Asian Americans face dual challenges: Surging unemployment and racism

[Demovictory9]

Asian Americans face dual challenges: Surging unemployment and racism
"This is why racializing COVID-19 as 'the China virus' has profound societal repercussions,” one researcher said.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/asian-americans-face-dual-challenges-surging-unemployment-racism-n1235356

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A new study from UCLA reports that since the start of the pandemic, 83 percent of the Asian American labor force with high school degrees or lower has filed unemployment insurance claims in California — the state with the highest population of Asian Americans — compared to 37 percent of the rest of the state's labor force with the same level of education.

At the same time, new research shows that discrimination against Asian Americans is surging. More than 2,300 Asian Americans had reported bias incidents as of July 15, according to the Asian Pacific Policy and Planning Council, or A3PCON, which hosts the self-reporting tool Stop AAPI Hate.

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"This is why racializing COVID-19 as 'the China virus' has profound societal repercussions. We have seen this in the increase in verbal and physical attacks on Asians and in material ways in terms of joblessness and business failures," he said in an interview.

Donald Mar, another researcher on the UCLA report and a professor at San Francisco State University, said many Asian Americans work in sectors that have been heavily affected by the pandemic. Almost 1 in 4 employed Asian Americans work in hospitality and leisure, retail and other services, including repair shops, hair-cutting and laundries, according to the report. Ong said the disadvantaged groups that are affected are mostly immigrants, many of whom worked in establishments that began to struggle before shelter-in-place orders were enacted, so they have experienced a longer period of losses.

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Discrimination continuing to surge
Lisa Lee was at a grocery store in Philadelphia near the end of March when, she said, an older white man saw her and started shouting, "Go back to China!" When she told him that she wasn't from China, the man responded, "Then go back to the Philippines or wherever you came from."

Lee, a Philadelphia-based artist, said she now leaves the house only if she has a white male friend to accompany her. "After the pandemic, I felt like can I really survive here? Can I really work here?" said Lee, who is originally from South Korea.

While hate against Asian Americans first spiked at the outset of the pandemic, it's continuing to rise. That includes more than 500 new reports of microaggressions, bullying, harassment, hate speech and violence from mid-June to mid-July.

Russell Jeung, a professor of Asian American studies at San Francisco State University who has been tracking the data for Stop Hate, said the group hit its peak in reported incidents the week President Donald Trump first used the term "Chinese virus."

"When Trump began to insist on the term 'Chinese virus,' we saw a spike in the number of anti-Asian hate incidents," he said. "When he uses those terms, people began to see the virus as Chinese and Chinese as having the virus. So his words have shaped the racial consciousness of Americans. Even non-Trump supporters are buying into that."

[DonaldsRump]

1. It is the Trump Virus

It is DONALD TRUMP, and DONALD TRUMP alone, who FUBARed this.

He singlehandedly is responsible for the death of at least 100,000 Americans. Had he and his idiotic son-in-law had even a modicum of sense on how to handle this, things would have been so different. The failure of international co-ordination because of the nationalistic jingoist "America First" nonsense added greatly to the pandemic worldwide and in the US.

It is not the Chinese Virus or the Kung Flu, you racist disgusting POtuS. It is THE TRUMP VIRUS.

Go Joe, Kamala, and Nancy!

[DSandra]

2. I was assaulted by a homeless man in the SF Bay Area...

When I was outside a chinese restaurant picking up food late at night. The guy approached me very angry, called me a disease, and pushed me, and would’ve attacked me more if I didn’t have a stungun. I am half asian, so he must’ve figured that I was chinese and took out his racism on me. I reported it to the police but never got to see the security camera footage.

[Demovictory9]

5. omg. I'm sorry

[radius777]

3. has been a big surge in anti-asian hate crimes

all over the country, even in liberal states/areas, which is a disgrace.

and it has been noted that asian communities tend to 'not want to complain' thus they don't report most hate crimes.

just shows how white privilege works, that generally speaking when something happens in the news or current events, whites as a race don't get blamed for it - it's often viewed as isolated actions of a 'lone wolf' or an 'unfortunate event'. but when a non-white country/person does something (or something happens) it's viewed as a malicious action by an entire group.

[abqtommy]

4. Hate in itself is not a bad thing. For instance, it's fine to hate tRUMP and the reTHUGS

because they deserve it. Asians and the rest of us, not so much...

[dalton99a]

6. FACT: Trump owns the pandemic in the U.S.

[crickets]

7. trump: the multitasking racist. *sigh* nt