Coronavirus/COVID-19 Resources to Stand Against Racism

 

Facts, Not Fear

For health information, please refer to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and World Health Organization.

In addition, the Asian & Pacific Islander American Health Forum has been compiling factsheets, social media posts, and other informative resources on COVID-19 and COVID-19 vaccines in over 20 Asian and Pacific Islander languages: Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander In-Language Resources for Coronavirus.

The AAPI Emergency Response Network (ERN), born out of a collaboration between the National Council of Asian Pacific Americans (NCAPA) and other non-profit groups, is a compilation of resources on health, hate incidents, small business, and more specifically for the Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander communities.

Here are additional resources to combat mis/disinformation while keeping our communities healthy and accurately informed:

• Digital Health and Connection: How Media Literacy Can Bridge Divides - a webinar hosted by Advancing Justice | AAJC and PEN America to inform community members on how they can help tackle the spread and effects of misinformation among Asian Americans.
• Identifying Misinformation or Disinformation (World Health Organization)
• Top COVID-19 Vaccine Myths and Facts (NewsGuard)
• How to Spot COVID-19 Misinformation (CBC News)
• How to Talk to Family Who Share Misinformation (PEN America)
• Guide on Disinformation and COVID-19 (PEN America)
• FactCheck.org

Resources to Document and Address Hate

We encourage reporting to our website, www.StandAgainstHatred.org, which is accessible in Chinese, Korean, and Vietnamese.

Asian Americans Advancing Justice created this site in January 2017 to capture information about the increase in hate we observed in the lead-up to the 2016 election. Through this website, we document hate crimes, harassment, and discrimination experienced by our community. As we state on the site, when people submit reports, they are aiding our efforts to monitor and push back against hate. “By sharing what you experienced or witnessed, you can educate the public, empower others, show service providers where help is needed, and strengthen advocacy efforts for hate crimes response and prevention.”

The following resources are available through Stand Against Hatred:

• We partner with the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law and their Stop Hate project to provide assistance to those impacted by hate. Assistance with legal and social services is available through the Stop Hate hotline (1-844-9-NO-HATE), which is accessible in a number of languages.
• Asian Americans Advancing Justice is part of Communities Against Hate, a diverse coalition of civil rights organizations led by the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights. Read the report Hate Magnified published by the coalition in January 2019 that details reports submitted to Communities Against Hate.

Discrimination should never be acceptable anywhere. We encourage our communities and allies to learn about ways to respond:

• Hollaback! – Show Up: Your Guide to Bystander Intervention
• New Resource from Teaching Tolerance, a project of the Southern Poverty Law Center – How to Respond to Coronavirus Racism

Anti-Hate Community Resources

See our Google doc created in February 2021 for crowdsourced resources, including community organizations, across the country. 

Bystander Intervention Virtual Trainings

One way we can take action to protect our communities is to learn ways to intervene effectively as a bystander without compromising safety. We're excited to announce that Hollaback! and Asian Americans Advancing Justice | AAJC are partnering for a virtual workshop on bystander intervention.
 
The one-hour, interactive training will teach you Hollaback!'s 5 D's of bystander intervention methodology.

• We'll start by talking about the types of disrespect that Asian and Asian American folks are facing right now -- from microaggressions to violence -- using a tool we call the "spectrum of disrespect."
• You'll learn what to look for and the positive impact that bystander intervention has on individuals and communities.
• We'll talk through five strategies for intervention: distract, delegate, document, delay, and direct; and how to prioritize your own safety while intervening.
• We'll have time at the end for practice, and you'll leave feeling more confident intervening the next time you see Anti-Asian and Asian American harassment online or in-person.

Sign up for an upcoming training!

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting. The training is currently only offered in English but we are seeking funding to expand it into other languages.

More Resources from Hollaback!

• Show Up, Your Guide to Bystander Intervention, by Hollaback! in collaboration with CUP
• How to Respond to Street Harassment, by Hollaback!. Written to respond to gender-based harassment but the tactics are applicable to all forms of harassment. We’ll be adapting these for the Asian/American community in the coming weeks.
• Responding to Online Harassment, Do’s and Don’ts by Hollaback! in collaboration with #ICANHELP, Project HEAR, and the Dangerous Speech Project.
• Self care guide to healing from Online Harassment, by Hollaback!
• Digital Safety Guide, by Hollaback!
• HeartMob, a platform where you can get support managing online harassment and/or support others experiencing it, by Hollaback!

Resources for the Asian American Community on Anti-Blackness

Click here for a compilation of resources, reading lists, and more on anti-racism and anti-Blackness for the Asian American community.

Additional Resources

• IMPACT Bay Area Training:  Free online classes to empower the community during the pandemic, including "Facing AAPI Race-Based Harassment" - Register here

This 90-minute class will introduce strategies that can be helpful in the face of race-based harassment like adrenaline management, de-escalation, and verbal boundary setting, as well as bystander intervention. This class is for AAPI identified and presenting individuals. Registration required, limited to 25 participants in each class.

• Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance (APALA) - Protecting Asian American and Pacific Islander Working People
• Association of Asian Pacific Community Health Organizations (AAPCHO) – Public Health Alerts, including Coronavirus (COVID-19) Update
• Asian American Journalists Association (AAJA) Media Guidance: Asian American Journalists Association (AAJA) calls on news organizations to exercise care in coverage of the coronavirus outbreak
• Joint statement from AAJA and partners denouncing anti-Asian racism during coronavirus outbreak
• AFL-CIO: COVID-19 and Immigrant Workers Fact Sheet
• APEN COVID-19 Emergency Community Stabilization Fund 
• APIAVote: Immigrant Neighbor Fund
• NAKASEC Emergency Mutual Aid Fund
• National Employment Law Project: Immigrant Eligibility for Unemployment Insurance  

 

Words Matter

We are working with the media, Congress, and partner organizations to inform around the harm of this xenophobia.

Media Hits

 

• Download the Social Media Toolkit from the National Council of Asian Pacific Americans
   
• Asian Americans Advancing Justice Statement on Discrimination and the Coronavirus Epidemic (February 2020)
   
• Asian Americans Advancing Justice Social Media Responses to Comments by Elected Officials:
  • House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (March 10, 2020)
  • President Trump (March 16, 2020)
  • Senator John Cornyn (March 18, 2020) 
• National Council of Asian Pacific Americans (NCAPA) - Asian American and Pacific Islander Leaders and Over 260 Civil Rights Organizations Call on Congress to Denounce Anti-Asian Racism around COVID-19
   
• Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus (CAPAC) - As Coronavirus Fears Incite Violence, CAPAC Members Urge Colleagues to Not Stoke Xenophobia 
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• Yes, Viruses Used To Be Named After Places. Here’s Why They Aren’t Anymore. (HuffPost - March 19, 2020) 
   
• Asian People Are Being Targeted By Racist Attacks. Here’s How You Can Be An Ally. (HuffPost - March 19, 2020)
   
• Photo of Trump remarks shows 'corona' crossed out and replaced with 'Chinese' virus (NBC Asian America - March 19, 2020)
   
• Trump doubles down that he's not fueling racism, but experts say he is (NBC Asian America - March 18, 2020)
   
• The coronavirus and the long history of using diseases to justify xenophobia (The Washington Post - Feb. 14, 2020)
• The National Council of Asian Pacific Americans (NCAPA), of which Advancing Justice | AAJC is a member, put together a social media toolkit  of many of the resources mentioned here that you can use to amplify to your networks.