There's No Debate When It Comes to the Obvious

During my sophomore year of college, Asian people were getting attacked on the street almost every week. It was tough. Growing up in the suburbs was never like this. An offhand comment here and there was common but never was I so scared of the possibility of being physically attacked.

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I was riding the train to work once, and someone spit at me. Alarmed and shaken, I rode to work in shock. I told no one.

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I felt more Asian than I had in my entire life. “American” was erased from my identity and I was only seen as a foreigner. In everyone else’s eyes, I was the reason everything was shut down. I was the vector for the virus. They assumed that everyone who looks vaguely “Asian” is from China and is directly the source of COVID. I was keenly aware of how I was perceived by others. In that regard, it felt more dangerous to be Asian.

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It didn’t matter if you were an international student or born here. It didn’t matter if you were five generations out from Asia or your parents just came to the U.S. yesterday. It didn’t matter how long you had been in the U.S. because you were still Asian, and you were a foreigner.

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When I was younger, I wished I had lighter hair or blue irises. Maybe if I put colored contact lenses in my eyes or dyed my hair, then maybe I would be seen as white. The door to this fantasy had shut a while ago, but when the anti-Asian racism hit, that door was completely locked and boarded up forever. The part of me that wanted to pretend to be white was gone.

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What was left was my raw Asianness. And I embraced it. My family’s traditional clothes and jewelry bathed me in pride. Their red was my armor, and their gold was my weapon. I wore these with courage as if to prove that racism would not scare me away from being who I was. I spoke my mother’s tongue in public and held close traditional meals that brought me comfort.

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When the news broke that six Asian women in Atlanta had been killed by a gunman who was trying to “eliminate his temptations” from a “sexual addiction,” I was furious. I couldn’t focus on school. I was not sleeping well. I cried and cried until my eyes were red and dry. I ranted to my peers and student groups. The weight of it felt like it would swallow me whole.

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My academic department had said nothing. Statements emerged around campus in support of Asian students and against anti-Asian hate, but my corner of campus was silent. They were “hesitant” they said. They “hesitate to put out a statement.” Are you serious?

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I needed to say something. I needed to tell people what this meant. It was not acceptable to let this pass in silence. With fire and fury, I drafted a statement and proposed a seminar on being Asian in science. A white graduate student who I had worked with on a departmental committee supported my efforts. We published the statement as an entity separate from the department and announced the seminar in a student group newsletter.

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I took the podium while the grad student set up the stage and aimed the spotlight at me. Despite my significant fatigue, I had convinced myself that I had the emotional capacity to proceed. Students, faculty, and staff from our department came, and the message was well-received. I was awarded accolades from the college. I deserved it. I deserved compensation for the emotional damage and toll that this took on me. I believe that minoritized people should not have to bear the brunt of social justice work, but when we do, there should be reparations.

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But the thing that mattered the most to me was the Asian students. They needed it. We needed it. No one was speaking up for us except us. Even in our corner of the university, it was necessary to be heard.