August 21, 2025 • 56 mins
Notes from my guest Amy Furuyama:
- “I want to acknowledge that many interracial relationships between Asian women and white men are loving, respectful, and not rooted in fetishization. What I’m sharing here comes from the experiences of some of my clients, not a reflection of every interracial relationship.”
- “Japan has formally acknowledged its role in the wartime sexual enslavement of Korean women. However, many Koreans feel that the apologies offered to date have not been sufficient or fully accepted.”
Episode Description:
What happens when cultural values of harmony and collectivism collide with personal sexual boundaries? Amy Furuyama, a Korean American sex therapist, provides a revealing glimpse into how Asian American women navigate consent and unwanted sex within relationships shaped by traditional expectations.
The conversation explores how collectivist values in Asian cultures often prioritize family harmony over individual desires, creating situations where women feel obligated to consent to unwanted sex. "There's this idea of what keeps the family units in harmony," Furuyama explains, noting that women are frequently expected to yield to maintain peace, particularly within marriage. This cultural dynamic creates a troubling pattern where women's boundaries become secondary to relationship stability.
The discussion delves into how historical trauma, like the "comfort women" phenomenon during Japanese occupation of Korea, may contribute to intergenerational patterns affecting bodily autonomy today.
Beyond cultural factors, the conversation examines how the hypersexualization of Asian women in Western media complicates matters, particularly in interracial relationships. These stereotypes often lead to objectification and assumptions about compliance that further undermine consent. Yet despite these challenges, Furuyama sees hope in younger generations who are determined to "break the generational trauma" and reclaim their sexual autonomy.
For clinicians, educators, and anyone concerned with healthy relationships, this discussion offers crucial insights into supporting women from collectivist cultures as they navigate the complex terrain of sexual consent. The conversation underscores that preventing trauma from unwanted sex requires comprehensive education about consent, boundaries, and communication that begins in childhood and respects cultural contexts while empowering individual choice.
Amy Furuyama is a 1.5 gen Korean American immigrant, licensed clinical social worker and sex therapist in Orange County, California. Amy is passionate about working with Asian American and BIPOC communities to help individuals reclaim their sexuality in a way that is empowering and life affirming.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Hello, sex Therapy 101.
Friends, you notice I mighthave taken a break, but we're
back and we're excited and I'mreally passionate about this new
series that I'm going to beoffering to all of you.
I haven't disappeared.
I've been working on someprojects that are really going
to be offering to all of you.
I haven't disappeared.
I've been working on someprojects that are really
meaningful to me, and one ofthose is a book for the public
(00:30):
about my research aboutregarding long-term outcomes of
consenting to unwanted sex, orduty sex as we sometimes call it
, and in doing that, adding tomy own research over the year,
you'll see my hair change, myface change, because these were
all recorded over the course ofa year and I wanted to talk to
(00:53):
experts about the culturalimplications or cultural beliefs
or the cultural ideas amongdifferent communities in the US
that might protect peopleagainst negative outcomes and
that might actually kind ofpromote people into some of the
more negative outcomes.
And that is the series I haveto offer you.
(01:17):
I'm really excited.
It's been really meaningful tome, it's been enlightening to me
, it's really helped me makesure that this book is what I
want it to be for all of you.
So, with no ado, here we go.
This is going to be the introfor the whole series, and I'll
give you a little bit of a biofor each, and then we'll jump
into the recording of theinterview.
(01:38):
I hope you enjoy thisconversation with Amy Furiyama,
who is a Korean Americanimmigrant, a licensed clinical
social worker, a sex therapistin Orange County.
She's passionate about workingwith Asian, american and the
BIPOC communities to help themreclaim their sexuality in a way
(01:58):
that's empowering and lifeaffirming.
I appreciated her perspectiveso much.
I hope you enjoy thisconversation with Amy.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Yeah, I'm excited for this interview and looking
forward to talking to you.
So, yeah, super excited.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
I'm really grateful you consented and were
enthusiastic and wanted to chatabout this.
I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Yeah, yeah, thank you for reaching out.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
All right.
So that first question is youknow you took a look at my
research, which is supergenerous, and I was curious
about from your lens ofsexuality and relationships.
How would you interpret this,Like what do you see is
happening with this research?
How would you explain it, likewith your clinical lens?
Speaker 2 (02:50):
yeah, yeah, yeah, um.
So, firstly, like, when I sawyour video about your research
and saw the results of it, um, Ijust found myself just being
like, wow, this really checksout with what I've been hearing
also from my clients that it waslike I was like, oh, like some
(03:13):
of the, even some of the quotesthat some of your participants
had said it was like familiarwords.
Right, yeah, it's like there wasso much um resonance in and
kind of the woman that I'veworked with, um, I remember
there's this one quote, you know, you, you mentioned that a
participant said she just needsto give in to sex, to just she'd
(03:35):
rather do that than deal withhis emotions.
I was like, oh yeah, like I, Ifeel like I've heard that.
So I think, um, there was justso much again like similar,
similar expressions that I'veheard.
And so, yeah, when I, when Isaw your, when I read about your
research, it was like, oh yeah,like, totally, everything makes
(03:56):
sense, like I can see thathappening, terms of like what I,
what do I see happening in thisresearch?
Um, I saw that you know that Ireally wanted to educate my
clients from what I kind of sawin your research, so that it can
be kind of enlightening forthem and kind of like normalize
(04:19):
that they're not alone, becauseI think how many?
of.
I think a lot of people and andmaybe this has also been your
experience in sex therapy islike people feel alone in their
struggles.
So I think like wow, there's aresearch that kind of shares
similar experiences and you'renot alone.
So I think it can be reallyhelpful in that way, like hey,
(04:43):
if you kind of continue inengaging in the duty, sex like
it doesn't mean really bode wellfor your mental health in in
the long run in the long runyeah, yeah, and that you're um,
there could be some sort of likehyper vigilance that could like
kind of go on and any symptomsof trauma like, oh, this is,
(05:06):
this is serious, let's.
Speaker 1 (05:07):
Let's kind of tackle this yeah, yeah, it was
interesting because I was like,oh, I've heard these things from
my clients too and I think itprobably is really validating.
I've gotten a few emails whenI've kind of released my
research that they said thatthey're like I thought I was the
only one.
It's really fantastic to belike there's 54% that is having
(05:28):
a similar experience to me, butI never hear about it and so I
feel alone.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Is that kind of what you meantby, like, what do you see
happening in this research?
Like, what would I do withinformation?
Speaker 1 (05:39):
Yeah.
And also, how do you interpretit?
Like we've all got differenttheoretical orientations, right.
So someone might be like, oh,this may be like kind of an
existential crisis of who am I.
Or someone else, through theirown different theoretical lens,
might say this is what'shappening.
Or, you know, it's a congruenceissue, or it's a consent issue,
or it's a yeah, I mean, we'veall got those different
(06:03):
trainings and differenttheoretical orientations and
just kind of curious how otherpeople interpret it or see it.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
And yeah, yeah, um, I'm thinking of it from like
also like a systems perspective.
I'm curious about kind of howall this, how the system kind of
play a role in in womenexperiencing this.
So I think that's kind of whereI'm coming from, um, especially
(06:31):
with my population, with asianamerican women, I think, just
like um even down to like theirimmigration, um like when did
you even move over to the UnitedStates?
How integrated are you withAmerican culture, levels of
acculturation?
(06:51):
How are you embedded into yourfaith?
There's a lot of like religiouscommunities in, especially for
Koreans, like there's there arereally plugged into the
christian church.
So kind of see, kind of likehow could all these different
things also influence how nowyou are responding to ccus.
(07:17):
Is that is it okay?
Speaker 1 (07:18):
yeah, cus, yeah, yeah , yeah I agree, I'm I'm an lmft,
so I'm rooted in systems, andso that makes total sense of me
too is how I was seeing this asbigger than just a personal
issue, but that it's influencedby so much more.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah thatthat population.
(07:43):
What are some specific aspectsof that community culture that
might promote women to consent,or encourage women to consent,
to unwanted sex?
Speaker 2 (07:55):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So I was thinking about thisand I was thinking, maybe before
I answer this question, I thinkit's probably important to
share like my identities, sokind of share my
intersectionalities.
I'm a 1.5 generation immigrantfrom South Korea.
I moved to the United Stateswhen I was six years old.
Now I'm 39 years old, so I'vebeen here for 33 years.
(08:20):
I'm quite familiar with theAmerican ways and the norms and
all that stuff, so I had a lotof time to acculturate to the
society.
Um, so my answers will be kindof based on just kind of my own
lived experience and I want tomake it just kind of emphasize
that this is my individual kindof what I've seen, and, of
(08:40):
course, my experience isn'tgoing to be all the other Asian
American women.
So just wanted to put it outthere.
Thank you, yeah, yeah, so yeah,and also noting that with Asian
Americans that there are likedifferent groups, right, like so
there's Koreans, chinese,japanese, indian, filipino, but
(09:02):
Vietnamese.
So, but in maybe more of ageneral sense, though, I think,
just in my personal experienceand in my practice with the
Asian culture, there's kind oflike this idea of like
collectivism versusindividualism.
Yeah, sure, it's kind of likewhat is for the greater good,
what keeps the family units inharmony for the greater good,
(09:27):
what keeps the family units inharmony.
And sometimes that means thatnot all, but sometimes it means
that women, maybe, are more ofthese caretaking more
traditional roles and thatthere's really more defined
roles.
In the culture, and I'm eventhinking at least in the Korean
culture, there's a strong senseof hierarchy and like this is
(09:52):
where you belong, this is whereyou belong, and there's almost
like like levels.
So, for instance, in the Koreanlanguage we have something
called the honorific language.
So, down to the language, wehave a language that we reserve
for people who are older than us.
So again, it's kind of likeokay, well, if you're older,
(10:16):
then I have to show respect, Ihave to kind of yield to those
older, kind of yield to thoseolder, and even to this day,
when I see a Korean elderlyperson like I have this
instinctive to just like bow andthat's what I was told like you
bow and respect your elders,yeah, so like I think definitely
(10:38):
like that's a huge part and howwe have to also kind of keep
the harmony of the family unit,which may sometimes mean that if
you're struggling in yourmarriage like kind of have to
just suck it up and deal with it.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
Like the greater good would supersede what you
personally wanted for yourself.
Exactly yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:01):
Yeah, yeah.
So it's kind of like oh, do Ihave a voice here, do I not?
Well, I have to kind of just be, you know, be in this role to
make sure that you know I'mbeing a good mother, a good wife
.
Speaker 1 (11:17):
um, like, let me just yield to what my husband wants
and that's seen as virtuous orgood, or the yielding is a
positive virtue.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, like it's just what you do to
keep the peace and harmony inthe family unit.
