Breaking the Silence: Accountability in Khmer Community Spaces w/Sina Sam

0:04 Hey everyone, this is Randy Kim from the Vendory Chronicles podcast. And so today is a special episode and I brought in my good friend, Sina Sam, who I have known several years ago. She was on my podcast six years ago and which feels like a whole lifetime ago. And we had, I think that was like the longest episode recorded episode, we talked for over three hours to the point where I had to put it into two parts. So I don't think we're going to get that far. But before we get started, I do want to issue a triggering content warning that there will be mentions of child exploitation, sexual violence towards women, fraud, and other potential community trauma.

0:50 So I do hope that you are able to navigate this episode to the best that you can. And I hope that in the end that we will provide you with resources and also talking points that will support our community. And I also want to say that I think this is very important to note out that Fatri Dirk Pan, who will we be talking about? He is the founder of Comerican. He has not been charged or convicted of any crime. So we want to be mindful of acknowledging that the claims against him are allegations.

1:30 And in this episode, we aim to address the allegations, the context and history of Comerican and its founder, And also opening dialogue about the safety of community spaces and the toxic harmful leadership of certain Khmer folks in these spaces. So, you know, the purpose of this episode is to not encourage or endorse harm or threats towards Fetri. It is also recognizing that he has not been charged with any crimes. The stories that we will share are given to us from folks who DM'd myself and Sophia, who could not join us, and Sina Sam. And because of that, they will remain anonymous, and other potentially sensitive information will not be included.

2:16 So... Sina has been a community leader in the Seattle Tacoma area for a number of years. She has been very vigilant in the anti-deportation work, specifically on Southeast Asian communities for a number of years. And Sina is a person that I have profound respect for in this community work. And she has been a person who's also been... sharing a lot of concerns about the Comerican co-founder for a number of years. And so thank you so much for being on my show. I know that you're under the weather today, but thank you so much for sharing.

2:59 Hi, Randy. Thank you so much. Yes, I am so glad to be with you. And thank you so much to being open to hosting and um really making space to have this conversation as it's come up um for a long time as um an issue that hasn't been formally addressed publicly and so i may not be the best authority or even the most impacted voice to speak on this, but I think it's important for someone who is trusted in the community to speak on it.

3:49 And fortunately, I have the privilege of many who do look to me to be a voice of representation, especially in advocacy areas. So I will do my best to go over all the heaviness that we will and try and open up ultimately recentering of safe space and newer tools and norms that really will allow for addressing these type of issues when they are first experienced instead of the decades that it has taken for us to get to where we are now.

4:38 Thank you so much, Sina. And I know that we're not always going to cover everything that we may miss certain context and clues. So we do apologize in advance if we do not cover that or if there are certain fact checking that needs to be done because I think that there's so much to be said. And what we can share is that Camerican was founded by Fatri Derek Pan, who is a 1.5 Cambodian American refugee in his mid 40s and been based in the Seattle, Tacoma, Washington area for a number of years before living in currently in Cambodia.

5:19 Now, Kamerican, I believe was founded nearly 20 years ago. And this was like during the time of where social media was starting to make its presence known. And there were very few digital community spaces for younger Khmer Americans. And Kamerican, from my understanding was started during around that time to bring and elevate the voices of the Cambodian diaspora people. And I believe it was like really the only platform that was recognized from a national level among Kamai folks.

6:07 And so I was wondering about what you knew about Fatri growing up, because you grew up in the Washington area, and what you knew about the beginning of Kamerican and your understanding of it. Sure. Thank you for that disclaimer and sharing that with everyone that this will not be an exhaustive, comprehensive history or telling of anyone's specific background, especially Patri direct pens. I share this to say that there are many community members who know him much better and who are closer with him and whether or not that is now something that is controversial when there is a prominent figure who is being called to accountability for indiscretions, harm, abuse, exploitation, any of those things, of course, it gets very difficult to speak up and to share.

7:20 And so I think for me, because I have quite a bit of the, I have the privilege to be, to have a bit of a distance from him as I'm not directly what I would consider a victim or someone who has a been harmed recently by him. I met him initially in college at the University of Washington and many others in the community through the Khmer Student Association at the University of Washington. We, as young folks in our early 20s and some late teens, just coming to college and having that experience.

8:07 As many of us know, in the early 2000s, mid 2000s, during that time, it was very hard to find community, especially in higher education spaces. And so when I first met Patry and others, leadership, young leadership in the Khmer Student Association. It was through a production, a theater group who's putting on a play for, essentially for our elders and our parents and for ourselves to find a place to try and relate to our, try to make visible our experiences and trauma. And it was a play about the Khmer Rouge era and the Cambodian American families in the U.S.

8:56 And at the time, I was very excited to be in that space. And I still am. I'm still involved. I still mentor students and stay very connected to many student associations across the country. especially Cambodian-American ones. And during this time, there was only the social online presence of a website or community called My Connection. And that is also a place where a lot of people Millennial Khmer have experience of connecting with one another too. And Parche happened to be in both places very prominently through his pushing of wanting to do At the time, I felt like very good endeavors and wanting to have my language classes, interacting with other my students and trying to bring up visibility as much as he could from what I knew of him.

10:02 And so when we first initially met, along with other young my students and leaders of our area, we We're first friends, honestly. All of us knew each other. We tried our best to really bond. And really, honestly, it was trauma bonding, you know, in a lot of Khmer American spaces coming from genocide survivors as our elders and us as intergenerational second 1.5 children.

