Sophia Chang

[GeneChing]

You also talk about Chris Lighty at various points in the memoir. He was someone that became one of your most valuable friends, giving you the gift of sanctuary during tough times. Can you speak on his contributions to hip-hop and what Lighty-isms you kept with you since his passing?

Chris Lighty, God rest his soul, yes, was one of my closest friends. Chris Lighty was my Rock of Gibraltar, he was my shelter to the storm. He was my Kevlar. Knowing that I walk with Chris Lighty figuratively, meant that I walked with this shield of imperviousness.

To his contributions to hip-hop, Chris came up carrying crates for the legendary DJ Red Alert. Way back in the day like the mid-’80s. And the thing about Chris is he was so smart, and he was so entrepreneurial. He was just a hustler to the core. And he grew up doing what he does with The Violators, grew up on the streets. He was no stranger to danger. He had really good instincts on people.

I remember I would go see Chris at his Violator office, and he’s a mogul, and he’s sitting at the top of the world and he’s managing the biggest talents in the world, and he would stop everything to listen to DJ Scratch -- another dear friend of mine -- to DJ Scratch’s radio show on WBLS because it was really important for him to listen to that show.

Chris was hip-hop in a way that I never will be. And I’m not diminishing myself, it was just him. He was from the South Bronx, he grew up there. I say in my memoir, the rise of Chris Lighty mirrors the rise of hip-hop. From the projects of the South Bronx and the turntables being plugged into a streetlamp to becoming this global cultural figure. And he was there. He was there for every one of those transitions.

After going through the deaths of ODB and Lighty, you talk about mental health, telling people if you see signs of your friend suffering, go ahead and speak up. A lot of people in the music industry have been open about their mental health issues as a way to destigmatize the shame from having depression or addiction. Personally, do you think this is a good direction we are heading towards?

My answer to that is yes -- but we need much more conversation around it. I was supposed to do a panel back in March with my friend Danielle Belton, the editor-in-chief of The Root. And it was going to be me, her, a mental health professional, and it was going to be RZA and Joey Bada$$. And the topic was, Mental Health, Substance Abuse, and Suicide in Hip-Hop. Because of my personal losses, I wanted to crack open this conversation because it’s just not discussed. For us, too. Asians, we don’t talk about mental health. It’s stigmatized. It’s seen as a weakness, as opposed to an illness, which it is. It’s an actual illness.

When I was coming up in hip-hop during what we call the golden era, people may of talked about smoking weed, but they didn’t talk about much else. I never saw anybody doing anything more than smoking weed. Maybe they were, but they sure as hell didn’t do it around me. But now, you have a bunch of really popular artists bragging about drinking lean, taking xans, percs, oxy. Those are prescription opioids. And you don’t have to be very educated to understand that prescription opioids is an issue. There’s an epidemic of overdoses all across the country. Every race. Every sector.

To me, hip-hop is the biggest genre in this country. For the biggest artists in the biggest genre to essentially brag about a lifestyle where they’re slowly killing themselves... Make no doubt about it. As far as I know, people don’t casually take prescription opioids. Oh, you know, every once in a while, I put the kids to bed and I have a glass of Rosé. You don’t casually take opioids. So it’s one of two things: Either they’re lying about it, which is terrible because it still means they’re setting an example. Or, they’re not lying about it, and those boys are addicted. And we will continue to lose talent if we don’t open up the conversation.

Lastly, what is the biggest challenge of being an artist manager?

I think the biggest challenge is that it is largely a thankless job. You have to have the constitution to just keep going at it, and you often don’t get the recognition you deserve because artists are -- and this is partially them, but it is also part of the culture that we created -- they are largely narcissists. And it’s a matter of saying, "I’m going to do this despite the fact I’m not really getting the recognition and the thanks that I wish." So I would say that’s the biggest emotional challenge. And maybe some people don’t care about that. I know that I care about it. The other thing is you’re constantly cajoling. Cajoling, cajoling, cajoling, all the time.

