this guy is saying it. I was excited to go out and meet some girls after hearing this.

I had just lost weight, ended a 6-year relationship with my white girlfriend, quit my job, and recently taken a strong interest in improving my life and luck with girls — to give some context.

It was myself and three other white dudes in Japan, and for the next few months me and my buddies went out about 3-5 nights a week. Each night (and day) we’d all try to pick up Japanese girls.

Two of my friends were tall, good looking and fit guys — like with abs and everything. The third guy was a skinny guy with glasses. After each night we’d all hang out in the “common room” at our guest house and talk about our night, and this was really fun because it was like a mastermind group.

In the next couple months I started to doubt the “girls in japan love white guys” mantra that I grew up believing. Language barriers, cultural barriers, shame barriers, weird taboos all hit us like a bag of bricks. One of the guys in our travel group even left the country three weeks early, even after paying a full month of rent, out of frustration — this, mind you, was one of the fit tall guys.

All of this had no real meaning to me at the time. I was having fun and did meet a lot of awesome girls. Sure the whole “it’s easy to meet girls as a white guy” thing was challenged a bit, but so what? Japan was just one place, right?

In the next three years, I traveled and lived in Korea, Thailand, Japan (Tokyo/Osaka), Cambodia, Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Vietnam — and every country I visit I talked to a lot of girls. Each country I visit I also travel with a crew, normally 2-5 guys at a time, and always a racially diverse group.

Three years later, having approached thousands of Asian girls, dated or seduced hundreds, and witnessing my friends do the same — I’ve come to believe the “white guy in Asia” theory is a complete myth.

Yes, I said it — the “it’s easy to meet girls as a white guy in Asia” narrative is bullshit. The “just be white” theory is a myth.

Now I can already hear half of the internet getting ready to slam their keyboard writing up big long comments on why I’m wrong, but wait there’s more!

Not only do I think the “it’s easy for a white guy in Asia” narrative is false — I also think it might actually be EASIER to be an Asian guy in Asia when it comes to picking up girls.

Now that everyone is pissed, let me explain why I think this.

Why Me Being White Makes My Opinion Better Than Yours

Before I make my case, I want to be very clear that I am a white guy who likes Asian girls. I WANT the ‘white guy’ myth to be true, and obviously am not offended when people told me the myth. It would be like a black guy being offended by the “big penis” stereotype, right?

However, if we’re going to have a discussion about how girls respond to a “white guy,” then it’s only logical to admit that the only person who can be true knowledge of this is a white guy. If you’re not a white guy, then your opinion on how people respond to “white guys” can only be that of a spectator.

To make an analogy, imagine you heard people say over and over, “Waitresses at Denny’s restaurants hate black guys.” Now ask yourself whose opinion on this would matter: An individual waitress who works at one Denny’s, a random customer who’s gone to Denny’s a few times, or a black guy who’s gone to Denny’s twice a day everyday for three years straight in every state in the entire country?

Obviously the black guy is the only person who can truly know what it’s like to be a black guy right? Also a black guy who’s gone to Denny’s many many times would have even a more accurate opinion on the matter.

That being said, telling me, a white guy, how people respond to me romantically when you yourself are not a white guy automatically makes your opinion have less weight than mine — this is obvious but often a forgotten point.

The Five Great Walls — Why It’s Harder For White Guys, Not Easier

There are some big obstacles you’ll be faced with being a “white guy” in Asia. Even if one argues it’s “easier” for a white guy in some aspects, there are definitely many “great walls” that make it very “not easy” and therefore offset the alleged advantage.

1) Language Barriers: Although it’s not always the case, anyone who’s approached or attempted to date Asian girls has been faced with language barrier issues. Language is something all of us take fully for granted, and attempting to approach, date, or seduce a girl who speaks little or *no* english is the furthest thing imaginable from “easy”.

Communicating with another person who does not speak your language or speaks it poorly is a challenging task that even guys who are very good with girls will struggle with. Talking slowly, removing words (like determiners), and using non-verbal communication (facial expression, pointing) adds an entire level of challenges. These challenges can be common with Asian girls, and is a virtual certainty with native Asian girls.

I don’t care how good looking you are, how good you are with girls or how “white” you are, storming up to a girl who speaks almost no english is not an easy task.