10:43 youth and so initial interaction was as friends as um student leaders and quickly through my connection and through just personal experience i did come to learn there was a lot of red flags and experiences of warnings from elder student leaders like the um officers of the Khmer Student Association at the time who were the cohort above ours are the incoming freshmen and sophomores at KHSA.

11:26 They warned us as new officers and those who were wanting to put on Khmer cultural New Year shows and conferences and summits and, you know, really doing what young activists and young organizers and young leaders do, which is really try to elevate and make visible our communities and our struggles and our, like... narrative building right narrative building in the sense of who we are as young people where we come from the communities we represent and our identities and maneuvering through all that trying to Especially if you listen to our first exchange and podcast together, Randy, you can really get an idea of what all was happening during that time.

12:24 And to summarize that, Patrick came out as a person by the end of my experience with the association and through quite a bit of tumultuous I would say conflict that happened between my student leaders and divisions that come about sometimes when we're doing our best to work with one another and also traverse all these traumas and really try to work through the best we can to achieve our personal goals and community collective progress and developing tools and all that, I can look back now, you know, now in my early 40s and say that was a lot and so forth.

13:19 And it still is now today for any young person from our community trying to do and manage all those things. And I just know by the time, you know, after a few years, one or two years of knowing Patriot, I was no longer friends with him. And it really came about because of behaviors that he exhibited in being very aggressive and wanting to have his voice heard over others, making decisions without... consulting with consensus being reached, the importance of community, building community in those ways. And that's something I've always taken with me since my early organizing days is that if there is division that comes up, those who are most interested in pushing forward, whatever it may be, a project, a vision, cause with knowing that harm is happening and not pausing to taking into account how to address it or how to at least move forward with everybody as much as possible.

14:34 That has always, from this experience with Patrick particularly, I learned who I could trust when I'm thinking of community building. And he definitely was not one of it at the time I was graduating and continuing my relationships and identifying lifelong friends and things like that in the community. Yeah, thank you for sharing your own early history with Fatri. And also like for myself, I believe that I had heard about him and I was coming back to the US in 2012 and I think I was starting to get myself involved with the Asian American communities in Chicago in 2013.

15:21 And so I had heard his name come up a few times. I was not close with any Khmer folks until that year and moving afterwards. And so I was very curious about Fatree because I had heard about Comerican and I had never seen a platform like that. And it was very enticing. It was a very powerful moment for us in the community. And as someone who really didn't see many fellow peers of my age, At that time, it was refreshing to see our voices this time and not our parents' generation taking up the space.

16:07 And now there's a space for us to share our stories. And so Camerican symbolized a lot of that. but i had a friend a good friend that took me aside and kind of warned me about him saying that i don't trust him there is a lot of i have concerns about the way he does his practices and so there was a lot of rumblings and i remembered um i think i came back from a trip from montreal i was very i was very very tired um the following day and and A good friend of mine basically said, oh, you know, if a tree's coming into town, you know, he wants to hang out with us and blah, blah, blah.

16:50 And I'm like, look, I'm really tired. I am not in the mood to hang out. And my friend kept convincing me. He's like, you gotta meet him. You know, he's very important to our community. And I'm like, fine, go ahead. And I remember I was being like, I was like half asleep the entire ride. And, you know, I don't remember a whole lot of that conversation, but all I did remember was him talking about Camerican and uplifting Cambodian people. And he said that ad nauseum. And I'm like, okay, that's cute. But then after that, exchange I started to learn more and more about other people's stories about him and I was a part of this Khmer group in Chicago and one of the co-founders wanted to invite him to Chicago and do a talk and of course that you know require money now I am with the belief that, you know, when you bring speakers, when you bring artists, that, you know, community people who are doing the labor should at least be compensated.

18:01 So I'm a full believer in that. But I think that there was something that was very suspicious at that time about how he wanted to do it i think he was trying to say like i only have five minutes well then okay then reschedule a meeting when you're actually available for 30 minutes then you know so i didn't like the rushing because he wanted to help us make a decision within five minutes and i wasn't going to go along with it and so it caused tension between that group and i and I think the rumblings got louder about him around 2016. I think this is kind of when people were starting to share their stories.

18:44 Like, it wasn't known done on a national platform like on a public call out on Facebook but it was like an open bad secret it wasn't open bad secret that community members were whispering to each other it's like yeah gotta watch out for him gotta watch out for this guy this guy's been grifting like this is what he did to this organization he grifted them there were a lot of allegations that were coming up. And for me, it made me pause about ever considering to support him. And I think it's a big credit to Sophia who couldn't be on the show, but Sophia made a post recently and she had talked about toxic Khmer leadership.

19:34 And I think that when she made that post, she talked about you know with us how people quickly responded and most of the comments were directed towards Fatri who comes up very often in those conversations and so people started sharing their stories with her and as a result she made a public post back in I want to say around November late November of last year to Talk about the allegations to talk about the predatory and grifting behavior that he that community members have been accusing him of so.

20:23 In that post. if anyone wants to look it up, or you can look at my Instagram post, a lot of folks chimed in and shared their own stories, shared their own experiences. And it really spoke volumes. And during that time, Fetri and Camerican, he also had other accounts. He had... Perfect 10, which we will get into. He had another handle called Camerica. There were other handles that he had. And so there was no official response from him.

