Scapegoat for the Plague
By Anonymous / Spring 2020
As the coronavirus pandemic surges, my life has been impacted a lot. Wearing a mask, keeping social distance and reducing the number of going outside, I feel that everything has become inconvenient with the pandemic going on. The worst thing is that it is easy to become anxious about a lot of things, such as my health, my family’s health and my education. A lot of mental pressure has come to me. Of course, I also have a hope in my mind that the situation will eventually turn better and I should have patience. However, the number of confirmed cases are still increasing and there is no signal that the situation is changing in a positive way. What’s worse is that as an international student from China, I can’t go back to my hometown this summer, since the president Donald Trump imposed an entry ban on people from China. The ban leaves me no choice but stay in the U.S. because if I go back to China, I would likely lose my education opportunity in the U.S. This summer, I can’t see my family, which makes me disappointed and mad. Why did Trump impose the ban on people from China? It is because Trump believes China should pay for the loss caused by the pandemic, since the pandemic originated from China, while China didn’t respond yet. So Trump made racist speech about China and called the coronavirus “Wuhan virus”, which makes me extremely mad. Many Americans followed Trump and believe that China made the fault and China should be responsible for that. I kind of question Trump’s policies towards China. The policies have shown hostility to China. However, if we look at Trump’s policies on the pandemic, we can see Trump’s inaction has led to the failure of controlling the pandemic. The U.S. scapegoats China for problems that it has caused during the pandemic period, which has misled a lot of people to believe that the pandemic is all China’s fault. We should dig out the truth about the pandemic on our own instead of blindly following what the government has told us.
By shifting blame to China, the U.S. government is trying to beat China in the U.S.-China competition and support Trump’s bid for reelection. There has been a competition between the US and China for a long time, for example the trade war. Trump always wants to find a chance to beat China in the competition or undermine the global power of China. Some mainstream media, like Fox News, claim that there are clues that China released the coronavirus by accident and China has concealed the truth about the pandemic. However, if we look deeper, we can see mainstream media spin the story to meet political agenda. If we check out systematic analysis sites, like Democracy Now, we can see that the charge against China is lack of evidence. In the article “The Folly of Trump’s Blame-Beijing Coronavirus Strategy,” Evan Osnos points out that “the White House seized on a blame-Beijing strategy to undermine China’s growing global power and shore up Trump’s bid for reëlection” (Osnos). Blaming China is actually a strategy to beat China in the competition. By emphasizing the fault of China on the pandemic, the U.S. government intends to conceal the problems it has caused and shift the public’s focus. However, the U.S. government actually made a lot of problematic policies, which led to the failure of controlling the spread of the pandemic. At the beginning of the pandemic crisis, the U.S. government overlooked the seriousness of the pandemic and didn’t take actions to control the pandemic in time, which caused the rapid spread of the pandemic and infections of millions of people. The U.S. government released neoliberal policies during the pandemic period, which gave no help to the control of the pandemic. In the article “The Consequences of Neoliberalism in the Current Pandemic,” Vicente Navarro points out that “One of the key public policies carried out by governments with neoliberal tendencies has been the mass privatization and commercialization of public services (such as medical care), which are so vital for the well-being of populations” (Navarro). The government commercialized public services. To the government, profits are prioritized over people. The poor are unable to afford the expensive fee for medical service and thus cannot receive good treatment in time. The well-being of the public is not guaranteed and as a result, more people are infected with the pandemic. The spread of the pandemic is actually the U.S. government’s fault. The U.S. government intends to emphasize the fault of China to shift the public’s blame and thus fault of the U.S. government will not be brought to the table. That is important to Trump’s bid for reelection.
