Facebook Instagram Twitter YouTube

Racism Is a Preexisting Condition

From increased violent attacks against Asian people to the disproportionately high COVID-19 fatality rates for Black and Brown people, racism is a preexisting condition. Workers and oppressed people must fight back.

Julia Wallace

April 16, 2020
Facebook Twitter Share

The COVID-19 pandemic has disproportionately hurt people of color in the United States, with recent data indicating that Black people suffer the highest numbers of coronavirus deaths around the country relative to population size. While politicians are feigning alarm at the shocking racial disparities only now being reported by the media, such disparities should come as no surprise. They result from structural racism, which manifests in all aspects of life: housing, testing, employment, sickness, incarceration, discrimination, and much else.

Some of the most criminal aspects of racialized health outcomes include the following:

Housing and homelessness. Black people have always been overrepresented in the U.S. homeless population, and today they make up 50 percent of homeless families. Lack of access to shelter makes staying “in place” difficult or impossible. Lack of access to health care due to lack of insurance, and lack of access to clean water and food have dire consequences for the homeless, and now this means that they are also more likely to be exposed to the virus and to receive no treatment when they get sick with COVID-19.

Lack of testing. The affluent neighborhoods in Los Angeles County currently have higher positive rates than others because wealthy people can get tested more easily than poor and working-class people. In the Brown and Black working-class city of Lancaster, California, a 17-year-old was turned away from being tested because he didn’t have insurance; he died soon after.

Precarious jobs. A high percentage of low-wage and precarious jobs are filled by Black and Latino people. Those jobs have offered less protective equipment as well as little to no sick time and sick pay. The meager pay means workers who have lost their jobs or are forced to work fewer hours will have a harder time paying for already-overpriced rent and food.

Chronic illness. Because so many Black people suffer from chronic illnesses such as diabetes and heart disease, they are more likely to succumb to the coronavirus. Access to healthy food has been systematically kept from Black people from the time of slavery to the present day’s “food deserts,” where smaller stores carrying junk food and little produce replace stores that sell a variety of healthy food.

Racism in health care. There are deep racial inequalities in health outcomes in the United States. For instance, while Black women have lower rates of breast cancer, they die from it more often than other groups because Black people’s health concerns are often ignored by medical professionals, leading to delays in treatment. People of color, especially recent immigrants, are less likely to be covered by insurance and often fear going to the hospital due to the threat of deportation or exorbitant medical bills. Such factors contribute to higher deaths rates for nonwhite communities.

People locked in cages. Even before the virus, jails, prisons, and ICE detention centers have had a majority Black and Latino people crammed together with substandard health care. For years, concerns have been raised about how substandard  health care and poor sanitary conditions have helped spread infectious diseases in the prison system. In Chicago’s Cook County jail over 270 inmates have contracted COVID-19, and the number continues to rise. The United States has more people in the carceral system than any other country in the world! Racist criminal justice, coupled with overcrowding, means more Black and Brown people die from COVID-19.

ICE and coronavirus. Attacks on immigrants are nothing new. Both Republican and Democratic Party administrations have routinely rounded up immigrants and immigrant children in detention centers. People of all ages, ethnicities, and genders have died in ICE custody because of the horrendous health conditions. The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated that. Recently, four children tested positive for coronavirus, prompting a judge to release them. There are, however, thousands of children in detention centers throughout the United States. We demand their immediate release!

Increased discrimination. Since the outbreak in Wuhan, there has been an increase in racist violence particularly toward Asian people, who have been blamed for spreading the virus. President Trump has repeatedly called coronavirus the “Chinese Virus,” a phrase that has provided political cover for bigots and spurred violence against anyone perceived as Asian in the United States and abroad. Japanese, Korean, and Chinese people have been victims of attacks, particular elderly people and women.

