Structural dimensions of romantic preferences

Fordham Law Review

Volumn 76, Issue 6, 2008, Pages 2787-2819

  Robinson, Russell K ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA   (United States)

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EID: 46249089228     PISSN: 0015704X     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Conference Paper

References (118)

1. See Kellina M. Craig-Henderson, Black Men in Interracial Relationships: What's Love Got to Do with It? 5 (2006) ("Today, Black men are more than twice as likely as Black women to be involved in an interracial relationship.").
2. See Russell K. Robinson, Casting and Caste-ing: Reconciling Artistic Freedom and Antidiscrimination Norms, 95 Cal. L. Rev. 1, 51-56 (2007).
3. See generally Russell K. Robinson, Perceptual Segregation, 108 Colum. L. Rev. (forthcoming June 2008) (on file with author).
4. Russell K. Robinson, Uncovering Covering, 101 Nw. U. L. Rev. 1809, 1822 (2007).
5. Consider the following examples from an article on Asian-white interracial dating: "I'm just not attracted to Asian guys,' says Reesa, a 32-year-old Filipin[a] American who lives in Northern California. 'I don't know why. I just never have been. I've just always dated white or European guys.'" Tony, a Japanese-American man interviewed for the same article, says: "'I've never been attracted to Asian women . . . . My type is a blonde-haired girl . . . . Blondes have caught my eye for some reason.'" Helen E. Sung, Dating Outside the Color Lines: Is It Just Innocent Color-Blind Love, or Asian Evasion?, Audrey, Aug./Sept. 2005, at 54, 56, available at http://www.audreymagazine.com/Sep2005/Features03.asp.
6. See, e.g., Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, Racism Without Racists: Color-Blind Racism and the Persistence of Racial Inequality in the United States 39 (2006).
7. See Brad Sears, Diff'rent Strokes, Village Voice, June 22-28, 2005, at 28 (citing statistics suggesting that there are six million queer-identified Americans and 281 million heterosexual-identified Americans - in other words, two percent of Americans identified themselves as queer).
8. This stylized scenario assumes that only blacks and whites exist in the neighborhood or that, to the extent that Asians, Latinos, and Native Americans are included, the black person has a preference for blacks rather than all people of color.
9. See, e.g., Adaora A. Adimora & Victor J. Schoenbach, Social Context, Sexual Networks, and Racial Disparities in Rates of Sexually Transmitted Infections, 191 J. Infectious Diseases S115, S117, S119 (2005).
10. Id. at S118 (stating that "[t]he shortage of [black] men places [black] women at a disadvantage in negotiating and maintaining mutually monogamous relationships, because men can easily find another relationship if they perceive their primary relationship to be problematic").
11. According to one Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) study of young men in six major cities, eighteen percent of black men who have sex with men reported that they did not disclose their sexuality generally, while just eight percent of white men failed to disclose. See Ctrs. for Disease Control & Prevention, HIV/STD Risks in Young Men Who Have Sex with Men Who Do Not Disclose Their Sexual Orientation - Six U.S. Cities, 1994-2000, 52 Morbidity & Mortality Wkly. Rep. 81, 82 (2003). The survey was conducted from 1994 to 2000 and focused on men aged fifteen to twenty-nine who lived in Baltimore, Dallas, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, and Seattle, and who attended a men-who-have-sex-with-men-identified venue. Id. Other men of color were also less likely to disclose than whites. Id. There are a number of reasons why some black men do not identify with the term "gay," which I explore more fully in a work-in-progress, tentatively titled Racing the Closet. Although homophobia in the black community is often cited as the sole explanation for black men not identifying as gay or bisexual, a more in-depth analysis reveals that other factors include white exclusion of blacks in the representational arena.
12. See Devon W. Carbado, Black Rights, Gay Rights, Civil Rights, 47 UCLA L. Rev. 1467, 1472 (2000). Other expressions of racism in the gay community include policies excluding blacks from access to gay clubs.
13. See, e.g., Rona Marech, Panel Finds Bias at Castro Bar: Owner Denied Entry to Black Patrons, Commission Reports, S.F. Chron., Apr. 27, 2005, at B2. Black men also may be particularly impacted by the erasure of bisexuality and the norm that holds that any man who admits having had sex with a man is automatically classified as gay.
