June 27, 2018
Page 13
O PINION
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Immigration and Trump’s Dehumanizing Language
Cruel policies
follow such
patterns of
thinking
J osé -a ntonio o rosCo
As I listened to the re-
cording of immigrant kids
crying because they were be-
ing separated from their parents, I
heard the Border Patrol agent joke
that they sounded like an orchestra
without a conductor. My reaction
was to wonder how anyone could
be so cruel to the fear of young
children. What could make a per-
son so cold to that kind of pain?
The incident reminded me of
philosopher Phillip Hallie who
wrote about the concentration
camps of Nazi Germany. Hallie
pointed out that amid the daily
horror of the camps, there were
guards who had not been broken
down by the constant show of
degradation and would display
kindness to the prisoners. They
would share a kind word, or sneak
an extra roll of bread to a starving
person. Such examples are often
used to argue that despite cruel
situations, there might be solitary
individuals who recognize the
humanity of others. The Border
Patrol agent laughing at children
in terror doesn’t seem to be one
by
of those.
But Hallie warns that we
shouldn’t narrow our focus on
the morality of individuals or
on episodic instances
of cruelty or kindness
when thinking of the
concentration
camps.
In fact, a Nazi guard’s
smile or an extra ration
from the camp kitchen
only works to remind
the prisoners that there is a world
in which people can be kind and
people are treated with dignity,
but they aren’t part of that world
inside the camp.
Hallie argues that the way to
comprehend the immorality of
slavery or of the Nazi concentra-
tion camps is with the idea of “in-
stitutionalized cruelty”-- the way
in that the individual infliction
of pain and suffering becomes
normal, justified, and everyday.
The Nazi guards could kill, beat,
starve, torture prisoners because
they had lived for years with their
leaders telling them that their
country, and their own families,
were threatened by enemies who
were not quite human. Ordinary
Germans tolerated the Nazi pol-
icies because they became con-
vinced by Nazi rhetoric they were
somehow morally better than
Jews, and therefore, deserved to
control and dominate them.
Recent public opinion polls
suggest that 28 percent of Amer-
icans approved of the President’s
policy of separating immigrant
children from parents at the bor-
ders; among those identifying as
Republican the approval shot up
to almost 60 percent. These num-
bers indicate that more than 1 in
4 Americans think that there is
an immigration crisis facing the
nation that requires an extraor-
dinary effort of cruelty to solve.
How could they be convinced of
that?
Trump started his presiden-
tial campaign in 2016 by railing
against Mexican immigrants as
dangerous criminals, assuring
his followers that (only) some of
them are good people. He contin-
ued this way of thinking at the be-
ginning of this year, bemoaning
that the only kinds of refugees we
attracted came from “shithole”
countries. Then he warned that
our laws were letting in “ani-
mals,” having then to clarify that
he meant specific MS-13 gang
members and not undocumented
immigrants in general. The ambi-
guity in Trump’s language might
be attributed to lazy speech, but
just this week he reiterated that
immigrants want to “infest” our
country. It’s clear that when it
comes to immigrants, Trump re-
lies on metaphors about animals,
insects, disease, filth, and crime.
It’s really not surprising that cru-
el policies follow such patterns of
thinking.
Hallie pointed out that the
remedy to institutionalized cru-
elty is not kindness but what he
called “hospitality”—caring for
the victim of cruelty in a way that
removes them from the relation-
ship of domination that makes
them suffer. Hallie’s heroes were
the people who sheltered run-
away Jewish families and kept
them out of the grasp of the Na-
zis. This suggests that what we
need now is not just a reform to
keep immigrant families together,
but also a recommitment to assist
refugees and asylum seekers and
attention to the economic and
political circumstances that are
creating waves of migrants to our
borders. And we need to stand
up to the dehumanizing language
from our leaders that hardens
hearts and then, crushes bodies.
Like Hallie’s heroes, we ought
show kindness not only by allevi-
ating the suffering inside the tent
cities where immigrant families
are being detained, but by making
sure that such places don’t come
to exist at all.
José-Antonio Orosco, Ph.D,
writes for PeaceVoice and is As-
sociate Professor of Philosophy:
School of History, Philosophy,
and Religion Director, Oregon
State University Peace Studies
Program.
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