The mere existence and frequency of language barriers is evidence that approaching/dating Asian girls is more difficult, not “easier”.

2) Cultural Barriers: Not all Asian cultures are the same, but most have commonalities that are similar or consistent in most. Views on sex, status, interracial dating, affection in public, marriage, humor and even talking to strangers can be taboo. An example of this would be in Korea — heavy eye contact can be considered rude, and thus giving a girl eye contact may cause anxiety instead of attraction. Another example of this would be kissing or hugging in public, which is considered taboo in Japan; even established couples may not do it.

When approaching/dating white girls for example, heavy eye contact, flirty touching, sexual humor, and even kissing in public are rarely a problem — all of these are common things between two fully Westernized white people.

The more conservative/traditional cultural barriers is evidence that approaching/dating Asian girls is more difficult as a foreigner, not “easier”.

3) Shame & Self-Image Barriers: This, in my opinion, is the most challenging reality of approaching and dating Asian girls. In the East, girls have extreme pressure to “appear” pure, clean, polite and innocent. In Asia, there’s a lot of shame surrounding intimacy that is so damaging and dysfunctional some country’s populations are even declining.

Many Asian girls are programmed to suppress their interest in sex and intimacy, hide it or deny it. If they display or admit at all that they want or even like sex or touch, they risk being seen as a “slut” — in Japan they’re called a “bitch” or in China/HK, a “public toilet.” Their sense of self is at risk, and their reputation is at risk if they show an interest in sex.

Disturbing examples of this are girls who spontaneously begin crying after kissing me for the first time, then holding me crying saying “I want kiss but feel shame,” or girls telling stories about their fear of friends talking about them and hurting their reputation. Other examples include girls covering their faces after sex or kissing, admitting they really enjoy it but feel bad as if they committed a crime.

Most of this shame comes from sexually frustrated men who take out their inner sadness on women by shaming them. Some men in Asia shame women about sex in the same way that a fat ugly girl will shame a beautiful girl for “dressing slutty,” when the reality is she’s jealous and sad that she’s not beautiful — a quick way to reduce the pain is by inventing a story in her head that she’s just a slut who dresses slutty. Any self-aware man who was once really bad with women knows that shaming women for their sexuality is a way to deal with the frustration of not being a part of it. Accepting the fact that you’re just a lonely confused guy is too hard, so it’s just easier to rationalize that the girl kissing her boyfriend in the street is just a slut. A Japanese man will browse a porn DVD store, go home and masturbate all day, then walk outside and see a girl kissing me and instantly go, “This girl should be ashamed for liking sex” — it’s pure hypocrisy and insanity.

The shame surrounding sex and affection is evidence that approaching/dating Asian girls is more difficult, not “easier.”

4) Extreme Shyness & Social Anxiety: In many parts of the East, talking to a stranger is taboo and even scary. Take a ride on a train in Korea or Japan — pure silence. In many parts of Asia, there’s a lot of anxiety surrounding talking to strangers, and because of this most never really develop the social muscles needed to meet new people. In the United States, if two strangers are walking by each other, it’s common to say “hello,” “good morning,” or “how are you!” — not doing so is even seen as rude. Talking to strangers is normal.

When attempting to approach or date Asian girls, often you will run into this. It’s not that they don’t like you, it’s that they have no practice talking to strangers and it’s outside of their reality. Even when a girl really likes you, her automatic response may be negative.

The social anxiety and shyness often found in Asian girls is evidence that approaching/dating Asian girls is, once again, more difficult, not “easier.”

5) Racism

One really shocking aspect of Asia you’ll encounter as a “white guy” is racism. Not subtle racism either — ‘Koreans only’ signs in Korea, being denied entry into a club for not being the local ethnicity, having people stereotype you as having AIDS because you’re white or girls refusing to walk with you in public out of fear of looking dirty.

My most memorable experience of racial disadvantage was when a Korean girlfriend I had in Korea introduced me to her sister. This was a girl who I had been seeing and even traveled to different countries with. She had my photo framed in her room and called me her boyfriend. When I met her sister, I assumed she knew who I was — I was, after all, her sister’s boyfriend, right? My girlfriend later told me she lied to her family and said her boyfriend was Korean. She feared they would flip a table if they knew I was a white guy so she lied.

