A Different Kind of Sad
By Sabaitide
Sabaitide is an emerging Asian American artist from Santa Barbara, CA. She is working on her portfolio, finding her voice, and she has a vegan food blog called @partyinmyrice. Follow her on Instagram for glimpses into her extraordinarily ordinary daily life. Social profiles: Instagram: @sabaitide @partyinmyrice Website: https://www.sabaitide.com There’s a lot I could mention on the topic of Asian Hate, but to begin, I would like to extend my sincere condolences to the victims and families of the shooting spree that happened recently in Atlanta, Georgia. The sad thing is that was not the only mass shooting that happened within the month, but what stood out about Georgia was that the victims were immediately identified by being Asian.
Why did this happen? There’s more to this and race is not the only issue, but race is the first thing we usually see. The headlines of this tragedy in large part identified the victims by their race, but when looking further, the excuses and explanations given were on the basis of sex and addiction. The suspect, Robert Aaron Long, had a deeply troubling and disturbing sex addiction, but that is not a rational excuse for going on a shooting rampage that claimed the lives of eight victims. What was also infuriating was that this was downplayed by having “a really bad day.”
“Please let the victims rest in peace and let this aftermath teach us all something new to be aware of. ”
When browsing the headlines for this recent tragedy, the first glances I saw were along the lines of “6 Asian Women Dead,” “Shooting at Asian Massage Parlors,” and “Asian Hate Crimes Rising.” My first impression from media headlines would be maybe this has to do with race, but my initial feeling to this was sorrow because those victims had names and families and unique immigration stories and the rest of their lives ahead of them. My second natural feeling was shock.
6 | Overachiever Magazine
It appears that excuse is invalid. It also appears messed up to me that the suspect’s reasoning for carrying out his shooting spree was to eliminate his temptation because he has a sex addiction and can assure that this was not racially motivated. So he’s definitely not racist and he just has a sex addiction? When he downplayed race to highlight sex, he also forgot to
