Peter Singer demonizes refugees as “queue jumpers”

if Singer cared about demonization and guilt-through-association, he would hardly be Peter “newborns lack personhood” Singer, would he

anyway there’s a word for an extraterritorial jurisdiction in a poor country that is governed by a rich one for the benefit of the most favoured guests of the latter; it starts with ‘c’ and ends with ‘olony’. Which is really the crux of the issue. A country can enforce certain conditions on facilities in its physical territory because that’s where its power is. Otherwise, it must take what it can get. Australians can argue with other Australians about how many refugees to take in, but it can’t argue very well with Lebanon on the same terms. You can outvote the conservatives in your own country but not the conservatives in another country.

Sovereignty is incompatible with egalitarian individualist utilitarianism. But who thought it would be anyway? Why is it surprising that it is so?

Does Singer really “demonize” these refugees?

The reason people make those dangerous journeys is because the governments of wealthy countries, using mechanisms such as carrier sanctions and visa restrictions, have blocked safe and inexpensive routes of escape from dangerous places. They do this not in the service of a fair conception of the distribution of humanitarian burdens but because they don’t want to deal with the numbers and would prefer to maintain the existing unfair distribution…

I don’t buy this. The main reason for blocking easy access to ‘normal routes’ from certain places is because they are at war or in some other way likely to contain individuals that represent a real danger to the potential receiver countries. The first thought probably isn’t ‘we must contain refugee numbers’, it is ‘we have no idea who might get on those planes, but we have to assume it could include willing ready and able jihadis, given their declared aim to destroy us in our own countries’.

Secondly, a fair conception of dealing with dealing with victims of war can’t be primarily founded on a refugee / fair settlement concept – i.e. assuming that the original countries are permanently failed states. It has to be founded on the idea that those states have to be rebuilt and that interim measures to enable that are needed (e.g. including militarily protected safe zones in those countries, e.g. Libya to name one). Doing otherwise is to assume that the world will convert over time to a few ‘safe areas’ and outside, permanently lawless warzones.

“The first thought probably isn’t ‘we must contain refugee numbers’, it is ‘we have no idea who might get on those planes, but we have to assume it could include willing ready and able jihadis, given their declared aim to destroy us in our own countries’.”

Important historical question answered! Allied countries refuse to accept Jewish refugees from Germany because of fear of German jihadis hiding on ships among refugees! Allies cite German aim to destroy us in our own countries!

Pfui.

Thomas Beale,

“@ZM/4 – the real problem with the ‘queue jumping’ notion is that noone knows who exactly is in those boats. Some (maybe many) are true victims of war; others are opportunists; a small number are likely to be combatants.”

In Australia people who arrive on boats are detained for processing until their claims for asylum are proven. If they are not proven to be refugees they are indefinitely detained or returned home. This actually presents issues as genuine refugees can spend a long time in detention waiting for their claims to be processed, which can be bad for their mental health.

At the moment though there is off shore detention in Papua New Guinea and Nauru, which has a *lot* of problems. The PNG Supreme Court has just found this to be unconstitutional as well.

Bleary-eyed, I read ‘Pete Singer’ as ‘Pete Seeger’ and was having a hard time reconciling the positions stated with his songs and politics supporting the poor and downtrodden. That, and Pete Seeger is dead.

Anyway, back to discussing how the West can best absolve itself of responsibility to those fleeing horrendous conditions resulting almost entirely from Western policies.

[aeiou] What if the asylum-seekers have cuddly puppies? Are the puppies expelled too?

ZM did you see ‘The Miracle of Kobani’ on Four Corners tonight? I’m not sure if it would be available to people outside Australia as it seems to be an ABC (Australian Broadcasting Commission) program although made by an Israeli film maker. Anyway it was a devastating program, just brought tears to my eyes. They featured the father of Alan Kurdi, the little boy who was found washed up on the beach, and of course showed that heart-breaking photo again. The father, Abdullah, lost his whole family. He has gone back to Kobani now but his life is empty – the most meaning in his life is visiting the graves of his family.

