Suburban Mosaic: Area Asian Americans to rally against hate March 27
Asian Americans from across the Chicago area and suburbs will participate in a rally against anti-Asian hate crimes at 2 p.m. Saturday, March 27, in Chicago's Chinatown.
Organizers have been planning the event since before last week's shootings at three Georgia massage parlors in which eight people, including six women of Asian descent were killed.
"Everyone is focused on the Atlanta attack, but actually anti-Asian violence has been going on across the country, especially against the elderly," said Nancy Chen of Naperville. "It's always a big tragedy that (captures) peoples' attention."
The Pew Research Center reports 31% of Asian adults say they have been subjected to slurs and jokes about their race or ethnicity since the pandemic began. Since March 19, 2020, nearly 3,900 hate incidents targeting Asians have been reported nationwide, according to Stop AAPI Hate.
In Chicago, two Chinese Americans were killed during an attempted robbery in February 2020 and a Chinese American was killed during a carjacking in December.
"People are angry. People are saying enough is enough. We can't stay silent anymore," Chen said.
The rally, outside Chicago Chinatown Library, 2100 S. Wentworth Ave., is organized by the Chinatown Security Foundation and the Coalition for a Better Chinese American Community in collaboration with more than 60 Asian organizations. Leaders are urging elected officials and law enforcement agencies to work with the community to develop effective measures to improve safety.
Black studies
Oakton Community College in Des Plaines is developing new curriculum focusing on African American history and linguistic justice.
The college received $30,000 from the Illinois Department of Human Services as part of its Healing Illinois initiative to encourage ideas and activities addressing racial injustice. Oakton is using the funding to develop anti-racism educational tracks and training for educators, said Donovan Braud, a professor and chair of the English department who is leading the effort.
"We don't have a dedicated African American history class," Braud said. "While that's in the works, we thought it would be good to provide some professional development for our instructors and other departments so that they could infuse African American history throughout the curriculum."
Oakton has offered training on Black linguistic justice for its professors and teachers from area high schools, including Maine West and Maine South. Participating schools will be introducing African American rhetoric into their English curriculum.
"It is a very rich rhetorical tradition that's not just about slang terms, but it also has its own argumentative strategies, lexical code, rules for grammar," Braud said.
In April, the college will host a public screening and discussion of the 2018 documentary "Cooked: Survival by ZIP code," telling the story of the 1995 Chicago heat wave in which 739 people - mostly poor, elderly and Black - died within one week. This fall, it will screen the 2020 documentary "The Dilemma of Desire" about female sexual desire and gender politics.
Bartlett officer retires
Gina Walsh joined the Bartlett Police Department at a time when female officers were scarce and there were few minorities among the ranks.
Walsh, 51, of Crystal Lake, who is half Korean, said people would do a double-take when she walked her beat as a community service officer in 1990. She became a sworn officer in 2001 when there was only one other female officer in the department.
Today, women make up 20% of Bartlett's police force.
Walsh served eight years as a school resource officer at Eastview Middle School in Bartlett. She is retiring at the end of the month after nearly 31 years with the department - the longest serving member out of 80 sworn and civilian employees.
"Nowadays, you see so many more (minority police officers)," Walsh said. "More minorities want to do this job."
Walsh's retirement will be short-lived. She will be working as a court security officer in McHenry County - one of a few women serving in that role.
Muslim history
Illinois lawmakers this week will review proposed legislation recognizing the contributions and history of Muslims in America.
Senate Bill 564 is up for a hearing Tuesday in the Senate Education Committee.
The legislation, proposed by the Illinois Muslim Civic Coalition, aims to ensure Muslim American children see themselves included in the curriculum and educate all Illinois students about Muslim American history. It includes a provision to add Jan. 17 - the birthday of Muhammad Ali - to the list of commemorative holidays.
"Muhammad Ali doesn't just belong to the Muslim community; he belongs to all of America," said Dilara Sayeed, coalition president.
Anti-racism and you
"This is not a history book, not like the ones you're used to reading in school," said Jason Reynolds speaking to Streamwood High School students and community members Thursday.
Reynolds was referencing the book "Stamped: Racism, Antiracism and You," he cowrote with anti-racist activist and historian Ibram X. Kendi. It was the subject of a "One Book, One Community" event hosted by Streamwood High School.
The book explores segregationist history, assimilationism and ultimately what anti-racism means.
"Assimilationism looks like (for) Black folks, specifically in this context, having to bend and mold themselves into other forms of themselves or into more muted forms of themselves so that they can make everybody else, specifically white folks, feel comfortable about their existence in the space," Reynolds said.
Being a 6-foot-2-inch, 140-pound Black man with long hair and covered in tattoos, Reynolds said he has to make himself "smaller" to seem unthreatening in most spaces.
"Anti-racism is so simple," Reynolds said. "You allow for people to be who they are and you accept them as such. Everybody deserves freedom. Everybody deserves love. Everybody deserves housing, food, education. ... It ain't nothing deep."
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