#MeToo and Asian Survivors
Content warning: rape, sexual harrassment
This October marks the two year anniversary of the viral #MeToo movement, which first emerged following the dozens of sexual harassment claims against producer Harvey Weinstein. Over the course of two years, over eighty women came forward with stories of personal encounters, spanning three decades of Weinstein’s career.
Most recently, one particular recount has come from former Weinstein employee, Rowena Chiu. In an op-ed for The New York Times, she recounts how working for Weinstein felt like chasing a carrot on a stick. “If you survived working with him, he could make your career,” she writes, but “if you refused his advances, he would do his best to ensure you never again worked in the movie industry.”
Chiu’s trauma stands out among the rest for what Weinstein did to target her specifically. In a particularly sickening section of the op-ed, Chiu writes, “Harvey Weinstein told me he liked Chinese girls. He liked them because they were discreet, he said — because they knew how to keep a secret.” Weinstein allegedly also told her, “just before he tried to rape [her], that he’d never had a Chinese girl.”
Chiu, unlike most of the other women who spoke out, is Asian. And that is imperative to consider when talking about her experience.
She’s not the only one who’s recently come forward as a sexual assault survivor, however. The previously unknown Emily Doe from the Brock Turner case — which garnered online outrage when Turner was only sentenced to six months in jail (of which he only ended up serving three) — went public this past month, revealing her identity to be Chanel Miller. She also happens to be half-Asian.
In a movement dominated by white women’s voices, two Asian women publicly coming forward with their stories in the span of a month is important. In fact, it is ignorant and dangerous to consider Chiu and Miller’s experiences without factoring in their race.
As history shows, the sexualization of women of color at the hands of white supremacy is nothing new. We see examples of this throughout the past and present: From enslaved Black women who survived institutionalized rape; to Native women today who experience the highest rates of sexual assault; to women who live under the shadow of a prolific sex-trafficking industry in Asian countries, survivors of color often suffer from racialized abuse, directed specifically towards them. For Asian women in Western countries, this abuse comes in the form of fetishization and the stereotype of the model minority myth, which makes them out to be docile and submissive. Instead of being viewed as people, Asian women are reduced to exotic sex objects for the white man to experiment with.
“For Asian women in Western countries, this abuse comes in the form of fetishization and the stereotype of the model minority myth, which makes them out to be docile and submissive.”
Unfortunately, Asian women’s experiences and their levels of oppression are often under-discussed in racial politics. Due to the model minority myth, Asians are often believed to hold a certain amount of privilege among other people of color. But the trauma of Asian women at the hands of men, particularly white men, should not be swept under the rug any longer.
The #MeToo movement has often been criticized for claiming the experiences of white women as universal. It is important to recognize that survivors of color have different experiences because they are a part of multiple marginalized groups, or what is often referred to as the intersection. Asian women, who are both racial and gender minorities, bring a unique voice to the ongoing conversation, and should not be ignored.