Kudos to columnist Karen Gardner (“Change is hard,” 10 April 2019) for calling out to readers the need for change among “whites,” for example, to fight racism, particularly against black people.
Rightly so, she pointed out that this racism exists in our society not only on the personal level, but also on the systemic level. I laud our community’s efforts to fight racism against blacks.
But may I invite our community to also change their views and attitude towards Asians/Asian Americans in our midst? U.S. Census Bureau records in 2010 have shown the Asian/Asian American community as having registered the highest percentage of population increase, not only nationwide but also in the state of Massachusetts (47 percent from 2000-2010).
Amherst and Springfield rank among the top 20 cities and towns in Massachusetts with the largest Asian American population. However, in my 15 years living in Northampton and working at UMass/Five Colleges, I have observed that when it comes to the topic of racism, Asians/Asian Americans are often left out in the discussion.
The only publicity they get from newspapers either portray them as “model minorities” who excel in academics (for example, “Admissions bias lawsuit against Harvard in judge’s hand,” Gazette, Feb. 14) and therefore are in no need for “assistance.” Or Asian Americans are portrayed as inhumane petty capitalists mistreating their own workers (“Some Chinese restaurants pay immigrant workers less than minimum wage,” Gazette, Sept. 21, 2016).
Lost in these negative news accounts about Asians/Asian Americans is the racism that Asians/Asian Americans experience in the Valley. I, myself, have been told while walking in the streets of Northampton to “go back to Japan.” (I am from the Philippines.) A former colleague of mine of South Asian heritage and whose daughter was crying while in one of the coffee houses in Northampton was told by one employee that, “Here in this country, we take our children outside.”
Beyond this personal experience of racism, we also experience it systemically. In my work with underserved Asian/Asian American communities in my university and in the Valley, I have observed the great lack of institutional or organizational support to address the needs of our members. For instance, many places that hire Asian/Asian Americans lack interpretation or translation services for those whose first language is not English.
Many of us here forget that the “Asian” or “Asian American” community is a very heterogeneous group, composing of East Asian, South Asians, and Southeast Asians, and that within these groups and subgroups, class diversity also exists.
Cambodian/Cambodian Americans or Vietnamese/Vietnamese Americans, for example, have the lowest per capita income ($16,800 and $19,988, respectively) among Asian/Asian Americans, which would put the Cambodian/Cambodian Americans just slightly above the Hispanic or Latino population with a per capita income of $15,098; and the Vietnamese/Vietnamese Americans slightly above African Americans ($19,554), but well below the “White/not Hispanic” population ($37,000), the Chinese ($32,379), or Indian ($43,909) populations.
The point I am making is that the Asians/Asian Americans (from professionals, restaurant workers, students, to business people) in general also experience racism, both on the personal and systemic levels. Historically, the Chinese had been victims of rabid xenophobia during the exclusion era of the 1880s to the 1940s; the Filipinos of being “repatriated” back to their country in the 1930s, the Japanese of being incarcerated in internment camps during World War II and then partly blamed for the economic downturn of the U.S. in the 1970s; the refugee communities from Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, or Bhutan of being neglected by city, town, and county governments in terms of social services.
The “change” that Gardner calls for asks us to include and understand the kind of racism that all other ethnic minorities experience in the communities, organizations, universities, businesses, courts, or churches found in what Gardner rightly pointed out to as “our overwhelmingly white community.”
Then can only true and lasting change happen for every member of our society.
Richard T. Chu lives in Northampton.