Um, so like you don't evenquestion it, like, oh, I should
do what my husband tells me todo.
And then there's, of course,the idea of patriarchy.
In Asian American cultures,kind of like men are prized,
(11:56):
like they are number one.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
In that hierarchy.
Speaker 2 (12:00):
Yeah, yeah, like even like growing up.
So I'm the oldest daughter andI have a younger brother.
I remember just like fightingwith my younger brother and then
my grandmother saw that I likepushed my brother.
She was so mad how dare youpush the son?
So she smacked me like youdon't do that to your brother.
(12:21):
And I was like I rememberthinking, wow, like there must
be something different about meas a woman or as a female that
I'm not allowed to show mydistress with my brother.
Yeah, because he was surprised.
And my aunt also had twodaughters and then she didn't
(12:43):
want to have any more kids, butshe said she felt pressure to
try for another one because itwasn't she only had daughters.
So she had a third child and itwas a son.
So they stopped after that.
But there's this idea like youmust bear a son to carry on the,
the last name, probably inculture, like you must have that
um to carry on our lineage, um.
(13:06):
So there's that um.
So yeah, and and just again, Imean I'm more obviously more
familiar with the korean culturebecause I'm korean, but in in
korea there's such high rates ofdomestic violence it's okay,
ridiculously high.
I think I read somewhere like46% of DV cases against women
(13:27):
were by intimate partners inKorea.
Yeah, it's so normalized therewhere women are like wow, this
is just what happens.
And if you have that kind ofmentality and then you move to
the United States more recently,then that's very much ingrained
(13:49):
into how you kind of relate inyour marriage, in your
relationships, like, oh well, Iguess, like it's normal to be
hit or it's normal to be abused,so like the sense of like, do I
even have a voice here?
But the interesting thing is itwas actually in Korea.
(14:13):
In South Korea, there was amovement that happened in the
late 2010s the 4B movement.
Because women were so fed up,they're pissed off, they're like
screw this, like we're tired ofthe domestic violence, we're
tired of being paid less thanmen, so, um, they kind of had
this movements right now.
(14:33):
I think you might have heardabout it recently I have.
Speaker 1 (14:36):
Yeah, but explain it because yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
So it's called 4b movements, because the 4b's b is
like it's a Korean word, so Idon't know all of them, but it's
like P1, it's like saying no tomarriage, sex dating and having
children.
Like these are the things womenwe will like no longer engage
in, because screw the patriarchy.
So we're gonna like really likeget back at you.
(14:59):
So there are women who are justcompletely avoiding all that
because they're so fed up withthe violence against women as a
form of resistance, right, yeah?
yeah, yeah, totally like we'regonna resist this.
Um, so they're trying to fightback and I'm like, yeah, but I'm
curious, like.
I'm curious like how that'sgonna actually play out in the
(15:21):
long run.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
Sure, yeah, it'll be interesting.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
Yeah, so that's that.
But yeah, I think, definitelygoing back to what are some
factors in how the communityculture can promote, cus is like
one's level of acculturation.
When did you immigrate to theUnited States?
How open is also thecommunication line in your
(15:48):
family unit?
Most of the time it's not superopen, at least in Asian
cultures, where we're nottalking about sex Like it's all
hush hush.
You found out about sex throughthe media porn books, friends,
right.
So it's not really talked about, so there's a lot of stigma
(16:15):
about that and so we don'treally know what's actually like
healthy sexual boundaries, likehow to have healthy
communication, healthy sexualcommunication um, there's just
complete lack of knowledge aboutbody boundaries.
So, yeah, when we don't haveall those things, it's gonna
(16:37):
affect how you kind of are inthe, in the marriage.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
That makes a lot of sense.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And another thing that kind ofcame to mind was the interracial
relationships and marriages.
Okay, and I have some AsianAmerican women.
They are dating or married to aCaucasian male.
So I am curious about,sometimes, the power dynamics
(17:10):
they play out in thoserelationships.
So there's something about kindof also those dynamics of how
could interracial relationshipmaybe even affect possible CUS,
because one's lived experienceas an Asian American woman may
(17:33):
not align with, kind of likesomeone who has a different
culture outside of the Asianculture.
Like I'm curious about that too.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
Yeah, and let me see if maybe some of my thoughts are
aligning with your thoughts ofdo you think sometimes it's
possible then for a Caucasianmale to maybe exploit that known
submissiveness of the Asianculture and like want that be
attracted to, that activelypursue that?
Is that kind of what, where youwere headed with that idea of
the interracial, or am I takingit too far?
Speaker 2 (18:02):
Um, I could, I, I can , I can see that happening.
Maybe even, like, if it's notconscious, maybe on a
subconscious level, that couldbe happening, because that is
definitely true, because Asianwomen are very hyper-sexualized,
right, we are considered exotic, submissive and we're even in a
(18:33):
porn category, right, right,yeah, so what does that mean,
right?
So what does that mean that canlead to?
Maybe the sense of likedehumanizing asian women, where,
um, this is more like, we'relike, objectified in a way,
right, and when Asian women areobjectified, we're not going to
be treated very well, we're notgoing to be seen as someone who
(18:57):
has a voice.
And I think that is reallyprevalent here in the United
States, where I've heard, evenjust like, some people in like,
just what I've heard is like,I've heard men say like, oh yeah
, I'm really into Asian womenbecause they seem like they'll
just do whatever I want, or likethey'll just, you know, I'm
(19:19):
just like, oh, that's sodisgusting.
Um, yeah, things like that.
I think definitely there's kindof like the, the cultural
promotion of cus through the, um, hypersexualization of asian
american women and sometimes,yeah, maybe that could happen
where, whether some men know itor not, that they are maybe
(19:40):
seeking maybe that type ofdynamic.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
Yeah, agreed yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
Yeah, and another thing came to mind as I was
thinking about it.
This question was I thinkanother cultural component that
could lead to the CUS is beingable to note each ethnic group's
cultural history, and this ideacame to mind.
(20:14):
So there's kind of like aconflicted history between Japan
and Korea, conflicted historybetween Japan and Korea.
So even as this is, I thinkit's still pretty recent, but in
the 1930s to 1940s, japanoccupied Korea and they took
(20:44):
tens of thousands of Koreangirls and women to be comfort
women.
Speaker 1 (20:46):
Okay, this is is new to me.
Speaker 2 (20:47):
I'm so glad you're teaching me this, okay yeah,
yeah, okay, okay, yeah, yeah, so, um, so the japanese military
wanted to have women to have sexwith just at their disposal,
like, oh, I just wanna you know.
And the japanese militaryagreed to provide this for them,
(21:08):
thinking that this willdecrease um levels of rape,
because we're going to give itour stamp of approval, yeah,
yeah yeah, yeah, um, and theythought that it could maybe help
reduce, uh, I guess, like theamount of venereal diseases that
(21:31):
were going around during thattime.
So let's just have like a placewhere you guys can all just have
sex with women.
So it's more contained.
Actually, it backfired and itincreased more rape and more
bacterial diseases, but anyways.
So this is a really huge painpoint in the Korean history
because Japan did not recognizethat they held comfort women.
(21:54):
They just completely said thatdidn't happen, like completely
erased that.
This is actual historicalevents that happened.
So there were tens of thousandsof Korean girls and women
kidnapped and forced intoprostitution to serve as sex
slaves for the Japanese militaryand called comfort women right.
Speaker 1 (22:17):
Even the language was used to make this maybe noble
or a good thing, yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:23):
Yeah, yeah, they're called comfort women Like this
is your role to comfort them andtheir sexual needs.
So, um, the majority of thewomen that were kidnapped and
forced to sexual slavery arekorean girls and women, but
there were also, um, chinesewomen, I think even some
japanese women and some other,um, but the majority were Korean
(22:45):
women and they estimate as manyas, maybe, I think, 50,000 to
like 200,000 girls possiblycould have been in this
situation.
Wow, so that, and just knowingthat, I'm just thinking about
how trauma is stored in ourbones and our muscles and our
(23:09):
bodies, okay, yeah, and how thiscould maybe even lead to that
intergenerational trauma where.
Korean women maybe, arestruggling with this idea.
That is my body, really my own.
Or is it for in the service ofsomeone else, especially if
(23:29):
there's this really traumaticexperience, at least in our, in
our culture.
Yeah, I'm just I think.
When I think about that, Iwonder what could have been
trickled down into the Koreanwoman today If my ancestors were
(23:50):
possibly in sexual slavery.
How much of that messagingcould get passed down
generations to generations.
Now let's say that someone whohad an ancestor who was a sex
slave, a prostitute, and is nowhere in the United States and
(24:11):
she's trying to figure out herown self and her identity, and
now she's in a relationship Iwould be so curious if there's
kind of that, remnants of thatin her body, where she's
struggling to speak up andsaying I don't want to have sex
with you.
Yeah, it's.
I think that's what really kindof came to mind and I'll be
(24:32):
kind of curious, you know, forkind of like the other um groups
, like asian um groups, likewhat is their history that is
also being passed down to theworld.
Speaker 1 (24:41):
Yeah, I don't think it's too far of a reach.
We I don't know that we havedata about that, but we do have
data about the Holocaust and thegenerational trauma that's
followed, and so I don't thinkit's too far of a reach to say
the similar thing would be atplay there.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:56):
Yeah, yeah for sure.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
Yeah, and there are some surviving women.
Um, there has been some memoirswhere some people have written
books about their experience.
Um, I haven't read it yet but Ithink definitely just like even
being able to um acknowledgethe, the, the cultural history
(25:20):
of each groups and how thatcould even show up in um c us
would beUS would be.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
it would be really interesting yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
Yeah, and I think just kind of another thing that
I was kind of looking intoonline just cause I was curious
more about it.
After reading about yourresearch, I kind of was like I
want to kind of read what's outthere too.
So I think I read that there,with Asian Americans, there's
also um a later age of sexualdebut, there's more conservative
(25:51):
, um ideas about sex andengaging in sex, sex or sexual
kind of things, um.
So I think maybe I'll be curiousif, like kind of like the later
age, you have your sexual debut, then maybe you don't maybe
have less time to be able toeven practice, like asserting
(26:13):
your boundaries or speaking up,because if someone's first
sexual debut is now they'remarried, then like you don't, in
some ways you haven't been ableto practice that too much,
right?
So I think that could possiblyplay a role as well, just at a
later age of sexual debut.
But yeah, I think it'simportant because Asian
(26:35):
Americans are also consideredthe fastest growing racial group
in the United States, whichmeans that there are going to be
a lot more immigrants, peoplecoming in to the United States
and immigrating to the UnitedStates, a lot of Asian Americans
.
So that could also play a rolein how they may show up in their
(26:57):
own sexual kind of experienceshere in the United States.
Speaker 1 (27:01):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, Did we hit your bullet points?