21:05 There was no conversation that he had with me, Sina or Sophia about the allegations, because we were the ones that brought them to light. So nothing was being said. So it also tells me that when you are staying silent, especially when you have very serious allegations, it really speaks volumes. It really draws concerns. And he knows very well when he looks at all these comments, not at one point did he even say anything in response to that. So I'm not saying that that's an admission of guilt.

21:48 I think that might be a very premature thing to be saying here, but it, it doesn't alleviate the suspicions and allegations that people do have of him. And so I felt when I saw Sophia's post, I had reached out to her saying that, well, finally, it's about time someone actually caught him out publicly. And I thought about that for a moment because For years, as I was mentioning, he was an open bad secret for so long, but he was never named publicly or caught out publicly on social media and digital media and whatever.

22:37 And I remember a couple of years ago, there was a time when I was talking to a couple of like Cambodian folks in Seattle. I think you might be included in that conversation that we wanted to consider calling them out. And, you know, we had a good conversation about it, but for some reason or another, it just fell by the wayside. So I thought about, wow, you know, we let an opportunity go. And I am, you know, part of that, you know, of not being able to call him out. And so I felt like when Sophia made that post, like, okay, we need to continue this conversation. I mean, not just a conversation about him, but also the pervasive nature of Kamai leadership in our communities and how there are toxic community leaders and members that drive away a lot of community members from their community.

23:30 And so I think what that really speaks to is there's something that was missing in all of this and being able to call them out and it took this long. But I also knew that when I made that, I decided to make a video because I felt like we needed this conversation. We needed to keep this going. And so a lot of people responded to it and voiced, again, their own experiences, their own concerns and their own suspicions about them. And so I think that really made me realize that, yeah, I think we need to continue this conversation.

24:15 And this is why we are here to name this. The last several years he's been living in Cambodia. Rumor has it that he left because obviously there were so many bridges that have been burned with a lot of Khmer organizations and groups in the US that it would be impossible for him to be present in those spaces without dealing with the potential backlash. I don't know if there's truth to that, but that is what it looks like and that he's decided to start his own work in Cambodia. So I think the last several years he has been working to connect with younger Khmer diaspora, Khmer local folks for his modeling agency called Perfect Ten.

25:11 There's been allegations about his association with very young Khmer women. Fatri is in his mid 40s. Some of the women are allegedly teenagers to barely legal adults. Now, I looked up the legal consent of the age of consent in Cambodia. It's 15 years old. So there's also a legality issue of what is considered legal. So with that said, it doesn't escape the questions of grooming and pedophilia that gets involved, even if it's technically legal at 15, which in America it's 18 for a lot of places.

25:59 I think with that said, I think that it's getting to this point where we do need to have this conversation about what it means to hold our leaders accountable, but also how and why a person like him provokes such a visceral reaction from the community. Because what I do notice, and I think why we struggle to name them publicly the way that we do is because dealing with the genocide, dealing with the struggles of refugee resettlement, it's, it's just, it's such another betrayal to have your own community member stab you in the back.

26:47 And, and it's, there's this shame. There's this, like, I can't believe I just got grifted by my own people. I mean, there is that feeling or like, I need to forget about this. Like pretend this never happened or that. Yeah, we, um, we struggle to, um, handle the emotional responses that come through our head because it's so triggering. It's very activating that we don't know how to, or we struggle to figure out how to place the anger, the frustration, the betrayal.

27:27 How do we channel it to do something productive? So I think that's kind of where we struggle about not having that dialogue. So I know I'm kind of going on a pretty long tangent, but I'm curious about when you saw Sophia's post, and I know in the past, you have been openly calling Fatri out in Cambodian groups when his name gets mentioned. I'm curious about what your reaction was, but also how people respond when you bring him up to community members. Yeah, thank you for saying all that and laying it out in terms of definitions that I think it's so important for us to be familiar with legalities as well as legalities.

28:23 just levels of social, emotional, and physical exploitation and abuse. And so you mentioned the word grifter and I just wanted to just lay some comprehension around terminology we're using in case it's new for anyone as it was new for me at one time and someone who works in violence prevention, mental health, advocacy. I have a background with those areas of support, not only personally and my own family and We know that my community needs that and more support of mental health and resources for all, you know, like plethora of many different areas of challenges we all personally face and then as a collective as well.

29:22 And so I just wanna quickly lay out the word grifter I would like to share is a con artist who uses their charm or usually involving charm, winning over trust to deceive and manipulate and swindle people out of money, possessions, labor. And even your trust is something that if done with someone who is trying to scam you, the intention of a grifter is to take advantage of you for profit. essentially, eventually. So that's what a grifter is. And I've heard opportunists come up as well in description of patre.

30:06 And, of course, I will also disclaimer to say we're talking about patre, particularly in this conversation. But this also applies, as Randy, you mentioned, that with Sophia Roche, really doing the wonderful job of courageously wanting to take on breaking the silence of addressing harm that she has faced or others in the community. And as you said, as open secrets, sometime that Pacha is just the epitome of so many stories and experiences that collectivize a experience like you said of the serial reaction to his name or to his brand or whatever project he may be doing and I would be one of those people I will admit that in my experience of sharing that since I have not been friends with him and I do not co-sign or support or will be a part of any of his projects or anything he's working on Realistically, however, I love and care about my people.