The Cause & Origin Of The “White Guy In Asia Myth”

Girls In Asia Staring At “White Guys”

One of the biggest sources for the “white guy in Asia” myth is the common phenomenon of girls staring at foreigners. Of course this depends on where you go but it’s a very common thing that happens.

The reason this fuels the myth is that many in the West only have girls intently stare at them when a girl is romantically interested, so it’s very easy for a naive Western man to walk around and feel like girls are checking him out. It’s very common when I meet guys who travel with me and they brag about how they feel like they’re a “god” or a “rockstar” just for being a foreigner.

Sometimes girls will even ask to take a selfie with you, and this fuels the delusion even more.

This has happened to me many times and my first few weeks in Asia I never missed an opportunity to approach when a girl stared at me. The girls would usually giggle, talk for a bit and I’d ask for their contact information. It certainly “felt” very easy.

If an American girl stared at you, you approached her, she laughed and gave you your contact information, this would almost certainly result in a second meetup.

In my first 60 days in Japan, I had collected over 180 contacts, many from the “staring” girls.

However looking back on all the girls I dated or slept with, I noticed absolutely ZERO of them were ever girls who were staring at me or wanted a selfie. All of them were girls who I approached cold from clubs or during the day. How weird was that?

The reality is that in many parts of Asia, the primary source of knowledge girls have of ‘Western people’ comes from the media and Western pop culture. In Western movies and music, Western people seem to always look really cool. Asians, on the other hand, have almost no positive presence in Western media.

In addition, many Asian girls have no Western friends or are unable to speak to them in a meaningful way, so when they see one walking around, there’s a very high level of curiosity — a curiosity that is not romantic.

To make an analogy, imagine you lived in a city where 99% of the men wear a blue suit. Now imagine when you go to the movies and watch films made from the other side of the globe that the characters are always flying around, saving the day, or otherwise looking really cool — and they all never wear a blue suit but instead wear a wild clothing with bright colors.

Now imagine you’re walking to the train and you see a person who looks like the people in the movies and he’s wearing the wild colorful clothing.

Of course you’re going to stare at them.

I call this “Mickey Mouse Mode”. Mickey Mouse Mode is basically being a character who gets a lot of attention but none of it is romantic. Everyone stares at Mickey Mouse, everyone wants a photo with Mickey Mouse, but nobody really wants to fuck Mickey Mouse.

Many Western men walk around Asia in Mickey Mouse Mode, and they leave the country long before they realize all the girls who stared had virtually no genuine romantic interest in them. They fly home and brag to their friends about how they felt like a “rockstar” from all the girls staring.

Of course, as a man, we only notice the girls staring, we don’t notice the old ladies or guys.

Although there may be exceptions, this has been tested over and over and over again between my travel mates and myself — the attention white guys get in Asia is fool’s gold.

You’re not a rockstar, you’re not a god, you’re just another dumbass in an invisible Mickey Mouse suit.

The ‘White Guy Blindspot’ Effect

When you’re a white guy in Asia and you’d like to meet some girls, you’re going to want to find a bar or club. The most natural thing to do is to Google “best clubs in korea” or “clubs in osaka” and go to whatever place is listed. Another natural thing to do is ask someone. Maybe a guy goes on Tinder and gets a few matches, maybe he asks the girl what a good club might be.

All of this sounds pretty normal and reasonable, right? Yes, but consider what type of results this style of research will yield.

He’s using English to research online, he’s speaking to people who speak English, he’s asking girls on Tinder who obviously think he’s attractive, and also asking friends who had a good time where to go.

Obviously his results will be very biased in favor of a Western friendly places and areas. The type of girl who even HAS a Tinder in Asia is often the type who’s Western friendly, and obviously will direct him to a Western friendly bar or club. The reviews of an English written website will be that of Western people.

Essentially, his naive methods of finding a good spot and meeting people create a bubble where all he’s exposed to is English-friendly, Western-friendly and ‘white guy safe’ places and people.

A great example of this is foreigners who go to Bangkok, Thailand and stay at Khaosan Road. Khaosan Road is basically an area that consists of almost exclusively foreigners who are “backpacking Thailand.”

Khaosan Road is so packed with foreigners that it almost has it’s own culture. You’ll see people dancing in the street with no shirt, drunk people screaming, girls grabbing guys to dance — it’s really wild.

