#126 Jennifer Wang, National Asian Pacific Women's Forum

It should not take a pandemic and an uprising spurred by police violence against Black men and women to generate a national reckoning with racism, but here we are. If we want this moment to spark transformation, we need to crack open the full body of evidence about how non-White people are perceived and treated in America. And we need organizations like the National Asian Pacific American Women's Forum, that build power in communities made invisible by bias. Jennifer Wang, lawyer, strategist and one of the women at the helm of NAPAWF, is a power-builder. She recounts how stereotypes of privilege overshadow the lived experience of AAPI people, a non-monolithic community of over 50 ethnicities. And she explains why NAPAWF has taken on a singular mission, the reproductive rights of AAPI women and girls. Our conversation is particularly salient in a moment in which discrimination against AAPI women is rampant, from the White House to the streets. Jennifer shares what happened when her boss, Sung Yeon Choimorrow, was assaulted by hate speech while on a walk with her daughter. This is essential listening: painful, heartening and invigorating.