Episode 73: The Struggle for Asian American and Pacific Islander Justice: A Conversation with Elise Hu

[0:00:07 Speaker 0] Welcome to race and democracy, a podcast on the intersection between race, democracy, public policy, social justice and citizenship. 20 twenty’s racial and political reckoning transformed american democracy beyond the black white divide. Of course we all witnessed the black lives matter marches and whites, asians indigenous uh and black americans marching for social justice. But we’ve also seen an uptick in anti asian and pacific islander hate crimes both in 2020 and 2021. And that’s really provided a context to talk about not just the negatives of that uptick, but also multiracial solidarity. And our guest today is a lease Hugh journalist who hosts the ted talks daily podcast is a correspondent for Vice News and a host at large for NPR Emily, thank you so much for talking to us.

[0:01:22 Speaker 1] I’m so glad to be here.

[0:01:24 Speaker 0] Well, you know, I I know you a bit and more about your work and I’ve had the real pleasure to get to know you through doing a panel on asian american, the sort of the myth of the model minority. But I’m also so much very interested in black asian american solidarity, but also multiracial solidarity. And what I’d like to talk to you about is really your own experiences. Um you’re a journalist, both personal and professional in the context of really the last 18 months because I think so many different people who might have never burrow deep into their own racial identity, sort of took this moment both of the pandemic and the George Floyd protest and then this very racially divisive presidential election last year. And and to top it all off the january 6th riot at the US capitol to really dig deep and think about race and citizenship and democracy themselves. And then on top of it for asian americans who a lot of times are left out of this conversation, it becomes this black white divide. Uh sometimes we mix in latin X people and indigenous people, but often we include asian americans, we exclude asian americans. Many are coming to the table and saying, hey, this is how I’ve been mistreated, this is how I’m thinking about citizenship and identity and equity in this space. I’ve never seen this conversation as broad as it is and I think that’s a great thing

[0:02:59 Speaker 1] I do too. I completely agree that now we’re finally having these sorts of conversations because as I have spoken about before, this binary, in which asian asians and asian americans are not included in the racial discussion in the US means that we often default to trying to be white or trying to be grouped into the dominant group or the group that is less oppressed and that has not worked for us because as we have discussed, as many of the conversations around model minority, the model minority myth really lay out the idea that asians are monolithic and the idea that asians are successful, both economically and in education is really, really papers over the differences among the groups. You know, the differences among subgroups of asian americans and also drives a wedge between asians and blacks. And you know, this historically obviously dr joseph and hopefully your listeners already do too, but it has been really problematic in a lot of ways, to say the least. And for me, um you asked a little bit about my personal experiences. I grew up in white spaces, almost exclusively white spaces. I

[0:04:13 Speaker 0] grew up police,

[0:04:14 Speaker 1] I grew up in the midwest, in uh ST louis outside of ST louis, west ST louis, County chesterfield. And really, I joke that ST louis is so white that even the salad bars are white. thank you, go to the grocery store and there’s the grocery store salad bar. They probably don’t exist anymore because of covid, but the macaroni salad, potato salad, all the cheeses, the lettuces iceberg. So really, you’re looking at, even a salad bar is completely white, and I didn’t realize it because that was all I knew. You know, I was a foreign correspondent in South Korea, covering north Korea a lot. And there’s so much talk about how north Koreans don’t realize their own poverty and they can’t because they’re in a closed society and they don’t see how other people live. And so I didn’t realize that um my trying to assimilate whiteness was something that was unusual. Even, you know, I just thought it was normal that there was a group, you know, that that white people were sort of their status was assumed and my status essentially had to be earned. So my entire identity is really cooked in this idea of achievement. You guys talk about, I’m sure a lot, you know, being twice as good for half as much and you know I’m finally questioning that and thinking, wait, if I’m twice as good, I should get twice as much weight.

