creating a community space of solidarity and empowerment for East and Southeast Asians: an interview with racismunmasked

RacismUnmasked Edinburgh is an online movement that aims to create a support network for, and raise awareness about, racism towards East and Southeast Asian people in the UK. Initially, RacismUnmasked was formed in response to a racist attack against an East Asian student that occurred on the doorstep of Edinburgh University’s main library. In a broader sense, this movement comes in response to the tangible increase in hate crimes towards East and Southeast Asians in Edinburgh over the last year that has compounded the existing marginalisation faced by the community in the UK. Since then, RacismUnmasked has become a platform for educating and raising awareness about anti-Asian hate in Edinburgh,  as well as offering a valuable space for East and Southeast Asians to share their experiences, and find comfort, solidarity and empowerment in doing so. I came across RacismUnmasked earlier this year, and as an Asian woman myself, it has been hugely cathartic for me to be able to place my experiences of racism in the broader experiences of the community, and to see visibility given to them. In this way, RacismUnmasked are contributing to important efforts to bridge a gap in visibility of racism against East and Southeast Asians in the UK that receives little mainstream recognition. I spoke to Feiya and Can, two members of the RacismUnmasked team, to learn about their work in the movement. 

Introducing the movement, Feiya told me about the importance of bridging this gap, and of amplifying the voices of the East and Southeast Asian community in Edinburgh and the UK more widely: ‘[Previously], there wasn’t really a platform for our community to have our experiences heard. So our aim is to provide a safe space for East and Southeast Asian people to speak about the different issues they face with racism, but also to celebrate the good things – the different cultures we have.’ 

Following on, Can told me about why RacismUnmasked endeavours to give voice to the community in the specific context of Edinburgh and the UK: ‘I feel like location-wise, there wasn’t really an organisation or a movement which focused on the welfare and rights of East and Southeast Asian people; and time-wise, I think this has been crucial, because Anti-Asian racism has proliferated and intensified during the pandemic – we can really feel an instant and tangible change in our everyday lives regarding how the people treat those who look like us – people who simply look like Asians. While conversations around racism often tend to be very US-centric, there’s a lot of overlooked racism in the UK.’ 

Indeed, there are growing AAPI (Asian American and Pacific Islander) movements taking valuable steps to combat Anti-Asian racism in the US, highlighting the experiences of racism that Asian-Americans endure; from the model minority myth and the lack of Asian-American representation in Hollywood, to the 3,800 reported Anti-Asian hate crimes that took place in the US over the last year. Movements such as the #StopAAPIhatemovement have been launched to combat the proliferation of racial attacks on elderly Asian-Americans, receiving influential support from many Asian-American celebrities and widespread US media coverage. Anti-Asian racism, however, is of course not isolated to the US. In the UK, reported Anti-Asian hate crimes rose by 300% between April and June 2020 – with the real figures likely being much higher. However, there is marginal public support and awareness for the East and Southeast Asian community in the UK, with a lack of mainstream media coverage contributing to the normalisation and downplaying of racism towards East and Southeast Asian people. Movements including RacismUnmasked are doing important work to rectify this. For me, engaging with the RacismUnmasked community, through their online discussions, Q&A’s, and experience-sharing forums, I’ve been able to feel less alone and ashamed of my experiences of racism in the UK. I asked Feiya and Can to tell me about how creating RacismUnmasked has contributed to their sense of community in the UK, and what their hopes were in creating this space for the community. 

For Feiya, the community space has been cathartic: ‘I think, just judging by the responses we get whenever we make a post or invite anonymous submissions of people’s experiences, there’s a lot of built-up frustration. We’re usually viewed as a pretty quiet community that doesn’t like to speak about our experiences with racism, because we’ve put in so much time and effort trying to fit in and assimilate; to not stick out.’ Indeed, as Angela Hui writes, the East and Southeast Asian community in the UK is relatively spatially dispersed and have worked hard to assimilate into UK society, making it difficult to “create a sense of community and, in turn, advocate for its needs” (Hui, 2021). 

