Quote:
Originally Posted by Maggy J
So what is your definition of a refugee? Or are you thinking of migrants?Even the BBC seems to be referring to refugees as migrants..
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Migrants is a general term. I separate the
economic migrants from those genuinely fleeing conflict whom I would refer to as
refugees. In practice that isn't easy however because anyone can claim to be fleeing conflict, persecution etc. and plenty of economic migrants do exactly that. Some of them are refused asylum if/when they get around to claiming it, others successfully obtain asylum under false pretences. We have no idea exactly how many.
I also realise that the really vulnerable (i.e. those with little or no money) are the least able to get to places like Greece, Italy, Turkey and Hungary. Nobody seems to be worrying too much about their plight right now, how many little boys and girls are dying and not featured in the media? Therein lies the problem the EU faces and has ducked for quite some years now, despite the evidence before their eyes that things were steadily getting worse.
At some point we're going to have to come up with the means and the political will to separate genuine refugees from economic migrants. Furthermore we're going to need to accept that we can't take in everyone deserving of our help. That's not a nice thought but it's reality I'm afraid.
---------- Post added at 13:36 ---------- Previous post was at 13:02 ----------
Quote:
Originally Posted by Chris
No - it takes a picture of a dead child to shame the public into demanding action.
We live in an age of triangulation. Our senior politicians follow public opinion. They rarely attempt to lead it. Here in Scotland, Sturgeon has shown herself the worst of the lot, jumping, moist-eyed, right on the bandwagon of that public opinion and using it as yet another opportunity for her favourite pastime (it's called "bash the evil Toe-reyyys and hope nobody notices what a mess we're making")
We need to take a long, hard, collective look in the mirror, and stop pointing the finger. This has been going on for many months. It has led the news, on and off, for many months. We *all* knew what was happening. Yet only this week is my Facebook feed overloaded with hand-wringing petitions on Change.org.
We get the government we deserve.
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It's called jumping on the bandwagon. Not that long ago it was ISIS murders which were the media was fixated upon, now it's migrants. People are still being burned, shot, buried alive, drowned, thrown off buildings, hanged, beheaded etc. but they're no longer newsworthy and nobody's raising petitions about their plight. Who raised a petition about the girl (and all those like her) who was murdered on camera and the subject of a recent thread here? Where were the politicians condemning that? Where was the national 'sympathy' we're currently seeing?
I reckon in the not too distant future most of those who've signed petitions and said how awful it all is will be more concerned about preparing for Christmas than the plight of migrants. Years ago it happened with the Biafran famine and it's been going on ever since. Outpourings such as this make people feel less guilty and it gives opportunistic politicians a stick to beat their opponents with until the next one comes along. Very few people will actually do something about the problem despite the fact that they could afford to give donations direct to those organisations currently dealing with this mess on the ground. Signing a petition's so much easier than signing a cheque...