5 Days Post Atlanta Anti-Asian Hate Crime Resulting in the Murders of 6 Asian Women

I obviously use this forum to typically share my struggles on recovering from my knee surgeries, but in this post, I want to share my struggles on coping with recent anti-Asian hate crimes that have come to light in the past week. The other day while I was on campus walking back to my car, I looked over my shoulder because I thought I heard footsteps. I’ve never had to look over my shoulder before while at Loyola in broad daylight, but I was paranoid.

When it comes to race, I almost always have an opinion, or at least have the ability to form an opinion. But ironically, I’m at a loss with what happened last week and what has been happening in the last year. I am disappointed in the reaction of many in my community regarding last week’s occurrence. Not that they dismissed it, just that it was not as acknowledged as BLM and other injustices last summer. I understand the AAPI community make up a much smaller percentage compared to other marginalized groups in the US. I understand that the roots in black people’s suffering in the US dates back to years before mass waves of AAPI people immigrated here. It makes me wonder if the majority’s social media reaction was genuine or due to fear of cancel culture.

I was raised to know that I am different. My parents and I have had discussions about this, and they question whether or not that was the right parenting move, being as transparent as they were about race. But if they hadn’t done that, then my brother and I would’ve been in for a rude awakening about our ethnicity in grade school. I never embraced the Chinese in me; I always made fun of it, demeaned it, criticized it. I didn’t like it; it was what gave people a way to treat me differently. Do you know when I did appreciate and embrace the Chinese in me? When I was with my whole family, which meant there was some sort of celebration happening, and we would eat and laugh together. It was the only time I ever felt like I truly belonged. And I continually blame myself for not embracing my culture when I was with anyone outside my family.

In a recent conversation with other Loyola student-athletes about the importance of diversity and inclusion in sports, I spoke up on my experience growing playing sports and explained that soccer was the only environment besides my family where I felt like I was not judged for the way that I looked. I was solely judged for my performance as a player, and that feeling is what is so hard for me to potentially let go of sooner rather than later. My brother and I always thought that racism was simply part of the package. Getting ridiculed for the shape of our eyes or how supposedly good we were at math was just a rite of passage. So, unfortunately, we went along with it. We know we reinforced the stereotypes because we thought that by acknowledging them first ourselves, we would get other people off our backs. Sometimes it worked, but most times, it just gave others more incentive to continue to make fun of us. This was our attempt in “embracing” the Chinese in us, when we were actually demeaning and degrading ourselves for approval amongst our peers. And that’s sad.

I’m disappointed in myself for being naïve and not making myself more aware of the frequency of hate crimes against the AAPI community. I’m disappointed that I have contributed to social atmospheres that discredit and humiliate Asian heritages, including my own. But I promise to be better. And that’s all I ask from my community, to be, do, and think better than we previously have and to treat people as human beings above all other things.