An unforeseen aspect of this enduring COVID-19 pandemic that has devastated countless numbers of lives throughout the past year, is the fact that racism and heinous acts against Asian people have become more evident in many communities. The first reported cases of this new coronavirus were in Wuhan City, Hubei Province, China, and has been seen to make hate crime rates increase against people of Asian descent, especially Chinese. According to “Stop AAPI (American Asian Pacific Islander) Hate,” from May 19th, 2020 to March 31st, 2021, there were 6,603 anti-Asian hate crimes, which consisted of 65.2% verbal harassment cases, 18.1% shunning (avoiding), 12.6% physical violence, 10.3% human rights violations, and 7.3% online harassment/bullying.  

Out of this immense number of hate crimes, 43.7% of people were of Chinese descent. This is due to the stigma of links between Chinese people and COVID 19, such as the use of terms like “China Virus,” and other such statements, which have been used by many influential individuals such as Donald Trump, Mike Pompeo, and Paul Gosar. These hateful terms are being spread over social media, which is detrimental if we want to stop these lies. Over 650% of Twitter retweets had terms similar to “Chinese Virus,” and there has also been an 800% increase in media platforms (mostly with a conservative bias) using these sayings. Many groups such as the World Health Organization (WHO), advise against using these prejudiced terms: “Don’t attach locations or ethnicity to the disease, this is not a ‘Wuhan Virus,’ ‘Chinese Virus’ or ‘Asian Virus.’ The official name for the disease was deliberately chosen to avoid stigmatization,” WHO states.  

All of these actions towards Asian people have made it uncomfortable and dangerous for AAPI to be outside during the pandemic. Beauty entrepreneur, Alicia Yoon, wrote on the Vogue website that, “...as an Asian American, the only thing I can think about right now is why I’m afraid to leave my apartment.” Many people of Asian descent feel the same way as Yoon, like Winnie Sun from CNBC, who wrote that “As we’re an Asian family, the rise in anti-Asian hate crimes has heightened our concerns about our safety here in the nation we have called our home.” These hate crimes have made people scared to be outside of their house and some don’t even feel safe in their own house anymore, because of the fact that there is a chance that they might be attacked just for how they appear.  

These recent incidents have brought to light so many ways that our country is not perfect, but you can help make it better. Some ways you can help are by attempting to stop the spread of false information online and on social media outlets, and by sharing the truth instead. You can use information from this article, or any reliable source in order to collect truthful information. You can take your research and spread it on social media, in school, with friends, or however else you can help create awareness in your community.

• https://www.csusb.edu/sites/default/files/FACT%20SHEET-%20Anti-Asian%20Hate%202020%20rev%203.21.21.pdf

• https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32911985/

• https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/anti-asian-hate-incident-reports-nearly-doubled-march-new-data-n1266980

• https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/anti-asian-bias-rose-after-media-officials-used-china-virus-n1241364

• https://www.fbi.gov/services/cjis/ucr/hate-crime

• https://www.npr.org/2021/03/11/975592502/asian-americans-experience-far-more-hate-incidents-than-numbers-indicate

• https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/03/25/asian-owned-businesses-hate-crimes/

• https://stopaapihate.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Stop-AAPI-Hate-Report-National-210506.pdf

• https://www.vogue.com/article/alicia-yoon-anti-asian-violence

• https://www.cnbc.com/2021/05/11/op-ed-the-pain-and-fear-of-anti-asian-hate-crimes-hits-close-to-home.html