Regardless of when the lock downs will end, the domestic imperative is to get things back to how they were before, as quickly and smoothly as possible. Fortunately the mass economic fallout from the shutdowns are only concentrated in one sector, the services sector. To jump start the economy as quickly as possible, relief efforts will need to be focused on this sector first and foremost. The Fortune Magazine article: The Food Service Industry Has Been Battered By The Coronavirus, says that 60 percent of the jobs lost in march were in food service (Hinchcliff 20)
Unlike in 2008, there is nothing inherently wrong with the economy. Housing bubbles are limited to a few large cities, and sub prime lending on a large scale is a thing of the past. Our national debt may be inflating, however this is not as big a deal as many right wing pundits often cite it as. Government debt is a commodity like anything, most of which is actually owned by Americas own people, in the form of long term bonds. For this reason, and this reason alone, it should not be a problem for the federal government to continue to provide economic relief to unemployed workers and shuttered business. Market Watch talks about just this in their article: Here’s how to think about the economy right now, says Fed’s Bullard: A car slowing in a construction zone. The publications says “this shouldn’t be labeled a recession because the slowdown is intentional as businesses pull back to save lives from the Coronavirus.” It than goes on to talk about the pent up demand that will cause a surge in the fall, when delayed projects are finally starting back up (Robb 20).
It is this pent up demand that will more than likely cause a surge come mid summer. People can not, and will not stay home or even social distance much longer. It is a commonly known biological fact that we are social creatures. It is also a delusional fallacy to say that these stay at home orders could last until there is a vaccine in 2022. These measures do not exist to make the virus disappear, they exist to buy time, so that hospitals can build infrastructure, and develop therapies. LiveScience talks about this in their article: What is Flattening the Curve, and Will it Work? In the first paragraph the editor says, “efforts to completely contain the virus in all 130 countries have failed.” This sounds dire, but the editor than proceeds to cite Italy, and why there were such a high number of deaths. Italy was caught off guard, and did not have enough hospital beds or other resources to treat their aging population. The editor than says “In epidemiology, the idea of slowing a virus’ spread so that fewer people need to seek treatment at any given time is known as “flattening the curve.” It explains why so many countries are implementing social distancing” (Spektor 20).
While people think that fear will keep people inside, I personally find this doubtful. The first thing many of us will do is go get a haircut. Now suddenly barbers and hairdressers will see the biggest surge in business they have ever seen in their lives, and will probably ever see. They will than go out and spend that money on items they have not been able to buy due to closures, or afford due to unemployment. This will happen in other sectors, as many like myself will want to visit our favorite restaurants, and eat foods we have not been able to eat for months. Suddenly the restaurants will jump back. People may be worried to go out at first, but once they see others enjoying their lives, due to fear of missing out, I cannot imagine they won’t comply.
To take things in a different direction, how should this pandemic change our world. Unlike what some losers and doomstday cheerleaders in the media are saying, there will not be a decade long depression, and we will not be locked in our houses until 2022. There will be deaths, that is a dire and unfortunate certainty, but we will get on with our lives sooner or later. But still, if this pandemic may not spell much noticeable long term change at home, how should it effect the world, on a macro level?
The hope for pandemic change is centered around one thing and one thing only, the hopeful destruction of the Chinese Communist Party. Before the pandemic, there has been almost no crime that the Nazis did during world war two, that Xi Jingping and his criminal gang have not attempted to mirror on its own innocent population. A population that makes up almost two of the seven billion people inhabiting planet earth.
Hitler had deadly concentration camps, so do the Chinese. You can see them from space. They are currently enacting a cultural and ethnic genocide against a group of people called the Uighurs. This group is considered a religious minority in China. They are native to the eastern Xinjiang region. The Chinese Communist Party views this group as a threat, as there Islamic worship and community unity stands in stark contrast to their one state and one party ideals. The NationalInterest.org article, The Horror Of Chinese Concentration Camps goes in depth on this genocide. The article mentions how the party refers to these as re-education facilities, and then goes on to mention the almost one million members of this minority who are currently detained, or have been “dissapeared.” (Forth 19).
