Asian businesses have been hit hardest

The argument

If help during the pandemic should go where the damage is greatest, then the question is which communities have borne the sharpest decline in consumer demand. We need to help the communities that have been affected most, and on this argument no community has been affected more than the Asian community. The scale is what distinguishes the case. Asian-American businesses saw a reduction in business by 80%, and they saw it even before isolation measures were introduced. The timing is the significant part. Losses that followed lockdown were shared across every sector depending on people leaving their homes, and they have an obvious cause that applies to everyone. A collapse of this size occurring beforehand cannot be explained that way, because the restrictions accounting for the general downturn were not yet in place. Something was already driving customers away from these businesses specifically. What was driving them, on this account, was association rather than risk. The virus originated in the Chinese city of Wuhan, and allegations circulated that Asian eating habits led to the first human COVID-19 case. Those allegations attached a general suspicion to Asian businesses and the people running them, and customers acted on it. The avoidance did not track any actual difference in danger between these premises and others; it tracked where the virus was thought to have come from and whom that was taken to implicate. This is why the case for directing help here is strong. These businesses absorbed a loss both larger than the general one and earlier than it, and they absorbed it for a reason unconnected to anything they did. Because Asian businesses have been hit hardest, help during the coronavirus pandemic should go to Asian communities.

Context

Due to the coronavirus originating in the Chinese city of Wuhan (and claims it was linked to Asian eating habits), many patrons have stopped buying from Asian food establishments.

Premises

Counter-arguments

Asian restaurants may have gotten us into this mess. There were reports that the coronavirus may have initially infected humans in China due to the consumption of a COVID-19-infected bat. If this is true, then Asian restaurants should be the last industries we should help.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] We shouldn't help industries that exacerbated or caused the pandemic. [Rejecting P2] Asian businesses may have caused the pandemic. [Rejecting P3] Therefore, we shouldn't help Asian businesses.

Framing

We need to help the communities that have suffered most.