Letter to the editor: Punitive approach to migrants will backfire later

Greeting our new Mainers with “welcome” signs at Fort Williams, rather than walls and cages, ensures a better outcome for all.

It’s ironic that our fear of terrorists crossing the U.S. border has led to treating asylum seekers like criminals. If incarceration changes their attitude toward the U.S. from hopefulness to anger, who is to blame? If you were locked in a crowded cage or forcibly separated from your children, would you feel warm and fuzzy toward your captors, or would those conditions breed resentment?

And won’t the after-effects of placing little ones in makeshift orphanages result in attachment disorder, a serious condition that may keep them from forming loving relationships in later life?

I fear we are creating the very environments that breed hatred in people – people who came here with the best of intentions. The sooner we eradicate these inhumane conditions, the more likely we’ll make friends instead of enemies.

Sally Connolly

Scarborough

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