The blame for China has caused the racial hatred against Chinese people. The spread of the pandemic has caused financial depression. Industries shut down and people lose jobs. Life has become harder for people. In such a difficult time, with Trump’s agitprop of China’s fault, people who don’t know the truth start to believe that China is the source of all these miserable things that happened to them. They start to believe that Chinese people have brought the coronavirus to their community and spread it out. They start to believe that the Chinese should be kept outside the border to stop the loss caused by the Chinese. People who don’t know the truth become hatred against Chinese people. Although China in recent years has been developing rapidly and Chinese people have achieved things in many fields, there is still a stereotype that Chinese people are inferior in some aspects, such as physique, education and etiquette. Chinese people sometimes are treated in a biased way and are marked as a weak, rude and cunning racial group. Chinese people don’t get accepted or even looked down upon no matter what they have achieved. And when special circumstances happen, Chinese people become the victims to be blamed, since they are prone to make trouble. The case of the coronavirus pandemic has provided a good example for what I described above. The pandemic is a natural disaster, but some people blame Chinese people for simply that the pandemic came from China. In the article “Coronavirus fears show how ‘model minority’ Asian Americans become the ‘yellow peril’,” Matthew Lee says that “While viruses and other pathogens do not discriminate between hosts based on race, ethnicity, nationality or immigration status — stigma and misinformation certainly do” (Lee). When a problem occurs, the stigma and stereotype about Chinese people can make people who don’t know the truth believe that Chinese people are the cause of the trouble. This way of thinking is completely racist. These people want to exclude the Chinese from their land and thus avoid more troubles. This is why a lot of people agree with Trump’s entry ban on the Chinese.
The situation that Chinese people are facing in the pandemic period is almost the same as that when the first group of the Chinese immigrated to the US 150 years ago. In the book A Different Mirror by Ronald Takaki, the history of Chinese immigrants is depicted. The Chinese in history were a racial group that was often discriminated against and suffered attacks. The Chinese were exploited as cheap labor for whites. They worked in mines, built railroads, helped to develop agriculture and did laundry for communities. Chinese workers made a lot of contributions to the development of the American society, but they were viewed as aliens who deprived white men of their working opportunities and thus they became targets of resentment. Chinese workers were treated as slaves who can do degraded jobs that people distained themselves from. “What enabled businessmen … to degrade the Chinese into a subservient laboring caste was the dominant ideology that defined America as a racially homogeneous society and Americans as white. The status of racial inferiority assigned to the Chinese had been prefigured in the black and Indian past” (Takaki 147). The Chinese were thought inferior than whites and put in the same category as blacks and Indians, who had been discriminated against for a long time. The racial inferiority of the Chinese left people with an impression of rudeness and savage. The Chinese were depicted as “a bloodsucking vampire with slanted eyes, a pigtail, dark skin, and thick lips. The Chinese were described as heathen, morally inferior, savage, childlike, and lustful” (Takaki 147). The white were disgusted with the Chinese and thought that the inferior racial group should not be on their land to threaten the homogeneity of their society. As a result, Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act to prohibit the entry of the Chinese. “Blamed as ‘the source of the troubles’ of white workingmen, the Chinese suffered from racial attacks” (Takaki 149). We can see that due to the discrimination, a stereotype has formed that the Chinese are inferior and degraded, and are always the source of troubles. On the other hand, the Chinese are stereotyped as a threat to the white society, which is termed by Yellow Peril, as they may deprive whites of things or even lives like vampires. These stereotypes have shaped the white’s xenophobia towards the Chinese, or even Chinese Americans.
If we look at the blame for Chinese people in the pandemic case, it can be explained by the stereotype that Chinese people are the troublemaker. The xenophobic Americans would rather believe that coronavirus was invented by China than believe that it is really a natural disaster. Trump’s entry ban on the Chinese is a parallel to the Chinese Exclusion Act. The Chinese are kept outside of the U.S. border and some are even expelled from the American land. It is all happening now, the same as history. Injustice is happening. Discrimination is happening. Chinese people are now suffering from all the unfair treatment. However, as an immigration country since the beginning of the nation, the U.S. has been advocating for its core democratic values, including liberty, justice and equality. According to the democratic values, any people, including the Chinese, should be treated equally and be free to enter the border. Trump’s entry ban on the Chinese has violated the democratic values. American society has changed a lot in a positive way to promote social justice, but why does the history repeat itself? The key ideology behind the scene is desire to maintain power.
