I'm REALLY glad that they gave Shane even this much acknowledgement about his race, cuz literally NONE of this dialogue exists in the books, 0%, zilch, nada, nothing. One of my biggest complaints about the books is how Rachel Reid only ever talked about book!Shane's hair--how Asians can't grow much facial hair / chest hair / ball hair, but they have beautifully long head hair (which Shane grows out in the sequel, past his shoulders). 🙄😒 Other than that, bookShane's race is a non-entity; he could've been fully white, and it would change literally NOTHING about his story or characterization whatsoever.
It's insane, compared to how heavily prevalent & prominent Ilya's Russian ethnicity is front & center, despite him not even being the main character in Heated Rivalry--which Rachel quickly amended in the sequel, The Long Game. Her obvious favorite character Ilya becomes the main character, and we spend WAY more time with his struggles & interiority & ethnicity, as a far more developed & fleshed out character than Shane ever is in either book. It's effed up.