During my recent travels I have heard all sorts of news regarding the widespread Coronavirus. I will not explain to you today what it is or how significant it is because I assume that if you are on my site reading my blog you are already aware that it is of far more significance than the Chinese government is trying to let on. Not to mention that there are already several other great blogs and articles out there doing it for me. What I will talk about however is how the failure of one government can greatly affect the rest of the world. Despite China’s president Xi Jinping being hailed “a great leader” in the past we are starting to realize the dangerous implications of his authoritarian ways, for China and for the rest of the world. The saddest part is the extreme lengths he is going to to silence people who attempt to warn other people about the health dangers they may face. Take for example, a doctor who told a WeChat group about the virus and was then punished by the Communist Party. It is still unclear what the doctor’s punishment entailed. Upon research, I cannot find exactly what happened to the doctor, all that is known is that he had to sign an “I am wrong” statement and is “under critical condition” according to Twitter user Yaxue Cao. Upon trying to follow the links that Cao cites, one reaches a blank page that says that “The content has been deleted by the author”. Sadly, this is just one of several cases of the Chinese government attempting to silence the people and punish those who try to spread the alarming news. They reportedly are closely monitoring “journalism, social media, nongovernmental organizations, the legal profession, and others that might provide accountability”, according to The New York Times. Even sadder is that by the time the Chinese government decided to act on it and listen to the doctors by locking down Wuhan (the city where the Coronavirus is said to have originated from), 5 million people had already evacuated. Because of the Chinese government’s refusal to acknowledge the virus at its onset, hospitals were unable to stock up on supplies. There are now shortages of testing kits, masks, protective gear, etc.
There is one other topic I wish to talk about regarding the Corona Virus, and that is the way that people that identify as Asians are being treated ever since the onset of the virus. Many Asians living abroad have spoken out about incidents of discrimination, the most common incident being people moving away from them on buses. There has also been a reported incident of a Singaporean woman being confronted in a mall in New Zealand. A French newspaper had “Yellow Alert” spelled in huge letters earlier this week. It’s disgusting and disheartening to hear that after all these years, what was known as the “Yellow Peril Era” is making a comeback to the west, at a time that I thought we were in progress of moving forward. That era was filled with lynchings of Asian immigrants, racial violence, and discrimination. I remember that time quite clearly and it’s beyond devastating to think that it may repeat itself again.
The Issue With Your Kind 