Warning: The following article may contain sensitive topics.

March 13, 2020. The COVID-19 pandemic suddenly became real as millions of people in the US had to isolate themselves. 2020 was famous for the outbreak of SARS-CoV-2 (the coronavirus), amid other things, but with the arrival of the pandemic came another disease: AAPI violence.

In previous years, we have seen race-based attacks on the rise. Hate crime statistics from the FBI in 2020 say that more than 60% of hate crimes were race-related. Half of these offenders were white. From 2019 to 2020, 121 new hate crimes against Asian-Americans took place--a 76.6% increase. Hate crimes against the AAPI community in 2020 include intimidation, simple assault, and aggravated assault, including murder and rape. Acts of destruction, damage, and vandalism include robbery, burglary, larceny-theft, motor vehicle theft, and arson. NPR wrote an article stating, “According to a new poll from NPR, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, 1 in 4 Asian Americans feared — in the past few months — that members of their household would be attacked or threatened because of their race or ethnicity.” Lisa Lu has spoken up about her fear during the pandemic. “I felt like during the height of the pandemic it didn't feel safe for me to go outside, and I was actually pregnant for most of the pandemic. So that was especially scary, like the thought of me going anywhere and being attacked and anything happening to my baby.”

Hate crimes against Asian-Americans include last year’s Atlanta spa shootings, which involved the killing of eight people, six of them being Asian women. NBC has said, “According to Stop AAPI Hate, 62 percent of the more than 10,000 reports it received between March 2020 and September 2021 came from Asian women.” In December 2021, Rong Xin Liao, an 84-year-old Asian man, was kicked in the face while he was waiting for the bus because of his race. A fatal attack on a Thai man was executed by a 19-year-old man last year. A serial assaulter in January and February was being hunted down with a reward of $25,000. However, it’s not only crimes that involve prejudice against Asians. Microaggressions, including Donald Trump calling the coronavirus the “China virus” and “Kung flu,” also contribute to bias against Asian-Americans. When people (including several news sources) confronted him on this, he replied, saying, “It’s not racist at all…It comes from China, that’s why.” The New York Times says, “At [a] Wednesday’s briefing, a reporter also asked the president what he thought of an unnamed White House official referring to the coronavirus as the ‘Kung Flu.’ Mr. Trump skirted that question before asserting that the Chinese ‘probably would agree’ with the coronavirus as the ‘Chinese’ virus, though Chinese officials have made it clear they do not.” Lu has said, “Trump called it the China virus, that's when I felt like life changed. And honestly, I don't want to venture out to any areas that are not diverse, and even in San Francisco and Oakland, I wouldn't walk alone.” These statements have only fanned the flames of xenophobia. Additionally, according to New York-Presbyterian: Health Matters, microaggressions can make mental health problems arise or worsen. Unfortunately, more than 9,000 Anti-Asian crimes have taken place since the beginning of the pandemic. In the first quarter of 2021, hate crimes rose by 169%. According to another article from NBC, “Anti-Asian hate crimes increased 339 percent nationwide last year.” In the last three quarters of 2021, hate crimes went from 169% to 339%. This is largely due to the pandemic and misinformation among Asian people. Even so, these hate crimes are hard to prosecute, despite the gravity of these crimes. According to ABC News, “Without solid evidence of hate speech to indicate a perpetrator's motivation, seemingly random attacks against people from marginalized communities may instead be pursued as traditional criminal offenses, creating a problem with combating hate crimes.”

How can we help? Stop AAPI Hate is an organization that is pushing for equality and safety for all people in the AAPI community. Another article from ABC tells us about AAPI people beginning to take action to protect themselves. “Recognizing the fear within her community, [Esther] Lim researched the process of how to report a hate crime and eventually created free booklets in six languages (Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Spanish, Thai, and Vietnamese) that detail the process.” Esther Lim has also said, “If you feel in fact that it was a hate crime, you need to push that they report it and list it as a hate crime, not an assault. When the data is collected -- and it doesn't show the actual numbers of hate crimes or hate incidents in that report, it just lists more assaults -- that means that there's not going to be any community resources allocated for hate crimes.”

