Let’s not forget that there’s also varying levels of racism associated to the Asian identity. The attitudes towards East Asians, South Asians, and Southeast Asians are remarkably different — even though their cultures have all intermingled at different parts throughout history. The stereotypes of “Asian-ness” are all exaggerations of East Asians, while most South Asians aren’t even considered Asian by non-Asians. As for Southeast Asians, there’s internalized racism involved along with a long going history between East and Southeast Asians that have created the same mentality that current Americans have towards the Latin@ population. Unlike the commenters above, I and many other Southeast Asians have been regularly referred to as “the Mexicans of Asia,” which is offensive in so many levels (along with other, more specific, derogatory terms), and sadly, that phrase was always said by fellow Asians.
There is a long history of oppression between groups in Asia that has lasted for centuries before Western civilization even considered exploring east. However, due to the constant, oppressive power of a Western world through globalization and colonialism, this internalized and externalized racism is not only exemplified, but horribly disfigured to accommodate Western ideals. The Asian community is HUGE and while half of the Asian community (cough, East Asians) is exonerated and experience the racism stated above, the experiences of South Asians and Southeast Asians are completely different. True, in past history, East Asians have been racially profiled and physically abused, but that has started to decrease. South Asians are constantly attacked and lumped together, their identities stripped to only “Indian,” forced to deal with the stereotypes and racism of that identity. Due to the recent arrival of Southeast Asians to America (and the circumstances in which they travelled) many Southeast Asians live in low income communities and within their own racial category, consistently have the highest poverty rates. It’s to the point where Southeast Asians are racially profiled by the police and police have entered homes without a warrant and assaulted families (I also experienced this firsthand along with many other people I know). Where more than half of Khmer, Laotian, and Vietnamese people drop out of high school. Or that Hmong people (an ethnic group) are treated so harshly not just by Western society, but even by other Asian groups and subgroups that in official government documents, they get their own category and are monitored and profiled. That there’s a HUGE difference in poverty levels just within Asian identities.
So yes, it’s true that not all Asians are stopped and frisked by the police. Only those Asians with higher levels of melanin and don’t fit within the “Asian Stereotype.”
The above commentators tiptoe around the “Model Minority Myth.” The Model Minority™ is only given to people who have reached acceptable levels of “Whiteness.” True, many East Asians are no longer as publicly abused or mistreated, but like they said, it’s all silent. The discrimination and racism happens in the backfolds of law, government, corporations, etc. As for those who were unfortunate enough to have slightly above accepted levels of melanin, the abuse is public and loud. And often times, internalized racism from those trying to reach the Model Minority™ will be sure to continue to add on to this inequality by distancing themselves (which is dumb on itself, because it makes you a perpetual foreigner and only perpetuates animosity within the Asian community). It’s even worse if you so happen to identify with the LGBTQ+ community.
How the fuck are you going to just lump together 6th generation Chinese Americans, Indian immigrants, and Hmong war refugees? Their histories are so vastly different. Their backgrounds will be the determining factor on why they’re treated a certain way. There’s inequality among the Asian community. It has a lot to do with politics and cultural identities, but these lumping of of identities ends up erasing actual struggles and experiences of Asian subcategories.
Asian Americans do experience racism. Asians do experience racism regardless of where they are in the world. The manifestations of racism and discrimination will vary depending on one’s ethnic heritage, but it is very much real. It is present because of our institutions and which only continues to uphold microaggressions within the Asian community.
