to assume that a man in his 40's having a quite younger wife who is Thai

[SlartyBartFast]

while he is not Thai.
that she is a Thai Bride,

or should I mind my own business.

or shoudl i believe the story that it was a Holiday Romance?

Well said Foxytocin

for those who cannot see how their beliefs are racist, listen to Portofino. she spoke from experience.

none of the Asian women I have known well I would have ever called subservient.

Not going to comment on the YABU bit, but you might be interested in Sheldon Archer.

He started a marriage agency. He is 72 and his wife 23

See:
www.indonesian-wife.com

Also his rationale:

web.archive.org/web/20080113051847/www.an-asian-wife.com/compare.htm

"Until I met Yuyun I had never been married. So what made her so special that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her? What was so different about her? I'll try to explain.
To begin with, Yuyun wakes up with a beaming smile that stays with her for the whole day. In the three years that we have been married, I have never known her to be miserable or angry (at least not with me but she will have a go at the bank employees when they screw up). I can wake her up in the middle of the night, take her out on the motorbike in pouring rain and she will still be giggling and laughing...how can you NOT love someone like that?
In Indonesia it is the custom to remove one's shoes before entering a house. Most people wear sandals which are easy to slip on and off. Whenever we leave someone's home, Yuyun precedes me and turns my sandals facing outwards so I don't have to bend down and do it. When I tell her that she doesn't have to do that, she replies: "Please don't stop me from doing something that shows that I love you." When we go shopping, she insists on carrying all the packages. At home, if I try to get a glass of water or make some tea, she insists that SHE does it for me. We never pass each other without hugging and kissing. After three years I find her just as exciting as the first day we met. She is such a caring person that she will always buy the food that I like before she buys what she wants. If I cough or sneeze during the night, she will wake up and make sure that I am alright.
She wants to be treated like a woman and she wants me to be a man. She will instigate wrestling matches with me to be assured that I am stronger than she is. She loves to be thrown onto the bed and kissed passionately. She has beautiful hair that I love to touch. Never has she complained that I am messing up her hair, even after just returning from the hairdressers. I wish that I had met her twenty years ago but she would have been only three years old :-)
Sexually she is totally responsive. Never says "I'm tired" or "Not tonight Dear." (Actually it's ME who has to say this sometimes) :-)
She devotes her life to making me happy and of course I try my best to keep her happy too. I am convinced that I could never find anyone like her in the West. On the other hand, I believe that Yuyun is typical of the unspoiled girls that one will find here so, if this is the way that YOU would like to be treated, it can be arranged! "

That's nice Someguy but by not commenting on the AIBU question you are ignoring the fact that she (the OP) is being very unreasonable to make assumptions about this man's wife based upon her ethnicity. Surely this is unreasonable. Like I said before, being a Thai looking woman in this country must be a right pain in the arse with people like the OP judging them like this.

thanks beanie. night all.

beanieb: I think it is a similar situation to millionaires and beautiful women.

There quite a few men who could not find a wife in the West who end up doing so in Asia. It wasn't the ethnicity I think so much as age + ethnicity. And the reason it is age + ethnicity is because it doesn't happen that often in the West, whereas a disproportionate number of these men have much younger wives.

I wouldn't really judge either party for it, it's wrong to assume that the women are miserable, and the men are probably not either. Not everybody holds the viewpoint that a married couple should be the same age, the same university, etc., and if the wife is happy to be a younger bride (and I believe that she may well be - people don't have the same attitudes in the East), then it really isn't anyone else's business.

ilove, the saddest thing is that he does love her! It's so obviously not reciprocated though. He doesn't seem to care that she is taking the piss. It is is his JOB to support her!

He talks a LOT now about my first SM (my mum died when i was 4 and he married again) but he won't admit to regretting anything.

I just think it's not really ok for anyone to assume every older man with a young woman of Thai appearance must have 'bought' her, that's all.

"""There's a forum I go on for economics stuff that is about 75% male posters and there is a hardcore of misogynists on there who go on about how they will only go with foreign women because English women are all fat/lazy/bolshy etc..I do hope they end up learning their lessons.""""

Ha ha - and welcome to the male alternative to mumsnet.

