Actress Sandra Oh rallies in Pittsburgh protest against Asian hate

Actress Sandra Oh attended a demonstration in Pittsburgh’s Oakland neighborhood on Saturday protesting a spike in violence against Asian Americans.
The “Stop Asian Hate” rally drew hundreds of people in the Pittsburgh neighborhood, according to multiple reports.
Oh, who was in the Pennsylvania city filming a series for Netflix, was seen addressing demonstrators with a bullhorn and thanking the organizers of the protest “to give us an opportunity to be together and to stand together and to feel each other.”
“For many of us in our community, this is the first time we are even able to voice our fear and our anger, and I really am so grateful to everyone willing to listen,” the “Killing Eve” actress said.
“One thing I know many of us in our community are very scared, and I understand that, and one way to get through our fears is to reach out to our communities,” she said, challenging rallygoers to reach out to community members and support “our sisters and brothers in need.”
Oh, who is Canadian and of Korean decent, also led protesters in a chants of “I am proud to be Asian” and “I belong here.”
The group of demonstrators later marched to the Carnegie Mellon University campus, according to multiple reports.
The news comes after eight people, including six Asian women, were killed Tuesday in a shooting spree at three massage parlors in the Atlanta, Ga., area.
The suspect was arrested shortly afterward and charged with murder in connection to the shootings. Authorities have stated that it is too early to rule the killings a hate crime.
The suspect has denied that the attacks were racially motivated and stated that he had a “sex addiction.”
The rally that Oh participated in was one of many that took place Saturday after anger over anti-Asian violence ripped through the country and Congress following the Atlanta shootings.
Demonstrators also gathered in front of Georgia’s Capitol building Saturday, calling for justice in the wake of the violence, according to The Associated Press.
A recent study from California State University’s Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism showed that hate crimes against Asian Americans in 16 of the country’s largest cities have spiked nearly 150 percent amid the coronavirus pandemic.
The nonprofit Stop AAPI Hate said last week that it received nearly 3,800 reports of hate incidents against Asian Americans over the last year.
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