[0:05:33 Speaker 0] No, absolutely. I think the underside of the model minority myth. And when we think about the model minority myth, just for our listeners, this idea that you know asian americans and really asian american pacific Islanders and we think about Asia broadly. We’re thinking about everything from china Korea japan, but also India Pakistan, the pacific islands, just a broad range but are somehow their excellence uh makes them um special. They’re not unruly, they are not dissatisfied. And and this idea of the model minority does a couple of things. It’s sort of um ah marginalizes african americans and other people of color by saying look if asian americans are doing so well, why can’t you? Uh it selectively um focuses the spotlight on very successful asian americans usually from uh south Korea, japan and china excludes other aspects of asian american community. Uh And and also again this idea of the meritocracy, you know, uh you know America as a meritocracy instead of as this racial caste system. So in a lot of ways the model minority is used as a wedge both to tame black and other insurgency. But as we’re seeing it really actually tames asian american expectations too because they know that there’s only a certain context where they can excel in and if they try to color outside of the lines, whether that’s in Hollywood journalism, politics there quickly disciplined.

[0:07:13 Speaker 1] Absolutely. Or we discipline ourselves right. What I’m finding in now in my late thirties is that because these ideas were so normalized. To me, it was sort of the air that I breathed that I believed that I had to behave right. I believed that I shouldn’t color outside the lines because I had some sort of responsibility as a token because I was constantly tokenized. And because I felt I had some, maybe, I mean, I didn’t I couldn’t explicitly tell you this when I was in fourth grade or seventh grade, but maybe I felt some responsibility because of the racism that I experienced, right. The racism that I experienced was often benevolent racism. It was like, oh, you’re so smart or you’re so great at the piano, but none of that was really my own. It was actually, um this idea that I now I realize if you peel back another layer, I realized that my intelligence, my intellect can’t really be mine because uh the white people around me were ascribing it to the idea that asians are considered smart. So my smartness can’t be mine. And that I couldn’t be talented musically or talented artistically on my own because I’m asian and it was tiger parented into me. So my artistic renderings could only be interpretive. They couldn’t be generative, right? So that which is special about me. My own magic wasn’t even my own because of benevolent racism. And so I am just starting to unpack that. Which is why when we were getting set for this call, I actually talked about how, oh, this is going to be like a therapy session. But hopefully these um identity sort of points of growth that I’ve gone through can be, might resonate with some of your listeners.

[0:08:55 Speaker 0] Um when we think about the therapy session, I think I’ve I’ve during this period I’ve listened to many asian american women, uh some self described feminist, others not, but chinese women korean women, uh Japanese women talking about the not just the racism they face, but the deep misogyny and sexism through the fetishization of men at times, especially white men, but other men to um I’d love to get into that in a sense of how have you navigated that as a journalist? And do you now retrospectively think about times that you face that, that you sort of brushed it off that you would handle differently because of of of where you’re at today.

[0:09:41 Speaker 1] That’s a really interesting question. Just to step back a little bit for those who might not be familiar asian women have been eroticized, especially through the white and Western gaze. And this was largely as a result of Western countries colonizing asian lands at the end of the 19th century. And because of economic necessity, which is the same reason why there are asian sex workers today because of economic necessity. Women in places that were occupied by U. S. Forces turned to sex work. And that only exacerbated the colonial notion of the submissive asian women to do the work for the imperial white man. It’s really noxious and insidious, but it’s a legacy that continues to live on in this idea of yellow fever, the asian fetish. Um uh it’s very prominent in pornography and um this sex negative negativity continues to have ramifications today for asian women. Um I’ve talked a lot about this and you saw with the very extreme violence against the asian women killed in Atlanta, it’s quite dangerous for us. And so we are not exotic emblems were actually humans with needs and desires. Um, and this history of conquest is really tied directly to it. And so um, the idea that Europeans see the east or saw the east as a place to exploit and plunder women got objectified because of that. And so we are living with the legacy of that. And the idea of asian women as available for white men is now so recognizable. Um, I immediately bristle at the notion that at notions of yellow fever I um and and really directly question any men, any white men who sort of, I find that date exclusively asian women because it’s sort of statistically impossible that you would date all asian women, you know, without targeting them because there are so I think, I don’t know what is it like? 1.5% population would be asian women um that are updating age. And so if you are, if you’re dating record is like two or three asian women in a row, even then I find that questionable and I wouldn’t date you if I were dating, you know, so, so I do explore that with white men and just ask a lot of questions of it, because the only way we can really try in our individual relations to unpack these things and get folks to think about it at the individual level is to get really specific with our questioning. So I almost never miss an opportunity to question men about this if I find that they have a certain kind of preference, if you will.

