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Detention and Immigration in the Closing Society

By Alexa

What do these terms mean, a "closed society" or "closing society?"

The most obvious example of a present day closed society I can think of is Burma. The violent crackdown in September 2007 was first reported with images from cell phone cameras. Bloggers posted photographs while their internet connections were alive. Once those connections were lost, the people of Burma had to rely on other forms of expression to spread their message.

If you look at history, you can see that there is essentially a blueprint for turning an open society into a dictatorship. That blueprint has been used again and again in more and less bloody, more and less terrifying ways. But it is always effective. It is very difficult and arduous to create and sustain a democracy - but history shows that closing one down is much simpler.

Henri-Louis Bergson defined an open society as one in which: "government is responsive and tolerant, and political mechanisms are transparent and flexible. The state keeps no secrets from itself in the public sense; it is a non-authoritarian society in which all are trusted with the knowledge of all. Political freedoms and human rights are the foundation of an open society."

Right here, right now, all the doors are closing.
In The End of America: Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot,  Naomi Wolf wrote:

Because Americans like me were born in freedom, we have a hard time even considering that it is possible for us to become as unfree - domestically - as many other nations. Because we no longer learn much about our rights or our system of government - the task of being aware of the constitution has been outsourced from citizens' ownership to being the domain of professionals such as lawyers and professors - we scarcely recognise the checks and balances that the founders put in place, even as they are being systematically dismantled. Because we don't learn much about European history, the setting up of a department of "homeland" security - remember who else was keen on the word "homeland" - didn't raise the alarm bells it might have.

Although I'm a bit ambivalent on some of Wolf's theory, and think her constant use of the word "fascicm" is inaccurate -- not unwarranted, just inaccurate (she identifies the hybrid and malevolent state of the nation, correctly, but I'm not convinced that "fascism" is accurate; more like, "fascism without the Stasi" or "fascicm with Christian nationalism mixed in." In short, we haven't seen anything truly comparable to the events of today and trying to "brand" it, though the tendency is understandable, actually diminishes the O.G. fascism of Mussolini and Stalin. I prefer not to label, for lack of a proper term.)

With this small disclaimer, let's examine one of the tenets of every closed society: Invocation of an internal and external enemy.

This is to no small degree fanciful phrasing for "closed borders." Not only our borders with Mexico and Central America, but the borders within our society as well, for it's within these borders that people of Arabic and Latino descent have been targeted in the mad post 9/11 rush to Islamophobia. The subtext here isn't even subtle. Brown people are suspicious persons. Whether trying to get into this country or trying to exist in the nation they were born, we are all suspects now.

We are a nation obsessed with racial profiling. Don't believe me? Look at Postville. Look at the ICE raids in 2008 alone as detailed by our companeros at Citizen Orange. This is, among other things, unlawful racial profiling but as Manuel at Latino Politico describes a symptom of a much more systemic and pervasive malady.

After we were hit on September 11 2001, we were in a state of national shock. Less than six weeks later, on October 26 2001, the USA Patriot Act was passed by a Congress that had little chance to debate it; many said that they scarcely had time to read it. We were told we were now on a "war footing"; we were in a "global war" against a "global caliphate" intending to "wipe out civilisation".

There have been other times of crisis in which the US accepted limits on civil liberties, such as during the civil war, when Lincoln declared martial law, and the second world war, when thousands of Japanese-American citizens were interned.

But this situation, as Bruce Fein of the American Freedom Agenda has noted, is unprecedented: all our other wars had an endpoint, so the pendulum was able to swing back toward freedom; this war is defined as open-ended in time and without national boundaries in space - the globe itself is the battlefield. "This time," Fein says, "there will be no defined end."

Meanwhile, research from the Arab American Institute related to anti-Arabism in the United States is startling. According to an AAI 2001 poll of Arab-Americans: "32% of Arab Americans reported having been subjected to some form of ethnic-based discrimination during their lifetimes, 20% reported having experienced an instance of ethnic-based discrimination since September 11. Of special concern, for example, is the fact that 45% of students and 37% of Arab Americans of the Muslim faith report being targeted by discrimination since September 11."

In the last month, Haiti has been ravaged by not one, but four natural disasters. Hundreds have died and thousands have been left homeless. Many cities are still entirely isolated and only accessible by air, and the country's fledgling agriculture industry has been obliterated by floods and mudslides. Haiti is certainly no stranger to crisis and despair. But at the present time, many deported Haitians simply have no communities in which to return. In light of all this, it would be particularly cruel for the Administration to continue deporting Haitians.

"TPS [Temporary Protected Status] is the least expensive, most immediate form of humanitarian assistance we can provide Haiti," Hastings said during a congressional hearing in Washington, D.C.

The Bush administration has temporarily halted deportations to Haiti, after mounting pressure from community leaders and activists.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement ICE spokesman spokeswoman Barbara Gonzalez said the agency would continue to review the situation in Haiti to determine how long the hiatus in deportations should last. (Orlando Sun Sentinel)

And yet, the question must be asked. Has a single Haitian caught up in the ICE dragnet before the hurricane TPS been released?

No.

Creating a threat, a multi-headed hydra which can never really be defeated, but requires constant struggle to contain and subdue (with shackles and batons and deaths in detention centers) is an obvious political ploy.

You must have internal division, an Us and Them, to set citizens against one another and to subdue a nation into sacrificing freedoms and liberties "for safety."

When ordinary citizens understand that their government is wiretapping their communiques, what's the natural first reaction? Of course, you want to know why. And the pat answer is and has been "to keep you safe . . . . [from scary, non-American looking types.]" This enables rationalization. There's a reason for spying and if it prevents another attack . . . . " and so on and so forth until we realize, too late, we've been drinking the Kool-Ade for years and take a merciless inventory of what we've sacrificed, without much protest, for "liberty."

What do you think the racially profiled have sacrificed?

The door closes, just as it closed on Postville, and just as it closed on accountability and oversight. The doors are closing quickly now.

Full post as published by Never In Our Names on September 27, 2008 (boomark / email).