There’s a part in the memoir where you talk about GZA saying, “We did it,” giving you your props and validation for your work.

Holy ****! Yeah, but the GZA is one in a million, for real. I would also say I have to shout-out Joey Bada$$. He was recently on the radio with Angie Martinez and the RZA. And she asked, "How did you guys meet?" And he said, "Shout out to Sophia Chang, she introduced us. And she’s been instrumental in my career." That was stunning. Stunning.

Our interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

shoot. i forgot our forum censors ***** again.

[GeneChing]

The First Asian Woman In Hip Hop Is Ready To Tell Her Life Story
By ERIN KELLY
Sept 26, 2019


Dana Scruggs

Sophia Chang is a living legend. At 54, her storied resume starts in the music business in 1980s New York City — a career that led her to become the first Asian woman in hip hop, ultimately becoming manager for members of the legendary Wu-Tang Clan — but that's not where her story ends. That union put Chang's life on a path that led her to a Shaolin monk who would become her partner, a journey into motherhood, and defining shifts that would force her to decide what kind of woman she wanted to be — and she's finally ready to tell her story.

In her Audible Original by Hello Sunshine, The Baddest ***** In The Room, Chang shares the intimate details of how she's lived a life full of dismantling biases about what it means to be an Asian woman. From the board rooms of some of hip hop's most powerful record labels, to a defining journey to the Wudang mountains, The Baddest ***** In The Room inspires anyone who’s ever struggled with defining their limits.

To give Bustle readers a taste of everything The Baddest ***** In The Room has to offer, we partnered with Audible to talk to Chang about all things fearless — from diving back into the dating scene in her 50s, to changing careers, to shattering one stereotype after the next.

You mention that it wasn’t until you were 50 that you were ready to tell your story. Why is now the right time?

I wasn’t ready before I turned 50. I spent my entire 30-year career helping remarkably talented men tell their stories and it simply didn’t occur to me that mine was worth telling. That changed when I started working at [a music group] in 2014 and took on a number of young female mentees, and then the idea crystallized three years later when I participated in [a film program]. A film I was producing was chosen to be part of this event that gives you a very limited time to pitch your project to buyers.

I narrowed my resume to 60 seconds and almost every time the buyer said, "Now that’s the movie I want to see!" Although I have never fulfilled the Model Minority Myth — that I, as an Asian Canadian am not supposed to stand out, play by the rules, never upset the apple cart — I did internalize it to the point of not wanting to be in the spotlight. Obviously, that’s changed.


Dana Scruggs

In The Baddest ***** In The Room, you discuss that you admired how one of your clients valued himself while negotiating. Looking back, what did being in this job teach you about valuing yourself?

Managing [a prominent hip hop artist] taught me to be truly in service of the artist, whereas doing A&R — being the talent scout who helped get an album made and shepherd it through the system — you are beholden to the label as its employee. Working with [that artist] elevated my negotiating game. He once said to me "Soph, you’ve gotta get me more money." I realized that the fact that I don’t care that much about money is irrelevant because, again, I am in the service of my client. So I learned how to read contracts and negotiate, and now I’m an animal at it and I love the art of the deal.

You write that you were warned not to sleep with artists or you’d be “done" in the music business. How did that make you feel at the time? Would you react the same way today?

It enraged me then, as it does now. It’s all about patriarchy, isn’t it? It’s the whole pimp/ho binary: A man is lauded, high-fived, and patted on the back for sleeping with a bunch of women, but women are shamed and branded with the scarlet letter. If someone told me that now, I would say "suck a d*ck," because I can sleep with anyone that I want and that by doing so, I am neither a lesser nor greater woman.

How did you know that it was time to move on to other career opportunities?