Now take a moment to think of what type of Thai girl would want to party at Khaosan Road — one who’s probably into foreigners, one whose English is decent, and one who’s not scared of shirtless drunk loud white dudes.

Now imagine you’re a Western guy who’s spending most of his time on Khaosan Road, your perception of Thai girls will be heavily influenced by the girls you meet, and if ALL OF THEM are on Khaosan Road then you might think Thai girls are really fun, wild and love to party.

The truth is you have a big fat blind spot, a warped perception that’s based on where you stay and who you interact with.

People were not stupid for thinking the sun revolved around the earth, after all when you just LOOK UP you see the sun moving. Thinking the sun revolves around the earth is a very intuitive illusion that can only be exposed with a change in perspective.

Being a naive Western guy floating around Western-friendly parts of Asia while meeting Western-friendly girls can create an illusion that may create the idea that you being a ‘white guy’ is the cause of how much fun you’re having. In addition, girls are staring at you as you explore the country. Of course you’re going to start to think it’s “so easy” for you.

A funny analogy I’ve made in the past is, imagine a big buff black guy named Chris goes to a city that’s mostly white and the people are very racist. He goes on Tinder and asks girls he matches with where the best bars and clubs are. He then walks around and girls stare at him. He goes to the club and the music is great and the girls are really nice. The next day he leaves and thinks “man that city was great, they love black guys.”

The reality is the type of girl who’d match a black guy obviously likes black guys, and a girl like that probably likes clubs that has black guys in it, and the only type of girl who’d go to a club like that will be friendly to black guys. In addition, people were staring because it’s so rare to see a black guy in that city.

The point here is that it’s possible for Chris to walk away thinking the city loves black guys when the truth is the opposite — something that could only be discovered with more time and perspective. Since 95% of Western men go to Asia for no longer than 1-2 weeks, this type of cultural blindspot is very likely to warp their perception.

A brilliant example of this blind spot is online dating in Vietnam.

In Vietnam, many of the girls on Tinder will message you first and seem happy to match, however the hottest girls there won’t be found on Tinder but on other apps like BeeTalk.

BeetTalk is an app like WeChat and has a feature where you can scan for people near you. The girls on BeeTalk are easily 2-3 times more attractive, rarely will message you, and if you don’t at least try to speak Vietnamese you’re dead.

Keep in mind that 99.9% of the men on BeeTalk in Vietnam are Vietnamese, and the only reason it’s not 100% is because I’m on it.

This is a perfect example of the “white guy blindspot” effect in action. More girls are using a dating app that no Western guy even knows exists, and a small minority are using Tinder. However, on Tinder there are plenty of girls who seem excited to talk to me.

My perception of Vietnamese girls may br that they’re super excited to meet a foreigner if I was only using Tinder, when the reality is most are not.

If you’re wondering why I’d go on a dating app where the girls are less interested in me, yeah I don’t know either!

Foreigner Obsessed Girls — The Empty Ego Boost

Every country in Asia has them — girls obsessed with foreigners. These are girls who may be considered unattractive or undateable by local men, so they seek affection and romance with foreigners. These might be girls who are too tan, considered ‘fat’ for being a little chubby, who are single moms, or otherwise have something that local men can’t accept. Some of them just have a thing for Western guys.

When you’re a ‘white guy’, it’s easy to find yourself going out with one of these girls very quickly. You may even meet a few. You may feel pretty cool, feel like “Yeah I’ve only been here a few days and already got a local girl!”

These girls do not have very high standards for the types of guys they’ll spend time with, and many of them are much more promiscuous than the average girl in the country you’re in. It’s only when you’ve spent time in a country or city in Asia for 2-4 months that these girls expose themselves as slutty and kind of weird.

One example is a girl who matched every single one of my friends on Tinder and she was all talking to each of us with equal enthusiasm. Another example was a girl my friend Josh met early on, who to be fair was quite cute. In the next few months, I saw her easily half a dozen times, always with a different white guy. There’s no doubt each of those dumb white guys thought they were hot stuff for having met her, when the reality is they’re just another naive fool giving their time to a foreigner obsessed girl with no standards.

