Teenagers Across America Take a Stand Against AAPI Hate
Amid the recent attacks against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, May was the month to celebrate the AAPI community. Both in the streets of San Diego and Washington D.C., Asian Americans and their allies stood together to fight against Asian Hate. Teenagers across the country are also finding their own ways to speak out.
At Torrey Highlands High School in San Diego, high school senior Emily Tianshi and her family told NBC 7 San Diego that they have open discussions about racism against Asians and lean into the difficult and uncomfortable topics that are discussed. Tianshi told NBC 7 San Diego that when Tianshi and her classmates went to downtown San Diego for a field trip, a man began verbally attacking them for their ethnicity.
Tianshi described that the man “looked like a businessman; he’s obviously involved in society.” She explained her frustration that “people have the audacity to do that because they think they have more power over young Asian girls.” Tianshi and her family have since then organized an anti-hate demonstration in which over 900 people attended in three different locations. On social media, Tianshi said, “We see a lot of buzzwords, we see a lot of pretty infographics, but that’s not enough. We really need policy-wide structural change.”
On May 20, President Biden signed the COVID-19 Hates Crime Act into law. It intends to make reporting hate crimes more accessible by developing public outreach and providing resources in multiple languages. The organization Stop AAPI Hate acknowledged the legislation on their website stopaapihate.org for putting the time into “community-centered solutions and provisions to mitigate anti-Asian rhetoric,” but they also believe that the “root causes of systemic racism and oppression” in the American government need to be addressed. More about their statement can be found at https://stopaapihate.org/statement-on-house-passage-of-the-covid-19-hate-crimes-act/.
Just outside the White House, high schooler Karen Xu expressed her fears to WUSA9 after the shooting in Atlanta, Georgia, where six out of the eight victims were Asian women.
“It’s so heartbreaking,” Xu told WUSA9. “I could envision my own parents, and like just being at a spa and hanging out and some guy just going and shooting. It was really, really personal to me.”
Xu decided to take action and met with Virginia Governor Ralph Northam to come up with solutions on how to handle racism. Keam and Virginia’s General Assembly thus formed the Asian American and Pacific Islander Caucus. Their purpose is to develop and pass law enforcement policies that protect the AAPI community. If the law is passed, they aim for the Justice Department to review hate crimes more efficiently.
“I just don’t want another small Asian girl and boy to feel and experience the things I did,” Xu told WUSA. “I hope that no one else has to go through that. The next generation deserves better.”