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I am reading a book by Brené Brown called "Braving the Wilderness: The Quest for True Belonging and the Courage to Stand Alone". She says some things about dehumanization in politics that really resonate with me. In so many political debates, I feel like people are actually saying very little about facts and policy, and saying a great deal about why we should hate and fear individuals or groups.

This reminds me of the Scriptural command to "speak the truth in love." We can't stop speaking the truth, but we must do that in love. In today's political climate, how should Christians respond when people talk of other people in ways that dehumanize them? What should we do to guard our own hearts, since we know we are surrounded by this every day and that we ourselves are not immune?

Here's an excerpt.

“Alien” is a legal term meaning someone who isn’t a citizen.

I detect a whiff of left wing bias here. Someone who breaks the law when they enter another country’s borders is an “illegal alien”, and that’s not a “dehumanising” term anymore than “convicted felon” or “suspect” are.

Josh wrote:“Alien” is a legal term meaning someone who isn’t a citizen.

I detect a whiff of left wing bias here. Someone who breaks the law when they enter another country’s borders is an “illegal alien”, and that’s not a “dehumanising” term anymore than “convicted felon” or “suspect” are.

I liked the approach Brown took to setting up symmetrical arguments. Should we stop listening if someone shows a whiff of left-wing or right-wing bias? Does that mean they have nothing useful to say if they are somehow tainted by "the other side"? I think that's the kind of dehumanization that Brown is talking about. And I do think she is careful to apply the same standards to both sides.

The hottest immigration debates right now involve (1) people who were given legal rights under DACA because their parents brought them here as minors and (2) refugees who want to come to the United States and traditionally would have been allowed in after sufficient screening. I don't think either of these groups should be treated as criminals. And sometimes using words like "children" or "refugees" changes the way we think about people. It's a little like using the word "baby" rather than "fetus" when talking about a baby that has not yet been born. Let's not imply that everybody who is not an American citizen is somehow a criminal.

But I'd like to avoid debating who is right about any hot-button issue in this thread, I think the real question is how we, as Christians, can be peacemakers in a world where dehumanization and partisan hostility is so much of the air we breathe in the world around us.

I think the real question is how we, as Christians, can be peacemakers in a world where dehumanization and partisan hostility is so much of the air we breathe in the world around us.

Well, it exists plenty within/ amongst the Church... so we should probably start there