People who stayed in Kobani fought off ISIS through guerilla warfare – and, it seems, with the help of air strikes – I won’t get into that debate, but I note that. Opinions there seem very divided about those who left, at least those who tried to get to Europe. Most refugees stayed in Turkey for the duration of fighting, but there seem to be some strong feelings against those who went to Europe. It’s complicated, but it brings home how irrelevant these ideas about ‘queue jumping’ or the rights and wrongs of flying vs boats are. The reason the Kurdi family tried to go to Europe was that they had been denied a visa to Canada, where Abdullah’s sister lives. They had all expected to go there, and when the visa was denied, wanting to help, she had given them some money for a boat passage to Europe.

Kobani had a population of about 50,000 and during the ISIS occupation apparently all but about 2000 left. The devastation to the town was horrific, though people are now rebuilding. Who’s to say what any of us would do in that situation? You’d hope to do the ‘right thing’ but who’s to say what that is? I’ve only once in my life had to flee from danger, in the Ash Wednesday bushfire, and my only thought really then was to get my children to safety, whatever I had to do, so I don’t judge people who are fleeing terror.

Ze K @ 16
People seeking asylum are not violating the law. Whether their claim for protection is valid is decided by the country where they seek protection. I am not aware that they are obliged to seek protection in the first country they arrive at, even if that first country is a signatory to the UN convention on refugees. Is there evidence for this statement?

Countries like Jordan, Lebanon, Iran, Syria, Pakistan have taken in millions of refugees over the last few decades, millions of refugees from Palestine, Afghanistan, Iraq … refugees created by the cynical geopolitics of the world’s big powers, starting and stoking conflicts, exporting arms and perpetuating structural injustice. It just goes to show the immense selfishness and narcissism of people in the Northern hemisphere that only now we are talking about a “refugee crisis” – tough luck, idiots, actions have consequences.

Dipper @21, can you spell out your first bullet further? I don’t find it nearly as likely as the second and third one. I can think of lots of analogous examples that make it patently horrific, but maybe you know something about the Eritrean case which would make it OK.

ZM @ 4 put her finger on it when she said you can’t talk about queue-jumping when

I haven’t read Singer’s piece yet but I wonder if he isn’t aiming to shock when the pearl of truth is, as Chris says in the OP, the unshocking fact that “those in refugee camps in poor countries are just was worthy of help as those who arrive in rich ones”.

There are vanishingly few, if any, cases in immigration (and refugee) law and policy where “queue jumping” is a reasonable charge or worry. In the vast majority of cases when someone raises it, it shows that he or she either doesn’t know what they are talking about, or are being dishonest. In this case, I assume it’s the former, but still, Singer should do better here.

Imagine that many safe, non-poor countries were moving aggressively to re-settle and protect people from unsafe and unsatisfactory camps – places of first refuge – in Jordon, Libya, Turkey, Lebanon, etc., and that this movement was strong enough to give good reason to think that those who entered a camp would have access to safety and security within a reasonable amount of time. Maybe in such a counterfactual situation we might call people who entered countries directly through unauthorized means “queue jumpers”, but of course we have nothing like this situation, and even there, it wouldn’t be completely obviously clear. In most, in fact nearly every, case where “queue jumping” is raised, there is no queue, and the reasons why we typically find queue jumping problematic in normal life do not apply. Minimal effort on Singer’s part would allow him to know this. It’s too bad he’s not worried enough to find out.

As for transit through one country on the way to another, there is no definitive international rule on this. The most common position is that if a refugee has been granted effective protection in one state – typically by being formally recognized as a refugee – then he or she must use normal immigration procedures to move to another state, if the 3rd state does not grant admission. However, it’s important to see that the “effective protection” here is usually though to entail a right of residency and re-entry, a right to work, guarantee of personal security, and some guarantee against return to a country of persecution. Most states don’t find mere transit through another state to be sufficient to establish that protection is available, though, as Chris notes, there are regional agreements (in the EU, and between the US and Canada, for example) that place some obligations on receiving states. For discussion of this issue, it’s good to look at Guy Goodwin-Gill and Jane McAdam, _The Refugee in International Law_, 3rd ed., pp. 149-51, among other places.

