Pardee Student Publishes Op-Ed on Anti-Asian Discrimination
Yiran Yu (Pardee BA ’23) published a POV article in BU Today discussing the rise of racism and discrimination against Asians and Asian Americans in the United States.
In the article, titled “POV: BU Student on Anti-Asian Discrimination: “It’s Just Dehumanizing,” Yu explores the motivators of racism against Asian American and Pacific Islanders (AAPI), how attention is only paid following confirmed cases of violence or harm, and how all this has effected her personally. Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, Asians and Asian Americans have been targeted as “COVID carriers” resulting in increased instances of violence against them.
Ye argues that violence against AAPIs have been deprived of their freedom from fear and hence inevitably dehumanized. In order or these communities to regain their “security, dignity, and freedom,” she says policymakers and lawmakers must work to eliminate misinformation and prejudice against such groups.
An excerpt:
The Atlanta shooting shocked the world with its abnormal level of brutality, but it was not a causal incident. Instead, the cruel crime manifests an internalized, accumulated, and circulated abhorrence of AAPI people in a racialized America today.
Upon hearing the news, I approached my mother, an immigrant of Chinese descent. Anger, confusion, and affliction filled the air as we discussed the issue. “I’m angry because I am Asian; but if I was not Asian, I’d be angry too. It’s just…dehumanizing,” she said.
The full article can be read on BU Today’s website.