How do we fight back when the government thinks it can win votes by coming up with more brutal ways to treat those trying to make Britain home?
This is an article in the fifth issue of New Economic Magazine.You can read the full question here.
Anyone who cares about people being treated humanely and with respect will be appalled by Priti Patel’s plans to deport people seeking safety in the UK to Rwanda. It is a dangerous and inhumane plan and unfortunately only the latest in a series of hostile government policies aimed at those trying to make Britain home.
We know this government can easily welcome people who have been forced to flee – look at the Ukraine House scheme, or the way Poland has hosted more than 3 million Ukrainians since March. And yet, instead of providing the same safe routes for black and brown people fleeing war, this administration has chosen to use certain refugees as political footballs every time it gets itself into trouble.
In fact, Priti Patel first profiled Rwanda’s plans to The Times in June 2021, when Boris Johnson’s ratings hit Britain’s third Covid wave It starts off sharply. This is just one example of how this administration is targeting minorities to divert attention from the harm their decisions have caused. They want us to blame refugees, trans people and environmental activists for our difficult times, not those in power: ministers handing over crony contracts to their billionaire mates, cutting funding to our parliaments, and Parties were held while others were locked down.
As immigrant rights activists, how do we respond? Well, we’ve been outraged by Priti Patel’s brutal asylum program. This is understandable. It feels compelled to speak out about the utter horror of the Rwandan deportation program. We want to expose the damaging impact of the Home Secretary’s new Nationality and Borders Act. Yet we often fail to paint a clear picture of the society we want to live in and the solutions that will help us get there. If people aren’t allowed to see the world we want to see, it’s easy for our audience to feel frustrated and hopeless rather than motivated to take action.
However, we have a great foundation from which to move forward. The government’s new punitive anti-refugee bill may have passed, but the movement for justice and dignity for immigrants is growing stronger every week. We’ve seen MPs and archbishops demand more welcome for asylum seekers, we’ve seen crowds resist immigration raids in Glasgow, Edinburgh and London, we’ve seen a huge coalition successfully stop Rwanda’s first deportation flight.
As this movement grows, it is important that we recognize that outrage is not enough to oppose the inhumane policies of this administration. We need to communicate our values and bring more people into our vision of a fairer, freer and more united society. This means that it is possible to show people a different world.
“As this movement grows, it’s important that we recognize that outrage is not enough to oppose the inhumane policies of this administration. “
Compassion, caring, fairness, equality — these are values most of us hold dear. When we start our messages by appealing to these shared human values, rather than jumping up and condemning an issue, it helps us create common ground between ourselves and our audience, and helps change people’s View. It might be easy to jump to denouncing a policy we know is excessive — like Rwanda’s deportation program — but the evidence shows that starting with denunciation often turns people away from our message, rather than engaging them. Relatedly, if you base your argument on morality, the financial cost of criticizing policy weakens rather than strengthens your argument. Would it be less immoral if the asylum deportation program was cheap?
Often, we also condemn policies without naming the politicians responsible or their motives.We passively talk about harmful immigration and asylum systems that lead to of‘Marginalization”, eg. This makes change seem unwieldy, if not impossible, and lets the powerful get off the hook: if marginalization was just the easy thing of‘happen’, how can we prevent it? If we are trying to encourage others to take action, we should discuss who is peddling these policies and why.
We know that government ministers are ignoring lockdown rules and supporting billionaire bosses rather than struggling families. We know that this administration is stoking fear and hatred of minorities to distract attention from their own political failures.also
To determine the damaging effects that ministers’ policies will have on people, we need to point to politicians’ motives. Pointing out this administration’s divisive scapegoating tactics helps us mobilize people to action and unite people from all backgrounds.
Finally, when we talk about people who have moved for work, love, security, or study (often a combination of these), we should also try to use human-centered language whenever possible, rather than categorizing people as of‘asylum seeker’, of‘immigrants even of‘refugees”. Most of us have moved at some point in our lives. People who cross borders are no exception—like all of us, they have families and dreams, good days and bad. When it comes to empathy and understanding, it makes sense to talk about what brings us together, rather than reducing people to a legal status or their negative experiences. In this case, whenever possible, it makes sense to use language like this helpful of‘flee from hurting people’ instead of‘Vulnerable asylum seekers”, and of‘people who call Britain home” instead of of‘migrant”.
“When we’re trying to elicit empathy and understanding, it makes sense to talk about what brings us together, rather than reducing people to a legal status or their negative experiences. “
Anthropologist David Graber once said of“The world is what we make it, and we could easily make it differently”. This statement makes a lot of sense. Decisions made by those in power are political choices, and they can just as easily make different, better choices. In Where possible, we should point to these alternatives – such as family reunification pathways for those seeking safety, or shorter and affordable pathways to citizenship.
Now, instead of focusing on solutions, we tend to repeat and refute the opponent’s arguments, such as of‘Seeking asylum is not a crime”. This only feeds unhelpful and stigmatizing framing. To generate hope and action, it is helpful to discuss practical steps forward and the world we want to build. For most of us, this is a society where everyone is treated with respect and dignity, regardless of race, religion or gender; our communities are welcoming, inclusive and caring, and people feel safe and free. Celebrate what we have been as we remind people of what we can be When progress is made and we inspire people with our vision for the future, we make our sport a team people want to be a part of.
Nadia Hasan is Communications Officer for the Joint Council on Immigrant Welfare.
Image: iStock/ petekarici
