A-Infos (en) Italy, FAI, Umanita Nova #22-25 - Racists Inside. Remigration, Repatriation, and Mass Deportation (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

In the chaos we are immersed in, made up of slogans shouted and 
obsessively repeated on the myriad of information channels that, 
willingly or not, reach us everywhere, another neologism has been 
appearing in public discourse for some time now: remigration. The term 
essentially refers to the concept of "reverse immigration," that is, the 
return of immigrants to their countries of origin. Put like that, if one 
were to limit its use in the sociological field, it would seem like a 
harmless word. In reality, it is a word in which the Austrian-German 
neo-Nazi right has been making a major political investment for years, 
which has garnered ever-growing support.

"Remigration" refers to a political action strategically aimed at 
expelling all foreigners from national borders. Mind you: this isn't the 
usual discourse targeting illegal immigrants or criminals. The 
unceremoniously stated goal is to expel all those considered foreigners, 
according to a profoundly racist logic. A racism that, apparently, 
doesn't rely on presumed biological differences or the alleged 
superiority of one "race" over others, but on an irremediable cultural 
incompatibility between human groups of different origins or 
provenances. For these new fascists, there are communities that simply 
aren't "assimilable."

It's not just a matter of documents or residence permits. According to 
proponents of remigration, even the children or grandchildren of 
immigrants, even if born and raised in a given country, can never be 
considered full citizens.

Of course, even the worst Nazis, when they have to run for office, need 
to sugarcoat things. Thus, in the speeches of Martin Sellner, the young 
leader of the Austrian group Identitäre Bewegung Österreichs (Austrian 
Identity Movement), who has long traveled across Europe giving lectures 
and presenting books to spread his unsound ideas, there is never any 
open mention of deportations or mass expulsions. What is proposed, even 
more subtly, if not chillingly, is the promulgation of increasingly 
restrictive laws against undesirables, even accompanied by financial 
incentives to "voluntarily" leave the country. In other words, we must 
make people's lives impossible (by denying them basic rights like work, 
healthcare, housing, etc.) in order to convince (and force) them to 
leave. If they don't want to, we resort to strong-arm tactics.

This approach is gaining increasing traction among the radical right, in 
Europe and beyond. In our country, it was the League, needless to say, 
that first embraced and relaunched the concept of "remigration." And, 
upon closer inspection, the entire operation of the repatriation centers 
established by the Italian government in Albania can rightfully be seen 
within an ideological framework in which deportation is no longer a 
shameful taboo. Capturing people, loading them onto a ship, and 
(de)porting them to a specially built prison outside national borders is 
a costly process, in many ways illegal (so much so that judges have 
repeatedly rejected these operations), but it has a strong symbolic and 
cultural impact.

Let's be clear: for thirty years in Italy and Europe, people have been 
systematically imprisoned or deported for not having the proper 
documents, but what we are witnessing today is a marked shift in the 
right-wing political and communication approach to managing the 
migration phenomenon worldwide. What is happening in the United States 
is plain for all to see, and while we must rightly never forget that the 
repression of migrants (in the US as in Europe) has always been carried 
out by governments of all stripes, it certainly cannot be denied that 
things are getting worse by the day.

The institutional racism we have always stigmatized and fought relied on 
a narrative that was undoubtedly hypocritical, yet formally anchored in 
the concept of respect for rules and legality. It goes something like 
this: those who toe the line are welcome (in reality, this has never 
been the case, but there's no need to return to the subject here).

Today, the deeply racist and exclusionary concept that entire categories 
of people are inevitably considered strangers, foreigners, and aliens 
has been definitively legitimized.

This is undoubtedly a qualitative leap that serves to reinforce mistrust 
and hatred toward immigrants within society. The goal is the same as 
always: to distract the exploited from identifying their true enemies 
and unleash the usual, well-rehearsed war between the poor.

The champions of remigration are getting a lot of votes, but countless 
people are taking to the streets to protest them and their aberrant 
ideas. It happened months ago in Germany with massive anti-fascist 
demonstrations, and it happened a few weeks ago in the United States 
with vibrant protests against roundups and deportations. From overseas, 
comforting news is coming about the ability of ordinary people to 
organize and resist the abuses of Trump's henchmen through the creation 
of self-defense networks and committees, demonstrating that, today as 
yesterday, the most powerful weapon against fascism is still solidarity.

Alberto La Via

https://umanitanova.org/razzisti-dentro-remigrazione-rimpatrio-e-deportazione-di-massa/
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