I dont think it is based on ethnicity, I think it is based on age. If I see a young guy with a young thai women I dont think she is a thai bride. However, where i live if I see a young thai women with a wart hog of a middle aged man I do sometimes make that assumption.

do they both seem happy?

Then what on earth are you "judging him" for?

Freyski, If I saw a middle-aged flabby man with a much younger woman of same race, ti could be his dd so it wouldn't catch your eye as much

nothing to do with ethnicity at all. some people will insist on dragging that in to everything from the price of fish to a good old fashioned bit of nosiness.

Yes it would catch my eye just as much

beanieb, I see women who might be from Thailand all the time, hardly ever see one with a local twice her age, and when I do, THEN it will catch my eye and hang me, yeah, I'll judge!!!

Freyski, I meant to say Exactly Freyski, I was agreeing with you!!

sorry I was supposed to add it it was obvious they were a couple.

Ok I am with you now, my typing brain hasnt kick in yet either

Foxytocin (and this is the last multiple post, as after 3 I will appear a bit crazy)..

what the British men think they are getting is a subservient, grateful woman!!! (unlike those awful educated, demanding British women who consider themselves a man's equal. That's the point! I'm not that sorry for them if they don't get what they expext.

A friend of mine has a 'thai bride'. It really upsets him. He met her through his work, it was a normal romance over a distance for a period of time, he went over to work, occasionally she came over here for her work, they fell in love over a period of time.

They got married, she moved here, they have one lovely child.

He is in his 46, had appeared never to settle down, typical batchelor. Has his own house, etc etc and people presume she is an internet bride. She came to the marriage with her own financial contribution, and continues to work 2 days a week now. She is 27. They are a happy family.

I also know someone who does have an 'internet bride' he is in his 40s, she is 32, they are both english and could not find the right person through other means. They are the happiest most successful couple I know, moreso together than seperately.

So, while sometimes it does happen, it is not necessarily 'thai' that is applies to and it is very judgemental, yes so YABU.

Someguy, that is a SAD story ,don't youget that!?!

As IF yayun would transport herself to the otherside of the world to marry a 72 year old for love.. I bet she'd rather have afforded the luxury of falling in love with a man closer to her own age. What a sad story. The 72 year old man sees her as a pet, in terms of how happy she makes him.

Oh and to echo foxy my SIL is chinese - married to my BIL. She has 2 degrees, a full time job, and is very successful in her own right. If anyone wears the trousers in that relationship, it is her (they live in USA, speak predominantly chinese around the children).

"There's a forum I go on for economics stuff that is about 75% male posters and there is a hardcore of misogynists on there who go on about how they will only go with foreign women because English women are all fat/lazy/bolshy etc."

More like because no self respecting British woman would touch the sad losers with a bargepole

And in response to the OP if they are both consenting adults and both parties have entered into it of their own free will why is it any of your business?

I got chatting to a lovely chap once who told me he was in his early seventies. He has an asian wife - who looked very young - and two young sons.

We got chatting about my baby, and he ended up telling me all about himself. He had been widowed and had grown up children, and had been knocked for six by the death of his wife. But then he had met his new wife, who was actually about 40 when they met (looked much younger ), and she had been living and working in the UK for years.

She wanted children so he had his vasectomy reversed but they still had little luck, even IVF failed. Then all of a sudden, they had two boys naturally, one after the other.

He told me of how devastated he had been when his first wife died, and how he would never have believed the way his life would turn out.

I remember thinking what a super person he was. It was a relationship that at first glance in the street looked like a "Thai bride" one but was anything but and in fact a rather fairytale-happy-ending one.

I think people can tell the difference. there are subtle clues that we pick up on before we 'judge'.

Clothes, personal confidence, confidence in the environment.....

Your comments assume that we all always believe that any mixed race relationship takes advantage.

That's obviously bullshit.

People pick up on a whole load of stuff, and occassionally, they subliminally notice something that doesn't stack up.

I can actually tell the difference between a Spanish student and an italian student from 50 metres away! I can certainly tell the difference between an educated chinese american with two degrees and a thai women who knows ONE middle-aged man in the country.

It insults EVERYBODY to say that we can't tell the difference tbh. As though, the ONLY way wwe have of reading people is their facial ethnic origin.

BalloonSlayer, I feel sorry for that man's grown up children tbh.