It is that time we want to welcome everyone to.
If you want to put up the first slide there, Doctor Whang.
All right. Let me share the screen.
So, I'm first? Oh, I'm sorry. That got the wrong line.
Hello, my name is Mario Brown and I want to welcome everybody to This Is Not Normal.
Allyship and Advocacy in the Age of Covid-19 town-hall series. And our topic
for this town hall is responses to xenophobia and hate crimes.
We have a dynamic panel for you. And my job right now is to introduce our
facilitator, the moderator for today's panel, Dr. Yun
Dr. Yun-Oh Whang p_h_d_. Dr. Whang is a
member of the marketing faculty at Katz Graduate School of Business at the University
of Pittsburgh. His academic interest involves consumer psychology and cross-cultural marketing
in the global market. Extending these interest Dr. Whang also promotes diversity and inclusion
around the country as a trainer and facilitator. His clients include faculty, staff and students
at colleges and universities, administrators and athletes at sports organizations
and notably the AACSB, which is the accreditation body for business
schools. So once again, welcome. And I would like to turn this over to Dr. Whang.
Thank you, Mario. It's my great pleasure to be a part of this event. And, thank you so much.
for everybody who worked together like really hard to put together this
event. Today, let me start out with.
The panelist, so let me introduce
them and they will have about 10 minutes of visual presentations,
Sharing their thoughts. And after that, it will go into lively
discussion. And we're going to wrap it up with a Q and A from the audiences.
So Doctor Huguley is the interim director of the Universe of Pittsburgh's Center on Race
and Social Problems and an assistant professor in Pitt School of Social Work.
He's a research practice scholar, focused on school based and parenting interventions
that support racial equity and positive developmental outcomes for youth and color.
Dr. Huguley, welcome to the panel. And thank you for joining us. And a
second panelist is Dr. Lu-in Wang. She's a professor in School of Law,
where she teaches contract civil procedures, employment discrimination and evidence.
Her Scholarship examines ordinary and extraordinary forms of discrimination
and connections between them. Thank you for joining us. And
the third panelist is Sheila Martinez, and
she is Jacques and Mobile Ellender, professor of Asylum, Refugee and immigration law
at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law. She is also director of clinical programs and
the Immigration Law Clinic for academic publications. And academic interests include
issues related to immigration, immigrant women, Puerto Rican migration,
Caribbean migration, remittance, legal pedagogy and outreach
theory now. Thank you for joining us. Now to our final
Panelist as Dr. Waverly Duck. He's an urban sociologist, sociologist
and associate professor of sociology at the University of Pittsburgh. He's the author of No Way Out
of Precarious Living in the Shadow of Poverty and Drug Dealing. Published
by University of Chicago Press in 2015, which was a finalist for the C
Wright Mills Book Award. His new book on the Unconscious Racism Passive Racism,
coauthored with Ann Rawls, is due out in June of 2020 with
the university style press. So I want to welcome all four of you. Thank you for
joining us. And we're gonna start out with Dr. Huguley
with his presentation.
All right. Hello, everyone, it's great to be here. Thank you all for
having me here. It's a very timely conversation. Very difficult conversation,
especially in light of recent events and that are
impacting so many of our communities. I look at the news every day
and I think about this notion of Post-Racial America. You
know, we have the election coming up. That's a few years ago when Obama
was first elected, there were many in the media actually, and in white media outlets
saying this is up, now we're entering a post-racial United States of America.
And, you know, lots of us in scholarly and activist communities of color
knew that that was inaccurate. And we're reminded more and more that every day. And people
have talked about how COVID really lays bare a lot of the racial issues
that are very strong undercurrents in our country. And, you know, just recent events.
A bird-watching Black Man in Central Park had police called on him for
asking someone to leash your dog. And when I was trying to recover from that,
then as a black man, I do want to say there will be some things in my presentation
that, well, could be uncomfortable. It's not graphic, but I do
bring up things that are out there that are tragic and traumatizing in some
way. So. Please do what you need to do to take care of yourself. But we
are also dealing with the reality of our society that we have to
face and try to fight for change in every day. So. You
know, just yesterday we saw George Floyd and what
happened to him in minutes in Minneapolis was it was truly tragic and unbelievable and
enraging and disheartening at the same time. And so
these racial issues are in our face everyday. And this is after only
a couple of weeks after the Ahmaud Arbery video was released, so. You know, as
a country, we're reeling. And our Asian-American community
Throughout this crisis has been victimized with harassment
and attacks. There have been more than 19 hundred reports
of Anti-Asian, racists attacks since the COVID
crisis started. And so, I wish I could say that
word. I'm surprised by this, but I'm going to go back a little bit in history and the two areas
I might touch on, namely today a little bit about race history and a little bit about the lives
of youth, which are areas where I where I focus. And if you didn't know
now, you know, America was founded in racism.
And in white white supremacy. So racism was used to justify the imperialism.
Colonialism, slavery and other forms of subjugation
that established the wealth of this country. United
States in western, the Western world, basically between maybe fourteen hundred
and, you know, the two thousands that gravitated from mainstream ideas around spiritual racism.
At first, the notion was that we can enslave these
people, we can colonize these people because they don't believe in that same God we
believe in. Well, when people started changing their religious views, that sort of morphed into a biological
racism. Well, you know, these people are scientifically inferior to us.
So, we can oppress them. And when that, you know, science started pushing back against that,
I think we're a stage now scholars tend to agree that there is a cultural racism.
And a white supremacy around people be responsible for their own
social scenarios and social situations. And without any sort of acknowledgment
of the larger fabric of racism in the
in the Western world and certainly in the United States. And as an illustration
of that, one thing I like to share with my students is a little game I like to call
name that document. So here's a famous quote or infamous quote.
It says He has excited domestic insurrections among us, an has endeavored to bring on
the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian savages whose known rule
of warfare is an indistinguished destruction of all ages,
sexes and conditions. So this document is calling Native Americans merciless
savages. Undistinguishing the structures of all types
of people. That is in what document, the Declaration of Independence.
And you know, for those that are skeptical of the print, so small in the words are so fancily
written ballots right there, right there, you can go to D.C. You look at
it yourself. I was have a very, very good
webcast the other day, and one of the speakers said that racism in the United States. You know, people are saying, no, this virus
of racism is a virus of Corona. We have the virus of racism. And this with Dr. Reid
in Rhoda, Kentucky Theological Seminary in Louisville. And he said that
racism in the United States is not a virus. That is inherent to the American body.
If you want to remove racism, you have to fundamentally change the composition
of the nation. And so we do
work looking at black youth experiences, and that's here in Pittsburgh
and we talked to hundreds of black youth about
race, their beliefs about race, experiences with race. And I want to point out some of the racial undercurrents
that we see in our own town. We have
to maintain one that is the school of medication itself. We have over 500 survey responses from African-American
middle and high school youth here in Pittsburgh. 73 percent of all
youth report experiencing racism already.
And say they've experienced it in school discipline. 33 percent of high school
students say they have experienced discrimination from law enforcement
or from security guards already in high school.
for almost 4 in 10. And sadly, when we
ask middle and high school students if they believe that people in this country value the lives
of members of their group, half of them say they do not believe it.
They basically do not believe that black lives are value in the United States. Half of
all U.S. When we look at the Asian-American community
national data. They are experiencing racism very frequently
and commonly 63 percent of Asian American youth report discrimination experiences.
And we know from psychology, from education and other domains that in criminal justice, that
discrimination experiences are overwhelmingly shown to be harmful for you academically,
Socially, psychologically, across the board.
So a lot of times, you know, I think we got a wake up call with COVID because, you know, I go back to the
2008 election and we thought we were post-racial. I think. Many
people still really doubt that this model minority idea around around Asians
in the United States and that they didn't really experience racism, like they kind of believe that
history of racism against Asians, you had mass murders of Chinese immigrants in
the 19th century. You add the 1882 Chinese
Exclusion Act banning Chinese immigration, and that meant no more immigration
of laborers and the nationalists in the country could not get citizenship.
