By Cynthia Zhang
Edited by Charles Liu and Alloe Mak

In 1860, French and English troops stormed the Summer Palace in Beijing during the Second Opium War. They looted and burned with reckless abandon, seizing treasures from the Emperor’s court, including a litter of Pekingese puppies. The British army gifted the smallest of the pups to Queen Victoria, who christened the dog “Looty” in a nod to the spoils of war. For the British elite, these dogs became more than just exotic pets—they embodied a deeper symbol of colonial nostalgia. They were seen as the manifestation of the belief that whiteness inherently deserved the wealth and treasures of the colonized, their royal artifacts reduced to mere ornaments of imperial superiority.

In the West, Pekingese dogs were popular with much of their allure wrapped up in the exoticism of the Orient—they were shrouded in tales of being “smuggled out of China” by the British. They were not merely pets but objects of desire, emblems of faraway lands and foreign customs—cherished for the mystique of their strangeness. With their delicate features and personalities—docile, detached, unwilling to breed with others, appearing to somehow sense the sacred “yellow” once reserved for the Chinese emperor—they were cast as symbols of traditionally feminine and oriental traits. Europe’s obsession with these dogs mirrored its orientalist fantasy—the belief that Old China, shrouded in mystery and frozen in antiquity, was proof of Western superiority. Owning a Pekingese became a way to possess a fragment of the East, a marker of social prestige, and a reminder of conquest over a weakened nation. Yet, for all the pageantry and symbolism attached to them, Looty, the first of these dogs given to Queen Victoria, was buried in an unmarked grave at Windsor Castle, forgotten like the empire that had once owned her.

The correlation between gender and exoticism remains deeply embedded in the way the West “appreciates” East Asian cultures. Just as Pekingese dogs were once cast with feminine and “oriental” attributes, entire societies across Asia are still filtered through a lens of passivity, delicacy, and submissiveness—qualities that, in a patriarchal context, connote femininity. And here lies a grim truth: the essence of Orientalism has barely shifted since the 18th century; only its framing has evolved. In today’s world, Western fascination with East Asia may have traded in mysticism for a more naive, yet still reductive, fetishization. This approach narrows complex cultures into digestible fragments, perpetuating an idealized view of Asia as “feminine”—a land that is exotic, alluring, and perpetually, inherently otherworldly.

Modern global enthusiasm for East Asian aesthetics, from K-pop to Japanese kawaii (cute) culture, reflects a nuanced but persistent gendered idealization. Kawaii culture in Japan, widely celebrated and marketed as charming or quaint, reinforces stereotypes of East Asian societies as youthful, innocent, and non-confrontational. In fact, the subliminal nature of fetishization seeps into everything that functions under modern capitalism; hyper-aestheticization and commodification reduces these cultures to visually appealing stereotypes—traits resonant with traditional feminine qualities like softness and charm. Consequently, the idolization of East Asian culture serves to infantilize and depoliticize the societies it represents, obscuring their complexities in favor of an idealized, consumable image. 

This idealization extends into beauty standards, as East Asian aesthetics have permeated Western societies through Korean, Chinese, and Japanese media. The West often idolizes East Asian beauty, especially Korean beauty standards—which verges into fetishization by framing East Asian individuals, particularly women, as embodying an idealized femininity: soft, elegant, youthful, and unthreatening. This admiration carries forward colonial-era tropes of the “oriental woman” as delicate and submissive, framing East Asian women as symbols of purity and beauty while simplifying their identities. There’s even a sense of veneration in replicating the looks of specific Korean or Japanese celebrities, almost an unspoken homage to the colonial notion that Westerners can’t distinguish between “different types of Asian.” This standard is so ingrained that K-pop idols who deviate from it often face criticism, largely from Western audiences who have internalized and idealized the “perfect” East Asian beauty.

Do we truly want this? Do we truly want to pander to long-held stereotypes for the sake of gaining soft power over our oppressors? To be looted, not of physical artifacts, but of the cultural essence that makes us distinct? 

The cycle continues. The centuries have passed but the pulse of it remains, as if echoing beneath the surface of every object we exalt; we relish as we carve beauty out of what was never ours to claim. Greed that is softened now, perhaps, but no less hungry. 

Oh, Looty. 

You were so much more than what they made you.