President Donald Trump has noticeably been altering his language in addressing COVID-19 in the media, which has included referring to the virus as the “Chinese virus.” A White House Official was also recently caught referring to the novel coronavirus as the “Kung Flu.” With anti-Asian racism being modeled by public figures, this kind of behaviour enables the general public to participate in this harmful rhetoric. Whether it be the vandalization of Buddhist temples in Montreal’s Chinatown, widespread verbal and physical harassment, or the spread of Asian stereotypes and stigmatization, associating COVID-19 specifically with Chinese people alludes to placing the burden of responsibility for the virus on them as well. Labelling the novel coronavirus as Chinese or associating it with East-Asian culture is explicitly racist in the simple notion that the virus is in no way Chinese. Although it originated in Wuhan, people of East-Asian descent are no more likely than any other person to carry or contract the virus. 

The anti-Asian rhetoric that is fueled by the discourse surrounding COVID-19 is no stranger to East-Asian communities. The racist stereotypes and stigmas surrounding Chinese traditions, such as enjoying exotic animals as culinary delicacies, are only magnified by the novel coronavirus. It is important to understand that criticizing these cultural traditions comes from a Eurocentric perspective. In the same ways that North Americans commonly consume pigs, cows, or other animals that are considered sacred or forbidden to consume in other countries, Chinese people consume certain animals as a part of their culture that many North Americans may not agree with. This difference in culinary preference and cultural norms has fueled anti-Asian stereotypes that often identify Chinese people as uncivilized, dirty, unhygienic, and savage. Due to the purported origin of COVID-19, these stereotypes have been amplified and projected onto many Chinese people in North America through acts of racism, xenophobia, and hate crimes. 

Being a Chinese individual in North America already comes with many challenges. Many Chinese-North Americans struggle with situating their racial identity, as it often straddles identifying as North American or as Chinese. I grew up as a third-generation Canadian citizen with a family that is culturally more tied to our North American roots than our Chinese roots. However, being a visible racial minority always came with a convoluted sense of not belonging or being able to identify with North American culture, despite not knowing anything different. As anti-Asian rhetoric surrounding COVID-19 becomes more prevalent, this feeling of visibility in the public arena is increasingly heightened. Asian-North Americans feel more culturally ostracized than ever when interacting with others in the social sphere, often finding ourselves on the receiving end of fear, anger, and blame. This kind of behaviour strips away the individual’s racial identity and assumes that every Asian-North American is a threat, which is problematic for a multitude of reasons. We now face a process of racialized Othering that is performed by dominant society, identifying all Asian-North Americans as Chinese (and therefore a threat), whilst failing to acknowledge the complexity and duality of our racialized identities. It does not go unnoticed when a stranger practices extra caution when faced with our presence, or looks at us in fear when we are wearing masks or clearing our throats. These subtle actions speak clearly, treating us as nothing more than the status of our visible racial minority and the negative connotations that come with it.  

This is a scary time for all of us, and it is especially difficult for Chinese individuals that are experiencing hate, xenophobia, and anti-Asian racism due to COVID-19. It is important to be mindful of the language we are using and consuming, and it is more important now than ever to practice compassion and empathy as a unified community. Many victims of xenophobia and anti-Asian racism are targeted based solely on appearing as a visible minority of East-Asian descent, meaning that anyone who is perceived to be of  East-Asian descent, many of whom are not Chinese, also experience similar challenges. 

The prevalence of North American xenophobia and anti-Asian racism that coincides with discourse surrounding the novel coronavirus has a profoundly negative impact on Asian-North American livelihoods. A significant part of practicing responsibility during COVID-19 should be practicing respect for East-Asian Americans and Canadians. Small, mundane gestures, such as smiling at someone on the sidewalk or ordering Chinese takeout and supporting local Asian businesses can help in making the world feel warmer for all of us. 

