Stopping Asian Hate isn't enough
I am an Asian American and what happened yesterday saddens me. A lot of the AAPI community (Asian American Pacific Islander) is hurting. The people who have died are much like our moms, our aunties, our sisters, our grandmas. Victims of other crimes are our fathers, our uncles, our brothers, our grandpas. It’s a fear that has slept in the back of my mind since moving to the mainland, and it has come to fruition. There are people out there who could look at people like me and think we’re deserving of violence. It's terrifying, infuriating, and yet, unsurprising.
Our country loves protecting whiteness from the consequences of its actions.
Just yesterday, a cop said that the murderer had a "really bad day." A lot of people have really bad days. But very few people kill others because of it. Law enforcement and the media have centered instead on his sexual addiction, despite his church attendance, and have ignored the narratives of his victims. If they're gonna center on that, then they should commit to it.
Yes, he had a sexual addiction.
Yes, he had a very bad day.
Yes, his solution to his bad day and sexual addiction was to murder people at Asian establishments.
If they were fully committed, then they should acknowledge he had mental health problems that this country refuses to address.
Every time we have a white man committing mass shootings, murders, bombings, it's always about their mental health. This country never centers on the victims, the grief, the pain, the lives lost. Instead, they reliably focus on the troubles that these perpetrators have. But certain lawmakers doesn't want to commit to Medicare for all; they don't want to dedicate money to mental health resources. Let's not forget that to cut costs, President Reagan dismantled the foundations of a mental health system in this country. Look at how it started and look at where we are now.
The narrative of the troubled white man is an easy scapegoat. People will look at him and feel pity. He didn't have help, he didn't know better. Fixing the problem becomes inconvenient. If mental health (and health in general) was a priority in this nation, sexual addiction could be addressed. Violent ideation could be addressed before it becomes realized. People wouldn't die because of a troubled man looking for external solutions to internal problems.
But once this country provides resources for mental health, it will no longer have a convenient cover for its racism.
We should absolutely stop Asian hate, but the problem is much bigger than that. There are people out there who will be racist and will absolutely not stop their shit. Demanding that we "stop Asian hate" puts the onus on our communities to change their minds and defend ourselves. We should absolutely do that when we can. But we should also demand that our representatives fund our communities and mental health resources.
Show them that racism is not just a symptom of the mentally unwell. It’s how this country is.
Communities of color would have one more resource for us to heal from trauma… But we also get another resource to protect us from people who believe they have the right to act on their racist, violent ideations. This narrative isn't separate from the violence against the AAPI community. This specific instance could even be framed as:
Man's untreated sexual addiction and hyper-sexualization of Asian women led to violent ideations which he acted upon. This is a failure of our country's healthcare system due to a lack of mental health resources.
The violence of whiteness doesn't get to hide behind mental health problems. If we strip away the "troubled white male" narrative, then whiteness gets to stare at itself in a mirror. It's the first step in acknowledging that this country's problems aren't external, but deeply embedded in its history and culture. It needs to realize that it created this problem by insisting that assistance is weakness.
Our inability to provide for vulnerable communities and people, regardless of race, is true weakness.
Today, I rest and I grieve with the families who lost their loved ones. I share their names in honor of their stories because we are the same. Our communities believe in our connectedness. Our bonds make us strong, and we should depend each other to make us stronger and keep us safe.
Ingat kayo.