#StopAsianHate

I wrote the below as a Facebook post one year ago. Since then we've only seen more attacks and very little discussion about how many of the perpetuators are men of color.

If we can't admit we have a problem in our community, we undermine our own quests for justice. Yes, a lot of this has to do with the mental illness of the attackers, but there's something else at play. -MG

Mi gente  - embracing the idea of justice for all also means exploring and owning up to the internal "blind spots" we have ourselves and in our immediate communities. Anti-AAPI sentiment isn't exclusive to Whites. Too many times we hear family members describe anything  or anyone remotely Asian as "Chino," despite country of origin.  How many of us have family members with nicknames "Chino" or "China" because they had eyelids or hair that differed from the rest of us?  How many times has an "Asian accent" been used by us as a form or entertainment or amusement? Even my favorite Salsa band, El Gran Combo, wrote and performed a song perpetuating this trope, replacing "r"s with "l"s  for "Puelto Lico." I cringe even now as it plays in my head. 

In our own circles, how many times have we assumed the Asian experience was somehow outside of the experience shared by Blacks and Latinos? How many times have we attempted to coalition build in the name of justice and overlooked or left out our Asian family?  Many years ago in college - where the student of color community was powerful, active, and "woke" before woke was a thing - there was a mens' event/talent exposition that performed every year - "Invisible Men." The idea was that as Men of Color, our visibility as leaders and talented artists was so low, we wanted to raise those voices up for all to see - yet it took a few years before we would reach out to our AAPI brothers to collaborate and contribute in that event.  How more "Invisible" could one be? I remember pushing hard for that collaboration, and getting push back from some that surprised and confused me.  Decades later, when I spoke with young men who had participated since, they had no idea that that collaboration had even happened.  

I was not immune  from this - I remember repeating jokes said to me when I was younger, stories of interactions with people who looked and sounded different, and therefore did not get the respect they deserved.  We thought because our worlds were so far apart from each other, even in a city like NY, that somehow we could not understand how common our experiences were. What we now realize is that we are separated by design, for that very purpose. 

#StopAsianHate  hit a chord with me that took me time to process. Because while we KNOW what the right thing is, and can easily condemn violence and blatant racism, we also need to step back and talk about how so many of us think of their experience as so different from our own, and how easy it is to ignore another group's suffering because we are so consumed with relieving our own.  We deal with so much these days, so many burdens to just exist as humans, humanely.  But I would challenge us to understand where we fail in uplifting others as well.  What a powerful group would we truly be, once we understand that we can stand together. 

Punto.