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Held on May 20 during Asian Heritage Month, the Asian Gold Ribbon Campaign urged individuals, organizations, and communities to demonstrate solidarity again Asian racism. The Campaign is a platform developed for social change and to initiate wide-spread visibility against anti-Asian racism.

The theme for Asian Heritage Month 2021 is Recognition, Resilience, and Resolve and the month provides an opportunity for all Canadians to learn more about the many achievements and contributions of Canadians of Asian descent.

To gain further insight into the meaning of the day, we reached out to two Faculty of Arts and Science students to better understand its importance.

Third year life sciences student Rebecca Zhao called the Campaign a meaningful event which is telling people that unprovoked hatred can only hinder social development and social stability.

“This event can lead to the whole society caring about the Asian group’s situation and respect them,” she says. “Secondly, this event is reflecting that the harm to the Asian community has reached an intolerant level. This is no longer just a distortion of the way of thinking and humanity for a small group of people in society.”

Zhao adds that due to the Covid-19 pandemic, many people in the general public blamed Asian or Chinese people for their dissatisfaction with their losses during this pandemic. With the surge of hatred, crimes against Asian people are rising rapidly. She opens up about her own experience with racism for the first time in her life, which occurred when the outbreak of COVID-19 had just occurred in China.

“I had an encounter with someone else in the store, an elderly man who covered his mouth and gave me a strange look, that made me feel uncomfortable and I really wanted to say the virus is the enemy, not Asian people.”

Fourth year chemistry student Jess Deng says Gold Ribbon Day is just the beginning and the start of the visibility of injustices that Asian people face in Canada. “Celebrating Asian Canadians should go beyond this day, and beyond the month of May. As Asian and Asian allies, you should not be only paying attention and advocating for this community during a dedicated month. It’s simply the start of what’s to come.”

For her, the pandemic has highlighted the prevalence of anti-Asian racism in society.

“Anti-Asian hate has skyrocketed in western countries, which has forced allies to see how bad it really is,” Deng says. “Words hurt, both mentally and physically though some words may be a ‘joke’ it supports ethnic stigmas, and is deeply rooted racism.”

Based on her experiences, she says a day like this was a long time in coming.

Growing up in an Asian-Canadian family we were very hush, hush on racism, and I was taught to stay in the shadows and not cause a fuss,” Deng says. “In fact, I truly believed that my parents never experienced racism when I was growing up, which was so incredibly false. It wasn’t until the shootings in Atlanta that we began having a mature discussion on racism in Canada.”

Learn more about and the Asian Gold Ribbon Campaign.