14. Another structural aspect of many large urban environments is the "gay neighborhood." Many view these communities as "natural," although they are fairly recent innovations and, according to a recent New York Times article, there are signs that they are dying in part because they do not resonate with younger generations of queer people. See Patricia Leigh Brown, Gay Enclaves, Once Unique, Lose Urgency, N.Y. Times, Oct. 30, 2007, at A1. Such enclaves are usually gay male dominated. The number of lesbian public spaces is typically dwarfed by the numerous opportunities for men to meet and mate. The separation of spaces by gender within the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender community - and the broader demarcation of "straight" and "gay" meeting places - are structures that implicate romantic preferences. As I describe more fully below, rigid separation of men and women into distinct sex-designated spaces frustrates the potential for sexuality to develop in ways that do not neatly map onto our artificial sexual categories. Studies show that despite labels suggesting that people are entirely monosexual, a significant number of people, including self-identified gay men and lesbians, sometimes engage in sex that is inconsistent with such labels.
15. See Michael W. Ross et al., Concordance Between Sexual Behavior and Sexual Identity in Street Outreach Samples of Four Racial/Ethnic Groups, 30 Sexually Transmitted Diseases 110, 110 (2003). Sex segregation then, although said to facilitate sexual liberation, may actually stunt certain affiliations.
16. See Voon Chin Phua & Gayle Kaufman, The Crossroads of Race and Sexuality: Date Selection Among Men in Internet "Personal" Ads, 24 J. Family Issues 981, 992 (2003) ("Preferences for minorities often are tinted with stereotypical images: Asians as exotic, docile, loyal partners; Hispanics as passionate, fiery lovers; and Blacks as 'well-endowed,' forbidden partners."); Robinson, supra note 4, at 1822 (discussing social pressure on men of color in white gay spaces to play up racial stereotypes such as black hypermasculinity and Asian passivity).
17. For an enlightening overview of racial discrimination and the Internet, see Jerry Kang, Cyber-race, 113 Harv. L. Rev. 1130 (2000).
18. See Fair Hous. Council v. Roommates.com, LLC, Nos. 04-56916, 04-57173, 2008 WL 879293, at *1 (9th Cir. Apr. 3, 2008) ("In addition to requesting basic information - such as name, location and email address - Roommate requires each subscriber to disclose his sex, sexual orientation and whether he would bring children to a household. Each subscriber must also describe his preferences in roommates with respect to the same three criteria: sex, sexual orientation and whether they will bring children to the household.").
19. See id. at *1; 47 U.S.C. § 230 (2000).
20. See Roommates.com, 2008 WL 879293, at *7 (noting that the web site was "engineered to limit access to housing on the basis of the protected characteristics" and that "Roommate designed its search and email systems to limit the listings available to subscribers based on sex, sexual orientation and presence of children"). The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit distinguished a Seventh Circuit case involving Craigslist, which has policies against discrimination but does not monitor all content for discriminatory preferences. See id. at *9 n.33 (citing Chi. Lawyers' Comm. for Civil Rights Under Law, Inc. v. Craigslist, Inc., No. 07-1101, 2008 WL 681168 (7th Cir. Mar. 14, 2008)).
21. See id. at *7 ("A dating website that requires users to enter their sex, race, religion and marital status through drop-down menus, and that provides means for users to search along the same lines, retains its CDA immunity insofar as it does not contribute to any alleged illegality . . . .").
22. For an eloquent narration of one race-conscious black woman's experiences in interracial relationships, which led her to decide not to date white men, see Kim McLarin, Race Wasn't an Issue to Him, Which Was an Issue to Me, N.Y. Times, Sept. 3, 2006, §9, at 9.
23. For an insightful analysis of the morality of taking race and disability into account in forming intimate relationships, see Elizabeth F. Emens, Intimate Discrimination: The State's Role in the Accidents of Sex and Love (Apr. 10, 2008) (unpublished manuscript, on file with author).
24. See Randall Kennedy, Interracial Intimacies: Sex, Marriage, Identity, and Adoption 33 (2003) (noting that "intimate association typically receives far less attention than other racial topics"); id. at 37 (emphasizing the complexity of studying interracial intimacy).
