There has been a total of about 30 million cases of COVID reported in the United States so far and about 540,000 deaths. For a country with a population of 330 million people, those are pretty staggering numbers. However, as devastating as this virus has been in our country, there are two other ‘viruses’ that are infecting large segments of the population that are far more insidious and likely a much bigger threat to this country. Those viruses are bigotry and disinformation.
This past year saw the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter protests in the wake of the George Floyd murder and all of the other instances involving the deaths of black Americans at the hands of police. And now, in the wake of the pandemic and all of the racist and divisive rhetoric from the former president, we are seeing a large increase in hate crimes against Asian-Americans. The killing of 8 people in Atlanta yesterday was just the latest in a long string of such attacks.
Bigotry is certainly nothing new in this country but it certainly seems like it has gotten much worse. As I have stated before in these posts, my ex-wife is Hispanic and Filipina, which makes my daughter a mixture of white, Hispanic and Filipina. I know from the many conversations that I have had with them over the years, they have both been the targets of racist remarks. Do I need to now worry about their safety when they are just walking down the street because of this insidious ‘hate’ virus that seems to have infected so much of the country?
I have been fortunate in my life and career to have worked with a wide spectrum of people of all races, faiths, backgrounds and sexual orientations. In addition, I have been fortunate to have traveled to and spent extended periods of time in many countries around the world. When I lived in Kuwait, we lived in an apartment building in a regular neighborhood that just happened to be right next to a mosque. We shopped in local stores, went to local restaurants, and safely walked around the neighborhood. We certainly didn’t blend in or look like locals. We were never assaulted, verbally or physically, because we looked different. The people were friendly and inviting.
I have spent time in Asia. I remember walking through a marketplace in Sri Lanka with a colleague of mine. We were a head taller than anyone around and we certainly didn’t blend in. Of course, people looked at us, but, again, everyone was friendly and welcoming. That has been the case of pretty much everywhere I have been. In all of my experience, I have pretty much concluded that people are pretty much the same everywhere – regardless of race, religion, or nationality. People just want to have a job, be able to take care of their families, worship however they choose, and be left alone to live their lives.
I have a theory as to why it is so difficult for so many people to understand and accept this which brings me to the second ‘virus’ infecting this country – disinformation. I don’t think its any accident that the parts of the country that seem so virulently anti-immigrant and anti-white are those states that are either holdovers from the days of slavery, i.e. The South, or those states that have the least diverse populations, e.g., Montana. There are a number of people in The South that are still fighting the Civil War and just cannot accept that all men, including black men (and women) are created equal. And when you boil this down to its essence, it really is a battle to preserve a white oligarchy.
The battle in those states (or neighborhoods) with less diverse populations is, in my opinion, fueled by a constant diet of disinformation focused on finding minority segments of the population to blame for whatever ills are prevalent at any given time. Think about it. If you have no real exposure to or daily interaction with Hispanics or Asians or Blacks and you get all of your news from media sources (or political leaders) that spew a constant stream of disinformation and lies, it is no small wonder that these feelings of bigotry surface. And now, this constant stream of disinformation is being propagated coast to coast so if someone has some kind of a problem and they are looking for someone to blame – they just have to select from the menu of ‘people to hate’ offered up by various media or local politicians.
It is a fact that this coronavirus originated in China. However, none of the Asian-Americans who have been attacked has had a damned thing to do with it. And the fact is, that this country was woefully unprepared to face a pandemic originating from anywhere despite warnings for years that it was a possibility. And when it did hit this country, the response was tragically inadequate. None of that is the fault of China nor of any Asian American living in this country. However, it’s a lot easier to find someone to blame as opposed to just look in the mirror and admit that we royally screwed up.
Unfortunately, hate and disinformation will linger long after this COVID virus is brought to heel with the wide-spread vaccination campaign. And the only ‘vaccine’ against hate and disinformation is knowledge (as opposed to propaganda) and experience. As long as people are unwilling to leave their safe little ‘white bubbles’ and suckle off the teat of racist propaganda, the COVID pandemic will be among the lesser long-term threats to this country.
Good article. Looking at our country’s problems I tend to come up with one word that describes our problem. Greed. One of the biggest problems in our country today is greed. Greed is not defined by what something costs; it is measured by what it costs you. If anything costs you your friends, family, faith, or your country, the price is too high. Greed does not produce happiness and peace but bitterness and unrest. You hear a lot of people say “Greed is good”. Is greed good to take advantage of others for personal gain? Is greed good when a very small percentage of a population controls the largest percentage of the wealth? Greed puffs up pride by comparing what they have at the expense of others. Derogatory Comments are made by making comparisons of themselves to others. Greed produces arrogance. Arrogance produces anger towards others and destroys compassion. A very good example of what greed cost a person is in the story from Charles Dickens “A Christmas Carol”. Scrooge learned the lesson of greed and finally came to his senses at an old age. Not like a certain ex-President we know that has defined his Party as the Party of greed. Is this how we make America great again?