Post 458: Stand Together Against Asian American Hate vs Eat Bitterness

 Post 457: The Concept of 'Eat Bitterness' in Asian Culture

 

 

Nicole Wong did a great job defining the concept of 'eat bitterness' in her Linkedin post on 3/31 which reads, "Among Sinocentric cultures, there exists the concept of 吃苦 (chīkǔ). This principle — which, according to Iris Chen, the author of the blog “Untigering,” translates as “to eat bitterness” — values the ability to accept suffering as a virtue." 

What is the importance of 'eat bitterness' in raising awareness against Asian American violence?

In Asian culture, we swallow our pain, our grievances, our problems, our ailments, to promote social harmony. If we just swallow our pain, then, we do not cause more pain by talking about our pain. Because of this stoic cultural trait of 'eating bitterness', it is difficult for Asian Americans especially older first generation immigrant Asian Americans to raise their voices against racism.

If you watch the movie, The Farewell, you see this 'eating bitterness' concept in action. In China, when a dying grandmother's family learns from their doctor that the grandmother is dying of terminal cancer, the family fakes a wedding as a pretext to get the whole family to reunite in China to visit the grandmother. In this way, the grandmother spends her last days in blissful ignorance of the fact that she is dying. Instead, she thinks the family get together is for a joyous wedding. Meanwhile, the family members 'eat the bitterness' of their grief as they gather around their grandmother for the last time.

As Asian, we cannot 'eat bitterness' when Anti Asian attacks become normalized through callous comments like 'Kung Flu', 'the China virus', or 'the Wuhan virus' as many racists blame Asian Americans for the virus, thus provoking attacks against innocent Asian Americns and blaming AAPI for the virus. This is the reason why the coronavirus should be labeled as COVID19 to avoid more AAPI attacks.

As Asian Americans, I know it is hard to overcome your 'eat bitterness' reflex, but you need to stand up and talk about any racist incidents that happened to you a la Me too Movement and let others know that anti Asian attacks are wrong and hurtful. It is only by speaking up that something can be done. In this case, keeping silent only encourages more racist Anti Asian American attacks especially during this pandemic. 

At the beginning of this pandemic back in March 2020, when I first wore my face mask, a total stranger walked up to me and said in a hostile threatening manner, "Go back to China. You bought the virus here. You are contaminated and infected." I didn't react at first because I was so shocked. I felt numb from disbelief that in the 21st century, such backwards thinking still existed. After I got over my shock, I told my friends and family who became equally appalled and horrified by what happened to me. 

As an Asian American, I am just as American as any white American with blonde hair and blue eyes. We need to all stand together to stop Asian American hate. After all, Asians are not the virus, hate is the virus.