25. See 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-3(b) (2000) (employment); 42 U.S.C. § 3604(c) (housing). The statutes' underlying bans on discrimination provide exceptions for small employers and owners of a single family home and other minor landlords. See 42 U.S.C. § 2000e(b) (defining employer); 42 U.S.C. § 3603(b)(1) (setting forth housing exemptions).
26. See generally Robinson, supra note 2.
27. See id.
28. See Craigslist - Fair Housing is Everyone's Right!, http://www.craigslist.org/about/FHA.html (last visited Apr. 21, 2008) ("If you encounter a housing posting on craigslist that you believe violates the Fair Housing laws, please flag the posting as 'prohibited.'"). The web site further explains, "If a post receives enough negative flags it will automatically be removed (only one flag per person per post is counted). Posters whose postings are repeatedly flagged are subject to staff review and additional remedial measures."
29. See Craigslist - Flags and Community Moderation, http://www.craigslist.org/about/help/flags_and_community_moderation (last visited Apr. 21, 2008). A dating web site might adopt a similar policy, which would allow people offended by expressions of racial preference to engage in self-help.
30. See infra note 100.
31. Phua & Kaufman, supra note 13, at 988.
32. Pittsburgh Press Co. v. Pittsburgh Comm'n on Human Relations, 413 U.S. 376, 387-88 (1973); Ragin v. N.Y. Times, 923 F.2d 995, 1002-03 (2d Cir. 1991).
33. Cent. Hudson Gas & Elec. Corp. v. Pub. Serv. Comm'n, 447 U.S. 557, 563 (1980) ("[T]here can be no constitutional objection to the suppression of commercial messages that do not accurately inform the public about lawful activity." (emphasis added)); Ragin, 923 F.2d at 1003 (determining the validity of a ban on a discriminatory housing advertisement by reference to the underlying statutory ban in the Fair Housing Act).
34. Compare Red Lion Broad. Co. v. FCC, 395 U.S. 367, 375 (1969) (upholding the "fairness doctrine" because it enhances free speech values), with Miami Herald Publ'g Co. v. Tornillo, 418 U.S. 241, 258 (1974) (rejecting the "compulsory access law" because it interfered with the newspaper's editorial judgment).
35. In Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition, 535 U.S. 234 (2002), the U.S. Supreme Court treated as speech and ultimately invalidated a federal pornography statute that criminalized certain "visual depictions" of underage sexuality. Id. at 241; cf. Langdon v. Google, Inc., 474 F. Supp. 2d 622, 629-30 (D. Del. 2007) (stating that the court would violate the First Amendment if it ordered Google to display plaintiffs advertisement). A statute narrowly targeting web site architecture, while permitting users to post whatever visual and textual matter they desire, is arguably different.
36. For instance, an important question would be whether the Court deems the law to be content-based, which would trigger strict scrutiny. See Texas v. Johnson, 491 U.S. 397, 414-15 (1989). That determination can be rather difficult. See, e.g., Hill v. Colorado, 530 U.S. 703, 723-24 (2000) (noting the disagreement between the majority and dissent regarding whether a law was content-based). Even if strict scrutiny applied, the Court might find that encouraging interracial interaction is a compelling governmental interest. Cf. Grutter v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 306, 328-29 (2003) (deeming diversity in higher education a compelling interest in the equal protection context).
37. Cf. Robinson, supra note 2, at 51 (noting that "[c]ourts can . . . accommodate both speech and equality in the casting context by creating minor procedural hurdles that create space for decision makers to consider the race and/or sex designation carefully and reflect on alternative casting options prior to making their ultimate decision").
38. See, e.g., Devon W. Carbado & Mitu Gulati, The Fifth Black Woman, 11 J. Contemp. Legal Issues 701, 717-19 (2001) [hereinafter Carbado & Gulati, Fifth Black Woman] (suggesting that grooming choices, such as wearing dreadlocks and African attire, determine an individual's racial salience);
39. Devon W. Carbado & Mitu Gulati, Working Identity, 85 Cornell L. Rev. 1259, 1265 & n.11 (2000) [hereinafter Carbado & Gulati, Working Identity].
40. See, e.g., Ian F. Haney López, The Social Construction of Race: Some Observations on Illusion, Fabrication, and Choice, 29 Harv. C.R.-C.L. L. Rev. 1, 7 (1994).
