From the perspective of Kia2, what is worse:
Insulting people based on their ethnic identity or to deny that their identity even exists?
Like say you insulted all chinese people versus saying that there is no such thing as a chinese person.
What is more hostile towards Chinese people from this communitys perspective?
The word "racism" is something that has been invented in the last 100 years, with the almost sole purpose of damaging cohesion in European societies. Before that there was the term "racialist" but "racist" was the word being used internationally.
And when it comes to attacks like that you can do both. If your group does something good they can respond with "Well what even is X anyways?" and at the same time paint it as evil by saying "Look at all the bad stuff X group has done!"
It's all for the same purpose. Do not expect people using arguments like that to have a logical foundation. They will use anything they can to attack their enemies.