‘When I was attacked by the subway, there were so many New Yorkers around me, but no one came to my aid; nobody made a video ‘, said the 61-year-old Filipino American.
“I was afraid I would not make it … We are all New Yorkers, and we need to look out for each other.”
Quintana, a New Yorker, described the February 3 attack on city leaders, Asian Americans and their supporters who attended the “Rise Up Against Anti-Asian Hate” rally in Foley Square on Saturday.
“Stop Asian hatred!” The mayor of New York, Bill de Blasio, told the crowd. “This is the message we need to get across, not just in New York City, but across the country as well: Stop the Asian hatred! Stop it now!”
U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer, a Democrat in New York, told the crowd that there were signs of an increase in violence at the start of the coronavirus pandemic.
“Tragically, these warnings came true and the Asian American community, across New York and the country, was the target of racial discrimination and harassment,” Schumer said.
New York Attorney General Letitia James urged individuals at the rally to report hate crimes at her office.
“Come to my office so we can report on these individuals we hate, so we can shut them down. Every attack on one of us is an attack on all of us,” James said.
Pearl Sun, a New York City resident, attended the rally but did not speak to the crowd. She told CNN she is now careful when walking in the city streets.
“I have to tell you that I walk out the door and get ready, I’m preparing myself,” she said. “I make sure I no longer listen to music, when I walk around. I no longer listen to podcasts … I want to make sure I pay attention to what, or whatever may be happening around me.”
“I think the rhetoric of our previous government was definitely the catalyst for all this. Anti-Asian sentiment has always existed, and we have had a lot of legislation in the past that was not good for us either: the Japanese internment camps, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882.
“It was an ongoing situation, but the previous rhetoric has intensified all its hatred and called it the kung flu virus and the China virus, and we are unfortunately an easy target.”
Sun said the rhetoric intensified the hatred, especially in cases involving elderly Asian Americans.
“They’re defenseless, and it’s cowardly, and it makes me angry, it makes me really angry,” Sun said.
City resident Will Lex Ham said many of his family live in fear and anxiety. He said the Asian community does not receive resources relative to its population in the city, state and country.
“We are just tired. We are tired of looking like a scapegoat for many of the problems of the pandemic. We are tired of being ignored,” Ham said.
Reports of increasing attacks
The protest was hosted by the Asian American Federation, an umbrella organization that strives for better policies and services for Asian Americans.
According to the federation, there were “nearly 500 prejudices or hate crimes in 2020, ranging from verbal to physical assault, to coughing or spitting, to avoidance, among other forms of discrimination.”
According to the AAF, the AAF, the advocacy group Stop AAPI (Asian American Pacific Islanders) Hate, the NYPD and the NYC Commission on Human Rights were gathered.
“However, this is a fraction of the actual number of incidents that have occurred, as the majority of incidents are not reported. For example, more than 90% of the reports collected by AAF are not to the NYPD or the NYC commission. reported for human rights, “the AAF said in a news release.