Centering Our Power: Asian and Black American Solidarity

Fam,

May was Asian American Pacific Islander Awareness Month.

These kinds of months can feel so insufficient, but they are important because they give us the opportunity to center stories we might otherwise not tell. They create the opportunity to center new issues and push ourselves to focus on building shared power across communities and movements.

As we face the anti-Black and anti-Asian violence that is deeply entrenched in the U.S., this moment offers us the chance to pause and reflect on our shared history, and to commit to building shared analysis and solidarity.

What does it mean to be in solidarity across race?

Grace Lee Boggs, Chinese American revolutionary activist and philosopher, once wrote: “We never know how our small activities will affect others through the invisible fabric of our connectedness. In this exquisitely connected world, it’s never a question of ‘critical mass.’ It’s always about critical connections.”

In these tumultuous times, it is critical connection that we seek. As we mourn loss after loss, and as we face race-based hatred and structural violence, we can turn toward each other for solace and solidarity.

In the aftermath of the murders of Delaina Ashley Yaun, Paul Andre Michels, Xiaojie Tan, Daoyou Feng, Hyun Jung Grant, Suncha Kim, Soon Chung Park, and Yong Ae Yue, President Biden called on Congress to pass the COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act. However, we know this kind of legislation doesn’t solve the problem of hate or white supremacist violence; between 2020 and 2021, there was a 567% increase in incidents of anti-Asian hate. Hate crimes in the U.S. have reached their highest documented level in decades.

Unfortunately, politicians who refuse to fund health care make quick work of blaming Asian communities for everything from COVID to crime. And when some policymakers make moves to fund hate-crime laws, that legislation is most often used to legitimize police violence, protect white people, and criminalize Black people, while doing nothing to actually stop the anti-Asian violence. This can exacerbate existing divisions between AAPI and Black people.

AAPI and Black people have so much to gain from our solidarity, and so much to lose if we allow ourselves to be divided. Solidarity in the face of white supremacist violence, at the hands of gunmen or at the hands of the state, is how we refuse to be pitted against each other by a brutal system that would have our communities scapegoating each other by deflecting its own constant harm. Here’s what such solidarity can look like:

Making sure to include anti-Asian violence, which is often erased, when we talk and think about systemic violence against communities of color in the U.S.
Educating ourselves, by learning about the history of anti- Asian sentiment in the U.S., as well as learning about the myriad Asian communities here that are often falsely conflated into one monolith
Including practical offers of support, like some communities that have set up foot patrols to escort elderly Asian Americans to and from their homes

If and when we have meaningful relationships across our communities, we will be best able to identify the kinds of community support we can offer. As carceral solutions fail us, time and time again, when politicians manipulate terror and violence to their own ends, all we can do is make meaningful collaborations to take care of each other.

We seek critical connection.

In Solidarity,
Movement for Black Lives

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