You had Japanese internment during World War 2 in the
United States. And, you know, economic competition and public health concerns have
always, you know, the white supremacist narrative of Asians and other groups in the United States.
These events that I just described were very economically fueled and sometimes the public
health concerns are real. Sometimes there can try, but they're there.
False narratives against a certain group of people.
Right now, there's survey data out that says that more than 30 percent of Americans have witnessed
someone blaming Asian for COVID-19. That's a very, very common belief
in our in our in our nation today.
So resources that that, you know, we've been monitoring and thinking about
at Center on race, here at Pitt, you know, there are a few that only my colleagues will provide others.
But the reporting mechanisms are there a lot and one of them is here
and you can screenshot this slide. Having resources, this is but you can report
these these incidents as a victim and as a witness, and I want to speak to this a little bit as a
as a witness. Because one of the points
of intervention is bystanders being a bystander. And what do you do in these moments or when these things happen?
And, you know, a lot of anti-racist work talks about what you do in those moments. And
there's a guy here. And then this is a comprehensive resource
that has these thoughts as material in multiple languages for folks.
I want to close out talking about parenting and things that that that we work on
very closely. You have the simultaneous job of
protecting your children if you're in a family of color and advocating for change and so
proactively promoting positive racial identity is a great thing for youth
of color and parents should engage in that. Preparing you for racism they may face.
And you did that with empathy, an affirmation. You know, it can be overwhelming. It can be disheartening to know you're going
to face racism. Let them know that they can overcome, in fact, the history
of people of color is they are very resilient. And you can use those histories
to affirm young people remote appreciation of all groups. It goes without saying
it's also in the literature shows that your positive developmental outcomes it's not just about moral
values. It's actually good for kids, too. Appreciate other cultures.
We want to protect them against racism, but but don't promote mistrust of whole groups of
people. That's not healthy. It's been proven to be unhealthy across groups.
And for white families, tell the true and realistic stories of people of color
and of racial subordination and the United States. This is what doesn't happen nearly enough.
Consume diverse media. You know, I do some fun activities with my students, like, you know, how
many black movies have you actually seen and it's such a racial divide. It's not funny.
But on a serious note, what are you doing to normalize black lives, Asian
lives like next life in, you know. Diversify your social network.
And again, promote appreciation of all groups. Anti-Racist teaching
yields anti-racist action. So as we grow our Anti-
racist perspectives in this country, if we do it as adults, we have you
talking. So thank you for listening. And I look forward to the speakers.
All right. Thank you, Jay. Now we're going to go to.
Lu-in Wang and please
share your thoughts.
Well, thank you so much, Dr. Huguely, for those powerful remarks, which I think connect
with some of the things that I'd like to talk about today. And I really want to thank the two officers for organizing
this really important program and for inviting me to participate with this really outstanding group
of speakers. I would like to do today is offer a framework for thinking
about hate crimes that I think can be helpful for figuring out
how to respond to hate crimes in a way that will be more effective.
And so at the risk of oversimplifying the complex dynamics that are involved in
hate crimes of what I would like to talk about is how the harms of
hate crimes interact with the motivations for
committing them. In other words, how the two are connected and in particular.
Sorry. My let me advance my slide. What I am going
to talk about is the reciprocal reinforcing relationship between the harms
of and the motivations for committing hate crimes. And what I'd like
to do first is begin by identifying and then debunking
some common assumptions that we have about hate crimes, including
which I'll get to in just a minute, including the view that hate crimes are irrational,
deviant acts that reflect the personal ideologies
of the perpetrators rather than what I have come to see them as, which is
opportunistic acts that are reflective of more mainstream social influences.
And so I like to begin by talking first about the harms of hate crimes,
which some people don't understand. Right. So one of the sort
of backdrops about talking about hate crimes and one of the sources of controversy
in the legal community has been this idea that we shouldn't refer to
particular crimes as hate crimes, because to do so
is to say that certain crime victims are more special or more valuable than others.
So, in other words, this is the view that any assault is just an assault. Right. All
crime victims are the same. And so all crimes should be treated equally.
And my point with regard to that is that, in fact, hate crimes are
more harmful than other crimes. And so we should call them out as a special category of
crime. And the reason why is that hate crimes have the
social effect of designating particular groups as what I call suitable targets
or suitable victims for violence and intimidation. And
this designation really has a lot of harm at many levels.
So it affects the individual victim of the hate crime. Members of the
group that identifies with that victim and also the broader society.
So let me just briefly describe the harms for each level. So for the individual victim,
recognizing that you have been targeted because of your identity is
especially traumatic emotionally and psychologically, it's more traumatic.
Studies have shown then be a victim of a random crime because
you attribute your victimization to something that you can't change. Right. That
is a part of you. And that creates the feeling of being uniquely vulnerable,
especially. Right. More vulnerable than other people out in the world.
And what that then leads to is victims feeling shame and stigma
and isolating themselves and even cutting back on mundane
daily activities. It's not going to class, not going to the store, that sort of thing,
in order to avoid further victimization. And it also leads to a lack of
reporting or underreporting, because people sometimes think I'm not going
to get any help. Sometimes they don't want to identify as the victim of a hate crime. And
so, you know, they don't get access to resources that could help them to recover
from a trauma or the group that identifies with the victim.
The effects are actually pretty similar. That is, if you recognize that the victim's
identity, which you share, was the reason why that person was targeted.
That likewise can lead to feelings of isolation and fearfulness
among members of the target group, even if they themselves are never individually
attacked. And it also can lead to isolation and withdrawal by members
of the group more broadly. And then finally, at a societal level, hate
crimes really harm all of us. Right. Even if we are not the individual victim
or even identify with the victims group because they really
bring into sharp relief and exacerbate the divisions among groups
and they also lead others who are not members of the targeted group to try to distance
themselves from the group, to try to differentiate themselves from the group.
And in particular, among Asian-Americans, what this has led to is members of
particular Asian ethnicities or national origins trying to distinguish
themselves from the particular group that is the target of the moment. And the writer
of one op ed said it's like that old joke about two people running away
from a bear. Right. The joke is you don't have to outrun the bear. You just have to outrun
the other guy. And as the op ed writer said, except in this case, you don't
have to deal with racism. You just have to make people racist at someone else.
So that's what these special harms are that
justify treating hate crimes as worse than as different from other
types of crimes. The motivation side actually is connected
with this designation of particular groups as suitable targets. Now the common
assumption is that hate crimes are deviant, right? Irrational acts of mentally
unstable individuals that reflect their personal beliefs or attitudes
or their fringe or extreme ideologies. But in fact,
this is really a caricature of the motivations behind the perpetration
of hate crimes. Really, it's a prototype, right, that we identify. But that actually
distorts our understanding of why people commit hate crimes. Because the reality
is that the perpetrators bias the perpetrators targeting or selecting
of someone from a particular group is socially reinforced.
And the perpetrators acts often are rational, although in a
very perverse way because perpetrators frequently are motivated
by a desire to obtain and in fact they often are successful in
obtaining social and even material rewards. By targeting
members of particular groups and the social rewards and the psychological rewards that
go along with them can be the excitement of choosing a suitable target,
bonding with peers and also receiving recognition
and even sometimes approval from authority figures.
Right. And that leads into another point that is very relevant
today. It always is. But it's really on our minds today. And that is that hate crimes
are often overlooked or minimized by authority figures and even
sometimes are prompted or encouraged by the rhetoric of authority
figures. So this, I think, is not going to be a surprise to anyone. But
recent studies prior to COVID-19, showed a high
correlation between the rhetoric and election of Donald Trump and
a surge in reported hate crimes against various groups across the United
States. And one pair of researchers speculates that his election,
after having engaged in this rhetoric, really validated
that rhetoric and that perspective gave them legitimacy.
