Interview with councilman diep
Lan Diep
He/Him/His
Ethnicity: Vietnamese American
Occupation: District 4, Councilmember
Location: San Jose, California
"Once they're no longer here (Older Asian Generation) and we did not prepare to take on those oral histories or those written histories, we lose that. In terms of language retention and cultural retention, and only that will we be able to carry on and not repeat the mistakes of the past."
July 23, 2020, 2:00 PM PDT
By Cathy Nguyen
San Jose District 4 Councilman Lan Diep set policy at Council meetings every Tuesday to help the community deal with problems such as city parks, roads, and public safety. Diep joined two students Cathy Nguyen and Kevin Nguyen to speak on his experiences during this nationwide pandemic. Councilman Diep is determined to maintain connections with the community and city hall during these difficult times by providing clarity in the form of newsletters, and such.
​
“So I try to gather whatever information I could and provide it in a newsletter in daily or weekly videos summarizing what was going on and trying to keep people engaged, trying to help them stay active safely, make them feel less alone. So that was the extent that I could do as a council member.”
“They should call up a friend from college that had talked to check-in on that brother or sister who lives across the country. So we totally should be social. As to really trying to push the message that we need to be physically distant, but not emotionally distant, not socially distant."
When asked, “what were the most notable struggles District 4 overcame during this pandemic?”. Councilman Diep replied, “Industry for North San Jose is the economic engine of the city, so to the extent that people aren't working in the tech hubs in North San Jose, they're working from home. That means less traffic, which is probably a good thing, but it also means less foot traffic to restaurants and bakeries and coffee shops along the North San Jose corridor and not just there, but across the city. That hurts our sales tax revenue for the city. Which impacts our ability to provide services such as part maintenance or public safety, etc.” With a Pandemic comes inescapable issues tied with the absence of essential businesses such as sanitation.
District 4 monthly Dumpster Day cleanup has been effectively rectified due to the many risks of group gatherings.
Councilman Diep has encountered and overcame multiple cases of overt aggression from individuals seeking to anger him. Like many of the Asian-American communities of the Bay Area, Lan Diep is no stranger to, “Go back to China”. Due to the pandemic, many Asian Americans found themselves, victim, to countless acts of microaggression due to the stigma that all Asians are foreign and disease-ridden. Diep fights for the many Asian communities in the Bay Area by providing support to Asian American organizations and inciting social justice in all communities. Councilman Diep believes that all issues can be resolved without hate and that our media regularly ignores the struggles of those under the veil of racial disposition.
During the interview Councilmember elaborates on his thoughts “There was one day where there were about seven Asian stores that were vandalized. Someone took a crowbar and broke the glass, they didn't steal anything, but it was all Vietnamese owned restaurants and tea shops, I thought this was a hate crime. I said something to the effect of, you know, it's too soon to say because there's no evidence of that. I don't want to speculate. But it's true that the people that were impacted were all Vietnamese owned businesses”.
Recently, President Trump tagline the Coronavirus pandemic as, “The Kung-Flu”. Unfairly directing all aggression towards all Asian Americans, xenophobia, prejudice, racism, and the unruly American belief that the Covid-19 virus is a joke. When asked, “What was your standpoint when President Donald Trump initiated the coronavirus as the “Kung flu” and “the Chinese virus?”.
​
"The first known place, but when people start taking offense to it and they say, hey, this is not OK because this kind of connection is causing hate, then we should actively stop using it and we should actively avoid adding more social pressure or more difficulty into people's lives."
Diep answered “I think it's disappointing that our president, our commander in chief, would be using Kung-Flu in a very intentional way to cause offense because when he does that, it makes it OK. He makes it seem like a joke. It's direct and connects this flu with the Chinese community, and with the Asian community. He does so in a dismissive manner, and that gives permission to other people to do the same. We easily make the connection and point the finger at Chinese people broadly Asian people as being the cause or the reason that we're in this global pandemic now. So that's not OK.”
Diep urges all Asian American communities to become more active in matters pertaining to social justice, and equality by learning the needs of other communities, not for power, but for unity and togetherness. “I think for our community as a whole, the Asian community, the Pan- Asian community, to be more engaged, and that are not to say we're not politically active, we are. We love it. We have a lot of non-profit groups and young student organizations engaging in all sorts of things, but on the whole, I would say that. Amongst the different groups, we always talk about the importance of disaggregating information to really understand what the needs of the Vietnamese community are to the Chinese community, the Korean community, the Filipino community, so on and so forth. Our community is on a story that plays well together. We don't necessarily have alliances, we have umbrella groups, the Asian Law Alliance. We have Asian health groups and such, but in terms of political activity, we're not a united front with any kind of tangible political power.” said Councilman Diep.
Diep believes reassurance and communication rather than racism and prejudice will be the best way to overcome our societal barriers. By learning to better communicate with those we love, all communities have the chance to remain safe, informed, and reassured.