Our Statement on Anti-Blackness

June 2, 2020

Dear Friends of ACDC,

Over the past week, protests swept across America calling for justice for George Floyd and the many other Black and Brown people who had senselessly and needlessly died at the hands of the police. It was powerful and beautiful to see so many people come together with signs and chants of “I Can’t Breathe” and “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot.”

Yet many news images focus on the subsequent violence and looting. While these images are painful to see, it is all too easy to get distracted by the damages from the core message – namely that there must be change to this system under which Black and Brown lives are discarded so callously, repeatedly.

Several stores in Chinatown suffered damages and loss on Sunday night, on top of the devastating economic loss and rise in anti-Asian sentiment from the pandemic. Across the country, many of the stores targeted were owned by people of color, many of them immigrants who have now lost their livelihood, built from scratch and with sacrifice. It is impossible to know how many of these small businesses will survive.

There will be temptations to blame the protesters. There will be comparisons to the L.A. riots. Except this time, it is happening concurrently with a global health pandemic. All this pain, anxiety and unknowns are compounding into an increasingly divisive society as injustices come to light.

This country has long pitted communities of color against one another, including Asian and Black communities. Asian Americans have often been used as a wedge to split apart people of color, such as the “Model Minority” myth, which puts us on an insidious pedestal while blaming Black and Brown people for their own sufferings. Divisiveness keeps the white supremacy system intact.

But we in the Asian American community must stand together with the Black, Brown and Indigenous communities. How can we ask others to stand in solidarity against anti-Asian xenophobia, if we cannot join the call now for justice for George Floyd and others like him?

We have a long road ahead of us. While we take care of one another during this pandemic, we must examine and address anti-Blackness within our own community, stand with our sisters and brothers in the Black and Brown communities, and work together to demand justice and dismantle racism. This time, we will not stand by silently.

Sincerely,

Angie Liou
Executive Director