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Up until 2020, Anna Wong had gone her entire adulthood in Los Angeles without ever facing blatantly racist abuse for being Asian. After COVID-19 hit, she was accosted twice in six months.
The first time, she was browsing an aisle in Bed Bath & Beyond when a white, 30-something woman suddenly yelled: “Six feet away from me, you Chinese witch!” A shaken Wong left the store, the woman still yelling after her. The second time, Wong was walking her dog when a passenger in a car — a young Hispanic man — screamed at her “Thanks for ruining the world,” followed by an ethnic slur.
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