Gregory Lightyear (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} lightyear) wrote,@ 2003-07-23 23:12:00 |
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The Nature Of Shame
Today, the BBC is airing a set of episodes on that ever-popular issue, Asylum. This issue has, over the last few years, ripped across the EU; it was the single most important political issue during the set of elections in Austria, leading to the election of the far-right Freedom Party, at least partially in response to the Serbo-Croatian conflict's influx of new refugees of all of the races, including Albanians, into their territory.
Germany, another 'sufferer' has had public cries of dissent over the influx of Turkish, Albanian, and other major nationalities seeking asylum; East Germany still echoes with right-wing comments on this influx. France saw the rise of Le Pen, again in the rural areas, as does the UK and the growing popularity of the British National Party.
We are standing at the edge of a great sea of darkness; throughout Europe, rural individuals are quickly becoming hardline in their support for anti-immigration and anti-asylum policies.
Tonight, this program saw 25,000 viewers call in to overwhelmingly 'vote' to refuse asylum to four individuals of varying claim. In each, one group of people asked their opinion sought to use the rules of asylum to find a way to say no to an individual; another group sought to use those rules to find a way to grant asylum to the individual.
Two entirely different approaches; two entirely different sets of reasoning. Two entirely different outcomes.
On the whole, the responders were wholly against giving asylum to the individuals; whether it be an intermarriage with a Rom resulting in public attacks and medical miscarriages of racism, or a woman who gets into a transport container with her eight family members and arrives as the only survivor, unconscious, her whole family dead from lack of oxygen, the people of Great Britain have spoken, and the words they spoke were unconscionably inhumane.
Utterly horrific. And as such, for one of the first times I can remember, I find myself utterly ashamed to be here. To be sure, things are not much better in America; I have little doubt that people fall through the system there - not the least of which for the reason that Milwaukee was literally full of illegal immigrants; which one might argue is actually a far greater problem than asylum seekers in that country, but who knows. What I can say about my feelings is that I no longer consider myself an American, though I may not be a proper subject of the Queen either...
Utter shame that people are trying to find ways to disqualify people, regardless of their horrors or their stories, regardless of the validity of their request, in the hopes of using rules to deny people asylum and return their to the terrible life that has brought many of them here.
This is the road to fascism; this road, the road these people are choosing, is the same road they damned Austria for being on, the same road that so many poorly educated and desperate East Germans looking for work find themselves on, the same road that led to Le Pen's rise in France, and the same one behind the BNP in the UK. This extremism is based on a lack of education, a populist smearing through media and social fallacy, and gut reactions to inflated propaganda.
Oh, to be sure, there are problems with the system - but so long as people approach the problem of the rules of asylum as a mechanism to disqualify instead of a mechanism to assist people in need, the rules will never be good enough for individuals to feel good about what takes place.
Today I can lower my head; because while I can see that the BBC is trying to do something pure and honest in trying to inform people on the facts of the problem and show people their own harsh interpretation of the issue, I can't help but believe that the road to honest treatment of asylum seekers in this country is a long, long, long way off.
Today, the BBC is airing a set of episodes on that ever-popular issue, Asylum. This issue has, over the last few years, ripped across the EU; it was the single most important political issue during the set of elections in Austria, leading to the election of the far-right Freedom Party, at least partially in response to the Serbo-Croatian conflict's influx of new refugees of all of the races, including Albanians, into their territory.
Germany, another 'sufferer' has had public cries of dissent over the influx of Turkish, Albanian, and other major nationalities seeking asylum; East Germany still echoes with right-wing comments on this influx. France saw the rise of Le Pen, again in the rural areas, as does the UK and the growing popularity of the British National Party.
We are standing at the edge of a great sea of darkness; throughout Europe, rural individuals are quickly becoming hardline in their support for anti-immigration and anti-asylum policies.
Tonight, this program saw 25,000 viewers call in to overwhelmingly 'vote' to refuse asylum to four individuals of varying claim. In each, one group of people asked their opinion sought to use the rules of asylum to find a way to say no to an individual; another group sought to use those rules to find a way to grant asylum to the individual.
Two entirely different approaches; two entirely different sets of reasoning. Two entirely different outcomes.
On the whole, the responders were wholly against giving asylum to the individuals; whether it be an intermarriage with a Rom resulting in public attacks and medical miscarriages of racism, or a woman who gets into a transport container with her eight family members and arrives as the only survivor, unconscious, her whole family dead from lack of oxygen, the people of Great Britain have spoken, and the words they spoke were unconscionably inhumane.
Utterly horrific. And as such, for one of the first times I can remember, I find myself utterly ashamed to be here. To be sure, things are not much better in America; I have little doubt that people fall through the system there - not the least of which for the reason that Milwaukee was literally full of illegal immigrants; which one might argue is actually a far greater problem than asylum seekers in that country, but who knows. What I can say about my feelings is that I no longer consider myself an American, though I may not be a proper subject of the Queen either...
Utter shame that people are trying to find ways to disqualify people, regardless of their horrors or their stories, regardless of the validity of their request, in the hopes of using rules to deny people asylum and return their to the terrible life that has brought many of them here.
This is the road to fascism; this road, the road these people are choosing, is the same road they damned Austria for being on, the same road that so many poorly educated and desperate East Germans looking for work find themselves on, the same road that led to Le Pen's rise in France, and the same one behind the BNP in the UK. This extremism is based on a lack of education, a populist smearing through media and social fallacy, and gut reactions to inflated propaganda.
Oh, to be sure, there are problems with the system - but so long as people approach the problem of the rules of asylum as a mechanism to disqualify instead of a mechanism to assist people in need, the rules will never be good enough for individuals to feel good about what takes place.
Today I can lower my head; because while I can see that the BBC is trying to do something pure and honest in trying to inform people on the facts of the problem and show people their own harsh interpretation of the issue, I can't help but believe that the road to honest treatment of asylum seekers in this country is a long, long, long way off.
