Wednesday, March 11, 2020


I'm not going to use the phrase "Wuhan Virus" anymore, if I ever did.  If it hurts people's feelings then I don't need to persist.  C19 seems more efficient at this point. But the rush to condemn those who have used the phrase as racist, even by those who used the phrase themselves a scant four weeks ago, is the same impulse that causes people to burn witches.  People feel frightened; bad things seem to be spinning out of control; a scapegoat is sought. Punishing an unpopular bystander is a common human response.  Even if it were deeply racist or unkind to call a disease by a particular name, that is unrelated to the spread of the disease.

Once it had occurred to me that this is true for discussions of the virus, the thought followed naturally that many accusations of racism or the various -isms and -phobias flow from this same unreasoning panic.  There is an urge to punish Someone when humans think Something has gone wrong, even if there is no connection, is fairly automatic, and we only unlearn it by training.  We try to enforce this on the community as well. If we are very, very pure, and do not allow anyone in the community to do wrong things (such as say bad words), then we will be safe. All our energy, then, should be put into enforcing purity, not solving problems. I suspect this is more common among those who feel unable to solve anything themselves.

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