When I was in first grade, there was an annoying kid named Michael. He was a bully with white skin and hazel eyes.

I do high school debate. As a debater, it's a common preconceived notion that I'm generally interested in politics and know a lot about politics.

There I was at recess, foolishly smiling alongside my friends, reciting rhymes that had somehow seeped into our minds…slanting our eyes upwards and downwards while chanting:

“Chinese, Japanese, Dirty Knees, Look at These…”

As the second wave of Black Lives Matter protests sweeps the U.S. in a nationwide uprising, I have been reflecting on the shared history that brings the U.S. to this point, and the history that brought my family and me into this story.

We are reading the news from the same platforms of racism in America. We sit comfortably in our homes, most of us laugh at the country that historically colonized ours to feel superior that we are better than these people, yet we have not done anything to dismantle the hierarchies and systems in our own homes--in our own country.

Tou Thao, the disgraced Minneapolis police officer who is one of the four officers involved in the death of George Floyd, is of Hmong descent (a Southeast Asian ethnic group).