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Quebec’s Law 21 has been a site of controversy since it was first implemented in June 2019. The right-wing government has promoted it as legislation advancing secularism, as the third amendment of the Law states that “all persons have the right to parliamentary, governmental and judicial services as well as public services that are secular.” Law 21, also known as “An Act respecting the laicity of the State,” prohibits public employees from wearing religious symbols. This includes a ban on wearing hijabs, turbans, kippahs, and crucifixes while working. Public employees that were already employed at the time the bill was passed into law can continue to remain in their current positions; however, they lose protection if they decide to accept a promotion or take on a different position of employment.

In an email sent by SSMU on the morning of the 17th, the student union expressed that the restrictions of Law 21 “[show] that the government cares more about radical secularism than the freedom of workers from harassment by restricting their ability to transfer positions; that it cares more about imposing its view of what a Quebecker should look like than the current labour shortage of teachers; and that it does not realise, or perhaps does not care, that banning (visible) religious symbols does not affect everyone equally, but rather disproportionately affects racialized individuals such as Muslim women and people of the Jewish and Sikh faith.”

Strikers and demonstrators were an equal mix of Francophone and Anglophone individuals, picketing in both languages. Signs read “Welcome Refugees,” “You Can’t Have Capitalism Without Racism,” “Thank God We’re Secular,” “Don’t be a Jerk,” and “Be Better,” to name a few. Interspersed between speeches, strikers and demonstrators chanted “long live diversity” and “no exclusion.” The crowd was in high spirits despite the harsh weather conditions, they marched from McTavish to Saint-Laurent, where the group gathered outside the Ministry of Immigration and demanded that Law 21 be repealed. The Service de police de la Ville de Montréal (SPVM) closed off Saint-Laurent for the demonstration and were present for the duration of the protest.

Following the student demonstration against Law 21, McGill’s Arts Undergraduate Society hosted a General Assembly (GA) in Leacock 132 at 4:30 p.m. to discuss and vote on a follow-up strike in conjunction with other mass demonstrations and McGill’s Education Undergraduate Society, the Law Students’ Association, and the Medical Students’ Society. The strike would take place on Monday, January 20. However, with approximately 90 students in attendance, the strike GA did not reach quorum, and no motions could be put forward.

VP-External Adam Gwiazda-Amsel encouraged McGill students wishing to take a stand against Quebec’s Law 21 to support students striking in the Faculty of Education in their classroom picketing on January 20, 2020.

“As the protest went on and we got closer to the Ministry building, it seemed like the number of police surrounding us was increasing. It started with cars clearing the way but soon cops on bikes were on the sides and a large police van joined the cars following us. When a man began to harass protestors carrying a banner, the police didn’t seem to notice. We called out to them but were forced to deal with the man ourselves. It quickly became apparent that they weren’t there for our safety.” – Demonstrator

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It is important to acknowledge that although Madama Butterfly premiered in 1904, it continues to be celebrated and performed as a highly praised opera around the world, and the original narrative remains unchanged, despite its controversy. Therefore, its cultural impacts continue to shape contemporary ideologies regarding this fetish. There are also many social platforms that fetishize East Asian women more explicitly, including the normalization of culturally appropriating East Asian women by celebrities and in the music industry, and East Asian characters in television and film. In understanding and acknowledging how this fetish manifests itself in everyday consumerism, many microaggressions reveal themselves. Consider the sale of kimonos as lingerie in Victoria’s Secret, the song “Chun-Li” by Nicki Minaj, or the undeniable disturbingness of an entire category of pornography titled “Asian,” providing instantaneous access to a materialization of this fetish.

Madama Butterfly is an opera about a white American Naval officer named John Pinkerton, whose military duties led him to be stationed in Nagasaki, Japan. There, he meets Butterfly, an impoverished 15 year old Japanese geisha, whom he marries for her exoticism. Butterfly falls deeply in love with him, even converting to Christianity for their marriage. He leaves Japan and returns to America, where he soon marries a caucasian, American woman named Kate. Following his departure, Butterfly gives birth to their son, and painfully awaits Pinkerton’s return. Butterfly then receives a letter indicating that Pinkerton is planning to return; however, her excitement overwhelms her, and she does not finish reading the letter, missing the ending, which states that he is returning with his wife in order to adopt his son. When Pinkerton returns, he is informed of Butterfly’s excitement and cowardly decides that he cannot face her, leaving Kate to arrive alone and take his son on his behalf. Butterfly reluctantly agrees to let Kate adopt her son. Butterfly is heartbroken and, out of devastation, commits suicide.

