Harvey Dzodin: COVID-19 – War is hell
January 28 , 2020
By Harvey Dzodin，a senior research fellow at the Center for China and Globalization(CCG).
A famous general, William Tecumseh Sherman said that “war is hell” and
while he was speaking of the American Civil War, his words aptly apply
to the epic battle we are currently fighting against COVID-19.
Wars bring out the best in people and the worst, and our war against an
unseen enemy is no different. There is an abundance of heroic, selfless
fighters on the front lines, notably in Hubei province working to save
lives, not infrequently at the cost of their own. But on the flip side,
as in most wars, the environment has been poisoned with racial prejudice
and hatred.
Online retailers continue to do a brisk business profiting from flogging
coffee mugs and t-shirts emblazoned with “Coronavirus Made in China”
despite angry protests to stop demonizing China and profiting from its
misfortunes. Some designs add insult to injury by defacing what looks
like a red Chinese flag but with the yellow stars replaced by the images
of the virus itself.
With the advent of the virus, prejudice against China, specifically, and
Asians, generally, have sprung up like weeds during a rainy spring. A
French newspaper proclaims a “yellow alert” in response to COVID-19. An
Austrian-Chinese woman coughs on a Vienna subway and all other
passengers flee. Extreme-right ideologue Rush Limbaugh asked his 27
million followers: “Is our government doing anything to stop the ChiCom
virus?” He later went on to claim that the virus was nothing more than
the common cold and was being weaponized against U.S. President Donald
Trump.
Perhaps the unkindest cut of all was the now infamous Wall Street Journal
headline “China is the Real Sick Man of Asia.” It was a double punch in
the gut, not only alluding to China’s Century of Humiliation at the
hands of Western powers but also referencing its author’s view of the
crippling impact of the COVID-19 on China and its economy. The Journal’s
editors knew or should have known both the negatively charged origin of
the headline about the demise of the once-powerful Ottoman Empire but
also seen its two daggers targeted at China’s heart.
surface, or if they are newly formed infecting people just like the
coronavirus is. There is a parallel global epidemic of hatred, tinged
with fear, that also needs to be treated and defeated.
and to build the transcontinental railroad. Many died in this dangerous
work that few Westerners attempted. In return, when their work was done,
they were considered a “yellow peril” As the New York Daily Tribune put
it in 1854, Chinese were “uncivilized, unclean, filthy beyond all
conception, without any of the higher domestic or social relations.” So
for their reward, new Chinese were essentially barred from the country
for 61 years from 1882 by the sole law in U.S. history to restrict entry
to the U.S. explicitly on the basis of race, the Chinese Exclusion Act.
half year-long trade war unilaterally initiated by President Trump,
and the economies impacted by them. It’s important to look beyond the
current crisis, however. In my opinion, one casualty of the virus is the
unrealistic Trumpian view of countries going it alone. As this current
experience demonstrates, we’re all connected. This means that now, more
than ever, that Chinese President Xi Jinping’s vision of a community
with a shared future has been validated and is the one the international
community must follow for future personal and economic health and
prosperity.
Dr. Harvey Dzodin, a senior fellow at the think tank Center for China and Globalization(CCG).
He was vice president of the ABC TV Network in New York and a former legal advisor in the Carter Administration.
