Its been an oddly positive thing for me to be in China right now facing discrimination. I have seen discrimination a lot in my life, but rarely have I been the one discriminated against and its given me better understanding. Although I understand that its different and everyones situation is unique. I think its going to get a lot worse here and I know its going to get a lot worse for Asians in the USA. Why do people treat others like that? It makes no sense to me. In the USA I understand not liking China's government but why does that effect how you treat someone who is from there? I would think now more than ever people would be nice to each other. The entire world is dealing with the same issue, you would think that would give us all empathy for others and be kinder, yet the opposite is happening.
I hear a lot from Chinese friends when I face discrimination here that person sucks dont worry about it or whatever ignore them. But that doesnt really help to hear. I hear a lot of things I would have told my friends back home and realized that what actually helps is taking action. If a bar/restaurant wont let me in because I am white I want my friends to yell at them and tell them they are being dumb, basically stick up for me verbally. I want my friends to say they wont go back because I sure as **** wont return to a place like that. For me I can always just say ill go home to the US if its bad enough. But its sad to think of people dealing with this that are home. I can write a lot about why it happening here and most of it is due to ignorance but that isnt the point of this post.
One major issue is that China's government is trying to look good to its people. They are allowing media and other places to show that the virus is only happening from people entering the country and are showing how poorly USA is dealing with it. What they are not saying is that all the new cases in China are from Chinese people returning to China, not foreigners returning. There are lots of other issues but that is a big one here. In the USA the Republican party(the Democrats would do the same thing if they thought it would help them) is doing the same thing. They want to keep power and look good so they are attacking China and are going to keep attacking China which is going to lead to more discrimination against Asians in general. Its already bad enough in the USA and its going to get worse over the next few months.
From someone in China being treated poorly at times right now please make sure to treat Asians in the USA with extra kindness right now for me. They are facing a lot of racism and they dont deserve it. Asians in the USA didnt start the virus and are suffering from it just like you.
