…via Children of Men and M.I.A

The last few months have been scary. The news has been a continuous, apocalyptic horror-show, full of bloodshed, chaos and carnage. Refugees from Syria have been fleeing one of the worst humanitarian crises since the Second World War, only to be greeted by the resurgence of fascism in many parts of Europe and a Republican presidential candidate – who seems more like a buffoonish cartoon villain than an actual politician – calling for a ban on all Muslim migration to the US.

Xenophobia is nothing new. The tabloid press often wields images of foreign troublemakers to pacify and terrify the population, many of whom are themselves struggling against the effects of austerity. But in recent months, The Migrant, that shadowy figure sneaking over fences and under trains at Calais, has become a new kind of Folk Devil: a furtive, dark-skinned menace seeking to…