This is fantastic yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
I yeah, Did we hit your bullet points?
Speaker 1 (27:08):
They're all.
This is fantastic.
Yeah, yeah, I think so.
Okay, let me know if we didn't.
No-transcript.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
Yeah, you know what I was.
I really struggled to answerthis question.
Okay, they're like not much.
No, I'm just kidding.
No, no, really.
Yeah, I was really like justlike racking my brain.
I was like what are some?
Because I think, unfortunately,I can only think about the
negative things.
Like, yeah, the negative thingsjust like popped up immediately
.
I was like, oh yeah, this andthis and this and this, but
(28:03):
protective factors.
I was like dang like, what arethis and this and this and this
but protective factors?
I was like dang like, what arewhat is protective?
I really struggle with this.
So I'd be really curious, whatother?
Maybe if you're alsointerviewing other Asian
American sex therapists like I'mcurious what they would say.
But like, I was like, I waslike maybe, possibly.
I mean, this idea came to mindand I was like I don't know if
(28:25):
I'm reaching here too, but I waslike maybe because, um,
typically asian americans, likewe, we like value higher
education.
So yeah, I'm curious with withthis value of getting higher
education and like, yeah, likeit's important to have that.
(28:45):
Could there possibility, couldthere be a possibility that the
more education one receives inUnited States, that there may be
possibly a sense of more likeopenness or expansiveness and
learning about different ways tomaybe just even interact in a
(29:06):
relational setting.
Maybe more sense of openness tobe like, yeah, this thing isn't
working between me and myhusband or my partner, like we
got to figure something out andmaybe educating themselves about
.
Okay, well, let's read books.
Speaker 1 (29:21):
Let's yeah, prioritizing, looking, learning,
yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah read books,let's, yeah prioritizing looking
, learning, yeah, yeah, yeah,yeah.
Speaker 2 (29:29):
I think that was probably the one thing that came
up for me um, maybe that and umanother.
Another thing possibly but itcan also backfire is if we do
have kind of this sense of like,let's create harmony within the
family unit.
Maybe sometimes it can work outin a positive way, that there
(29:55):
can be a sense of accountability, like, oh wow, I see that
you're suffering so much.
This is also affecting, maybe,the wellbeing of our family so
much.
This is also affecting, maybe,the well-being of our family.
Um, maybe there'saccountability from other people
in the family unit or mayberelatives.
Maybe that could also lead toone maybe even seeking couples
(30:18):
therapy because they're like hey, let's figure this out clearly,
something's going on here.
Yeah, maybe the sense of liketrying to keep harmony in the
family unit could be positive,but I was thinking the flip side
of that is it can backfire,where a woman can be like oh, I
need to keep harmony so let mejust, she's lower in that
(30:40):
hierarchy.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
There's more of a likelihood that she'd augment
herself to for the greater goodthan for the male to look at the
female's distress and say let'schange things.
Yeah, because that hierarchyyeah exactly, yeah, said it
beautifully.
Speaker 2 (30:54):
Yeah, I was thinking that too.
Like in one way it can behelpful, in one way it cannot,
because like, oh well, I don'twant to rock the boat here.
So let me just deal with thissituation where I'm clearly not
happy about having sex with myhusband, but all these people
count on me, or like I.
You know people are, um, gonnabe very upset if I speak up
(31:17):
about this.
So let me just try to deal with, deal with it on my own or see,
yeah, see if it can be justdealt with between me and my
partner.
So, um, so yeah.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
I'm less likely, but that is one value that could be
used in a different direction,possibly in the future.
Speaker 2 (31:37):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So I was thinking we can helpor maybe not help.
It's so like, probably in veryindividual case by case.
But yeah, that's the only thingthat really came up and then
like what could be protectivefactors?
Speaker 1 (31:58):
awesome.
Okay, if we go on to questionfour, do you feel comfortable
moving to the next one?
Yeah, okay, so you know you'rean expert in this field.
What do you see as a solutionfor these women?
How would you work with a woman?
I don't know that you work withcouples.
I think you work with justindividuals right now.
(32:19):
Is that right?
It's a very few couples.
How?
Speaker 2 (32:24):
would you work with this woman?
Yeah, yeah, um, I think a lotof it is education, educating,
um again, like kind of, as Imentioned, like normalizing that
you're not alone, that um thatfor you to be able to navigate
(32:48):
this let's talk about.
You know, let's have some goodsex education and
psychoeducation around consent.
Um, let's talk about boundarieswhat does that look like for
you?
Let's talk about, um, thesexual health principles.
Like.
What does that look like foryou?
Let's talk about, um, thesexual health principles.
Like, what does that look like?
Yeah, they're kind of reallyincorporating all these things
(33:10):
so they are able to have a morekind of holistic view and how
they can navigate the situation,instead of just feeling like,
oh my gosh, like this reallysucks and like I can't do
anything about it.
But I think there's so muchempowerment with education, so
just being able to be like, hey,this is how you assert yourself
(33:30):
, because I think so many of thetimes they don't even know how.
Yeah, one of my chinese um,american female she's once told
me she's like I didn't know, Ihave a voice and there's tears
in her eyes.
I didn't know I have a voice andI'm like they're like
cheerleader.
Like you can, you can speak up,like you are, you know you, you
(33:51):
can, you totally can.
So, like just being able to bethere and tell them like you do
have a voice, like you canassert yourself, and let's kind
of learn more like baby steps onhow to get you there, because I
don't want it to be too likeoverwhelming for them, because
they're very much ingrained inlike how they have been
(34:14):
functioning.
So, yeah, a lot of education.
I think support is really big.
Um, I'm hoping to eventuallystart a support group for asian
american women here, um, becauseI don't see any, yeah, yeah,
and and maybe some sort of like,um, like building intimacy for
(34:38):
asian american women here in insouthern california, something
where where another Asian womancan see another Asian woman in
the room and be like, wow, we'reall kind of in this together
and I'm not alone and we can allsupport each other.
Speaker 1 (34:56):
So being able to have like a support system, I think
could be really helpful forwomen or a couple experiencing
this for sure helpful for women,or a couple experiencing this
for sure, and I imagine thatworking on assertiveness skills
would be more challenging withyour population than maybe a
Caucasian born American girl,woman, right, because we've
(35:20):
already got maybe more messages.
Culturally, that's okay to beassertive, whereas the Asian
American population it might beharder to want to learn.
Speaker 2 (35:29):
I will believe that it would be good for them to
learn assertiveness skills oryeah, yeah, I could definitely
see that yeah, including thatinto their value system might be
more difficult yeah, yeah, itit definitely can, because
they're not used to it.
It wasn't modeled to themgrowing up.
Modeling might be oh, dad isyou know he's the breadwinner,
(35:53):
he gets the final say mom defers, although you know I have
actually had some clients whosaid it was maybe the opposite.
But it again, you know, it'svery individual case by case.
But yeah, for the majority it'slike wow, I have a voice, can I
speak up?
Or just being able to say I amallowed to have boundaries, like
, yeah, you totally can, yeah,yeah.
(36:16):
So I think that's and I thinkmaybe also the reason why I went
into this field was I couldn'tfind and this is more of a
personal thing I couldn't findan Asian American sex therapist.
When I was looking for one,yeah, I said, where are they?
There were very few.
And I mean I found someone elseand she's Caucasian but she's
(36:36):
amazing, I love her so much.
But, yeah, I remember justthinking like it's, it'll be
nice for other Asian Americanwomen to see a familiar face in
a way.
Absolutely, tell them thesethings.
There's maybe more sense ofmaybe trust.
Yeah, section where, oh,there's a Korean American woman
(36:58):
telling me how boundaries hashelped her.
Maybe it could help me too.
Speaker 1 (37:03):
Absolutely, yeah, has helped her and maybe it could
help me too.
Absolutely yeah.
So a little bit ofrepresentation too in the field
of, in this area, especiallysexuality, for asian americans
to see other asian americanstalking about sex, breaking the
taboo, yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:19):
Learning assertiveness, skills, skills
yeah and and um, I think, uh, inthe beginning I was a little
nervous.
I was like, oh my gosh, likeI'm in some ways like presenting
myself to the world as a sextherapist and I noticed even my
own stuff coming up.
Like, oh my gosh, I'm a littlebit embarrassed, like can I
(37:41):
really have an Instagram pagewith like talking about, um,
talking about kink and fetishes,and like what does that mean?
And like what does it mean tohave good sexual communication?
Like I, oh, I was like I was alittle nervous about doing that,
but I was like you know what,amy?
Like this is the work.
(38:02):
Like you just put yourself outthere in the universe and this
will help others in their ownsexual journey.
So I was like, okay, just do it.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
Absolutely, I totally resonate with that.
I have that experience even todaily, you know, because I have
a Mormon background and there's,it's it's deep stuff to say.
Can I use the word clitoris?
Can I post the word?
Speaker 2 (38:26):
clitoris in a public forum yeah, although on
Instagram they're so censored,so you'll write clitoris Right,
right, yeah, yeah, but yeahdefinitely.
Speaker 1 (38:36):
Yeah, awesome, okay, and so clinically, what we see
here?
Moving to that question five,do you think this qualifies
clinically, as you know, in theDSM, hypoactive desire interest
disorder, or do you think thisis something else?
You know, because I've seensome people being like, oh, this
(38:59):
is the diagnosis, so we justgot to do desire interventions.
And I'm wondering if you'relike, yeah, pretty solid in that
or if if looking at it moresystemically has you leaning
different ways yeah, definitelya different way.
Speaker 2 (39:15):
Yeah, I read the question and I was like, oh okay
, so I think I also have kind ofmixed feelings about the DSM.
But I know why it's there, like,yeah, we need some sort of
criteria so people are maybebetter organized and how they
kind of do their treatment plan,and it's needed for, like, the
(39:35):
billing and code.
So I get it like why we had thedsm, but I, you know, just kind
of want to put it out there.
I have mixed feelings about theDSM, yeah, so when I read your
question I was thinking I thinkwe shouldn't pathologize women's
sexuality.
So that's what came to mind,like it's kind of like at least
(40:00):
in your study, it seemed to memore like this is a woman's
choice to you know, she doesn't,obviously she's not thrilled to
experience CUS.
But I was thinking about kindof like what your research said,
where kind of they're doingthis in some ways as a.
(40:21):
I think it's like a copingmechanism, right, like this is a
way where they're trying tosurvive and maintain, um, some
sort of sense of stability intheir relationship and, um, it
seems more like it is more, yeah, like a relational issue than
like hypoactive this like amedical diagnosis of there's
(40:44):
something wrong with you yeah,yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
So so, um, I'm thinking like ifwe had to like give a code, then
maybe like a z63 relationalissue, but yeah, I, I think that
and I'm not sure if it meetscriteria for hypoactive desire,
(41:06):
but I don't know.
