The Rising Tide of Violence and Discrimination Against Asian American and Pacific Islander Women and Girls Drishti Pillai, Ph.D., MPH Aggie J. Yellow Horse, Ph.D. Russell Jeung, Ph.D. I. Introduction II. AAPI Women’s Experiences Prior To the Pandemic Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) women and girls are prime targets of hate and AAPI women’s experiences are influenced discrimination against the AAPI community. The by the historical contexts of U.S. interactions with recent shootings across several Atlanta spas that Asia and the Pacific regions, U.S. immigration claimed the lives of eight people, including six policies, and the stereotypes of AAPI women Asian American women, came on the heels of a stem from the aforementioned. AAPI women are staggering increase in hate incidents targeting continuously fetishized, exoticized, and objecti- the AAPI community. Hate incidents, which in- fied through hyper-sexualization, and this affects clude both hate crimes and incidents of violence the racialized, gendered, and sexualized violence or discrimination, against AAPIs rose sharply over AAPI women have experienced, historically and the past year, with over 6,600 reports collected by now [3]. Stop AAPI Hate between March 2020 and March 2021 [1]. In particular, AAPI women and girls report Even prior to the pandemic, AAPI women these hate incidents 2.2 times as often as AAPI were experiencing a great deal of violence and men; and AAPI non-binary people have also re- discrimination at the intersection of race/ethnicity, ported experiencing heightened incidents of hate. gender, immigration status, and socioeconomic class, among many other factors. According to the We applaud the Biden Administration for Asian Pacific Institute on Gender-Based Violence, re-establishing and expanding the White House more than one in five AAPI women experience Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Island- some form of contact sexual violence (23%) and ers (WHIAAPI), and for the proposed actions to non-contact unwanted sexual experiences (21%) respond to anti-Asian violence, xenophobia, and during their lifetime [4]. Furthermore, AAPI women bias [2]. Aligned with the goals of the WHIAAPI experience discrimination in multiple domains, advocating for “research to understand, address, including unequal pay, where AAPI women, on and end bias, discrimination, and xenophobia,” average, make 85 cents for every dollar made by this report aims to provide nuanced information non-Hispanic/Latinx men [5]. These experiences about AAPI women’s experiences of racism and of violence and discrimination differ by multiple discrimination amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. factors including AAPI women’s ethnicity. AAPI women have continued to experience sub- stantial discrimination since the onset of the pan- demic. AAPI women make up a disproportionate share of both the front-line and low-wage work- forces, and they experienced the highest rates of long-term unemployment as a result of the pan- demic [6-8]. 2 III. AAPI Women’s Experiences Of the 3,943 Asian American women who reported their experiences to SAH; 67.6 percent of Hate Incidents During the were by East Asians, 16.2 percent were by South- Pandemic east Asians, 8.1 percent were by Multiethnic Asian women, 6.7 percent were by Multiracial Asian To take an in-depth look at AAPI women’s women,3 and 1.3 percent were by South Asians experiences of violence and discrimination, we (Figure 1). Overall, East Asian women were the draw from two data sources: (1) Asian American most likely to report having experienced any form women’s reports of hate incidents from Stop AAPI of violence or discrimination, followed by South- Hate (SAH) between March 2020 and March 2021 east Asian, Multiracial/Multiethnic Asian, and (n = 3,943), and (2) Pacific Islander women’s re- South Asian women, respectively. sponses from the landmark nationally represen- tative survey of AAPI women conducted by the The most frequently reported type of hate National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum incident experienced by all Asian American wom- (NAPAWF) in conjunction with The Harris Poll con- en was verbal harassment and/or name calling ducted in February 2021 (n = 415).1 Overall, Asian (51.4%) (Figure 2).4 For East Asian, Southeast American women reported these hate incidents 2.2 times as often as Asian American men and Figure 1: Hate Incidents Reported Pacific Islander women also reported alarmingly by Asian American Women, by high rates of racism and discrimination. We fur- Subgroups (n = 3,943) ther disaggregate AAPI women’s experiences by different subgroups.2 The numbers in the report 6.7 only reflect the hate incidents that were reported 1.3 8.1 to SAH; the true proportion of women experienc- ing hate incidents is likely to be much higher since many of these incidents are never reported [9]. 