Comparing people to animals seems to increasingly be a part of our political discourse. This type of insults are at their core, are a way to dehumanize others – a practice that can have pernicious effects. The dehumanizing messages can influence how we think about and treat people.
- People who associate black people with apes became more likely to tolerate aggressive, violent policing of black criminal suspects.
- People comparing women to animals showed a spike in hostile sexism.
- Dehumanization has an increased willingness to perpetrate violence.
- Men who showed stronger automatic associations between women and animals have a greater proclivity to sexually harass and assault women.
- Those who dehumanize Arab people are more supportive of violent counter terrorism tactics: torture, targeting civilians and even bombing entire countries.
At its most extreme, dehumanizing messages and propaganda can facilitate support for war and genocide. It’s been used to justify violence and destruction of minorities. We famously saw it in the Holocaust, when Nazi propaganda referred to Jewish people as vermin, and we saw it during the Rwandan genocide, when the Tutsi people were referred to as cockroaches. International NGO's consider dehumanizing speech as a one of the precursors to genocide.
As social creatures, we’re wired to empathize with our fellow human beings, and we get uncomfortable when we see someone suffering. Once someone is dehumanized, we usually deny them the consideration, compassion and empathy that we typically give other people. It can relax our instinctive aversion to aggression and violence. Once a person has dehumanized another person or group, they’re less likely to consider their thoughts and feelings.
Dehumanizing language deprives people of human qualities, attributes, individuality, personality, or spirit and is a threat to the fabric of our civic life. These patterns of thought influences our national ethos when they touch our religious practices and traditions. The tendency to dehumanize individuals, lumping them into groups, comparing them to diseases, infestations, animals, monsters or other malignant nonhuman threats, is not the exclusive practice of the political right or the political left. Jewish people living in disputed territories in Israel were once described as 'termites' and Islam as 'cancer' by some irrational people. It is easy to slip from disagreeing with a policy or a practice to demonizing a people. But this is a line we must recognize and resist crossing.
Ms. Asma Afsaruddin, professor of Islamic studies at Indiana University and chairwoman of the Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy warns, “The White House is a huge soapbox…The demonization of Muslims and Islam will become even more widespread.”
We know from studying history, politics, and religion that dehumanizing language can have dire consequences. Genocide is only possible when dehumanization happens on a massive scale, and the perfect tool for this job is propaganda. It is much easier to incite violence and mobilize crowds when your enemy is portrayed as an unfeeling monster or an immoral infestation. With emphasis on dismantling stereotypes, building authentic relationships, highlighting moments of inter-religious cooperation, and sharing stories that build an appreciative understanding of diverse traditions, we can contribute to cultivating a national ethos that rejects polarizing rhetoric. Educational models that emphasize the importance to know each other across lines of difference can counteract the the sin of dehumanization.
Some may have chuckled at New York magazine’s caricature of Trump. But the pervasive use of dehumanizing language is a slippery slope that can ultimately cause tremendous harm – and that’s no joke.
The foolish and wicked practice of profane cursing and swearing
is a vice so mean and low that every person of sense and character
detests and despises it ... George Washington
Politics has touched a new low, though the language used in political dialogue does not cause any distress to politicians. The new normal in politics does not entail a sense of morality, fairness and dignity towards political competitors, opponents and enemies. The language of power and wealth has on the one hand become legalistic and threatening and on the other, less humane and more animalistic. Rhetorical statements equating rivals and opponents with animals exposes an incapacity to manage one’s own affairs. Arvind Kejriwal describing Sheila Dikshit as "dalal", labeling Arun Jaitley as a “crook”, Narendra Modi describing Sonia Gandhi as a “Jersey cow” and Rahul Gandhi as her “hybrid bachhada (calf)” and Priyanka Gandhi exclaiming that BJP leaders were scampering like “panic-stricken rats”, Devendra Fadnavis comparing the opposition to “wolves” and so on falls into same category. While politicians stooping to lows is pardonable to some extent, Narendra Modi after ascending to the position of PM should have demonstrated that he is "leader of nation" by refraining from foul language and treating compatriots with respect but you can't expect such big things from small people.
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