China’s government allows only about thirty-four Hollywood movies to be shown in Chinese theaters. As a result, entertainment companies like Disney go out of their way to make sure a film appeals to both North American crowds and Chinese Communist…

Mulan: Disney Talks Freedom at Home, Toes the Line in China

DEFINITIONS
Outbreak
The sudden rise of the incidence of disease or the sudden rapid increase in the number of harmful organisms, particularly insects (ref: Merriam- Webster Online).
Epidemic
When an outbreak spreads rapidly, as in the case of…

A Timeline of Plagues, Epidemics & Pandemics

"Pandemics are uniquely destabilizing." Matthew Lee Anderson, founder of the journal Mere Orthodoxy, gave a presentation on the imago Dei and the value of a life at The Center for Bioethics & Human Dignity's virtual conference on June 26, 2020. The…

Disaster Ethics & the Trouble with Triage

“What will we do after the war?” Dorothy Sayers asked this of her readers in 1942 in her essay “Why Work?“
““The question that I will ask you to consider today is this: When the war is over, are we likely, and do we want to keep this attitude to work…

What Will We Do After the Pandemic?

Why is TikTok so controversial? It’s the first Chinese technology company that has reached a billion users outside of China. Its main demographic is Generation Z—teens and twenty-somethings. If you take a look at TikTok videos, most are goofy and…

Why Some Nation States Are Banning TikTok

In an essay written in 1942, Dorothy L. Sayers called her readers to be suspicious of a phrase commonly used among her fellow Britons. “After the War,” she heard her countrymen and women assure each other, things will go back to normal. Work, in…

Work After the Pandemic

COVID-19 has led to a large uptick in cyber espionage. Last May, I reported on the joint statements from the U.S. and the U.K., formally accusing China, Russia, and Iran of trying to hack into Covid-19 research institutions.
Now the U.S. Department…

Charges Reveal Extent of China-Sponsored Hacking in the West

The semi-autonomous region of Hong Kong is no longer semi-autonomous, at least in practice. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), circumventing Hong Kong’s parliament and courts, passed the Hong Kong National Security Law on June 30 that effectively…

Hong Kong: Tech Companies Face Serious Ethical Decisions

For the Chinese Communist Party, SARS-CoV-2 (the coronavirus) has provided an opportunity to expand its massive surveillance system.
The current extensive network of facial recognition cameras has left some gaps. People could avoid recognition, for…

China’s Health Code App: One More Way to Track Citizens

While countries around the world have been dealing with the spread of COVID-19 (coronavirus), China has claimed disputed areas in the South China Sea, taken over the Hong Kong government, and flown planes over Taiwan.
One result was a standoff…

The Age of the Wolf Warrior: China’s Post-Pandemic Strategy

To be a Christian without prayer is no more possible than to be alive without breathing.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Racial injustice, viral pandemics, job loss–Is God there? Does he see? The Psalms have many prayers of lament that ask these very…

A Lament for Our Nation

Language matters and it is sometimes used in a confusing way. For example, we hear talk of “killing” viruses, even at sites sponsored by medics But, unlike bacteria, viruses are not alive. COVID-19 is RNA encased in a lipid membrane. So the sentence…

Making Sense of the Numbers Behind COVID-19

The United States has formally accused China of both funding and operating cells of hackers who infiltrate research labs working on responses to COVID-19. From a statement released jointly by the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security’s…

The New Cyber Cold War with China

It is widely recognized that medical professionals and journalists in China are being silenced if they publish any information about COVID-19 that contradicts the ruling Chinese Communist Party’s official narrative. But now mainland Chinese…

COVID-19: Getting to the Bottom of What Happened in China

U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams said, “It’s tragically fitting that we’re talking at the beginning of Holy Week because this is going to be the hardest and saddest week of most Americans’ lives, quite frankly.”
I had been thinking about the…

Meditation on Holy Week in the Midst of a Pandemic

Since totalitarian movements exist in a world which itself is nontotalitarian, they are forced to resort to what we commonly regard as propaganda.
U.S. Intelligence reports that China has misrepresented the extent of the COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan.…

The Dragon’s Deception: Conspiracy Theories and False Numbers

The SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19 has spread throughout the world with the number of cases increasing daily, both due to spread and to extended testing. We have provided links to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s websites that…

Coronavirus: Explanations and Ethical Issues

As the world reels amid the COVID-19 (formerly, coronavirus) pandemic, the government of China wants us to know that 1) the virus didn’t originate in China and 2) President Xi stopped it in its tracks. And that we should all be thankful to him.
The…

China: Rewriting the History of COVID-19

Students and employees in China, like many across the globe, are adjusting to learning or working from home under quarantine in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. But the app that the Chinese school system is using has angered many…