A truth – over 50% of all refugees are children
For every man we are shown
fleeing police in France and for every vagrant we see climbing aboard a truck
in Calais on the news seemingly every day, there is a child who needs food and
shelter. We have this image of men, willingly breaking international law and
hoping across borders to, at least in our minds, sponge off a system designed
for us!
The truth is that these people
are escaping war, famine and terrible situations and traditions such as female
circumcision – a brutal and all too popular practice in the third world – for their
children’s futures. Who are we to deny them the opportunity to give those
people, those fellow humans, the chance to make things a bit better for their
next generation?
In 2014, 34,300 asylum claims
were made by unaccompanied children: the highest number since records began. These are children of all ages, running away from their homes fearing for their
lives.
A truth – we can afford to help
We complain that they are coming
here to sign on or to take ‘our’ jobs. The fact that there is a culture of
social welfare scamming by Irish ‘natives’ is lost on these complainants, as is
the fact that those jobs are, in many cases, done for employers who pay little,
if any, tax. Yet the Irish media doesn’t report on these facts. The vast
majority of Irish people still accept the narrative that the national
broadcaster spews in their direction and use little agency to filter through
the agenda.
The fact is that only 14% of all
refugees make it to the developed world and make a minuscule dent in our
economies, especially here in Ireland, than compared to the tax dodging exercises
of certain musicians with offshore bank accounts and the aforementioned
conglomerates who abuse our corporation tax system.
Google paid 0.14% tax between
2005 and 2011. That works out at €10m per year. Had the company paid the usual
income tax rate of either 12.5% or 25% (depending on circumstances), Google
would have paid €537m or €1.1bn per year. The asylum system costs €150m per
year. Surely this discrepancy cannot be ignored by even the least empathetic
mind.
Even taking a moment to assess
and compare the needs of the parties should draw empathy from even the most barbaric
of humans. Tax dodgers or human beings in need of food and shelter. Those are
the choices we are presented with and by repeating the narrative of the media
we are standing by and are as responsible for their troubles as the wars that
displace them.
If we can send aid to Israel, one of the world's wealthiest countries, we can do more to help those who actually need it.
A truth – we are responsible
The fact is that many of these
refugees come from countries which are worn-torn because of our actions. More
than half of the world’s refugees come from just three countries; Afghanistan,
Syria and Somalia. I don’t think a history lesson is required to prove our part
in those conflicts.
We cannot continue supporting
invasions and war in these countries expecting there to be no consequences. The
displacement of millions upon millions of people is a direct result of our
international policies.
We are reaping what we have sewn.
Cause and effect.
A truth – they have to go
somewhere
These displaced people, in the
majority of circumstances, do not face the option of ever returning home.
Indeed, in most cases, there is no home to go to. So what do they do? What have
we Irish done for hundreds of years? Indeed, what have we humans done for as
long as we have existed? We migrate. We move. We go to a place where we can
prosper and thrive, not merely survive.
Lumping millions of displaced
people in one place is not an option either. Our ‘great minds’ got together
after the Second World War and decided to lump all the Jews in Palestine. Look
at how that country is now; a war that never looks like ending and countless
deaths and suffering.
The most pertinent truth – we are
all the same
When I say we are all the same, I
don’t mean it in a malnourished, whinging, head in the clouds, lefty,
socialist, Marxist, tree-hugging kind of way. I mean that we do it too. Every
person we know that has traveled to Australia, Canada or the USA. The
generations of us that have left our circumstances in the Emerald Isle and
sought fortunes overseas. The thousands of us, myself included, that have
wanted to better themselves. We are all the same.
The difference? Some collection
of suited bureaucrats sat at an international meeting and decided which nations’
people should be allowed cross their borders. The difference between an
immigrant, a refugee and tourist on a working holiday visa is mere politics.
When we endured famine in
Ireland, did we sit around and suffer, waiting for things to get better? Some
of us did and those were the ones who perished. The survivors, the ones who
refused to give in fled Ireland and headed off around the world. This emigration and
illegal crossing of international borders are the reason so many Irish people
are alive today. Without this flagrant breaking of the law we are so quick to
chastise, many of us would not be here today.
For any Irish person to criticise
those risking their lives to save them is among the biggest hypocrisies I can
imagine, we have literally been doing it by the boatload for thousands of
years, we still do it and will continue to do so.
Sovereignty is a myth and is
nothing more than a symptom of bureaucracy. These international borders we seek
to protect all of a sudden are nothing more than a stick with which to beat the
victims of our xenophobia.
Never before have the signs of
NIMBYism been stronger and more damaging.
Never accept the world with which you are presented.
