‘Subtle asian traits’ is a place for second gen bonding, but it’s not all fun and memes

Is there anything more real than bonding over shared trauma through Pikachu memes? 

When a friend added me about a month ago, subtle asian traits had about 300,000 members. Every Asian person I know — from middle school classmates to second cousins to a handful of people I’ve matched with on Tinder — appeared to be in this massive meme conglomerate. The Facebook group has nearly tripled in membership since I joined and has ballooned to a whopping 869,000 since its creation in September.

The group, founded by a group of Asian-Australian teenagers from Melbourne, is flush with memes about boba tea, clever linguistic puns, and a joint sense of otherness. It has inspired countless spin-off groups like subtle asian eats, a platform to share mouthwatering photos of food and swap restaurant recommendations, and subtle asian dating, a matchmaking group so your mother will get off your back about finding a significant other. There’s even a subtle asian kevin traits, poking fun at the name’s inexplicable popularity among Asian parents.  Read more…

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