41. See, e.g., Phua & Kaufman, supra note 13, at 985-87 (studying Yahoo! personal ads and finding that users were least likely to express a preference for blacks).
42. Cf. id. at 984 (suggesting that men of color may expect white men not to be interested unless their profile says "all races are welcomed" or "race doesn't matter"). Because some black people openly profess a preference for a black partner, see infra text accompanying note 39, some white people might believe that blacks are not interested in them and thus focus on other races.
43. See id. at 991.
44. See id. at 989.
45. See id. at 988.
46. See id.
47. Id. at 991.
48. Barbara J. Flagg, "Was Blind, But Now I See": White Race Consciousness and the Requirement of Discriminatory Intent, 91 Mich. L. Rev. 953, 969-73 (1993) (stating that "the white person has an everyday option not to think of herself in racial terms at all").
49. See Robinson, supra note 3 (manuscript at 55-56).
50. See generally Carbado & Gulati, Working Identity, supra note 34, at 1294; Robinson, supra note 13, at 1838.
51. A white person might also prefer not to date black people because of the expectation of racial conflict. Some expectations may be based on racial stereotypes, such as "black women have attitude" or "black men are angry." Even when such expectations are not based on stereotypes, blacks and whites are not similarly situated because only whites have the privilege not to engage race in their daily lives.
52. See Kennedy, supra note 21, at 29 (rejecting the simple-minded notion that "all racial distinctions are the same" and arguing for the "need to discriminate among discriminations").
53. See, e.g., Sears, supra note 7.
54. See id.
55. Id.
56. Id.
57. See Match.com, http://www.match.com/ (last visited Apr. 3, 2008) (prompting the user to state whether he is a "man" or a "woman" and whether he is searching for a "man" or a "woman").
58. On the interests of gay/lesbian people and straight people in minimizing bisexuality, see, for example, Kenji Yoshino, The Epistemic Contract of Bisexual Erasure, 52 Stan. L. Rev. 353 (2000).
59. See Emens, supra note 20 (manuscript at 5) ("Sex is so foundational to the way we talk about desire that we rarely include it in the description of someone's type; it's assumed.").
60. Even the requirement that a person identify as a "man" or a "woman" is too narrow in that transgendered people may feel excluded. Perhaps a bisexual person may set up two profiles, assuming that the site permits users to create multiple profiles. In any event, a site's failure to include the option of bisexuality in its "man looking for woman" framework likely influences behavior. Cf. Russell Korobkin, Psychological Impediments to Mediation Success: Theory and Practice, 21 Ohio St. J. on Disp. Resol. 281, 308-14 (2006) (reviewing studies on the impact of framing on behavior).
61. See Stephen Ellingson & Kirby Schroeder, Race and the Construction of Same-Sex Sex Markets in Four Chicago Neighborhoods, in The Sexual Organization of the City 93, 97 (Edward O. Laumann et al. eds., 2004) (arguing that gay male culture encourages separating sex from intimacy, while lesbian culture promotes longer-term relationships).
62. This is a reference to a long-standing joke in the lesbian community: Q: What does a lesbian bring on a second date? A: A U-Haul. See U-haul Lesbian, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U-Haul_lesbian (last visited Apr. 1, 2008).
63. Corey W. Johnson & Diane M. Samdahl, "The Night They Took Over": Misogyny in a Country-Western Gay Bar, 27 Leisure Sci. 331, 337 (2005).
64. Id. at 332, 341. In the words of one gay man who refused to take his friends to the bar on Thursdays, "Gay men are like flipped out if there are like more than two [lesbian] women in a place, you know two women in a bar. They are like, "Oh god [sic] there is [sic] all these lesbians everywhere." Id. at 342 (first alteration in original).
65. Id. at 344-45. The authors suggested that sexual interest explained some of these perceptions. The all-male bartenders were more likely to flirt with gay male customers than lesbians, and thus the men were more likely to tip. Id. Similarly, a man who is bumped by another man on a crowded dance floor might use it as an opportunity to meet and flirt, but that same man might have little interest in engaging a female who bumps him.
