Stop AAPI Hate Shares Findings on Anti-Asian Hate Crimes in U.S. Over Past Year

By Sonam Hundal

SAN FRANCISCO, CA – In the last year, one out of every five Asian American and Pacific Islanders reported falling victim to anti-Asian hate crimes, according to Stop AAPI Hate, a national association whose goal is to address those practices.

The report found that the most popular hate crime was verbal harassment, and most incidents happened in public spaces. The majority of reports, 62 percent, were made by women.

Stop AAPI Hate partnered with Edelman Data & Intelligence (DXI) and Dynata from Sept. 21 to Oct. 8, 2021 in order to conduct a national survey that would draw in more data than its previous one.

Joshua Wu, a study leader and vice president of Edelman DXI, said the company “partnered with Stop AAPI Hate because good public policy and effective social mobilization must be informed by the lived experiences and expectations of the communities suffering from persistent anti-Asian discrimination and violence.”

From this survey, Stop AAPI Hate was able to conclude that 21.2 percent of Asian Americans and 20 percent of Pacific Islanders were victims of hate crimes this past year.

The survey was also able to conclude what the affected communities believed would be appropriate solutions to this problem. Community-based solutions, education on anti-Asian hate, and civil rights legislation/enforcement were among the top solutions to fight anti-Asian hate crimes.

The survey also found that a person’s educational background is a factor when it comes to being the target of a hate crime; Asian Americans with less education were targeted more than those holding higher degrees.

Cynthia Choi, the co-executive director of Chinese for Affirmative Action and co-founder of Stop AAPI Hate, said, “It’s tragic but not surprising that Asian Americans with lower education levels are experiencing more hate.”

Choi also added that such hate is a result of systemic racism and that “[s]topping hate is not about quick fixes like law enforcement but about deeper investment in our communities.”

Co-founder of Stop AAPI Hate and executive director of the Asian Pacific Policy and Planning Council, Manjusha Kulkarni, also weighed in on this upsetting find.

Kulkarni urged elected officials to “must make real investments in civil rights, community resources and education” to help eradicate the issue.

Many AAPI parents involved in the survey claimed that even their children were targets of hate crimes at school.

A professor of Asian American Studies at San Francisco State University and co-founder of Stop AAPI Hate, Russell Jeung, Ph. D, feels that “[t]here needs to be an urgent push toward incorporating solutions that promote racial understanding in schools.” He suggested that investing in Ethnic Studies would be helpful in doing so.

One of the last major finds of the survey was that Asian American and Pacific Islanders, 31.5 percent and 26.4 percent respectively, even experienced anti-Asian hate in their place of work.

People from across the nation sent in their experiences to Stop AAPI Hate, many involving slurs being hurled at them from aggressors.

One report from Los Angeles, CA regarded a man who yelled a slur at the victim, which was promptly followed by the aggressor “put[ting] his two fingers next to his eyelids” to “mock” the victim’s eyes.

Stop AAPI Hate urges hate crime victims of AAPI communities to report their experiences at https://stopaapihate.org/reportincident/.