The truth about anti-Asian racism

Why nuanced discussions and coverage of racialized communities matter.

Hey y’all, Anita here. This week, I received quite a few check-ins from acquaintances and colleagues who were concerned about the impact that the Atlanta spa shootings have had on me as a Chinese-Canadian woman. As you all know, a 21-year-old white man is in police custody for allegedly killing eight people, including six women of East Asian descent, on Tuesday — leading many to believe that he was motivated by race-related hate. 

Although I appreciate the sentiment behind the check-ins, they made me realize that until Tuesday, few people outside of East Asian diasporic communities were aware of — much less concerned about — rising anti-Asian sentiment. Despite the fact that reports of hate crimes against people of East Asian descent have been mounting since before the pandemic (former U.S. president Donald Trump frequently incited violence by using the term “Chinese virus” in place of “coronavirus”), Tuesday seemed to be the moment when most non-Asians realized this is a real problem.

Some of the check-in messages presumed I was beside myself with horror. Yes, I was deeply angered and saddened, but horrified? No. Horror implies shock, and I wasn’t shocked. Anyone who’s been paying attention to the statistics over the past year — or who knows their history — wouldn’t be shocked, either.

Timeline of all Twitter hashtags under #covid19 and #chinesevirus with anti-Asian sentiments from March 9 to 23, 2020. 📈: American Journal of Public Health

But even though I was well aware of this reality, I hesitated to speak candidly about it. I was so hesitant that I experienced a nearly year-long bout of writer’s block. In June 2020, I pitched a follow-up to this 2016 piece I wrote for The Walrus that was going to touch on the “model minority” myth, but something — I wasn’t sure what at the time — was preventing me from sharing my true feelings about this topic. I was worried that my words would be misconstrued, especially during such a fraught time for racial discourse. It wasn’t until early March 2021, when coverage of anti-Asian hate crimes picked up again, that I felt compelled to give it another go.

Today, I understand what was bothering me. For much of 2020 and into early 2021, I began interacting regularly with social and advocacy groups made up of non-Black and non-Indigenous people of colour I didn’t know very well, but with whom I seemed to share similar equity-related goals. Over time, though, a few members of these groups started making problematic statements about my race meant to minimize me. One person told me to tone down my communication style and with faux concern, shared that “people” said I was acting like a model minority (yes, the vagueness of this statement should’ve been a red flag). Hearing this wounded me because I care earnestly about supporting communities of colour, and have a long track record of fighting systemic racism, so my worst nightmare is to cause further harm. As someone who believes strongly in taking responsibility for her actions, I self-reflected on this person’s comments for a long time, but ultimately concluded that they were baseless and that I was experiencing a form of lateral violence from someone who wasn’t very grounded themselves. Still, the accusation shook me — so much so that I’m now positive it contributed to my writer’s block.

Of course, I’ve also faced prejudice from white people. I distinctly remember experiencing two racist incidents in Vancouver within the span of two weeks several years ago; one involved a man accosting me on the street and asking if I knew where he could get a “Chinese massage,” while another involved a woman on public transit yelling at me to move and the man next to her saying “these people” don’t understand English anyway. I also remember recounting the incidents to my colleague at the time who just rolled her eyes as if to say, “What’s the big deal?” — a sentiment that was repeatedly conveyed to me over and over again at this particular workplace, where my then-boss often told me that my complaints were rooted in my lack of confidence. (If you know me or have seen me speak in public, then you know this assessment is utterly laughable.)

If, at this point, you’re thinking: So what, Anita? Words can’t hurt you. My answer to you is: Yes, they can. In fact, such language fundamentally dehumanizes a person, and can therefore lead to the kind of violence that makes it okay for someone to murder six innocent Asian women in cold blood. That’s not alarmism — it’s just fact.

Over the past few years, whenever I tried to bring up my concerns about growing anti-Asian sentiment in a public setting, some people — both white and racialized alike — would try to silence or shame me. Eventually, I became comparatively quiet about anti-Asian racism despite being so vocal about racism against other communities. (I always find it strange whenever anyone insists on limiting discussions of racism to one group at a time, as if human beings might short-circuit if we handle more than one issue simultaneously.) 

📸: Screenshot

The Atlanta shootings are devastating. Full stop. But if there’s one tiny silver lining, it’s that mainstream society finally seems to be taking anti-Asian racism seriously — or at least, they’re talking about it for longer than one day only. Much like how it took George Floyd’s murder for the broader public to wake up to the ongoing injustices against Black communities worldwide, perhaps Tuesday’s deaths will do the same for Asian communities. Maybe we’re finally ready to discuss race and racism with more nuance.

But the question, as always, is: Why did it have to go this far before people started giving a damn?

