I Committed a Hate Crime
It’s taken me over twenty years to realize that what my friends and I saw as a moment of wild teenage hi-jinx was, in fact, a hate crime against Mormons. What did we know about Mormons? Nothing. We were sixteen. All we knew was that they dressed strange, had multiple wives and very occasionally cycled their bikes through our suburban streets.
Who were we? Bored teenagers with a driver’s license. We had just picked up some bubble tea and were driving aimlessly down familiar streets when we saw them: The thing that didn’t belong. Bicycles? White people? Wouldn’t it be hilarious if we shot our boba at them through our thick, tapioca ball launching dart straws? Yes. That would be funny. That would be a crazy story to tell! That’d be a tale I could regale partygoers with years later as evidence of my lighthearted, silly and fun youth.
It was probably my idea. I was always desperate to lead, to push my flock to new adrenaline pumping heights. As my reliable partner in crime pulled her VW Golf alongside their bicycles I leaned out my passenger window and shot them both directly in back of their white, starched, collared shirts. Direct hit. My cowardly self quickly turned and looked straight out of the windshield to avoid the look on their faces while commanding my ride or die, “Go go go!” They probably heard our hysterical laughter as the car peeled away. We didn’t spare a second thought for them. The attack was all about us and how wild and crazy it made us feel. We had just pulled a Jackass level prank and our biggest concern was: Why didn’t we have our own MTV show?
Today I went for dinner with my second generation Taiwanese American friend. She is a glasses wearing, TV binge watching, badass boss lady who runs her own successful business. In light of the recent rise in hate crimes against the Asian American Pacific Islander, AAPI, community I asked if she had ever experienced racism where she lives in San Diego. She informed me that a month ago a McDonald’s cup full of water was thrown at her by a car of teenagers who shouted out, “Bitch!” as they drove off. When she posted about the incident in a neighborhood forum she discovered that several other Asian women had been attacked in the same way. She was the only victim who had seen the attacker’s faces, so she filed a police report and went through a photo line-up to identify them. The police said that the incident did not qualify as a hate crime because the teens did not shout anything racist. That’s bullshit.
My heart breaks for my friend. She cried after the attack. My poor, strong, independent, sweet, generous, caring friend who was assaulted in broad daylight because of the way she looked. Those poor, young, innocent, hard working boys on bicycles who were attacked while riding through unfamiliar streets in hopes of saving people from eternal damnation. I’m so sorry for what I did. My friend did not deserve what happened to her and neither did they.
Is there a difference between what my friends and I did and what those San Diego teens did? My friends and I didn’t drive around town searching for Mormons to launch boba at because we blamed them for a pandemic or because we hated their religion. We attacked them on a whim because we were bored, ignorant and cruel. The teenagers who attacked my friend also attacked several other Asian women during a time period of increased in incidents of hate crime against the AAPI community. They may have shouted “bitch”, but what they meant was “we blame everyone who looks Asian for the pandemic and are misdirecting our anger for our shitty lives out on you.”
I don’t know if the differences in our intentions is meaningful, or if it’s just something I placate myself with when faced with the ugly truth that my friend was a victim of a hate crime and I was once the perpetrator of one.
Photo by El Salanzo on Unsplash
