marjaerwin | Entries tagged with xenophobia

I've seen a lot of people opposing immigration, and often hurling slurs against immigrants. And I've never seen any plausible ethical counter-argument against free immigration.

And actual American immigration restrictions were originally based on racism and eugenicism. And there have been attempts to rework these, remove the blatant racism, etc. but they're still continuations of many of the same policies, the same institutions, etc.

An actual argument is that immigration sometimes reduces wages, but the immigration restrictions, which leave people vulnerable to exploitation, also reduce wages. I really doubt that free immigration would reduce wages in America, if immigrants can join unions, etc., and I think it would increase wages globally, and eventually in America.

And I think violence against human beings, such as deportation, razor wire on the river-banks, imprisonment, extraordinary rendition, etc. needs stronger justification.

The most common "argument" is that free immigration is politically unpopular. But that's not an argument that it's wrong, or that the current cruelty is somehow not wrong.

A similar "argument" is that "every other country restricts immigration," or even that "every country has a sovereign might to restrict immigration." But again, that's not an argument that free immigration is wrong, and I don't think a government can have rights.

Another "argument" is that free immigration would somehow lead to more human smuggling, but it's the restrictions that force people to turn to smugglers.

Another "argument" is that allowing immigrants into the country is somehow comparable to allowing all of them into our home. Which just doesn't make sense to me. Current restrictions literally keep people from visiting friends and family who have invited them into their homes.

Another "argument" is that it's some kind of conspiracy or invasion. Which is blatant nonsense, and allows people to dismiss thical arguments, and encourages violence against immigrants and refugees and, in the case of the Pittsbugh Synaogue shooting, against people who support immigrants and refugees.

Another "argument" is that they're "poisoning the blood" of America. Which is worse.

P.S. I don't feel any responsibility to steel-man these arguments.

If this were an abstract discussion, maybe, but these anti-immigrant policies have hurt and killed people. So it feels sick to try to argue for them.

And plenty of other people offer their versions of these arguments every day.

Slavery and genocide against black people, Jewish people, Rroma people, Rohingya people, various American Indian peoples, and so on, are all racist.

If your definition can't include this violence, and similar violence, change your definition!

"It's not racist, because Muslims/immigrants/etc. are not a race" fails that test. Or similar claims that it's not racist if it's not about biological categories. But biologically, we're all Homo sapiens sapiens, and there are no coherent racial groupings within Homo sapiens sapiens. For example, black people are not a race either. Now the original Klan and the original Nazis didn't know that there aren't coherent racial categories, but they invented their categories out of power structures (such as the one drop rule) and out of pseudohistory (such as the "Aryan race" where early 20th century anthropology suggested Mediterranean, Nordic, and Alpine types, possibly spreading from Central Asia in successive waves). So "only about biological categories" can't include the above violence.

"love it or leave it" isn't necessarily racist, but it is a kind of totalitarian nationalism, it's intended to silence dissent, and it's cruel to people who are unable to "leave it"... most people, especially disabled people.

"go back where you came from" is definitely xenophobic, and again, it's cruel to people who have escaped danger and/or found a home and/or just want to live their lives.

"it's not racism, it's just capping immigration" is again xenophobic, and cruel.

"it's not anti-immigrant, it's just anti-[slur for undocumented immigrants]," is again xenophobic, and cruel.

It's worth noting that many Jewish refugees were unable to escape Nazi Germany because of immigration restrictions, and hostility towards "illegal immigrants." For example, the Franks were refused entry to the United States, and settled in the Netherlands.

It's also worth noting that immigration restrictions in the United States, such as the Chinese Exclusion Act, and the Klan-backed 1924 Immigration Act, have been explicitely racist, and the latter was also explicitely eugenicist. The 1952 and 1965 revisions haven't been as racist. But xenophobia is no better, And both xenophobia and racism have led to anti-immigrant violence such as the Olathe shooting, the Squirrel Hill massacre, the Christchurch Massacre in New Zealand, deportations, child separation (which is also against the Genocide Convention), and concentration camps.

And whether you call it racism or ethno-nationalism, targeting ethnic minorities is wrong.

Current Mood: aggravated

Mass anti-immigrant raids scheduled for Sunday.

With my disabilities, I don't know what I can do about this. I am unable to travel to protests, or to religious groups, or most other foci for activism. I could easily get sick from noise, police-car lights, and so on.

There's a lot in common with the early Holocaust: organized state violence, concentration camps, etc.