@Ze K, from the article Chris linked to.
‘There is no obligation under the refugee convention or any other instrument of international law that requires refugees to seek asylum in any particular country.’

and

‘The short answer is that anyone is allowed to claim asylum anywhere, but states may lawfully remove asylum seekers to safe third countries on the grounds that they could have claimed asylum there. ‘

This means that a refugee can legally claim asylum in any country but the state may sometimes be able to legally deport them to a third country for their claim to be processed.

See also article 31 of the UNHCR, which basically states that if someone enters a country in a manner which breaks that country’s immigration laws and claim asylum they should not be treated or penalised as an illegal immigrant.

ARTICLE 31. REFUGEES UNLAWFULLY IN THE COUNTRY OF REFUGE
1. The Contracting States shall not impose penalties, on account of their illegal entry or presence, on refugees who, coming directly from a territory where their life or freedom was threatened in the sense of Article 1, enter or are present in their territory without authorization, provided they present themselves without delay to the authorities and show good cause for their illegal entry or presence.
2. The Contracting States shall not apply to the movements of such refugees restrictions other than those which are necessary and such restrictions shall only be applied until their status in the country is regularized or they obtain admission into another country. The Contracting States shall allow such refugees a reasonable period and all the necessary facilities to obtain admission into another country.

This has been a source of controversy in the UK where refugees have been prosecuted for use of false documents.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/aug/24/syrian-refugee-jailed-uk

In short there is no obligation on a refugee to claim asylum in the first safe country they travel to, they have the right to claim asylum in any country, and if they enter a country clandestinely or using false documents they should not be treated as criminals.

@29

Article 31 seems to be more limited than you make it out to be.

“The Contracting States shall not impose penalties, on account of their illegal entry or presence, on refugees who, coming directly from a territory where their life or freedom was threatened in the sense of Article 1…”

So once the migrating person is no longer coming directly from a territory where their life of freedom was threatened it appears as if a Contracting State may impose penalties for illegal entry.

I have to say that although Singer’s use of the term ‘queue-jumping’ may be imprecise, he’s clearly referring to a virtual or putative ‘queue’ i.e. assumed order of processing of those claiming asylum by whatever means (going to camps, going to a safe country directly, applying from within home country…). This was always understood to be the ‘system’ in Australia historically and as far as I have ever understood it, it’s a reasonable way to talk about the Australian processing approach (whatever its moral characteristics may be). I suspect Singer is using the term carelessly, perhaps thinking that the ‘queue’ exists for the current UK / EU / ME refugee situation, when it probably doesn’t.

Accusing him of ‘harmful’ and ‘dog-whistle’ tactics is looking for a fight where there is none. At the most, it’s a sloppy attempt to conceptualise the current system (aka shambles) for processing refugees in the UK.

If you accept that there should possibly be some order of priority of processing refugee applications, then his point is in fact correct – the persons who manage to physically get to target country X have no innate right to be treated as the first in a putative queue of applications; others fleeing the same horrors may simply be incapable of doing the same, and get stuck in some intermediate location.

>those who arrive in boats as “queue jumpers”

There’s a queue, they’re jumping it, or trying to, by ignoring the law and physically coming to the countries in question. how are they not queue jumpers?

>and the endorsement of the ridiculous argument of right-wing politicians about “incentives” to make dangerous journeys.

How does giving privileged status to those who make the journey not incentivise that journey?

>The reason people make those dangerous journeys is because the governments of wealthy countries, using mechanisms such as carrier sanctions and visa restrictions, have blocked safe and inexpensive routes of escape from dangerous places.