I'm actually curious, like,what do you think?
Speaker 1 (41:10):
I know I'm curious too about other thoughts, but I
think initially, women and theirpartners come to me saying the
woman has a problem, she doesn'twant sex, and you know they're
like it might be hormonal and alot of times, especially in this
situation, I'm like I thinkthis is systemic and relational
and as much as we want to putall the focus on the woman to
(41:34):
figure out how to make her wantsex when she doesn't want to, I
don't think it's.
I don't think it's a diagnosis,so much as it's a systemic
problem.
Yeah, that they arrived totogether.
Yeah, because of the dynamicsof the relationship or the
(41:54):
culture or whatever.
And I might also see it maybemore as CPTSD.
Yeah, ptsd, yeah, rather thanlow desire, where these coping
mechanisms are her trying to dothis difficult situation well
(42:14):
and it not going well, right,like it being more about coping.
And maybe I mean I was shockedthat the majority of the women
we interviewed you know when youscore the PCLS, it was like 54%
were having moderate to severetrauma responses.
I'm like I don't know that wehave thought about sexual trauma
(42:34):
this way before.
Speaker 2 (42:36):
yeah, no yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, and that hopefully
we can do something about thattoo, so that it doesn't get to
that point for the woman.
Speaker 1 (42:48):
Right.
What would you say if you knowI'll use that magic?
You know overused question.
But if you had the magic wand,how would you prevent?
What would you wish for youngerAsian Americans to kind of
prevent this from being part oftheir story or part of their
experience as they navigatetheir adulthood and their
(43:11):
relationships?
Speaker 2 (43:14):
Yeah, um, this is a.
Is this a segue, kind of, tothe question?
Speaker 1 (43:17):
Yeah, yeah, six, yeah , what, what would?
What do you wish you could door what do you think the
solution is for that?
Like the prevention.
Speaker 2 (43:24):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
And um, when I read thatquestion, I actually noticed my
my body felt sense of overwhelm.
Oh yeah, because I think I was.
I so badly wanted to be more of.
How can we have a solution forwomen to not even experience the
(43:47):
U?
S in the first place?
And I was like that's why Ithink that's what I really would
want If we had a magic wand.
It was that that we're not evenhaving women experiencing this
in the first place then.
But then that got me thinkinglike if we don't want women to
even be in that situation in thefirst place, then like I feel
(44:08):
overwhelmed because I was likewe have to tackle like these big
systemic things which is likethe, you know, like patriarchy
and sexism and like racism andlike gender roles, and I was
like, oh, I was like OK, I meanlike calm down.
Speaker 1 (44:24):
So I was like OK, neuroscope, neuroscope, I think
(45:04):
the things that we have to do,at least I think, for Asian
American women to kind of helpthem.
Speaker 2 (45:07):
Teaching the moms too about body boundaries, consents
, having the kids be able toname their body parts, teaching
women so that they can quicklydiscern what they're
experiencing is coercion or notcoercion, and knowing for
themselves what's okay andwhat's not okay.
Communication, and just likebeing able to have all of that I
think could be so helpful, notjust asian american women, but
(45:29):
just for everyone in all of theUnited States.
I think could be a really goodstep.
But yeah, I mean that's why wedo the work we do right.
Speaker 1 (45:44):
And I like that you painted that as a developmental
thing, not a do this one thingthis one time, but you see it as
this prevention be reallydevelopmental, with messages all
along the way, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (45:58):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, because I was even when I was
thinking about, like, what couldbabies be?
How can babies be learningabout consent and body?
It goes back to the parent.
The parent is also modeling tothem.
Hey, it's okay that you knowyou're curious about your
genitals.
I'm not going to shame you forkind of getting curious and
touching your, your penis oryour vulva, like this is part of
(46:20):
healthy exploration, versussmacking the hand and say, oh,
dirty, dirty, don't do that.
Yeah, as that early of an age,as in in their baby states, like
these are the things that wekind of carry with us through
our entire life.
So how do we teach that?
Well then, the parents alsoneed some good sex ed as well.
(46:40):
Yeah, yeah their whole, like yousaid, yeah, the developmental
piece is absolutely andgenerational.
Speaker 1 (46:47):
I like that you brought it to that too.
Speaker 2 (46:48):
Yeah, yes, for sure, so all of that, um, yeah, so
like uh also bringing being ableto create sense of support and
community with for the asianamerican women, and sex therapy
um teaching communication skillsand all of that good stuff.
Speaker 1 (47:09):
So yeah, Do you see?
This wasn't I didn't give youthis question.
It's okay if you hadn't thoughtabout it, but do you see the
Asian American communitybecoming more open to these
ideas of a little moreindividualism, a little more
assertiveness, more consentbetween genders?
Speaker 2 (47:33):
I think definitely more the younger generation, for
sure.
Okay, yeah, I, I see more of myclients are more in the 20s to
40s age range and a lot of themare first-time therapy seekers.
And then they're like I heard onhit tiktok that maybe therapy
might be good for me, orinstagram, and, and sometimes
(47:59):
the the younger generation,they're like empowered, like I
want to break the generationaltrauma that my ancestors have
carried on.
I want to be the one to do thatand I'm like, yeah, so like,
when I see's so like wow, it'sreally inspiring and there's
definitely a little bit moresense of openness when we talk
(48:20):
about consent and healthy sexualcommunication, because they're
like sponges, like they want tolearn more.
Typically, what I've seen isthey want to have a more
positive and a better lifeexperience than what their
parents had to go through,because they see their parents
just holding on to all so muchtraumas from the immigration,
(48:43):
like escaping communistcountries, escaping war, and
they're like wow, wow, this isreally affecting my parents and
it's affecting me too, and I'mcarrying all these traumas
myself, but I want to be the oneto kind of change that.
Speaker 1 (48:57):
So a lot of courage, a lot of determination in the
younger generation in thecommunity yeah, I think so.
Speaker 2 (49:04):
I think definitely more openness, so with at least
a younger generation.
I I do think there could beyounger generation.
I do think there could be somechanges with maybe the older
generation, but I thinkdefinitely the younger
generation is a little bit morelike expansive and open to these
things.
Speaker 1 (49:23):
Okay thanks for letting me throw a question in
there yeah, yeah, yeah yeah no,that's again yeah.
And then the last one was likedo you have any op-ed commentary
?
As you watch the video andmaybe you thought about the idea
you could have had completelyfantastic ideas outside of what
I was thinking.
Speaker 2 (50:01):
You know I don't want to be looking at op-ed
commentary or things that youthought of with this kind of
distinguished what coercionmeans?
I think it was like was itverbal coercion but no physical
coercion, right?
Speaker 1 (50:21):
Yeah, yeah, and that wasn't necessarily my work, that
was borrowing from I think itwas Zoe Peterson, who's at the
Kinsey Institute, or else it wasMuehlenhardt who's at the
Kinsey Institute, or else orelse it was Muehlenhardt, but
they did a research study aboutcoercion being on like a
spectrum and that, like forcedphysical coercion was on the
(50:42):
most damaging end.
But then coercion can also beverbal and emotional, um, on
another end.
And they're like, does thisstill create damage?
That was kind of their questionat the end of their research
and I'm like, well, I'm going tosee, yeah, and then I found us,
uh, uh, an assessment of verbalcoercion and it had like 10
(51:06):
examples of you know, afteryou've said no, I think it's
called the post refusal scale,and so it was only looking at
verbal coercion of tactics thatI think a lot of people don't
recognize as coercion, wherethey keep asking, keep asking,
keep asking, or they disregardit and start taking off your
clothes, or they might out andkind of throw an emotional fit,
(51:27):
or they may make an acclaim toauthority of I'm the breadwinner
or I'm you know.
And so then the study it kindof showed which percentage of
our population saw which kind ofverbal or emotional coercion
tactics used.
Speaker 2 (51:45):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
I was just kind of curious,like do women even know what
they're experiencing?
Is the coercion, or were they I?
Speaker 1 (51:55):
don't think so.
That's why I asked it.
Like that's why at thebeginning of the study you know
one requirement I was like nohistory right, we've got to
assess for coercion that's notrecognized.
Yeah, so we can see if it wastruly consensual.
And I think only 18% of thoseresearch participants had none
(52:17):
of the emotional or verbalcoercion as present in their
relationship.
It's like, oh my gosh, okay.
Speaker 2 (52:25):
All right, yeah, and I mean I think I really loved
all the quotes that you broughtinto the studies.
Like the participants quotes,it really broadens the sense of
like realness to theirexperience.
Speaker 1 (52:38):
And.
Speaker 2 (52:39):
I remember just reading all those quotes and
just my heart breaking.
I'm like, oh my gosh, like sosad that you know these.
This is our, the realities ofmany women out there, many women
out there and um, just really,yeah, I, I really felt like this
research study was so importantand like, um, I, I want to
(53:00):
share this to my clients.
Like, hey, this is what couldhappen, and I know you want to
have a good marriage, so let'swork on these things.
And maybe that could also leadthem to be more motivated.
Like, hey, this isn't somethingthat you just wait until
decades have passed, especiallyfor like 20s 40s age range.
Like this is something that youcan actually work on now for
(53:22):
the longevity and the health ofyour relationship.
Like, let's tackle this now.
Speaker 1 (53:29):
Yeah, yeah, it could be kind of a warning bell or
like like a you know.
Here's why it's not a goodstrategy in the long run.
Is you think you may be helpingyour relationship and in the
long run, it's going to hurt youpossibly?
Speaker 2 (53:46):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly yeah.
Speaker 1 (53:49):
I I wish I could publish a book that was just the
responses of the women, becausethat was the most powerful for
me too, and the most beautifuland the most relatable.
And sometimes in research weforget that there are people
behind the statistic and andthat was the most important part
to me in the study was theirown words.
(54:11):
Yeah, I'm glad they touched you.
Speaker 2 (54:13):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, and I'm I'm so glad
you did this research, um,because it just like certain
faces of my client just poppedto mind like oh yeah, well, I
remember that client said sheactually used the word duty sex.
So I just did, I just provideduty sex and I just see how much
, how long they can hold himover till the next time.
(54:34):
This is very intelligent asianamerican woman, like highly
educated and in her 30s, and I'mlike oof, this is that's not
good for you guys.
Speaker 1 (54:45):
Oh yeah, we got some work to do, but yeah any last
thoughts before I let you getback to your own life.
Speaker 2 (54:59):
No, I think I actually had a question but I
have a client coming in twominutes.
But I think the last questionwas just like I was curious
really about the level of maybehow one identifies in their
religious faith in thesesettings, Just because I work
with a lot of women who have hadupbringing in the Christian
(55:23):
church and have stayed in theChristian church or they've
deconstructed from it.
