 How can this still be happening? Some American born Asians and Asian immigrants are not getting along. What's going on here? I'm shocked. There was a viral Reddit post saying why are ABC girls so mean to fobby girls? Long story short, this girl's from China. She went to high school in America, but when she got to college, she felt like there was such a big disparity in treatment between ABC girls, American born Chinese girls, her interactions with them and then with other international students. She tried to join the CSA, which was mostly for ABCs and she kept getting cut off in the interview and she just feels very sensitive. She's like, I just felt like I was so wrong for being who I am and then I started taking a student job at the religious center and I saw a lot of Muslim students come in and my other coworkers would get so excited when they met another person from Sudan and like try to bring them in and acculturate them to the American culture and she felt like, I never got that experience myself. What's going on? There's just such a disparity between the two groups, ABCs versus fobs. Let's talk about it guys. We've talked about this on the channel before, so if you're ready for this discussion, please hit that like button right now. But you know what ABCs and fobs couldn't agree on? Smala sauce. This might bridge the gap, possibly, hopefully. SmalaSauce.com. Check it out. Selling everywhere. Real quick, I want to say this. I believe all of her details. I do think she's telling the story a little bit one-sided and possibly from a sensitive perspective, but I don't doubt the things that she says happen in this post actually happen because I've seen them with my own eyes. No, I know what she's saying and I believe, take it for face value, I believe her, but let me just give you some possible reasons real quick before we get into the comment section because I thought there's some good insight there. I would say number one, I think she could be being sensitive and it could be misinterpreted. There could be a language barrier boom, but let's just be honest. Not all American-born Chinese are good ambassadors. They're not all nice people. They're also insecure in themselves. They're trying to find their way through America and they feel like the FOB student threatens them. And let's be honest, particularly, I think this happens with all Asian groups. I'm talking about Korean, Vietnamese, Filipino. I think that this split exists amongst all of them, but amongst Chinese, the disparity might be even larger due to the geopolitical relationship, due to being Chinese not being considered cool. It creates an even wider chasm. I mean, think of how different a second generation Hong Kong needs girl is to a first generation girl who just came from like Northern China. Or she could even be like third or fourth gen. She could be fifth gen from the Gold rush. I'm just saying that already there's like, there are cultural differences. So there has to be some common ground found. And then also sometimes there are like well off FOB students who kind of look down on the ABCs and that starts some tension, but usually they won't even interact with the ABCs. So I don't think those are like the rich for a dive. This is not who this girl is. This girl may also and I'm not saying that she is or isn't because honestly, this is the internet. We do not know the details. That's why it's so hard to really like actually make a final conclusion on it. But she might not be considered one of the cool FOBs, right? That can like bridge the gap or whatever like that. Who knows, man? And what are your personal stories in terms of like, like you almost got rejected from CSA by FOBs in college for not being Chinese enough? Yeah, every CSA is different, but I would say this like knowing like, I just think that it's really key that the FOB student and the American student, by the way, when everybody, when I say FOB or FOB, I'm not, I don't mean it in a derogatory way. That's why, because I know we're going to get some comments about that. But when the FOB and the ABC student, they have to, they have to have some type of common activity, whether it's maybe sometimes it's parting, but they have to align culturally on something, right? Find points of alignment, whether it's sports, find some common ground, partying, or some food or like cooking activity, or some type of classroom, maybe they both are in pre-med and they find some common ground. But you have to have some common culture because there is going to be a cultural barrier. It is, it's okay to say that, that there's a slight cultural barrier. Right, right, right. And you know, that's why even sometimes at schools, Andrew, and we're just referring to the Chinese situation, because we're more in tune with that, or like know the most about that. There's a CSA at a school that's more for like ABCs and a CSSA that is more for like quote, unquote, like the FOB kids, because you know, the student groups, Andrew, they kind of turn into gangs, and maybe you didn't fit into that particular gang of leadership. But I thought that was the CSA, that was the more American one, CSSA is oftentimes for the Chinese grad students. But anyways, yeah, let's go into the comment section. Yeah, I think ultimately for me real quick, I got to save my quick comment though, it comes down to sample size. You can meet people that you can relate to of any group of people, but you have to meet enough. But the thing is, most people in their life, Andrew, they just meet who they meet and base their judgment on a group based off that. But it's like, you have no way of telling whether your particular sample size was scientifically large enough to be accurate. Right. Somebody said, deep down, you might remind them of the awkwardness of their own parents or parts of their cultural heritage that made them feel ostracized and stand out in opposition to their mainstream peers. You remind them of everything you are trying to distance themselves from in order to be accepted in white America. You remind them of everything that they hate about themselves. I'm going to be very blunt and this is going to sound mean, but if you are a shy, awkward immigrant, that's going to be tough for like a lot of American people to kind of embrace that. But there is a way if you're outgoing or fun or funny or if you're good at something like an activity