If you read my [resume], you’d be stunned by the number of jobs in different sectors that I’ve had. I was never very conflicted about leaving one job and taking on another, even if I knew nothing about it. Partly because I had the privilege of a middle-class safety net, partly because, again, my confidence. If I f*cked up or got canned, I always knew that there would be another hustle for me. Other than with my ex, I never attached my identity too tenaciously to any one position. I think that’s a potential recipe for disaster — what happens if you get fired? Are you lost because you no longer feel whole? No, thank you.

What was your motivation for beginning kung fu training?

I never had to work out to stay thin, thanks to my mother’s hummingbird metabolism, but as I neared 30, I wanted to be more fit so I started going to the gym, which I found so boring. Then I met Wu-Tang Clan and they introduced me to kung fu flicks and the beauty of Asian culture in general, which I had rejected from childhood. I decided I wanted to start to train.

I had no idea that training would lead to me being at my strongest at 54 and the man I would partner with in business and life and parenthood. That’s a profound gift and I owe that to the Clan!


Dana Scruggs

How did your priorities change when you became a mom?

My priorities changed completely as a mother. The second I gave birth I knew two things with utter certainty: That I would die for my child in an instant, and that I would kill for my child just as quickly. My child’s safety is my primal and primary concern such that every single move I make is for them — from the jobs I take to where we live to the men I date.

What’s your relationship with hip hop like today?

I don’t have a relationship with current hip hop. As a 54-year-old mother, I think it would be weird if I said that the music of today is the soundtrack to my life. It doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy certain songs and artists, but the music doesn’t speak to me the way it used to. To be clear, that’s neither a judgment nor indictment of the music; I simply got too old for it. In my eyes, it’s the most youth-centered genre of music: it’s made by the young, about the young, for the young. My 17-year-old daughter and 19-year-old son are total hip hop heads, thank god, and they tell me anything I need to know. I love and respect the culture because it gave me so much, but it’s no longer the music I listen to on the daily.

I'm curious: What's it been like to dive back into the dating scene in your 50s?

I was 42 when I left my ex and hadn’t been single since I was 30, which was in 1995. Well, guess what happened in the meantime? The internet and smartphones. When I emerged from that relationship I felt like ... "Wait, you send pictures of what, how?" But let me tell you, once I crossed that line, I was an instant pro.

What's next for Sophia Chang?

Well, at 54 I have a new career: I’m an author. I have more books in me for sure. I also have a number of TV shows in development, one that’s a scripted project about me. I will be a showrunner one day and make sure that my Asian sisters and brothers are brought into the writers’ rooms and we are properly represented.

So: What's the secret to becoming the baddest b*tch in the room?

I don’t know that there’s a secret to becoming the baddest b*tch in the room. What I do know is that it starts by self-examination and self-celebration. I hope my memoir inspires women to mine their power and see their beauty. It’s not only the amazing aggregate of our qualities that makes us the baddest b*tch in the room, it’s also claiming it. I know that’s hard, but more of us need to get there if we’re going to rule the world, right?



Courtesy of Audible
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

This post is sponsored by Audible.

Sophia's impact on Shaolin and pop culture was fascinating. I'm glad she's getting some spotlight now.

[GeneChing]

Sophia Chang — Woman Who Helped Guide the Career of the Wu-Tang Clan, Q-Tip & More — is Finally Telling Her Story [Interview]
POSTED BY DIMAS SANFIORENZO 19 HOURS AGO


Photo Credit: Dana Scruggs

We sat down with industry veteran Sophia Chang, who just released her memoir The Baddest ***** in the Room. She talked about her career, public speaking, her relationship with Chris Lighty, and imagining Wu-Tang Clan’s “C.R.E.A.M.” video with women at the table.
“My name is Sophia Chang, and I was raised by Wu-Tang.”

Usually, that would make for an amazing greeting. But it’s one of the last things Sophia Chang tells me during our 40-minute phone conversation we have just days after her memoir, the Audible Originals The Baddest ***** in the Room, is published. It’s a hell of a line, one she’s probably said dozens of times during her 30-year career working in music.