And with the pandemic, of course, high level government
officials. Certainly President Trump, but also others,
such as his trade advisor Peter Navarro, have identified
Asians or people of Asian descent as suitable targets by labeling
COVID-19 as the Chinese virus, the Wuhon virus and other
even more derogatory names. And the key idea that really
connects the harms and the motivations and that I think can be really helpful
for thinking about how to respond to hate crimes is what I'll go back to
as the designation of certain groups as suitable targets or suitable
victims. And the connection is that perpetrators will
depend on and then perpetuate that designation.
Right, and thereby depend on and then perpetuate the harmful effects
of hate crimes. So in other words, the desirability of selecting
a victim from a particular social group is tied to past
discrimination against that group that has marked the group as suitable targets.
And in turn, perpetrators of new hate crimes continue the pattern
by contributing further to a social environment in which targeting particular
groups can bring rewards to its perpetrators. So that's what I talk about
and label as the reciprocal reinforcing relationship between
the harms and motivations for hate crimes. So in other words,
hate crimes both are influenced by the social context or reflect the influence
of the social context and in turn have influence on the social context
that designates particular groups as suitable victims. And
I think this framework is helpful for thinking about how we can respond
to hate crimes effectively, because it suggests that what we need to do is disrupt
that relationship between the harms and motivations by addressing the harmful
effects of hate crimes and by denying perpetrators the rewards
that they seek to gain from committing them. So with that in mind, it's been
heartening to me to see a couple of things. First, that
far from isolating themselves and hiding away, you know, withdrawing
from the shame and stigma. Victims of hate crimes recently
have been much more open about sharing their experiences, about publicizing
what has happened to them and without objecting to what is happening to them. In other words,
we're not going to withdraw. Right. We are going to make ourselves visible. And likewise,
others have. And this is the op ed author that I quoted earlier. Others
are not distancing or differentiating themselves from the victims, but instead are
showing solidarity with that. Right. Saying, no, we're in this together. Right.
I'm not going to accept that that group is identified as a target and try
to sort of immunize myself from that target. And
of course, even as some authority figures are encouraging hate crimes
through their incitement of anti-Asian sentiment, other officials
at high levels are denouncing that anti patient sentiment. And so that's been really heartening
to see. So I will close with words from the op ed on the right
hand side of the screen, the words of Euny Hong, the author of the Op-Ed piece, who
says the only path forward for any of us requires a united
front. And so I'm really happy to be part of this program, because I think programs
like this do a lot to further that effort. So
thank you very much for listening to what I have to say. All
right, thank you very much, John. And we are going to move to
second legal scholar back in our panel, Dr. Sheila
Velez Martinez. Thank you, doctor. All right.
Let me share my screen.
OK, so first of all, thank you so much for
for this opportunity, I think that this is a terribly important conversation.
And as as the as the panelists come through, we are all, I think, feeling
from it from each other. What I'm going to try to do to relay is to talk
about the context of the Asian American immigrant
experience and how and how it has evolved throughout the years. And like
I always say, I'm usually the Debbie Downer because
there's there. It's a very interesting. It's very interesting to see how
the Asian American immigrant experience has shaped immigration law probably
more than any other than any other group. So so
I would like to be able to say that this is not normal, like the like the
title of the of the series, but unfortunately, I'm not able
to say so. So COIVD-19 is the disease of social distancing
and seclusion. But it's also the disease of transparency
and it has given visibly a structural
inequality fueled by long lasting policies that are
based in on Euro, auterio, patriarchal
view since the foundation of this country, of what this country is and should be,
and that it's very evident in the context of immigration policy and particularly
in the context of Asian American immigrant experience.
So how did how did we get here, though? Originally states regulated
migration. There was not a federal immigration law and.
Chinese immigrants began to come to the United State in large numbers in the
1840s through the gold rush and settle in the
in the western part of the United States, mostly in California, and remain really regulated
by state migration. And interestingly, the first
federal immigration law. The first attempt of the federal
government to exercise control of immigration law was through their pay tax in
1975 And that had a clear intent of excluding Chinese
immigrants in particularly in particular, Chinese women and older Asian women that were
seen as coming to the United States to engage in prostitution. So that's how we started. That's
how immigration law, all federal immigration law starts in the United States. It's by exclusion.
But even but even before that first federal attempt,
there had already been racially motivated
attacks and violent attacks against the Chinese community in the United
States and most notably, the Chinese massacre of 1871
that left 18 dead bodies and at least 10 lynched
bodies during the massacre. And many people don't know that,
although the lynching experience, it's it's way more impactful and widespread
against blacks in the United States or outside of the South.
There was lynching of Native Americans, Latinos
and Chinese people, especially in the in the in the late 19th
century. And this is a this is our photograph from the L.A. Public Library
that has a series on on on this event. So even before the Chinese
Exclusion Act, these things, the experience of Chinese communities
in the United States had already been barred by by violence.
And the first more  comprehensive immigration bill, which is the Chinese Exclusion
Act, that aim to exclude from the United States immigration from Chinese
that had already come to the United States even through what treaty to work
through the birth, the Burlingame treaty to work in the United States.
These are most of these are people that already had permission to come into the United States. And
interestingly, this is the first. This is a first of a series of cases that
will give through the Supreme Court opinions, plenary power over
immigration to the Congress of the United States. So still today,
the Chinese Exclusion Act related case says like Xi Jinping
quoted like the basis of the full plenary power that Congress has over
already immigration in the United States. And the
discourse against Chinese migration was widespread. So not on. It was not only
just not the people eating tooted the American Federation of Labor.
Are going to Federation of Labor went to Congress. And this is actually the first page
of their actual presentation and of Congress. Meat versus rice.
American manhood against asiatic Coolieism. It was also
present and to quote from their from their presentation that.
We'll see these constant reference regarding health,
as labeling Asian immigrants have unhealthy or as a disease.
So this this reference to COVID-19 is also very consistent with the way
the discourse has work against Asians in the United States. I've heard that
an advancement with an incubus like the Chinese, it's like the growth of a child with a malignant
tumor or Albany spot. So it's this there's a constant of this type of
of discourse and imagery against Asian immigrants.
A platter of political cartoons against Chinese
immigrants and these are all stereotypes of older immigrants. So it's
all if you're an Irish, you can come in. But also it's also depicting
the other immigrants in derogatory ways. But of all the other immigrant,
all the immigrants of all immigrants are terrible. But Chinese immigrants were particularly
the worst of the lot. According to the according to the discourse.
And there was that also was this were supported by the invasion
of how large numbers and how the United States was going to be overrun
by by by Chinese people, which is a similar discourse that we've heard
more recently against Mexican immigrants. And recently
during the last four years against unaccompanied minors that are coming from the Central American
Triangle. So it's a consistent discourse.
immigrant. And in this discourse was also supported by
Supreme Court precedent. So so that's the Supreme Court of the United States in church
and thing in the eighteen eighty nine validated the plenary power of immigration,
but also the exclusion of Chinese that already had permission to enter the United
States. Fong Yue Ting is also a case related
to the Chinese Exclusion Act. In this case in
this case, Mr. Ting had a certificate and permission to be in the United States, but he was
not able to provide one white witness to corroborate his
assertion. Naturalisation was also
available for four Asian Americans and that it was not only Chinese
but all Asian Americans because their naturalization laws is 1790, said
that naturalization was open to free white persons and then was
extended to black people. But
the Supreme Court of the United States goes to great lengths to analyze
that. Japanese people and Chinese people and Indian people in the case
of fent, are not white. That when we say white we mean Caucasian, which is also.
An interesting, different conversation on how we came to with the  Caucasean term.
Right. But that's a different that's a different conversation. And
of course, in nineteen forty four, the Supreme Court in Korematsu
condoned the concentration camps for Japanese-Americans.
