The Undesirables: The Roma and Conscience

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore,
Send these to me
--Emma Lazarus
poem at the base of the Statue of Liberty

Our role is not to welcome the world's misery.
--Manuel Valls, Interior Minister, France

The Phantom is not an accidental tourist. He is a reluctant tourist. He is happy with the home upon which he has lavished his attention and love and not eager to leave it, except when he has to, and that unfortunate circumstance is periodically forced upon him by his wife, for whom travel is life, adventure and renewal. She was an Army brat, moved every 3 years through her childhood,  born in Heidelberg, raised on Army forts from Kentucky, Florida, to the Presidio in San Francisco to Tripler in Hawaii, to Weisbahden and VonKruetsnacht in Germany. She speaks German and English which does not help her in most of the world  but she is undaunted by foreign tongues:  when speaking with French speaking people she simply speaks English with a French accent and expects them to understand her.

The Phantom has been dragged, kicking and screaming, to various parts of the world where English is not much spoken, and where people keep demanding and occasionally confiscating his passport.
Strangely, he has often, in retrospect at least, found the experience edifying, broadening even. He has been able to look at his own American assumptions with fresh eyes.

In Florence, some years ago, the Phantom found his way blocked by a shocking looking woman, a hunchback in a black head scarf, long black dress. She did not look at the Phantom, but stood in his way, a foot from him and held up her hand. Her face was sallow, gaunt and  she may have been blind, maybe not. The Phantom's rule when accosted by pan handlers on the street is to give them something--it saves a lot of agonizing. Just give them something and move on. But this woman was, for some reason, disturbing, and something about her made the Phantom hesitate about reaching into his pocket.  There was something insistent about her outstretched hand; this was not supplication but demand. The Phantom's American back got up: Millions for defense--not one cent for tribute! She was clearly a Roma. The locals  seemed to be watching the Phantom to see what he would do.How would this American tourist deal with this Roma?

So, the Phantom understands, on a gut level, why the French and other European citizens find the Roma, or Gypsies as they are called in the States, such a vexing problem. It's not so much the Roma as our own response to them. It has something to do with their appearance, most importantly, although their behavior is not irrelevant.

Of course, that can be a swift slide to Hell--the emotional response to appearances. The Nazis pointed to the dark people, Gypsies and Jews and used that appearance to justify murder.

Look at how vermin like these people are, Goebbels said. They are outside, trying to get inside. 

They are the others.

Not like us.

And where does that get you?
There is a wonderful scene in Band of Brothers where Liebgott, a Jewish soldier in E company, is asked to translate for Richard Winters, the commanding officer, when the Americans stumble on a small concentration camp.  Winters asks a prisoner why the prisoners had been incarcerated. Are they criminals? The prisoner looks offended and surprised. but then he tries to explain. He uses a German word Liebgott cannot translate. "I don't know the word," Liebgott says. "No, not criminals. More like 'unwanted.' They are 'undesirables,'" Liebgott says. And then the prisoner adds,  "Jews, Gypsies." Liebgott, of course, is Jewish, but nothing is said about this. The viewer knows what he is thinking. 

On the other hand, the Phantom remembers when Gypsy patients were admitted the New York Hospital in Manhattan and the whole family moved in, occupied the solarium at the end of the hall, cooked meals there. The nurses ran around locking everything up and the Phantom thought them not much removed from racists. But, the fact was, things did just disappear: scissors, dressings, blood pressure cuffs, anything which was not tied down or locked up. And when the Gypsies left, the thefts stopped and things returned to normal.

A French official described the problem he faced when the law required him to find a place for the Gypsies in his town to live and he arranged for a hotel.  Later, he heard from the hotel owners: "They had stripped the rooms of all the furniture and the hinges and knobs and fled."

This behavior is said to be understandable: Because the Gypsies have nothing, they must steal.
What do we do with a group which appears, at least from casual observation or by rumor, to be uninterested in assimilating our values. What to do with a culture which values survival by breaking the rules?

And what do we do with people we find repugnant?  We know we should be more charitable, but we find it difficult to work for and with people who seem intent on remaining repellent? 
And when we are charitable and they bite us, how should we respond?