“A White Man’s Bad Day”, by Roxane Gay

“Language matters but it will not bring an end to racism. This rise in anti-Asian violence has to stop, the same way police brutality against black and brown people has to stop. But saying that will not make it so. It is up to our elected leaders to do more than offer their absolutely useless thoughts and prayers and tepid directives. There have to be consequences for racism. We need more than hashtags. We need more than symbolic gestures on Instagram. We sure as hell do not need people turning their avatars into yellow squares. We need more than allyship. We need to intervene when we see or hear anti-Asian discrimination in ourselves, with our friends and loved ones, in our communities. If we do not hold this line, if we do not take this stand, we will lose more ground to white supremacy than we already have. All of us need to condemn this violence and we need to do so in specific terms. A hate crime was committed. It was vicious, gendered, and racially motivated. It was about class, the fetishization of Asian women, and men feeling entitled to sex. To eradicate this kind of moral rot, we need to name every part of it.”