66. I am not categorically opposed to men-only or female-only social spaces, whether queer, straight, or mixed in terms of sexual orientation. But I find it disappointing that the social and political possibilities for coalitions between queer men and queer women are often subordinated to a narrow focus on constructing a ready supply of potential sexual hook ups.
67. For an in-depth analysis of this phenomenon and an application to the legal system's adjudication of Title VII claims, see Robinson, supra note 3 (manuscript at 136-201).
68. See, e.g., Cheryl R. Kaiser & Carol T. Miller, Derogating the Victim: The Interpersonal Consequences of Blaming Events on Discrimination, 6 Group Processes & Intergroup Relations 227, 228 (2003) [hereinafter Kaiser & Miller, Derogating the Victim];
69. Cheryl R. Kaiser & Carol T. Miller, Stop Complaining! The Social Costs of Making Attributions to Discrimination, 27 Personality & Soc. Psychol. Bull. 254, 254 (2001) [hereinafter Kaiser & Miller, Stop Complaining];
70. Gretchen B. Sechrist et al., Mood as Information in Making Attributions to Discrimination, 29 Personality & Soc. Psychol. Bull. 524, 525 (2003).
71. See, e.g., Julie Schmit & Larry Copeland, Cracker Barrel Customer Says Bias Was 'Flagrant,' USA Today, May 7, 2004, at 1B (describing lawsuits by black and interracial parties who alleged that the Cracker Barrel restaurant chain discriminated against them).
72. Craig-Henderson, supra note 1, at 123 (reporting the experience of Gary, who stated that "'it was mostly a matter of perception . . . for example, if we get a bad table in a restaurant or very slow service . . . you're never really certain'").
73. See id. at 101-02. Although I emphasize a number of the problematic responses from Kellina Craig-Henderson's interviews, a number of the men explained their involvement in interracial relationships in ways that were not stereotypical or otherwise troubling. See, e.g., id. at 107-08 (discussing Damon, who was not looking for a white woman but ended up happily married to one, much to his surprise).
74. Id. at 102.
75. Id.
76. Robinson, supra note 3 (manuscript at 15-17, 39-41).
77. Consider this white man's explanation for why he prefers Asian women: "[H]e stated he liked them because their food 'is awesome,' they are 'just so attractive to me,' and he 'just love[s] the Asian race, it's mystical to me in a way.'" Bonilla-Silva, supra note 6, at 118 (second alteration in original).
78. Craig-Henderson, supra note 1, at 97.
79. Id. at 96-97 (discussing interviewee Derrick, who Craig-Henderson described as "obsessi[ve]").
80. Id. at 105. L.G.'s explanation is ironic because this is precisely the sort of charge that black women sometimes level at black men. See Joy Jones, Marriage Is for White People, Wash. Post, Mar. 26, 2006, at B1.
81. This person responded to a profile that we posted as part of the empirical study detailed below. This profile and all data compiled in the empirical study are on file with the author.
82. Another respondent, who described himself as a thirty-eight-year-old man of mixed racial heritage, similarly stated in his profile, "looking for hung, verbal, assertive tops that knows [sic] how to work a willing, submissive bttm [sic]. happiest making you feel good! like men around my age or older . . . ethnic men to the front of the line."
83. See Craig-Henderson, supra note 1, at 97.
84. Id. at 98. Although this example involves a Cuban woman, who may have been able to pass for white, 1 do not mean to imply that Latinos in general are aligned with the "white" perspective in perceiving (or failing to perceive) instances of discrimination.
85. See id.
86. Id.; see also id. at 119-20 (discussing Chester, who "generally avoided seeing certain 'Black' movies with his wife" because they might make her "'uncomfortable'").
87. Id. at 98.
88. See id. at 103 (discussing M.B., who stated that he and his white girlfriend "'view people as people. For us, color just doesn't matter'"); see also Robinson, supra note 3 (manuscript at 124 n.251) (discussing psychological evidence suggesting that many people of color and women minimize discrimination as a coping mechanism). See generally Gary Blasi & John T. Jost, System Justification Theory and Research: Implications for Law, Legal Advocacy, and Social Justice, 94 Cal. L. Rev. 1119 (2006) (applying system justification theory, which holds that outsiders have strong incentives to minimize discrimination in order to avoid the view that the social world is structurally aligned against them). Craig-Henderson found particularly noteworthy that several men in her study could not recall a single instance of adverse reaction to their interracial relationship. Craig-Henderson, supra note 1, at 124.
