#StopAsianHate
Here at PDXWIT, we are devastated, angry, and disgusted at the racist and misogynist hate crimes that took the lives of Asian women in Atlanta. This incident made headlines, but there have been nearly 4000 anti-Asian transgressions in the U.S. over the last year. These incidents are a result of our country's deeply rooted white supremacy and misogny and those in power encouraging, coining and condoning racist and bigoted language.
We all must work every single day to disentangle ourselves from these patterns and exist in solidarity with our Asian friends, family, colleagues, peers, and strangers.
It is critical that Asian voices are centered in this conversation, so read on to hear personal experiences from the PDXWIT team and what we can all do as we move forward:
KATHY LEE, SPEAKER’S BUREAU
When I was growing up in the 1980s in Michigan, I had a lot of racial slurs thrown at me. People would slant their eyes up and say “Ching Chong” or “Go back to China.” I had friends whose parents were from India/Pakistan who were told to “ride a camel back home” and called “towelheads.” My high school experience was an emotional mixture of teenage hormones and trying to protect myself from racist bullying.
Cut to adulthood, and people still hurl words like weapons. In an obvious lack of imagination on the part of racists, the slurs haven’t changed over the years.
Over the past year, I’ve watched with a slow feeling of dread, the rise in Asian hate as Trump and his allies continued to say things like “China Virus” or the “Kung Flu.” I watched as the words escalated to violence and now that violence has taken an irreparable form: murder.
I spent most of last Wednesday 4/17 hiding in my house and feeling myself sliding into a panic and anxiety spiral. It is not lost on me that this feeling I have: feeling unsafe in public spaces, is something my Black friends have been coping with their entire lives. To date, I’ve dealt with hurtful words, I have never feared being the violent victim of a hate crime. I’ve decided that there is only one thing to do and that is to follow the model and example I’ve seen over my lifetime from my Black friends: live life and live it authentically. The only other choice is to live in fear and that is a win for the terrorists.
ZHOU FANG, SPEAKER’S BUREAU
When I moved to the U.S. as a student, I decided to use a nickname that is easy for my American schoolmates to pronounce. Over the years, it is getting stranger to use my nickname instead of my Chinese legal given name. So I started to teach folks how to pronounce my first name Zhou correctly. It has been an interesting ride but I enjoyed the process — if more people can properly say my name, why not use it? When the Atlanta shooting happened, most of the media couldn’t even get the victims’ names right. At that moment, I realized how neglected and disrespected by the society the Asian community has been, and the bystander’s attitude has enabled and emboldened racists/white supremacists and encouraged them to commit hate crimes and murder.
What happened in Atlanta is not a stand-alone crime. It is a combination of racism, sexism, discrimination against and dehumanisation of Asian sex workers, sexualization and exoticization of Asian women. It all came out of White Supremacy.
While I am terrified and worried about my own and my Asian sisters and brothers’ safety, I refuse to live in fear and I will work alongside everyone who’s committed to smashing White Supremacy and fighting for equity.
HAZEL VALDEZ, PDXWIT AMBASSADOR
I came to the United States when I was five-and-a-half years old. What does that mean? Well, it means that all my formal education, how I think and how I am have all been influenced by my surroundings. Yes, my parents and siblings had a hand in molding me into who I am today, but I will say this, my surroundings didn’t make it easy. Fast forward to today, where I’m mistaken for staff at a restaurant being asked to clean up a white woman’s spilt drink, being asked in the office if I’m an American citizen (I am, BTW), being yelled at across the street if “I spoke English,” or being called a “yellow monkey that needed to go back to where I came from,” all because of my brown skin. It also doesn’t help that my name, Hazel (connotates an old white woman), Valdez (an obvious foreign last name), female and a lesbian, a trifecta that is, quite literally, a perfect storm in any situation I walk into. I’m tired, sad and angry all at the same time these days. Asians have long been discriminated upon, it’s a fact, but one that for whatever reason, doesn’t come up in mainstream media. It sucks.
So I learn. Learn as much as I can to affect change by joining committees, volunteering in organizations that have large captive audiences who can amplify my fight for equality or sit on boards that educate and/or influence policy and produce change.