East Asian women are often subjected to a projection of sexual desires rooted in Western ideals of the characteristics an East Asian woman should embody, and these ideals are enforced through popular art and culture in our society. East Asian women are often stereotyped to be sexually submissive, exotic, and traditionally domestic, and therefore a novelty to the white, cisgender men who choose to engage with them in sexual and romantic contexts. Furthermore, these beliefs imply that East Asian women are weak and subordinate as a result of their ethnicity, therefore requiring such perpetrators to be held to the internalized obligation of saving them from Oriental oppressors (also known as a white-saviour complex).

Butterfly is portrayed as a girl in need of a man such as Pinkerton to rescue her from her environment, which, in itself, stereotypes ideas of culture in East Asia. She is willing to convert to Christianity for her husband, and places the value of Pinkerton’s romantic
validation so highly that without it, in combination with her child having been taken, she deems her life as not worth living. It is evident that Pinkerton saw Butterfly as disposable, as the novelty of being with an East Asian woman wore off. The ideas presented in Madama Butterfly exemplify a white- saviour complex and negatively paint East Asian women as docile beings, therefore reinforcing such fetishizations through the cultural impact of the opera. Through analyzing contemporary and historical North American academia and literature surrounding feminism, it is evident that the narratives presented are often focusing specifically on a white, cisgender, feminist history that is rooted in colonialism. Although there continues to be progress in closing the gap on representation in activism, representation for East Asian women and demographic- specific issues falls short. The implications materialize in a variety of lived realities for East Asian women living in Western societies. Efforts to alleviate sexual violence towards women of colour are often ineffective due to the intersectionality of racism, sexism, and white-privilege. The intersection of race and gender holds a uniquity of experience that cannot be replicated or understood by those who are not similarly marginalized. These oppressions cannot be erased without the perspective of East Asian women; however, the intersectional experience of these women is often overlooked. The exclusion of East Asian women in academic discourse directly correlates to the inadequacies in addressing the issue of fetishization, as North American discourse predominantly surrounds white, cisgender women. Efforts for change are therefore useless, as the ideologies utilized are built upon foundations that cannot adequately reflect the experience of East Asian women.

The implications of white privilege in our society shape all individual experiences, and East Asian women are burdened by the intersection of an oppressed race and gender. In North American popular culture, positive and adequate representation is an inherently white privilege. In Madama Butterfly, Butterfly is portrayed negatively, therefore contributing to the harmful societal image of East Asian women. Furthermore, the narrative of Pinkerton marrying Butterfly for her exoticism, whilst secretly yearning for an American wife, is problematic in a multitude of ways. This narrative implies that East Asian women are a less viable marital option when compared to white women; however they are a perfectly acceptable temporary infatuation. This objectifies and degrades East Asian women, identifying them as a sexual novelty, while white women are portrayed as ideal wives. Furthermore, in contemporary Western popular culture and media, the lack of East Asian female representation further normalizes this fetishization, as there are few roles present to challenge or change this harmful archetype (optimistically assuming that the portrayal of these characters would be positive). These issues with representation in popular culture also have adverse effects on the psyche of these women; the internalization of these harmful stereotypes places a burden on East Asian women to fulfill this set of characteristics that are wrongly associated with them, enabling the possibility of a toxic self-fulfilling prophecy.

In order to understand the normalization of this fetish, it is important to acknowledge the colonial history of sexuality. The European bourgeois was unanimously comprised by white men, who subsequently shaped the structures of sex and sexuality that our contemporary North American ideologies are built upon. In doing so, the bourgeois implemented harmful ideologies through the interest of self-preservation in order to remain superior, and it is evident that the normalizing of this fetishization is accepted due to a history that was, and continues to be, shaped by white, cisgender men. Madama Butterfly perfectly captures the essence of this notion; it is a historical piece of artwork that includes both implicit and explicit forms of racism in its narrative, written by a white man.