89. These particular concerns of blacks and other people of color are distinct from the concerns that whites often cite as a basis for not wanting their family members to enter interracial marriages. See Bonilla-Silva, supra note 6, at 121-22 (citing interviews with a white person who opposed interracial marriage because of purported harms to interracial children); id. at 123 (noting that whites sometimes used the discrimination faced by interracial couples to justify their opposition to interracial relationships). The concern is not simply that the interracial couple will have to face social discrimination, but rather that some of the racial dynamics prevalent in society (i.e., perceptual segregation) will invade the intimate relationship as well.
90. Dwight A. McBride, Why I Hate Abercrombie & Fitch: Essays on Race and Sexuality (2005).
91. Id. at 88, 120.
92. Id.
93. Id. at 121.
94. See id. at 124-25 (describing the responses of black men to the "gay marketplace of desire . . . that centers on 'whiteness'").
95. For a humorous take on rules for dating a "whiteboy," see James Hannaham, Mr. White Now: Beware the Chocoholic, Village Voice, June 22-28, 2005, at 29.
96. See, e.g., Kennedy, supra note 21, at 39 (acknowledging that "[a]ll too little is said here about gay and lesbian relationships"); Shauna B. Wilson et al., Dating Across Race: An Examination of African American Internet Personal Advertisements, 37 J. Black Studies 964, 970-71 (2007) (studying 200 profiles of African Americans on Match.com presumably looking for partners of the other sex without giving specific attention to profiles seeking partners of the same sex).
97. See Phua & Kaufman, supra note 13, at 988-89.
98. Id. at 992. Voon Chin Phua and Gayle Kaufman examined thousands of Yahoo! personal ads, but they did not post ads in order to compare responses to ads posted by men of different races. Id. at 985-87.
99. This research also attempts to answer the call by Devon Carbado and Mitu Gulati for greater scholarly and judicial attention to intraracial distinctions in order to understand racial discrimination fully. See, e.g., Carbado & Gulati, Fifth Black Woman, supra note 34, at 720-21.
100. I conducted this study with my research assistant, Greg Furtado, who provided invaluable assistance. In addition, my colleague Saul Sarabia advised and assisted with the study. UCLA's Office for Protection of Research Subjects Institutional Review Board approved this research.
101. See Robinson, supra note 4, at 1822-23.
102. See id.
103. See, e.g., Robinson, supra note 3 (manuscript at 74-75).
104. The statistics of each profile (height, weight, penis size, etc.) were identical for each profile. The primary difference was that we changed the profile's text slightly so that users of the web site would not become suspicious. For example, the first racial profile (i.e., white top) included text stating, "No-nonsense man looking for same. Cut to the chase about what you want." The second racial profile (i.e., white bottom) contained the same basic message but in different language: "Let's get to the point. No games or BS." Because we thought the black profiles might provoke the most skepticism because of our model's racial features, we wrote the black profiles so that the profile referred to the subject as a "light-skinned black man."
105. We recorded 515 profiles to account for potential duplicates in our searches. Ultimately there were five duplicates, which we discarded. Thus, the final number of profiles was 510.
106. The eleven geographical locations were assigned numbers alphabetically. Thus, downtown was "1," east Los Angeles was "2," Echo Park and Westlake was "3," and so forth. Similarly, the six racial categories were assigned numerical identifiers with Asian being assigned "1," black "2," and so on, though mixed was assigned "6," outside the otherwise alphabetical order. The five sexual position preferences were assigned numbers based on the sequential order as given by A4A. Top was "1," bottom was "2," versatile/top was "3," versatile/bottom was "4," and versatile was "5."