31:18 And I hope to those who do not know me yet that my reputation and the work that I do gets to you in a way where those who care about community like Randy does and I do, the purpose of calling out or calling in someone like Patre is not to criminalize him or for revenge or to further some sort of punishment. Accountability is another word that can be really difficult to have nuance around when we're dealing with correcting behaviors or addressing behaviors.

32:07 And I can speak for myself. If I harm someone, it is really difficult to say, I'm sorry, I made a mistake and I care about you. I care about our community. What can I do to fix this wrong or harm? And on an individual basis, many of us, there's many different levels of patres out there. And so we're just taking the opportunity to make sure address and speak on one of the most prevalent names and I would say offenders in the community and so I hope folks who are listening and want to engage and want to step forward or want to provide services and resources more than we can offer in just one short episode that we really start to do that with one another.

33:02 And so I welcome it. And to continue on with definitions, opportunists is what I said, is another word that I've heard come up to describe Pache and others like him who do take advantage of our community and exploit in ways for them to gain personal benefits out of the vulnerability and whether it be through monetary gain or fame or, you know, status, whatever it may be, an opportunist typically is not with good intention and is there to exploit circumstances to gain like immediate advantage over others.

33:51 others and are not guided by principles of actually helping. I will also put out there, I will use the term activists and Brandy already brought up grooming. So grooming, I also want to quickly say is in terms of when we're talking legalities, it's sexual grooming is usually what we're referring to. And it's the action or behavior that some people may not even know they're doing it because we live in such a patriarchal society that is also capitalist.

34:35 And so sometimes when these behaviors are exhibited and success comes from an individual, they're actually lifted up as someone who has authority or success or to be aspired to because oftentimes their transgressions and harm is overlooked, right? We see that happen often with open secrets and people who may have long histories of domestic violence in their family or relationships. And culturally, fortunately, there is a shift to be more mental health conscious.

35:24 And I give a lot of applause and admiration to younger our younger folks or the younger generation like Sophia are the ones who are really doing the job of calling out people and behaviors that long for long time and for many different reasons older generations have not done the job of doing. And so grooming, sexual grooming, we know this happens, even if we don't know the terminology or maybe it's new to us, but the victims and the experience of women, children, including boys, There is, you know, exploitation and abuse of just vulnerable people.

36:12 And that includes boys and men, too. But particularly in terms of statistics and experiences, we know that overwhelmingly, disproportionately, those who do are victimized. It does change. veer more towards women and girls and the LGBTQ community as well. And so grooming, I say all that to say that I want this to be as holistic as possible in terms of accountability. It's not just about punishment.

36:56 We really want to move understanding and accountability in a way that we can be perpetrators. We can be, you know, ourselves, whoever we may be. It's not just Patre and those horrible people. It's like Randy mentioned, it's really difficult when it's our own people in this case. And then I also want to really be honest and call in the vulnerability if we have it to be with one another to say, Where do I contribute as someone who maybe just, you don't get involved.

37:46 Say something comes up and you see something happening and someone's being harmed and you just don't get involved. That is a place of condoning behaviors as well if we don't speak up and those with authority or those with the power dynamic Like having a platform like Comerican, when we know that platform may not at some points be helping, but we don't say anything. That's a place of putting on that burden, labor on others. And so I just... want to make sure we have that understanding here in terms of intentions.

38:27 And to finish off grooming, I just want to say that it is from a legal standpoint, a behavior that is trying to establish emotional connection with someone like a target. And sometimes it's really obvious and intentional. There's steps and interactions where it's very premeditated and it's insistent and invoke guilt on the parties who don't partake or submit to and oftentimes power is used to say I'm someone who's trusted I'm someone who has a following or I'm someone who you know so and so will back up and so those who find themselves in the situation where you're being groomed you may not know it you may not see it until it's too late so I hope we'll go over addressing some of the tips and ways we can identify when we ourselves are maybe receiving the grooming or experiencing it and don't even realize.

39:40 And maybe those who are exhibiting those behaviors because it is so prevalent in a patriarchal society where men are centered and those with power are centered, those with visibility are centered. authority is centered and they often are the ones who can commit these type of exploitation and abuse without accountability or being called out or folks being able to ignore it. I would really love for us to have a conversation where we try and move away from that culturally or socially as much as possible and really allow for honest conversation when maybe even say I myself am exhibiting you know grooming behavior or I am myself in a place where it looks like I'm causing harm to someone else in my personal life or my community.

40:39 No, that was a lot, Andy, in answering your question. Yeah. Yeah. And I wonder, like, in the past, like, what the reaction has been from Fatri when he's been called out by individuals. I don't know what his response has been, but I'm also, like, curious, like, what does accountability look like for for him I think that's the question that goes beyond just me and you but like from a collective standpoint and the people that were victimized by him the ones that have been accusing him about his but the harm that he's caused so I think the question is what does accountability look like I think that's an open-ended question that we really need to be having Yeah, to go back to your question about what my thoughts were when I saw Sophia post initially on social media, I was on Instagram where, She was just wanting to, I guess, break the ice a bit in terms of bringing up a call to action to say there's been experiences in the Seattle, Washington community and her own personal that she eventually wanted to share and

42:10 was just opening it up to what thoughts of what others have on the topic. And as you said, in terms of the chronology of how this all came about, there was just such an overwhelming like response and triggering that came from hundreds of messages that she received and you received, Randy, and I received in support of Sophia. And so what came from that, and as you mentioned, that I've been an outspoken person individual in the community who will speak up and say that I do not support Patre or I will not work with him or more likely people will approach me and ask me about him or tell me about whatever interaction they are having through the years and I think the accumulation of that over decades.

