The article talks about the stereotypical model minority and what it means to the group of minorities who are often labelled as the “model minority”. First off, what does it mean to be model minority? What’s the criteria for it? A model minority is referred to as the more successful subordinate group, more like the higher middle class and lower first class part of a socioeconomic hierarchy. Many Asian Americans fall under this group, often being coined with the term ‘model minority’. This may sound like a compliment, since they’re basically setting an example for the other minority groups–being referred to as a model for others and whatnot, but not everybody likes labels.

There’s still racism and discrimination going on around the world, so when Asian Americans are referred to as the ‘Model Minority’, it creates more of a divergence within the minority groups, even though we’re all minorities. The reasons why this label is so dangerous is because of the expectations it creates for other groups, the emerged estrangement from the other groups, and the systemic racism it causes. Since this term is ok’d by the racists themselves, they feel it’s okay to add more on top of the term model minority. Since the coronavirus first arrived in the US, many xenophobes have denominated the virus as the ‘Chinese virus’ or the ‘chink virus’ as it was rumored to have started in Wuhan, China and brought to the US by Chinese people. This has led to numerous harassment cases by ignorant people discriminating against Asian Americans, blaming them for the virus and calling them the embodiment of this virus.

Nguyen later says “the end of Asian Americans only happens with the end of racism and capitalism.”, which is understandable because capitalism is one of the root of racism. The term ‘Asian Americans’ will always coincide with capitalism and racism, and until the culmination us minorities won’t be referred to as just ‘Americans’.