All wealthy countries limit immigration, that’s why there’s a queue in the first place. Unless you take the argument that it is immoral to limit immigration at all, you can’t say it’s immoral to reject large numbers of refugees.

>would prefer to maintain the existing unfair distribution where most refugees are in poor countries.

You mean, they’re in their own countries? Again, this is not supportable unless you morality the logic of any immigration restrictions whatsoever.

>Singer is correct that we can distinguish between the right to asylum and the right to settle in a particular place.

theoretically yes, but given the uproar around suggestions of deporting asylum seekers and illegal immigrants, not in practice, it seems.

>Pending that commitment to justice on the part of the wealthy, stigmatizing those who make it across from Libya, Turkey or Haiti as “queue jumpers” is the mark of someone who has lost his moral compass.

No, it’s simply an accurate description that you’re trying to moralize in service of propagandist ends, much like the campaign against the phrase illegal immigrants.

Philip, you get law right, there is no obligation, of course, for a refugee to apply for asylum in the first safe country she lands, but under article 31(1) she has to show that it comes ‘directly’ from a territory where her life or freedom was threatened. In the practice of the immigration authorities I am aware of, the ‘onus probandi’ is on the person claiming asylum (and by no means is taken lightly). Because ‘western states’ do not have many borders with territories where life of persons is threatened, it is not easy to show that as an asylum seeker, you came ‘directly’, especially when you do not use a boat or a plane to come (when you come by boat, you can establish this nexus somehow easier, if you live in a coastal territory where there is such a treat, so ironically, the ‘boat people’ coming in Australia would have a stronger claim than-saying people coming by land in Bulgaria, from Eritreea). What happens if the seeker could not satisfy the immigration authorities that she came ‘directly.’ First thing she will get deported, with the observation of the principle mentioned by Ze K. She may also be prosecuted, usually at the discretion of local law enforcement officers (many states make a criminal offence the illegal crossing of border, so in principle you can be prosecuted for such a crossing, if you cannot show a text that exclude the application of the criminal law’s provisions- -Art 31(1) is such an exception). Some do prosecute, some do not (personally I do not see any point in prosecution, but for prosecutors, files where they can get a conviction, add to their professional dossier), but even in case one is prosecuted, the execution of any punishment is quite impracticable, so the person is just deported and banned to entry for a number of years.

The issue seems clear-cut, and it also appears, from the comments, that there is not the slightest possibility of having a debate about this.

From one side, “What a wonderful professor, who wants to barricade us against the terrorists with spicy food who steal our jobs !”

From the other side, “What a dreadful professor, who wants to barricade us against the people who cook us spicy food more cheaply than the dreadful locals do!”

Both sides, naturally, claim to have justice and morality on their side. It would seem that the former argument is obviously odious. The latter argument seems less odious (but is still opportunistic and connected to an international system which is intrinsically odious). But there seems to be no debate about the issues.

Val,

No, I didn’t see the ‘The Miracle of Kobani’ documentary on 4 Corners, it sounds interesting though. I might try looking if ABC iView has it to watch. It is terrible to think a small city of 50,000 people was reduced to 2,000 people so quickly.

I was with a friend at a talk on refugees a few weeks ago, and we were briefly speaking to one of the speakers, Petro Georgiou, afterwards, and he did say he thought Syrian refugees were a special sort of case, because many of them are well educated and could easily be migrants through Australia’s normal migration program. I wonder if this has also facilitated Europe being comfortable in accepting refugees from Syria compared to other Middle Eastern countries.

The Peter Singer article doesn’t really go into detail on what he thinks should be a global policy response on refugees. It would be interesting to see what an “effective altruism” approach to the problem would be, I get emails from Peter Singer’s The Life You Can Save (even though I actually support other charities, so its not very consistent of me) and they are very good with numbers. The article says he gives 40% of his income to fight global poverty annually, so he is very active.