The tragedy that occurred in Atlanta cannot be dismissed, and I hope that justice is served accordingly. I worry for my family, relatives and friends and hope they are safe. I also encourage them to fight, not in the physical sense, but in ways that will affect the bottom lines of companies and governments who perpetuate white supremacy. To my Asian brothers and sisters, stay strong, fight the good fight and stay safe. #notyourmodelminority
DEANA SOLIS, MENTORSHIP TEAM
I am a descendant of people whose names were replaced by Spanish ones some centuries ago. I am the daughter of immigrants who stopped speaking Tagalog to their children after my older brother was bullied in kindergarten for his accent. Kindergarten. I am a cousin to people who have lived and worked in shadows after arriving some decades ago on student or tourist visas. I know something about making myself invisible.
Yet on a day a few years ago at the Clark County Fair, a military veteran I had never met considered himself perfectly congenial as he took hold of my arm and hand with both of his. He then declared that of all the women in all the countries he was stationed, Filipina women were the BEST. Emphasis his. I did not thank him for his service.
I could have been one of those women killed in Atlanta but for the sacrifices that my ancestors made to lift me on their shoulders. I could stay quiet, as my ancestors would have it, to protect myself. But in unlearning my power of invisibility, I am learning to value my voice. I am learning that the rules of survival they taught us as children were made by the people who would deny us humanity. I choose to be seen, to exist, to thrive.
To my resilient API family, I see you. We are as diverse and abundant as our languages and dialects. We share the loneliness of isolation, the pressure of expectations, the gift of endurance and the grace of community. We cannot be erased. We are not their model minority, but let us be models to our descendants. The fight against white supremacy must be our fight, not one we leave for our children. We have always known the rules were rigged and how to best the systems used against us. It is time to make better rules, ones where people are not property, not disposable, not less than. Together, let's use our power.
PADMASHREE KONETI, BOARD CO-CHAIR
I am of South Asian Indian descent. When I first came to the US, like many others who look like me, I fell prey to being typecast as the model minority. Model minority is a myth that Asian Americans (in particular, although this myth includes other groups) are a group of people who can be allowed to succeed in the midst of white people because they will put up with prejudice and discrimination but thrive without violence or confrontation. This myth became my belief. I believed that I was accepted because I was good at math, that I would keep my head down, mow my lawn, pay my taxes and hence, should be “ok.” It is the belief that prevented me — over the next 2 decades — from resisting whenever I witnessed any discrimination, overt racism or xenophobia, either towards me (“how come you don’t smell like curry?” or “where are you really from?”) or towards people of Asian, Black and Hispanic races. As I dug into deep issues of inequity in tech over the past 3-5 years, I have had an awakening that this myth was yet another systemic form of perpetuating racial prejudice.
The violence in Atlanta is horrific. I am sick of it, and my callout is to my South Asian friends. While there is a lot that can be done to root out systemic racism and white supremacy, we all individually have a role to play in examining our own biases, digging deeper to understand ourselves, educating those around us and mustering up the energy to call out discrimination and racial injustice when they occur. We will never make progress if we stay silent.
Next steps:
We've compiled a list of next steps and resources for the Asian community and allies below.
If you are part of the AAPI community and want to add your story to this piece, or if you have suggestions on additional resources the community should be aware of, tell us here.
Join PDXWIT in donating funds to immediately support the families of the victims in Atlanta here.
Sign Asian Americans Advancing Justice - Atlanta's collective community statement.
Sign up for a free Bystander intervention Training to stop anti-Asian American and xenophobic harassment with Hollaback! and Asian Americans Advancing Justice.
Learn about local organizations like APANO that are advancing social justice initiatives for Asian Pacific Islanders in Oregon.
If you'd like to have a safe space to continue the conversation with PDXWIT, please join our #diversity-inclusion slack group.
Feeling unsafe? Need support? Here are some resources:
Follow these social media accounts so you continue to center the voices and needs of those most impacted by these tragedies and ongoing oppression.
Additional resources:
API Chaya is supporting survivors of sexual and domestic violence and trafficking in Asian and Pacific Islander American and South Asian American communities.
NAPAWF (National Asian Pacific American Women's Forum) is currently doing significant advocacy and legislative work for Reproductive Justice specifically focused on #STOPASIANHATE. Sign their petition.