Friday, May 14, 2004
Dealing with illegal migrants the Belgian way
I'm in two minds on this one:
The problem is not the method but the end. For most on the left, illegal migrants are a new persecuted and marginalised minority victim group that has to be protected; for most on the right (and judging by the polling, majority of the population), illegal migrants are a law enforcement issue - after all, they're not called illegal for nothing. If you in the latter group, reporting criminal activity is hardly a Nazi-like behaviour.
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"Belgium's far-right Flemish party, the Vlaams Blok, has launched a new telephone service that allows people to denounce anonymously suspected illegal immigrants living in Belgium...The problem is that a lot of successful law-enforcement does depend on denunciation, very often anonymous (take two Australian examples: the Crime Stoppers hotline and the annual Operation Noah during which the police gets anonymous tips about drug offences).
" 'The Blok has shown its real face: they are Nazis,' said Belgian senator Isabelle Durant, a member of the pro-environment Ecolo part when she heard about the Vlaams Blok's latest initiative. 'It's almost like Flanders in 1933, when informers denounced people'."
The problem is not the method but the end. For most on the left, illegal migrants are a new persecuted and marginalised minority victim group that has to be protected; for most on the right (and judging by the polling, majority of the population), illegal migrants are a law enforcement issue - after all, they're not called illegal for nothing. If you in the latter group, reporting criminal activity is hardly a Nazi-like behaviour.
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