43:20 It's been at least two decades now for me in this experience. So I can imagine without being a direct victim of some of the more really egregious and serious types of experiences that people have shared with us is that this is something that just really is not only not okay, but it's just, unacceptable to allow to continue with a response that we're receiving from people. It's almost an outcry of will someone do something about this?

44:04 And or what can we do about this? And like you said, there's been so many instances of people coming together. And we've been a part of those conversations throughout the years where people want to do a petition. or want to do a public statement, or there's some people who have wanted to sue him who've approached me and asked me about those type of avenues. And for someone who, like I said, I feel like I'm trusted by community and advocacy spaces, I...

44:44 think when it comes to accountability when we have our young people like Sophia and she doesn't know him directly she hasn't had any type of um victimization story like others have had yet she has the burden now of holding the space and the emotions and the questions of what do I do about this now and that is so to me that's so heartbreaking and in some ways I understand a little bit more of like maybe my parents and elders who, when they as refugees are trying to do the best they can to, you know, create a safe and safe and like really, better life for us that they run into a lot of trouble and trying to, you know, figure that out for us.

45:44 And some places they fail, some places they're still struggling, some places, you know, like we may never reach a place of older folks understanding our generation, millennials. And then I see Sophia and other young folks, I'm hearing all these personal stories coming out of Cambodia and, um, girls in particular, young, very young women who are Khmer and have these stories of interaction with patre. And I will be honest and say it's not just patre. It's very common to hear it from Khmer cis hetero.

46:33 men in the community too. And so I think it was just a breaking point for me where, um, seeing Sophia was a reflection of how much I have been holding to, um, support and care for personally and privately, um, individuals in the community who have direct experience with Patre, but also in extension, um, a type of culture where it's very difficult to try to call in and call out people in our community, particularly our cis-heterosexual men, Khmer men.

47:18 And, you know, me doing the work of anti-deportation As well, that has that intersection of detention and running into the law and criminality already. And I know the statistics and I know the disproportionate impact of what state sanctioned violence looks like, the history in the US, our history as a community. And so it's a lot to really nuance out when you ask, what does accountability look like? There's so many layers and nuance to get to a place where we find the appropriate or what's considered the appropriate measure or pathway to what accountability looks like because there's so little of the examples that we see, especially publicly, of how to do this together.

48:22 It's either, you know, send them to jail or deport them or punishment in some sort of violent way. And very little is it examples when we're doing restorative justice, which looks more like community accountability, just because of, you know, structure. Sometimes the power oftentimes, of course, is in those who already have authority and those who are in privileged positions. And then when we're talking about like sexism or gendered violence and LGBTQ violence, transphobia and homophobia, like all the vulnerable groups, it is so difficult to, you know, really get that critical thinking where we can analyze and then have open, honest and caring and loving relationships.

49:24 restorative approaches to accountability. And just so to, in short, what I'm saying, the answer is, I don't really know what accountability is going to look like in this situation, especially, particularly in regards to Pach Chai, because I think it also needs and requires his involvement. We can't do accountability without all parties being involved, including those who are perpetrators, those who harm. We can do healing, you know, we can do how can we support people who have been harmed ways, and we should do those things with one another, support those who have experiences where they're saying this person makes me uncomfortable.

50:12 where they're saying this person has harmed me, has violated me, and really having that as a shift in priority to center those voices. So those who feel uncomfortable when they have their personal experience, whether it's with Patre or whether it's with another person in the community or whether it's with me, it could, you know, it might, maybe I've done something. So, yeah. not putting that out of the possibilities if we approach an environment of calling in our people with restorative justice in mind, which is a way to really have all parties involved to...

50:58 account for, address, name, have everything out to say this is a space and a process that is going to humanize all of us and say we could be victims, we could be perpetrators, because that's what, you know, being human is. We make mistakes. But it is really egregious and it's wrong and it should be unacceptable if a person is harming someone else, like Patrick is doing, And we don't collectively, if we call ourselves a community, protect those who are being harmed and center their comfort, their healing, their voices publicly.

51:44 It shouldn't be just an open secret that we don't directly address. And it's relied upon by personal relationships just to warn people one another um i think there are ways uh we can go about accountability for patra in particular where we need him to be involved in that process um to you know like not only hear and it's not necessarily for those who've been harmed it's hard to hear that like there's a there's a space or an option for those who are violent or those who have harmed them or those who are doing unforgivable things to have a place of like voice in that way but I think when it comes to restorative justice it's really important to humanize one another as much as possible because we don't have the ability to reform or change and correct behaviors and wrongs if we're not given the opportunity.

53:00 And I think that's just my, a lot of my own personal principle when it comes to, you know, extending to my organizing work of really being an abolitionist at heart, that there's no form of violence that really is going to help bring us to a place of liberation and love and community safety and self-safety without humanizing one another first and then From there, the agency and the option and opportunity is up to those who have harmed.