It’s not hyperbole, either. In the early ’90s, Chang was a pivotal behind the scenes player in music, working in various departments from A&R to promotions to management. Over the years she collaborated and rubbed shoulders with a wide spectrum of artists: like Paul Simon, Q-Tip, Redman, and Chris Lighty. But it was the Wu-Tang Clan who she really bonded with and who, she says, “claimed” her. She met the Clan in 1993, right when they released their debut single, “Protect Ya Neck,” and almost instantly sparked a friendship with the group. Often called “Wu-Tang’s muse,” she has, at various points in her career, managed RZA, Ol’ Dirty *******, and the GZA.

Despite her resume in rap music— she says she’s the “first Asian in hip-hop” — only a small portion of The Baddest *****, which was released on September 26th, is centered around hip-hop. There is a love component here. In the mid-’90s she started learning kung fu and fell in love with a Shallon Monk named Shi Yan Ming. She left the music industry behind and put a majority of her time and effort into building Yan Ming’s brand and maintaining his Manhattan-based temple. The two would eventually go on to have two kids together before going their separate ways. (During this time there were early plans on expanding Ming’s temple.)

After making her way back into the music industry — in various stints, including working in a senior position at Universal Music Group — Chang started to realize she spent her life helping craft the stories of men. It was time to tell her own story.

The Baddest ***** in the Room is a compelling listen, mainly because Chang is an expert storyteller. She’s great with details and she isn’t scared to be vulnerable in public. (At various points in the book you hear her voice crack while telling an emotional story.) Lots of artists are mentioned in the book. But nothing ever feels gossipy. Sophia made a conscientious effort to keep the story centered around her and the many geniuses that orbited her. In this book, Chang is the Sun. The memoir is also super interactive; throughout you hear (sometimes grainy) audio clips from the likes of RZA, Ghostface Killah, Method Man, Raphael Saadiq, hip-hop feminist Joan Morgan and more.

I recently sat down with Sophia Chang to talk about the making of the book, her relationship with Chris Lighty, and imagining Wu-Tang Clan’s “C.R.E.A.M.” video with women at the table.

Check out the interview below.

Could you have written this book 15 years ago?
No. I wasn’t ready to write it 15 years ago. I still wasn’t interested in telling my story. I didn’t yet think that it was worthy of telling. Also, 15 years ago, my children were two and four…and [at those ages] you’re in the thick of it. There’s no way I would’ve been ready. I was still with my ex. I was running this temple. [There] was way too much going on.

Did you have an epiphany moment?
There were two things that happened. I started working at Universal Music Group. And I took on a number of young women fresh out of college — many of them 22 at the time — as mentees. It occurred to me, given my vast experience, having worked so many different jobs in so many different sectors, I could use my experience to help teach people. That was number one. Number two: [Sheryl Sandberg’s book] Lean In came out. Lean In had some really great messages. But that is written from a very specific perspective, and I had originally conceived of this book as a Lean In for women of color.

It turned into a very traditional chronological memoir. But I do really hope that people, particularly women of color, glean messages from it.

continued next post

[GeneChing]

Photo Credit: Gary Gershoff/Getty Images

You left a career in music essentially for love and family.
It wasn’t a conscious decision. It’s not like I sat there and said, “OK Sophia, you’re leaving this world and now you’re going to into that world.” It was a pretty organic transition, and I didn’t really think that hard about it.

One of my editors asked me when I was writing, “Did you ever regret leaving any of those jobs?” And as a personal philosophical philosophy, I do not believe in regret. I don’t experience regret like that. So if I **** up — and I **** up plenty — I am regretful that I’ve hurt somebody’s feelings and then I address it and I apologize. As somebody who is self-analyzing ,self-interrogating, self-critical, and self-renewing, I am constantly taking stock of what it is that I do, how I behave, and how I could have modified my behavior for a better outcome.

