Lisa Ling Rallies Demonstrators at L.A. Koreatown March

Hundreds gathered in Los Angeles’ Koreatown neighborhood to march in support of the #StopAsianHate movement. Among them was journalist Lisa Ling.

“We have been rounded up and put in camps,” Ling said during the unity rally, which took place at the Normandie Avenue and Olympic Boulevard intersection. “We have been attacked, and we have been killed. But something so powerful is happening right now.”

The unity rally was part of the National Day of Action in support of #StopAsianHate. It was just one of many across both Los Angeles and the country over the last two days.

“We are part of this incredible tapestry with stories and histories from every corner of the globe. And if one thread comes loose we can all fall apart. So we have to protect each other,” Ling urged.

In Los Angeles alone, anti-Asian crimes saw a 114% increase just from 2019 to 2020. It’s not a new phenomenon for the city. The original wave of Yellow Peril instigated the Chinese Massacre in 1871, in which a mob lynched and killed over a dozen Chinese men and boys. More recently, as reported by NBC, two men attacked Air Force veteran Denny Kim, who said they threatened to kill him and called him racial slurs. The 27-year-old was left with a black eye and fractured nose.

Saturday’s Koreatown rally effused a sense of unity, providing much needed optimism and solidarity. Ling’s speech rallied spirits and bestowed everyone with an important task.

“Find someone you don’t know in this crowd and look them in the eyes and say, ‘I will protect you. Please protect me,’” she said. “There are some street vendors who are here along the side, please say to them, ‘I will protect you.’ This way guys, this is the way. If we keep our threads, if we maintain these threads and make sure they are unbroken, we can get past all of this and really rise up together to Stop Asian Hate and to stop all hate.”