Standing up to anti-Asian racism
At Bushnell Park event, mayor calls for unity amid increasing attacks
About 150 gather at Bushnell Park in Hartford to speak out against a wave of attacks across the country on Asian Americans.
HARTFORD — Proclaiming that Connecticut will not harbor racism, a crowd of 150 chanted “Hate is a virus — protect Asian lives” at a rally Saturday afternoon at Bushnell Park in Hartford.
Associate State Attorney General Vanessa Avery called on Connecticut to reject bigotry against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, and Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin declared that the city won’t tolerate any form of racism.
“Attacks on Asian Americans are attacks on Americans, period. There is no such thing as ‘looking like an American,’ ” Bronin said. “We all need to stand together as Americans.”
Saturday’s rally follows similar gatherings in Fairfield, West Hartford and elsewhere in the wake of the March mass shooting in Atlanta that killed eight people, including six Asian women. Research from California State University at San Bernardino shows hate crimes in 16 major U.S. cities dropped in 2020, but anti-Asian attacks soared by 149%.
Connecticut hasn’t been free from that wave. Alan Tan, chairman of the General Assembly’s Commission on Equity and Opportunity, told rallygoers Saturday that he’d been speaking at a press conference less than a month ago about the state’s determination against racism.
“It only took two weeks from that press conference until we found out someone in Milford allegedly tried to run over an Asian American with a motor vehicle, telling them to go back to their own country,” Tan said. “That should never happen here in Connecticut.”
Tan praised state lawmakers for enacting tough hate crime legislation, and credited Milford police for a quick arrest. Joseph Rohrig is charged with second-degree harassment and third-degree intimidation based on bigotry or bias.
“Hate has no place in Connecticut, the United States or, for that matter, our planet,” Tan said. “To
our Asian American citizens of Connecticut, I want you all to know that you are part of our country, that you are not a virus and that Connecticut government will do what is necessary to protect the citizens — including Asian Americans — from harm.”
Natalie DeLaCruz and Maya Palanki, both students at Conard High School in West Hartford, told of their struggle with being accepted during their childhoods.
“Why can’t we build a society where kids learn to be accepting from a young age? Society has built an environment that nurtures children to believe these things, and minority children to want to hide their cultures and try to conform as much as possible,” Palanki said. “It was exhausting trying to fit in and conform during my youngest years.”
Without using former President Donald Trump’s name, several speakers made clear they believe he bears much of the blame for the surge in anti-Asian racism.
“We need to recognize that words matter,” Avery said. “Terms like ‘China virus’ and ‘kung flu’ enable anti-Asian xenophobia and contribute directly to the violence that we see today.”
Bronin was even more direct, saying, “The acts of violence and the rising strain of racism didn’t just happen — it happened because leaders stood up and empowered the worst and ugliest tendencies in our country by talking about Mexicans as racists and criminals, by talking about a virus as the Chinese virus.”
Among the rally organizers were the Asian Pacific American Law Students Association at UConn Law, the Connecticut Asian Pacific American Bar Association and student groups from Quinnipiac.