107. Of the profiles that expressed a racial preference, the hierarchy of preference for a particular race was as follows: whites (49.3%), Latinos (43.8%), blacks (39.7%), and Asians (9.6%). The hierarchy of preference against a particular race was as follows (starting with the group least preferred): Asians (8.2%), blacks (5.5%), whites (4.1%); and Latinos (2.7%). These numbers might be read to suggest that a unique disadvantage attaches to Asians. However, I hesitate to draw conclusions from this sample since a small number of profiles overtly stated racial preferences and unlike the second stage of the study, this sample reflects only men in Los Angeles. Moreover, there does not appear to be any reason to think that the subset of people who express racial preferences are representative of the remaining, vast majority of people who decline to state a racial preference, but might nonetheless have implicit racial leanings. See Steven D. Levitt & Stephen J. Dubner, Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything 83 (2005) (discussing a study of online personal ads snowing dissociation between white users' stated lack of racial preferences and their tendency to send e-mails overwhelmingly to white profiles). The second part of the study attempts to measure more directly such implicit racial preferences.
108. The profiles were also created with a locked "private pic" that was never unlocked during the course of the study.
109. Some users of the site incorporate references to their penis size (for example, "Teninchtop") in their usernames in order to attract interest.
110. There may be a distinction between identifying as a bottom and performing the bottom role at times. For instance, some men on A4A identify as tops yet seek only other tops. The implication is that at least one of the tops will bottom but neither holds himself out as a bottom publicly. We found some support for this phenomenon. Approximately 8% of the respondents to top profiles also identified as tops; another 9% of the respondents to top profiles identified as a "versatile/top," which is supposed to signify that one usually, but not exclusively, performs the top role in intercourse. But we did not find a comparable pattern of bottoms responding to bottom profiles. In fact, not a single bottom replied to a bottom profile, and only 2.4% of respondents to bottom profiles identified as a versatile/bottom. Therefore, it may be more acceptable among some blacks (and nonblacks) to identify as a top or versatile/top than to identify as a bottom.
111. See Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw, Race, Reform, and Retrenchment: Transformation and Legitimation in Antidiscrimination Law, 101 Harv. L. Rev. 1331, 1373 (1988) (setting forth a binary paradigm of black-white stereotypes, including the belief that black people are "criminal" and "immoral"). I thank Jerry Lopez for this insight.
112. Although the site gives users the option of indicating a preference for friendship and/or a relationship, the user is bombarded with sexually explicit advertisements for pornographic movies and online services and none that promotes friendships or relationships. These ads, which support the free service, may channel men toward sex.
113. Several profiles conflated blackness with masculinity and an expectation that a black man perform the top role. For example, one thirty-nine-year-old white man who identified primarily as a top indicated that he would "flip" and play the bottom role for a black man: "Hairy aggressive verbal masculine top looking for kinky bottom and am open to being versatile to black masculine tops." A thirty-four-year-old Puerto Rican bottom echoed the stereotype of black male virility: "NSA [no strings attached] PUERTO RICAN MASCULINE MUSCULAR BOTTOM LOOKING TO SPREAD EAGLE FOR MASCULINE HUNG RAW [unprotected sex] BLACK TOPS. . . . BEST THING IN LIFE IS FEELING ANOTHER MASCULINE MAN HAVE HIS ORGASM INSIDE MY ASS." A few men of color associated whiteness with effeminacy. A twenty-three-year-old mixed man who describes himself as a "Rican Dominican Arab Italian Grey Eye Dr Feel Good" and who appears black or Latino, emphasized that he is "into ETHNIC mixxed [sic] guys" and "I am not into Caucasian the WeHo/Chelsea Ambercrombie [sic] FISH." "Fish" is a derisive term for female genitalia. This profile goes on to rule out "anyone who uses the term BLATINO and . . . Homothugs." Interestingly, as problematic as some of this man's assumptions are, he is seeking to define a space between the dominant and white West Hollywood scene and the "Homothugs" that emulate 50 Cent.
114. The demand for Asian top profiles was roughly the same in New York and Los Angeles. For the Asian bottom profiles, there was much more demand in Los Angeles (thirteen e-mails) than New York (four e-mails).
115. The findings suggest that Asians also enjoy this freedom. However, regardless of the role they assume, Asians drew less interest than whites.
116. Overall racial demographics in the online community, which are based on our count of 100 randomly displayed profiles each time we posted a profile, are as follows: 46% white, 18% Latino, 16% black, 13% mixed, 6% Asian, and 1% Middle Eastern.
117. Posting all profiles in Harlem would have raised concerns about the nonblack profiles, especially the white and Asian profiles.
118. Kennedy, supra note 21, at 37.