Coronavirus as an Opportunity to be Racist

Coronavirus is not an excuse to be racist. We all know that. Nonetheless, as we struggle to deal with the Coronavirus crisis, significant numbers of Americans are dusting off their favorite go-to tactic, racism, and aiming it toward the Far East. This time, it’s racism against Chinese people. For many examples, see the attached clip from Samantha Bee’s show (begin at 3:05 min for many examples where Fox Commentators follow Donald Trump’s xenophobic lead).

I struggle to find words to express my disappointment at this celebration of bigotry, and it’s not simply because I have many acquaintances and friends who are Chinese. It’s not simply because my daughters are Chinese. It’s because engaging in bigotry is a cruel thing to do to any another human being. We need to stop painting hundreds of millions of people with this broad brush. Have we learned NOTHING from the civil rights movement? For those who are tempted to push back at me and continue to blame “the Chinese” for our current struggle, which particular people are you angry at? You know it’s not all the Chinese people. You know that viruses don’t respect national borders. If you know anything about the evolution of viruses, you know that the next pandemic might originate in your own hometown.

Making this even more irritating for me, many of these racists claim to be Christians. Here’s my advice for those of you who are working hard to rename Coronavirus as “Chinese Coronavirus” or “Chinese Virus”: Take a deep breath, look in the mirror, take seriously your own commandment to love your enemy and put your fucking dog whistles away.

PS. This entire episode in hyper-nationalism is predictable by “Terror Management Theory.” (TMT). It’s well documented that people do this kind of shit when they are scared. See, here and here. Also see "The Worm at the Core," an excellent book on TMT by Sheldon Solomon.

That said, we can work harder to become better versions of ourselves in this crisis. We need to do a better job of keeping the focus on saving lives.

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The Wish Power of “Have a Good Day”

As I left the YMCA tonight, Rachel, the pleasant woman at the entry desk waved to me and said, "Have a good evening!"

I jokingly replied, "Have a good rest of your life!"

She frowned and even looked insulted.

I said, "Since we are trading wishes and hopes, I decided to give you the biggest one I could think of."

It is funny how, in the expression, "Have a good [X]," the X signals approximately how long it might be until you think that you will see each other again. Thus, the BIG wish that I uttered, which ostensibly seems more generous, suggested that I would never see Rachel again (or maybe even that I didn't want to ever see her again). Conversely, "Have a good afternoon" often signals that the speaker hopes to contact the other person that same evening (or at least, soon).

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Zoofari at the St. Louis Zoo

Lions have often been spotted only a few miles from my house.

I live in St. Louis, Missouri, where we have a rather excellent zoo that offers free admission to everyone. Today my daughter and I took our cameras to the St. Louis Zoo, which is only about four miles from my home. Here's one of the lions that is often spotted:

We also enjoyed watching apes interacting with sea lions:

Here are some of my chimpanzee pics. Whenever I see the chimps grooming, I think of Robin Dunbar's (persuasive) arguments that human gossip serves the same purpose as chimpanzee grooming.

If you click on the title, you will be taken to the full post, where you can view a gallery of these and other photos from today, Zoofari.

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How to Prepare for Coronavirus in the U.S.

According to this article in Scientific American, stockpiling and hoarding supplies is not a solution.

The reality is that there is little point “preparing“ for the most catastrophic scenarios some of these people envision. As a species, we live and die by our social world and our extensive infrastructure—and there is no predicting what anybody needs in the face of total catastrophe. In contrast, the real crisis scenarios we’re likely to encounter require cooperation and, crucially, “flattening the curve” of the crisis exactly so the more vulnerable can fare better, so that our infrastructure will be less stressed at any one time.

. . .

The infectiousness of a virus, for example, depends on how much we encounter one another; how well we quarantine individuals who are ill; how often we wash our hands; whether those treating the ill have proper protective equipment; how healthy we are to begin with—and such factors are all under our control. After active measures were implemented, the R0 for the 2003 SARS epidemic, for example, went from around three, meaning each person infected three others, to 0.04. It was our response to SARS in 2003 that made sure the disease died out from earth, with less than a thousand victims globally.

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Having Few Friends is Dangerous to your Health

Here's a good incentive to turn off your TV and go make real friends.

[C]lose relationships with children and other relatives had very little impact on how long you live, but people with the most friends tended to outlive those with the fewest by 22 percent. Better yet, a clinical review of nearly 150 studies found that people with strong social ties had a 50 percent better chance of survival, regardless of age, sex, health status, and cause of death, than those with weaker ties. . . . In fact, according to the researchers, the health risk of having few friends was similar to smoking 15 cigarettes a day, and more dangerous than being obese or not exercising in terms of decreasing your lifespan. Keep in mind that means real friends. Not Facebook friends or Twitter followers.

For more, here's the full article from Inc.

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