The discourse against Asian Americans is also fueled by colonialism. Like like professor
Huguley said. This is a political cartoon of the hour on 1898
when the Spanish-American War happened
and Puerto Rico, Filipinas, Cuba became part of the
imperial United States. And if you've see in the back, is the Chinese student
not even let there, It's not even allowed into the school. So we're
still going to civilize this. This group of people that
Congress called mongrels Chinese are even farther away still,
even even at that time. From the discourse, you will see
it was also from academia. This is an excerpt from
Columbia Law Review 1901 after the Spanish-American War
and how Filipinos are you know it. Bringing Filipinos
into the United States political system would mean then, transorm,
an inferior race. It was also part of that congressional debate
on how we should be beware of those mongrels of these with breath
of pestilence and torture of leprosy. This is the Congressional Record.
Not to depress anyone. But this is the discourse. And it will set a discourse that was widespread
that included the media, it included Congress putting in academia,
included the the Supreme Court of the United States.
And that discourse allowed for Korematsu to happen, right? It allowed for
the internment of Japanese people in concentration camps during the
Second World War. And it also prevented any Asian
immigration to the United States during the national quotas. So until 1965,
there was no quota that allowed for Asian immigrants to legally come
into the United States. And even after that has change
the way the immigration system is structure, it impacts disproportionately
Asian immigrants. So legal immigration in the United States through the family categories
as it's in place since 1965. Affects disproportionately
Asian immigrants. So if you look at that chart with this is an old chart, but it's
the principle. These are the wait times for people to immigrate legally to the United States through
family. And as you see, there are separate categories for China, India.
and Filipinos. Because of the volume.
Of immigration from those countries and their backlog of years of
immigration, that has not been that has not been process.
In the contents of COVID, I didn't want to leave it there.
I wanted also to highlight the importance that immigrants have.
Because, as I said, COVID is also the disease of transparency,
and one of the things that has been highlighted throughout is the importance of immigrant health care
workers. And we've seen immigrant health care workers, particularly physicians
and surgeons, are mostly Asian immigrants.
Right now in the United States, third, close to 30 percent of all physicians and surgeons
are immigrants. The same is true for a search
for home health care, AIDS, personal care aides, nurses,
so interestingly enough, are immigrants are an important
part of what we call the front line and the essential workers
of those immigrants increasingly. These are proportions of Asian immigrants
that are serving and as the frontline
and essential workers and also disproportionately affected by COVID
19 disease.
have to be it? Does it have to be this way? And I think that that and I'm going to close with
a quote from Warren Thawra Santos, who has been writing about about COVID-19.
And one of the things that he says is, is that this is an opportunity. This is an opportunity
to take this transparency and engage us in this conversation and change
and make deliberative, intentional changes in the way that we
relate to each other. And in the way we let,
you know, racism become structural and fight
structural inequality. And I think that we can only do it when we work together in
in solidarity. And there's no other way.
All right. Thank you. Now we're going to move on to our last but not least
just urban sociologist scholar Dr. Waverly Duck.
So first, I want to thank you all for A. inviting me, but putting together
this important panel, I'm honored. I think I know everyone on this panel
Personally, I've have wonderful stories and how your work, your life experiences
have informed my thinking today. I.
It's a bit weird for me because I'm a ethnographer that studies face to face interactions.
And so COVID has presented this unique opportunity because I wish I knew how
to turn it off. But understanding where we are at this moment,
I'm usually I have I don't have the slides, but I'm going to talk through and I think it'll be
easily fold stream of conscious
that's going to dig a rabbit hole that you'll find yourself at. But at the end of
hopefully if I do everything right, you'll get a sense of how we're all implicated and
that this is literally a matter of life and death for a lot of people and that things
that you may assume don't impact you actually has an impact on.
What I've historically done with talks like these is I usually have like three points, but
for this talk And actually I'm going to time myself so I don't go for time.
I have just six basic very easy points to talk about where we
are at this particular historical moment and some of the observations I made in regards
to COVID. So I think the first point and I'm
just going to go through, then I'll talk about them individually and sort of in the life
and death is recognizing that the world has changed, that, you know, this is
we're focused in terms of not only in this country, but countries all over the world in dealing with
this particular virus. With that being said, there is
this sort of natural experiment where things that we used to take for granted we can no longer take for granted
in terms of language, how we do face to face interactions that we all had to learn
new ways of communicating. I think the third point
that I want to make is how we started to discover what was happening
in our communities and particularly how I was hearing about friends.
And particularly I grew up in Michigan. Oh a number of my Hmong friends were going and experiencing anti-Asian
sentiment and talking about the sort of the languages and practices
around that. And I think the last point that I want to make
is about a double consciousness in terms
of how one may see themselves. I mean, in this I find this that even the
category of what somebody is as an Asian that includes,
you know, East India, China, the Philippines, almost
anywhere from a third to probably about half of the world's population has collapsed in this category.
And so how people see themselves within it between groups and then how that's used
to discriminate against people and what the response is And then I'm going to just end
it all with how this is a matter of life and death. So let's get
into it. So the what's exciting and I must
acknowledge that, you know, one hundred thousand people have died. Millions of people have
lost their lives across the world, has really brought the world to a standstill.
And I think for those of us who study the world and particularly face to face interactions,
it becomes really important to make the ordinary strange. And what I mean by that
is looking at the new ways that people are creating social reality, whether it's in their Zoom meetings
where you're a central workers or just your interactions on the street of how
are you learning this new way of life? You know, where do you get it? You're not reading rules.
You may pick up this at the supermarket, may pick up this on the street. What does it mean in terms
of your new identity while you're sheltering in place? I think for me, I've become very
aware of how I'm extremely privileged in relationship to
my working class relatives as one of my brother said, You know, either he works or he starves.
OK. I think we are having a little bit of technical difficulties.
All right, let's give a moment.
All technology is great now until it works.
All right. Let's lock him. I have a few questions actually that came in.
So until you know Waveryly gets back to,
like with a more stable Internet connection. Let me go
to let me go to some of the questions that were posted through the Q&A and chat room.
One thing is look at this question is for you, Lu-in And this is from Karen.
And she's an Asian American. And oftentimes I do not have the energy or desire
to educate friends on why certain statements, actions are racist or micro aggressive
toward Asian folks. Like what are some responses I can say
towards these friends? Now,
this is a question that I get all the time, all as well. And I don't have good answers.
So Lu-in like it. what do you think? So I get
this as well. And I also don't have that answer so I can commiserate a bit. And I was wondering
if maybe Dr. Huguley actually may have some good responses and resources. But
the thing that I think is really interesting is when it is people who regard themselves as your friends.
Right. So it's like, oh, I'm close enough with you that I can say this racist thing to you.
And we will enjoy it together. And I find that very difficult to respond to.
But. And so I would I'd like to learn myself how that can be effectively addressed.
Yes. I got three or four including Sheila Well, I have
a feeling that you might have greater expertise at this. I don't know if I do
either. I'll take a shot at it though. First thing I would, I would say.
It's really just to validate that, you know what we would call a racial battle, fatigue is real.
You get tired. You don't you don't fight every battle. And in fact, when I'm dealing with
my students and I am
trying to mentor students for their careers. You
know, that's the conversation that comes up because they feel like after a while, they're getting worn out of all
the racial battles they feel like they have to play. Sorry. Waverly,
Waverly's back. Another byproduct of the Internet,
these times of COVID
words. Thank God teaching has sort of prepared
me for this.
OK so we're gonna go back to Waverly. And we I think
we cut off right at the 'whether you work or starve.'
That was the last sentence. OK. I have
to do my entire
Um give me one second- we'll come back to it Dr. James
answers later on. I mean, I think one of the things that sort of keep this
short and sweet. I think one of the things of realizing, you know, not only where
you are in terms of relationship to other people, but also, you know, friends all over world
of how are they coping and managing. And then I think this becomes a really important point
about that we're all in this situation together and that there needs to be a certain level of
trust and reciprocity where it may not appear that anti-Asian
sentiment or anti-black sentiment or any type of sort of racism
doesn't impact you. But the thought of, you know,
hospitals being closed down, food chains being disrupted, people in our communities who we need
to participate, not feeling safe becomes extremely important. And I think the other issue that
cannot be downplayed is how people see themselves. And I'm going to do something
really creative and talking about just, you know, one of the beautiful things about
growing up in Michigan is that I had a number of friends from
a diverse background. But hearing some of the challenges that some of my Hmong friends were dealing with with
anti-Asian sentiment. So what happened? Corona
virus spread. Most people were quarantined. But it reshaped the way that
we do just ordinary life and the ways that we talk to each other.