[0:12:34 Speaker 0] Yeah. And when we think about this, we, you know, you mentioned Atlanta and the sex workers who were targeted in the way in which the Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office appeared to defend the 21 year old

[0:12:46 Speaker 1] suspect.

[0:12:47 Speaker 0] Uh really, really bad way. Um

[0:12:51 Speaker 1] You

[0:12:52 Speaker 0] know, I think, I think it’s very, very interesting this sort of shame that goes with this idea of sex work just generally in the United States. But when it comes to asian american women, because it does connect back to those 19th century trappings of basically american imperialism and having um uh chinese uh so called coolie labor who really worked alongside at times african americans in terms of building up the railroads and the infrastructure uh in the United States. So it’s really, it’s really remarkable. Um let’s let’s talk for a second about um what happened during the trump administration because I really believe with President trump, talking about the covid 19 pandemic and miss labeling it as the chinese flu. Um, some people were using terms like the kung flu

[0:13:46 Speaker 1] uh

[0:13:47 Speaker 0] that really uh increased and ratcheted up um anti asian american pacific islander hate crimes, not to mention just the rise in white nationalism that we saw really from the inception of the trump presidency with the Charlottesville in august of 2017 and the tiki torches all the way up into the presidential election, where the president told white supremacists and racial terrorists to stand down and stand by. Um I really feel that uh that last administration really showed us all why you need a moral leader in the White House who at least rhetorically signals in a robust way that racial equity should be at the core of who we are.

[0:14:39 Speaker 1] Absolutely because otherwise um we fall prey to our worst instincts, you know, and um humans we are we can be quite tribal, you know, in terms of like neurobiology biologically speaking, and it’s very easy to see in groups and out groups. But uh the research from neurologists indicate that we can um certainly expand our notions where we are flexible, even though we are tribal in our thinking, sort of biologically we’re biologically wired that way. Where we are flexible is in our notions of who’s in the in group and who’s out group. Right? And like that the idea of the in group can continually expand. And so that is where I do have some hope. Um, but the scapegoating continues and um, even among like this large group of asians, right? There is scapegoating, there’s always, I think it was you who talked about this dr joseph, like there’s always the idea of a bet noir. And so what what we’re talking about now in terms of actives of activism and advocacy is to have this multi racial solidarity that sees our communities as a web rather than a hierarchy, Right? My whole, um, knock against late capitalism and patriarchy is that when you think about it, and when you visualize the ideas of capitalism and the ideas of patriarchy, it’s constantly like a pyramid where somebody could be at the top, right? You constantly compete because there’s only so much room at the top of a pyramid. But my more ideal society mimics nature and what nature looks like is more of a

[0:16:20 Speaker 0] web.

[0:16:21 Speaker 1] It’s a, it’s a whole ocracy as some of the tech pros call it, right? Where there isn’t this constant idea of scarcity and needing to fight against each other for a small piece at the top. But really that understanding of the way things are in the world, which is that we are all dependent on one another and, um, and can stand together and that, uh, it would benefit all of us. And so that is kind of the vision that I think that we should run toward though. Uh, it’s quite difficult and it’s going to require a lot of work among all of us.

[0:16:57 Speaker 0] And I want to talk about that idea of multiracial solidarity specifically between black and asian american communities. One we know about the deaths of people like Vincent Chin in 1982 was chinese american who was killed by white, uh disgruntled auto workers in the plant. And and none of them ever came to justice. We know about Latasha Harlan who was, who was killed by a korean american grocer in 91. And that, that that sort of was part of why 92 exploded so much in Los Angeles and the Rodney King verdict. So there’s there’s been times of historic tensions, but I would argue that if asian and black communities learned more about each other’s struggles, they would find out that they have actually a lot of commonalities. Um um when it comes to things like wanting community family, wanting a living wage, trying to build generational wealth, uh there’s so much in common, what are things that can be done. I think last year I appeared in more settings that had asian american and pacific islander activists and I had ever appeared before, even though that was always a part of my work looking at um multiracial uh political radicals, especially when you think about the black power period, there were strong, especially in California, black asian solidarity as the black panthers, but different asian radical asian american organizations, whether it was the Red guard, the yellow peril, asian american student alliance, there’s so many um I wonder what, what are you seeing? Uh huh on that score now in the context of George Floyd? Because certainly there was a lot of asian american pacific islander activists and citizens and immigrants who are out there in the streets alongside of white and latin X and black during during those demonstrations last year,