53:43 What are they going to do with that information? What are they going to do with those accusations and hearing how they've harmed? And if they've done that, they're there at the table to hear how they've harmed. And, you know, it can be, some situations is not just black and white of here's the victim and here's the perpetrator. There's situations, and I've seen this often working with, working especially with domestic violence situations and in families who experience domestic violence and personal intimacy situations.

54:28 relationships, personal, intimate violence is sometimes situations can happen where those who are victims perpetuate violence as well through how they, how it manifests in their themselves. And so I know a common saying is harmed people harm people and I hope that people know that with that saying there's healed people heal people too and it can be a mix of you can be someone who harms someone else and then also be a victim as well in the case of say in families where a parent is you know physically abusive and they're really harming their children and like hitting the children and then the children hit their siblings or their partners or their friends and so you see how it's not so easy to say let's hold this person accountable and again I'm going off of just modalities of different therapy and psychology and pulling from mental health trainings and intervention training and things like that to say, I just know it requires full involvement in order to do accountability.

56:08 And if Pacha's not at the table, then... I feel like true accountability is not going to be there. We could go the route of people suing him and people calling him out and all that. But I know the important option out there is that there is support and healing that we really want to get to those who have been harmed. So even if we don't have patre and those who perpetuate violence at the table, participating in how to restore you know restorative justice process that then we can still step in and I hope we do continue to do this you Randy me others involved and those who I hope step forward as well to work together to shift the narrative to say Let's make the safe spaces.

57:13 Let's move the needle in making sure we center those who are uncomfortable, those who have been harmed, and believe them. When particularly vulnerable groups, girls, boys, women, LGBTQ folks, say they are uncomfortable or they are... isolated from community and they're the ones who step away because the perpetrator is in those spaces or they are leaving the conversations or they are the ones who are still welcomed into spaces. It's those who have been harmed who have to step away and who have to do the job of minimizing themselves and being quiet or not causing quote unquote trouble.

57:59 And I think that also tells you that because of that harm, when it goes unchecked, community members who have been victimized or have survived harm they do exit out of the community altogether, which the community does not benefit from. We lose out on their friendships, creativity, innovation, advocacy, the work that they contribute, but also them as people. And I see this time and time again in other spaces where it has happened. It breaks my heart. It breaks my heart when you see a person that was victimized and that was a victim to what happened or to their past and they can't engage in the space anymore, a place that they once called home or a second home or a place where they built most of their foundation or their friendships.

59:01 And to have that disappear overnight almost, it's breathtaking and it's really heartbreaking to watch. And I think that as a community, we have to think about what we actually lose out on all together. And this does not push a community moving forward. Like, I don't care if this toxic community leader does all this great work or brings in all this money. It's not going to matter when there's a couple of people or even one person that gets... that gets harmed by that person and that it creates an effect and it also leads to more victims.

59:47 And it also leads to more division and focus away from the heart of the matter, whether it's an advocacy work or community level work, it disrupts the process and community altogether. And I think as we start to wrap up, How do you think, I think maybe the best way of putting it is what should we do? And I know you touched up on accountability and, you know, collective accountability and bringing people to the table, but what would you say to those who are struggling to speak up, whether it's about Fetri or anyone else in the community, what would you say to them?

1:00:38 Yeah, thanks for bringing it back to centering the work that needs to be done for us moving forward. And when it comes to what I would say, I guess it's, I would say that these are the things I would, I will do. And I want to do personally and I want to do as a trusted person and advocate in the community is create a directory that has, at least from my, you know, limited, although it is more expansive than others, knowledge and, um, networks of those that are trusted and are doing wonderful amazing really genius like transformative things not only in our community but as examples of mentors who they don't even know it but I see them as just such lights like beings, illuminate role models that I want to tap and really name.

1:02:06 And so I want to do the job and I invite others to join me in that. And those who have been doing it, like you see in platforms like Khmer Renaissance with Zotira, And really, he shared recently and, you know, being aware of all this that came up that Sophia shared how his platform was how it came to be. And it was a direct response to what he saw in exploitation and the disservice that Tamerican and others were doing in the community so he's just one example we have so many like I said and I don't have one podcast I can even like list all of them and there's so many and I think I will do the job because I carry that institutional knowledge and community knowledge and the history that I have an experience with all these wonderful community builders and exemplary stories and examples of those who are doing the work of building trust and healing and lifting and supporting businesses and you know our identity and building it and connecting one another so I want to do the job of creating at least a place where I

1:03:37 will share that knowledge and I'll be some sort of directory and I'll welcome those to collaborate if they would like to You know, you mentioned working in Chicago and at the Killing Fields Memorial. and Cambodian American History Museum there, it's like the only national museum we have in the United States. And not a lot of people know that we have one. And so I think knowledge, sharing knowledge is really important to combat the vulnerabilities that our younger generation and others who are just maybe interested in learning about who is who in the community especially those who want to get started in a, you know, an area they're not familiar with.

1:04:27 If they want to become a doctor, here are all the Khmer doctors. If they want to be an actor and an educator or an artist. We have so many professionals and creatives and trusted professionals I would call community members and leaders and folks who should be mentors, but we don't have established institutions that build that in for us like other communities do. There are programs and internships and all these pathways that are institutionalized for other communities to really connect and build in that generational knowledge and pathways of bringing up training their people and educating their people.

