#stopsilence

Six vaccins en une seule dose 💉, sans test placebo ⚠️, juste comparés à d’autres 💭. 319 microgrammes d’aluminium 🧪 injectés à des nouveau-nés 👶. C’est réel. C’est maintenant. Réfléchissez 🧠. Posez des questions ❓. Protégez-les ❤️.

On Wednesday, my newsfeed was flooded with posts about Alton Sterling’s murder. I was getting ready to go numb again when I saw one of my black friends post: 

“Sometimes I just want to take a black leave. I just want to mourn. I just want to contemplate how to protect myself from my own blackness.”

Then I saw comments on that post. One of them was from her Asian friend who asked, “What’s wrong?”

All sorts of emotions at that comment. Anger. Shame. Frustration. Disbelief. 

What’s wrong?? Seriously?? It’s been two years of media coverage of black individuals being murdered by police officers! TWO FREAKING YEARS. You seriously don’t know what’s wrong?? 

Maybe I’m too quick to judge her friend. But the emotions aren't directed solely at that friend anyway.

My emotions are directed at my Asian friends who consume black culture on a daily basis and still refuse to stand with the black community against the injustice they face. Friends who listen to black artists, talk about black players in the NBA, and use black slang on a normal basis. They’re totally fine talking about the black culture they consume, but say nothing when it comes to the pain and oppression the black community faces. 

I’m not saying that my Asian friends are the only ones who are guilty of this. I know plenty of non-Asian friends who do this. I cringe just as much at their actions. But my Asian friends have been disproportionately silent about the issue of police brutality. I probably have around 30 Asian friends who’ve said something about the racial injustice in this country on Facebook in the past two years. And I’m pretty sure at least 300 of my Facebook friends are Asian.

My emotions are also directed at myself. I’m just as guilty of being silent. Even though this silence from my Asian friends has bothered me throughout the past two years, I haven’t said anything to them. But seeing that comment, “What’s wrong?”.... and then knowing that Philandro Castile was the 559th person to die at the hands of the police in the past 188 days... 

If you are a good friend of mine who is Asian and haven’t considered the injustice that the black community faces... Please ask yourself this question:

Is it really okay to join the black community in listening to their music, watching their athletes, and using words like “lit” or “bae”... and then look away or stay silent when that same community faces violence and asks for your help? 

If you said no... and are willing to ask yourself more challenging questions to begin engaging with this issue... 

Why are we Asians disproportionately silent? 

Do we need time to process these events? It’s been two years of media coverage though. How much longer do we need to process and decide to stand against injustice? 

Do we think that being silent frees us from being responsible for the injustice that the black community faces? Because like I said in my previous Facebook post, not knowing just makes us ignorant, and not doing anything even after knowing makes us oppressive. Do we think that the people who didn’t do anything despite knowing that the Holocaust was happening were innocent? It scares me that I can even make that comparison, but both the Holocaust and the current issue involve four groups of people: People who murder (+ those who support these murders), people who are murdered, people who are fighting against these murders, and people who do nothing and allow the murders to continue. 

Or do we want to avoid the pain that comes from seeing a human being murdered by another human being just because of the differences in skin color? Because the pain we feel is not even close to the pain felt by the black community who lost their members. And the black community doesn’t have the privilege of running away from that intense pain. 

Maybe we just don’t care at all. Maybe we feel that the issues of the black community aren’t ours to deal with. But then do we care about the issues our own community faces? I’m not proud of this, but I really don’t know much about the injustices that my community faces. Because again, the Asian community is disproportionately silent and I have very few Asian friends who raise awareness about those issues. And don’t the issues we face as a community come from the same source as the issues faced by the black community? From the lie that some people’s lives are more important than others? 

If you actually read this far, thank you. I know it’s rough to read what I wrote. It was rough for me to write them out, knowing I was going to post this for people to read. But I had to find a way to initiate a conversation with my Asian friends. Because I love both my black and Asian friends, and I knew my black friends were hurting from the silence of my Asian friends. And because I would be leaving my Asian friends to support the violence through their silence if I didn’t confront them. 

If you’re one of my Asian friends and are now interested in breaking your silence, please listen to the black community before doing anything else. Talk to a black friend. Read an article written by a member of the black community or an ally about how to respond. Understand that police brutality is just one symptom of an unjust system that oppressed the black community for centuries. Get the full picture of where the black community is coming from. I found that these were necessary for me to start posting about police brutality on my Facebook.