The law of conservation of scape-goating

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

Cultures and populations are bigoted in rough relation to 1) economic and technological anxiety, 2) national security anxiety and 3) historical levels of bigotry defining social traditions. Depending in the pressures of the moment, certain groups are made scape-goats because they are "stealing our money", "selling out our country" or are simply un-clean... un-sanctified.

Interestingly, it makes little difference who the targets of bigotry are... bigotry is fungible. (Many black comedians have noted that 9/11 took some heat off of African Americans, at least temporarily, as the national "us vs. them" lens shifted to Muslims and foreigners.) Tradition is slow moving, so old bigotries don't disappear over night, but new ones can arise in dramatic fashion. German-Americans had to essentially abandon their identity overnight during WWI.

When you look at the histories of groups motivated almost entirely by bigotry (like the Klan, Aryan Nation, or the Republican base) their bigotry is constant, but their focus changes.

The vogue today is scape-goating illegal aliens. The Klu Klux Klan used to be very active against Catholics, and had scarcely heard of Mexicans. Today the Klan is recruiting specifically based on bigotry toward "illegals" in general and Mexicans in specific.

There are all sorts of valid objections to uncontrolled immigration, but most of those objections were just as valid twenty years ago. There is not an epidemic of illegals any more than there is an epidemic of kidnapped children, euthanasia, partial birth abortions, dog-fighting, poisoned halloween candy or anything else TV news and politicians seize on for ratings and votes.

The "illegals" have been coming here, and living among us in vast numbers, for a long time. The reason immigration a hot issue today is that that Republican policies have exaggerated the effects of normal trends in technology to screw working Americans. Working Americans are more insecure and cynical politicians have found they can focus that insecurity on illegals, taking the focus off the plutocrats who own the TV channels that pump this anti-immigrant stuff 24/7.

Our Democratic candidates have to talk tough on illegal immigration for the same reasons they have to oppose gay marriage. It is a political necessity. But we should not fall, zombie-like, for our own rhetoric. We should, as individuals, recognize in our heart of hearts that gay people should be allowed to marry, and that this immigration hysteria is an overtly racist propaganda campaign run by the people at the top, seeking to set everyone at the bottom at each others' throats. Divide and conquer.

Lou Dobbs is not a friend of the working man; he is a cynical racist crack-pot who aggrandizes himself a friend of the working man as he envisions the category, meaning smiling white men with lunch pails circa 1955. It is sentimental, nostalgic bullshit, like so much of economic nationalism throughout history. All Lou Dobbs accomplishes is encouraging working people to vote Republican, convincing them that their problems are caused by dark-skinned strangers, not by their own bosses and the investor class.

The enemy of our enemy is not our friend, particularly when he works for our enemy.