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Recently I read a book about the Chinese community in and around Sacramento. Many of them huddled in smaller, less urban areas because of anti-Chinese violence in San Francisco Chinatown; as well as to flee white supremacists who killed them, at various points throughout the late 19th and early 20th century.
That gives me more perspectives when I read stories like these.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/may/02/oldest-chinese-american-restaurant-chicago-cafe
More info on places like Locke https://sfstandard.com/2022/09/14/journeys-locke-in-the-sacramento-delta-is-the-rural-chinatown-youve-never-heard-of/
Some people really like to portray this part of America as a paradise for racial and sexual minorities, but I think that belief hampers any actual growth in these areas.
In the late 1800s, Antioch had a series of tunnels connecting their Chinatown to different areas because Chinese people were not allowed to walk above ground after sunset.
Then in 1876 they burned it all down
https://www.sfgate.com/sfhistory/article/antioch-race-riot-chinatown-arson-california-16067820.php
I say this because when I speak of having experienced anti-Chinese attacks in San Francisco, or my queer friends being discriminated against in different ways up and down the Bay Area, cis straight white people often say, what, here? I thought we don’t have that stuff here??
I don’t even know where to begin, other than to cry / laugh
At the same time I’m also very skeptical of many of the Stop Asian Hate people. I feel like many of them don’t know how to separate their legitimate feelings of having been targeted and attacked especially through early Covid, from the reactionary politics sweeping ‘liberal cities’ right now. The one that says put more people in prison, punish everyone. It’s a weird time out here
(a lesbian couple friend experienced this in palo alto, home of stanford... in 2023: post office staff refused to work with them for passport renewals for baby until 'the father' can show up) ahahahhaha
we may not have codified bigotry, but it doesn't mean it isn't here
@skinnylatte San Jose, too. Racists burned down the SJ Chinatown in 1887, forcing them out. A lot ended up in LA.
This is on-brand for St. Louis. 
@fuzzychef @skinnylatte yeah I used to live right next to that area and it was great. Hearing that now recent news made me sad
@grumpasaurus @fuzzychef @skinnylatte Thanks for the thread and y'alls contributions! I've learned more. Truckee in California chased the Chinese out of town with violence. It became the "Truckee Method."
https://www.themountainmessenger.org/article/ghosts-of-sierrans-past-truckees-chinatown
@skinnylatte I understand Portland Chinatown had tunnels for similar reasons. I had no idea about Antioch.
@skinnylatte thank you again for crystallizing so many feelings I've had while *gestures around* into cogent words
The Grove This.
Esp as the loudest of the StopAsianHate group (wait, legit ask too, is SAH still a thing? I usually refer to it as like, a dead movement… from the start imho, but that’s just me being spicy) were absolutely not the ones facing the worst of the anti-Asian harm caused by COVID…
@thedandeliongrove i'm also deeply skeptical of how much 'asian' they include in that category. i've certainly seen a lot of discrimination towards southeast and south asians in that movement, which makes me meh about it
This exactly is what I remember from watching SAH from TikTok during 2020/2021.
Esp as it absolutely galvanized reactionary Han Chineseness, and heard lots about the tea of some Han Chinese “activists” absolutely shouting down other non-Han Asians to, yeah, speedrun cooptation to try to become celeb activists 
@thedandeliongrove lol they were absolutely shouting down han chinese filipinos and vietnmaese people as well. a lot of weird local sf politics now is around 'getting the conservative pro-police chinese american vote' ugh
@skinnylatte oof, yeah I feel that and appreciate the noting of that; def my own journey with SAH and unpacking Han Chinese politics is seeing the milieu I’m from (Mandarin Speaking Han Chinese Mainlander Professional-Managerial Immigrants) just… really double and triple down on reactionary tales of victimization.
So many sob stories of smelly lunchboxes, name calling, and failed admissions… and yeah, the unmasking of their desire to shout over the BLM uprisings
@thedandeliongrove i'm suspicious of any han chinese N american identity that doesn't also investigate its own anti-Blackness and classism. without that, everyone just ends up becoming simu 'white women won't date me but i'm hot' liu. lol
@skinnylatte OMG P MUCH.
And same lol XD
Also… esp being particularly androgynous-genderfuck presenting, just gonna say it.
The Chinese entities I’ve met who I am certain have done none of that work and absolutely have a cloud of reactionary-fash particles surrounding them…
They always look at me like I’m a fucking fish in a market XD instant turn off to any sort of allegiance XD
Gods, also sounds similar to the bullshit in Seattle too…
Not in tune with Seattle electoralism, but the conservative cop loving Chinese absolutely are a maddening thread across the Sound too…
@skinnylatte
I know you are sharing painful experiences, but your thread reminded me of an old and funny/bitter sketch that you might not know and might like.
@hananc ahaha i've seen that. excellent!
@skinnylatte I’m sorry. This is bullshit
@skinnylatte I was talking about Chinese food with a Chinese colleague of mine. He told me that he feels that a lot of the Chinese food in the Netherlands has stagnated to the period that the person running the restaurant emigrated. He was saying, and I'm loosely paraphrasing, that while Chinese cuisine has changed over time that the food he sees in the Netherlands is food that his parents or grandparents ate and not really the food that his generation eats
@webhat yep that is totally true. i feel that of chinese food in the diaspora everywhere (bay area for example has food very specific to the toisan food of the szeyap area in pearl river delta, but that's stayed in that time for 200 years)... which is why i don't personally love a lot of it.
recent chinese immigrants to NL know to go to.. Düsseldorf!
personally i see more references to my food in thai-chinese cooking, than in say, stuff normally called chinese food
https://restofworld.org/2023/xiaohongshu-users-make-dusseldorf-destination/
@skinnylatte thanks, I'll share that with my friend
@skinnylatte
Same thing with the East Coast, or any coast or "blue" state. "The East Coast isn't full of racists," makes me think "...my brother in Christ, Boston exists."
Prejudice and tribalism is a thing everywhere, unfortunately. Bias doesn't have a zip code.
Maybe some are more open about it 
I do wish we, as a society, had a better gasp of our history. I definitely learn something about our history that surprises me on a regular basis...or doesn't surprise me even when I wish it would.