So I was just like I wonder, Iwas just kind of curious about
that.
Speaker 1 (55:32):
Agreed, agreed, most of the demographics were
homogenous.
Where this was, mostly educated, white, cis, christian women
and I've got that question toois is this a religious issue?
Is this a US issue?
Is this kind of a female issue,you know, and so that's why I'm
reaching out to these differentcommunities to be like do you
(55:54):
see this here too?
Is this a white woman issue?
Is this a purity culture issue?
Is you know?
Because the demographics wereso similar.
I hope someday the researchwill be replicated, maybe with
diverse populations, but untilthen, I'm just trying to learn
from all the communities aroundme.
Of what do you think?
You know, the experts in thosecommunities, what do you think
(56:15):
when you look at this?
I've got the same question.
Speaker 2 (56:18):
Yeah, yeah, but yeah, thank you so much.
I really found it so enjoyableto kind of look into your
research and do this with you.
So thank you.
Speaker 1 (56:29):
Thanks, amy, have a good day, bye, See you, bye-bye,
and do this with you, so thankyou.
Thanks, amy, have a good dayBye.
Hello, sex Therapy 101.
Friends, you notice I mighthave taken a break, but we're
back and we're excited and I'mreally passionate about this new
series that I'm going to beoffering to all of you.
I haven't disappeared.
I've been working on someprojects that are really going
to be offering to all of you.
I haven't disappeared.
I've been working on someprojects that are really
meaningful to me, and one ofthose is a book for the public
(00:30):
about my research aboutregarding long-term outcomes of
consenting to unwanted sex, orduty sex as we sometimes call it
, and in doing that, adding tomy own research over the year,
you'll see my hair change, myface change, because these were
all recorded over the course ofa year and I wanted to talk to
(00:53):
experts about the culturalimplications or cultural beliefs
or the cultural ideas amongdifferent communities in the US
that might protect peopleagainst negative outcomes and
that might actually kind ofpromote people into some of the
more negative outcomes.
And that is the series I haveto offer you.
(01:17):
I'm really excited.
It's been really meaningful tome, it's been enlightening to me
, it's really helped me makesure that this book is what I
want it to be for all of you.
So, with no ado, here we go.
This is going to be the introfor the whole series, and I'll
give you a little bit of a biofor each, and then we'll jump
into the recording of theinterview.
(01:38):
I hope you enjoy thisconversation with Amy Furiyama,
who is a Korean Americanimmigrant, a licensed clinical
social worker, a sex therapistin Orange County.
She's passionate about workingwith Asian, american and the
BIPOC communities to help themreclaim their sexuality in a way
(01:58):
that's empowering and lifeaffirming.
I appreciated her perspectiveso much.
I hope you enjoy thisconversation with Amy.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Yeah, I'm excited for this interview and looking
forward to talking to you.
So, yeah, super excited.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
I'm really grateful you consented and were
enthusiastic and wanted to chatabout this.
I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Yeah, yeah, thank you for reaching out.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
All right.
So that first question is youknow you took a look at my
research, which is supergenerous, and I was curious
about from your lens ofsexuality and relationships.
How would you interpret this,Like what do you see is
happening with this research?
How would you explain it, likewith your clinical lens?
Speaker 2 (02:50):
yeah, yeah, yeah, um.
So, firstly, like, when I sawyour video about your research
and saw the results of it, um, Ijust found myself just being
like, wow, this really checksout with what I've been hearing
also from my clients that it waslike I was like, oh, like some
(03:13):
of the, even some of the quotesthat some of your participants
had said it was like familiarwords.
Right, yeah, it's like there wasso much um resonance in and
kind of the woman that I'veworked with, um, I remember
there's this one quote, you know, you, you mentioned that a
participant said she just needsto give in to sex, to just she'd
(03:35):
rather do that than deal withhis emotions.
I was like, oh yeah, like I, Ifeel like I've heard that.
So I think, um, there was justso much again like similar,
similar expressions that I'veheard.
And so, yeah, when I, when Isaw your, when I read about your
research, it was like, oh yeah,like, totally, everything makes
(03:56):
sense, like I can see thathappening, terms of like what I,
what do I see happening in thisresearch?
Um, I saw that you know that Ireally wanted to educate my
clients from what I kind of sawin your research, so that it can
be kind of enlightening forthem and kind of like normalize
(04:19):
that they're not alone, becauseI think how many?
of.
I think a lot of people and andmaybe this has also been your
experience in sex therapy islike people feel alone in their
struggles.
So I think like wow, there's aresearch that kind of shares
similar experiences and you'renot alone.
So I think it can be reallyhelpful in that way, like hey,
(04:43):
if you kind of continue inengaging in the duty, sex like
it doesn't mean really bode wellfor your mental health in in
the long run in the long runyeah, yeah, and that you're um,
there could be some sort of likehyper vigilance that could like
kind of go on and any symptomsof trauma like, oh, this is,
(05:06):
this is serious, let's.
Speaker 1 (05:07):
Let's kind of tackle this yeah, yeah, it was
interesting because I was like,oh, I've heard these things from
my clients too and I think itprobably is really validating.
I've gotten a few emails whenI've kind of released my
research that they said thatthey're like I thought I was the
only one.
It's really fantastic to belike there's 54% that is having
(05:28):
a similar experience to me, butI never hear about it and so I
feel alone.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Is that kind of what you meantby, like, what do you see
happening in this research?
Like, what would I do withinformation?
Speaker 1 (05:39):
Yeah.
And also, how do you interpretit?
Like we've all got differenttheoretical orientations, right.
So someone might be like, oh,this may be like kind of an
existential crisis of who am I.
Or someone else, through theirown different theoretical lens,
might say this is what'shappening.
Or, you know, it's a congruenceissue, or it's a consent issue,
or it's a yeah, I mean, we'veall got those different
(06:03):
trainings and differenttheoretical orientations and
just kind of curious how otherpeople interpret it or see it.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
And yeah, yeah, um, I'm thinking of it from like
also like a systems perspective.
I'm curious about kind of howall this, how the system kind of
play a role in in womenexperiencing this.
So I think that's kind of whereI'm coming from, um, especially
(06:31):
with my population, with asianamerican women, I think, just
like um even down to like theirimmigration, um like when did
you even move over to the UnitedStates?
How integrated are you withAmerican culture, levels of
acculturation?
(06:51):
How are you embedded into yourfaith?
There's a lot of like religiouscommunities in, especially for
Koreans, like there's there arereally plugged into the
christian church.
So kind of see, kind of likehow could all these different
things also influence how nowyou are responding to ccus.
(07:17):
Is that is it okay?
Speaker 1 (07:18):
yeah, cus, yeah, yeah , yeah I agree, I'm I'm an lmft,
so I'm rooted in systems, andso that makes total sense of me
too is how I was seeing this asbigger than just a personal
issue, but that it's influencedby so much more.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah thatthat population.
(07:43):
What are some specific aspectsof that community culture that
might promote women to consent,or encourage women to consent,
to unwanted sex?
Speaker 2 (07:55):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So I was thinking about thisand I was thinking, maybe before
I answer this question, I thinkit's probably important to
share like my identities, sokind of share my
intersectionalities.
I'm a 1.5 generation immigrantfrom South Korea.
I moved to the United Stateswhen I was six years old.
Now I'm 39 years old, so I'vebeen here for 33 years.
(08:20):
I'm quite familiar with theAmerican ways and the norms and
all that stuff, so I had a lotof time to acculturate to the
society.
Um, so my answers will be kindof based on just kind of my own
lived experience and I want tomake it just kind of emphasize
that this is my individual kindof what I've seen, and, of
(08:40):
course, my experience isn'tgoing to be all the other Asian
American women.
So just wanted to put it outthere.
Thank you, yeah, yeah, so yeah,and also noting that with Asian
Americans that there are likedifferent groups, right, like so
there's Koreans, chinese,japanese, indian, filipino, but
(09:02):
Vietnamese.
So, but in maybe more of ageneral sense, though, I think,
just in my personal experienceand in my practice with the
Asian culture, there's kind oflike this idea of like
collectivism versusindividualism.
Yeah, sure, it's kind of likewhat is for the greater good,
what keeps the family units inharmony for the greater good,
(09:27):
what keeps the family units inharmony.
And sometimes that means thatnot all, but sometimes it means
that women, maybe, are more ofthese caretaking more
traditional roles and thatthere's really more defined
roles.
In the culture, and I'm eventhinking at least in the Korean
culture, there's a strong senseof hierarchy and like this is
(09:52):
where you belong, this is whereyou belong, and there's almost
like like levels.
So, for instance, in the Koreanlanguage we have something
called the honorific language.
So, down to the language, wehave a language that we reserve
for people who are older than us.
So again, it's kind of likeokay, well, if you're older,
(10:16):
then I have to show respect, Ihave to kind of yield to those
older, kind of yield to thoseolder, and even to this day,
when I see a Korean elderlyperson like I have this
instinctive to just like bow andthat's what I was told like you
bow and respect your elders,yeah, so like I think definitely
(10:38):
like that's a huge part and howwe have to also kind of keep
the harmony of the family unit,which may sometimes mean that if
you're struggling in yourmarriage like kind of have to
just suck it up and deal with it.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
Like the greater good would supersede what you
personally wanted for yourself.
Exactly yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:01):
Yeah, yeah.
So it's kind of like oh, do Ihave a voice here, do I not?
Well, I have to kind of just be, you know, be in this role to
make sure that you know I'mbeing a good mother, a good wife
.
Speaker 1 (11:17):
um, like, let me just yield to what my husband wants
and that's seen as virtuous orgood, or the yielding is a
positive virtue.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, like it's just what you do to
keep the peace and harmony inthe family unit.
Um, so like you don't evenquestion it, like, oh, I should
do what my husband tells me todo.
And then there's, of course,the idea of patriarchy.
In Asian American cultures,kind of like men are prized,
(11:56):
like they are number one.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
In that hierarchy.
Speaker 2 (12:00):
Yeah, yeah, like even like growing up.
So I'm the oldest daughter andI have a younger brother.
I remember just like fightingwith my younger brother and then
my grandmother saw that I likepushed my brother.
She was so mad how dare youpush the son?
So she smacked me like youdon't do that to your brother.
(12:21):
And I was like I rememberthinking, wow, like there must
be something different about meas a woman or as a female that
I'm not allowed to show mydistress with my brother.
Yeah, because he was surprised.
And my aunt also had twodaughters and then she didn't
(12:43):
want to have any more kids, butshe said she felt pressure to
try for another one because itwasn't she only had daughters.
So she had a third child and itwas a son.
So they stopped after that.
But there's this idea like youmust bear a son to carry on the,
the last name, probably inculture, like you must have that
um to carry on our lineage, um.
(13:06):
So there's that um.