And this is what a sociologist name Harold Garfinkle calls
a natural a natural experiment where all the things that we used to take for granted are no longer in play.
And we actually get to see the things that we've historically taken for granted. I speculate that there
is a lot of self reflection that has happened in these past few months
of quarantining. But it also exposes some of those that
historical residue and some current contemporary things about how we think about inequality along
lines of race, class and gender. So being very much aware of looking at interactions
between people become really significant and there are very few sort of staging places. And I think
the supermarket is one how people are interacting, social
distancing. So this natural experiment, paying attention becomes extremely important.
The checking in for the first time, you know, I think there is a ritual
of asking people, how are you? But for the first time, I think that statement is sort of saying people, I'm fine.
Well, you know, how are you? I think for the first time in a long time, you're actually getting accurate depictions
of what people are experiencing both psychologically and physically. And we're reconnecting
with people we haven't talked to in years, or at least I'm speculating based on the people
who I've been talking to. And so then it becomes even much more complex of, you
know, asking people if they're sick, you know, and then this sort of realization
of how, you know, fortunate. And right now, I feel very fortunate to have
a job to be able to work from home, to be able to shelter in place. But recognizing that
that isn't the case for a lot of people or even realizing that depending upon
your accumulation of wealth, your relationship to COVID, seems to be
sort of shaped by that. I'm almost out of time, so I'm going to fast forward to
talking about sort of, you know, how we're all in this together and realizing
how different communities are making sense. I had an aunt who was diagnosed with COVID, and it was
really difficult because she's 86. She had to go into a hospital and even working through the language
of a ventilator versus a respirator, a noninvasive one. And the potential
of what was gonna happen to her, even just working out those details within families and asking how people
are doing. Which brings me to some of the issues in this anti-Asian sentiment that we're seeing
at this moment in time. I look at a lot of my
friends and family and I have a friend of mine
whose willing to ask me if her brother should buy a gun because he doesn't feel
safe, because there are people who are, you know, breaking social distancing guidelines
and blaming him for the Corona virus and how
this sort of rhetoric, you know, has a long history. I think Sheila points out
very well, like the history of anti-Chinese sentiment. But this isn't our first time at the rodeo. Like when
the bubonic plague happened in nineteen hundred in San Francisco
fumigated. Blame the Chinese for filth and immorality. And then instead
of using sort of a public health, you know, way of dealing with things, it was
also just blaming that particular group of people. And then after the earthquake
in 1906, I believe 1905 or 1906, it became more seen as a public health crisis.
What I mean to say is that it becomes a distraction over the issues that we have to deal with. In
one sense, this man sees himself as a Mhong man, not
as Asian, not as Chinese, but. It's a particular way,
but then this sort of historical residues of anti-Asian sentiment that has
a particular shape depending upon your history in this country or whether it's your food sensibilities,
whether it's your country of origin or whether who we're having conflict. All of that stuff can be invoked
to point out that you have sort of a provisional status in terms of who and what you are in terms of your
rights and privileges. Which brings me to my last point. How this is a matter of life and death.
I worry about people because
I'm in the world with, you know, people who are doing anti-lockdown protests.
People who are being discriminated against because
how that impacts them, whether it's a run on the hospitals, where there's a disruption of the food chain, whether
it's causing people who we need to cooperate, not to cooperate. Has implications. And even
the language that we're using now that we've never used before. From PPE
to flattening the curve to herd immunity, we still see even race. And, you know,
you know, past tragedy is sort of loaded in those terms from sheltering in place with
school shootings to how we seem
to sort of make it a go from a racial to a cultural issue. So
I'm saying this all to say that this moment in time is traumatic for a lot of people
and sort of dealing with and watching how certain segments of our population are being discriminated
against and thinking that it doesn't have anything to do with you. It's problematic in and of itself that
it actually we're all in this together. And it may impact us in
a number of ways. And so I think we're still in sort of the midst of it. But this history
of anti-Asian sentiment is, you know, it's like a many headed hydra. It's
situated for all Asian groups that can be a vote to discriminate against somebody who doesn't even see
themselves in that particular way. But again, racism doesn't have that sort of specificity.
It doesn't matter. You know, you become flattened into this category. So I'm going to end
there. I apologize for my my shaky Internet,
but thank you for being patient and sticking through with this. Well,
it is not your fault that your internet is  shaky.
Now, like all four of you, the great Capellas. Thank you for
sharing your thoughts. And I think like we have a, you know, a number of different
angles. OK, in terms of looking at. Look at this issue. And I think it is a
really great it's a combination. So good All of you
of provided sort of a kind of framework how it kept
basically taught us how to look at it and how we can actually understand it. But like we're
all academics and of course, like it, there are tons of people who are not actually in
academia who like totally understand what's going on. Like, why is this happening?
And I think we actually got a good input in terms of I get that
perspective. But at the same time, like we I think you like,
it was a great education as even for me that like, you know, being an Asian American,
you lived through a lot of kind of instances that were talked about.
Still, it is a great education of what other people are experiencing and
what is actually going on in the society in general.
Let me kind of like share one experience that I had, which was a
long time ago in the 60s. I grew up in St. Louis, so I was a small kid,
I can walk around at the end of town. There was a very
nice old lady who approached My mom was with me at the time
and asked, pointing at me and asked her like, what is that?
It was not Who is that? Or No? Like it was. And now, like. And
I still remember that moment very vividly. I don't have that many memories of at that
age. Like I think I was four at the time. But I still remember that in
a moment. And it was not about like her being a bad person
or like, you know, she was a hostile or anything. She was a really, really nice lady.
But for her, I was just an object. Right.
A very peculiar object. Right. And I don't think
it has changed that much. And it
kind of gives us an opportunity to kind of look at it
with, you know, one step back and think about, OK. Like, what is the kinda like
root cause of everything that is going on? And I find it really
interesting to hear all your thoughts now. Like, let's go back to like
the point of some people who are trying to kind of help
others understand the situation and kind of help them
a little bit. Help them not to make the same kind of mistakes. Right.
So the question was like, yo, but I got how so? Why certain
statements, actions are racist or micro aggressive. Like, how do I explain
it to others? And James was in the middle of answering that question and
kind of giving some insights. So, you know,
I spoke to validating racial battle fatigue. Look, you're not going to you're probably not
going to fight every battle. And but when you when you do choose to
fight, you know, I mean, you're talking about interpersonal dynamics. Let's say your response is going to be very different
depending on that person, your relationship with them. Well, you know, they will on.
And then, you know, are they harming someone in that moment that you need to intervene?
So if someone is about to say something racist to somebody else in your circle
or in an encounter or you're that you're there for it, maybe you feel compelled to
aggressively, you know, step in and say that's not OK. We can't tolerate that here.
If you think someone has a racist misunderstanding, maybe that's a maybe that's
a I'm gonna pull you aside for the second moment in and break it down for you. And
or maybe someone who's just not being. Not really thinking about it. And you can just kind of be like, come on. That's
not okay. And then it depends on the dynamic. And in that moment. But
I want to look to some with another question that someone John asked in.