[0:19:10 Speaker 1] I think a lot of us who are the sons and daughters of first generation immigrants um have racist parents, right? Or our parents can express express some real racist um sentiments and especially against the black community and the next generation generation Z is really finally having these difficult conversations with our parents. Um and I say I say this I’m painting a very broad brush. Um and I know some people are still uncomfortable with the notion of even saying things are racist, but um I don’t say that as a personal attack, but it’s really largely a critique of systems that we’re in, and those systems are an economic exploitation, which then scapegoated a lot of the black community. And so I, um, see that among the baby boomers, a lot of the sort of first generation, uh, asians who immigrated following the 1965 immigration act that allowed for a lot of asian immigration. And what we’re seeing now is a generational shift towards solidarity, toward a recognition and, um, a criticism of how complex it is to have economic violence being exerted against you, because we all have to survive economic violence through different means, um, in the asian women in Atlanta’s case, it was sometimes through sexuality. Um, and really the conversation, the next level, the next layer conversation that we need to be having is about this economic violence and how then it leads to more intra ethnic group racism and, um, and actual violence, you know, in the streets. And uh, it continues to drive a wedge between groups like blacks and asians where we should be. We really have to have each other’s backs, um, against this wave of white supremacy that took hold in, or at least became more explicit during the trump administration.

[0:21:12 Speaker 0] At least tell us about your own parents. What was their, their their immigrant story? What was their immigrant story?

[0:21:18 Speaker 1] Yeah, that’s a great question. My father came up during the Cultural Revolution, so after Mao Zedong won the chinese civil War in 1949 I think my father was just a child, maybe six or seven years old, younger than that. And um, the Cultural Revolution really took hold in the 19 sixties when Mao wanted everybody to return the fields. Um, the intelligent class was really, uh, they were sent to labor camps and reeducation camps. My grandfather had come to the states in the 19 forties before the Civil War, during the Civil War to earn a PhD because he had won some sort of scholarship back when china was under the kuomintang, so more of a democracy and so he was out of the country and uh could not return because his country had been taken over by the communist leadership. Um My father was then raised by his mom and his older sister and they remained in china when my dad was um sent to the fields in the 19 sixties to work in these re education labor camps. They were all there called, sent down youth where they had to work on pig farms and help harvest fields and to to show the classes of artists and intelligent uh intelligentsia and their sons and daughters that you know, we were all the same, Right. And

[0:22:43 Speaker 0] how does he remember that

[0:22:45 Speaker 1] experience? He doesn’t talk about it very much. But I actually think that I became a journalist largely because my dad because I wanted to hear more stories frankly and my dad was a little unreachable when it came to his difficult period. Um but what I did here and he does talk a lot about or more openly about is escaping. So he ended up being this is um an obscured part of chinese history. But uh he was one of the freedom swimmers is what they’re known as. Um the freedom swimmers are the young chinese men. There were thousands of them who escaped communist china by swimming through the bay of Shenzhen shark infested waters to get to Hong kong. There is a land border connecting china to Hong kong obviously, but it was heavily guarded. So there was an entire wave of young chinese men

[0:23:37 Speaker 0] who would

[0:23:38 Speaker 1] try and swim most if not many of them died. Um trying to make this really harrowing swim. But my father was one who survived and made it to Hong kong. And then thanks to the immigration act in the Hong kong refugee act was able to get into the United States where his father, my grandfather already was. So that’s how my dad got to the US. My mom’s story is different and far more privileged. She grew up in Taiwan um and met my dad I think on a set up and uh they dated for a while and she gained citizenship through marriage. So I was born in the early eighties to chinese immigrants who came to the States in very different ways,

[0:24:24 Speaker 0] wow, that’s amazing. And you talked about your own parents and and race do you feel when they came here, they sort of just imbibed the lessons of anti blackness that are obviously very prevalent in the country. It seems to me they would have been here right around the time of the war on drugs and you were a toddler when the explosion of crack cocaine occurred. So they were getting um being fed these these very, very specific stereotypes that are that are that circulate uh, all around us, but that are very, very powerful in the grip in their grip on our imaginations.

