The besea.n story

Written by Amy Phung

The year is 2020, house-ridden by the pandemic and thirsting for a drop of good news amongst the ‘is it 2021 yet?’ memes, the prolific and unnecessary use of East and South East Asians (ESEA) in headline imagery for COVID-19 news articles begins seeping insidiously into the public consciousness. It does not go unnoticed.

Plenty of us are disgruntled, some of us - isolated and unknown to each other - email various publications to complain. The response of Assistant Readers' Editor David Whitfield at The Guardian echoes around our heads:

'Your statement about using solely East and South East Asians in articles relating to COVID-19 in The Guardian is, frankly, wrong.'

Karlie Wu

The initial rising anger is followed by the quick realisation that, as members of the ESEA diaspora, we’ve faced this type of response before, that we’re disillusioned and overreacting. What he doesn’t realise is that with a rising awareness around systemic racism, we can objectively recognise the counter-arguments as just deflection tactics and ignorance. Enough is enough. Viv Yau heads to change.org - 'Stop Depicting East and Southeast Asians in Coronavirus-related Media', and promotes the petition on Instagram.

With the verve of a toddler creating their first collage but none of the flair, Whitfield issues his cut and paste responses back to Kai, Amy and Karlie, who message Viv to reveal their identical responses received back from The Guardian. With hardly a whiff of effort to address our individual concerns, Whitfield dismisses the idea that the pervasive use of ESEAs in COVID-19 news imagery is widespread across BBC, Sky News, ITV News, Metro and The Daily Mail, just to name a few.

The use of 'Chinese Virus' amongst world leaders and organisations across the world is having a devastating impact on the community. Bat soup and Kung Flu jokes run rampant across the internet, slowly brewing a toxic concoction of animosity and prejudice.

Viv Yau

Far away in Senegal, Mai-Anh is overwrought by the dismissive attitude of The Guardian. Her only solace, a glass of red, she transmits her frustration on Instagram, where out of the blue, a northern lass reaches out. Soon we discover that individually we are not alone in fighting the same cause, Amy suggests joining forces and a group is set up. A taskforce with Karlie in Scotland, Viv & Charley in the North West, and Kai and Amy in London.

Amy Phung

We continue to pressure news media and push the petition hard, gaining support from influencers and celebrities. Building our momentum through Instagram messages, we finally move the conversation somewhere more comfortable - WhatsApp. Armed with Google Docs, spreadsheets and a shared love of karaoke, we know things are getting serious.

Mai-Anh Peterson

Using our backgrounds in copywriting, design, marketing, education and project management, we produce social media posts to reach as many allies as possible. As the signatures rise, so does our courage to raise up the voices of so many who have been previously silenced. At over 3,000 signatories, the petition comes to the attention of Sarah Owen, MP for Luton North. As someone of East Asian descent, she is familiar with the unheard cries of ESEAs and addresses Victoria Atkins MP, Minister for Safeguarding, about the petition in Parliament. Slowly, we are breaking through and rushing towards 10k signatures on the petition, we continue to negotiate with newspapers about the need to address the biased representation of ESEAs in their stories. Empty promises are made to be 'more sensitive and culturally aware' but the same offence keeps happening.

Kai

Speeding past the 10k mark, we encounter further reports of violent racist abuse against ESEA communities, which has tripled since the start of the pandemic, and we realise that fairer and broad representation of ESEAs cannot wait. We want to build on the momentum of an increasingly vocal, diverse and prolific community and create a positive space for legacy. As newspaper and media outlets dig in their heels to stand by their stagnant policies, the six women behind the petition decide to take matters into their own hands, and Britain’s East and South East Asian Network, conveniently acronymed to besea.n, is born.

Charley Wong

Like most long-distance relationships, we not only united by the same passions, in our case, a drive for social justice, equity and education, but also by a love for Hamilton, uncontrollable urges to burst into song, and late night conversations on the questionable folklore remedies our Asian parents used to give us. In this LDR we are hopelessly committed and we extend that commitment to besea.n, where we want all ESEA to share in our celebration and love of our amazing community.