Xenophobia is commonly defined as a fear or hatred of foreigners, people from different cultures or strangers. It is an attitude that is irrational and unreasonable. In the midst of the current global pandemic, humanity is demonstrating its beautiful, compassionate and caring side, but also its inexplicably xenophobic and racist face. It boggles the mind that, at a time when a deadly virus is on the loose — resulting in more than 3.5 million known cases and 250,000 deaths to date, and putting an immense strain on individuals, families and entire societies — there are those who are engaging in xenophobic attacks on individuals and groups whom they identify, in their ignorant mindlessness, as the cause of the calamitous pandemic.
The British philosopher Bertrand Russell observed that xenophobic behavior is motivated by a collective fear that “stimulates herd instinct and tends to produce ferocity toward those who are not regarded as members of the herd.” Fear no doubt plays a significant part in our behavior in response to danger, especially to an existential threat that is affecting the physical and/or mental health of almost every human being on the planet. However, the xenophobia we are witnessing in response to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) crisis, with its racist undertones and nationalist chauvinism, is not a direct result of the pandemic. Instead, the virus is simply triggering the cancerous sentiments that were lying dormant in those who harbor them.
Fear is an understandable and natural reaction to a deadly enemy, and it may become stronger when we are confronted by an invisible enemy like the coronavirus, against which we have no adequate protection. Scientists are still struggling to understand how the virus spreads and how best to keep ourselves safe while the ultimate protection of a vaccine is still many months away. But this understandable fear cannot even remotely be used as a justification for calling people from other groups “corona” and beating them up for allegedly causing and spreading COVID-19, as certain sick-minded people in the West have been doing to anyone who appears to be Chinese.
The pandemic’s strong element of the unknown, even mystery, with no obvious human perpetrator, has led the less constructive elements in our society to embark on their favorite sport of dishing out blame, instead of looking for solutions. Trust US President Donald Trump to call COVID-19 “the Chinese virus,” thereby inciting hate acts against the Chinese. He has been supported by, among others, Texas Sen. John Cornyn, who claimed China’s “culture” of eating bats, snakes and dogs is to blame for the spread of many major viruses in the last two decades.
At the beginning of the current pandemic, a number of media outlets and politicians spoke of the “Wuhan virus,” reinforcing the association between the virus and certain people. In the UK, a law student originally from Singapore was subjected to catcalls of “coronavirus” and was brutally assaulted. And this was no isolated case. However, it is not only the Chinese or people of Southeast Asian appearance who are being attacked. Thailand’s public health minister lashed out at white foreigners, who he reportedly described as “dirty” and responsible for spreading the virus in his country. And in China itself, following its apparently successful containment of the coronavirus, attacks on foreigners are on the rise. According to media reports, a restaurant in northern China put up a banner celebrating the virus’s spread in the US and Japan. The African population in China is bearing the brunt of a mix of xenophobia and racism: Some are unceremoniously evicted from their homes after testing positive for the virus or, even if they test negative, are ordered to undergo a 14-day quarantine period at their own expense. Elsewhere, signs were put up banning black people from a McDonald’s.
It is this behavior that is spreading the worst disease to ever hit humanity — that of xenophobic hatred, which, as we know, caused more deaths than any virus in the not-too-distant past.
The World Health Organization is rightly not giving a name to any outbreak of disease that denotes a connection to a specific country or region to avoid the stigma that comes with such a health crisis. The Ebola outbreak, named after a river in the Congo where it was first detected, led to the abuse of African people, while Middle East Respiratory Syndrome stigmatizes people from that region. In the minds of many, the connection between a place or a nation and extreme suffering evokes sentiments of sympathy, empathy and, on many occasions, leads to support for such disease-stricken places. But, among the xenophobes and racists, it evokes the opposite emotions. It serves as some sort of sick affirmation of their preconceived ideas of the shortcomings, even the inferiority, of such people. By blaming people who belong to a different “herd,” as Russell calls it, they not only justify their own distorted worldview, but also feel safe and secure in their misplaced belief that the disease won’t be able to affect their “superior culture.”
The virus has given worldwide legitimacy to the attitudes that xenophobes and racists already hold.
Yossi Mekelberg
Since the xenophobia associated with coronavirus is closely derived from the existing and inherent stigmatization of “the other herds” and claims of their inferiority, it will still be here when COVID-19 is long gone. What this virus has done is give worldwide legitimacy to the attitudes that xenophobes and racists already hold and, with that, the liberty to express and spread their diseased views. Islamophobia, anti-Semitism and all other forms of xenophobia always find their justification.
To eradicate this, governments need to introduce, improve and prioritize policies of education and socialization that underline the immorality and factual baselessness of xenophobia and racism, and the damage they cause to the fabric of our societies. And, when this doesn’t work, the laws against this poisonous behavior should be tightened to ensure that anyone who uses xenophobic language or violently attacks those originating from other countries or ethnic or religious groups faces the full force of the law. The chaplain in Bertolt Brecht’s “Mother Courage and Her Children” observes: “War is like love; it always finds a way.” We might sadly now say the same for xenophobia, until we eradicate it from our lives.
- Yossi Mekelberg is professor of international relations at Regent’s University London, where he is head of the International Relations and Social Sciences Program. He is also an associate fellow of the MENA Program at Chatham House. He is a regular contributor to the international written and electronic media. Twitter: @YMekelberg