You know, we spoke to how. You can be an advocate as a white person for other people
and people of color and his friend group. And I think some of these similar dynamics play out. You can be an advocate
by disrupting yet another. In other circles where people color may not be
able to be there. You don't have to discrupt. You don't have to necessarily try to engage
your friends of color and comforting them with racism uninvited. You know,
if you see what's happening on your own, it's really, you know, feel obligated to go in and do something
directly with them to let them know you're there or things like that. Then they can
come to you and know you're someone they can count on. And another in another fashion. But don't feel that kind of
obligation. I think. Well, we can all do better, whether
it's in a moment or in general is getting involved in anti-race is work. That can be in
your parenting. What are the children's books in your home? What are you exposing your children to?
Are those diverse? Are you teaching them about it, where you go race and systems-
racism in the United States. Those are anti-racist acts as well as getting
involved in campaigns and activities and donating to causes. So there's a wide
range of. Things are going to move the needle. What are you saying in a given moment?
It's part of that. But it but there's a much, much bigger picture of that
as a white person here, as a person of. So I can hear it.
I think this is a little bit of really a broad question where
like what we can do individually to basically
remedy the situation right now. Like sometimes like I
do, I tried to speak out, but it is to get the perception of and look
at the whole message gets perceived based on a quiet. Right.
So to speak, or the identity of the speaker matters. So I could let
me go to Sheila to ask, because somebody who looked really
into the Puerto Rican and also the Caribbean immigration and all the struggles that they have
gone through and all the discrimination they experience. I get what kind of lessons
we can learn from that and basically apply to
the Asian-American situation that we're experiencing these days. So
I think that that that goes back to something that James said James
said at the beginning, and that also Waverley was saying.  we are
all we are all people of color, our experience,
are shared experiences. And I can add in my writing,
for example, when when I was looking at how I found all of the discourse
against Filipino Americans and Filipinos during and after a Hispanic American
war, because I was researching the same type of language against Puerto Ricans
and Cubans when they Spanish American War happened. And and by
reading that and read the full text of the Congressional Record and then
Columbia Law Review, Harvard Law Review and Yale Law Review articles from that era. It's
the same discourse. So so we. So this is this is a discourse
of otherness and inferiority
that has been imposed on all of us across the board.
And the main issue and I and I think that we can't get too distracted because the
the main issue is an issue of arrow at that old patriarchy
of colonialism, racism
and capitalism also because all these sorts of serves that the way
capitalism is structure andorganized and it seeds from
subordination. So if it requires all of us to start looking
at this from a broader lens of anti-subordination
across the board and also learn from our shared experiences
through events like this, so we can all say, OK, this is all of us. Right.
And it will take all of us.
So Doug, Waverly and Lu-in Would you like to add
some of your thoughts. I think what Sheila mentioned it and what I
really appreciated about her talk, but I think all the talks are sort of situating this in
a history and a discourse that I think becomes really important. But also, I think
it's extremely important to pay attention to language. I don't think this point can be downplayed.
I find it fascinating that a virus that is spread face to face
has sort of created this this sort of this fear and this sort of tension,
but also how false claims become a distraction to sort of push a narrative forward.
And I say this all to say is that I think, again,
this is a important historical moment in terms of recognizing what's going on, but, you
know, thinking about how we're going to move forward. And I think there's a certain level uncertainty that we need to deal with.
But I think what's different at this particular historical moment is that we have enough people
with knowledge about these sort of past transgressions and that I speculate that we should
know better. And in terms of, you know, demonizing people.
But it also brings into question of, you know, our American like, what does it mean to
be an American that I think needs to be interrogated and unpacked
and, you know, and sort of, you know, the rights and privileges that people have at
the moment that I cannot. And so it's mind numbing to me
at a moment where people are losing their lives. This is a matter of life and death. And I think this,
you know, and I cannot I don't want to marginalize or downplay the racism
that a lot of my you know, that a lot of people of color
in general are experiencing. But I also think, again, the only
way and I'm not sure who ended their talk with this, I think that we've got to get
through this together like there's no there. There is this moment where we need coordinated
action and focused attention to just transition to whatever the new normal is going
to be. OK. Thank you.
You want to you want to chime in a little bit. So I just wanted to say that I agree
with everything that Sheila and Waverly said. And I think it's important to recognize that
when we think about hate crimes, I mean, they're just at one end of a continuum, right? I mean, this is all
the social environment. And it just manifests in different ways. And and so
we need to recognize that daily interactions, mundane interactions do
affect the social environment and have a role in influencing
the more extreme forms. Right. It does become a matter of life and death because everything is so connected.
So. So I really appreciate that we're all coming at this from different
perspectives, but kind of saying a very consistent thing, which is
we're all in this together. Right. And a lot of this has to do with how people view their place
in society and how they protect it, how they keep others from
being able to have the advantages that they have. So I really do need to recognize
all the connection. All right. Thank you. Now, look, we were talking like
this whole discussion kind of got bigger and bigger, but we started out with a question
from Karen, who is an Asian America and like, okay, how do I explain how I explained I
look at anything that is racist. I go to my friends when they actually don't get
it. Now, those have got another question from John, and that's like a
similar question, but in a little bit different kind of perspective. He's a white male
and a he wants to be a good father. He has three young kids
and he wants to be a good father. He wants to show them, Lead them by examples.
But. He's not Asian American, right? So, again, at the same time, there are
questions from. Let
me try to find it. Oh, yes. So I get a question from another
sort of person who basically ask Duck. OK. As a bystander. As a bystander,
like I'm not Asian-American, but like when I see like some sort of, let's say, harassment
or anything happening, like the one I witnessed that. Like, how do I actually
intervene? Like, what can I do to help? So let's go to Sheila.
You first because. You probably have a lot of cases. They
get it under your belt, basically that dealt with these things. So, I want
one thing that that I have learned to do and how I. And there's there's several
questions on that thread about how do you deal with this directly. And.
It's it's really hard for people that that make a
racist comment to see that they heard you on. And they are more
defensive if if you identify that yourself.
So I usually say, you know, that some people might find this
to be racist, or that some people might find it to be offensive
in such and such way. And let me give you an example on how that could be interpreted
by some people as offensive. And most people, I mean,
that are intelligent and want it to be better. Will welcome
a conversation from that perspective. So so that's
a tool and a way and a way of doing it. I
mean, we're all racist in one way or another because we have been all social. We have
been all socialized in a racist society and we are proud of our culture. So
to stop being racist requires a tremendous deliberative
effort and deliberative, not in the not only because we need to talk about it that
this causes, but it's also a deliberate effort, that it's an effort that has to be
intentional and it has to be of liberation. So so so it's
really hard. I mean, the easiest thing is to be racist.
That is the easy thing why it's difficult to break from that. And when
you're a parent, you have to invest in not
being racist. Let me give you that. The thing that we're dealing with in our house right now.
So Pittsburgh Public Schools, it's teaching about Johnny Appleseed and
John Chapman and how he planted the trees to make the nation grow. And I'm here
pulling my hairs. So it it it's an and therefore, to say, you know, Lucia
this is just a legend and a perspective.
But this is all that was happening also. And you have to educate
and you have to offer a counter-narrative. All the time,
and it never stops. It will never stop. You will have to be to do this for
the rest of your life. It will never stop. So basically is the diligence
that pays off right now. Look at where actually you like with all the lively
discussions. Look, we were kind of running out of time and
like, you know, Jay just posted a link to a bystander guide on the chat window in the chat window.
So I could you if anybody who was interested in that, please
go to the link later after the session is over now. Okay. Here are some of the other questions
that. And. And I think it is a good question. There is
a kind of like common thread among the questions about how do we
kind of just talk about this with
white peers. And how do we
basically help them become an ally like in this whole
series of webinars? It is about ally ship. Right.
So how do we actually get there? Let's start with Lu-in like
what your thoughts or advices on that one. So one
thing that Sheila said I think is a helpful thing maybe for approaching
these discussions. And that is I think that if I heard correctly, what she said is that recognizing
that we're all racist is actually kind of liberating. I mean, it's not certainly a good thing to be a racist,
but to recognize that's kind of a human condition is to be a racist.
I think helps people to get past the sort
of stigma of thinking that.
