UConn professor speaks up about anti-Asian violence

STAMFORD — A University of Connecticut panel on anti-Asian violence set for Thursday night had been set up weeks ago, but the Tuesday night shootings in Atlanta that left eight dead have only brought more urgency to the discussion.

“It’s time for us as a community to have a discussion about this and it needs to come from our voices as opposed to having a panel of allies,” said Angela Rola, director of the UConn Asian American Cultural Center located in Storrs.

Terrence Cheng, professor of English and campus director for UConn Stamford, is the moderator of the panel. On Wednesday, Cheng posted a letter to the UConn Stamford community condemning the attacks in Atlanta and pushing back on the “model minority” stereotype for keeping people silent for too long.

“In the past I would not have said anything about this publicly,” he wrote. “Even now, I feel uncomfortable doing so. But that is the problem, that society has conditioned us to be ‘the model minority,’ to be silent when we should be speaking out and taking action.”

The panel, titled “Anti-Asian Violence and the Fight Against Invisibility,” is scheduled for 5 to 6:30 p.m. on Thursday and is open to the public, but registration is required.

Instances of anti-Asian violence have grown in the last year since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Activists and elected officials have blamed former President Donald Trump for fueling the increased vitriol and attacks against Asians by using racist language to describe the coronavirus.

On Wednesday, Gov. Ned Lamont put out a statement addressing the recent attacks, emphasizing that “hate and bigotry are symptoms of a virus that continues to permeate our society — racism.”

“I condemn — in the strongest of terms — the recent violent acts of racism and hate committed against Asian Americans that we have seen across our country,” Lamont said.

Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection Commissioner James Rovella said they were monitoring the events in Atlanta, but “at this time, there are no known threats or confirmed hate incidents in Connecticut toward our Asian population.”

The nonprofit Stop AAPI Hate, which tracks incidents of discrimination and hate against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, reported that there have been 3,800 anti-Asian incidents recorded in the past year.

Rola and others decided a few weeks ago that the cultural center should put out a statement, as well as host a panel to discuss what has been happening.

That letter, which was co-signed by the university’s Asian and Asian American Studies Institute, also attacked the model minority stereotype.

“Because of this racial stereotype, Asian Americans are too often left out of discussions of racial justice, thus ignoring our pain, minimizing our feelings, and assuming a passive response,” the letter reads.

While many have condemned the Atlanta attacks, the hesitancy from the local police to classify the killings as hate crimes has been roundly criticized on social media.

Cheng said he noticed how the narrative after the shootings shifted, as the perpetrator’s crimes were described as a result of a “sexual addiction.”

In his letter, which was shared on UConn Stamford Instagram, Cheng wrote, “I don’t need an official report to tell me that these murders are a hate crime.”

“The facts are that six of these eight people were Asian,” Cheng said.

Rola also criticized the failure to call the shootings a racially motivated crime.

“I am hoping that the narrative of these murders will be more informed as they get more information,” she said. “I’m struck that usually in other communities, the racial component is pointed to very quickly. Here, there is that reservation.”

She said her reaction to the killings was numbness.

“While we are coming to talk about this because of the increase of antiAsian violence due to COVID, this is not something new to our community,” she said. “We’ve been experiencing racism and bias ever since we stepped foot on this land.”

In the wake of the Atlanta attacks, Rola said the panel event on Thursday will begin with a discussion of the shootings.

Other panelists include Mike Keo, a West Hartford photographer who founded the #IAMNOTAVIRUS campaign; Na-Rae Kim, associate director at the Asian and Asian American Studies Institute at the University of Connecticut-Storrs; Glenn Mitoma, assistant professor of human rights and education at UConn; and students Shaina Selvaraju and Aubrey Tang.