That means that once I make that analysis that I am learning something — learning something means that I have gained a lesson. A lesson, to me, is a gift. So I don’t live with regret in general and I never looked back. It wasn’t until I was writing this memoir that I went, “Wow, you know what? I might be a record company president right now.” And there’s no part of me that says “****! I made the wrong decision.” Because it wasn’t just for love that I left. It was also because I believed so deeply in Yan Ming and his vision for building the Shaolin Temple in upstate New York.

Why do you think Wu-Tang hovered towards you in the beginning?
When I met Wu-Tang it was before the album came out, but everybody knew they were going to be huge. We only had to hear “Protect ya Neck” once to know, Oh ****, these guys are going to blow the **** up. So there were hundreds of people around them, all clamoring for access. And here comes this petite Asian, Canadian woman in the midst of them.

They just plucked me out of the crowd and they not only welcomed me, they claimed me. Now why do I think that was? I never had an agenda. I never had ulterior motives. I had [three] things: I was a devoted fan, but there were plenty of those. Number two: I love them deeply as people. And number three: I only ever wanted what was in their best interest. I say in my memoir being embraced by the Clan was amazing because I felt truly seen. And my friend said, “You know, don’t you think it’s possible that they would say the same thing? That when they met you, they felt seen because they were seen in one way. and then here comes Sophia Chang and you just cut through everything and you see them for their humanity?”

The bonus content [on the book] to me is some of the richest content. I specifically asked Ghostface Killa and Raekwon this question, “Why me, you guys, why did you choose me?” And they both put it up to the Most High. They both said “It’s God’s plan, Soph. You were supposed to be there with us.” Ghost was like “You’re like sunshine, Soph.” And Raekwon said “You were a gift to us. You were instrumental in the things that we did.” And I never knew they thought of me that way. I just thought that I was somebody that they loved dearly who was just kind of in the midst.

The other thing that Ghost said is “You never ever changed. Ever.” And Busta Rhymes said this to me last year, he said, “You’re the most consistent person I’ve ever met in hip-hop. We met you before Leaders of the New School was signed. When I had my solo career. When I was up, when I was down. You never changed.”

One of the things I found interesting is that you talk about how you learned about your Asian roots through hip-hop.
I am Asian, and I was born and raised in Vancouver. So I am a yellow girl in a white world. And what I wanted more than anything, when I was a kid, was to be white. And then in 12th grade, I hear “The Message” by Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five and it’s an amazing song. And of course the lyrics are incredible and the beats are amazing.

I understand now, in retrospect, but I think that one of the things that really struck me was that I was hearing a song about a story about people of color by people of color as opposed to what I saw. Which, when I saw people of color, it was all through Hollywood’s lens, which is a white male lens. And so hip-hop to me was so much about agency in storytelling and defiance and pride. And I never ever seen that before. So that was really regulatory. And then I moved to New York, I get into hip-hop, and I’m very close friends with many of the artists in the Native Tongues movement: De La Soul, Jungle Brothers, A Tribe Called Quest, Latifa, Monie Love, Leaders of the New School. And, you know, they’re part of this Afro-centric movement, which focuses a lot on yearning for a deeper connection to Africa — their motherland.

And so that kind of sparked curiosity in me. And it makes me think about my own connection to my own continent, which is Asia. Korean was my first language. I lost it in my desire to assimilate. I wanted to be white. I didn’t think that Asian men were attractive. At one point. I didn’t like Korean food, like it was just this very broad, really wide rejection of my culture. And then I meet Wu-Tang clan. They were raised in Staten Island and they call their borough Shaolin and their whole ethos on [Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)] was all about Kung-fu movies and John Woo movies.

So not only am I seeing this really incredible, robust culture of period martial arts movies, but now I’m getting a lens on modern age masculinity through John Woo’s eyes. And you know his muse is Chow Yun-fat and Chow Yun-fat, to me, is like the handsomest man that’s ever walked this planet. That was also regulatory for me. And so their respect for, and reverence and love of Asian culture helped open my eyes to it, but it wasn’t until I met them that I let all of the blocks fall away. It was kind of through the chambers of Wu-Tang that I ultimately came back to myself.