In order to address the issue of the fetishization of East Asian women in North America, it is crucial that East Asian women are included positively in the public forums of academia, feminist discourse, and popular culture, in order to combat the deeply rooted history of white privilege in our society. Inarguably, the narrative of Madama Butterfly needs to be drastically altered or the opera needs to be permanently retired. The prolificacy of a historical work of art does not justify explicit racism and subsequent contributions to oppressive practices. White men and women need to act as allies in correcting this toxic culture of fetishization.

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Aiming to “provide information that is often harder to come across,” the Shag Shop’s goal is to “empower queer people to have informed sex that is relevant to their desires and bodies!” In an interview with The McGill Daily, the Shag Shop discussed the importance of these resources being accessible for queer people, and emphasized the various barriers they face in accessing adequate sexual education. “There is a lack of standardized and comprehensive sexual education in Quebec that includes queer experiences and bodies,” the Shag Shop said. They also elaborated on the lived differences that queer people experience regarding sex and sexuality, including the notion of having to “come out” as someone with a queer identity, and then subsequently having to navigate the various social expectations and pressures that are often present in heterosexual relationships. Further, the general stigmatization of discussing sex and sexuality is a barrier in itself; the Shag Shop spoke to how “just generally talking about sex openly, especially if one’s desire is not what is ‘expected’ of them, can be really awkward and hard for queer people, [making] accessing or engaging in sexual education challenging.”

To address these barriers, the event started with a discussion facilitated by Shag Shop co-ordinator Leigh Hoffman and co-facililtator Anna Walton on how to talk about sex and sexuality in inclusive and nonjudgemental ways. The organizers used gender neutral language throughout the event when discussing bodies and sex acts in order to ensure that the event was a safe space.

The workshop covered a variety of topics, including STIs, protection and barrier methods, sex toys, and lubricants. The language that was used in discussing these various topics was positive and inclusive, destigmatizing many of the traditionally taboo subjects. The event was also very interactive – the Shag Shop passed around some sex toys that they carry, as well as examples of various protection and barrier methods including a demonstration on how to convert a condom into a dental dam. Throughout the event, participants were free to ask questions to the presenters, and it was clear that this event offered many participants a safe space to pose questions facilitating discussions outside of the workshop’s agenda, opening the conversation to topics such as pornography or how hormones interact with birth control.

Queer sexual education is a crucial resource to be able to access, especially during McGill’s Queer History Month. Speaking to the gaps in sexual education that drove them to run the event, the Shag Shop posed the question: “how can folks explore their sexuality or engage in sex safely if they do not know what risks are associated with the kinds of sex they have, or have never encountered sex ed materials that include trans bodies?” The Shag Shop emphasized why a need exists for fundamental, queer oriented sex ed: “for so many reasons, folks may not have had access to informed, sex positive sexual education. Beyond having access to foundational sex ed, even fewer folks have had access to sexual education that specifically focuses on sex/sexualities of queer people.”

The Shag Shop provided a safe, accessible, and informative Queer Sexual Education event for their attendees that positively contributed to McGill’s Queer History Month. “In order to be best equipped to have happy, healthy, and consensual sex lives, we need access to information that is relevant, informed, and nonjudgemental about the types of sex that we have, the types of bodies we have, and the kinds of relationships we have!”

The Shag Shop and the Healthy Living Annex provided many resources for those who attended the event, including free condoms and access to sexual health services. These resources are inclusive and available for all McGill students. The Healthy Living Annex organizes student-run workshops on a variety of topics including sexual health, and the Shag Shop coordinator is always available to answer questions regarding sexual health. Furthermore, the McGill Shag Shop is a great sex-positive resource to access sex toys, condoms, lubricants, menstrual products, pregnancy tests, and more at low prices (www.mcgill.ca/shagshop). The Shag Shop also referenced scarleteen.com as a reliable additional resource for sexual health.

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