Margaret Cho has opened up about the rise of hate crimes against Asian Americans.
"I'm scared to go out," the bisexual comedian told Monet X Change and Lady Bunny in their new podcast series, Ebony & Irony. "As an older Asian woman, it's actually like, it's hard out there for people like me. It's very much like being the target."
Specifically, Bunny asked Cho about the string of attacks against San Francisco's Asian community in the past year, several of which involved Black attackers. Cho, a San Francisco narrative, clarified that the primary perpetrator in these crimes was white supremacy.
"Even though that there are instances of Black-on-Asian violence, it's still because of white supremacy because we're put together from this idea of the myth of the 'model minority,'" Cho told the drag performers. "And that statement is such a damaging one ... because it makes it seem like other minorities are not the model. And so it pits us against each other as if our only value is our relationship to the white patriarchy."
While Cho also addressed comedy in the interview, which dropped Friday, the newly launched drag podcast, from the Starburns Audio network, also aims to address serious issues. "We're not here to 'Yass, Queen!' our guests," Bunny said in a statement. "We ask hard-hitting questions so that different viewpoints are expressed."
The interview comes in the wake of the Atlanta spa shootings in which eight people were killed; six of the victims were Asian women.
Listen to a clip from Ebony & Irony below. And catch the full episode today at Apple podcasts; new interviews drop every Friday.