If you follow my work or my media appearances, you know I rarely discuss systemic racism from a personal perspective. Although I absolutely respect others who do, I feel I’m more effective when tackling racism from a systemic perspective because I strive to be solutions-oriented. But it grates me when those who are anti-equity accuse people of colour who courageously choose to share their experiences with racism of acting like victims.

Earlier on, I talked about racism committed by white people against communities of colour, as well as racism between different communities of colour. Regardless of whether the perpetrator is white or racialized, it’s all framed in a system of white supremacy. In other words, the symptoms may look different, but the root cause is the same.

📊: Racial Equity Tools

Called the “Integrated Model,” this framework is one of several that describes the stages of racial identity development for people of colour, biracial people and white people. Not every person will go through every stage in a framework. Many of the authors acknowledge that the stages could also be cyclical, so people may revisit different stages at different points in their lives.

While there are far more knowledgeable experts than I who are figuring out ways to dismantle systemic racism, I was recently thinking about how combining the Integrated Model with the Spectrum of Allies framework may illuminate an actionable pathway forward. When I look at the Integrated Model, I see my own journey reflected as someone who grew from “Conformity” as a child, all the way to “Integrative Awareness” today as a 33-year-old. I also observed that at each stage of the model, starting from “Dissonance,” I was able to educate people one stage to the right of me about systemic racism in a way that resonated with them because I wasn’t too far from their thinking and therefore understood how to frame the conversation.

A former undergraduate classmate of mine, who’s a white man, wrote this email to me in response to a 2019 newsletter I wrote. Back then in my early 20s, I was probably in the “Immersion” or “Emersion” stage, while he was likely in the “Acceptance” stage. 📸: Screenshot

If we want to effectively combat systemic racism, we have to leave room for people to grow. Perhaps we can all act as allies to each other by identifying the people to our immediate right, and bringing them along the spectrum until hopefully, every one of us arrives at the left and final stage.

As someone who’s experienced this first-hand, I speak with humility when I say that Integrative Awareness is not a status, but a journey — and one that you consistently need to check in on.

The Integrated Model framework combined with the Spectrum of Allies framework. The white text shows the stages of racial identity development for white people, while the grey text shows the stages for people of colour.

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Shout-outs

Thanks kindly to Hannah Wise, news partnerships lead for the Local News Lab at the Brown Institute for Media Innovation, for becoming one of The Other Wave’s monthly paying supporters.

Hannah Wise @hannahjwise

I just became a paying subscriber to @neeeda's stellar newsletter. If you work in #canadian #media you should, too. She offers a much-needed critical voice in the landscape and is doing essential (and tireless) work in making our industry more equitable.

Anita Li @neeeda

Lots of revelations in the most recent edition of @theotherwave, my newsletter about challenging the status quo in Canadian journalism! In it, I reveal the powerful group that's missing from the conversation about how to save #cdnmedia, as well as... https://t.co/EtXNAoqviX

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In my community

• I’m proud to have contributed to the Google News Initiative’s Startups Playbook, which launched earlier this week. The playbook is a how-to guide for developing and starting your own news business, featuring advice from founders and experts who’ve done it all before.

• URL Media, a network of high-performing Black and brown news outlets co-founded by my fellow Facebook Sustainability Accelerator coach Sara Lomax-Reese and CNN’s former head of digital programming S. Mitra Kalita, is among four new organizations that will receive support from Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s Archewell Foundation.

• I’ll be co-leading RSJ Safe Space Forum on Anti-Asian Racism, a Zoom session for Pan-Asian and Asian-identifying Ryerson School of Journalism students, with my fellow faculty member Adrian Ma on March 24.

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Cool stuff I like

• I recently subscribed to Noema, a thought-provoking and beautifully designed magazine published by the Berggruen Institute, for which my friend Kathleen is executive editor. I highly recommend checking out Noema, which explores “the transformations sweeping our world.”

• Pre-lockdown in Toronto, my fiancé Lucan and I would attend Rooftop Comedy, a socially distanced standup show hosted by the hilarious Danish Anwar. The comedian is also the creator of Your Hood’s A Joke, a no-holds-barred roast battle that pits comedians from different territories against each other.

• I flew and cringed through all two seasons of PEN15, a comedy series available on CBC Gem that depicts middle school as it really happened (no, really). Stars Maya Erskine and Anna Konkle play versions of themselves as teenage outcasts in the year 2000.

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Last thought

fangmeli @pangmeli

I think a lot about the idea that allies need to be grounded. like, spiritually steady and chill instead of pursuing — consciously or otherwise — approval, attention, authority, absolution, a sense of moral superiority, an outlet for aggression, a source of self-worth, etc

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