He'd Rather Be Alone Than Pretend . . .

Yes, I know I should be happy that there are Asian women on match.com out there who wuuuuuuuuv me, who are jonesin' for the Starkster. Ohhhh, that coy little wink, that soft lens graduation photo and that broken English that sounds like disposable chopstick instructions. I guess I would find that sexy . . . if I was some creepy mid-fifties accountant wearing tan suits off the discount rack from the Piscataway K-Mart who surreptitiously surfs for websites that have the term "Asian" within three words of "Slut" or "Fetish" at work.

I know some of you are saying, "Whoa Marty, why you bein' such a hatah? Them phillies just be needin' some of your luvin'." And I admit, everytime I get these thoughts when I open up an e-mail from some chick from the Fujian Province, I feel a little bit guilty. But since I'm such a self-aware guy, I've been thinking about why I get this reaction. And it goes deeper than just hating FOBs.

What it comes down to is they don't friggin' read my profile. And I don't feel guilty anymore.

So in this last week, I've received a spate of match.com "winks" and e-mails from women living in China. Now, before you start thinking that I look like Long Duck Dong (may you rot in hell John Hughes), I actually look like Elvis Costello, but, ummmm, Asian. I don't have a bowl cut nor am I wearing badly pressed dress shirts with pen protectors in my match.com photo. And if you've been reading this blog for a while, you know I can write, so no, my profile does not read like a Japanese advert for scotch.

Anyway, back to this whole Nancy from Nanjing crapola that's been flooding my e-mail. See, the reason why I'm annoyed is that my profile specifically says I'm looking for women within 50 miles of Los Angeles. If you don't take the time to read my profile, then why should I take the time to get to know you?

Hmmmm, still think I'm going a bit overboard? OK, so let's say you meet someone. You tell them your name, a little bit about yourself, a little window into you. And during this conversation, that someone starts calling you the wrong name, gets your profession confused, keeps stepping on your toe. Yeah, don't tell me you wouldn't get peeved. Now imagine that this happens to you all friggin' night. The reason why you get peeved is because that someone has shown an utter lack of consideration toward you.

Now reading a profile is a helluva lot easier than listening to a conversation.

Thrown into this whole lack of consideration is the vibe I get from some of these e-mails. And that vibe is "Oooooh, lawyah, american, he rich! Maybe he invite me to america too! I get rich! Live in big house! Buy big car!" And before you accuse me of stereotyping, just take a look at a random sampling of match.com profiles from anywhere, and you will see "lookin' for sugar daddy" profiles. The women from China seem to be more pushy about it.

Now I appreciate why some profiles that I read the women explicitly state "DON'T REPLY IF YOU DON'T READ THE PROFILE" and are all bitter. They get mooks all the time who don't read the profile hopin' on the off chance that they're the frog that gets the princess. Instead, they're just the frog that doesn't friggin' read the profile and show an utter disregard from the woman whose profile they're reading.

I'm tempted to write "NO FOBS--IF YOU LIVE MORE THAN 50 MILES OUTSIDE OF LA, DON'T WRITE BECAUSE I WON'T WRITE BACK TO YOU," but hey, that comes off very very badly. That won't stop me from kvetching about it here though.

Marty Stark, providing you yet another window into the Asian American male mind.