Being a racist is actually deviant, right? Being a racist is normal and is something
that. I think people want
in general not to me. Right. And so I think being able
to explain these dynamics in ways that are understandable
to people, in ways that maybe parallel experiences they've had in situations when
they weren't part of the privileged group. Right. And sort of show analogies between
that situation and what's happening when they are part of a privileged
group and are saying something that is racist or behaving in a way that is racist. I think
that can help. I mean, that's what I try to do, is present things in a way where people
can relate and be like, oh, yes, I have had that experience. And I I can understand
what you're talking about. Right. And I can see that this doesn't make me a bad person. It just
makes me a flawed person, which means I'm just a person. So I think
that's a really important thing to do. I think the other thing that
we need to recognize, though, is that we all have different kinds of privilege. And
one thing that's really hard to get past is enjoying your own privilege.
Right. When it is in contrast to or expense at the expense of
someone else. And that's kind of the distancing thing that I was talking about. This one of the harmful effects of
hate crimes is when you can distinguish yourself from a group that is targeted.
I mean, that actually gives you a bit of a boost, right? They've shown, you know, that
the converse of stereotype threat in a test-taking situation is the stereotype boost that
white people can get. Or that men can get. And I think that that is a
really hard thing to overcome, because sometimes being aware of your own privilege
actually can make you embrace it a little bit and enjoy it a little bit too much.
And so so that I think is a challenge in having these discussions with people
who generally don't feel like they are in a targeted group.
So I think that I find it really interesting. And you let me kind of add one more kind of like
flavor to that, which is the mock dog, the model minority kind of label
that Asian-Americans can only get so James pointed out, get a point,
pointing out some interesting insights about that as well earlier. But because, you
know, we have to look at that kind of stereotype imposed upon us
as a model minority. There is a lot of times that
there was a kind of like a mixed responses that we're going to get right. Because sometimes people look at us and
say like, you know, like, why are you complaining about anything but you shouldn't talk? Or like, some
people could consider actually Asians as the most racist people because
like, you know, we are like, you think you are above everybody else, like a type of notion.
Now, how do we kind of. Kind of like kind of come to
a kind of common ground. Right. Like on that park, like on
where we like we are and where we stand in this country, because even with the model minority
notion. Asian Americans have never been
accepted to the so-called Right back in this society,
we are always considered as foreign. Right. So Waverly like your work.
So I get it. Okay. So one of the things that I want to jump in and try to two points
and actually this one, I think so much of this is structural. So much of this is embedded in
our language. And I think, you know, one of the things that I tried to open up with is like once you make the ordinary strange
taken for granted, strange becomes visible. And one can speculate that we won't do
that thing anymore in terms of highlighting how this
marginalized people and I think be an even pointing out that we've all had moments
where we've been discriminated against. But sometimes there are people who deal with it or had those experiences
more so than others on a day to day and everyday life.
The model minority thing is again making the ordinary strange model minority compared to who?
And who are we talking about? Once you
start going down that rabbit hole, you start to see the social construction of race and how these things are perpetuated
and play out. And that, again, you think that's you know that.
You know, it represents the sort of provisional status that, you know, whether it was during 9/11 and how,
you know, we have to recalibrate Arabs and their whiteness or, you know, how
at this particular historical moment, you know, a lot of people of
Asian descent are dealing with anti Asian sentiment and particularly anti-Chinese
sentiment, hasn't it itself in this country a long, particular history. And so I think what I
what I would say is to sort of interrogate those language regimes, interrogate
how these things work structurally, what is the recourse and how are these things able to work
in everyday life? I think it's important that we have two attorneys on this panel because we see how it works within
the law. And so there's ways of looking at practices and languages,
practice and language in the ways that we talk about people not only ourselves, but in relationship to other people.
And I had my eye that this concept of model minority is in itself a trap.
Because it is a trap, because once you you said you are validating
the premise of minorities being lesser right off of.
They all either been bad. They all. And you validate
the premise that it is that sits on all the discourse that we have been
that we have been covering and all that history of exclusion, discrimination,
all that history of oppression. So that's the trap by you. By trying
to use that as a platform. You are. It is a validation of all that. So
we need to really deconstruct and this dropped that premise and not even engage
in that conversation of modeling. And who decides? And it's also given power
to to white supremacy to decide what it's
what it's called, what's socially acceptable. So all that has to be this mountain.
And I think this is implicit maybe in what Waverley and Shaila just said, but I just want to say it explicitly,
I think it's also a trap in the sense that Asians can
actually kind of take pride in it sometimes in a very perverse way. Right. That then promotes
the myth. And I think that might have been implicit in what you were saying. And so just to recognize
that actually it's not a good thing, right. To be labeled a model minority,
which is something that, you know, I have some older relatives who actually don't understand
that this is not a good thing. So, you know, it's very
tricky. Yeah. Go ahead. You know, I've been.
We wonder, I think we tend to underestimate how little people know in this country about
actual racial history in this country. And one of the things I think we can do
is make sure we educate ourselves on what has transpired in this world.
You know, one of the questions we ask at the center of our students is if you
don't talk about race, how do you explain, Rachel? Well. And that's
where many, many people in the United States are, they don't talk about race, but they want to make some
kind of working assumption around inequality. And usually that assumption is racist. And so
we can educate ourselves in that way. And with the model minority, please. If you understand
the racial history of this country, including racism against Asian Americans and all of mechanisms that have.
Systematically work to dis-empower people economically, socially,
rate the hierarchy that we have today when we have a crisis
like this. It's not a surprise that that underlying racial current comes back
into play. And I think one reason I would highlight is that even tangible
kind of be an anti-racist simply because I think it's very, very accessible and
it gives people and white people language that is very accessible to
understand the dynamics of race and be able to communicate that. And I do believe that this
although office of diversity has been coming here in July, too. So that's
great. All right. OK. Thank you so much, everyone.
And now we are actually right at 1:30, but I
think we can go a little bit longer. OK. If that is
OK. I can. I think that anybody who wants to leave because
they have other obligations, that is fine. But this
is not a kind of like everyday moment that we have these great
people in the same Zoom chat room. So I'm going to try to kind of hang on
to a bit longer. And so in terms of the
conversations about this whole, you know, Asian American.
issue that came to the surface, and I think we all agree that the problem was
there in the past has always been there. It just came to the surface.
Now, I think it probably is a kind of a
Wake-Up Call for a lot of people like you who basically bought into that old model minority
definition, including the Asian Americans who bought into that, too. I think
there are a lot of Asian Americans in a way that were a little bit complacent
in terms of fighting racism or things like that. Because of that whole label
that was put on us now. There was a question I got from the audience
that actually asked us about like what Pitt is doing. So I can what
are the kinds of things that Pitt is doing in terms of our university or each schools?
We have in three different schools that are represented including like
four, including the business school I'm from. So what are the things
that we are doing or we can do to make our
Oakland campus or like, the city of Pittsburgh for that matter
a lot safer place and a lot more inclusive place?
Anyone who wants to kind of say something that our central
administrators are not going to be happy to hear about? You know, I think
this is odd. I think there are a couple things that we need to
think about in terms of how are how these things
are structured in terms of, you know, and in one sense that Pitt is not a modelific place
that you have students, you have faculty, you have staff.
And I think those issues have different workings. But
think about what is to be done when a complaint
about racism comes up and how do we how do we handle those issues?
What are what are we doing as an institution in terms of educating the public? But
also, keep in mind, you know, how do we create a much more inclusive environment?
The demographics of this country is rapidly changing. And I speculate the Pitt is going
to be a qualitatively different place 10 years from now, maybe 15 years from now.
And so I think thinking about being ahead of the curve in terms of having these
really meaningful conversations about all forms of discrimination and
not flattening. I also think there is something we need to think about sort of
recourse in terms of how do we deal with these grievances
at the institutional level. I think, you know. And again,
I know it's an academic institution, so paying attention to how even within our structure
on how we do hiring, how we do recruiting, how we support
people who are, you know, who have been historically marginalized, who have this weight
upon them to sort of educate the public in addition to trying to do your job.