[0:25:03 Speaker 1] Absolutely. And to be clear, my parents have never said anything outright. Um that made me sort of think like, uh they’ve never said anything so explicit where I was just, I had to sort of lecture my own parents, you know, and I know that that has happened in a lot of families, but I just do think that they constantly um wanted me or would push me towards trying to assimilate with whites and that that was where I needed to to look to to really fit in and make it in society uh in american society. Um and even to do that, that I couldn’t fully be myself right, that I would have to be better and really strive for excellence. And so that’s the kind of thing that we’re all, many of us asian americans who grew up during that time period or having to unpack. Um they did not encourage me for instance, to have a lot of black friends even though they were available, you know, And so, so I didn’t have close black friends until I was in my late teens and into college. And um if you remember where I grew up, I first ST louis and then texas. Then I moved to north Dallas, also full of the caucasian persuasion. I didn’t have a single black teacher growing up. Doctor does not one, not one, I did not have a black teacher until I was maybe in my junior year of college when I had black professors. But that’s wild. And the fact that more, so many american kids are growing up that way I think is terrible. I think we need to fix that. It’s really awful.

[0:26:53 Speaker 0] And how is that um evolved when you think about your career as a journalist, especially, you know, you you work in such high profile with such high profile organizations, you think about the ted talk podcasts. NPR Vice News. Uh and historically journalism has, you know, been a very, very segregated profession. Uh I work in one to higher education has been very segregated in predominantly white institutions at least.

[0:27:22 Speaker 1] Yeah, I would love to interview you frankly. I don’t really want to be the one talking.

[0:27:26 Speaker 0] So how has that worked? Because, you know, all these these journalistic organizations alongside of sports and literary and so many different business and corporate and political organizations over the last year have have had to deal with their own racial reckoning, especially in the context of representation and who’s in the newsroom, who who’s L. A. Times just named his first black editor in chief, kevin Merida, and so many different places are naming black folks for the first time uh, in some powerful positions. How how is um both you coming into your own asian american identity? Um, but you’re you’re your professional experiences. How is that playing out from the start of your time in journalism? Really to the present,

[0:28:26 Speaker 1] I’m thinking about this for a second, but I will tell you that my biggest criticism of newsrooms has not been for lack of diversity writ large because in the aggregate these organizations have tried to hire and be inclusive. The problem that I see and continue to see at these organizations that I’ve worked for and been a part of is a lack of representation in its leadership. So to this day, NPR’s top bosses, the executives, the C suite are largely not just white people, but british people not large. There’s a lot of british leadership. So it’s quite colonial looking if you will. Um, and so

[0:29:16 Speaker 0] I think

[0:29:17 Speaker 1] it’s not good enough. So what I will critique is it is not good enough just to have diversity. The the diversity and the representation should be um such that when you do have color, it’s not just there for flavoring, right? It’s not just there for window dressing, but that the people of color in your newsrooms or in your organization’s feel as though it is safe for them to speak out to have a voice and that their ideas matter just as much and could shape the direction of coverage or shape the direction of an organization because that is actually where I feel um people have of color have been stymied in my adult life or in my career in journalism. It’s not that there is a lack of representation though in some cases there is a very real lack. I still think that um black voices and black people are generally underrepresented in newsrooms and then it’s constantly blamed on this pipeline problem like, oh, I can’t find enough people, you know, and it’s just like, no, you’re just not trying, you’re not trying hard enough, you need to be a lot more explicit in your hiring and, and so, so there is still a lack of outright representation of african americans and latin X folks. Um but beyond that, we are not getting enough seats at the table. And then when we do have a seat at the table, I don’t think um are perspectives which might be quite different and may be considered quite, you know, radical in some cases to to challenge old journalistic notions. Um I think, I don’t think those are welcome as much as they should be.

