NBA Player Jeremy Lin on Asians and Masculinity

Jeremy Lin has become a world-wide superstar since starting the whole “Linsanity” craze back in 2012. Since then, there’s probably no Asian American who doesn’t know who he is.

With Asian males constantly emasculated in mainstream media, Lin shatters these stereotypes with his continued success in the NBA. However, his accomplishments have not come without challenges and hardship. Even to this day, Lin says he needs to convince security guards he’s a player when he enters the gym on game day.

However, beyond this, Lin has rarely spoken up on his struggles as an Asian American male, until now.

In a video recently uploaded by fitness activist Kevin Kreider, he asks Lin the following question during an apparent Q&A session.

“Did you ever come across the stereotype Asian guys not being attractive, and if you have, how do you think we can break that in the American culture especially?” Kreider asks.

Lin then admits that Asian-American masculinity is one of the issues he feels should be talked about way more. He shares his experience during his draft year when people compared him with another rising star — Jon Wall.

“Me and Jon [Wall] were the fastest people in the draft, but he was athletic and I was ‘deceptively’ athletic,” Lin said. “I think I’ve been deceptively ‘whatever’ my whole life.”

Another point Lin addressed was surprising because it’s a topic that’s rarely talked about when it comes to dating:

“I feel like a lot of times we had a lot of Asian girls going for non-Asian guys,” Lin said. “You don’t see a lot of non-Asian girls going for Asian guys. That’s just like when they say ‘yellow fever’ growing up, it wasn’t like all these white girls are going for Asian guys. It was the Asian girls going for white guys.”

However, Lin remains forward thinking and feels that times are changing and as long we Asian Americans just focused on being the best they can be in their craft, they’ll continue breaking stereotypes.

“I think Asian American males are viewed differently, but I think we just need to keep being ourselves and I think that the world will come around and appreciate us Asians,” he said.