The Real, Tragic Story Behind That Roof Korean Meme You May Have Seen

In the wake of the anti-racism protests across the country, you may have seen some pro-gun family and friends share articles and memes about rooftop Koreans.

The dramatic pictures show Korean Americans taking up arms during the 1992 Los Angeles uprising, when riots and looting erupted after four white Los Angeles Police Department officers were acquitted in the brutal beating Black motorist Rodney King.

Just like 92. Dont mess with the #RooftopKoreans,  one man tweeted. 

We should all be ready to do our duty as American citizens and, when duty calls, each of us should embrace our inner Rooftop Korean, an article on Town Hall said , days after mostly peaceful protests against police brutality turned chaotic and resulted in looting in many cities across the U.S. 

The right-to-bear-arms community has celebrated roof Koreans for a while theyre even depicted on stickers  sold on sites like Etsy.  But given that some gun-toting, Second Amendment groups have shown up to meet the Black Lives Matter protesters, now is definitely one of the more disturbing times in which theyve been evoked.

What we see here are white supremacists using rooftop Koreans images and video to justify their own position, said Edward T. Chang , a professor of ethnic studies at the University of California, Riverside, and the director of the Young Oak Kim Center for Korean American Studies at the university.

This has potentially very damaging consequences to incite racial division and hatred between Korean Americans and other communities of color, particularly African American communities, he said. It speaks to a common divide and control strategy perpetuated by white supremacists.

Chang said those who share the meme owe it to the Korean American business owners in the photos to do a deeper dive into the history of the 1992 Los Angeles uprising and what led them to take up arms to begin with. 

The nearly weeklong unrest that occured in Los Angeles in the spring of 1992 left more than 60 people dead and more than 1,000 injured, and it caused an estimated $1 billion in damage , about half of which was sustained by Korean-owned businesses.

When the LAPD officers were acquitted, longstanding cultural clashes between Korean mom-and-pop store owners and their predominantly African American customers in the community spilled over. 

It wasnt surprising. Tensions had already reached a boiling point a year earlier, when Soon Ja Du, a Korean American liquor store owner, fatally shot Latasha Harlins, a 15-year-old Black girl, in South Los Angeles. Du claimed that Harlins tried to steal a bottle of orange juice. In the security camera footage, you see a scuffle between the two. Harlins eventually throws the juice on the counter and begins to walk away. As she does, Du shoots her in the head.

Du was given a light sentence for the killing probation and community service which outraged the Harlins family and the Black community. 

Harlins name became a rallying cry during the 1992 uprising, and many believe it was a big reason that Korean Americans shops were targeted .

When the looting spread into Koreatown, the shop owners did indeed stand up to protect their businesses. As immigrants, theyd opened shops and liquor stores shortly after arriving in the U.S. in the late 1970s and early 80s.

But they took up arms because the LAPD had, in the words of one K-Town shop owner, left us to burn. 

Today, the Los Angeles uprising is known as Sa-i-gu  in the Korean American community a phrase that literally means April 29, the day the violence began.

The unrest was a turning point for Korean Americans across the country, Chang said, and an absolute wake-up call to Koreans in Los Angeles to the indifference of the powers that be in the city. 

Without any political clout and power in the city, Koreatown was unprotected and left to burn since it was not a priority for city politicians and the LAPD, Chang said. As rioting and looting spread, streets between Koreatown and wealthy white neighborhoods were blocked off by police, with official defense lines set up around largely white cities, including Beverly Hills and West Hollywood. Some Koreans said that emergency responders ignored their calls for help .

It was containment, Andy Yoo, a resident of K-Town who was 7 at the time, told CNN in 2017. 

In the end, Chang said not a single person was shot and killed by the Korean shop owners just warning shots to chase away potential looters and arsonists.

This is what makes the rooftop Korean meme frustrating to so many Korean Americans: Those who co-opt and meme-ify Korean shop owners speak of them reverentially. The police were overburdened, one man explained in a viral tweet , so the people of Koreatown become peak American citizens by exercising their God given and constitutionally protected rights.

But the Korean Americans that were literally on the rooftops in 92 tell a different story. 

I truly thought I was a part of mainstream society, Chang Lee, a gas station owner who immigrated with his family to the United States as a child, told CNN.

Nothing in my life indicated I was a secondary citizen until the L.A. riots, he said. The LAPD powers that be decided to protect the haves, and the Korean community did not have any political voice or power. They left us to burn.