[0:30:59 Speaker 0] You know, I want to talk about what’s happened since the election. President biden has signed executive orders uh in terms of anti A A. P. I hate crimes. Um there’s been um you know, it’s been a very racially diverse cabinet um You know, nationally people are making a big deal over Andrew yang, running for mayor of new york who had run for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020. Um I’d like to talk to you about where is this going? Where is this heading? Both positive signs? Um Some challenges um in terms of political representation and really what the the biden administration is doing, especially since we have Kamala Harris the first, not just black vice president in american history, but she’s also south Asian, she’s she’s half indian right? And so um where do you think this is going? Because I think one of the reasons why for instance Andrew Yang, who is not considered politically progressive um is getting

[0:32:08 Speaker 1] such attention

[0:32:10 Speaker 0] is that I would say that Andrew Yang is probably uh in my lifetime and there’s been, we’ve had a P. I. Senators from Hawaii and and there’s been there’s been officials, but who, who has received this kind of media attention, positive media attention as somebody who people say, hey, this person could be president. I like how this person thinks. There’s been a lot of deep background reporting on Andrew Yang, especially vis a vis race and the startup that he founded and whether or not they were hospitable to black

[0:32:44 Speaker 1] people.

[0:32:45 Speaker 0] But um I think it’s remarkable that that uh this is this is one of the first asian american politicians who’s really been um sort of accepted as as sort of this legitimate political actor. But I also think it shows us the limits of of how asian americans can be accepted as potential um high level elected officials.

[0:33:11 Speaker 1] Yeah, there’s a lot there, I do think Andrew Yang and his candidacy is uh and Andrew Yang himself is just an example of how how much disagreement there is among the asian american community. I mean, he is as an example of somebody who, many asian americans and asian american citizens and voters are not comfortable with and his positions are things that we are not comfortable with because Andrew Yang to me just in my personal case I can speak to myself. I mean I think that he holds up with some of those ideas that when Bill Cosby was doing all those valid uh those graduation speeches, those commencement speeches, he would say like pull up your pants, young black men, you know, I think that Andrew Yang does a lot of that sort of thing where it’s like oh can continue to try and behave in a way such that a greater power will take pity on you instead of saying hey we should just challenge this system and challenge these norms, be the greater power at least in domains that we can try and fight for it. So he’s been a lightning rod I think among not just the asian american community but large. There’s a lot of problems with Andrew Yang has a political candidate. Um But to your earlier point about Kamala Harris and more representation, it makes such a difference. I have three young daughters and it makes such a difference. Just to be able to see what they could be. You know, the idea that you can’t see or you can’t be what you don’t see. I think it’s so powerful to have it be normal and normalized that there are lots of different people of different backgrounds in power and in positions of power. It’s like when you talk about a gender norm and these days when you go to target, you’ll see models and the posters at the store be full figured.

[0:34:57 Speaker 0] And

[0:34:58 Speaker 1] for me, somebody who grew up in the nineties where it was like everybody was was Allie Mcbeal and these waves, kate moss and all of the heroin chic was the time I grew up and everybody kind of got to college and had eating disorders. Well, no wonder, you know, so, and so when I go to stores now and I see all these people that actually are more full figured and and look like normal people, models, you know, these models are full figured and um, they have bodies that look more like mine. I’m like, oh my gosh, I was really in the sunken place. You know what? And so I I think that my baggage or our baggage is not going to be the same baggage as our kids, um, that Children are now growing up in a more pluralistic and multicultural society that is normalized and, and that’s across it’s not just race, it’s also gender, you know, in our notions of what gender are and the gender binary is really coming down for gen Z. And so that to me is hopeful. That’s what I’m really hopeful about, um, that just that my baggage is not going to be passed on to my Children or my Children will just have different issues in different ways of seeing things growing up. And so I shouldn’t saddle that on them. Where I’m uncomfortable is the stance that essentially asked me to continue to beg others to care about racism,

[0:36:20 Speaker 0] right? So

[0:36:21 Speaker 1] for those who aren’t having these conversations like you and I are having like, I am really getting tired of having to re traumatize myself by talking about my trauma and saying like, yeah, these things happened and it makes a difference that I was uncomfortable about the lunch that I brought to school. Like I would like to have more deeper and more complex conversations about economic violence for example, and the economic conditions that force us to have to fight for the little scrap of bone that is that is available. And so that’s where I’m really struggling dr joseph. I mean, how do we get to the next layer of conversation beyond just having to get people to have some empathy for the racial trauma that we have experienced?

