The Dehumanization of the Unvaccinated
I have recently seen a new radical attitude of hostility against Unvaccinated Americans. With President Biden setting the precedent. I was surprised by Joe Biden's latest speech where he tells unvaccinated Americans that his patience is waning thin. I have never heard a President address American people with such sustain.
In my career, my specialty is to study Behavior so I had to think of the deeper meaning behind this. I could be wrong but my conclusion is this is a start of a process to dehumanize unvaccinated Americans.
There was absolutely no compassion or positively motivated unvaxxed Americans to get vaccinated but it was filled with shaming and threats. I did some research on people dehumanize others and I found an uncanny resemblance of the 4 step plan and what is going on.
1. Prejudice The first step to dehumanize a social group is using Prejudice. One way to do this is to voice opinions that are hostile towards the out-group. That is exactly the feedback I got from Biden, which was of condescending anger.
2. Scapegoats Another way is to point fingers at the Out-group and making then the main reason why a problem is happening. Blaming them that they are the only reason why they are the main problem. As Biden proclaims, "This is a Pandemic of the Unvaccinated". Even though Vaccinated people still get Covid and can still pass it on they do not have to get weekly tests.
3. Discrimination Scapegoating leads to discrimination. Not allowing the Unvaccinated to have a job is unprecedented. This will create a new class system. One day in the future, Americans will be appalled at how they discriminated against people and the degree to which they did. What is next to put the Unvaxxed in camps? These are crimes of Humanity that people will be ashamed of in the future.
4. Persecution The last step is Persecution. Removing people from their homes, not allowing them to earn money. In order for the group that thinks they are superior to the out-group to carry out out full persecution, they need something to rationalize their bad behavior, They do this by dehumanizing people. If they dehumanize people they do not need empathy and it makes it much easier to feel better about hurting others. I did hear someone mention that a Tv host said they wondered if the unvaccinated were raised by wolves. This is the catalyst to dehumanization. It tricks their minds that this people group is not completely human. It gives them the pass to carry out any persecutions with absolutely no remorse.
History seems to repeat itself and this Process of dehumanizing people is unfortunately not new to the world. Yet I wanted to write this so that you can think about it as it happens instead of blindsiding the people as they have been in the past. Crimes of Humanity start and end with the dehumanization of a people group.