In addition to concentration camps, the Chinese government is also known to harvest organs from its political prisoners. This is arguably the most Nazi like thing this group has done. The NBC article, China Forcefully Harvest Organs From Detainees says that “China’s organ harvesting trade is worth one billion a year.” It than goes on to say “some of the more than 1.5 million detainees in Chinese prison camps are being killed for their organs to serve a booming transplant trade.” A London international tribunal apparently concluded that this is true (Smith 19).
Combine organ harvesting, concentration camps, and the imperialistic mess that was Hong Kong last year, and there is clearly a problem. Many people outside China did not feel threatened by their government, as the only thing they knew about China was that iPhones come from there. Now due to the recent Pandemic, it is clear just how threatening this regime actually is. Many people in the west have never even heard of China’s countless crimes against humanity, up until now.
Whether you believe conspiracies or not, the fact that we are all sitting at home going to school through a computer is one hundred percent the fault of the Chinese Communist Party. They knew about the outbreak in November, instead of spreading awareness and containing it, like any country with free press would do, they silenced and disappeared doctors. In the New York Post article, Whisleblowing Coronavirus Doctor at Wuhan Hospital Disappears, the editor mentions Doctor Ai Fen, a hero a martyr, who attempted to warn the world about the virus but was than silenced, later she leaked to the world, the fact that many doctors at the Wuhan Central Hospital knew about the virus but didn’t say anything out of fear. Ai Fen is now nowhere to be found (Woods 20). She was most likely tortured and than executed.
It is my personal view that the disappearing and silencing of doctors during an infectious disease outbreak is a full admission of guilt and responsibility when the disease escapes China and infects the entire world. Not only were doctors silenced during the critical stages of the outbreak, the government allowed Wuhan Citizens to disperse all over the world to celebrate Chinese New Year.
I feel that if anything, this should inspire the world to come down hard on the Chinese Communist Party. Not just for the thousand of dead caused by their incompetence during the pandemic, but for their many crimes against humanity carried out before the virus. I suggest 5 years for western and allied companies to move all assets out of China, and than a full Cuba style embargo goes into place. Only to be relieved when either the current ruling party implements full democracy, or if the people rise up and overthrow the ruling party.
Works Cited
https://www.livescience.com/coronavirus-flatten-the-curve.html
https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/horror-concentration-camps-china-121991
https://nypost.com/2020/04/01/whistleblowing-coronavirus-doctor-mysteriously-vanishes/
English 802 Spring 2020 
It is difficult to know just how many people are going to die because of lies and misinformation from the Chinese government. From lying about number of infections to disappearing doctors to censoring information about the virus, I do not understand why more people are not upset with China. I do not understand why the media is not more upset with China. One time is one thing, but deadly viruses keep originating in China, likely due to the unsanitary wet markets that the Chinese government can’t or won’t do anything about. I don’t know what is to be done about the Chinese government. I don’t know shit about politics but they seem untouchable, and they definitely dont strike me as a government who would easily relinquish power.
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I agree with everything you said. The world isn’t ending and a lot of people just don’t realize that. The statement about the economy stood out to me because of how accurate it was. I like how you incorporate your quotes and it all flowed well. I feel that more people should realize this and understand the facts. This piece is informative and relates to all of us. Good work
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I like how you wrote about communication, but also the big picture of communication across nations. Honestly, in the beginning of this pandemic I was praising China for their communication, because I was comparing it to the SARS epidemic that occurred, but looking back it’s sad that I thought just informing us was good enough, and trusting that they informed us in a timely manner. I don’t completely agree about pulling all “western assets” out of China just because there are many Chinese citizens that depend on the addition to the economy, but I think this is a good opportunity for the world to start building more trust and communication across nations, and they can use China as an example of where things could have gone better.
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The overall flow of this blog post was great! I liked how you spoke upon the current status of the economy and why people shouldn’t worry about it. I think that that is a very important topic and that often goes overlooked. I also enjoyed how you mentioned that humans are social creatures and that people will most likely not be staying home for much longer. I think that is a unique perspective and it should be understood by other people who disagree.
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