Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2020 March 12

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March 12

Is the world mad at China for the coronavirus?

Hi!

Are some countries angry at China for the coronavirus? Do you think some countries could put pressure on China to stop eating wildlife? Or will China just not care and not learn anything from what happened? Ericdec85 (talk) 01:59, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

The last two parts of the question call for speculation, and will not be answered here.

As for the first part, what have you found so far from googling? -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 02:50, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

You might consider that wildlife is eaten in most countries of the world – perhaps all. Also, people can get angry, but countries have no feelings.  --Lambiam 05:33, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict) The Chinese government has prohibited the sale of bushmeat. In this country, a shopkeeper in a local street market let it be known that she could supply it. Shoppers in the market are used to police sweeps (e.g. for illegal immigrants) but one morning the shop was closed with police stationed outside. Would-be customers were told there was a "customs investigation". What had happened was that an undercover investigator had asked for bushmeat, and when the shopkeeper obliged she was arrested [1]. She was sentenced to seven months' imprisonment at Crown Court. The local community said "enough is enough" and staged a protest outside the Nigerian High Commission (in Trafalgar Square, I believe), whereupon diplomats told them to go away. See Will the next pandemic come from...Bushmeat? [2]. The takeaway is that rats get eaten. 2A00:23C4:7908:EF00:894D:1E6F:66EE:BE5C (talk) 12:07, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Considering that HIV, Ebola, SARS and recent outbreaks of pneumonic plague have all been traced back to bushmeat I bet a great many people aren't particularly thrilled about it right now. 93.136.43.47 (talk) 03:46, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

This is a fast-breaking story with tons of misinformation and speculation flying around in all directions through every known medium. Honestly, the best way to get an answer to this question is to wait and see how things pan out.--WaltCip (talk) 13:30, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

And wash hands frequently. By the way, China is now blaming America for it. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 13:41, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

They have a point. The Orange One hasn't exactly been executing sound leadership in managing COVID-19.--WaltCip (talk) 14:11, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

I never thought I'd be defending that creature, but his mismanagement of, well, pretty much everything he ever touches does not equate to the coronavirus originating in American forces stationed in China. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 19:54, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

I'm angry at first world countries and their wealthier, powerful residents for forcing large parts of the third world to remain poor, and thus live in non-hygienic conditions and feel the need to eat unsafe foods, just so rich, first world people could build even greater wealth. OK, that's an obvious POV comment, but it's to highlight the narrow perspective and POV nature of the initial question here. HiLo48 (talk) 21:46, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

By that same token, it annoys me when I see the word "bushmeat" used (though the use above is fairly neutral) because it simply means wild animals that were hunted/killed by non-white people. Wagging our collective fingers at Chinese people for hunting in their forests works a lot better than teling our own hunters that they can no longer hunt deer/moose/turkeys/etc. but because we call one action "bushmeat trade" we can "other" the action and continue to do the same thing. Matt Deres (talk) 01:58, 15 March 2020 (UTC)

There is a lot to unpack here, and I had intended to make a better researched post, but honest I don't think will bother. First, since this is clearly began with the SARS-CoV-2, I think we need to be clear that a big reason for the consumption there is not from poor people who can't afford or lack access to "ordinary" meats, but due to some of the wealthier people wanting "exotic" meats [3], [4], Ye wei. A look at that widely circulate price list from the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market [5] is an example of this.

Those farming, catching/poaching or butchering these animals are the ones more likely to be at risk of starvation but they probably often aren't eating them themselves in that case. Even then, I think it's complicated. While there's clearly major problems for the poor in quite a few developing countries, and I don't restrict this to China since the animals could easily have been caught from somewhere outside China, I don't think it's really clear how many of these people would be in major economic strife if not involved, or whether they would probably be able to do something else for less money but still generally able to live. (You get the same questions when it comes to things like scam call centres in India.) This is not to say there's no one in China hunting "bushmeat" because they don't have access to anything else. And the situation in large parts of Africa may be different.

Note that I'm not saying that the fact these are richer people doing it for personal preference means it's bad, simply that the argument over poor people falls apart when that isn't really the reason. I do agree there tends to be a "Chinese are weird" generally with negative connotations arising from this. Generally ignoring the fact that conspicuous consumption etc is hardly unique to the Chinese even if the specifics may differ. E.g. although there is increasingly a backlash, you of course have plenty of people often from the West, especially the US wanting to kill lions etc at most for a trophy and to be able to know or say they did. And well, Instagram.

