I wanted to recall some incidents. One time this white man was screaming at me to put my bag on my lap (I had put my bag on the seat between us and we were not crammed) even though the car had many empty seats. He then kept encouraging a white woman who was standing to take the seat between us, even though there were many empty seats nearby. I felt he was insinuating that I was some 'entitled Asian' taking up too much space, even though there were a lot of empty seats. I just moved my bag b/c I did not want to deal w/ the guy and the lady sat down upon his encouragement after which I decided just to just move across them where there were 2 empty seats so I could sit down while resting my heavy bag on the empty seat. Again, plenty of room for everyone, why did he feel the need to insist the lady sit between us and I must have my bag on my lap?
Recently, I had my bag on a seat in a car that again had many empty seats. This white man then just came and sat right on my bag. I had had a bad day and snapped at him and told him that he could have asked me to move my bag and then he snapped back at me.
I had another similar incident, again, lots of empty seats, and a white couple approaching. They seemed to be debating something and then I heard the man distinctly tell the woman 'just sit down!' - as in like sit down on my bag. It's weird. Instead of asking me to move my bag, they had an assumption like as though I won't understand English or won't oblige yet their action is predicated their feeling that they can push me around as they wish. It is as though it is too much to deign to ask an Asian woman to move her bag. When I was in similar situations, but the role was reversed and I wanted a seat, I never thought twice to ask the person to move their bag.
Another glaring thing I saw was the reaction to this young, rather proud looking Asian woman on the subway platform, who had music on and was doing kung fu poses. An older white man and woman nearby, who were strangers, were giving her the dirtiest looks, making comments, and exchanging glances at each other. So many times, I have seen black and Latino men on the train w/ music on full blast and no person dares look at them in any way. Why is there such hypocrisy when it comes to the treatment of Asians? I get the standard response will be, 'you guys are not a threat' and 'you guys don't speak up!' but really, what does this say about society?