Racism and hate crimes against Asians has surged since the beginning of the pandemic, especially towards elderly Asian-Americans. Asian-owned businesses have also been targeted and damaged over the course of this pandemic. According to NextShark, a publication dedicated towards news within the Asian community, "3,795 incidents of anti-Asian were self-reported to the [Stop AAPI Hate Reporting Center]" from March 2020 to February 2021.
Perhaps one of the most horrific hate crimes against the Asian community this year happened Tuesday, March 16th. An active shooter in the Atlanta area shot and killed 8 people, 6 of which were Asian women. Though the shooter claims that his attacks were not racially motivated, this appalling event sparked anger and sorrow within the Asian community. Even more outrage arose when the Atlanta police issued a statement, saying it was just "a really bad day" for him. To brush off his crime as just "a bad day" is so incredibly tone deaf and insulting, especially towards the families that lost their loved ones in the shooting.
Despite all of these attacks against the Asian community, the amount of media coverage that discusses the hate crimes towards Asians is minimal. It's disgusting to see the apathy and nonchalance towards the blatant racism Asians face, whether it's through micro-aggresive remarks or literal hate crimes.
From comments about eye shape to micro-aggressions about "eating dogs," racism against the Asian community has been extremely normalized in our current society. Even the concept of Asians being the "model minority" is stemmed from racism and was developed to paint other minority groups in a negative light. This myth is an effort to whitesplain the minority experience, and divide minority groups, rather than unite them through their shared experiences of racism and discrimination. Let's #StopAsianHate and start uniting minority groups.
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