If it wasn’t for Wu-Tang, I wouldn’t have started training in Kung-Fu. I wouldn’t have met Yan Ming. If didn’t meet Yan Ming I wouldn’t have my children. I mean I owe a lot to the Wu-Tang clan.

In the book you talk about the last time you saw Ol’ Dirty ******* and the fact that he just wasn’t present. Was there any part of you that wanted to sugarcoat that story?
One of the things that I think listeners will be struck by is how many times I say “God rest his soul” or “God rest her soul” in my memoir. I’m only 54 years old and other than my father — God rest his soul — who was 80 when he passed, everybody that I lose leaves in an untimely fashion. I think that, yes, naturally it was hard for me to write and it was hard for me to narrate. You know, that’s one of the things that I knew about my memoir, and that it was going to be an audiobook: I insisted that I had to read it I had to be the voice behind the story. Because another reader — let’s say we’d hired a professional actor — they would not have been able to emote the way that I did, especially when it came to loss.

And in terms of sugarcoating things or holding things back, there’s plenty more I could have put in this memoir. I’ve been around famous people for 32 years, but I never intended to write a tell-all. I’m not interested in that. If somebody came along to me today and said, “Sophia, I’ll give you $5 million if you’ll write the tell-all, and you’ll tell us all the dirt on all the famous people you know” I wouldn’t even hesitate, to say no. I have no interest in telling anybody else’s story unless it is part of my narrative.

So when I was shopping my book deal — and it was competitive — there were two things that I said, and I said the same thing when I was looking around for agents: number one is that it’s my voice. I write this ****. I am far from the best writer in the world, but I’ll tell you what, I’m not going to ****ing let somebody else try to capture my voice. Number two: I refuse to write a book about being with greatness, meaning hanging out with celebrities because that is, to me, an exercise in narcissism.

I found Chris Lighty to be a very interesting and mysterious presence in the book. Did you, did you ever feel like you fully understood him?
Yeah. I think I fully understood him, but did I know everything that was going on in his life? No. And I think those are two different things.

I knew who Chris Lighty was, but I didn’t know the burden that he was bearing. I couldn’t say I understand everything that was going on in his life. But I understood Chris. Absolutely I did.

continued next post

[GeneChing]

What do you tell people who have questions about the music industry in general? Like what are things you tell them that wish you knew as a 22-year-old?
Let’s reframe the question. I was in the music business, pre-digital, so it’s very, very different. I’m in an industry that is flushed with cash, so everything is different. So let’s reframe it this way. What would I tell a 22-year-old getting into the business now? If they want to manage artists, I say, “OK, go ahead and do it. But you better be OK with not making any money unless you’re somehow going to manage an artist who already has a robust touring merchandise and endorsement or sponsorship career because otherwise you’re not making money.” And that’s OK. I don’t care. You don’t have to make money. But you have to know that going in. And for that reason, be passionate about your artists because you will go in and you will be their proxy and you will need to sell the **** out of them.

They have to be on top of everything because hopefully when get as big and successful as you want, they’re going to be many, many, many balls in the air. Raphael Sadiq said about me, ” Soph, you never let a ball drop.” And RZA said “You’re the most organized person I ever met.” And those might sound like banal skills. What I realized now is [how imporant] those things are when you have so much stuff going on.



I love the part in the book when you talk about helping Rakeon with the “C.R.E.A.M” video, and you mentioned how there shouldn’t be women in the video. But, looking back, you now wish you had women in there around the table as CEOs.
My ideas about everything are still evolving. I’m sure there are things that I wrote and that I say today that in a few years I’m going to say, “well that was stupid” or “that was ignorant.” You know, I’m still learning. I’m just constantly evolving and pushing myself to be better. And I surround myself with people who are smarter than me, who can check me if necessary.

