Posted March 19, 2018
Aaaaah yes yes yes, yes. THEY love this so much (them). The old self-evident "natural vs artificial" diffusionism. The lovely varnish upon "get off my lawn". Yes, this, that and that, they belonged to The Grand Natural Order Of Things, but thhhis, thhhose people there ? They are unnatural. OUT WITH THEM, and the barbaric music and food and skin tone they artificially impose upon us.
I had lovely conversations with greek ethnicists about that. Nationalist fanatics that scream at each sign of "eastern influence" while consuming mostly american music (traditional music is so left-wing) and gloriously shaping their society after western models of economy and nuclear families. Same rationalisation : "What I prefer, when it's foreign, is just natural evolution, but if my neighbour adopts dirty elements from countries I dislike, it's just alien stuff forced upon us."
What makes it fascinating is that absolutely every epoch is made of that. Whining about external influences, that later become part of the culture (and part of what is defended as either intemporal or "naturally occuring") as opposed to the alien filth brought by the current migrants. Even stuff imposed by the most straightforward, brutal, murderous colonial invasions (language, religion, etc) becomes later "our sacred culture" that we must preserve against newcomers. Just like the past generation of migrants were "Okay people after all, see, they integrated themselves" while "Those from THESE countries now ? They'll never adapt, they're too different and numerous, and they're all criminals anyway". Until the next wave from another country, that shoves the former one into normality and becomes the new apocalyptic threat upon Our True Cultural Identity. And the new scapegoat, or target for ethnic cleansing fantasies (when not policies).
In a way, this should be a relief for everyone, on all sides. The same arguments, the same events, the same discourses, reactions, polemics, and tensions, are happening perpetually, with variations in violences. Short-sightedness never prevented anything, just made it all more tense, and just perpetually grinds one identity under the weight of "self-defense" xenophobia before forgetting about it and switching to the next one. And no lesson is ever learnt.
And then, of course, is the whole legalist circular rationalization. Migrations happen, through much stronger forces (economic differentials, workforce needs, geopolitical tragedies, human relations, etc) than local policies. They happen, and, by definition, always too much (that is, too much right now) for the traditionalist nationalists. So, laws and policies adapt, fluctuate, change back and forth, depending on governments in place, populism, pragmatism, opportunism, dominant ideologies, etc. And these laws arbitrarily define who is a legit migrant or a criminal (what "illegal" implies), proving, by definition, that the (currently) illegal ones are illegals and therefore shouldn't be here. The following day, or the day before, the same undocumented migrants could be legalized, but hey, as long as they are criminalized for the time being, it's the proof that they deserve it. Half of the time, the capricious fluctuation of the law becomes all the validation that is required ("the State said so, who are you to question it"). The other half of the time, it's a big scandal ("the State is so corrupt, vote or march to change its treacherous laws"). Again, the double standards of rationalizations.
But yeah, another lovely thing is that it's universal. Indeed not a black vs white thing. African countries show the same racism and xenophobia between each others, the same stigmatizations of the neighbour's refugees, and the same ethnic nationalisms - which makes it all the funnier when a black migrant in Europe just wears the stigma of globally being from that whole continent. And the "alien intruders" whose "culture are destroying ours" can also be white in Europe (racist attitudes also happen/ed versus italians, portugueses, poles, all allegedly "impossible to integrate" depending on the moment's populist trend), and I'm not even talking about "the Jew" in the 19th and 20th century. Or protestants, catholics, etc.
Let's just enjoy the noise. It's like the foam on the waves, an ever repeated epiphenomenon of perpetual movements. Each time renewed by our short memory span. Humans are ridiculous, including in the reasons they find to tear each others apart. But hey, a lawn is a lawn, and that's what it comes down to.
I had lovely conversations with greek ethnicists about that. Nationalist fanatics that scream at each sign of "eastern influence" while consuming mostly american music (traditional music is so left-wing) and gloriously shaping their society after western models of economy and nuclear families. Same rationalisation : "What I prefer, when it's foreign, is just natural evolution, but if my neighbour adopts dirty elements from countries I dislike, it's just alien stuff forced upon us."
What makes it fascinating is that absolutely every epoch is made of that. Whining about external influences, that later become part of the culture (and part of what is defended as either intemporal or "naturally occuring") as opposed to the alien filth brought by the current migrants. Even stuff imposed by the most straightforward, brutal, murderous colonial invasions (language, religion, etc) becomes later "our sacred culture" that we must preserve against newcomers. Just like the past generation of migrants were "Okay people after all, see, they integrated themselves" while "Those from THESE countries now ? They'll never adapt, they're too different and numerous, and they're all criminals anyway". Until the next wave from another country, that shoves the former one into normality and becomes the new apocalyptic threat upon Our True Cultural Identity. And the new scapegoat, or target for ethnic cleansing fantasies (when not policies).
In a way, this should be a relief for everyone, on all sides. The same arguments, the same events, the same discourses, reactions, polemics, and tensions, are happening perpetually, with variations in violences. Short-sightedness never prevented anything, just made it all more tense, and just perpetually grinds one identity under the weight of "self-defense" xenophobia before forgetting about it and switching to the next one. And no lesson is ever learnt.
And then, of course, is the whole legalist circular rationalization. Migrations happen, through much stronger forces (economic differentials, workforce needs, geopolitical tragedies, human relations, etc) than local policies. They happen, and, by definition, always too much (that is, too much right now) for the traditionalist nationalists. So, laws and policies adapt, fluctuate, change back and forth, depending on governments in place, populism, pragmatism, opportunism, dominant ideologies, etc. And these laws arbitrarily define who is a legit migrant or a criminal (what "illegal" implies), proving, by definition, that the (currently) illegal ones are illegals and therefore shouldn't be here. The following day, or the day before, the same undocumented migrants could be legalized, but hey, as long as they are criminalized for the time being, it's the proof that they deserve it. Half of the time, the capricious fluctuation of the law becomes all the validation that is required ("the State said so, who are you to question it"). The other half of the time, it's a big scandal ("the State is so corrupt, vote or march to change its treacherous laws"). Again, the double standards of rationalizations.
But yeah, another lovely thing is that it's universal. Indeed not a black vs white thing. African countries show the same racism and xenophobia between each others, the same stigmatizations of the neighbour's refugees, and the same ethnic nationalisms - which makes it all the funnier when a black migrant in Europe just wears the stigma of globally being from that whole continent. And the "alien intruders" whose "culture are destroying ours" can also be white in Europe (racist attitudes also happen/ed versus italians, portugueses, poles, all allegedly "impossible to integrate" depending on the moment's populist trend), and I'm not even talking about "the Jew" in the 19th and 20th century. Or protestants, catholics, etc.
Let's just enjoy the noise. It's like the foam on the waves, an ever repeated epiphenomenon of perpetual movements. Each time renewed by our short memory span. Humans are ridiculous, including in the reasons they find to tear each others apart. But hey, a lawn is a lawn, and that's what it comes down to.
