[happytoexplain]

My observation is that the political polarization of the topic came before any government action, and is the more primary cause of the issue. Government action (both heavy-handed and otherwise) sparks backlash because of the political polarization.

[buscoquadnary]

Honestly I saw it the other way around, when it was first came out the future was uncertain, and there was a lot of confusion the only data we had was untrusted reports from China, I saw a lot of people band together, people looking out for on another general expressions of concern.

There were politics involved but it was relatively mild, and ignored by many people it was about two or three months in when much of the news around COVID changed to being news about how Trump was doing what about the virus, and congress what congress was saying about responses to the virus and the usual schlop I noticed things started to get polarized at the same time the estimates were being adjusted from 1-9% fatality rates to 0.3% fatality rates.

[slg]

I feel like I am taking crazy pills the way that many on HN constantly seem to imply that the polarization and politicization of the pandemic was caused by the media, scientists, public health officials or anyone else but the last president and many people in his administration. They were immediately trying to shift blame to anyone but themselves. It was the "China virus" from pretty much day 1. He was literally crossing out "Corona" in his speeches and writing in "Chinese"[1] in mid-March. Or do you remember Trumps "I'd love to have it open by Easter" less than a month after the first lockdowns started? It didn't take "two or three months" for it to be politicized as a reactionary measure against Trump. Trump's first reaction was to politicize the situation.

[1] - https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/03/20/three-pha...

[buscoquadnary]

It is interesting you say that because the first notice I saw of it starting to get politicized was people calling Trump racist for attempting to placing a travel ban from/to China, and for using the phrase China virus, when there is a decent history of naming diseases from where they came from. I think in fact your link attests to that because it's not saying anything about COVID it is all about how Trump is being racist for using the word China flu. Personally I can't stand the guy, but if you believe that the entire virus and COVID response was made entirely politicized by Donald Trump, I'd check your medication because you might just be taking crazy pills in that case as you stated at the beginning.

[slg]

>It is interesting you say that because the first notice I saw of it starting to get politicized was people calling Trump racist for attempting to placing a travel ban from/to China,

Trump has a history of xenophobia. The China ban was viewed as a second Muslim ban. It also appeared to be disconnected from the facts at the time because it was neither a full ban and was only singling out China. So it was clearly going to be ineffective and unfairly stigmatize Chinese people. Considering all of this, it isn't surprising his critics called it racist.

Also now that we are still in a pandemic two years later, it should be obvious that Trump patting himself on the back for this China ban is at best foolish. It was never going to have much of an impact.

> and for using the phrase China virus, when there is a decent history of naming diseases from where they came from.

Just because there is a "decent history" of something happening doesn't mean we should continue it forever. It is known that this type of naming is often wrong (the Spanish Flu likely originated in Kansas) and can lead to unnecessary and unproductive stigmatization. There is already a history of intentionally not using the place of origin to avoid these problems (Ebola was consciousness not named after the village it was found so they used a more generalized area)

> I think in fact your link attests to that because it's not saying anything about COVID it is all about how Trump is being racist for using the word China flu.

Why do you think Trump would consistently use "China flu" other than for political reasons? Isn't it obvious so people blame China for it?

>Personally I can't stand the guy, but if you believe that the entire virus and COVID response was made entirely politicized by Donald Trump, I'd check your medication because you might just be taking crazy pills in that case as you stated at the beginning.

I didn't say he was the only person responsible. I said he was the one who initially politicized it. Once it is politicized, both sides will continue to perpetuate that polarization.

[yucky]

>The China ban was viewed as a second Muslim ban.

...which was also misrepresented in the media. They literally used the same countries the Obama Administration had put on their list with the Visa Waiver Program Improvement and Terrorist Travel Prevention Act of 2015.[1]

Also, the majority of countries on the list weren't Muslim, and the majority of Muslim countries weren't on the list.

[1] https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2017/01/29/news-bull...

[slg]

The list of countries was less important the the universal nature of the Muslim ban. It was kind of the opposite of the China ban. When it comes to disease, we need to act decisively and universally with care not create loopholes that allow people to pass through. When we are talking about terrorism, banning an entire country doesn't make sense. There has to be some type of vetting for exceptions.

The Muslim ban included people who had already been living in the US for years. These are people who have lives, families, and jobs here. But if they happened to be outside the US when the ban went into effect, they couldn't reenter the country. If they already were in the country, they couldn't leave. They couldn't have their friends or family from back home visit them. There is no logic to a ban of that scale when it comes to preventing terrorism. That is the type of universal ban one creates to stop a pathogen. Except the China ban was full of holes and thousands of Chinese nationals continued to travel to the US. That isn't a plan based on science.

The motivations for both these moves was not rationale. Considering they both came from the same person, a person who has a long documented history of other bigoted actions, his critics connected them with the shared thread of xenophobia.

[nonethewiser]

I feel like I am taking crazy pills the way that many think Trump was the source of the polarization and not a reaction to it.

[slg]

Are you talking about in general or in relation to the pandemic?

In general it was both. Trump was both a reaction to polarization and helped increase it.

With the pandemic, I don't think there was an polarization beforehand. The US usually rallies around even unpopular leaders during trouble. 9/11 is the obvious example. Who specifically do you think caused the pandemic polarization?

[kcplate]

> Who specifically do you think caused the pandemic polarization?

The progressive left saw it as a strategy to attack an opposing party president in an election year. The pandemic was their only real hope of election success. Their candidate field was weak. The economy was strong leading up to 2020. The president was polarizing, but was immensely strong among his base and had cross over appeal to the blue collar middle class and increasing support of other demographics that usually vote Democrat.

I think there is no doubt in my mind that no pandemic Trump would have easily won a second term. You can argue that the pandemic polarization strategy was successful in that Trump lost, but there was a cost. Also considering the significant lack of success that the Biden administration has had managing the pandemic, too, I am of the opinion that the cost of the increased public polarization may not be worth it.

[archagon]

Yes, maybe you are taking crazy pills.

[archagon]

Propaganda works, unfortunately — especially on people who self-identify as smart.

[falcolas]

Imagine, for a moment, the change in reactions had Trump & company declared a "War on Covid".

We love wars. A vast majority of Americans have historically gotten behind wars. Wars on drugs. Wars on terror.

I dunno how things would have turned out, but it makes me wonder.

[pandaman]

I can imagine how every TV comedian would have had a recurring "War against common cold" segment, CNN had a ticker with the current economic damage from lockdowns, ACLU suing against mask mandates in every court and FB/Google/Twitter censoring everyone who dared to doubt that chicken soup does really cure viral infections.

[argvargc]

Even if this were true, it's irrelevant. If a government initiates action that sparks a backlash, the government is responsible. If the government didn't also anticipate that backlash, it's incompetent in its duty to its citizenry.

And if it did anticipate it, well that's just worse.

[nonethewiser]

Yes, politics is downstream from culture.

Policy in a representative government tends to come from established interests.