There’s a line in my memoir where I say, “Rae, you know what I love about Wu-Tang and about the [36 Chambers] album is that there are no women in it.” He’s like, “yeah, you get it Soph.” And then I said to him, “What I do… the 28-year-old me is happy because there are no women in it because they were so objectified at the time. But the 54-year-old me wishes that you’d put a woman in there at the table with you as your peer. “And he was like, of course Soph, but it’s a different time. He totally understood that.

So yeah, things change, you know, hopefully we continue to evolve and we continue to get smarter and better and we just keep growing.

Is there anything you want to add?
What’s next for me, is public speaking. It’s not even that it’s next. I started public speaking before I even wrote a book. I know that God put me on this planet to put a mic in my hand and have me on stage, you know, just like an MC, except I’m not a talented artist like that.

I honestly think I’m the greatest public speaker I’ve ever seen. I mean that from the bottom of my ****ing heart. I don’t think there’s anybody better than me. And I don’t think there’s anybody that can deliver my message. Who could deliver my message? My name is Sophia Chang, and I was raised by Wu-Tang. I’m the Korean-Canadian immigrant who was a French literature major who was raised by Wu-Tang Clan and who was partnered with and had children and ran the business of a Shaolin monk. So all of that kind of crazy diverse experiences hone this voice and this voice is supposed to be shared with the world.

I mean, RZA knew it. He was like, “I can hear you. I can imagine that you are going to be in arenas talking to 25,000 people.”


Photo Credit: Dia Dipasupil/Getty Images for Audible

I've been doing the Sophia Chang thread a disservice by not copying it to the Wu Forever thread.[/QUOTE]

[GeneChing]

Opinion
I'm Not Really Afraid Of Anti-Asian Hate And Racism. I'm Enraged.
"Many of us Asian New Yorkers are afraid. But the emotion that rises in me is not crippling fear; it is un-****ing-adulterated rage."

"Here is my exhortation to America: Open up your myopic, microscopic vision of us and let us all in," the author writes.
SOPA IMAGES VIA GETTY IMAGES

By Sophia Chang, VIP Guest Writer
Mar. 31, 2022, 05:45 AM EDT | Updated an hour ago


I stared incredulously at the photo of GuiYing Ma in the hospital after she was bashed over the head with a large rock. There must be something wrong with this picture, I thought, because the right quadrant of her head was missing, almost as if it had melted — like a Dali. Surreal. My disbelief converted to ire when I saw my mother and ajummas in Ma’s beautiful white hair and wise wrinkles.
I held my breath as I read of Christina Yuna Lee’s murder. Oh, no, not again, I thought. My consternation gave way to fury as I imagined my daughter walking to the train every morning, just a few short blocks from where Christina was killed.
In the wake of the recent torrent of anti-Asian violence, many of us Asian New Yorkers are afraid. But the emotion that rises in me is not crippling fear; it is un-****ing-adulterated rage.
Of course, I am not immune to the fear. Like all women, I live with the deeply internalized, incessant, insidious fear of assault. To paraphrase Margaret Atwood, “Men are afraid that women will laugh at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them.”
Further, I am a petite Asian woman careening through middle age. Like many of my city sisters, I have developed hyper-peripheral vision. I don’t listen to music loudly on my headphones, and at night, I avoid desolate streets and watch the shadows of those behind me elongate on the sidewalk when streetlamps grant me the rearview. That said, 27 years of Shaolin Kung Fu training has resulted in my reflexes, physical awareness and instincts being sharper and more potent. Furthermore, to many, I appear like a man and am less likely to be targeted.
Asian women make up almost 62% of the victims of reported attacks on our community, according to a study conducted by Stop AAPI Hate. It’s been just over a year since eight people were shot and killed in the Atlanta area — six of them Asian women. I still remember how my voice trembled with tears as I read out the names of the six Asian women who were murdered.
My anguish morphed into anger when it was suggested that the murders were not racially motivated. I and my sisters knew better.