that people really value, right? There just has to be a way in. What's your way in? Right. You can't. I mean, maybe if you're really good at Genshin impact in the cello, you can appeal to the crowd that likes that. But obviously, if the ABC crowd is more and going towards football and basketball and like American eyes, things like ABG and Kevin win things, a fob may not have super high hit points in that section. So then where is the in like where? How do you get your foot in the door to be valued, right? Yeah. And there is a whole Disney show on Disney plus based around the book, Jean Yang's American Born Chinese, where the cousin character Chen Qi is the manifestation of the exact same shame that ABCs have. So I guess this is pretty well documented, right? Somebody said same in the Indian black and Hispanic community. People born here were not very good to their people born abroad versus other like American born second gents. I do think every community has some version of this. I do think that there is a lot of Chinese and there's a lot of recent Chinese immigrants. So I would say yes, I can see this happening amongst like African American, like if there's an African immigrant versus a black American student, you know what I mean? I heard a ton of jokes about that. Yeah. So that that does happen. I acknowledge somebody said those mean ABC girls were probably those like cool sorority girls. I mean, most of them are just mean in general. There are nice ABC girls, but just not the ones in sororities. I would say this, a lot of ABCs in college, especially they grew up in parts and towns that were super white and they were the only Asian kid. And then they go to college and they find other Asians there because like all the college kind of pulls all the Asians from that area, right from a radius. So now sometimes it's as simplistic as those ABCs just want to do American things, but with other ABCs and feel comfortable doing that. So I'm not saying they're just just don't think that the CSA is built to like study Chinese culture. Okay, it's really just like ABCs to feel together. Right. Right. And I mean, this girl may feel a little entitled to like having been brought in and stuff like that. It's going to be, of course, very different from the Sudan situation where that's like ethnic religious group. They went through a crazy ward. You know what I mean? Like, of course, they're going to feel tight together. Like the Chinese group is almost like the inverse of that situation. Like every detail is completely, you know, almost the reverse. Somebody saying, you know, I grew up as an ABC in New York's Chinatown and us and the FOBS were always frenemies that would hang out together, but also pick on each other. But ultimately when we got older, we stopped hanging out with each other. So this, he was talking about how it was like a 50 50 thing. How much do you think it is that the FOBS don't like the ABCs too? Yeah, I think it can be both. It can be both, you know, and you know, the FOBS are like comparatively, it depends on what tier they came over at. They're almost like the rich majority of where they're almost like the rich bros are rich girl it material it girls of where they're from. But I wouldn't assume that every FOB wants to be American eyes and wants to hang out with ABCs. Sometimes those FOBS are just happy being amongst themselves and that's fine. Right, right, right. Somebody was saying, I don't know. I'm an ABC and I lived in Taiwan for 11 years. I have a hard time thinking of a single time anybody there ever treated me bad for being ABC. So it's not 50 50. It's true that we are more bad to them than they're bad to us. This person was saying like, yeah, but I think it varies country to country. I know that being ABC in Taiwan, it definitely is like more elevated than even being ABC in China to be on mainland. Somebody said whiteness is the currency of popularity in the Midwest. And long story short, it is the currency of popularity and attention. And we don't want to associate with people who are going to bring our currency down. Right, right, right. But then some people were bringing up examples like a FOB from China, Andrew Jackson He who accumulated a ton of Midwestern cred by playing D one football, even though he still has a very thick accent. So so is it that is it just like the act of who they are? But it's like literally just the difference in behavior and interest. I think it's not really the accent. I don't even think it's always the language barrier. Sometimes it's just how you guys are acting. And because Jackson He has this kind of like American sports bravado, this football enthusiasm, this charisma, you would say it's probably statistically kind of rare, right? Yeah, it's more Americanized, even though he speaks it with an accent, he's still more Americanized than a lot of Asian Americans. He captures the American spirit because he understands football and football is like the most American sport I can think of. Right, it's very outgoing. It's very gregarious. It's very brutal in some ways, but also you shake hands afterwards. They're just this whole post causing outpour of people's like just really long stories, you know, people who spend five years overseas, 10 years in America. So many people were arguing about it. You know, is there just any concrete way to make sense of the situation? A lot of people are like, Oh, it's 50 50. It's not 50 50. It's on the Asian Americans to extend the olive branch. It's on the fobs to understand that they need to assimilate more before the Asian Americans extend that olive branch. And you know, it just the threads just kept going and going. Yeah, listen, we made what 12 years ago, we made a video called. What is it? Don't hate fobs. Don't hate fobs. That was one of our first videos we ever made on our channel, guys. You know what? I don't even know if I want to pop up the thumbnail, but if you guys want to search for it, go search for it. It's still it's still live. But I think to reiterate some of the things that we had talked about in that in that video, it's like one ABCs need to have more empathy. I'm not saying you have to be best friends and you have to accept all behavior, but a little bit more empathy for immigrant kids, like immigrants, they have to because those are like your parents. It's like you imagine if these people were like your