March 26, 2020
By Cindy Lee
Cindy Lee
On March 25, 2020, a man in Scottsdale stomped away from me, covering his face. I’m Korean American. The secondary effects of COVID-19 coronavirus have come to the city in which I live.
Yesterday morning, I was standing in line alongside the Target in Scottsdale, waiting for the doors to open. Others who had come to shop were also waiting and practicing social distancing, standing about six feet apart.
A man walking toward the end of the line saw me. He jammed the jacket he was holding into his face to cover his nose and mouth, made a wide-berth move away from me, and kept walking toward the back.
I wondered if he was avoiding breathing other people’s germs in general, or if it was just me he was bothered by. I looked back and saw he had removed the jacket from his face after he had passed me. I was the only Asian American in the line
On March 22, 2020, the Arizona Republic published an article: “Scottsdale councilman shares false info claiming COVID-19 means ‘Chinese Originating’ virus.” https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/scottsdale/2020/03/22/scottsdale-councilman-shares-false-information-covid-19-meaning/2895909001/
The councilman had reposted a Facebook comment that read: “Hate to break this to all of the morons who call themselves Journalists. COVID literally stands for ‘Chinese Originated Viral Infectious Disease’ and the number 19 is due to this being the 19th virus to come out of China.”
I already knew COVID-19 is “CO” for corona, “VI” for virus, “D” for disease, and “19” for 2019.
I Googled “What does COVID-19 stand for?” In 1.85 seconds, the search loaded. In less than another second, I clicked and opened the listing that showed this correct information. IT TOOK UNDER 3 SECONDS to verify that the Facebook post content was factually incorrect.
The Scottsdale councilman is not anti-Asian; his wife is Asian. But words matter. And vilifying the Chinese has damaging consequences, in a time when people are panicked and angry about how devastatingly the COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted their lives.
Courtesy AestheticPlasticSurgeons.org au
Happening Elsewhere in the U.S.
I saw a video in The New York Times on March 14, 2020, entitled: “Coronavirus Infected My High School.” https://nyti.ms/2INpFZO In it, a Chinese American teenager shares comments made to her at school: “Everyone knows Chinese people are disgusting.” “It felt like a stab to my chest,” she says. The student from West Palm Beach, Florida continues: “As the coronavirus spreads, there is another virus spreading that we need to be talking about…. Young Asian Americans like me are feeling hate infect every part of our lives.”
On March 16, 2020, I read of this violence: “FIRST ON CBS7: Suspect admits he tried to kill family at Midland Sam’s Club.” https://www.cbs7.com/content/news/FIRST-ON-CBS7-Suspect-admitted-to-trying-to-kill-family-at-Midland-Sams-Club-affidavit-says-568837371.html
The man tried to kill an Asian family shopping in Midland, Texas. They are Burmese. “Pictures posted on Facebook show that the father and his son were cut very badly across their faces. The son, who is very young, has a cut reaching from behind his ear all the way across to his eye.”
On March 17, 2020, a staff writer at The New Yorker, Jiayang Fan, was verbally abused while taking out the trash. “I wasn’t offended. I was afraid. I was worried he knew where I lived.” https://twitter.com/JiayangFan/satus/1240111033550766080
On March 20, 2020, Kyung Lah of CNN was attacked with a racial slur while reporting on the coronavirus’ impact. “A man walked up and used a racial slur, slung it right at me…. and what I find most surprising is that it’s happening in front of our faces, directly at people. That is something that I have not experienced in a very, very long time in this country.” https://twitter.com/TheLeadCNN/status/12410874529342136340
On February 18, 2020, my youngest sister and her family from Massachusetts were visiting my parents in southern California. Angie and her three sons, ages 12 to 18, were in their hotel elevator going down for breakfast. It stopped at a lower floor; the doors opened. A woman started stepping in, looked up and saw four Asian faces, hesitated, and backed out.
On March 25, 2020, someone in Scottsdale reacted negatively to my being Asian. I’m concerned about the coronavirus in more ways than one.
Violence toward Asians and Asian Americans in the U.S. and globally is on the extreme rise due to the other dangerous virus accompanying the spread of COVID-19: xenophobia and racism. The pandemic is rightfully stressful and horrifying. But looking Chinese does not make a person the cause and carrier of the novel coronavirus.
On March 22, a physician, Eugene Gu, MD, wrote on Twitter: “The H1N1 swine flu pandemic that infected up to 1.4 billion people and killed up to 575,000 originated in factory farmed pigs in the United States. Yet nobody ever calls it the “American Pig Flu.” Let’s stop calling the coronavirus the ‘Chinese Virus.’ We’re all in this together.” https://twitter.com/eugenegu/status/1241701009144995840
“Stigma, to be honest, is more dangerous than the virus itself,” Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the World Health Organization, said.
https://twitter.com/WHO/status/1234597035275362309
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I urge elected officials to take the time to consider and verify if what you’re saying is true. That is your responsibility to your constituency and community. You cannot control what others do with your message once it’s out there.
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April 1, 2020
Cindy Lee,
Thank you for your thoughtful and fact-based piece. I am an Asian man living in Northern California. While I have not experienced any racial backlash, I can in part understand the dynamics of this situation and people’s instinct to exert energy in making sense of it. As you demonstrated, there are different ways of interpretation without losing our heads and our facts.