I actually think angels are weeping over the behavior of humans. Some days in this land of coronavirus in which we live it is hard to be anything but repulsed by fellow human beings. People keep saying over and over that this virus brings out the best and worst in people. Over the weekend I saw the worst again.

NextDoor is a social media platform that a lot of people who are on it for some reason don’t think it’s actually a social media platform. The end result are things that you wouldn’t even see on Facebook at times. Sociologically and psychologically it’s fascinating even when it’s terribly sad.

A conversation thread went up over the weekend of someone looking for literally Chinese takeout food. A lot of the restaurants are closed, one in particular may have lost their lease but no one is sure, and because of the horrible nickname COVID-19/coronavirus has been given, I think a lot of these places are closed because they’re scared of peoples’ reactions to their nationality.

The thread was humming along with people posting restaurants open and closed here and there and then boom! All of a sudden up pops this one woman who says something to the effect of she couldn’t believe anyone would want to patronize Chinese restaurants. this person goes on to write other things that can only be described as both prejudiced and racist.

Then a separate post pops up. From a gentleman who ironically claims to have an Asian descended wife. And it’s basically why would anyone want to have Chinese food they caused the virus and my Asian wife agrees with me. I am paraphrasing, but that was the gist of their post.

I sort of sat there gob smacked looking at it because this is a person whom I know to be intelligent and can be quite thoughtful. But sometimes they go off the rails and I guess this is one of those occasions. But to take an entire nationality to task over a virus that may or may not have originated in a particular country is just repugnant. I say originated because I don’t think anyone has determined the ultimate point of origin for coronavirus/COVID-19. And I think starting and originating are two different things.

It’s also the whole sick argument of if people look different so they must be different, therefore they must be bad and I just can’t stand it. And I just am amazed at the hate that is fomenting in this country even more so than before the virus took over our lives.

I am descended from people who were discriminated against in this country because of their nationality. Irish, Italian, and German. And don’t forget the religion – I’m Catholic. That’s been a huge problem here and there in this country as well. And not just today because of the issue of pedophile priests.

I have a step sister-in-law who is Taiwanese by birth. I have another good friend who is Taiwanese by birth. I have an honorary Chinese mother who is also actually Taiwanese by birth. These three women are all important to me and I feel very lucky to have them in my life.

I have other friends who are Indonesian and others who are Korean and Vietnamese. I do not look at any of these people with descriptive tags attached. Their cultures are unique and beautiful and they share them openly and generously with all of us. Just like my friends of other cultures like Poland, Romania, the UK and Ireland, France, Germany, Spain, Latin America, and so on and so forth. My friends come in many different races and nationalities and isn’t that part of what being an American is about?

We are a country born of immigrants and founded of immigrants. Yet we seem to be devolving into a country of pig ignorant people. Racism and prejudice seems to be rampant right now. And why can’t we just take a breath and pause? Why do we have to be so hateful to one another? We are all affected by what is happening because of COVID-19/Coronavirus.

I also know people who have adopted children of different nationalities and even different skin colors than their own. These sentiments for lack of a better description terrify them. They worry how it will affect their children, if their children will be safe in this world in which we live. And can you really blame them?

We (again) are a nation born of immigrants. It’s our literal history. This country was formed because people wanted a better life and less persecution and religious freedoms.

Yet here we are.

Every time something goes wrong in this country instead of dealing with it you have some faction that goes off and place the blame game with races and religions.

My wish, heck my prayer for this country, is we stop and pause and use this time out of our control to better our country, to stop the hate.

Yes it’s a tall order. But we never seem to learn from our history how to deal with our mistakes. And among those that are the most grievous are racism and prejudice.

I’m far from perfect, you all are far from perfect. To be human is to be imperfect. But we just have to try to do better.

Please. We are stronger together than apart. And that is a big component of why things are so agitated right now. You have the whole economic fallout from coronavirus/COVID-19 and then there’s the emotional component. But we have to stay the course.

Pay it forward when you can. If you can’t just do your part and stay home. And try not to blame other races and nationalities for something that is beyond the world’s control at this point.

I wish you all peace this week.