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Dehumanizing the “Other”
How Israel deploys an age old tactic to justify genocide.
The greatest atrocities ever committed against humanity — from the subjugation of colonized peoples, to the mass enslavement of Africans, to the Holocaust, to the War on Terror — have all begun in much the same way, and that is invariably with the social diminishment of the targeted populace.
In order for a particular regime to enact wide-scale terror, there must first be widespread support and compliance from the domestic citizenry, which can usually be achieved vis-a-vis a process of otherization and the encouragement of an “us vs them” mentality.
Whether the aim is exploitation, resource extraction or land appropriation, portraying the victims of brutal socio-political policies as somehow morally deficient, intellectually backward, or even physically inferior proves effective in legitimizing the horrific crimes committed against them.
Accompanying this is also usually a condescending “It’s for their own good”, or “If we don’t do it to them, they’ll do it to us” mentality that serves to frighten the hesitant into feeling as though they have no choice but to attack, enslave…
