Thread by @NBCNews

While police say the suspect in the Atlanta shootings denied having racial motivations, experts and activists alike say it's nearly impossible to divorce race from the discourse, given the historical fetishization of Asian women.

nbcnews.to/3c0dJmw

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"Saying that this violence is not racially motivated is part of a related history of the denial of racism in the Asian American experience," Catherine Ceniza Choy, a professor of ethnic studies at the University of California, Berkeley, says. (2/7)

21% to 55% of Asian women in the U.S. report having experienced intimate physical and/or sexual violence during their lifetimes, according to the Asian Pacific Institute on Gender Based Violence. (3/7)

Many attacks and sexual misconduct can be traced to the rampant perpetuation of stereotypes around Asian women as exotic, hypersexualized, and submissive, Sung Yeon Choimorrow, executive director of the nonprofit National Asian Pacific American Women's Forum, says. (4/7)

The beliefs have been shaped by legal code, America's history of imperialism, and popular culture, historian Ellen Wu says. (5/7)

Advocates are calling for public safety nets and support for families, as well as for more public leaders to speak out against violence, particularly in Georgia. (6/7)

"People living in that community and, frankly, American women across the country are living this trauma in some ways. There's the idea that 'this could have been me,'" Choimorrow says.

Full story by @kimmythepooh: nbcnews.to/3c0dJmw

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