As for "bush meat" vs other hunted meat, that's also complicated. Zoonosis are a concern whenever there is strong contact between humans and other animals including butchering. So it arises in farming and in any case where animals are hunted for consumption. However there are specific concerns that arise with "bushmeat". One of them is with primate consumption especially of the great apes given our strong genetic similarity and so the increase likelihood that something can successfully infect humans.

Another is that many of these animals have probably rarely been hunted in the numbers and level they are in modern times. I mean I'm sure some people ate pangolin centuries ago, and they were also killed for their scales (which likely also has similar risks) as our article shows, but it's unlikely it was at anything like modern levels. Also this was happening in a much less interconnected world. (Yes I'm aware that SARS-CoV-2 probably didn't come from pangolins.) In other words, while there are risks from hunting deer, ducks etc, and farming, the fact that this has been happening for a long time at fairly significant levels and not just in the West, means the concerns are different. (But we shouldn't downplay the risks. E.g. new strains of influenza often involve farmed animals. There there is stuff like the Nipah virus where one of the outbreaks came from farming, although fortunately it doesn't seem to spread from human to human,)

This is not to say I disagree with the general point, a good example of this is views towards eating cats and dogs, or even whales and dolphins. (For the later 2, arguments about intelligence, difficult of killing, etc may come into play, but it seems clear this isn't the only reason.)

A related example, probably in part due to my Malaysian heritage, I tend to find all many "palm oil is evil" views simplistic. Let's use soya bean oil from Brazil instead? Or do we restrict our farming to developed countries who've already turned a lot of their country into farmland, well it's fine since it happened centuries ago. And let's not worry so much about ongoing actions to support that farmland or other stuff harming the environment like mining and the risk to world heritage coral reefs. But developing countries? Nah they have to keep their land intact and hope they can somehow make it work via ecotourism or climate change payments. Yet it's also somewhat true that tropical rainforests in particular have been a haven for biodiversity before human civilisation, and also we can't get back what's been destroyed very easily. So as an environmentalist I also hate the ongoing loss. And, as happens in a lot of the world, those benefiting most from such development in developing countries tends to be disproportionately those who are already well off.

I mention the above semi-rant because it semi ties into the issue. While zoonosis may be one concern, and especially significant at the moment, a bigger concern with the trade is the environmental impact. It's clear that poaching for human consumption and Chinese traditional medicine is often unsustainable and placing populations at significant risk. Yet even among those who recognise this, there often tends to be a "evil Chinese" etc, while ignoring or recognising but not really doing anything about the stuff that they are doing that is harmful. E.g. seafood, their use of rare earth minerals, fuel, water, sustainability issues surrounding farming. (And yes, I'm as guilty of that as many.)

Nil Einne (talk) 13:10, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

Who said it first?

• Ralph Waldo Emerson (May 25, 1803 – April 27, 1882):

— “Do the thing you fear and the death of fear is certain.” - Ralph Waldo Emerson

• Mark Twain - (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910):

— “Do the thing you fear most and the death of fear is certain.” - Mark Twain ...

  Question:  Which one said it first? Did the second quote the first without attribution? 

72.242.221.33 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 11:55, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

When discussing Mark Twain quotes, you have three major problems:

1. Many quotes attributed to Mark Twain were never written or said by him.
2. Mark Twain was well-read and often used existing quotes, altered to fit his needs.
3. Mark Twain regularly performed talks, which were then written down to create books, but the talks were verbal and the quote sources were obviously not cited.

So, it is possible that Mark Twain never made the quote, or Mark Twain took the quote and twisted it to fit his needs, or Mark Twain used the quote on stage and it was not cited. 135.84.167.41 (talk) 12:19, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

The oldest occurrence of the phrase in a Google Books search is from 1942, which makes it likely it was made up around that time.  --Lambiam 18:59, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Since two dates over 30 years earlier have already been established, that is clearly not the case. ——SN54129 15:11, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

What two dates? If you're referring to Emerson's and Twain's dates of death, that is relevant only if it can be established that one of them definitely said the original quote, but that is the very thing that has NOT been established. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 19:52, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

UEFA Euro 2020 cancelled?

This site says that UEFA Euro 2020 would be cancelled because of the coronavirus epidemic and moved to 2021. The Wikipedia article UEFA Euro 2020 does not mention this. Is this true? JIP | Talk 19:20, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

The article the OP linked simply speculates that a decision to postpone will be made next week. No such decision has been made yet. Xuxl (talk) 19:22, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Indeed it happened today [6], UEFA Euro 2021 so clearly did not happen last week. Nil Einne (talk) 14:57, 17 March 2020 (UTC)