Tell your story. Help us track hate.
Report a hate incident
I work at a bookstore and a customer started berating me when I didn’t do what he wanted fast enough. I didn’t argue with him so he said to me, “You don’t know anything! You can’t speak English! You don’t speak English!” He said this even though he heard I had no accent (and I also have a graduate degree in creative writing).
At my place of employment, a man (likely a patient) approached me while I was minding my own business with, "Young lady are you a Chinese?" I was already thinking "What the heck?" and told him to back off. He said, "Your kind are diseased." I said shame on him and that he was being a racist. Of course, now he went in with the racial slurs. None of my colleagues stepped in to help me. Everyone was silent. I took out my phone to record him and he started to become aggressive trying to grab at me, adding in misogynistic slurs for good measure too.
I am so done. I am so tired. I am in my 20s and to be honest, I am really not sure how much more I can take. This was not the first time with the racial slurs, insults, abuse, but this was the first time the racist individual tried to physically aggress me. A freaking 200 something pound man trying to push me around because of the racism in his heart. I am so sad.
An unmasked man in his 30s verbally assaulted me on the subway line around 11:50am. I was sitting down and reading a book. He came into the car at a stop and started asking everyone to pay attention to him. When he neared me, he also demanded my attention and announced "You think I don't know? You eat live frogs, you people eat frogs, and cats and dogs." He was very loud. I was in so much shock I didn't say anything. Nor did any of the passengers sitting around me.
My town is a predominately white area, and I am of the few Asian American students attending my school. It's disheartening to me the normalization of racism toward Asians. Even my close friends often make stereotypical racist jokes regarding my eyes, food, and academics. The other day phrases such as "So you're Asian, do you eat dogs?" made an appearance on a call with a friend. When I confronted them about their racism, they replied with, "Stop being so sensitive. It's just a joke." I am sick and tired of these so-called jokes. They were never funny and never will be; they are only shallow and insensitive. I am tired of being seen only for the stereotypes.
I was on the bus when a man in MAGA hat accosted me with, "me lux you long time" harassment and slurs. I asked him to please stop but he pointed to his hat and said, "this is MAGA country b***h" he then began shouting "blue lives matter," "jews will not replace us" and other national socialist dog whistles. When we got to his stop he gave the white bus driver a fist bump and thanked him for his service. I was seriously traumatized.
I was a victim of a racist incident (spitting/racial slurs) under the awning of my own apartment building in NYC. Despite the apartment staff having seen everything (recorded in the video I took while the man was still threatening me), he didn't come out the door to help me or even address the assault. When I confronted the apartment management, they expressed no regret but just that "what happens outside the building is outside their control." And though there are Asian and other POC residents in the building, the apartment provided no warning to keep the residents safe. Since then I've not been feeling safe living in the building and asked to terminate my lease early, but they're refusing to, despite 4+ month heads up. It's hard to believe the incident would've been completely ignored like this, had it happen to a non-minority or even non-Asian.
My husband, daughter and I were walking toward when I saw a white woman (appeared to be in her 60s) making her way toward my husband while he was crossing the street. She got closer and closer to him until she whispered in his ear, "Why do Muslims behead only white people and not Chinese?" My husband told me to ignore her, but she continued to ask the question and escalate the situation. When she asked the question again, my husband responded, "I don't know--I'm not a Muslim." She walked away, and we started laughing because the situation seemed so ridiculous. When she heard us laughing, she turned around and walked back toward us asking, "You think being beheaded is funny? You think murder based on race and ethnicity is funny?" My husband said, "No I think you coming up to me very closely is a little rude." She said, "I think that's called a crime on humanity, to behead somebody because they're white!" This continued on about five or six more times as she came charging back toward us each time we made a comment or laughed. She started getting really close to us, and I was holding my one-year-old daughter the entire time. Concerned for her safety because this woman wasn't wearing a mask and yelling at us, I yelled back at her to "Back up! I will call the police if you come any closer!" There were multiple witnesses of this incident. Two Black couples checked on us afterward, and one of them recorded much of the incident. I also have video of the incident. It was truly an alarming and traumatizing experience.
My regular walk every evening on the outer loop. Another regular, an old fella calling out “Mr. Wuhan" in a low voice as he walked behind me. I was stunned and had to look back twice not believing what I heard. I had my iPhone camera ready on our next encounter but he knew what I was doing and quietly moved away.
I always run, and I always have. I've never really had any issues, every now and then a crooked look, but people generally ignore runners. I'm an ultradistance trail runner. I run with gear—a Patagonia running vest with silicon chest water bottles, a visor, and a buff. I cover my face with the buff when I get within about 20 feet of anyone, and I try to avoid people by jumping into the street. I have run this exact route with my partner dozens of times. But this time was different. There is a skinny path on Lake Washington Blvd, which bypasses running on the road. I slowed down through the path, it's single-track, and I didn't want to bump into anyone. This middle-aged woman saw me.
