I'm more than happy to entertain the idea that the research is and was worth it. But we need to have an accurate accounting of recent events. They tried to completely shut that down. Thankfully, lately it seems that they failed.
Please explain to me how position A) is more racist than position B)
A) Scientists all over the world, including Chinese, Americans, and others, made a fundamental misjudgement about the safety of the Wuhan virology lab, or perhaps viral experimentation generally, and the result was a global pandemic
Versus
B) Chinese people eating & trading wild and exotic meat unintentionally caused a global pandemic due to their consumption
Of course, neither theory is racist. That's a word that used to mean something (and I wish it still did!), but is mostly used today to shut down debate in Western countries.
I mean... for several years, the notion that Chinese people are unsanitary was conisdered not racist, while the notion that extremely smart Chinese bioscientists may have covered up a lab accident was considered Asian hating. That sort of double think is worthy of questioning and criticism.
I still get the impression the 'selectively silence misinformation' crowd is still as emboldened as ever, even in the pursuit of science. Despite it repeatedly failing and backfiring.
COVID helped give Reddit-style control of discourse a glean of urgency/respectability and "it's okay because we had good-intentions" continues to be the go-to justification.