There has been an undeniable rise of hate against Asian Americans since the start of the Pandemic. The rise of hate crimes against Asian Americans has increased 833% since the start of the pandemic in 2019 according to Stop AAPI Hate, which stands for Stop, Asian American, Pacific Islander Hate. According to the New York Police Department, 13% of Asian American hate crimes are reported there. 58% of Asian Americans surveyed for the Pew research center found that racism is more common toward Asians since the start of the pandemic.

NYPD Hate Crime Data

58% of Asians surveyed for the Pew research center found that racism is more common toward Asians since the start of the pandemic.

Information from the Pew Research Center from the American Trends Survey ##Asian Hate in New York

New York’s population of Asian Americans is the highest in America, at 11.8% of the total population of New York. Jaye, a first-generation Chinese American said, “It’s alarming how different people treat me after I can speak English eloquently versus when I couldn’t.”

Data from Certified Healthcare Simulation Education (CHSE)

According to the NYC Government tracking website, hate crimes against Asians have risen 20x the amounts that were reported in 2019. Many people have speculated that the rise in hate can be attributed to the COVID-19 pandemic originating out of Wuhan, China. The rhetoric around the virus and its organs were shaped by former President Donald Trump referring to the deadly virus as the “China Virus” and the “Kung-flu”. The continued blame on China came from many voices at the White House, Kellyanne Conway, former advisor to the President said that President Trump, “wants everybody to understand, and I think many Americans do understand, that the virus originated in China.” These events have led Asian Americans being the target of more hate and racism than years prior, although racism against Asian Americans is nothing new.

##Asian Racism is Nothing New

Yamuna Hopwood works as the communications manager for the center for Stop AAPI Hate. Pointed to the rise of Asian Hate as “Anti-Asian racism, anti-Asian xenophobia is not new, it’s an American tradition in some respects.” She continued that “We can’t ignore the role of President Trump and a lot of the rhetoric he has spread. For example, calling it the china virus, the Kung flu.”

“Shit has always been bad… my Dad’s been pistol-whipped multiple times,” said Jaye. “We have always had to deal with racism, things are a little worse right now but we were always kind of worried anyways.” Racism and hate against Asian Americans are not a new concept. Asians in America have been facing racism since the first Asians migrated to America. “I think a lot of the racism [today] is currently directed specifically toward east-Asian appearing individuals. honestly, a lot of it seems similar to what happened in 9/11, where people who weren’t even Muslim would get hate crimed, because they looked Muslim,” said Fern Hassan who is a First generation Bengali-American. “People see an Asian person and blame them for something they had no involvement in’’ continued Fern.
“My dad sat a year in Ellis Island Prison, before even being able to come in.”- Jaye

Center for public integrity/ IPSOS poll found most Americans who blame a specific group for COVID-19 blame China or the Chinese people as of April 28, 2020 Racism against Asians has a long history within the United States In 1942, Star Trek actor George Takei [https://www.npr.org/2019/07/17/742558996/george-takei-recalls-time-in-an-american-internment-camp-in-they-called-us-enemy] was taken with his family to live in an internment camp because of the fallout from World War II. The United States government facilitated these internment camps in order to isolate Americans of Japanese descent from the rest of the population. “I think ignorance, that’s the essence of it, people are born and raised in this country to view Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders as perpetual foreigners,” said Hopwood.

Among the 44% of respondents to the Center for Public Integrity poll that said a specific group was responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic, 66% said China, 45% said China or Chinese People, 13% said a lab in China, and 9% said the Chinese Government.

When asked about the increase of hate crimes in the past year, Jaye detailed that her family had experienced hate crimes before, “my Aunt had actually been assaulted with her hip dislocated.” Jaye continued, “My second-grade teacher refused to put a Band-Aid on me because she said I might have a disease.”

FBI Hate crime data

Jaye spoke about the “model minority myth”, the myth that Asian Americans are considered the model minority, this was “constructed as a way to pit the minorities against each other,” said Jaye. The model minority is a stereotype that perceives one group as more successful than the rest of the population. “My parents did not name me, they let the nurse name me because they didn’t want me to have a Chinese name, and face the same kind of racism that they had to face,” said Jaye.

Information and Data form Stop AAPI Hate

##Why is the Data Complicated?

Data around hate crimes can be distorted due to the fact that not all hate crimes are reported, investigated, or treated as hate crimes. For example, the Spa Shooting in Georgia in March was dismissed as a man who was addicted to sex rather than a hate crime. This is extremely problematic for a number of reasons, one of which being that sex addiction is not a recognized addiction and that the target of this crime was clear considering six out of eight of the victims were Asian women. There are a variety of numbers reported. Stop AAPI Hate has the highest % change as it is a self-reported chart that doesn’t require police intervention. Stop AAPI Hate is the hate reporting center that reports on trends of hate towards the AAPI communities. The data from Stop AAPI Hate comes from reports submitted on their website, there is a data team working there that works to remove any false reports or accidentally submitted ones. The Stop AAPI Hate team reaches out after the report is processed to provide any counseling, legal or financial support. The reason that Stop AAPI Hate has the highest reported numbers is that they report on more than hate crimes, they record any incident of hate reported to them.

The Stop Asian Hate movement was created to combat Asian hate and provide a platform for reporting incidents of hate against Asian Americans during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Stop Asian Hate movement is similar to the Black Lives Matter movement: focusing on protecting the community and ensuring safety. Both movements are centered around bringing awareness to the hate and racism faced by both communities and hope to educate others in order to prevent it.