Racism against Asian Americans isn't unique to the coronavirus pandemic—everyone else is just becoming more aware now

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Racism against Asian Americans isn't unique to the coronavirus pandemic—everyone else is just becoming more aware now

On March 2nd, I went to Costco. News that coronavirus (COVID-19) could hit the U.S. the same way it had devastated China in January was just starting to spread, so I figured I might as well take my annual shopping trip to the warehouse in Clifton, New Jersey, to stock up. With toilet paper and paper towels in my cart, I walked toward the front of the store, passing by a product representative hawking samples. “Stay away from my face!” she said sternly. I looked around. Was she talking to me? There was another Asian woman in front of me. When I turned back toward her, I couldn’t even make eye contact with the product representative—she was holding a box in front of her face, shielding herself from us.

Whether this was directed at me or the woman ahead of me—or both of us—I didn’t know, but I shrugged it off. After all, comments reflecting anti-Asian sentiment like this have long been a part of my life: I was born in Chicago and raised in California by Taiwanese immigrants.

Sometimes these incidents are just a passing comment—or the pressing question, “No, where are you really from?” Other times they’re harsher, like when a non-Asian stranger incessantly shouted at me, “Ni hao ma?” trying to get a chuckle out of me, or when a neighbor asked how I could see through my “small eye slits.” “But really, how do you see?” he insisted. There was even the time I was told the only reason I landed a magazine editor job was because I was Asian and someone got a diversity hiring bonus.

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