@Izzy
Izzy S-L
@Izzy · 1:08

Effects of Anti-Chinese Sentiments: Conversation with Jenny Yang, IU Psychology Student

article image placeholderUS Anti-China Sentiment Reaches New Peak
Hello, everyone. I hope you are having a wonderful start to your new week. I am super excited to start my week off by talking with someone who I personally admire and find super brilliant. Jenny Yang Jenny is a senior at International Indiana University, Bloomington, studying psychology, and today I'm going to talk to her about the anti Chinese sentiment that plagues the United States. The article from The Diplomat, which I linked here discusses how antichinese sentiment is at an all time high

How #Trump affects views of #China and impacts #ChineseAmericans with @jenzyang https://s.swell.life/SSEXGql6ON5zuoH

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@jenzyang
Jennifer Yang
@jenzyang · 2:00

Anti-Chinese sentiments are nothing new to America

I think that it has just led to a lot of fear, mongering and scapegoating for how the US itself has handled the pandemic and led to a lot of backlash and hate crimes for Chinese Americans today. Bye
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@Izzy
Izzy S-L
@Izzy · 0:32

Personal experiences of #Xenophobia and #Sinophobia

Thank you for your perspective on that, Jenny. I mean, I really appreciate how you acknowledge this longstanding prejudice that has been implemented and enforced throughout American history against Chinese American Americans and people immigrating from China. So I really want to elaborate on that further and ask you what ways has this affected you in your daily life? What are some of your personal experiences of Xenophobia or xenophobia
@jenzyang
Jennifer Yang
@jenzyang · 2:08

Normalization of xenophobia and sinophobia

And an example I have is back in January, UC Berkeley made an Instagram post about managing anxiety about coronavirus, and they listed Xenophobia against Asian people as a normal reaction to have. And I think this normalization just leads to a lot of tension and fear for when we cough, when we wear masks, when we exist in public, that we're never really sure what can happen, and that we're never 100% sure how others are perceiving us
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@Izzy
Izzy S-L
@Izzy · 0:57

#TikTok as educational or suppressive ?

Thank you so much, Jenny, for sharing your experiences and the experiences of others in your immediate circle. The hope in talking with you is to make conversations like these more normal because the things that you experienced that you just discussed are blatantly not okay. We need to acknowledge these things that you and other Chinese Americans are experiencing, which are acts of violence and discrimination. And one of the ways to talk about these issues is social media like we're doing now here in Swell
@jenzyang
Jennifer Yang
@jenzyang · 2:22

Spreading both information and fearmongering

And my hope is that TikTok is doing more good than harm in helping the Chinese community advocate for themselves. On a different but similar note, I think it's important that we talk about how Trump's treatment and spreading of misinformation about TikTok as well as prominent Chinese social media platform has incited a lot of fear mongering amongst the Chinese community. Earlier this year, Trump was attempting to ban both TikTok and WeChat claiming that they were threats to national security because they were taking personal information
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@Izzy
Izzy S-L
@Izzy · 0:46

impacts of "othering" Chinese Americans as a group of people

As a psychology student who studies clinical psychology and social psychology, I want to ask you, what are the psychological impacts of othering a group of people? And how is the current handling of the Trump administration going against, or perhaps supporting what's that evidence suggests
@jenzyang
Jennifer Yang
@jenzyang · 3:08

The effects of ingroup/outgroup biases

Not only does it lead to the psychological and physical impacts that I mentioned earlier, but it also pushes the Chinese immigrants to align more with the Chinese government if they feel like they're not being included or involved in America. And the only way to really improve this sort of ingroup outgroup biases is by listening to other people's perspectives and having empathy and the way the Trump administration is not only trying to restrict direct immigrant access but also banning prominent social apps and thus decreasing communication only further racial divides
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@Izzy
Izzy S-L
@Izzy · 1:21

What other populations does this psychological impact apply to?

And to hear more about that, definitely check out the interview that I did with Selena Drake, who talks about this and how it's an effort, basically to put down the voices of black people by saying that it's monolithic. So I'm curious. My last question for you is what do you think as to how the psychological impacts of othering might be relevant to other populations?
@jenzyang
Jennifer Yang
@jenzyang · 2:34

"Othering" impacts all marginalized groups in the U.S.

Again, all of the things that I've mentioned before about hate crimes about in group out group biases, psychological and physical distress, all of them apply to each of these groups
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@Izzy
Izzy S-L
@Izzy · 1:11

HUGE thank you! Listeners: have you noticed a shift? Share your experiences

I really appreciate your emphasis on empathy and the importance of listening to people with identities that are marginalized for those listening. If you're interested in expanding your empathy, please follow my Swell cast because this is exactly what I aim for to do uplift people's voices who have minority identities and give them a platform to share their experiences and perspectives. Jenny, thank you again, so much for sharing with us your experiences, your perspective, and your knowledge about these psychological impacts and the relevant studies
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@Phil
phil spade
@Phil · 2:20
There was one person that I know of that said that they wouldn't order from a Chinese food restaurant, and I walked them through just just how illogical and asinine that comment was in that belief. But I know that that happened. I know that there were plenty of people that said that, especially back in the spring
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