Here lie the unwanted of Calais – an indictment of us, not them | Jonathan Jones

This is an age of unparalleled harshness. While desperate people sleep amid piles of rubbish, we have lost sight of their humanity, and ours

These are people in Calais now. People who wanted to find new lives. Instead they lie like cocooned caterpillars, desperately hoping to wake up to a different world. Others sit on the rubbish-strewn pavement, hunched in blankets. They too are rubbish, or so it would seem, according to widespread attitudes that have in recent weeks seen calls for children to undergo dental inspections to determine their age. How old are the people huddled here in the heart’s cold dawn – children, adolescents or adults? Can we at least agree they are fellow human beings?

I would harrow you, I would harrow myself. Give me words to make this picture real. If we could feel the pain of others, we would be good people, you and I. But this is an age of unparalleled harshness. Pictures of suffering pass us by. We narrow our eyes and close our souls. What have we become?

If history has taught us one thing it is that fear of the other is always irrational

Related: Calais: refugee children 'sleeping rough' after camp demolition

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