parents, then you have to have some empathy for your parents, right? It would have been helpful if your parents, your foby parents came to America and met some helpful Asian Americans right during that time, right? So that's number one. Number two, I think the fob kids and the immigrants need to understand that if you are doing everything and you're not trying to be a little bit more American, it is going to be tough to get very close to other Asian Americans. It will be tough. Yeah. And that's that's on you partially. It's both sides. Yes. Both sides because I'm not going to lie. I know some really rich fobs and they still stand in front of the elevator when people are trying to get out and they try to make people squeeze through this like tiny little crack. And I'm like, bro, I get it. You never got taught elevator etiquette growing up. And plus you guys are the richest people where you're from. So you could just act however you want. But you can't do that. You're not making a lot of friends standing in front of the elevator when the elevator opens. Exactly. I understand because there could be a language barrier, a lot of international students, they're not very friendly or like, you know, bright eyes. Some are some are and some aren't like, you know, the ones that aren't. But back to the ABCs because I want to say two for the ABCs, one for the fobs, because I think there is a little bit more responsibility on the American ones. I'm like, you got to just be a better job of being an ambassador. You can't be so insecure in yourself and always being like, oh, I'm just trying to be accepted. Oh, there's a fob. They're acting funny. They're eating fish and rice that they brought from home. That's gross. That makes me feel less of an American like you can't feel that way. Yes. Yes. I can't be so insecure because we have to be better ambassadors. You know, I saw this guy downstairs. We have this like lounge in our building and he was eating spicy mala xiao, you know, like the crossfish rice. It smells strong. Yeah. It has the wuxiang, the spice on it. And I went to, you know, and I was, we were with a group of people from basketball, you know, white black people, some Asians, but very Americanized Asians as well. But I went down there and I was just like, oh man, you guys eating mala xiao. Let me take a look. And he's like, oh yeah, you want one? And I was like, oh man, I can't get one right now. I'm like eating over here, this American food, because we're watching the game, but I still respected it. I didn't go against it. Yeah. I didn't go against it because I went over. I was curious. I said the name in Chinese. We spoke a little bit. We mostly speak English, but I'll throw some Mandarin in there just to let people know, you know, we've, I think that's a good way of like having a fun friendly ping, acknowledging that they are eating a food. They're eating spicy crawfish in the lounge, which it's not against the law to do that, but it probably is making that room smell like spicy crawfish. Right? Right. Now, you don't need to tell them to stop because maybe you don't mind, but acknowledging like, hey, you guys are eating spicy crawfish. Wow. Yeah. I just went over, oh yeah, you got young girl trying over here. And that also helps the American guys that you're with understand what they're eating because maybe the American guys were kind of like, yo, what are they eating? And then you're like, oh, they're eating crawfish. You know, it's like Cajun crawfish, except just like the Chinese Cajun version. But then when you say it, you don't say it bashfully or in the shame, but you're just like, it's late. I mean, that's, they're getting late right now. So that's why ABCs need to understand a holistic Chinese culture better. And they need to be more confident that they can complement and understand Chinese culture and be the bridge and be the bridge to both sides. Yeah, because you're the American one and you understand what it's like here. So you are given a little bit more responsibility on this. I don't think it's 50 50. I give responsibility 65% or 60% on the ABCs, 40% on the, and let's be honest too, though, I wouldn't say that like all the fobs for lack of a better word, they all, they, then they don't all have the same attitude. No, some of them have a great attitude. Some of them have a great attitude. Some of them have the middle one and some of them have a horrible attitude. Listen, some of these FOB students are stupid too, like our rude too, just like ABCs can be stupid and rude. So everybody has the rudeness. Anyways, guys, let us know in the comments down below what you think, right? Yeah, I mean, I think there was a lot of macro takeaways, but as far as this girl specific situation, you know, without game film, we'll never know what the true thing, you know, what the true root of her exact situation is, but it sparked a lot of good I guess like my last advice to this girl, she's watching this or anybody out there who's wondering like, what can I do? What can I do if I'm an international student? I guess you do somehow need to show that you are being a little bit more Americanized in some aspect of your life. Because I do see the ABCs want to be friends with like, I mean, especially the more open minded ABCs with the cool FOBs. You do see that. Dude, I think there's nothing about them being an international student that makes me not want to be friends with them. It's if we culturally can align on things and share things together, that's great. We can be friends no matter what culture you're from. But if we find it hard to find common ground and mutual respect for each other, then it's tough. Yeah, I always ask people, you got a Louis jacket? I'll ask about your Louis jacket. That's a dope jacket. Oh man, you've been lifting. How are you lifting? But if you give me like a really negative response or really be like brushing off, then I'm just like, oh, okay, well, that's it. Yeah, just recognize when a real person is trying to reach out and be friendly. Anyways, guys, let us know in the comments down below what you think ABC is Asian Americans versus international students of any type of Asian. It doesn't have to be Chinese, but obviously we're just stories about a Chinese person today. So let us know in the comments down below. Check out smaller sauce, the bridge in between. Until next time, we out. Peace.