Shifting blames to the Chinese is the tactic of the American politicians who want to maintain power and the purpose is to scapegoat different racial and immigrant groups. To the politicians, like Trump, power is more important than other things. Power has overshadowed justice and equality. In the article “The ‘Chinese Flu’ Is Part of a Long History of Racializing Disease,” Carl Abbott says “Disease outbreaks are often racialized and made vehicles for nativist beliefs and ethnic hatreds” (Abbott). Racializing disease has been a weapon of undermining the power of other races and strengthening the power of the politicians themselves. The politicians take advantage of the public's fear toward the virus to strengthen xenophobia. Abbott continues to point out that “blaming victims and increased hostility toward minorities had been hallmarks of health-related panics since ancient times” (Abbott). The xenophobia under health-related panics has been exploited by the politicians to shift the public’s rage and blame to the Chinese so that their power will not be harmed. So Trump still has the chance to win the reelection. However, the whole Chinese racial group including Chinese Americans become scapegoats. The racial group is blamed for the origin of the virus and thought as a threat to the health of the whole society. As a consequence, Chinese people are facing hostility. Racist speech and unfair treatment are happening to Chinese people. Injustice is happening. Do the politicians know that scapegoating different racial and immigrant groups will produce racist issues and injustice? Of course, they do, but they still do that on purpose. In their heart, power is prioritized over everything else. To maintain their power, they can be every individualist. They can harm other groups’ profits for their own. They can ignore social issues to avoid the issues undermining their power or exploit social issues to strengthen their power. As a consequence, social issues never get resolved and even get exacerbated. The pandemic is still raging on our land but there is no good approach to control it. People are losing jobs, workers are exposed to the virus, the poor can’t receive good treatment in hospital, etc. But there is no good solution to these issues. Chinese people are facing discrimination and xenophobia but there is no authority standing out to call for the justice and equality. Meanwhile, Trump and some other politicians are still thinking about how to maintain their power, thinking about how to win the bid for reelection, thinking about how to beat China in the trade war, but they are not concerned that the society has been separated and people have been struggling.
It is important that everyone is concerned with the problems that we are facing during the pandemic period, since the pandemic is related to everyone’s life. I hope my readers can realize that we should not blame the Chinese for the origin of the pandemic and we should not racialize the pandemic. The pandemic is a natural disaster. Most of the racist and biased information comes from the mainstream media and people take it without critically thinking about it. We should not blindly take the propaganda of mainstream media, since mainstream media tend to spin stories to meet political agendas. We should always question propaganda and check out more systematic analysis sites to see stories from various angles. At this difficult time, instead of figuring out who ought to be responsible for the loss caused by the pandemic, we should be empathetic with the people struggling during the pandemic period. It is urgent to find an effective way to control the pandemic and stop the number of confirmed cases from increasing. It is urgent to help the people who lost jobs and have difficulty living a life to get through the difficult time. It is urgent to guarantee that everyone can receive a good treatment in hospital to get rid of the risk of death after infection. A lot of social issues are urgent to be solved during this period. Solidarity of the whole society is of significant importance. We should treat the same for people from different nations and races. No matter where they are from, no matter what skin colors they have, we should help them as much as we can when they are in need. Also, in this thing-oriented society, we should prioritize people over profits during the pandemic period. This is especially important for leading companies. We should make more contributions to save more people from dilemma or death rather than aiming for profits. For example, coronavirus vaccine research groups should aim to save people’s lives rather than making profits. It is important that people from all fields in the society unite together to figure out solutions to the issues caused by the pandemic. With solidarity, a lot of issues can be solved and the situation can turn better.
In conclusion, American politicians who stand with Trump have scapegoated China for their failure of controlling the pandemic to maintain their power. As rational people, we should not listen to their words blindly. Instead, we should look at the story from different angles to figure out what the truth is. Chinese people are not the racial group we should blame, but instead we should see what the government have done wrong during the pandemic period. At this difficult time, we should have empathy for people who are suffering and we should be in solidarity with people from any race and background and help each other as much as we can. With solidarity, I believe we can get through the difficult time.
Work Cited
Takaki, Ronald. A Different Mirror. First revised edition. Little, Brown and Company, June 1993.
Osnos, Evan. “The Folly of Trump’s Blame-Beijing Coronavirus Strategy.” The New Yorker, 18 May 2020. Accessed 14 June 2020.
Navarro, Vicente. “The Consequences of Neoliberalism in the Current Pandemic.” National Center for Biotechnology Information, 7 May 2020. Accessed 14 June 2020.
Lee, Matthew. “Coronavirus fears show how ‘model minority’ Asian Americans become the ‘yellow peril’.” NBC News, 9 Mar. 2020. Accessed 14 June 2020.
Abbott, Carl. “The ‘Chinese Flu’ Is Part of a Long History of Racializing Disease.” CityLab, 17 Mar. 2020. Accessed 14 June 2020.