And I think that can not sort of be downplayed right now, that there
are things that institutions can do at the student level, at these sort of administrative
level, but also just, you know, making the general public aware of
some of the things that we do. We have this panel of amazing, you know, critical
race and race scholars who have a lot of insights and work in there and very
approachable. So I think it's it's like a kid has these many parts that can be
that can be changed and address. And I think the Office of Diversity
and Inclusion was a step in the right direction. But again, given teeth in terms of hiring,
recruitment, students and what have. All right.
Yeah, Lu-in do you want to jump in? I agree with everything that Waverly said, and I think that a lot of
efforts are being made. I know what the school of law did. We are paying a lot of attention. We're creating a new
associate dean position to really. And, you know, there's going to be a fantastic person in
charge of that effort at a school of law. And I think that one of the really important
things for those of us who are in a position to have an influence on the institution
should sort of recognize is that we should try
not to be afraid to talk about these issues. Right. It's actually it makes it scarier
if you can't talk about them. And so, you know, I'm really so glad
that that the Office of Diversity, Inclusion and Health Sciences Diversity Office are opening
up these discussions. I know the center on Race, likewise, is always talking about these issues.
And I'm just making it more normal to talk about these issues. I think is really
important. All right. On the same line. Let me throw in another
question like this related question to everybody. This is actually from the question
of Alaiha. I hope that I'm not mispronouncing your name, but the core
question is how do we keep ourselves from being distracted by
all the things going on in terms of politics? Right. So like
suddenly the whole social issue and the politics are kind of
like, you know, tangled up as sort of like a single
issue, like a motor car. In many cases now, they're not supposed to be a single
issue like, you know, the whole right on social issues and especially the racial issues that we're talking
about. Those are about right versus wrong. Now, politics is about a difference
of opinions. Right. Like they're supposed to be different. So how do we actually kind of this
entangle them and how do we not get distracted
by everything going into politics? So I guess I'll start with J there,
because you have probably more experience on this than I do.
Let's say a couple of things. But I think Sheila has done such a great job laying out O
law, which are both are created by politics. Talk about
governmental policy, not like social definitional politics. Isn't
it the fabric of our of our power systems? Have, Rachel,
strong racial mechanisms and I don't think you can disentangle race
and politics. I think politics have always.
Supported racial subordination hierarchies in the United States. So, I mean,
first of all, people have that right to vote. Or many years of both people of color.
You have you have representation
in American governing bodies being determined at the origin
for racist policies around slavery and three-fifths compromise.
You have very active attempts to disenfranchise people of color from
voting. Even right now, that's an active. And it's succeeding
endeavor in different parts of the country. Oh, I really don't make
much of an effort to try to disentangle issues of race from issues of politics. The
think that you're not going to be able to do that. I mean, obviously the rhetoric coming from
the leaders of the country. Whether it be over or.
Implied it has a lot or is very racial. And so I just think it's
it's false to think you can you can disentangle those things.
All right. Let's go to Waverly. Go. Can you kind of at for more insights
on that? You know, it's like a horrible Venn diagram
where that sweet spot of politics and at times anything
becomes sort of eclipsed. And I think, again, this
sort of history can be invoked. I mean, you know, being
in Pittsburgh and watching the tree of life shooting at this particular moment,
you know, checking in, my friends, and you know, where you're worried about not only contracting the virus
to keep your family safe and worrying about your economic prospects. You now have to worry about
your safety. And it's totally a political issue and it's distracting
it. What I mean by a distraction from, you know, doing the things that you need to do. But
it's also very hurtful, you know, to be born in a country, to grow up in a place
and then to be the target of very pointed
racism. And I think anyone who sort of traffics in that sort of behavior. I think
we just have to highlight. And I think politics sort of creates these, you know,
situations. And it has been this way historically. And I think Sheila did a wonderful job
in explaining sort of this this history that, you know, this language
that has been used in it comes up over and over and over again. And it's not only happening in this
country, but it's happening in other parts of the world as well. And so I think there is
it becomes really hard to decouple the two, because by its definition, it was
a political category that was created to keep people separated or subordinated in the first place. And so
it's extremely complex, but it's very hard to decouple the two
particular groups because there is a particular orderliness that racism has for different populations
that can be afoot. All right. Thank you so much. Now,
look, let's go a little bit deeper. And this is gonna be our last question. OK. James go ahead.
I've gotta take off. It's been great. And I thank you, everyone, for attending. Thank you. Thank
you for your time, James. I like it. This is going to be our very last question. And I'm going to hand over
to Mario to close out to the event. And I thank you for
everybody who is still sticking with us. I see it. There is still tons of participants. Doctor watching.
I got this webinar. Now, the last question is a little bit kind of tricky because
there is has been quite a bit of tension between African-American and
Asian communities in the U.S. Now that it's
not helping in this kind of particular point of time
right now, because as you can see, like a lot of videos posted about Asian
Americans getting harassed, getting a pact that sometimes
it is the other minority groups attacking them, including African-Americans.
Now, for example, there is a question from Gary who pointed out that
it there was a black protest against Chinese and Asian merchants in response to
China's human rights violation and mistreatment of African residents. And, you
know, like this complicates things, of course. But how do we
actually bridge that gap, this or let's say,
kind of ease the tension, right, like it between African-Americans and
Asian communities. So I attempted to to answer
that question in the chat. But I'll be I'll be happy to say
what I was trying to do with what I was trying to engage is that
there's only one way to deal with racism and it needs  a collective effort. Right. So
it has to be dealt with collectively, collectively. And we lean-we
need to learn from each other's experiences. We need to know each other. We need to work with each
other. That it's an enormous effort that that it's a great effort. That
doesn't mean that we are not going to denounce when we're at fault, because
we are all products of our society and we are going to be informed and when we are at fault.
That has to be denounced. And if it's a it's. And there has all there has been
for 40 years, this discourse between the
Tensions between Latinos and African-Americans, for example, for the role
that Latinos might have played in labor. This is very manufactured,
right? So. So this is a manufactured problem. And that
only serves to. Allow
the systems, the interconnected systems of oppression to continue. So we have to denounce
ourself. We have to denounce it. What we also need to work together.
So it requires both things. So it requires the recognition of
fault. But that can't mean
that we won't be able to engage in working together. So it's a challenge,
but that's from my perspective, the only way forward.
All right, so we're all awfully fifteen minutes over time about
it. It has been a great experience for me.
I learned a lot. It was a very educational in terms of
understanding the structure on the side of the perspectives and the historical and the social
implications. It's good. This is an issue that I think people really have
to take a step back and think about as an Asian American
Like I have to confess that these days it is the first time
that I'm actually looking over my shoulder whenever I walk out there on the street.
I didn't have to do that ever. But now it has become a habit.
It is part of my going outside. Right. So good.
Thank you so much for all your insights. All the great panelists. And at the same
time, like you. Thank you, Mario. And office diversity and inclusion. For giving
me the opportunity to be a part of this. And now I'm going to hand over to
Mario to close. You know, thank you so much for your great facilitation.
I want to thank the panelists again. Nothing else to be said at this point, except I hope that we will continue the dialog
at some point. Thank you for your willingness to stay over. I think we could probably go another half hour
based on the number of people that are still in there. I just want to share the screen really quick
and make people aware that we will have two more
town halls under allyship and advocacy. An Age of COVID-19. Our next
will be Codes of Relief in COVID-19. Faith in an Age of Pandemic. I know one
of our attendees ask about the religious and spiritual component to this.
So we will do that on June 12th. On June 10th. I'm sorry. And the last
probably won't be the last. But the town hall following that will be holes
in the safety net. The forgotten needs of people with disabilities under quarantine. That will be on June
24th. So please look for those and please register. I hope you all will attend. Thank you
for coming and have a great day. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much,
everyone. thank you so much.
