1/ Asking "Is saying 'Chinese food' racist?" as a way to own the libs is a special kind of stupid. When we call such food Chinese food it means a) we're not in China, bc there they call it "food." Thus b) we need to differentiate it from other foods for some reason. Why? Easy...
2/ ...obviously bc given all the cuisines from which we could choose (like to go out to eat or order take-out, or simply to recall a meal we previously had and we're describing), naming it conjures specific associations that are critical to a dining decision or memory...
3/ If I ask my kids "do you want Chinese or pizza?" they can think about the meaning of each, think about their relative like/dislike of each and decide on dinner. Because regional culinary differences are RELEVANT. We don't label it Chinese just for geographic accuracy...
4/ We do it bc different cuisines conjure specific taste profiles, flavors, combinations of ingredients. But w/viruses, naming them in terms of origin serves NO similar valuable information purpose. There's nothing ABOUT C19 originating in China that is relevant to fighting it...
5/ ...Unlike naming certain foods by origin, which IS relevant to eating it, enjoying it, knowing what it is and how it's going to either satisfy your appetite or not...The only purpose in naming it this way is to conjure prejudice/bigotry re: the dreaded foreign "other"...
6/ As a way to deflect attention from the clusterfuck that is this president's response to warnings from his own intel professionals (whom he ignores bc "deep state! argle, bargle,")...
