I like to take photographs of people with their dogs, and
when I meet an interesting dog, once I’ve asked if I can take the photo, I
always ask the dog’s name, but I never ask the person’s name. I meet these dogs
in all kinds of places, and sometimes I wonder whether anyone I know will
sometime recognise the person. Well, last week it happened. One of my friends
recognised a fellow tennis player! This placed the dog’s owner in a context: a
person with a name, a past (in his case playing tennis, rather well I gather)
and quite possibly a future.
From a
tennis-playing dog owner to a fleeing asylum seeker may seem a leap of the
imagination, but for me the common factor is the name. Linguistics is an
interesting science, and like many sciences it’s also an art form, which can be
practiced with subtlety by those who wish to conceal what they’re actually
doing. One of the problems with the treatment of refugees (those who are
fleeing) is the language used to describe them, in particular the official language.
Getting
onto a plane for international travel requires a passport, on which is written
your name (writing is most important) which links you to other persons and
places, probably to large swathes of your past, and very possibly to a future. Getting
onto a boat chartered by persons for carrying cargo may not be such a precise
venture. This lays refugees open to the possibility of becoming nameless.
Official
language tends to treat people in groups. Leila and her children, fleeing (by
the only means available) from the distinct likelihood of getting shot, have a
place, a past, a context, a family; often a religious affiliation; a
nationality, race, or ethnicity which may contribute to the likelihood of
getting shot: in short, they have individual human lives symbolised by their
names. They’re running from a present danger — run, Leila, run! — towards a
future where, like you and I, they hope to live in peace.
Why don’t
we say, “Leila got onto this boat because there was no other way out; Leila
came from this town, a long way, through much peril; Leila’s dream is to
educate her children, and she can’t do that if they’re shot dead.” Why do we
say instead: “Another boat full of asylum seekers (plural), economic refugees
(plural), victims of people smugglers (plural) is sinking and must not be
rescued; if anyone drowns they can’t be retrieved and honourably buried; if
anyone is brought out alive we have an arrangement with a foreign country to
stow the cargo there.” With or without a passport, official language promotes
namelessness.
I’ve just
read Chamberlain’s “The Philosophy Steamer,” the story of Lenin’s international
exile of Russian intellectuals (not only philosophers, but poets, agricultural
experts, economists, literary figures, religious thinkers, and other academics) in 1922, creating a
class of ‘boat people’ who were sent to Berlin by arrangement with the Weimar
government which desperately needed money. (Unlike Stalin, Lenin shot only a
proportion of those who disagreed with him; it was early days in the Russian Revolution).
When a government makes an
arrangement with a foreign country to house people who belong to us, we can
understand more clearly what’s actually going on by following the money.
Chamberlain notes that “Chancellor Wirth disdained the idea that Germany be seen the world over as a second Siberia. But, war-ravaged and diplomatically
cold-shouldered, his country was committed to helping Russia in exchange for
the gifts of Rapallo, which included Most Favoured Nation trading status and
extensive trade agreements, plus cancellation of war debts and pre-war claims. Germany
did not have much scope to say no.”
[i]
The
academics sent out of Russia
by the Russian government obviously belonged to Russia. But I’m saying that Leila
and her children, who appeal to us for our help, belong to us by the very
reason of that appeal. Leila is seeking refuge, a quintessentially religious
act.
The
Buddhist liturgy — if that’s the correct word — states: “I take refuge in the
Buddha, the Dharma (or, the teachings), and the Sangha (or, community).”
Christians take refuge in the Trinity: the Father, the Son (or, the Word), and
the Holy Spirit (which informs and interpenetrates the community known as the
church universal). According to Panikkar God, humanity, and the world cannot be
separated from one another. One always takes refuge, ultimately, in a
community. And this community is bounded by the whole world. Therefore, Leila is
entitled to our protection. She takes refuge in us, the community, and it would
honour us, as our privilege and responsibility, to provide that refuge.
[i]
Chamberlain, Lesley,
The Philosophy
Steamer: Lenin and the Exile of the Intelligentsia (London: Atlantic, 2006), p. 85.
