Merlin Lu, the young Asian American University of Illinois-Chicago senior who burned a cross in Chicago’s Grant Park, offered a puzzling defense: “My protest had nothing to do with race. Nothing to do with gender.”
He went on to say that though he knew a burning cross was a charged symbol, he didn’t understand its affiliation with the Ku Klux Klan (KKK). He claimed he knew nothing of that historical context. Assuming he is being honest, this raises a troubling question: What does this say about America’s education system?
Raven Schwam-Curtis, an academic turned popular content creator and public intellectual (@ravenreveals), believes that if Lu is being genuine, “this whole incident shows that we can’t build solidarity between Black and Asian people if we don’t understand each other’s histories.”
Modern tensions
And right now, I don’t know too many brothers and sisters even thinking about Black-Asian solidarity amid the Natasha doll madness, and all the anti-Black hate coming from a loud Asian-American online community.
That came on the heels of the murder of 14-year-old Cyrus Carmack-Belton by convenience store owner, Rick Chow. Chow shot Carmack-Belton in the back, after falsely accusing the child of theft, and was declared not guilty (due to “self-defense”) even though Chow shot a child fleeing, fearing for his life.
The result: Blackfolk nationally called for a boycott of all Asian-owned and run businesses. Some in the Asian community used that call to double and triple down on the anti-Black rhetoric. And their businesses are feeling the economic pain.
So, why talk about the history of Blackfolk and Asian folk working together now?
Schwam-Curtis, who spent over six years at Cornell University and Northwestern University researching Afro-Asian solidarity and coalition building, notes that these shared histories are rarely taught unless individuals actively seek them out. And she says without saying that knowledge of this past can lead to a more respectful future between the two peoples.
Forgotten legacies
In a recent IG post, Schwam-Curtis listed several historical examples of Black and Asian coalition work, including the group of Chinese Americans in San Francisco in 1969 who founded the Red Guard after being inspired by the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense. She discussed legendary activist Yuri Kochiyama, and her work with Malcolm X. The two considered each other comrades in the struggle against U.S. racism and imperialism.
Schwam-Curtis then mentioned someone I had the honor of meeting when I lived in Detroit—Grace Lee Boggs, an activist legend in Motown, where Malcolm X began his NOI ministry. In 1970, Boggs founded the Asian Political Alliance in Detroit and was close friends with Trinidadian historian CLR James and Rev. Albert B. Cleage Jr., who is known in theological circles as the “Father of Black Liberation Theology.”
Decades earlier, in 1940s San Francisco, while interim-pastoring for the illustrious Rev. Dr. Howard Thurman, Cleage called his congregation to stand and fight for Asian Americans who were being rounded up and forced into internment camps during WWII.
Lost in translation
If Lu was completely unaware of the connection between burning crosses and the KKK, it’s highly unlikely he knew about these historical moments of alliance. Yet, the injustice he did recognize moved him to act.
Describing his Grant Park actions, Lu stated, “I put a red hat [on the cross] to signify… the Make America Great Again hat.”
Lu intended the cross-burning as a protest against white Christian nationalism and the MAGA movement. However, his message was lost in translation by using a generational symbol of anti-Black terror perpetrated by white domestic terrorists. As Schwam-Curtis noted, “Those who don’t know their history are doomed to repeat it, but more often are doomed to distort it; and that is dangerous in a whole different way.”
Whitewashed education dangers
Lu’s formal education failed to teach him that the KKK used the burning cross as a weapon of psychological terror against Black people. He never learned that it served as a warning of impending violence, a tool to force Black families out of white neighborhoods, or that the white Christian church was often ground zero for Klan organizing.
The U.S. education system has historically done a masterful job of whitewashing history, which makes current GOP efforts to outlaw Black history even more insane. Still, Lu managed to develop a worldview that opposed the MAGA movement, even without understanding the nation’s deep foundations of anti-Blackness.
Most people in the U.S.—whether Asian, Latino, Arab, white, or Black—learn very little about Black history. Consequently, they miss out on the rich history of cross-racial solidarity between Black communities and other marginalized groups, including Indigenous Americans, Palestinians, LGBTQ+ activists, and Asian Americans.
Dismantling division
Would anti-Blackness, so easily accepted and practiced by so many, even exist had they grown up learning about the coalition and solidarity work Blackfolk have engaged in with darn near everybody? Probably. Unfortunately.
To paraphrase Rick James, “Anti-Blackness is a helluva drug.” And the way American society is set up, countless immigrants from countless lands pick up on America’s context clues and realize that siding with anti-Blackness is the most direct pathway to “potential” acceptance by white society.
But ignorance is just as damaging. Being oblivious to the history of solidarity work with Blackfolk is one thing. But remaining ignorant of this land’s history of using its mistreatment of Blackfolk as a stepping stone to abusing and removing rights from others is dangerous too.
As thought leader Lurie Daniel Favors recently stated, “When Black people get rights, everyone gets rights. When Black people have their rights taken away, it creates a pathway for everyone else to lose those rights.”
We see it happening now. Communities that voted in 2024 for a proven white nationalist over an over-qualified sister have been catching hell (and begging Blackfolk for help). I’d like to think that if these tribes knew of their histories of justice work with Blackfolk, it’d be easier to find common ground and work towards common solutions. But we Blackfolk can’t hold our breath, waiting to find out.