She screamed, and she pointed. "KEEP AWAY FROM ME WITH YOUR VIRUS." I was so taken aback. She followed it up with, "I MEAN IT." What I have yet to say is my ethnicity. I'm biracial, Filipino-Danish. My skin, eyes, and hair reflect my Filipino heritage, and my cheekbones, freckles, and jaw show off my Danish half. I'm not Chinese, but that really isn't the point. With a buff over my mouth and nose and my visor covering my forehead, the only thing she could have made out was my eyes and the colour of my skin.
I experienced an awful incident of anti-Asian coronavirus-related racism in Madison Square Park in NYC and am sharing with the hope of spreading awareness to prevent future incidents.
I'm a young Asian/Caucasian female and was verbally harassed with phrases including "Kung-flu." After the first incident I walked away and found another part of the park to sit in. I was found by the harassers and experienced a second incident, part of which I captured on video. I am happy to share that video but would like to remain off the record and anonymous so my name is not attached to the story or video. I've lived in NYC for 10 years and this was the first time I've been harassed based on race (all prior experiences have been based on gender). I'm concerned for people's safety with the growing numbers of harassment incidents toward the AAPI population.
As I was checking out by an Caucasian female cashier, the cashier started an conversation with me regarding food. The cashier asked what I was having for lunch, grabbed the cat food, and asked me "Is it this?" Cashier also had a line of customers. I never had conflicts with this cashier. This is not the 1st, 2nd, nor 3rd time this cashier had used cat food as racism. I don't eat cat food nor cats.
My brother and I run a small restaurant. A Doordash Driver came to our store for pick up. And he said, “I don't want to get close to you. You are Asian and you have Coronavirus”. We wanted to talk to Doordash manager to discuss about the issue. But we have not received a call from them yet.
I am a railroad conductor for the MBTA Commuter Rail in Boston, MA. I was approached by two white male passengers on the train station platform, who asked why the trains were operating two hours apart. I told them that the reduced schedule was due to the COVID-19 state of emergency.
They replied, “oh right, the virus you fucking C****S started.” I responded by telling them to leave and that the police would be called. They walked away while shouting racial slurs and death threats.
I am a graduate student. I was jogging on Sunday and a woman yelled at me loudly and repeatedly "Go back to hell, go back to China. Your country is hell."
I was caught off guard and I froze for a moment. Then I tried to say something to defend myself but it came out nonsense. I choked and stuttered for a minute and I then ran away. Afterwards, I felt so angry with myself because I was so weak and completely forgot how to defend myself. I felt so powerless, I thought that I should have fire back with words since this was not the first incident that happened to me.
Over the past 5 months I have been the target of many curse words around my area. Every time, I promised myself to record the next time this happens, but every time I freeze up and fail to do anything. I was so angry and had no way to seek justice for so many times, and that day was just a tipping point for me. I couldn't take it anymore. I cried when I got home in the shower and then the whole night. It has become too difficult to handle and I barely sleep right now. I just don't know how to fight back and take back some of my dignity. I feel useless, but I want to change that and that is why I am here. I want to help every Asian faces for the right of my people, and take back what those people has taken from me -- my agency as a human being. Please tell me whatever I can do to fight back.
My wife and I are both of Chinese descent. We are both front-line critical care physicians taking care of increasing numbers of COVID-19 patients on a daily basis. Our mother-in-law has been living with us in order to provide care for our one-year-old daughter. For the past year, we have lived in a community with an HOA. Our neighbor has been on the board of directors for the past year, and he has scrutinized alleged violations of the HOA bylaws to the point of making many of us miserable. In particular, this neighbor has repeatedly harassed my wife and I regarding my mother-in-law parking in the guest/occupant parking spot. He does not want anyone to park in the guest spots in front of his house, because it "ruins his view." We ultimately decided to ignore him, but did agree to move the car to the street so as not to incite further harassment.
Recently, I overheard him making disparaging remarks about my wife to another neighbor. When I confronted him outside to ask why it was he was spreading malicious rumors about us, he became infuriated, and advanced towards me (breaking the 6-ft barrier while not wearing a mask) while carrying a large shovel. He proceeded to "chest-bump" me and told me "I will put you down, little Asian man." Out of self-defense, I shoved him back, and he seemed surprised at the reaction. This incident was shortly reported to the police, who stated this was simply a civil matter. When I reported this to the HOA manager, she was less than helpful, and proceeded to take the side of the neighbor in claiming that this was a dispute between neighbors.
Two days later, this neighbor called one of his family members to verbally accost my mother-in-law, who is elderly and barely speaks English. She felt that her life was being threatened at that time. I again reported this to the HOA manager and, once again, she refused to escalate the issue, and instead took the side of the neighbor while also blaming my mother-in-law. I find it incredibly disheartening that, while my wife and I are risking our lives to take care of others affected by this terrible disease, petty individuals like this neighbor are inciting racial hatred against us in our community, and we are unable to seek any form of remedy from the HOA management. We would like to request any possible assistance from Asian American support organizations in bringing into the limelight this and other cases of discrimination against Asian Americans. Thank you.