[0:37:09 Speaker 0] Well, yeah, I was gonna ask that and you know, I would answer that by saying, I mean, it’s it’s really um the old adage of political power and multiracial solidarity because I’m heartbroken over the videos that I see of asian americans, especially the elderly being being punched in the face at times by really multiracial uh folks. At times I’ve seen black men do it, I’ve seen whites do it. Um some of these people clearly have mental illness I think, but I’ve seen young people doing it. People are bullying, people are doing horrendous things and what we’re not what we don’t have. I think uh in terms of people of color across the United States, along with whites who are in solidarity because I I love the word solidarity much more than ally Ship. I’m coming from a union household in new york city. Uh My Haitian immigrant mom was part of S. C. I. U. 11 99 for over 40 years. I was on my first picket line in elementary school. So I think that multi racial solidarity is about us having um enough political power uh to protect ourselves and to pursue our interests collectively. You know, and I think if we’re able to do that, I had folks on generation X, I’m older than you, at least by at least 10 years. I had folks

[0:38:31 Speaker 1] who,

[0:38:31 Speaker 0] thank you. I had folks who went to Bronx, not just Bronx science, but stuyvesant in Brooklyn, black folks who are friends of mine, who went to school with a lot of asian american pacific Islanders who were at stuyvesant, which was a school you sort of tested into. Um and you know, they came out of the experience very much. Um So in solidarity with the asian american community, you know, like, like they had friends who were and and for those of us who didn’t go to one of those schools, we we we we might have had less of a connection because we went to schools that were sort of either racially segregated black or black white schools and not a lot of um A. P. I. Uh so I think that multiracial solidarity is going to require um things like ending public school segregation and ending racial segregation in neighborhoods. It requires, you know, you connected to the filibuster uh and and the filibuster has been used historically. Two stop legislation that promotes um civil rights and anti racism and human rights. And so, you know, I think that until we get the political power to say that again, black lives matter, asian american pacific islander lives matter. And that we’re saying this because we understand that there’s this racial caste system that sets up an institutionalized system of not just systemic oppression but privilege that says, you know, white lives, non people of color matter the most right, you know, and we know this, we’ve got the data that shows us this. So until we do that, I think we’re we haven’t gone to that next level. And that includes reparations, you know, and and uh reparations not just for racial slavery, but we’ve seen discreet reparations being given to well earned japanese internment camp

[0:40:30 Speaker 1] survivors, right?

[0:40:32 Speaker 0] Um and there are other uh asian american pacific Islanders who can make a case for reparations. So I’m supportive of black reparations, but I’m supportive also of all reparations for native americans for a P. I. Um many many folks have been um absolutely marginalized in this country. To the extent that there there there there requires some kind of repair and healing.

[0:40:58 Speaker 1] Absolutely. Um I love that dr joseph because I do think I agree with you completely that we have to get beyond that which is individualized, right? These individualized dog and pony shows for white people about how much racism hurt me is feeling, not only exhausting but kind of degrading right? Because it infantilizing us. Um to just be part of this rhetoric about how traumatized we are and how white people who are more powerful um should offer their hands. I think that we have power of our own or need to go and seize it and claim it um in solidarity with white people who understand and see that and see these systemic injustices. And so I love what you’re saying endorse endorse

