Why do liberals give China a pass on the virus?

I don't see any liberals giving China a pass. It simply isn't being talked about because we've got bigger fish to fry at the moment.

As a centrist, I put most of the blame on the virus.

China certainly screwed up early on by suppressing information and not suppressing travel out of Wuhan. That kind of thing is typical for the communist government. But this is a very sneaky virus, and it caught them by surprise as it spread so quickly. A lot of people carried the virus out of Wuhan before the government could figure out what was going on. China's government certainly deserves some blame, but I don't think it's worthwhile to harp on about it, and counterproductive to try to punish China at this point when everybody needs to work together.

I don't blame Trump for spread of the virus in the US over the past few months. Could he have done some things better? Sure, hindsight is wonderful, but as I said, this is a very sneaky virus. I think Trump hasn't taken it seriously enough, and I think he's now sabotaging efforts to recover in a responsible way. I want to reopen as fast as our health system can manage it (faster than some leftists would prefer), but I see Trump trying to move things too quickly, and dismissing the likely consequences.

I'm a liberal. The innate distrust of the Chinese government has grown stronger.

Every country got the same information and responded to it in its own way. You can't blame China for how your own country responses domestically. That's just extremely childish.

Hi pavel,

I also don't see anyone giving China a pass on this issue. However, there isn't any proof that China created this pandemic with some malice aforethought. It's just a virus that has come upon us much like HIV, MERS, SARS, Influenza A, B, and C. My home was just destroyed by a tornado. Is it my fault that my home lies in ruins? Should the governments of the world blame me for a tornado destroying my home?

If some proof can be found that China worked to release this virus onto the world with the intention of creating world chaos, then I'm all for 'blaming' China. However, according to the Scriptures, there is a horseman riding among us who is responsible for these things and I don't see that China should be blamed for the truth of the Scriptures.

HIV is believed to have started in Africa. Did we 'blame' the nation in Africa from which we believe it started? MERS is believed to have originated in the middle east, thus MERS stands for middle east respiratory syndrome. It is a form of corona virus just as Covid-19 is. Did we blame some country in the middle east for bringing it to life?

So, my question back to you is: Why do you feel it important that we handle the cause, or place of origin, of this outbreak any different than previous ones? Is there some reason that you know of that we should blame China for the tornado that destroyed my home?

God bless,
In Christ, ted

Pavel Mosko said:

As a conservative and Trump supporter it looks to me that liberals in general and on the board seem to largely give China a pass when it comes to the virus. I see much more preoccupation with complaints on how Trump has handled it etc.

Is that a correct perception?


If this is true in some way (cite your own reasons please) does this fit with the usual critique of western imperialism, US interventionism and so on?


In my personal estimation, Trump has actually done a better job nationally at managing the virus than Governor Cuomo has done at managing it at the level of his state. From what I can tell, Cuomo runs a great press conference, but has made more mistakes at the management level than Trump. He however is treated much differently by the press because of his party identification and personal demeanor and comportment.

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Do you mean "give a pass" as in "decline to believe that China intentionally created and spread the virus as a scheme to destroy Western Christian Civilization?" Yeah, we do.

Speedwell said:

Do you mean "give a pass" as in "decline to believe that China intentionally created and spread the virus as a scheme to destroy Western Christian Civilization?" Yeah, we do.

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I knew it was your new hoax!!!!!

Pavel Mosko said:

2) Given China's ambitions to be the World's top super power, I believed they passively aggressively allowed the virus to spread to "level the playing" to help their future ambitions.

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Highly unlikely, since it would be a moronic thing to do. Intentionally spreading the virus abroad invites it to boomerang back on them, bringing the virus to the rest of China.

Pavel Mosko said:

I blame China for not putting in the same travel bans for outgoing flights and travel that they did for folks attempting to leave the Wuhan province. I also blame China for lieing about the virus that it cannot be spread "person to person" to the World Health Organization.
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1) This makes me think that they #1 only cared about their short term interests so they could buy up the World's masks, ventilators etc.

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they are already far and away the biggest producers of these things...
And they did a terrible job all things considered.

2) Given China's ambitions to be the World's top super power, I believed they passively aggressively allowed the virus to spread to "level the playing" to help their future ambitions

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perhaps they took a lesson from the smallpox blankets hey?
.

Pavel Mosko said:

As a conservative and Trump supporter it looks to me that liberals in general and on the board seem to largely give China a pass when it comes to the virus. I see much more preoccupation with complaints on how Trump has handled it etc.

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Correct. China has done a worlds better job than Trump.
And all countries outside of China had plenty of heads-up.
The US with its head in the sand.

Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS)
Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV)

Even 229E, OC43, NL63 and HKU1.
WHO Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) Dashboard

There is also the issue that America's factory farms produce conditions that may be as conducive to generating a virus as the Chinese wet market's are. It would therefore be hypocritical to blame the whole wet market thing (if this is indeed how the virus entered the human population).

Pavel Mosko said:

As a conservative and Trump supporter it looks to me that liberals in general and on the board seem to largely give China a pass when it comes to the virus. I see much more preoccupation with complaints on how Trump has handled it etc.

Is that a correct perception?

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I have a mixed reaction. On the one hand, I share the liberal concern that Trump has not handled the situation as well as he should have, and he is definitely encouraging anti-Chinese feelings that are negatively impacting Chinese-American citizens.

On the other hand, I suspect that China has not handled it all that well, either. In particular, I simply do not believe that China has had only about 80,000 cases and 4,000 deaths. A few weeks ago there were a number of articles pointing out that something like 40,000 cremation urns had been shipped to Wuhan, and wondering why, but since then I have seen no follow-up on that question. It would not surprise me a bit to discover that China's actual numbers are far higher than America's numbers.

I think a lot of us were critical of China not listening to those first doctors raising the alarm, and even punishing them. And for spreading conspiracy theories about the virus.

It's why we're mad about Trump doing the exact same thing.


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After China's initial failures, they then went on to aggressively shut. everything. down. And it seems to have worked (always remembering that the Chinese government is not always entirely truthful about health crises). Meanwhile, Trump has largely complained about the shutdown, eroding support for the actions taken at the state and local level, without providing any clear leadership of his own. It's why we're seeing at best a slow, gradual cooldown of the virus here, ironically dragging out the negative economic effects Trump is so worried about.

essentialsaltes said:

It's why we're mad about Trump doing the exact same thing.

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Yeah, this. I neither like nor trust the Chinese government, but I haven't seen anything that suggests their behavior was any different from the sort of bungling and cover-up that is common among governments, including ours (both Federal and state). China just happened to be the source of the virus. What exactly is to be gained by spending a lot of energy blaming China, apart from providing a distraction from our own shortcomings?

Pavel Mosko said:

As a conservative and Trump supporter it looks to me that liberals in general and on the board seem to largely give China a pass when it comes to the virus. I see much more preoccupation with complaints on how Trump has handled it etc.

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You have answered your question right there, haven't you?

Pavel Mosko said:

Yeah I can see that. Focus on your immediate problem aka Trump.

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How about ... just surviving the pandemic ?

When we're out of mortal danger, ... we can begin to assess blame ...

Yttrium said:

Highly unlikely, since it would be a moronic thing to do. Intentionally spreading the virus abroad invites it to boomerang back on them, bringing the virus to the rest of China.

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Not only that ... but they got it first, as far as we know ...