'I Become a Person of Suspicion'

The Daily

The New York Times

Daily News, News

4.4 • 102.8K Ratings

🗓️ 10 April 2020

⏱️ 36 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Note: This episode contains strong language. As the death toll from the coronavirus rises in the U.S., so do reports of verbal and physical attacks against Asian-Americans, who say hostile strangers are blaming them for the pandemic. Today, one writer shares her story. Guest: Jiayang Fan, a staff writer at The New Yorker magazine. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Background reading: Ms. Fan’s story is echoed across the country by others who say they have been spit on, yelled at and attacked. Asian-American community and political leaders have tried to comfort their constituents. But they, too, admit to feeling unnerved.Some have turned to social media to share their stories and procure medical supplies in an effort to aid the crisis response.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Jay, do you remember the first time that you started thinking about the backlash in this
0:07.8	country against Asian Americans in response to the coronavirus?
0:13.8	Yeah, I mean, around, I guess this is the beginning of March, I had seen on Instagram,
0:24.4	a friend and a fellow writer documenting an incident in Manhattan where I think he is
0:32.5	Korean American and he was told by a stranger to get away.
0:39.8	But I remember reading about that incident and thinking, yeah, I mean, like that's really
0:46.0	terrible that this has happened.
0:48.6	And wondering, like, is this a singular incident or is there a friend?
0:58.6	As a journalist and perhaps by my own personal temperament, I'm pretty cautious.
1:04.7	I don't like to make sensational generalizations that go well on a headline.
1:12.8	I feel like I need very convincing proof that something is happening before I call it.
1:21.1	And especially as a Chinese American, I wanted to make sure that I was not crying racism
1:28.4	before I had the full evidence.
1:32.1	I wonder if it's because if I don't make too big a deal out of it, it won't be fully
1:39.8	real.
1:50.5	From the New York Times, I'm Michael Bobaro.
1:54.5	This is the Daily.
1:56.6	I get to the gate at LA Act Home Depot in an Uber Pool.
2:00.5	A grocery store, Wegmans.
2:01.9	We were walking from the gym to get in our classrooms.
2:07.0	I got some milk, a little pasta, most of everything's gone.
2:11.5	And at that moment, there was this guy.
	...

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