The play is about gender on many different levels. Song understands this dynamics from the start and speaks about his racism overtly in their first meeting, claiming that Madame Butterfly, an opera Gallimard loves, is a white fantasy of oppression and tragedy. Throughout the play, there is a contradiction between the fact that Gallimard is in love with Song and puts her on a pedestal, but also disrespects her culture and race. Indeed, his perception of Song as "submissive" and easy to dominate has a great deal to do with her race-the fact that, as Song points out in his testimony against Gallimard, "The West believes the East, deep down, wants to be dominated because a woman can't think for herself." Gallimard falls in love with his ideal submissive partner, and he expresses a negative image of just about everything that is Chinese. The play examines issues of racist stereotypes throughout the narrative.
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