AFA: on the great Ukrainian bride hunt

[Admin]

Folks,

Some (much?) of the attached Harper's article is disturbing. It seems to fit a LOT of the stereotypes about the men who participate in this endeavor through the tours - and the stereotype is not favorable.

Anyone who has spent time with AFA, or other tours, and would like to compare/contrast their experiences with what is stated in this article, please do so.

- Dan

[groovlstk]

Dan,

I think it has been mentioned before but one of our members (I forget his handle and I don't think he's posted in a long time) wrote a nice rebuttal to the Harper's piece:

http://everybodyiloveyou.blogspot.com/search/label/Marriage%20Agencies

[Admin]

Dan,

I think it has been mentioned before but one of our members (I forget his handle and I don't think he's posted in a long time) wrote a nice rebuttal to the Harper's piece:

http://everybodyiloveyou.blogspot.com/search/label/Marriage%20Agencies

groov,

I *do* remember that blog author, and you are correct, I don't think he has visited in a while. Somehow, I missed his rebuttal to the Harper's article. Thanks for providing the link.

- Dan

[Gator]

The author is a clever writer.  His description of UW seemed accurate to me, and in fact I enjoyed reading them.  So why would he use his journalistic license to alter his description of the men to place them in a less than favorable light?  Did he?   

The author captured such believable irony as how several men on the tour "consistently made a point of saying how intelligent their dates were, even if their outing had only lasted for half an hour and had taken place without a common language between them."   And his quotes of Dan the Man, the tour guide, echo the same sales pitches as used by RWD's own Eduard.

Nevertheless, some aspects of the author's report seem far fetched, e. g. a man admitted to having gone to his room and weeping because a woman he first met the night before did not show for a date; another man became engaged to three women during the tour. 

And this description of what the men were seeking in a wife, although clever, requires imagination to write, too vivid to be what I consider factual and investigative reporting.  It seems judgmental to me although I admit that I have never met tour goers.

But what they really wanted, and what most imagined they would find in Ukraine, was a fusion of 1950s gender sensibilities with a twenty-first-century hypersexuality.… The vision was Madonna and puttana rolled together, an American male desire shaped in equal parts by the Promise Keepers and Internet porn.

Groovlstk gave a link to a "nice"  rebuttal.  Within that link, one can find a link to a nasty rebuttal.

http://caliban.wordpress.com/2006/07/22/%C2%BFquien-es-mas-macho-kristoffer-a-garin-o-carpetblogger/

 

[Admin]

The author is a clever writer.  His description of UW seemed accurate to me, and in fact I enjoyed reading them.  So why would he use his journalistic license to alter his description of the men to place them in a less than favorable light?  Did he?   

The author captured such believable irony as how several men on the tour "consistently made a point of saying how intelligent their dates were, even if their outing had only lasted for half an hour and had taken place without a common language between them."   And his quotes of Dan the Man, the tour guide, echo the same sales pitches as used by RWD's own Eduard.

Nevertheless, some aspects of the author's report seem far fetched, e. g. a man admitted to having gone to his room and weeping because a woman he first met the night before did not show for a date; another man became engaged to three women during the tour. 

And this description of what the men were seeking in a wife, although clever, requires imagination to write, too vivid to be what I consider factual and investigative reporting.  It seems judgmental to me although I admit that I have never met tour goers.

Groovlstk gave a link to a "nice"  rebuttal.  Within that link, one can find a link to a nasty rebuttal.

http://caliban.wordpress.com/2006/07/22/%C2%BFquien-es-mas-macho-kristoffer-a-garin-o-carpetblogger/

 

Speaking of embedded links - did you happen to follow one on the link you provided? Here -- http://carpetblog.typepad.com/carpetblogger/2006/07/devuskha_style.html

- Dan