[0:41:48 Speaker 0] Absolutely. And my my final question is going to be really about this, the power of hope moving forward because we have the biden Harris administration. We have much more of a conversation about ending A A. P. I hate but also about expanding the contours of asian american citizenship where we can think of an asian president, think of an asian american. You know, governor athlete, action star in Hollywood because representation matters painter, artists, sculptors, just the whole range of humanity. We saw this with the film Minnery which is a beautiful film about the korean american experience that got a boatload of Oscar nominations last year. But it was really incredible because when you watch that film you really get a great example of sort of the humanity of asian people in ways that Hollywood has been loath to ever offer. You know asians are infantilized are fetishized, are turned into villains and and and sex objects but never actually three dimensional people. Uh So you know, are you are you hopeful? I wanna wanna get your your thoughts on the moment that we’re at because it’s so interesting this George Floyd moment has really turned into a generational opportunity not just the crisis to build that multiracial beloved community that dr martin Luther King Jr talked about a community that wasn’t just devoid or free of racism and economic injustice but that actually cared about citizens that cared about where you live, how you live, that cared about food and food, justice for people, cared about racial integration and they cared about ending violence everywhere in the United States, but also globally. So I think this this is a moment of opportunity as well.

[0:43:45 Speaker 1] Yeah. I’ll answer the question with where I’m not hopeful and then where I am, where I’m not hopeful is I think the biggest concern in american politics right now is the fate of american democracy. I think we have some real um that we are not paying enough attention to what’s happening at the state level to make it hard, if not impossible for many people to vote. And already we know that the way that our congressional districts are drawn, the way the Electoral College works. Um there is so much more representation for rural whites then urban people of color in this country. So it’s already not one man, one vote in this country, right? Um, and then these voter suppression laws and the lack of getting rid of the filibuster in the Senate to try and pass some comprehensive voting rights act at the federal level, I think could mean that we could have minority rule for a generation if not longer. I’m really, really concerned about that and I’m concerned that the democrats in power aren’t doing enough about it. So that’s where I think that we need to organize and be louder and that it can’t just be left to Stacey Abrams groups. You

[0:45:01 Speaker 0] know, Stacy will save us. Black women will see

[0:45:04 Speaker 1] exactly how many times are we going to count on black women to save us? So there’s that. And then but where I am hopeful is I was interviewing black woman who I think is 100 and 102 she was one of the very first black park rangers. And we know that national parks, the history of national parks is quite white supremacist. They were born out of to try and create spaces for white people. But she was one of the first black park rangers and she talked to us when I interviewed her about how when she was coming up during the black freedom movement in the 19 sixties that there were white protests and there were black protests. And now when she saw the George Floyd protests last year it was really eye opening for her to see all of us protest and demonstrate together. There are demonstrations were happening um in this kind of solidarity that you discussed dr joseph and if I just think if somebody who has been through all of that, you know, she lived in the Jim Crow era, in the south, in Virginia and and has come up through civil rights. If she has hope, then I surely shouldn’t be so fatalistic and cynical, you

[0:46:17 Speaker 0] know,

[0:46:18 Speaker 1] so that is where I do have, I have hope for the next generation and ours, frankly, and the exercise and the wires we often get passed over because the boomers never seemed to to leave.

[0:46:32 Speaker 0] They don’t leave the stage. The president is a boomer, silent generation. They won’t leave because the president, if gen X had its day, we would have had, you know, Julian, castro, federal Rourke cory booker, uh, you know, they won’t leave the stage, they will not leave.

[0:46:49 Speaker 1] But I do. I do have hope for solidarity in the way that you describe it. So long as we just completely reframe and think what’s possible? We’ve got to rethink what’s possible.

[0:46:58 Speaker 0] Alright. Rethink what’s possible. I love that as the closing to our conversation, Elise you. It’s been great talking with you. I’ve been talking with um Elise you who is a very well known journalist globally who is the host of the Ted talks daily podcast, a correspondent at Vice News and host at large for NPR Thank you so much. A lease.

[0:47:22 Speaker 1] Thank you. I really enjoyed it.

[0:47:24 Speaker 0] Thanks for listening to this episode and you can check out related content on twitter at Peniel joseph. That’s P e n i e l j o s e p H and our website CSR d dot LBJ dot utexas dot e d u. And the Center for Study of Race and Democracy is on facebook as well. This podcast was recorded at the Liberal Arts Development Studio, at the College of Liberal Arts, at the University of texas at Austin. Thank you. Yeah