Video Shows Line Around the Block in Chinatown for Pepper Spray After Latest Anti-Asian Attack in New York City

Hundreds of people, many of them Asian women, formed a line around the block in New York City’s Chinatown over the weekend to acquire pepper spray, after the latest in a string of vicious Covid-era attacks on Asian women, many of them elderly.

On Sunday, a New York based non-profit called Soar Over Hate distributed roughly 1,000 pepper spray kits to women.

“I hope this illustrates to the daily fears that many are experiencing,” wrote Soar Over Hate founder Michelle Tran on Twitter. “We gave out ~1000 [pepper] sprays to women who looked just like me looking to feel a bit safer.”

Chinatown, NYC. Look at the long, long line of mostly Asian women and elderly waiting to get their pepper spray. This is the clearest sign people are living in fear 😔💔 #StopAsianHate pic.twitter.com/FXt5Zl3qZS

— Evelyn Yang (@EvelynYang) March 14, 2022

The line around the block, many of them elderly Asian women, showed that “people are living in fear,” added Evelyn Yang, an author and wife of politician Andrew Yang.

Earlier that week, a man in nearby Yonkers, New York, was arrested and charged with an attempted hate murder after punching an elderly Asian woman 125 times and calling her a racial slur.

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