1:05:33 And so, you know, we are really doing the most phenomenal job as Khmer diaspora and survivors of a genocide. Like, it's tremendous how far we've come. And so I want to try to combat the vulnerabilities there of feeling isolated, of feeling like you're maybe the only person who you know, like has this experience or have this family or this violence that happens. Like, I think something that really stays with me since I first, maybe it's one of the things that really first made me so passionate to pursue as any pathway possible and learn and read books and watch documentaries and, you know, listen become like the empathic person I am for the community is that I kept feeling even personally too I felt this that what feels wrong about our community or what feels like we don't work or we why do we have all these problems and it became such a deficit you know approach of existing like

1:07:05 when Khmer people get together, I've heard over and over and over people say, you can expect drama, you can expect issues, and it becomes a place of feeling like, really, it's something naturally wrong with us or embedded in us as a person, as an individual, as a family, community, or as a collective. And it's There's so many things that create that environment to feel that way. And I think from that, when I... exhibited that myself felt that way and then other people continuously saying you know our culture is dying or language or dance or food whatever it is I just see such a tremendous overwhelming response to that that we don't say enough and we don't I think, center enough as our asset, right?

1:08:08 Like we have such an asset-facing culture, like the pride as being Khmer, especially with what has been going on in Cambodia recently and the attacks of feeling like our culture, our history, our heritage sites and all that is being under attack, you know, Khmer people, the world over, I feel like I see the visceral response of saying, you know, of coming together. But really, I feel like approaching as much as possible to say, I have so much...

1:09:00 faith in knowing we were we're going to be triumphant and having our younger people still speak our language still know our history just because having to start over from nothing and you know a genocide it's you're starting from being a people that is erased. So I understand where that comes from, but as much as possible, my approach is going to be asset sharing where the work is being done, the people that can be trusted and the accomplishments and what has been, what's in the works and what can be.

1:09:43 And so it's not a place where we're thinking that we don't have we can't do anything about anything like a place of as much as possible that things are hopeless and things only get worse right um moving away from um overthinking in that way i'd rather be a overthinking optimist i guess yeah And I think one thing I forgot to mention during this episode is that, yeah, there were a lot of Cambodian folks that were coming to Cambodia, a lot of them for the first time.

1:10:24 I know I did last year and I knew how transformative that experience was, but then you know, for Fatri from the stories that I have heard, like, you know, he would offer them a place to stay, reach out to the young Kanmai diaspora folks. And I think that this is something that we all have to talk about collectively, you know, as a community when we're making that pilgrimage. for the first time or the fifth time and discovering our own relationship with the ancestral land and what that means for us moving forward and how, you know, there are, these are examples of vulnerabilities that can be exploited in this case.

1:11:08 And I have heard these stories from folks that shared with me about how they feel that their first trip was tainted because of their association. A lot of what was associated with Fatri, who was leading the charge. So I think that also really speaks to how do we find ways to support our own young folks, especially that are just trying to learn about their identity and not be put in a position where there's harm and where their own vulnerabilities get exploited and to the point where they disappear forever from the community. Again, this kind of goes into that cycle. This is kind of going into that behavior that we see happen in many other spaces and in closing I will offer like in the episode notes like some of the resources that Sophia did share with us I know Sina you might have a few things as well too and I really hope that for listeners I know this was a very exhausting take on not just on Fetri but also on the pervasive nature of community spaces and how we address or encounter harm.

1:12:24 So I do hope that when folks do speak up, that we do find ways to support and create an opportunity for them to share their stories and what makes them feel safe and prioritize their safety. Because if we lose one, we lose everything. I think that's the way I you know try to think about this and i hope that folks listening to it um i hope that you do take good care of yourself i hope that you do take your time and you know think about how we can make spaces better and more accessible for people and listen to the voices that are more marginalized than we are um but you know i was wondering if you have any other lasting comments before we close out Yeah, absolutely.

1:13:17 Thank you for closing it up in terms of next steps or opening the space to move towards centering those with most vulnerability or feeling marginalized or isolated. And so I will double up on your welcoming of those to speak out and share and Don't shy away from being honest about your experience if you've experienced harm in a way where it prevents you from going to, you event, that cultural show, that dinner with everybody.

1:14:16 I know it's really going to take a lot of work and time and resources, actually, that we realistically, there's a lot of resources in terms of mental health support, even like medical care. A lot of folks don't even have that in itself and safety, feeling safe to even feel vulnerable to address all these interpersonal, what is considered private life. issues. You know, no one wants to put any dirty laundry, especially if it's your own out there.

1:15:00 And I just want to uplift that invitation to say, I think we do have the ability and the people and the intentions there of those who are helpers and those who love our community and those who really care. I have seen what it looks like for someone myself who had in my childhood was very violent and have learned through therapy and really putting in the effort and taking the initiative to join the table to do restorative conversations and accountability not only for myself but from learning those skills to help facilitate that with others.

1:15:59 And I know there are educators and mental health providers and trained clinicians. I know it's not a lot of us, but we have them in our community. And so I guess I want to say that I would have two calls to action for those who, you know, like are listening and maybe you're hearing all this for the first time. So it's really new to be a part of the community in this way. But I would want to extend the call to action to you to say, is there something you want to do in the Khmer community in particular?

1:16:43 And maybe it's, you know, whatever your ethnic background is, or whatever your background is in community that you want to have with others. And there is a barrier, maybe an experience, a negative one, where you feel like because of that experience, and maybe a particular particular individual or people, a group of individuals who them being there prevents you from feeling like you're welcomed or that you will be treated poorly or negatively. I would really encourage you to think about first what what prevents you from being in that space.