16.2 67.5 Experiences of Violence and Discrimination Among Asian American Women An in-depth look at disaggregated data on East Asian Southeast Asian South Asian hate incidents experienced by Asian American Multiethnic Multiracial women and collected by SAH reveals important subgroup similarities and differences among Asian American women in the types of hate in- cident they experience, the sites where hate is experienced, and the perceived reasons for the hate incident. 1 This survey was conducted by The Harris Poll on behalf of NAPAWF. The study interviewed over 3,537 adult AAPI women in the United States on a fully representative sample, allowing for a deep and disaggregated analysis of key demo- graphics characteristics. Respondents either self-identified as Asian American and/or Pacific Islander (AAPI) or of any ethnicity/ national origin recognized in the Asian and “Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander” race categories by the U.S. Census Bureau. Interviews were conducted both online and via telephone from February 1 to March 2, 2021, and respondents were given the option to complete the survey in English, Mandarin, Korean, or Vietnamese. More information about the survey can be found here: napawf.org/s/NAPAWF-Survey-Deck-041321.pdf 2 Categorization into different ethnic groups was based on Asian Pacific Institute’s classification. Asian Pacific Institute on Gender-Based Violence, “Census Data and API Identities”. https://www.api-gbv.org/resources/census-data-api-identities/. 3 “Multiethnic” Asian women refer to women who reported more than one Asian ethnicity (e.g., Chinese and Indian); and “Multiracial” Asian women refer to women who reported at least one Asian ethnicity and one non-Asian race (e.g., Chinese and White). 4 Women can report multiple responses for questions about types, sites, and reasons for hate incidents; thus, the total sums exceed 3,943 reports. 3 Figure 2: Types of Hate Incidents by Asian American Women, by Subgroups (n = 5,098 types) [In Percentage] East Asian 52.6 12.1 9.2 7.2 3.1 4.7 6.2 Southeast Asian 49.9 15.3 6.5 5.4 6.1 5.3 5.9 South Asian 36.8 10.3 16.2 7.4 7.4 5.9 4.4 8.8 Multiethnic 51.7 16.3 5.7 7.2 5.3 5.0 4.3 Multiracial 45.5 15.3 5.2 6.1 4.3 4.0 9.2 6.1 Verbal Harassment/Name Calling Avoidance/Shunning Physical Assault Coughed At/Spat Upon Barred from Establishment Workplace Discrimination Barred from Transportation Vandalism/Grati Online Other Asian, and Multiracial/Multiethnic Asian women, Asian American women, with some differenc- avoidance and/or shunning was the second most es among different Asian American subgroups common form of hate incident. South Asian wom- (Figure 3). For East Asian and Multiethnic Asian en experienced the highest rate of physical as- women, public streets and/or sidewalks were the sault with over 16.2 percent of all incidents involv- most common sites of hate incidents, whereas ing physical assaults (compared to 9.2 percent for for Southeast Asian, South Asian, and Multiracial East Asian women and 6.5 percent for Southeast Asian women, places of business were the most Asian women). common sites of hate incidents. Public streets and/or sidewalks (28.3%) For all Asian American women, race (50.1%), and places of business (28.0%) were the more ethnicity (29.5%), and gender (9.1%) were the most frequently reported sites of hate incidents for all frequently reported reasons for experiencing hate Figure 3: Sites of Hate Incidents by Asian American Women, by Subgroups (n = 4,349 sites) [In Percentage] East Asian 26.2 31.2 6.7 4.1 6.9 8.3 7.9 5.9 Southeast Asian 37.0 20.6 8.2 5.8 7.7 6.3 5.8 5.2 South Asian 21.1 15.8 14.0 12.3 12.3 5.3 7.0 5.3 7.0 Multiethnic 27.0 27.3 10.2 6.4 8.1 6.7 7.0 4.7 Multiracial 25.9 19.1 13.7 8.6 6.8 6.8 5.8 5.4 6.1 Business Public Street/Sidewalk Online School Private Residence Public Park Public Transit University Place of Worship Other 4 Figure 4: Reasons for Hate Incidents by Asian American Women, by Subgroups (n = 7,265 types) [In Percentage] East Asian 50.0 29.8 9.4 Southeast Asian 53.3 28.1 7.2 South Asian 40.4 26.6 8.5 6.4 6.4 Multiethnic 49.3 30.6 9.4 Multiracial 46.2 30.0 9.1 Race Ethnicity Gender Food Language Mask Religion Sexuality Other incidents (Figure 4) — reflecting women’s under- standing and acknowledgement of intersectional Experiences of Racism and experiences. In addition to the aforementioned Discrimination Among Pacific Islander reasons, East Asian and Southeast Asian wom- Women en were more likely to report mask-wearing as a Among the 415 Pacific Islander women reason for experiencing hate incidents, whereas from the NAPAWF national survey, 51.9 percent South Asian women were more likely to report reported that anti-AAPI racism had affected their their language and religion as being reasons for lives in 2020 and 2021.