The roof Korean meme also forces Asian Americans to reckon with anti-Blackness in the community. 

Asian Americans have a long, complicated and toxic relationship with white supremacy, he told HuffPost. Weve always been made to feel like were two steps removed from whiteness. Weve convinced ourselves into believing that were honorary whites because some of us come from middle-class or wealthy families, or weve bought into the myth of our own intellectual superiority.

For many, its more than just a dislike of Black people, Maningding said, its a fundamental belief that were made differently and thus destined for a life of academics and wealth, while the others are built for poverty and crime.

On Twitter last week, user Roscoe Von Rotten shared a Twitter thread that broke down the racial intricacies of the 1992 uprising while exploring anti-Blackness in Asian communities.

In the thread, Von Rotten reminded Asians who identify with alt-right beliefs that it wasnt too long ago that East Asians, too, were seen as dangerous and subhuman by white supremacists. (As NBC News reports, the term yellow peril  comes from the 1800s, when Chinese laborers were brought to the United States to replace emancipated Black communities as a cheap source of labor.)

Weve fallen so hard, hook, line and sinker, for the myth of the model minority, she said.

Von Rotten is Korean American and was 5 at the time of the uprising. She knows firsthand how complicated Sa-i-gu is in Korean Americans collective memory. What happened during the destruction and looting is not something she and the elders in her family discuss with pride or braggadocio. 

They know who was up on the roof, and there is no reliving the glory days, Von Rotten told HuffPost. When looking at the photos from 1992, my parents and I agree that were proud of the community defending themselves. But we also agree that the pride does not extend to the fact that we had to do it at all.

We need to hold ourselves, and especially our communities, accountable in the ways we are complicit in supporting the white supremacist power structure and the anti-Black narrative in this country, she added. True change cannot happen unless we recognize and are held accountable for the roles we play and the words we speak. 

More than anything, Von Rotten said, the photos serve as a reminder that you can come to this country seeking a better life wanting the American dream and seemingly achieving it but still be a second class citizen if youre not rich and white. 

Comparing 1992 to 2020: What a difference almost three decades makes.

In the end, the rooftop photos are important not to be used as props for gun rights advocates and the alt-right but to show Americas complicated, unjust relationship with both minority groups.

And as protests over the deaths of Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery and countless others continue, its heartening to see other images of Asian Americans including many Koreans standing with Black Americans. 

A viral video from protests in downtown Los Angeles earlier this month shows community organizer Isabel Kang explaining why its essential for Asians to stand up as allies and confront their own internalized racism.

To see that many Korean Americans havent woken up makes my heart break, she said. But those who know what its like to be oppressed get it right away. 

In Los Angeless Fairfax District, not far from Koreatown, Asian designer Bobby Kim, who goes by Bobby Hundreds, watched last month as fires were set near his streetwear store. Not long after, though, he hopped on Instagram and shared an impassioned message of solidarity with the protesters. 

When people ask why Im not upset that my business is impacted or my neighborhood pillaged, I tell them that my disgust over injustices in this country eclipses any other temporary feeling, he wrote . Even if you bring the fire to my doorstep, I will stand in it with you.

And in Koreatown now, shop owners seem less inclined to grab their guns and more inclined to stand with Black Lives Matter protesters. 

Sam Yang co-hosts the martial arts and political theory podcast Southpaw and lives in Koreatown. Earlier this month, he shared some of the Justice for George Floyd and Black Lives Matter signs hed seen hung up by Korean shop owners while taking a walk in his neighborhood with his toddler. 

I wanted to share what I wasnt seeing armed Koreans, menacing people, Yang told HuffPost. So I sent out that tweet to say, Heres the stereotype in your mind, and heres reality. Work on yourself.

Yang said Asian Americans today are emboldened to speak out against things like the rooftop Korean meme because so many of their elders were essentially voiceless in 1992. 

The Korean American generation back in 1992 didnt have social media, he said. No one wanted to speak with them or hear their story. If you cant speak the language and you have no outlet, others speak for you.

He said that those who share the meme are in essence speaking for Korean Americans, telling us how to think and feel, co-opting our voice and our ability to tell our own narrative.

Yang refuses to allow that to happen. Now is not the time for division, he said, its the time for minority groups to stand together.

As Asians, we have our own work to do within our own communities, which starts with decolonizing ourselves from white supremacy and healing from its effects, Yang said.

But while we do that, we must support Black lives and we must protect Black bodies. We must be in solidarity with our Black and brown siblings, he said. Yellow Peril must support Black lives.