The ‘foreigner obsessed’ girls give many Western guys the false belief that the women in Asia are easy for them due to this illusion. This phenomenon is also largely responsible for the thousands of ridiculous “I have a friend who went to Asia for a week and met a lot of girls” stories used as proof to push the ‘white guy in Asia’ myth.

What about Asian Guys?

One of the most enlightening learning experiences for me on this topic is being close friends with confident Asian men. The reason I say that is when you meet an Asian guy who’s getting laid, you can compare stories, results and experiences that expose how fucking stupid the ‘white guy in Asia’ myth really is.

A great example of this is my friend Jake. Jake’s an Asian guy who I lived with for a month while in Asia. Jake isn’t afraid to approach girls — he knows how to talk to girls, make them laugh, ask them out and take them home.

Jake met way more girls than I did, got more dates and slept with way more girls than I did during his stay. On one occasion, the girl in the lobby started to give him funny looks over how many girls he’d bring to his room.

We’d go out and meet girls during the day and at night together, and even compared Tinder results. It was crazy to see how many cute girls swiped right to him but left to me.

One day we even wore the same clothes, even down to the same bag and GoPro, before going to our favorite spot to meet girls during the day — it was becoming quite the scientific experiment.

Looking like identical twins who weirdly wore the exact same clothes, we spent a few hours hitting on girls. If the “girls in Asia love white guys” theory was correct, you’d expect me to get great reactions, lots of contacts and you’d expect Jake to get worse results.

The results were always the same, some girls hated me, some girls loved me. Some girls loved Jake and some girls hated jake. We both met cute girls, had fun and got some fun videos to watch later.

Jake was not the only one in my crew to do this with me. ALL of us will hit the same spots with GoPros on — we call it “strapping up.”

“Strapping up” is what guys new to our crew are pressured to do as a right of passage, so we can all watch the footage together and see each others game in action. It’s a lot of fun.

As time went by Jake was starting to go to clubs I had never been to, and some of the clubs I liked he started to hate. I decided to go with him to these clubs and had a hard time meeting girls where he had no trouble.

One funny fact was the clubs I liked had way more annoying hookers roaming around where the clubs he liked had none.

I realized that something interesting was going on — the girls he was dating prefered Asian guys over white guys, so he’d would suggest clubs and bars that had that type of crowd. The types of girls who had a thing for Asian guys went to those clubs, which explained why I had a harder time. In addition, the reason the clubs I liked had hookers was because hookers love going to clubs with Western men because most of them are naive horny tourists.

The clubs Jake liked also had way hotter girls, which was frustrating for me. One reason the hottest girls rarely date foreigners is the shame from peers that they get, so if a super hot Asian girl is dating a white guy, she’ll get sexually shamed harder than if she was average.

Many people claim that being ‘white’ has the advantage of looking exotic or looking unique. This on some level is true, but what people forget is that being an Asian man who acts like a ‘Western guy’ by being less shy and more expressive is also super unique, especially in Asia.

In many parts of Asia, there are cultural and social norms that make it very difficult to be a confident, social and expressive man. Saving face, being obsessive with reputation and taboos against talking to strangers all act like cultural chains that keep them from attracting woman on the scale that Jake is able to do.

Jake, being from the West, is in a way “acting” like a “white guy” in the sense that he is free from an Asian culture that makes him feel bad for talking to strangers, expressing himself, or otherwise being a badass.

Also, being an Asian guy, he has access to more girls because most girls in Asia are comfortable with Asian guys. Jake can get hotter girls because the hottest girls in Asia virtually never date white guys, and the clubs and bars that worked for him are all hooker free.

This is why I might argue that it’s better to be an Asian guy in Asia, for the reasons listed above. The only condition is behavioral — being an Asian guy who is liberated from a culture that may otherwise make him feel bad for approaching women and expressing himself fully.

In some weird way, sometimes I wish I could be an Asian guy for a month to see what it would be like to have all of these benefits — or even better be Eurasian, or “hapa”. The hapa friends I’ve had, like Alex Dickinson, always did well in both camps (Asian girls who like Asians and Asian girls who like white guys).

The bottom line is girls respond mostly to behavior, not race — if you’re a confident cool guy, girls will respond to that. The whole “just be white” mantra is bullshit and only repeated by confused people with a naive and shallow understanding of dating in Asia.