Ignorance is once again on deadly display in the U.S.
My eyes look Asian. But I have never truly felt Asian.
I was born into a mixed household and was never taught any language other than English. I never learned what it meant to be Asian.
By all rights, I am an American. So why do I, and others who look like me, feel endangered when we step outside?
Perhaps it is because of that statistic that has been floating around. According to Stop AAPI’s report, since the start of the pandemic approximately 3,800 hate incidents were reported by Asian Americans from March 2020 to February 2021.
From model minority to the cause for a worldwide pandemic. The U.S. in all its greatness and inclusivity has struggled to face one of its most long-standing issues. The desire to scapegoat.
Just like the Japanese internment zones at the start of U.S. involvement in WWII, approximately 120,000 Americans were relocated out of irrational fear.
Similarly, since 9/11, American citizens have been harassed and discriminated against because of their Islamic faith.
The simple fact is that looks matter in America. No matter how long one has lived here or what their upbringing is, if you look like anything but Caucasian, you will be a target one way or another.
Children today are taught that the U.S. as a society has grown and moved past its racist roots, that we are all treated fairly. Frankly, they have been lied to.
I have seen it through my own eyes, the ignorance that others have about
Asian-Americans that we all talk and look a certain way, eat certain foods, believe in a particular faith.
Our society may have matured from the era of public discrimination like the Chinese Exclusion
Act and Jim Crow, but by the looks of it, not much has changed. Law-abiding Americans are still being judged, harassed, and murdered based solely on their ethnic appearances.
According to a Ispos poll, approximately 44% of Americans believe the COVID-19 virus was caused by the Chinese. Around the same time, former President Trump coined the phrase “China Virus’’ and then later “Kung-Flu” when referring to COVID-19.
With the growth of antiAsian sentiments such as these becoming mainstream, it is no wonder how so many people easily blame the virus on us.
And so it went from harassment and insults to physical attacks, mostly on our women and elderly. Then as of March 16, 2021, everything came to a head with the Atlanta spa shootings.
The joke is not funny anymore, it never was, and yet somehow we all knew that it would come down to this result. Worst of all, it did not have to.
As it turns out, the greatest threat to the U.S. is not some worldwide pandemic or foreign power, but ignorance. As a people, we must educate ourselves to understand all perspectives before laying blame
My eyes look Asian. Though, up until now, I have never truly felt Asian.
But don’t focus on our eyes, focus on the people. We are Asian Americans. Our nationality is of the United States of America, same as most everyone else in this country.
We are not a virus, we are just people.