Anti-Asian hate has no place in Sacramento. Swift action can protect our communities
A white gunman targeted three metro Atlanta massage parlors last week and killed eight people, including six Asian women. Many Asian American and Pacific Islanders have been candid about how last week’s horrific tragedy has devastated their communities and incited terror.
“I go to the store and am fearful of everyone,” Sacramento resident Barbara Tanaka wrote in a letter to The Sacramento Bee. “I resist the urge to flee when I see white people walking in my … neighborhood.”
About 1 out of 5 Sacramento residents identify as Asian. We share in their sorrow. All of us must embrace and support our friends, colleagues and neighbors who are grieving and outraged by the nationwide spike in anti-Asian violence. Greater action is needed and we must listen to the AAPI community as we seek a response.
Hours before the attack, research group Stop AAPI Hate said it had received reports of nearly 3,800 hate incidents against Asian Americans since Mar. 2020. Over 1,600 were in California, and 503 occurred in the first two months of 2021 alone.
“Women report hate incidents 2.3 times more than men,” according to the report.
Former President Donald Trump and his sycophants deserve blame for spewing bigoted rhetoric to scapegoat the AAPI community throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. But experts and scholars have noted the deep-seated biases, destructive stereotypes and racist policies that influenced the Asian experience throughout our nation’s history. Trump used the world’s largest bully pulpit to instigate a new chapter.
Sacramento is not immune. Police reported 57 hate and bias-motivated crimes last year — nearly triple the amount from four years ago, according to recent crime data. At least 11 incidents targeted Asian Americans in 2020, compared to just four in 2017.
“Karun Yee, a member of the Chinese American Council of Sacramento, experienced it herself earlier this year when she was punched in the face by a stranger on the sidewalk,” The Bee’s Ashley Wong and Alexandra Yoon-Hendricks reported.
Racial hatred against Asians in America is not new. It began with the violence that led to the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1882, which banned Chinese immigration. One hundred years later, it motivated the murder of Vincent Chin, a Chinese American attacked by two white men in Detroit who blamed Japanese immigrants for taking their auto-industry jobs in 1982.
It’s also a part of Sacramento’s history. About 3,000 Japanese residents were forced from their homes and farmlands and placed in internment camps during World War II. When they returned, their neighborhoods were erased.
“In 1957, the City Council ignored the pleas of Japanese Americans and let developers bulldoze a once-vibrant community, demolishing Japantown to make way for corporate skyscrapers and a manicured Capitol Mall on K Street,” Wong and Yoon-Hendricks wrote.
On Jan. 17, 1989, Patrick Purdy fired 105 rounds from an AK-47 at a Stockton schoolyard, killing five Southeast Asian children and wounding 31 others before killing himself. State investigators determined it was racially motivated.
The recent increase in hateful violence highlights the fears the AAPI community experiences daily. Hopefully, the outpouring of support will prompt swift action from leaders.
Assembly members Al Muratsuchi, D-Torrance, and David Chiu, D-San Francisco, proposed a bill that would require the California Department of Justice to create a statewide system for reporting hate crimes, including a toll-free hotline for anti-Asian incidents. State legislators should act immediately to pass and implement Assembly Bill 557.
In Sacramento, councilmember Mai Vang led the city’s passage of a resolution condemning anti-Asian racism and xenophobia. The measure called for new data collection efforts to track local hate incidents and address barriers for reporting. Sacramento police have hosted information sessions outside local businesses to show residents how to report hate crimes. The next session is Saturday at Welco Supermarket at 7100 Fruitridge Rd.
Anti-Asian xenophobia has a long history here, but it has no place in today’s Sacramento. Let’s use the pain of this moment to finally live up to our inclusive ideals and protect the AAPI community.