GAR Statement on Monterey Park and Half Moon Bay Shootings
It has been over a month since the mass shootings in Monterey Park and Half Moon Bay, CA, and we continue to grieve with our communities and the families impacted by these horrific acts of violence. As we approach the second anniversary of the tragic Atlanta shootings that took the lives of eight people, including six Asian women, these acts of violence are a painful reminder of the ongoing racism, misogyny, and class violence that continue to plague our communities. During these difficult times, Grassroots Asians Rising (GAR) turns to the leadership of our grassroots organizations physically and emotionally closest. It is crucial that we direct attention and resources to those who are most impacted.
Donate funds and resources to the families of victims:
GoFundMe fundraiser for the Matsudas, an elderly Japanese couple in Cincinnati whose small business, Tokyo Foods, was recently shot up and destroyed in an incident of race-based violence.
Support our members in California that are organizing to keep our working-class communities safe beyond policing:
Asian Pacific Environmental Network, Oakland/Richmond and Los Angeles, CA
Chinatown Community for Equitable Development, Los Angeles, CA
We know these incidents are not isolated, but rather symptomatic of larger issues of class inequity and structural violence that disproportionately affect working-class, immigrant, and refugee communities. Chinatown Community for Equitable Development in Los Angeles wrote how our communities’ safety requires the “dismantling [of] systems that target the poor and the unhoused, and eradicating the violence inflicted upon marginalized communities by the police state, toxic masculinity, patriarchy, and white supremacy.” For GAR, we understand that hate violence includes all forms of violence that affect our communities whether against or within our communities, including gender-based violence, state violence, and interpersonal violence. Muslims for Just Futures in the DMV Area added the critical lens that “white supremacy operates by enabling the conditions for communal violence and gender-based violence to flourish. This allows the state to justify state abandonment and punishment of communities.” Systemic economic and material changes are needed to end the cycle of violence both against and within our communities.
GAR members have continued to win concrete improvements to their members’ housing, education, livelihoods, safety, and environmental health. Through local, regional, and state-wide policy advocacy and organizing, our members have widened our impact to reach millions of people. Through our peer learning spaces and uniting our members behind a shared vision, we are scaling community organizing to win material changes and to move us collectively towards transformative racial, gender, and economic justice. During our peer exchange We Keep Us Safe, our members shared their lessons learned about their community-led alternatives to policing models to address violence. At another exchange on Lessons Learned Post-9/11, our members delved into addressing the role of our government and state violence in perpetuating hate violence and how we must organize to protect and empower our bases that are at the most precarious of margins. These conversations within the working-class, pan-Asian movement are crucial in order to build solidarities that exemplify community alternatives to stop the expansion of policing and surveillance.
Join GAR as we continue to organize for a world where our working-class immigrant and refugee communities have dignity, safety, and justice. Beyond moments of crises and violent incidents, together, we will mobilize the collective power of a progressive, working-class, pan-Asian, racial and economic justice movement!