But some of it echoes parts of the Pogrom wave during the Russian and Ukrainian Civil Wars: disorganized state policy, encouraaing the violence with some statements and discouraging it with others. The Trump admin probably wouldn't protect a Semesenko yet. But Trump pardoned Arpaio and appeals to white nationalists. The far-right media sows a lot of the seeds for the Squirrel Hill Massacre, the Christchurch Massacre, the Portland Murders, the Olathe Murder, the Charlottesville Murder, etc.

Fortunately, it's nowhere near 30,000 to 60,000 dead. May it never get there.

Current Mood: distressed

I don’t understand anti-immigrant politics.

To begin with, it’s cruel to decide that people can’t live the lives they want because *those* people were born on the other side of *that* line. And unjust.

By the way, the 1924 law kept the Franks from becoming refugees in America, so they could only get refuge in the Netherlands, and that didn't last long enough.

In America, these policies were introduced for white supremacism, starting with the Chinese Exclusion Act, and for eugenicism, both partly motivated by the idea that the target populations were less intelligent and more fertile. While they have been changed, they haven’t been abolished due to institutional inertia. Of course many people insist that they support these policies because they’re the law rather than because of white supremacism or because of eugenicism, but now many of these people want to tighten/worsen the law– because what?

To continue, if you believe different countries represent different values, and if you also want to restrict immigration, then you’re saying that people can’t choose a country that represents their values, and you’re saying that this country should represent your cruelty, and not my rejection of this cruelty. I’m disabled and can’t travel, and would be turned away because of my disabilities if I could travel.

Now many insist that “each nation” “has a right” “to restrict immigration”. I think rights are something which protect people from arbitrary power, including state power, so these restrictions are the opposite of rights.

So right now the rulers impose these restrictions, and then they have a growing police state to enforce the restrictions, and concentration camps to enforce the restrictions, and disappearing children, and mass graves on the border.

Now some insist that the mass graves justify further restrictions, because “people smugglers,” but there wouldn’t be any people smugglers without the original restrictions.

So it looks like cruelty, for the sake of cruelty, or for some other evil end.

For example:

https://lithub.com/rebecca-solnit-the-myth-of-real-america-just-wont-go-away/#comment-3896906191

Libertarian

While this white author pens venomous, self-loathing screeds, we are restoring the integrity of our border and arresting liberal plans for a permanent electoral majority through immigration.

Marja Erwin

If you want to protect hierarchy, and oppose equality, and oppose immigration, that makes you an authoritarian. Not libertarian.

Libertarian

Who said anything about opposing equality? I’m all for the meritocracy. Immigration controls are necessary, and if you contend otherwise you’re unintelligent.

Marja Erwin

> “Who said anything about opposing equality?”

You described this essay, which started with representation for the rest of us, as “incoherent.” You hurl sexist and ableist slurs, as do some of your critics. You write that “You can try this petulant strategy of insulting and disregarding white voters again, but stitching together a vast "coalition” of patronized minority groups already failed in 2016.“So it’s easy to think that you oppose equality.

> "Immigration controls are necessary, and if you contend otherwise you’re unintelligent.”

Hurting peaceful people is necessary? How? For whom?

Libertarian

There’s a reason your input has no place in public policy! Do you want to have a place at the table? Get on board with immigration controls or shut the fuck up about politics permanently. Easy choice!

Marja Erwin

“There’s a reason your input has no place in public policy!”

Do explain.

“Do you want to have a place at the table?”

I want to stop being beaten up for my disabilities.

“Get on board with immigration controls or shut the fuck up about politics permanently. Easy choice!”

I’ll take the third option, the only justifiable option. I will not support violence against peaceful people, violence to enforce white supremacism, and I will not shut up about violence, Racist Authoritarian.

If the price for not being beaten up any more is to let other people be beaten, enslaved, and deported– I cannot support that.

P.S. I may come off like this:

https://www.smbc-comics.com/comics/1499354499-20170706.png

But I don't think I really am like that.

Some people do try to justify the violence. Common arguments for the violence include “we need to stop overpopulation, and allowing immigration will somehow cause overpopulation, so we need to stop immigration,” or “we need to stop border-crossers being killed, and if we escalate the killing, eventually that will stop all crossers, and thus stop the killing,” or “we need to stop border-crossers from being abused by human traffickers, and if we make sure they ca’t come legally and have to turn to human traffickers, that will stop them being abused.”

But I just do not find these arguments convincing.

Most don’t try. Common non-arguments include “might makes right” “you should be silenced,” “you should be forced out of the country” “we need to enforce these laws, and also tighten them, and ignore abuses when enforcing them, because laws.”