Billy Chen Week 9

Billy Chen

Section 2

11.19.17

In this week's article, “Why Ferguson Matters to Asian Americans” by Soya Jung,

discusses the importance of Asian’s standing in solidarity with African Americans and the Black Lives Matter movement. She explains to her audience that anger and the way the protests went about in Ferguson should be acceptable because of the pain the African American people have endured throughout their time here in America. Even though many still think that Asian Americans are privileged and that they are the model minority race, they still stand in solidarity with people of color. Asian Americans have had their own series of events where they were hated and pushed down by other ethnicities, so they use those feelings to stand with African Americans in the Black Lives Matter movement.

My own life’s experiences also connect to “Why Ferguson Matters to Asian Americans”. During my sophomore and junior year of highschool, I was an intern for a program called Asian Pacific Islander Youth Promoting Advocacy and Leadership or AYPAL. AYPAL is a youth led program that allowed youth from all over Oakland, CA to become exposed to problems in their community. Those problems included gentrification, Asian American youth not knowing their history and heritage, Asians standing in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement and more. I really got to see first hand why these groups were fighting and what they were fighting for by attending protests, marches and gatherings.

Question: When you are fighting for equality amongst races and ethnicities, are you picking a side and ultimately, who are you against and why?