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SARS did not have a regional name, and it did not stop ignorant racist behaviour against people who appeared to be ethnically Chinese, even in a multicultural c
by slantyyz 7y ago
SARS did not have a regional name, and it did not stop ignorant racist behaviour against people who appeared to be ethnically Chinese, even in a multicultural city like Toronto, Canada, which was hit hard by SARS. And keep in mind that this was before racism was amplified by social media.
Honestly, ignorant racists are going to continue to be the same, irrespective of the virus naming. IMO, anyone who thinks that people with racist tendencies won't blame Asians for SARS-CoV2/COVID-19 because of non-regional naming is delusional.
As someone who is ethnically Chinese but not from China, it's obviously a nuanced situation. I have mixed feelings about the geographic naming. I can see and appreciate both sides of the argument.
- epistasis 7y agoOne advantage of using neutral names is that when somebody deliberately uses the wrong name, their political motivations become very clear. And it may be a matter of degree too; calling something "swine flu" versus H7N5 (or whatever) might result in increased negative associations for the industry, even if the industry can measure effects both ways. I start with industry because there are clear measurements (revenue). For racism, where we have few quantitative measures that we can trust without doing in depth studies, it may be harder to see the effects of better naming policy, and the experience of individuals affected is still the same. Also, a lot of the way that racism works is terrorism, and whether there are 6 people terrorizing or 24 people terrorizing, the effects are going to be fairly similar.
- slantyyz 7y agoIf the virus was called [Geographic Origin Optional] Wildlife Wet Market Coronavirus, and that naming caused the permanent banning of wildlife wet markets worldwide, I think I'd be all for it.