1:17:34 And if that is the case, it's certain people and experiences that makes you feel like you don't belong, or that you will be ostracized, and you're in the position and you're not in the position of power, meaning you're the person who will likely be excluded or be told to leave, or you feel like you're that you have that vulnerability, then likely you're someone who is experiencing the power dynamic of a typical victim in a situation where the perpetrator is being centered from that experience.

1:18:19 And so I encourage you to look to who are the people who believe you. And maybe if you have the resource of support, like a therapist or a trusted advisor, mentor, friend whoever is trusted to you and you can share that with um find conversations of building out your safety network and so then i know i'm speaking to those who are typically the victims um right now and i'm saying i think that i've seen in my experience that is helpful because then you're doing the work of trying to heal for yourself and building a safety environment for yourself as best as you can and really think about those things and not just ignoring it and just being like, oh, I'm not going to go to that event.

1:19:24 I don't want to see that person. Therefore, I'll be the one to just not go. I really invite you and would put a call to action to say... you deserve to be in those spaces if you're someone who wants to be a part of the community. And so hopefully in building safety for yourself, you're doing that healing work and that safety building work for yourself. And then hopefully on the other end, to those who are the ones who are harming our community, speaking to you, this is the call to action I would have for you if you do... And I want to say this with the most...

1:20:08 Love and care for... particularly Khmer men in my life who I do organizing work with, who is in my family, who is some of my closest friends that have been abusers, who have assaulted others, sexually assaulted, who have exploited, and generally harmed others that I know of. Speaking directly in this way to those who have harmed, I've also seen, because they are some of the closest people to me, because of the work that they have done to address and to, as best as they can, change those habits.

1:21:14 I've seen the transformation given the stepping up that people who harm will do and be honest in wanting to stay in community as well i've seen them do the work and that is possible to come to a place where um at least on an individual level they're no longer abusing assaulting um taking advantage or being violent, harming others, at least on a personal level. And there needs to be more of that.

1:21:55 And so I speak directly to those who do recognize and know that they have harm too. please also share your stories to not just have it be the victims or those who have experienced harm and feel isolated and no longer showing in those spaces. I would love to see the leadership of those who recognize that someone that they have harmed someone or someone are saying something about them that hey you violated me or you make me uncomfortable or I don't go somewhere because of you when you hear that that that is an opportunity instead of just an attack taken as an attack to um you know, like continue that cycle of violence.

1:22:50 And sometimes people don't know how to approach, you know, this topic is so difficult. But if we, like I said, really approach each other with humanity at first, at least have that as a foundation, I hope that leads to, okay, the perpetrator, if you're the person harming Did you hear how this harmed that person? Make space for it and then go from there on what can be reconciled and what can't. Sometimes there's people who's never going to work together again. There's people who don't want to come back to community and that's unfortunate but I hope that in those two call to actions that we speak up more if we are someone who have experienced harm to create healing for ourself, um, to approach healing, to make healing for ourself.

1:23:40 Um, and then if we're causing harm to be open to accountability in ways that is restorative, that it's not just going to be, um, punishment and, you know, being garbage and thrown out from the community. I don't believe anyone is, you know, like, hopeless in this way. Hopefully given the opportunity. Thank you so much, Sina, for being willing to go into deep dives and for really being able to be vulnerable, but also very thoughtful and caring about, you know, the way we work.

1:24:26 think about folks who experienced harm and survived harm. And so I think this is an important conversation that this is not a conversation that ends with this episode, I hope that there will be more conversations from other community folks and leaders to think of ways and reimagine ways in which we can do better and must do better and how we hold ourselves accountable and, and and centering the voices of those harmed. And yeah, I think this is a great discussion. I hope that people get to check in the episode notes and feel free to reach out to myself or to Sina if you have any questions.

1:25:10 In the meantime, I hope that you do take good care of yourself and that I hope that the 2026 year is prosperous for all of us, despite the heaviness that we are still continuing to deal with. So, yeah, many thanks to you, Sina, for joining in at the last minute. And I hope you do feel better. Thank you, Randy. And thank you for being a place of safety to have these conversations. I know there are so many podcasts and so many resources that we want to uplift. And I just want to say that Banh Mi Chronicles and with you, Randy Kim, and also holding identity that I feel like I'm is not the most privileged and, you know, protected and uplifted and things like that, that is so important for us to work together.

1:26:01 The ones who, where we have a platform, where we have trust and where we have expertise to not be shy about coming together and Randy and I may not be the best experts on this topic, but what I do know is that we're going to do the best we can to always try and protect and uplift our community. So I really... Hope the call to action is not just for those who have experienced violence, who are perpetrating violence, but to just like all of us who want to be in community together to be an active villager of participating and taking initiative to speak to, you know, like I hope.

1:26:50 other people reach out to you Randy and want to continue this a bit of a series of how you can be a place that has been a long time space holder to share our stories and people look to the trusted platforms and experts and leaders to really shift where that power differential happens when it's those who are out to abuse and exploit. We need to be the ones who, if we love and care about community like you do, Randy, really be more outspoken and be louder and take up space and be unapologetic about protecting each other and speaking up for one another.

1:27:39 So thank you for doing that. Thank you so much, Sina. Thank you so much, everyone.