During pandemic lockdowns, I became deeply dissatisfied along woke-ish lines, with aspects of modern life involving being unseen or invisible as an Asian man, not being able to physically preserve the safety of our parents and wives and children.
To be completely honest, I had been totally fine for 40 plus years in America, telling myself the magic phrase "But I was born here"[^1] would provide an escape hatch for any situation that might encroach.
The imaginary script goes:
Random White Or Black Person: Go back to China!
My Model Minority Face: But I was born here
RWOBP: Oh! your English is so good
MMMF: Yeah I grew up here, how about them Knicks[^2] etc.
And I had a trump card in my back packet too: "Me family Taiwan, not China. If you anti China, so I too! Haha, friend."
Then I heard stories of Japanese and Korean dudes, resigning themselves before leaving the house that "We are all Chinamen." (And not in the nice way that I would have said it.)
A young father got attacked in front...