So yeah, and and just again, Imean I'm more obviously more
familiar with the korean culturebecause I'm korean, but in in
korea there's such high rates ofdomestic violence it's okay,
ridiculously high.
I think I read somewhere like46% of DV cases against women
(13:27):
were by intimate partners inKorea.
Yeah, it's so normalized therewhere women are like wow, this
is just what happens.
And if you have that kind ofmentality and then you move to
the United States more recently,then that's very much ingrained
(13:49):
into how you kind of relate inyour marriage, in your
relationships, like, oh well, Iguess, like it's normal to be
hit or it's normal to be abused,so like the sense of like, do I
even have a voice here?
But the interesting thing is itwas actually in Korea.
(14:13):
In South Korea, there was amovement that happened in the
late 2010s the 4B movement.
Because women were so fed up,they're pissed off, they're like
screw this, like we're tired ofthe domestic violence, we're
tired of being paid less thanmen, so, um, they kind of had
this movements right now.
(14:33):
I think you might have heardabout it recently I have.
Speaker 1 (14:36):
Yeah, but explain it because yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
So it's called 4b movements, because the 4b's b is
like it's a Korean word, so Idon't know all of them, but it's
like P1, it's like saying no tomarriage, sex dating and having
children.
Like these are the things womenwe will like no longer engage
in, because screw the patriarchy.
So we're gonna like really likeget back at you.
(14:59):
So there are women who are justcompletely avoiding all that
because they're so fed up withthe violence against women as a
form of resistance, right, yeah?
yeah, yeah, totally like we'regonna resist this.
Um, so they're trying to fightback and I'm like, yeah, but I'm
curious, like.
I'm curious like how that'sgonna actually play out in the
(15:21):
long run.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
Sure, yeah, it'll be interesting.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
Yeah, so that's that.
But yeah, I think, definitelygoing back to what are some
factors in how the communityculture can promote, cus is like
one's level of acculturation.
When did you immigrate to theUnited States?
How open is also thecommunication line in your
(15:48):
family unit?
Most of the time it's not superopen, at least in Asian
cultures, where we're nottalking about sex Like it's all
hush hush.
You found out about sex throughthe media porn books, friends,
right.
So it's not really talked about, so there's a lot of stigma
(16:15):
about that and so we don'treally know what's actually like
healthy sexual boundaries, likehow to have healthy
communication, healthy sexualcommunication um, there's just
complete lack of knowledge aboutbody boundaries.
So, yeah, when we don't haveall those things, it's gonna
(16:37):
affect how you kind of are inthe, in the marriage.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
That makes a lot of sense.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And another thing that kind ofcame to mind was the interracial
relationships and marriages.
Okay, and I have some AsianAmerican women.
They are dating or married to aCaucasian male.
So I am curious about,sometimes, the power dynamics
(17:10):
they play out in thoserelationships.
So there's something about kindof also those dynamics of how
could interracial relationshipmaybe even affect possible CUS,
because one's lived experienceas an Asian American woman may
(17:33):
not align with, kind of likesomeone who has a different
culture outside of the Asianculture.
Like I'm curious about that too.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
Yeah, and let me see if maybe some of my thoughts are
aligning with your thoughts ofdo you think sometimes it's
possible then for a Caucasianmale to maybe exploit that known
submissiveness of the Asianculture and like want that be
attracted to, that activelypursue that?
Is that kind of what, where youwere headed with that idea of
the interracial, or am I takingit too far?
Speaker 2 (18:02):
Um, I could, I, I can , I can see that happening.
Maybe even, like, if it's notconscious, maybe on a
subconscious level, that couldbe happening, because that is
definitely true, because Asianwomen are very hyper-sexualized,
right, we are considered exotic, submissive and we're even in a
(18:33):
porn category, right, right,yeah, so what does that mean,
right?
So what does that mean that canlead to?
Maybe the sense of likedehumanizing asian women, where,
um, this is more like, we'relike, objectified in a way,
right, and when Asian women areobjectified, we're not going to
be treated very well, we're notgoing to be seen as someone who
(18:57):
has a voice.
And I think that is reallyprevalent here in the United
States, where I've heard, evenjust like, some people in like,
just what I've heard is like,I've heard men say like, oh yeah
, I'm really into Asian womenbecause they seem like they'll
just do whatever I want, or likethey'll just, you know, I'm
(19:19):
just like, oh, that's sodisgusting.
Um, yeah, things like that.
I think definitely there's kindof like the, the cultural
promotion of cus through the, um, hypersexualization of asian
american women and sometimes,yeah, maybe that could happen
where, whether some men know itor not, that they are maybe
(19:40):
seeking maybe that type ofdynamic.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
Yeah, agreed yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
Yeah, and another thing came to mind as I was
thinking about it.
This question was I thinkanother cultural component that
could lead to the CUS is beingable to note each ethnic group's
cultural history, and this ideacame to mind.
(20:14):
So there's kind of like aconflicted history between Japan
and Korea, conflicted historybetween Japan and Korea.
So even as this is, I thinkit's still pretty recent, but in
the 1930s to 1940s, japanoccupied Korea and they took
(20:44):
tens of thousands of Koreangirls and women to be comfort
women.
Speaker 1 (20:46):
Okay, this is is new to me.
Speaker 2 (20:47):
I'm so glad you're teaching me this, okay yeah,
yeah, okay, okay, yeah, yeah, so, um, so the japanese military
wanted to have women to have sexwith just at their disposal,
like, oh, I just wanna you know.
And the japanese militaryagreed to provide this for them,
(21:08):
thinking that this willdecrease um levels of rape,
because we're going to give itour stamp of approval, yeah,
yeah yeah, yeah, um, and theythought that it could maybe help
reduce, uh, I guess, like theamount of venereal diseases that
(21:31):
were going around during thattime.
So let's just have like a placewhere you guys can all just have
sex with women.
So it's more contained.
Actually, it backfired and itincreased more rape and more
bacterial diseases, but anyways.
So this is a really huge painpoint in the Korean history
because Japan did not recognizethat they held comfort women.
(21:54):
They just completely said thatdidn't happen, like completely
erased that.
This is actual historicalevents that happened.
So there were tens of thousandsof Korean girls and women
kidnapped and forced intoprostitution to serve as sex
slaves for the Japanese militaryand called comfort women right.
Speaker 1 (22:17):
Even the language was used to make this maybe noble
or a good thing, yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:23):
Yeah, yeah, they're called comfort women Like this
is your role to comfort them andtheir sexual needs.
So, um, the majority of thewomen that were kidnapped and
forced to sexual slavery arekorean girls and women, but
there were also, um, chinesewomen, I think even some
japanese women and some other,um, but the majority were Korean
(22:45):
women and they estimate as manyas, maybe, I think, 50,000 to
like 200,000 girls possiblycould have been in this
situation.
Wow, so that, and just knowingthat, I'm just thinking about
how trauma is stored in ourbones and our muscles and our
(23:09):
bodies, okay, yeah, and how thiscould maybe even lead to that
intergenerational trauma where.
Korean women maybe, arestruggling with this idea.
That is my body, really my own.
Or is it for in the service ofsomeone else, especially if
(23:29):
there's this really traumaticexperience, at least in our, in
our culture.
Yeah, I'm just I think.
When I think about that, Iwonder what could have been
trickled down into the Koreanwoman today If my ancestors were
(23:50):
possibly in sexual slavery.
How much of that messagingcould get passed down
generations to generations.
Now let's say that someone whohad an ancestor who was a sex
slave, a prostitute, and is nowhere in the United States and
(24:11):
she's trying to figure out herown self and her identity, and
now she's in a relationship Iwould be so curious if there's
kind of that, remnants of thatin her body, where she's
struggling to speak up andsaying I don't want to have sex
with you.
Yeah, it's.
I think that's what really kindof came to mind and I'll be
(24:32):
kind of curious, you know, forkind of like the other um groups
, like asian um groups, likewhat is their history that is
also being passed down to theworld.
Speaker 1 (24:41):
Yeah, I don't think it's too far of a reach.
We I don't know that we havedata about that, but we do have
data about the Holocaust and thegenerational trauma that's
followed, and so I don't thinkit's too far of a reach to say
the similar thing would be atplay there.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:56):
Yeah, yeah for sure.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
Yeah, and there are some surviving women.
Um, there has been some memoirswhere some people have written
books about their experience.
Um, I haven't read it yet but Ithink definitely just like even
being able to um acknowledgethe, the, the cultural history
(25:20):
of each groups and how thatcould even show up in um c us
would beUS would be.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
it would be really interesting yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
Yeah, and I think just kind of another thing that
I was kind of looking intoonline just cause I was curious
more about it.
After reading about yourresearch, I kind of was like I
want to kind of read what's outthere too.
So I think I read that there,with Asian Americans, there's
also um a later age of sexualdebut, there's more conservative
(25:51):
, um ideas about sex andengaging in sex, sex or sexual
kind of things, um.
So I think maybe I'll be curiousif, like kind of like the later
age, you have your sexual debut, then maybe you don't maybe
have less time to be able toeven practice, like asserting
(26:13):
your boundaries or speaking up,because if someone's first
sexual debut is now they'remarried, then like you don't, in
some ways you haven't been ableto practice that too much,
right?
So I think that could possiblyplay a role as well, just at a
later age of sexual debut.
But yeah, I think it'simportant because Asian
(26:35):
Americans are also consideredthe fastest growing racial group
in the United States, whichmeans that there are going to be
a lot more immigrants, peoplecoming in to the United States
and immigrating to the UnitedStates, a lot of Asian Americans
.
So that could also play a rolein how they may show up in their
(26:57):
own sexual kind of experienceshere in the United States.
Speaker 1 (27:01):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, Did we hit your bullet points?
This is fantastic yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
I yeah, Did we hit your bullet points?
Speaker 1 (27:08):
They're all.
This is fantastic.
Yeah, yeah, I think so.
Okay, let me know if we didn't.
No-transcript.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
Yeah, you know what I was.
I really struggled to answerthis question.
Okay, they're like not much.
No, I'm just kidding.
No, no, really.
Yeah, I was really like justlike racking my brain.
I was like what are some?
Because I think, unfortunately,I can only think about the
negative things.
Like, yeah, the negative thingsjust like popped up immediately
.
I was like, oh yeah, this andthis and this and this, but
(28:03):
protective factors.
I was like dang like, what arethis and this and this and this
but protective factors?
I was like dang like, what arewhat is protective?
I really struggle with this.
So I'd be really curious, whatother?
Maybe if you're alsointerviewing other Asian
American sex therapists like I'mcurious what they would say.
But like, I was like, I waslike maybe, possibly.
I mean, this idea came to mindand I was like I don't know if
(28:25):
I'm reaching here too, but I waslike maybe because, um,
typically asian americans, likewe, we like value higher
education.