It would be good if there was global response to settle the high numbers of refugees within a reasonable time frame. Especially when climate change is estimated to cause so many more refugees and displaced persons in the next 35 years, from over 50 million now, to around 250 million by 2050. Resettlement of refugees and displaced persons will be an issue that the global community is going to be faced with for decades. Hilary Clinton has spoken about this, on the other thread someone was saying she has pledged to take more refugees if she is elected President, and Trump has already came out against that.

@44 sorry to be picky, but I understood the ‘queue’ concept to apply to the receiver countries (Australia; UK in this current discussion), not the UNHCR register. If a receiver country has any kind of operational policy for selecting refugees from the various categories and sources (UNHCR-registered camps, boats, directly from warzones, 3rd countries etc), then by definition there is a notion of ordering. If the policy says (just for argument’s sake) ‘immediately process and grant or refuse a visa to anyone arriving directly on our shores’ that must imply that people coming in boats are jumping ahead in the order of processing compared to if they stayed in a camp in a 3rd country. As far as I know this isn’t the policy anywhere, but conceptually, the notion of ‘jumping the queue’, however distasteful it may seem, is a logical outcome of certain policy approaches. Australian politicians have talked for years about how boat people won’t ‘jump the queue’.

Happy to be corrected, but I don’t think the above reference does so.

@JQ

>As is made clear here, there is no “queue”, at least as regards refugee admission to Australia

That’s precisely the point. There is a queue for normal immigrants, or at least a waiting list. There isn’t one for asylum seekers. Refugees, legitimate or not, are jumping it by applying for asylum rather than going through the normal process.

The “queue jumpers” rhetoric is bad and wrong. It fuels xenophobic fantasies that refugees are dishonest, immoral etc. Singer also entangles himself in non-utilitarian (because arbitrarily bracketed and implicitly nationalistically weighted) resource allocation talk. Utilitarianism is a global moral theory. The possible difference in utility from sheltering refugee 1 (who got here) instead of sheltering somewhat more needy refugee 2 (still in a massive refugee camp in a country near Syria) is very small compared to a very, very long list of non-optimal resources uses in the UK and other countries.

@tony lynch

Utilitarianism’s moral compass is invariably filled by prejudice, as it has to be.

This comment genuinely confused me-why are utilitarian views “invariably” filled by prejudice? Maybe we have very different understandings of utilitarianism, but from my knowledge of Singer’s version of preference utilitarianism, the rightness or wrongness of a moral action is determined by the preferences which it satisfies or frustrates, irrespective of whose preferences these may be. I’m not sure where the prejudice is coming in here, as Singer quite clearly says that it does not matter whose preference it is.

It would be great comedy if it were not so tragic how right wingers complaining about refugees routinely claim contrary to facts one could just go to the next embassy and get into some asylum waiting list.

@Matt/46 I didn’t claim or imply having any legal expertise on refugee law. What I know about refugees is anecdotal, having met and worked with many, and being a legal immigrant myself. My point was about the ongoing confusion about the use of language such as ‘queue jumping’. As an original resident of Australia and a current one in the UK I do know about the use of terms like ‘queue jumper’ in politics and the press.

There are two mutually incompatible ways of using this language. An objective use of it is a conclusion to premises consisting of statements about real world facts, more or less as @cassander/47 stated, to put it in the shortest possible form. A subjective use of / reaction to the term is exemplified in @ccc/48.

Meaningful debate about the validity of discourse using such terms, and any moral judgments that may follow can’t even start unless everyone is on the same page, or at least agrees to distinguish the two uses of this and other problematic terms.

@42. “the test required by the law”

Whose law? Presumably international law? So presumably a treaty?

Sorry, but I go bonkers at talk of “the law”. It’s always somebody’s law.

…and if you really have to think about queues, don’t think about queues at the supermarket, think about queues for medical treatment. There are separate queues for patients with broken legs, patients who have just had a heart attack, and patients who want liposuction. Someone on the waiting list for liposuction doesn’t get to complain about a heart attack patient “jumping the queue.”