It is the age of the woke for places like the UK and Canada, and as a result, the biggest fear about any given disaster or potentially deadly event that could have massive effects is that people might be racist about it.

Across the UK, boarding schools are being issued instructions to “be watchful for prejudice against Chinese pupils by others, be it online or in person” according to The Evening Standard:

“They will be worried about themselves but more particularly about their friends and families,” the advice says. And it also counsels schools to, “stay alert for any signs of xenophobia by students towards one another, or by any external audiences, either in school or on social media sites”. “Such behaviour should not be tolerated and action should be taken against anyone acting in this way,” it adds.

Unsurprisingly, it would appear that no issues of racism or xenophobia have popped up yet according to the Standard:

On the issue of xenophobia, A BSA spokesperson said: “We have not heard of anything happening in our schools, and we don’t envisage it happening in our schools, we are trying to make sure we are covering every eventuality.”

The same thing is happening in Canada, where school boards are releasing warnings that if the Coronavirus breaks out in the region, that one of the symptoms that may be experienced is xenophobia according to The Globe and Mail:

On Monday, the York board released a note to parents to address another virus: anti-Chinese xenophobia. “We are aware of an escalated level of concern and anxiety among families of Chinese heritage,” wrote Juanita Nathan, the board’s chair, and Louise Sirisko, its education director. “Individuals who make assumptions, even with positive intentions of safety, about the risk of others, request or demand quarantine can be seen as demonstrating bias and racism.”

Racism is, in no way, a good thing, but I have to wonder if the woke governments of Canada and the UK are misinterpreting people’s fear of catching the virus from a very specific group of people associated with the virus with xenophobia.

Logic says that if a person is just fresh off the plane from an area that had the possibility of being infected with the virus, then being wary of that person isn’t just natural, it’s smart. Wanting that person to stay in China to limit the possibility of a spread is also not xenophobic, it’s just making sure that a deadly plague doesn’t have the chance to go buck wild in other continents. It wouldn’t matter if the person is Chinese, white, or what have you.

People just don’t want to get sick. It doesn’t make them racist or xenophobic. If any of these elected officials were told that some people were going to walk into their office that had a higher chance of being infected with the virus, they’d lock their doors.