Feiya perceives a sense of relief from members of the RacismUnmasked community as they vocalise and find solidarity in their shared experiences of racism: ‘There’s a lot of relief I think, when people read each other’s experiences and are able to relate. Often, we aren’t just staying silent about our experiences, but also in some sense denying them, because it’s painful to admit that it’s happening. So, I think it’s been really well-received by the community, because it’s given people a space to talk about things without feeling like they’re being diminished. I’ve seen a lot of similar organisations pop-up on Instagram in the last couple of months, which shows that it’s needed. It has created one big kind of online community in the UK, which has never really been a thing before, which is really nice.’ 

Agreeing, Can reflected: ‘Empowerment can come from identifying the problem in the first place. In the past, when we’ve experienced racism and haven’t felt comfortable sharing it, we might just say: ‘Oh, I’m unlucky today,’ or question whether we did something wrong. But after sharing our experiences with each other, and hearing others’ stories, you start to realise that it’s a broad issue – and it’s not because of you.’ 

The work that has gone into creating RacismUnmasked, as a space of shared experience and empathy, has however not only been cathartic for Feiya and Can, but has also necessarily been emotionally laborious. Working to highlight the realities of racism faced by the East and Southeast Asian community means engaging frequently with and responding to acts of hate and violence that are too-often too resonant. Feiya and Can told me about the difficulties of maintaining a boundary between being online to connect with friends, and being constantly engaged with racial trauma. 

As Can told me: ‘We’re able to break physical boundaries through this online platform, and improve awareness of our experiences, but because we are dealing with racial issues that are part of our identity, everything comes from ourselves and a lot of it emotionally comes back to us.’  

As such, for Feiya, setting boundaries has been important: ‘I’ve connected with so many different people and made friends, and when you log-on and share experiences, you feel supported, and able to have your voice more easily heard and shared. However, the information can get quite overwhelming, especially when you’re trying to keep up-to-date with happenings. After engaging with violent hate crimes, I often feel really burnt-out afterwards, and have to step back. And this is only harder because we’re all at home all the time now with lockdown, so there’s less of a boundary: you’re online all the time, and on the same platforms you use to talk to friends you also see people being attacked – it’s challenging. So, I’ve had to set some boundaries. But in the beginning, when it [social media] was all just blurred into one, it was really hard.’ 

Reflecting on the rewards and challenges in building RacismUnmasked thus far, I asked Feiya and Can what the movement hopes to achieve in the future. Both hope that RacismUnmasked will continue to grow as a space for which East and Southeast Asian people can continue to find solidarity and empowerment in talking through their shared experiences.  

As Feiya said, ‘We just want to continue! Continue talking about lots of different things and continue including everyone who wants to be involved, and hopefully have a wider reach so that people can feel like they can contribute to the conversation. Right now, we’re just working toward normalising speaking about Anti-Asian racism. For a long time our vulnerability as a group hasn’t been recognised because of the model-minority myth, erasing the marginalisation we face. So we just want to get our voice heard as much as we can and to continue supporting people.’ 

Adding to this, Can said, ‘Mainly, I want to help people – to at least provide a space for people to talk and share the experiences in order to make our experience living in the UK less alienating.’  

[image description: five members of RacismUnmasked stand holding placards at a protest against ESEA racism in Edinburgh]

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Racism Unmasked Edinburgh is a movement to combat racism towards East Asians/South East Asian-presenting people in Edinburgh and the wider U.K who have experienced racism. This is a place to share experiences, come together as a community and become empowered. You can find them on Instagram at racismunmaskededinburgh, on Facebook, and on their website. You can also use their anonymous messaging service for advice here.

Michelle Moira Mei Ling Firth is a writer and creative who is passionate about the arts as a mode of expressing shared experience and empathy. She is currently reading Social Anthropology at the University in Edinburgh. You can find her through Instagram at michelle.moira.