Biden, the Asian American community still needs your support
by Hannah Bernstein
On March 16, 2021, a gunman entered an Atlanta spa and killed 8 people, 6 of those people were of Asian descent. As a result, the public and mainstream media have finally started to pay attention to the Asian community’s anger and fear regarding the rise in anti-Asian hate.
What happened in Atlanta was a tragedy, but it is not the only hate incident towards the AAPI (Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders) community and may not be the last incident. Between March and August of 2020, nearly 3,000 hate incidents towards the AAPI community have been reported according to the Stop AAPI Hate Initiative. These hate incidents must be stopped as they impact all members of the AAPI community from the elderly to preschoolers.
While I do understand that not all Asians are Chinese, people who are not a part of the Asian community often assume everyone with Asian-like facial features is Chinese. There is also a common misconception that people who are of Asian descent are not originally born in this country and are seen as perpetual foreigners. The US also has a long history of using Asian Americans as scapegoats for diseases and purposely excluding them through legislation like the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882.
This causes me to be concerned about how I am viewed, how my family is perceived, and how anyone who looks like me will be treated when I see my country’s leadership so focused on competing and controlling China. While the intention may be to protect American interests and push for better treatment of the Uyghurs, I do not have faith in our leaders’ capabilities of handling international relations and protecting the Asian American community.
While Biden has not fully announced how he and his administration will handle China and the rise of anti-Asian hate, we do have precedence.
Long before Trump started his campaign to prove American superiority over China, US-China relations were based on the “One China Policy,” which meant the US would sever ties with Taiwan and acknowledge Taiwan as a part of China. Trump broke away from the One-China policy when he accepted a call from Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen and began his “hard on China” approach. Then, in 2018, the Trump administration announced sweeping tariffs on Chinese imports, worth at least $50 billion, in response to what the White House alleges is Chinese theft of U.S. technology and intellectual property. This led to a long trade war between the world’s two largest economies.
While the ‘Phase One’ Trade Deal signing did relax some U.S. tariffs on Chinese imports and commit China to buy an additional $200 billion worth of American goods, tensions between China and the US rose again as the Trump administration barred all non-U.S. citizens who recently visited China from entering the United States amid the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak. There were also months of the Trump administration and Republicans referring to the coronavirus as the “China flu.”
Keeping in mind that Biden will be handling China-US relations more intentionally than Trump, I am also aware of the pressures in Washington to be tough on China. I fully support the U.S. designating China’s abuses of Uyghurs as genocide and I also do not support China’s treatment of Taiwan. However, I also hope that the final message being sent to the American public is to support the Asian-American community and not turn against as we all belong in this country.
As this article is published after Derek Chavin was found guilty of murdering George Floyd, I must note that while the rise in Anti-Asian hate has caused more fear in the Asian community, calling for more policing is not the answer. Like Janelle Wong, a professor of Asian American studies at the University of Maryland says “If addressing violence against Asian Americans entails furthering stereotypes about Black criminality and the policies associated with those stereotypes … we’ve misdiagnosed the problem.”
Rather, as Teach for America suggests, we should be
Educate yourself on the history of anti-Asian racism in this country and expand your understanding of how white supremacy and systemic racism have positioned AAPI communities for discrimination, erasure, invisibility, and harm.
Educate yourself on transformative justice practices. Learn about white supremacy. Understand how oppression is connected and recognize how anti-Blackness is at the root of all of this.
Use whatever platform you have to raise awareness about what is happening. Denounce violence and xenophobia in your circles. Raise awareness about this to those in power at your institution. Do not leave it to your AAPI community to ask you to do this.
Disrupt anti-Asian racism when it is happening; attend bystander intervention training and build your skills around how to anticipate and interrupt the harm. We must keep each other safe.
Differentiate your social media feeds: Do you follow any AAPI educators, community organizers, activists, scholars, media, or organizations doing work within the community? Some recommendations on where to start: educators/voice: @TeachandTransform, @TonyRosaSpeaks, @DearAsianYouth; organizations: @SmithsonianAPA, @AAPIWomenLead, @ActToChange, @AdvancingJustice_AAJC; media: @NextShark, @NBCAsianAmerica
Invest in long-term community care by supporting mutual aid networks both locally and nationally. Watch out for each other and give when and as often as you can. If you are unable to give financial support, follow up with your local community mutual aid organization to see how else you can provide resources.