Portraying human beings as animals – less than human – is not new.
It was a common way in past centuries for politicians and others to demean immigrant groups as each arrived, the Chinese, Irish, Italians, Slavs, Jews, Latinos and so on. Cartoons, “news” articles, even theatrical productions carried the message that these “others” were worthy of ridicule.
It made it easier to turn a blind eye to their privation, pay them pitiful wages and mock their “foreign” religion even as the country needed their labor. It immunized the national conscience when we turned away shiploads of refugees, lynched thousands and doomed generations to poverty.
We tell ourselves that those days belong in the past – that even sharing that history is harmful to the fantasy of equality we strive to create.
A few days ago, we saw that in the White House such blatant racism is not merely a practice of the past. If the President intentionally approved the message containing viciously racist images, he should admit it. If he did not know of it originally, he should explain why he let his staff describe the public outcry over their transmission as fake outrage.
Either way he should apologize. Our shock is real. So is our outrage. Nothing less than an unequivocal apology – to the nation and to the persons demeaned – is acceptable.
And it must come immediately.
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