Racism is one of the oldest methods of capitalist domination. From the genocide of native people to the mass enslavement and importation of Africans; from “Operation Wetback,” in which up to 1.3 million Mexican workers were deported in the 1950s, to the Chinese Exclusion Act 70 years earlier, U.S. elites and their corporate-controlled governments have always brutalized and disregarded the working masses, most especially Black, Brown, and Asian people and many oppressed groups. Today, the coronavirus pandemic has exacerbated and exposed that racist reality once again, as oppressed people are hit the hardest and are dying the quickest.

Capitalism and capitalist governments have nothing to offer working class and oppressed people but death and misery. But the multiracial working class has the power to transform society, to begin the work of ending racism and oppression, to finally, once and for all, create a society of equality and abundance. As we see today, workers have gone on general strikes in defense of safety, are demanding production be prioritized to meet human need, and in some cases are questioning the need for bosses completely.

Racist capitalism is a disease; workers and oppressed people fighting back is the cure.

Facebook Twitter Share

Julia Wallace

Julia is a contributor for Left Voice and has been a revolutionary socialist for over ten years. She served on the South Central Neighborhood Council in Los Angeles and is a member of SEIU Local 721. Julia organizes against police brutality and in defense of LGBTQ, women, and immigrants' rights. When she's not actively fighting the patriarchy, white supremacy and/or capitalism, she enjoys many things: she loves Thundercat, plays ultimate frisbee and is a founder of the team, "Black Lives Hammer."

United States

What “The Daily” Gets Right and Wrong about Oregon’s Move to Recriminalize Drugs

A doctor at an overdose-prevention center responds to The Daily, a podcast produced by the New York Times, on the recriminalization of drugs in Oregon. What are the true causes of the addiction crisis, and how can we solve it?

Mike Pappas

March 22, 2024
Former president Donald Trump standing at a podium in front of American flags.

To Stop Trump, We Need Much More Democracy, Not Less

Democrats have been trying to kick Trump off the ballot as an "insurrectionist." Liberals say we have to restrict democracy in order to save it. As socialists, we think they have it backwards: to beat the Far Right, we need a mass movement fighting for radical democracy.

Nathaniel Flakin

March 18, 2024

New Jersey Democrats Attack the Public’s Right to Government Records

The New Jersey state assembly, led by the Democratic Party, just tried to fast-track a bill that would have gutted the Open Public Records Act. This is a reminder that their party is an obstacle, not an ally, in the fight to preserve democracy.

Samuel Karlin

March 15, 2024
President Biden giving his State of the Union speech at a podium in March, 2024.

Biden’s State of the Union: Hyper-Nationalism and Eroding Legitimacy

President Biden’s hyper-nationalistic State of the Union speech focused on selling himself as a defender of democracy at home and abroad. But it’s not enough to solve his — and the whole U.S. regime’s — crisis of legitimacy.

Tatiana Cozzarelli

March 14, 2024

MOST RECENT

A square in Argentina is full of protesters holding red banners

48 Years After the Military Coup, Tens of Thousands in Argentina Take to the Streets Against Denialism and the Far Right

Tens of thousands of people took to the streets across Argentina on March 24 to demand justice for the victims of the state and the military dictatorship of 1976. This year, the annual march had renewed significance, defying the far-right government’s denialism and attacks against the working class and poor.

Madeleine Freeman

March 25, 2024

The Convulsive Interregnum of the International Situation

The capitalist world is in a "permacrisis" — a prolonged period of instability which may lead to catastrophic events. The ongoing struggles for hegemony could lead to open military conflicts.

Claudia Cinatti

March 22, 2024

Berlin’s Mayor Loves Antisemites

Kai Wegner denounces the “antisemitism” of left-wing Jews — while he embraces the most high-profile antisemitic conspiracy theorist in the world.

Nathaniel Flakin

March 22, 2024

Lord Balfour Was an Imperialist Warmonger 

We should give our full solidarity to the Palestine Action comrade who defaced a portrait of Arthur Balfour at Cambridge University. But the problem for everyone who opposes the genocide against Gaza is how to massify and politically equip the movement.

Daniel Nath

March 21, 2024