Dignity taking

American Revolutionary War and Loyalists Legal historian Daniel Hulsebosch applied the dignity takings framework to the American Revolutionary War when the nascent governments subjected Loyalists to a civil death by expropriating their properties, revoking their professional licenses, annulling their civil and political rights, and detaining and banishing them. The American revolutionary government dehumanized Loyalists by taking their lives—the most severe form of dehumanization. Albert's research outlined the circumstances required for the denial of self-rule to be considered infantilization: the community must have a will to self-govern, the community must have the capacity to self-govern, and no greater conflict must result from granting sovereign rule. In his case study of the Iraqi Kurds, Albert concluded that all three factors were present, and that a dignity taking had occurred. == Criminal punishment ==

Lua Yuille describes gang injunctions as dignity takings. Gang injunctions prohibit suspected gang members from engaging in a wide range of activities that would otherwise be legal. These bans amount to the deprivation of identity property, which is property that implicates how people understand themselves. Additionally, Yuille found that the state treats young gang members like inhumane “super predators,” instead of as children and teenagers. The City of Monrovia subjected suspected gang members to a dignity taking because this dehumanizing treatment occurred with the deprivation of their identity property == Labor & Employment ==

Undocumented workers in Chicago Sociologist and legal scholar Cesar Rosado conducted ethnographic work in a Chicago worker center called Arise, which provides services to ensure that vulnerable and undocumented workers can exercise their labor rights. Rosado looked at whether two claims of unpaid wages fit within the framework of a dignity taking. Deemed unworthy of standard military training or uniforms, the battalions' soldiers were considered “class enemies,” e.g. landowners, economic elites, dissenters and their family members, and clerics. Although the battalions operated under the guise of military service, the soldiers were slaves subject to forced labor, treated like animals, and dehumanized. == Public policy ==

Nationalization of land, farms, and property in Communist Poland Legal scholars Kozerska and Stec also describe the nationalization of land, agricultural production, and other property in post war Communist Poland as a dignity taking. China has allowed private ownership of urban buildings since the reforms of the 1980s, but not ownership of the underlying land. the property confiscation had to occur “without paying just compensation or without a legitimate public purpose.” Historical documents also reveal that the infantilization of women was intended by legislators who codified coverture. But, for women who owned property, the act that precipitated the alleged dignity taking was marriage, which legal scholar Hendrik Hartog argues is more accurately understood as dignity bestowing rather than dignity denying. A bottom up empirical interrogation using original sources established that becoming a wife was a source of dignity for women and it was spinsterhood that was a source of shame. Marriage was a gateway to adulthood and did not trap women in a permanent form of childhood, as the definition of infantilization requires. As a result, Hartog argued that coverture did not constitute a dignity taking because it lacked the dehumanization or infantilization element. Hartog argues that most women chose to enter into relationships where they were subordinate to and dependent upon a man. == Community property ==

Chicago Public Schools Legal scholar Matthew Shaw studied the controversial 2013 closure of 49 public schools—which occurred primarily in Chicago's communities of color— and concluded it was a dignity taking. Neighborhood schools are formally state property, but informally they are community property shared by residents in its vicinity. Urban renewal was a public program created in the 1940s and 50s that used eminent domain to transfer ownership of homes and businesses in blighted areas to private developers for redevelopment. The avowed purpose of urban renewal was to eliminate urban decay. In practice, it eliminated long standing communities—mostly communities of color like Japantown—which belonged to the people who inhabited, ran businesses in, and frequented the area. Consequently, when authorities demolished Japantown, the larger community as well as individual homeowners and business proprietors suffered an involuntary property loss. Because King-Drew was the only hospital in the city of Compton and surrounding areas that treated everyone regardless of insurance coverage, it was the community property of those within the hospital's catchment area. Although the public discourse characterized gay bathhouses as threats to public health and closed them under this pretext, empirical evidence shows that bathhouses were community institutions that actually bolstered public health through education and awareness campaigns. Through closure, state authorities infantilized gay communities by stripping them of their autonomy By shutting down the gay bathhouses, state authorities “destroy[ed] community, depriv[ed] gay men of an important source of emotional sustenance and connection, and ignor[ed] the community-based work accomplished.” == See also ==