"In America, Asian women are sexually reduced to the extremes of two stereotypes: the submissive geisha or the dominating dragon lady," Chang writes. "There’s nothing wrong whatsoever if we are one or the other or both. My issue is that we are not allowed to be self-determining and self-defining."
NATHAN CONGLETON/NBC/NBCU PHOTO BANK VIA GETTY IMAGES
As of last spring, 81% of Asian adults surveyed by Pew Research Center said they believed violence against us is on the rise. According to NBC News, anti-Asian crime was up 339% in 2021 from 2020. And we should assume the numbers are far greater, as many crimes go unreported.
Indubitably, the rise in violence against us was brought on by the abhorrent racist rhetoric around the coronavirus that granted gleeful permission for people to act out their racist fantasies against us. Remember the U.K. variant? Were people with British accents targeted? Hell ****ing no!
But don’t get it twisted; Asians have faced racism and violence from the gate. As is the case with so many marginalized populations, the hatred is codified into law, thus undergirding the othering and fear of us — from the Page Act of 1875 to the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 to the incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II. Then there’s the MSG that enhances the hate recipe: the model minority myth, which gives everyone the impression that we’re all doing Gucci — taking their kids’ spots in the best schools, getting the top jobs, making the fattest checks.
But not so fast, cowboy. In New York, almost 1 in 4 of us live below the poverty line. The model minority myth is particularly draconian because it pits yellow against Black. You know; divide and conquer. When the crimes started accumulating, many of the images I saw were of folx of color, particularly Black people, perpetrating the attacks. As it turns out, Janelle Wong, professor of American Studies at the University of Maryland, College Park, found that 75% of the crimes had been committed by white people. I believe that there have been perpetrators of color, and I do think that anti-Blackness, particularly in my community, accepted this narrative with a degree of facility. I can hold two truths simultaneously.
I have long thought that one of my responsibilities is to bridge communities. As the first Asian woman in hip-hop who managed Ol’ Dirty ******* (RIP), RZA, and GZA of Wu-Tang Clan, then introduced them to a real-live Shaolin monk who would become my partner, I believe I have done a small part to create cross-cultural alliances. I was a fan of hip-hop when I moved to New York in ’87, but it was the community that embraced me.
Though I point to government policies as enforcers of anti-Asianness, I can’t ignore the deleterious impact that the media has had on our safety. The eroticization, exoticization and fetishization of Asian women in this country ― aided and abetted by the largely white male leer of Hollywood — has surely exacerbated the attacks. When the Atlanta massage parlor murders occurred last March, there was a question as to whether or not they were racially motivated. I don’t believe that every assault against a marginalized person is a hate crime, but this was crystal ****ing clear to me.
In America, Asian women are sexually reduced to the extremes of two stereotypes: the submissive geisha or the dominating dragon lady. There’s nothing wrong whatsoever if we are one or the other or both. My issue is that we are not allowed to be self-determining and self-defining. Many Asian women have been courted with such dulcet phrases as “Me love you long time” and “Is your ***** sideways?” I don’t even know what the **** that means. Aren’t all pussies sideways?! And if one more white boy tells me he had an insert-Asian nationality-here girlfriend, that he speaks insert-Asian-language-here, or that he studied insert-Asian-martial-art-here, I will summon all the Han of my Korean ancestors and asphyxiate him with red hot dukbokki.
When I was writing my memoir, “The Baddest ***** In The Room,” my very smart brother Heesok Chang said, “Sophia, what you’re doing with your book is simply asking the world to imagine that you exist.” And here is my exhortation to America: Open up your myopic, microscopic vision of us and let us all in, and grant us the grace of being whatever the **** we want — even angry.


Sophia Chang
Sophia Chang, VIP Guest Writer

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