So yeah, I'm curious with withthis value of getting higher
education and like, yeah, likeit's important to have that.
(28:45):
Could there possibility, couldthere be a possibility that the
more education one receives inUnited States, that there may be
possibly a sense of more likeopenness or expansiveness and
learning about different ways tomaybe just even interact in a
(29:06):
relational setting.
Maybe more sense of openness tobe like, yeah, this thing isn't
working between me and myhusband or my partner, like we
got to figure something out andmaybe educating themselves about
.
Okay, well, let's read books.
Speaker 1 (29:21):
Let's yeah, prioritizing, looking, learning,
yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah read books,let's, yeah prioritizing looking
, learning, yeah, yeah, yeah,yeah.
Speaker 2 (29:29):
I think that was probably the one thing that came
up for me um, maybe that and umanother.
Another thing possibly but itcan also backfire is if we do
have kind of this sense of like,let's create harmony within the
family unit.
Maybe sometimes it can work outin a positive way, that there
(29:55):
can be a sense of accountability, like, oh wow, I see that
you're suffering so much.
This is also affecting, maybe,the wellbeing of our family so
much.
This is also affecting, maybe,the well-being of our family.
Um, maybe there'saccountability from other people
in the family unit or mayberelatives.
Maybe that could also lead toone maybe even seeking couples
(30:18):
therapy because they're like hey, let's figure this out clearly,
something's going on here.
Yeah, maybe the sense of liketrying to keep harmony in the
family unit could be positive,but I was thinking the flip side
of that is it can backfire,where a woman can be like oh, I
need to keep harmony so let mejust, she's lower in that
(30:40):
hierarchy.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
There's more of a likelihood that she'd augment
herself to for the greater goodthan for the male to look at the
female's distress and say let'schange things.
Yeah, because that hierarchyyeah exactly, yeah, said it
beautifully.
Speaker 2 (30:54):
Yeah, I was thinking that too.
Like in one way it can behelpful, in one way it cannot,
because like, oh well, I don'twant to rock the boat here.
So let me just deal with thissituation where I'm clearly not
happy about having sex with myhusband, but all these people
count on me, or like I.
You know people are, um, gonnabe very upset if I speak up
(31:17):
about this.
So let me just try to deal with, deal with it on my own or see,
yeah, see if it can be justdealt with between me and my
partner.
So, um, so yeah.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
I'm less likely, but that is one value that could be
used in a different direction,possibly in the future.
Speaker 2 (31:37):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So I was thinking we can helpor maybe not help.
It's so like, probably in veryindividual case by case.
But yeah, that's the only thingthat really came up and then
like what could be protectivefactors?
Speaker 1 (31:58):
awesome.
Okay, if we go on to questionfour, do you feel comfortable
moving to the next one?
Yeah, okay, so you know you'rean expert in this field.
What do you see as a solutionfor these women?
How would you work with a woman?
I don't know that you work withcouples.
I think you work with justindividuals right now.
(32:19):
Is that right?
It's a very few couples.
How?
Speaker 2 (32:24):
would you work with this woman?
Yeah, yeah, um, I think a lotof it is education, educating,
um again, like kind of, as Imentioned, like normalizing that
you're not alone, that um thatfor you to be able to navigate
(32:48):
this let's talk about.
You know, let's have some goodsex education and
psychoeducation around consent.
Um, let's talk about boundarieswhat does that look like for
you?
Let's talk about, um, thesexual health principles.
Like.
What does that look like foryou?
Let's talk about, um, thesexual health principles.
Like, what does that look like?
Yeah, they're kind of reallyincorporating all these things
(33:10):
so they are able to have a morekind of holistic view and how
they can navigate the situation,instead of just feeling like,
oh my gosh, like this reallysucks and like I can't do
anything about it.
But I think there's so muchempowerment with education, so
just being able to be like, hey,this is how you assert yourself
(33:30):
, because I think so many of thetimes they don't even know how.
Yeah, one of my chinese um,american female she's once told
me she's like I didn't know, Ihave a voice and there's tears
in her eyes.
I didn't know I have a voice andI'm like they're like
cheerleader.
Like you can, you can speak up,like you are, you know you, you
(33:51):
can, you totally can.
So, like just being able to bethere and tell them like you do
have a voice, like you canassert yourself, and let's kind
of learn more like baby steps onhow to get you there, because I
don't want it to be too likeoverwhelming for them, because
they're very much ingrained inlike how they have been
(34:14):
functioning.
So, yeah, a lot of education.
I think support is really big.
Um, I'm hoping to eventuallystart a support group for asian
american women here, um, becauseI don't see any, yeah, yeah,
and and maybe some sort of like,um, like building intimacy for
(34:38):
asian american women here in insouthern california, something
where where another Asian womancan see another Asian woman in
the room and be like, wow, we'reall kind of in this together
and I'm not alone and we can allsupport each other.
Speaker 1 (34:56):
So being able to have like a support system, I think
could be really helpful forwomen or a couple experiencing
this for sure helpful for women,or a couple experiencing this
for sure, and I imagine thatworking on assertiveness skills
would be more challenging withyour population than maybe a
Caucasian born American girl,woman, right, because we've
(35:20):
already got maybe more messages.
Culturally, that's okay to beassertive, whereas the Asian
American population it might beharder to want to learn.
Speaker 2 (35:29):
I will believe that it would be good for them to
learn assertiveness skills oryeah, yeah, I could definitely
see that yeah, including thatinto their value system might be
more difficult yeah, yeah, itit definitely can, because
they're not used to it.
It wasn't modeled to themgrowing up.
Modeling might be oh, dad isyou know he's the breadwinner,
(35:53):
he gets the final say mom defers, although you know I have
actually had some clients whosaid it was maybe the opposite.
But it again, you know, it'svery individual case by case.
But yeah, for the majority it'slike wow, I have a voice, can I
speak up?
Or just being able to say I amallowed to have boundaries, like
, yeah, you totally can, yeah,yeah.
(36:16):
So I think that's and I thinkmaybe also the reason why I went
into this field was I couldn'tfind and this is more of a
personal thing I couldn't findan Asian American sex therapist.
When I was looking for one,yeah, I said, where are they?
There were very few.
And I mean I found someone elseand she's Caucasian but she's
(36:36):
amazing, I love her so much.
But, yeah, I remember justthinking like it's, it'll be
nice for other Asian Americanwomen to see a familiar face in
a way.
Absolutely, tell them thesethings.
There's maybe more sense ofmaybe trust.
Yeah, section where, oh,there's a Korean American woman
(36:58):
telling me how boundaries hashelped her.
Maybe it could help me too.
Speaker 1 (37:03):
Absolutely, yeah, has helped her and maybe it could
help me too.
Absolutely yeah.
So a little bit ofrepresentation too in the field
of, in this area, especiallysexuality, for asian americans
to see other asian americanstalking about sex, breaking the
taboo, yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:19):
Learning assertiveness, skills, skills
yeah and and um, I think, uh, inthe beginning I was a little
nervous.
I was like, oh my gosh, likeI'm in some ways like presenting
myself to the world as a sextherapist and I noticed even my
own stuff coming up.
Like, oh my gosh, I'm a littlebit embarrassed, like can I
(37:41):
really have an Instagram pagewith like talking about, um,
talking about kink and fetishes,and like what does that mean?
And like what does it mean tohave good sexual communication?
Like I, oh, I was like I was alittle nervous about doing that,
but I was like you know what,amy?
Like this is the work.
(38:02):
Like you just put yourself outthere in the universe and this
will help others in their ownsexual journey.
So I was like, okay, just do it.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
Absolutely, I totally resonate with that.
I have that experience even todaily, you know, because I have
a Mormon background and there's,it's it's deep stuff to say.
Can I use the word clitoris?
Can I post the word?
Speaker 2 (38:26):
clitoris in a public forum yeah, although on
Instagram they're so censored,so you'll write clitoris Right,
right, yeah, yeah, but yeahdefinitely.
Speaker 1 (38:36):
Yeah, awesome, okay, and so clinically, what we see
here?
Moving to that question five,do you think this qualifies
clinically, as you know, in theDSM, hypoactive desire interest
disorder, or do you think thisis something else?
You know, because I've seensome people being like, oh, this
(38:59):
is the diagnosis, so we justgot to do desire interventions.
And I'm wondering if you'relike, yeah, pretty solid in that
or if if looking at it moresystemically has you leaning
different ways yeah, definitelya different way.
Speaker 2 (39:15):
Yeah, I read the question and I was like, oh okay
, so I think I also have kind ofmixed feelings about the DSM.
But I know why it's there, like,yeah, we need some sort of
criteria so people are maybebetter organized and how they
kind of do their treatment plan,and it's needed for, like, the
(39:35):
billing and code.
So I get it like why we had thedsm, but I, you know, just kind
of want to put it out there.
I have mixed feelings about theDSM, yeah, so when I read your
question I was thinking I thinkwe shouldn't pathologize women's
sexuality.
So that's what came to mind,like it's kind of like at least
(40:00):
in your study, it seemed to memore like this is a woman's
choice to you know, she doesn't,obviously she's not thrilled to
experience CUS.
But I was thinking about kindof like what your research said,
where kind of they're doingthis in some ways as a.
(40:21):
I think it's like a copingmechanism, right, like this is a
way where they're trying tosurvive and maintain, um, some
sort of sense of stability intheir relationship and, um, it
seems more like it is more, yeah, like a relational issue than
like hypoactive this like amedical diagnosis of there's
(40:44):
something wrong with you yeah,yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
So so, um, I'm thinking like ifwe had to like give a code, then
maybe like a z63 relationalissue, but yeah, I, I think that
and I'm not sure if it meetscriteria for hypoactive desire,
(41:06):
but I don't know.
I'm actually curious, like,what do you think?
Speaker 1 (41:10):
I know I'm curious too about other thoughts, but I
think initially, women and theirpartners come to me saying the
woman has a problem, she doesn'twant sex, and you know they're
like it might be hormonal and alot of times, especially in this
situation, I'm like I thinkthis is systemic and relational
and as much as we want to putall the focus on the woman to
(41:34):
figure out how to make her wantsex when she doesn't want to, I
don't think it's.
I don't think it's a diagnosis,so much as it's a systemic
problem.
Yeah, that they arrived totogether.
Yeah, because of the dynamicsof the relationship or the
(41:54):
culture or whatever.
And I might also see it maybemore as CPTSD.
Yeah, ptsd, yeah, rather thanlow desire, where these coping
mechanisms are her trying to dothis difficult situation well
(42:14):
and it not going well, right,like it being more about coping.
And maybe I mean I was shockedthat the majority of the women
we interviewed you know when youscore the PCLS, it was like 54%
were having moderate to severetrauma responses.
