New Delhi: American men are increasingly moving to Southeast Asia for love and marriage. They blame the modern dating landscape of the US, where women “treat men like crap”, as reported by The Economist. These men are called “passport bros”.
“Online forums, YouTube channels and TikTok accounts rank countries according to their women, advising which are the most “feminine,” “traditional,” and likely to pamper men. Thailand, Brazil, Colombia, the Philippines and Vietnam are among the most popular,” The Economist said.
The concept of American men finding wives in foreign countries is not new—it started right after World War II. Women had started working, and men were not having it because they wanted traditional partners. According to historian Beth Bailey, 100,000 men married foreign women at the time. Many were also going for “mail-order brides”. However, these men were not essentially “passport bros” since they didn’t move to another country for the women they wanted to marry; they brought the women home—to America.
Dating apps, rejection and the rise of ‘passport bros’
Now, the trend is reignited because of the dating failures of conservative men who can’t handle rejection. Worst of all, they don’t want to compete for women’s attention.
“Some claim the dating landscape is stacked against men. They say apps such as Tinder and Hinge favour only a handful of highly desirable profiles, while others are left competing for scraps,” read the report.
Reddit records go as far back as five years, when the term first started being used for men who traveled to countries like Vietnam and Thailand in search of “love” or similar arrangements. On the subreddit r/thepassportbros, one user even created a “dating world map” ranking countries based on how easy it is for American men to date there. India and China are “Normal”, Thailand, the Philippines, Vietnam, parts of Brazil and many African countries are placed in the “Easy” and “Very Easy” categories. Meanwhile, the US, Canada, much of Western Europe and countries like Japan, South Korea are marked as “Hard” and “Improbable to date”. Basically, the wealthier the country, the harder it gets for the passport bros to date there.
“You’re spot on. Korea being improbable is hilarious. Have they even seen the US troops there? Every other guy has a Korean spouse he met 3 months into being on the island. And many have long, successful flings or relationships. I’m a testament to that personally through my own experience and witnessed experiences,” wrote a user.
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Masculinity and the global market
In a world where young men are increasingly turning to the manosphere and hating on women for their success and independence, the “passport bro” trend is not difficult to understand. Men in the US can’t afford to be the only earning member in the household, and the thought of having a female partner who is financially independent threatens their masculinity. So, they travel to parts of the world where women would accept them in exchange for financial support.