Asian American groups hold vigils to ‘safely grieve’ after Atlanta shooting

Several vigils have been held around the US to condemn all forms of anti-Asian violence and to remember the Asian-American lives lost in a series of shootings in Atlanta.

From Phoenix to Philadelphia, Asian American organisations nationwide organised events aimed at showing unity. 

They expressed grief and outrage after Tuesday's shooting that left eight people dead in Atlanta, Georgia, including at least six Asian women. 

Police have said suspect Robert Aaron Long, a 21-year-old white man, has so far denied a racist motive for the three shootings in the southern US state of Georgia.

However, women protestors in Orange County, California disagreed with the US police.

"He was trying very hard to find six Asian women to murder," Tammy Kim, Vice Mayor of Irvine, said during the vigil, CBS Los Angeles reported. 

Asian Americans United, the Asian Pacific Islander Political Alliance and several other partner groups held a vigil on Wednesday afternoon in Philadelphia's Chinatown neighborhood.

Activists carried banners calling for an end to hatred and violence against Asian-Americans citizens of the country.

“After the month and year we had, we knew our folks needed the time to come together safely just to grieve and heal and mourn and speak to what’s happening,” said Mohan Seshadri, Asian Pacific Islander Political Alliance co-executive director.

Meanwhile, hundreds of Asian Americans turned to social media to air their anger, sadness, fear and hopelessness. 

The hashtag #StopAsianHate was a top trending topic on Twitter hours after the shootings.

“I think the reason why people are feeling so hopeless is because Asian Americans have been ringing the bell on this issue for so long ... We’ve been raising the red flag,” said Aisha Yaqoob Mahmood, executive director of the Atlanta-based Asian American Advocacy Fund, which does political and advocacy work across Georgia.

For the past several weeks, Asian Americans have questioned how to deal with a recent wave of assaults, many on the elderly, that coincided with the pandemic. 

The virus was first identified in China, and then-President Donald Trump and others have used racial terms to describe it.

Numerous Asian American organizations say Trump's rhetoric has emboldened people to express anti-Asian or anti-immigrant views. 

Nearly 3,800 incidents have been reported to Stop AAPI Hate, a California-based reporting center for Asian American Pacific Islanders, and its partner groups, since March 2020. 

Nationally, women reported hate crimes 2.3 times more than men.