I'm like I don't know that wehave thought about sexual trauma
(42:34):
this way before.
Speaker 2 (42:36):
yeah, no yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, and that hopefully
we can do something about thattoo, so that it doesn't get to
that point for the woman.
Speaker 1 (42:48):
Right.
What would you say if you knowI'll use that magic?
You know overused question.
But if you had the magic wand,how would you prevent?
What would you wish for youngerAsian Americans to kind of
prevent this from being part oftheir story or part of their
experience as they navigatetheir adulthood and their
(43:11):
relationships?
Speaker 2 (43:14):
Yeah, um, this is a.
Is this a segue, kind of, tothe question?
Speaker 1 (43:17):
Yeah, yeah, six, yeah , what, what would?
What do you wish you could door what do you think the
solution is for that?
Like the prevention.
Speaker 2 (43:24):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
And um, when I read thatquestion, I actually noticed my
my body felt sense of overwhelm.
Oh yeah, because I think I was.
I so badly wanted to be more of.
How can we have a solution forwomen to not even experience the
(43:47):
U?
S in the first place?
And I was like that's why Ithink that's what I really would
want If we had a magic wand.
It was that that we're not evenhaving women experiencing this
in the first place then.
But then that got me thinkinglike if we don't want women to
even be in that situation in thefirst place, then like I feel
(44:08):
overwhelmed because I was likewe have to tackle like these big
systemic things which is likethe, you know, like patriarchy
and sexism and like racism andlike gender roles, and I was
like, oh, I was like OK, I meanlike calm down.
Speaker 1 (44:24):
So I was like OK, neuroscope, neuroscope, I think
(45:04):
the things that we have to do,at least I think, for Asian
American women to kind of helpthem.
Speaker 2 (45:07):
Teaching the moms too about body boundaries, consents
, having the kids be able toname their body parts, teaching
women so that they can quicklydiscern what they're
experiencing is coercion or notcoercion, and knowing for
themselves what's okay andwhat's not okay.
Communication, and just likebeing able to have all of that I
think could be so helpful, notjust asian american women, but
(45:29):
just for everyone in all of theUnited States.
I think could be a really goodstep.
But yeah, I mean that's why wedo the work we do right.
Speaker 1 (45:44):
And I like that you painted that as a developmental
thing, not a do this one thingthis one time, but you see it as
this prevention be reallydevelopmental, with messages all
along the way, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (45:58):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, because I was even when I was
thinking about, like, what couldbabies be?
How can babies be learningabout consent and body?
It goes back to the parent.
The parent is also modeling tothem.
Hey, it's okay that you knowyou're curious about your
genitals.
I'm not going to shame you forkind of getting curious and
touching your, your penis oryour vulva, like this is part of
(46:20):
healthy exploration, versussmacking the hand and say, oh,
dirty, dirty, don't do that.
Yeah, as that early of an age,as in in their baby states, like
these are the things that wekind of carry with us through
our entire life.
So how do we teach that?
Well then, the parents alsoneed some good sex ed as well.
(46:40):
Yeah, yeah their whole, like yousaid, yeah, the developmental
piece is absolutely andgenerational.
Speaker 1 (46:47):
I like that you brought it to that too.
Speaker 2 (46:48):
Yeah, yes, for sure, so all of that, um, yeah, so
like uh also bringing being ableto create sense of support and
community with for the asianamerican women, and sex therapy
um teaching communication skillsand all of that good stuff.
Speaker 1 (47:09):
So yeah, Do you see?
This wasn't I didn't give youthis question.
It's okay if you hadn't thoughtabout it, but do you see the
Asian American communitybecoming more open to these
ideas of a little moreindividualism, a little more
assertiveness, more consentbetween genders?
Speaker 2 (47:33):
I think definitely more the younger generation, for
sure.
Okay, yeah, I, I see more of myclients are more in the 20s to
40s age range and a lot of themare first-time therapy seekers.
And then they're like I heard onhit tiktok that maybe therapy
might be good for me, orinstagram, and, and sometimes
(47:59):
the the younger generation,they're like empowered, like I
want to break the generationaltrauma that my ancestors have
carried on.
I want to be the one to do thatand I'm like, yeah, so like,
when I see's so like wow, it'sreally inspiring and there's
definitely a little bit moresense of openness when we talk
(48:20):
about consent and healthy sexualcommunication, because they're
like sponges, like they want tolearn more.
Typically, what I've seen isthey want to have a more
positive and a better lifeexperience than what their
parents had to go through,because they see their parents
just holding on to all so muchtraumas from the immigration,
(48:43):
like escaping communistcountries, escaping war, and
they're like wow, wow, this isreally affecting my parents and
it's affecting me too, and I'mcarrying all these traumas
myself, but I want to be the oneto kind of change that.
Speaker 1 (48:57):
So a lot of courage, a lot of determination in the
younger generation in thecommunity yeah, I think so.
Speaker 2 (49:04):
I think definitely more openness, so with at least
a younger generation.
I I do think there could beyounger generation.
I do think there could be somechanges with maybe the older
generation, but I thinkdefinitely the younger
generation is a little bit morelike expansive and open to these
things.
Speaker 1 (49:23):
Okay thanks for letting me throw a question in
there yeah, yeah, yeah yeah no,that's again yeah.
And then the last one was likedo you have any op-ed commentary
?
As you watch the video andmaybe you thought about the idea
you could have had completelyfantastic ideas outside of what
I was thinking.
Speaker 2 (50:01):
You know I don't want to be looking at op-ed
commentary or things that youthought of with this kind of
distinguished what coercionmeans?
I think it was like was itverbal coercion but no physical
coercion, right?
Speaker 1 (50:21):
Yeah, yeah, and that wasn't necessarily my work, that
was borrowing from I think itwas Zoe Peterson, who's at the
Kinsey Institute, or else it wasMuehlenhardt who's at the
Kinsey Institute, or else orelse it was Muehlenhardt, but
they did a research study aboutcoercion being on like a
spectrum and that, like forcedphysical coercion was on the
(50:42):
most damaging end.
But then coercion can also beverbal and emotional, um, on
another end.
And they're like, does thisstill create damage?
That was kind of their questionat the end of their research
and I'm like, well, I'm going tosee, yeah, and then I found us,
uh, uh, an assessment of verbalcoercion and it had like 10
(51:06):
examples of you know, afteryou've said no, I think it's
called the post refusal scale,and so it was only looking at
verbal coercion of tactics thatI think a lot of people don't
recognize as coercion, wherethey keep asking, keep asking,
keep asking, or they disregardit and start taking off your
clothes, or they might out andkind of throw an emotional fit,
(51:27):
or they may make an acclaim toauthority of I'm the breadwinner
or I'm you know.
And so then the study it kindof showed which percentage of
our population saw which kind ofverbal or emotional coercion
tactics used.
Speaker 2 (51:45):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
I was just kind of curious,like do women even know what
they're experiencing?
Is the coercion, or were they I?
Speaker 1 (51:55):
don't think so.
That's why I asked it.
Like that's why at thebeginning of the study you know
one requirement I was like nohistory right, we've got to
assess for coercion that's notrecognized.
Yeah, so we can see if it wastruly consensual.
And I think only 18% of thoseresearch participants had none
(52:17):
of the emotional or verbalcoercion as present in their
relationship.
It's like, oh my gosh, okay.
Speaker 2 (52:25):
All right, yeah, and I mean I think I really loved
all the quotes that you broughtinto the studies.
Like the participants quotes,it really broadens the sense of
like realness to theirexperience.
Speaker 1 (52:38):
And.
Speaker 2 (52:39):
I remember just reading all those quotes and
just my heart breaking.
I'm like, oh my gosh, like sosad that you know these.
This is our, the realities ofmany women out there, many women
out there and um, just really,yeah, I, I really felt like this
research study was so importantand like, um, I, I want to
(53:00):
share this to my clients.
Like, hey, this is what couldhappen, and I know you want to
have a good marriage, so let'swork on these things.
And maybe that could also leadthem to be more motivated.
Like, hey, this isn't somethingthat you just wait until
decades have passed, especiallyfor like 20s 40s age range.
Like this is something that youcan actually work on now for
(53:22):
the longevity and the health ofyour relationship.
Like, let's tackle this now.
Speaker 1 (53:29):
Yeah, yeah, it could be kind of a warning bell or
like like a you know.
Here's why it's not a goodstrategy in the long run.
Is you think you may be helpingyour relationship and in the
long run, it's going to hurt youpossibly?
Speaker 2 (53:46):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly yeah.
Speaker 1 (53:49):
I I wish I could publish a book that was just the
responses of the women, becausethat was the most powerful for
me too, and the most beautifuland the most relatable.
And sometimes in research weforget that there are people
behind the statistic and andthat was the most important part
to me in the study was theirown words.
(54:11):
Yeah, I'm glad they touched you.
Speaker 2 (54:13):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, and I'm I'm so glad
you did this research, um,because it just like certain
faces of my client just poppedto mind like oh yeah, well, I
remember that client said sheactually used the word duty sex.
So I just did, I just provideduty sex and I just see how much
, how long they can hold himover till the next time.
(54:34):
This is very intelligent asianamerican woman, like highly
educated and in her 30s, and I'mlike oof, this is that's not
good for you guys.
Speaker 1 (54:45):
Oh yeah, we got some work to do, but yeah any last
thoughts before I let you getback to your own life.
Speaker 2 (54:59):
No, I think I actually had a question but I
have a client coming in twominutes.
But I think the last questionwas just like I was curious
really about the level of maybehow one identifies in their
religious faith in thesesettings, Just because I work
with a lot of women who have hadupbringing in the Christian
(55:23):
church and have stayed in theChristian church or they've
deconstructed from it.
So I was just like I wonder, Iwas just kind of curious about
that.
Speaker 1 (55:32):
Agreed, agreed, most of the demographics were
homogenous.
Where this was, mostly educated, white, cis, christian women
and I've got that question toois is this a religious issue?
Is this a US issue?
Is this kind of a female issue,you know, and so that's why I'm
reaching out to these differentcommunities to be like do you
(55:54):
see this here too?
Is this a white woman issue?
Is this a purity culture issue?
Is you know?
Because the demographics wereso similar.
I hope someday the researchwill be replicated, maybe with
diverse populations, but untilthen, I'm just trying to learn
from all the communities aroundme.
Of what do you think?
You know, the experts in thosecommunities, what do you think
(56:15):
when you look at this?
I've got the same question.
Speaker 2 (56:18):
Yeah, yeah, but yeah, thank you so much.
I really found it so enjoyableto kind of look into your
research and do this with you.
So thank you.
Speaker 1 (56:29):
Thanks, amy, have a good day, bye, See you, bye-bye,
and do this with you, so thankyou.
Thanks, amy, have a good dayBye.
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