BREAKING NEWS about Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPI) being massacred and assaulted because of their racial identity has dominated the headlines in recent weeks. Many of them are of Filipino descent. Here are some cases as the Asian Journal reported:
In Georgia: Eight people, including six women of Asian descent, were mercilessly shot by a white man who police say went on a rampage at three spas in the Atlanta area where businesses are owned mostly by Asian Americans.
At a San Jose, California Caltrain Station: A 26-year-old Filipina medical worker named “Tiffany” was reported to have been grabbed by her neck, pulled to the ground and threw by her hair the suspect, a 32-year-old white man named Johan Strydom. The district attorney’s office said that he told Tiffany, “F*ck you, Asian,” and that Strydom intended to rape her.
In San Francisco, California: 84-year-old Thai immigrant Vicha Ratanapakdee was violently pushed to the ground in a daylight attack, hitting his head in the fall, and died shortly after arrival in the hospital.
In New York: Noel Quintana, a Filipino man who was slashed in the face on the New York subway while on his way to work and received nearly 100 stitches.
In Phoenix, Arizona: 74-year-old Juanito Falcon, a Filipino grandfather was punched in the face and later died of his injuries.
In White Plains, New York: an 83-year-old Korean American woman was spat on and punched, causing her to hit her head on the ground and blackout, without provocation.
These are just a few stories that have made a lot of Asians in America fearful for their own life and safety. These are not isolated cases. The hate and attack against Asian Americans have in fact escalated since the coronavirus pandemic started.
“Nearly 3,800 hate incidents have been reported by Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPIs), including 8 % of reports coming from Filipinos across the country,” the Asian Journal reported based on new data from Stop AAPI Hate. From that data, 503 cases happened in the first two months of 2021 alone.
Stop AAPI Hate is a national coalition that tracks anti-Asian American discrimination.
President Joe Biden condemned the verbal and physical assault on Asian Americans “who have been attacked, harassed, blamed and scapegoated.”
“At this very moment, so many of them, our fellow Americans, they’re on the front lines of this pandemic trying to save lives, and still, still they’re forced to live in fear for their lives just walking down streets in America. It’s wrong. It’s un-American. And it must stop,” Biden said on the first anniversary of the coronavirus pandemic on March 11.
We could only think of our modern-day heroes — including the Filipino nurses — who paid the ultimate sacrifice more than any other group fighting on the front lines.
As part of his administration’s action to address this problem, President Biden signed an executive order on January 26, “which included directives to remove language in federal actions or documents that would contribute to xenophobia and racism against the Asian American and Pacific Islander population and for the Department of Justice to expand its collection of data and public reporting regarding hate incidents against community members.”
Unfortunately, the one factor that most fueled this hate was the former President of the United States Donald J. Trump, who used and abused the power of the Office of the President and the bully pulpit to blame and scapegoat China in order to deflect his own accountability and failure of leadership in handling the coronavirus pandemic.
He used peoples’ frustration, pain and desperation to direct their anger to China by calling COVID-19 the “China virus,” even up to now when he would take credit for the expedited production of vaccines, contrary to facts.
Trump carried on spreading the virus of hate without regard to the already growing number of violent hate crimes against Asian Americans, where the hate for China has been channeled to all Asians. “Go home to where you belong!” was directed to Asians including us, Filipinos. This had been consistent with his tactic of making groups hate each other so he could divide and conquer.
And Trump was not alone in this. Trump was just a catalyst who emboldened the racists in our midst to come out, demonize and be violent to Asians and other ethnic groups, while praising white supremacists as “patriots” and giving excuses for crimes they commit against the Constitution and the nation.
Unfortunately, this virus of hate, insults, discrimination against Asians and other immigrants and people of color did not just start during the pandemic. This has been the painful and ugly reality of many people, including Filipinos, and sadly, the racism comes from our own kababayans in the community.
“Anti-Asian racism has been normalized for such a long time. If you complain about it, you’re gaslit. This isn’t just the result of the pandemic. This is the result of years of normalizing anti-Asian jokes and rhetoric, treating Asian women as sex objects, and Asian men as punchlines,” lamented by a good family friend “F”.
“Kids made fun of me [calling me] an Asian prostitute from 4th grade onward. Blood relatives have told me, ‘Be grateful you weren’t born picking rice in a communist hell hole.’ These attitudes are nothing new, and these attacks are the natural result of years of normalizing these attitudes. This is f*cking awful and I’m just tired,” she intimated.
“Internalized racism, misogyny… it’s like we’re playing terrible person bingo. The ‘picking rice’ comment? I was probably 15 or 16 at the time. How am I supposed to respond to that at that age without being a smart-ass kid who is ‘overreacting’?”
“F” is biracial. Her Dad is a white American English Professor of Irish descent, while her Mom is a Filipina medical doctor.
“The first priest my parents went to in the U.S. to ask to marry them basically accused my mom of being a prostitute,” F anguished. “He was Filipino but that doesn’t really make it any better. I personally think the Filipino priest made it worse.”
F was raised well by their parents despite this reality and is now a lawyer helping people fight for their rights, especially those who are marginalized and discriminated against by society.
This is personal to me. Aside from my family being Asian immigrants here in America, I worry about my grandchildren. They are biracial and I worry about how they would be treated by other people if this racism against Asians and all minorities in America does not stop. How do we make this stop?
Perhaps we can start with ourselves and our family. I remember my third child Katrina, a political science major in college, courageously started a conversation with me and my husband after we were sharing our experience in Hong Kong and impersonating the Chinese tour guide, with us talking “like” Chinese without Chinese words.
Katrina respectfully called us out, saying she knows we are not racists, but talking and acting this way perpetuates stereotypes, which prevents us from really taking other groups of people seriously, and thereby failing to treat them with dignity and respect.
My husband and I were taken aback but she brought out one important point — that we have to be honest in examining our thoughts and behavior and check if we are unknowingly spreading the virus of racism, discrimination, mistrust of other “people” and hate against them.
If we hear words and see acts of racism from our family or friends, do we laugh or insult those being discriminated against, or do we call out the people doing these racist acts? As President Joe Biden said after he and VP Kamala Harris talked with the Asian American community in Atlanta on Friday, March 19: We need to speak up and speak out. We cannot remain silent. Silence is complicity.
If you are married to a white racist family, rub elbows with racist friends, work in a racist environment, do you feel compelled to think the way they do and demonize others for their racial identity, even our own kababayans, so you will be accepted as they would accept “white” people? Do you feel the need to pull down other people of color to lift you up and make you feel better about yourself in the company of racist people?
If you applaud and support Trump for his racist rhetoric, blaming and scapegoating minority groups, passing broad generalizations and judgment about their worth as human beings because of stereotypes and prejudices, isn’t that spreading hate and division ourselves?
What have we really done to stand against racism, discrimination and hate?
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The opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by the author do not necessarily reflect the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints of the Asian Journal, its management, editorial board and staff.
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Gel Santos Relos has been in news, talk, public service and educational broadcasting since 1989 with ABS-CBN and is now serving the Filipino audience using different platforms, including digital broadcasting, and print, and is working on a new public service program for the community. You may contact her through email at [email protected], or send her a message via Facebook at Facebook.com/Gel.Santos.Relos.
