Distance

The issues of (meaning about and related to) immigration and refugees continues, obviously, to bedevil the EU and USA, and Australia, and so on.  For many, the presence of immigrants and refugees calls for theories of moralitry and politics that extends protection to these groups.  Countries are not the sort of thing which can justifiably exclude newcomers as it chooses, but must find ways to accommodate and protect refugees.  The problems are pressing because the numbers are large.  An common idea is that the only status that really matters is that of being human beings.  It is not only cold or heartless, but immoral or evil not accommodate refugees in whatever numbers, to integrate into society.  Crooked Timber, for example, has posts along these lines with some regularity. It does not really matter where one is from, where born, etc., one's claims on a society, once one is present or sufficiently near, are the same for all within the circle, the physical circle. It is an arena in which the notions of right are to be grounded in being human.  The others, they do not matter as much or not much at all.

Distance is in a curious role in these lines of thought.  One the one hand, place is not important.  That this one has been in a place always gives no moral advantage over that one who has only just come seeking entry.  It is curious that the physical distance of various people governs the moral and political relations. Those near at hand, refugees, have greater call on concern and resources than those far away, those still in the place the others fled.  No claim that latter are better off than the former, or that the former are more virtuous than the latter.  Maybe more deserving, but it seems odd that desert would tie top the distance traveled.  Distance traveled hardly seems a morally compelling category.  But how else to distinguish the former from the latter?  On the other hand, social distance is to be ignored.  That those at hand, have limited social connection to those already present is wholly discounted.

Perhaps there is something to Hume's account.