The Lunar New Year is known as the Spring Festival, and it has a multitude of names: Chūnjié in Mandarin, Seollal for Koreans, and the Vietnamese refer to it as Tết. Lunar New Year is also commonly known as “Chinese New Year,” but since so many other ethnic groups celebrate it, “Lunar New Year” is more accurate. Lunar New Year took place on Tuesday, February 1, 2022, ushering in the Year of the Tiger. Usually, however, the New Year is celebrated over multiple days. The Lunar New Year also has 12 zodiac animals: the rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, sheep, monkey, rooster, dog, and pig. There are also five elements of earth, water, fire, wood, and metal that are placed on the lunar calendar. This year, the Year of the Tiger represents the water tiger, which comes every 60 years. The water tiger is action-oriented and represents strength, bravery, and clearing away evil. In China, the New Year celebrations and traditions supposedly originated in the 14th century but stopped in 1949, after Mao Zedong (chairman of the Chinese Communist Party) prohibited the celebration of the New Year. Later in the 20th century, new rulers were more willing to accept the tradition. Chinese New Year foods include fish (which is normally eaten at the end of the meal), glutinous rice ball soup, moon-shaped rice cakes, and dumplings (which sometimes have a coin placed inside). The Lantern Festival takes place at the end of the New Year celebrations. In Vietnamese celebrations, homes are decorated with kumquat trees and flowers such as peach blossoms, chrysanthemums, orchids, and red gladiolas. Food includes five-fruit platters (to honor ancestors), bánh chưng (rice cake made with mung beans), pork, and other ingredients wrapped in bamboo leaves. Snacks called mứt tết (made from dried fruits or roasted seeds mixed with sugar) are offered to guests. In Korea, similarly to China, celebrations stopped from 1910-to 1945, when the Empire of Japan annexed Korea and ruled it as a colony, which lasted until the end of WW2. The celebrations officially revived in 1989, and North Korea began celebrating Lunar New Year according to the lunar calendar in 2003. With North and South Koreans, tteokguk (sliced rice cake soup) and a dish made from five different grains are eaten. Additionally, unlike Chinese and Vietnamese celebrations of Lunar New Year, elders give money in white and patterned envelopes rather than in red envelopes. Traditionally, families all over Korea gather at the oldest male’s house; however, this is not common in North Korea, where the Lunar New Year is mostly celebrated at home. Many others also celebrate the Lunar New Year globally, but unfortunately, it isn’t all lanterns and celebrations.

In early 2021, after several attacks, including the ones on Vicha Ratanapakdee and another 91-year-old man, many people were afraid to step out into the streets. A New York Times article says, “Carl Chan, the president of the Oakland Chinatown Chamber of Commerce, has tallied more than 20 assaults over the past two weeks in Oakland’s Chinatown alone. Many of them were not reported, Mr. Chan said, partly because it can take hours for the police to arrive at the scene. ‘Our seniors are afraid to walk their own streets,’ Mr. Chan said.” Last year, the New Year’s celebrations were “a muted celebration after a crushing year for the banquet halls, restaurants, and businesses that would normally be pulsing with holiday cheer.” This year, celebrations of the Lunar New Year were filled with jubilee. A USA Today article quotes Amanda Nguyễn, who says, “Joy is the most radical form of rebellion.” The article also stated, “Lunar New Year is an opportunity for the Asian community to mobilize against the rise of anti-Asian sentiment, said Russell Jeung, co-founder of Stop AAPI Hate.” After a tough two years, the AAPI community is rising again and will not be silenced.

The future of hate crimes remains yet to be seen. However, you can make a difference. Whether it’s simply teasing someone or vandalizing property or even assault, any incident that occurs with bias against someone’s race should not be tolerated. If you witness a hate incident that happens because of someone’s race, there are hundreds of resources to support you. Together, we can make a difference. Together, we can heal the fractures in our society. But this will only work if we work together.