OCA Launches Hate Incident Reporting Website for AAPIs

Screen grab from aapihatecrimes.org.

WASHINGTON — Asian Pacific American Advocates launched its new hate incident reporting website on Dec. 20.

The AAPI Hate Crimes Reporting Website, which can be found at http://aapihatecrimes.org, will help maintain a database of incidents of hate against the AAPI community. This online tool features a form where victims and advocates can report hate incidents that will be tracked by the OCA National Center.

Though users should always report any hate crimes to law enforcement first, the data tracked from this project will help expose hate incidents and inform community responses.

The launch for the reporting tool took place during a national call that brought together community leaders from around the country. OCA chapters discussed the importance of tracking hate incidents and strategies they use to fight hate in their local communities. Speakers on the call included Bill Lann Lee, former assistant attorney general for civil rights, and OCA chapter leaders David Fung, Greg Jung, Linda Ng, Aryani Ong, and Elizabeth OuYang.

Ong opened the call by discussing the background of policy on hate crimes and how OCA chapters and local organizations could get involved.

Lee expanded by sharing his own experiences working on hate crimes at the U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division during the Clinton Administration. He emphasized that tracking and exposing hate incidents were important because ignoring them could lead to more serious hate crimes.

The OCA-Sacramento chapter shared their experiences working with local law enforcement, as well as cross-culturally with other community based organizations, to solve community crime issues.

The OCA-New York chapter shared their work with students through the hate crimes art project, which draws attention to hate crimes and encourages law enforcement to elevate these issues.

“After Vincent Chin was murdered in a hate crime in 1982, he could have been easily forgotten,” said Leslie Moe-Kaiser, OCA national president. “Instead, the Asian American community came together to demand justice and our community emerged stronger than ever. Similar to the time preceding Vincent’s murder, we are now living in a time when we must choose between doing nothing or fighting back.

“In just the past few days we have seen a Korean church vandalized with Nazi symbols, a noose hung in a Southeast Asian youth center, and ‘build that wall’ written on a receipt for a Filipina American waitress. These intolerable acts cannot be allowed to continue. We must show that our community will fight for fair and equal treatment for all.”