Syracuse professor put on leave over China slurs

A professor at Syracuse University in the United States has been placed on administrative leave for using derogatory language against Chinese.

Although the university did not name the professor in its announcement, social media posted screen shots of a course syllabus belonging to chemistry professor Jon Zubieta that refers to the novel coronavirus as "Wuhan Flu" and "Chinese Communist Party Virus".

The statement, released by Karin Ruhlandt, the university's dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, and John Liu, interim vice-chancellor and provost, said:"The derogatory language used by a professor on his course syllabus is damaging to the learning environment for our students and offensive to Chinese, international and Asian Americans everywhere who have experienced hate speech, rhetoric and actions since the pandemic began.

"The professor has been placed on administrative leave from teaching and removed from the classroom pending the outcome of a full investigation."

The decision resulted in varied reactions from the university community as shown by reader comments on a report on the website of The Daily Orange, the daily student newspaper for the university in New York state.

Some deemed the action a suppression on freedom of speech or politically correct policing.

But those who supported the university's action pointed out that the use of such language constitutes racism. "The First Amendment means the government can't arrest you, it doesn't mean there aren't consequences for your actions. There are so many international students from Asia at SU and calling corona a 'Chinese virus' perpetuates racism toward them," wrote one reader, Virginia Weisar.

Another reader, Miles Paulson, said:"Why do people choose to use these words? Because they know what these words mean. They know what they mean to the people they're targeting."

Keiji Fukuda, former assistant director-general for health security at the World Health Organization, while issuing best practices for naming new infectious diseases in 2015, pointed out that connecting a disease with a specific location or category can stigmatize certain communities.

US President Donald Trump has repeatedly referred to the coronavirus as the "Chinese virus".

This year, there have been thousands of incidents in the US involving Asian Americans being verbally and physically assaulted by other groups of people who blame them for the coronavirus because the virus was first identified in China.

The Asian Pacific Policy and Planning Council has set up an online reporting mechanism to document coronavirus-related discrimination incidents against Asians since March. In the latest report, released on Thursday, 2,583 reports had been recorded as of Aug 5.

Physical assaults made up 9 percent of the incidents. Potential civil rights violations, including workplace discrimination and people being barred from establishments and transportation, comprised 8 percent of the incidents.

"I'm a healthcare worker. I saw a maskless man sit across from me on the subway," reported one respondent in New York."I moved to the other side of the train car and he followed. He spat and coughed on the subway while yelling racial slurs. No one stood up for me."