Let's get a couple of things straight right off the bat regarding some virus names:
"Zika" and "West Nile virus" were named before 1950, when things were even more racist-y than they are now. "Ebola" got its name because scientists, including ones from the Centers for Disease Control, decided to name it for a river near the village in the Democratic Republic of Congo (then Zaire) where the first case was discovered. They didn't want to name it after the village because they didn't want to stigmatize the people living there.
MERS, or "Middle East Respiratory Syndrome," was named by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses, which has a Coronavirus Study Group and works with the World Health Organization and researchers. Originally, the name contained "SA" in it because the first reported case was in Saudi Arabia, which pissed off the Saudis (and, it turned out, the real first case was in Jordan), so it was changed.
SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) got its name from the WHO because "we didn’t want the press or some other group to name it with a stigmatizing name." H1N1 is a shortened version of "A/H1N1pdm09" and, yes, it was nicknamed "swine flu" because it originated from human contact with pigs. The WHO has guidelines for how this shit is done, and now they specifically avoid animal and location names because it gives the wrong idea about the virus. "Swine flu," as you might imagine, caused people to stop eating pork because people are fucking idiots.
The coronavirus we're fighting now was given the name "COVID-19" by the WHO. It's got a damn name. But it originated in China, so, of course, conservative media started calling it the "Chinese virus." And, of course, that meant President Donald Trump, who loves racism as much as normal human beings love babies and puppies, started calling it that.
And, of course, that means that all of MAGA-world, who are loyal cumgobblers anxiously awaiting with open mouths for the next ejaculation from their orange jizz master, will repeat it and justify it and stand by it and fight for it and shout about it and insult anyone who defies them or their orange jizz master and accuse us of loving commie China, and they'll do that until we all just give up saying that it's wrong or Trump stops saying it and then says he never said it and that the media is just out to get him and the cumgobblers will tell us we're liars for saying what's on video for everyone to see. Repeat endlessly with a new load.
It's not a distraction that Trump is calling COVID-19 (which isn't that difficult to say) the "Chinese virus." On so many levels, it's significant. It gives fuel to rising anti-Asian hate crimes and attacks. It allows Trump and his assorted douches and dicks to deflect blame for the Trump administration's catastrophic fuck ups in preparing for and dealing with COVID-19 onto China. At today's petulant press conference, he said, "[I]f people would’ve known about it could have been stopped in place. It could have been stopped where it came from, China." Except, of course, that "people" did know about it for over a month before Trump took any action at all beyond closing the border to people coming from China (which Italy did before us and then they never saw COVID-19 again...oh, wait). And who the fuck is defending China? Someone ought to say to Trump, "Motherfucker, you're the one who always talks about how good you get along with President Xi. What did that get you?"
So, sure, in many ways, the whole "Chinese virus" bullshit is of a piece with Trump's refusal to accept responsibility for anything and his use of racism to keep his white troglodyte minions all hot and sweaty and ready to fuck some shit up.
But I think something else is at work here. It's also part of his anti-immigrant rhetoric, that Stephen Miller crap that has created a humanitarian nightmare at our southern border that is going to turn into a catastrophe. If you keep telling people that invaders from the outside are harming us, then you better be able to fuckin' prove that. Caravans of brown drug dealers? You fuckin' bet. Virus-ridden yellow menaces? Hell, yeah. Fuckin' stop that shit cold. Once this real and frightening crisis is over, if not before, Trump is likely going to use it to institute even more draconian policies on immigration. If you don't think that's possible, you haven't been paying attention. What better way to get his base all ready to fuck when it comes to the election in November than to tell them that they are battling to keep diseased foreigners out of our precious white America?
Coming to Trump's defense today was the white nationalist/conspiracy mongering One American News Network (motto: "Fox 'news,' but dumb") and reporter/insane person Chanel Rion. She really asked Trump, "Do you consider the term Chinese food racist?" Believe it or not, Trump doesn't think that's racist. And he's right, unless you're being a racist while saying it. Then Rion, who is oddly allowed in the same room with actual reporters, really asked, "Major left wing news media, even in this room, have teamed up with Chinese Communist Party narratives, and they are claiming you are racist for making these claims about Chinese virus. Is it alarming that major media players...are consistently siding with foreign state propaganda, Islamic radicalism, Latin gangs and cartels, and they work right here at the White House with direct access to you and your team?" Honestly, that's not a dog whistle. That's a full-fledged racist blow horn.
Trump answered, in part, "Well, I think they do. I mean, they are siding with China. They are doing things that they shouldn’t be doing. They’re siding with many others. China’s the least of it."
We'll be lucky if this doesn't end with them rounding people up and turning them into soylent green. Hell, he'll rebrand it soylent Trump: "Only the best people."
