Asian Americans at Indiana University Bloomington are reeling after an 18-year-old student was stabbed on a city transit bus last Wednesday, allegedly because of her identity. But they don’t feel that they’ve received sufficient support.
Since the incident, a sense of shock has rippled through the school’s Asian community. The suspect, Billie Davis, told the Bloomington Police Department that she targeted the student, who survived the incident, for “being Chinese,” adding “it would be one less person to blow up our country,” court documents show. With fears around their safety amplified, Asian American students who spoke to NBC News said they’ve been disappointed in the response from both those outside the Asian community and the school administration, who made their first statements around the attack two days afterward.
“It’s very tiring for the Asian community to be doing all the work,” Audrey Lee, a senior, said. “I think a lot of Asian Americans internalize the feeling that if they do kind of speak out, when these situations happen, they’re going to be viewed as crazy or overreacting.”
Mara Yankey, senior media relations consultant for Indiana University, responded in an email that the victim’s request for privacy “limits what IU or other local officials can say publicly.”
“But it does not diminish our university’s commitment to provide support to them, their family, and — of course — to our students, faculty and staff,” she wrote.
The student, whose identity has not been released, was allegedly waiting for the bus door to open when a fellow passenger struck her repeatedly in the head before walking out, police said in a statement. While the suspect told police that she targeted the victim due to her race, Jeff Kehr, Monroe County chief deputy prosecuting attorney, previously said in an interview that the state does not have a hate crime law that would alter the severity of the charges.
The students say that…
Read the full article here
