Those Pesky People That Come To Australia on Boats.
I'm sure by now that we've all heard the statistics, "boat people" and what a delightful turn of phrase that is, make up just 10% of all people arriving in Australia, and that between 85%-90%(some statistics put it higher, but for the sake of argument we'll use the commonly accepted numbers) of them are found to be genuine refugees, which means out of the total number of people coming into Australia "boat people" contribute a whole 1.5%-1% to people not found to be genuine refugees. Those no good very bad people that come by boats. Statistics though, don't work against irrational fear (nor do they work on racism, but nothing works on racism). So instead lets talk about other aspects of this whole "boat people" fiasco.
The objection that I hear most from people that are otherwise quite understanding is that somehow the act of paying to get to Australia on a boat, rather than paying to get to Australia by plane somehow makes you less of a refugee. A quick look back in to the archives of history will tell you that this is simply not true. It is well known that Jewish people payed to leave Nazi Germany and I'm sure no one would try to argue that those people were any less genuine refugees because they paid. I realise now some of you are rolling your eyes and reciting Godwin's Law, but my point is it's the push factors that matter, and not the amount of money someone spends to get over here.
Push Factors there are, and plenty of them, whether it's the Sri Lankan government committing Genocide (Yes they do that) or Americans and Allies bombing the hell out of a country because of a war on a concept. Push Factors in recent years have gone up, and they are only going to get worse, global warming is going to put a lot of islanders out of a home and Bangladesh will also suffer, so make way for new waves of people who aren't white to come in to our country.
The other big objection I hear is that of "Queue Jumping" for those of you who are unaware, this is what a refugee camp looks like. Photo from http://eventingnation.com/home/international_security_image_6-_refugee_camp.jpg
note the conspicuous lack of a line or and sort of basic comforts. A queue as people envision it simply doesn't happen, it's not first comes first served, corruption is rife and life in these camps can be a living hell a hell which without the right connections you may be living in the rest of your life. Finally if we are going to talk about queue jumpers keeping the proper refugees (obviously false as seen by the statistics above) Lets talk about visa over stayers, This is the actual blight on our society, people who come from countries where they are quite welcome, who are taking up room in this country that could be given to actual refugees. Some how though, these majority white illegal immigrants don't seem to make such a splash with the media, gosh I wonder why that is?
There are legitimate concerns that you can have about asylum seekers, I'm sure, but none of them are the sexy headline sort so they never get mentioned, "boat people" on the other hand create the sort of knee jerk reaction that keeps people buying papers.
The objection that I hear most from people that are otherwise quite understanding is that somehow the act of paying to get to Australia on a boat, rather than paying to get to Australia by plane somehow makes you less of a refugee. A quick look back in to the archives of history will tell you that this is simply not true. It is well known that Jewish people payed to leave Nazi Germany and I'm sure no one would try to argue that those people were any less genuine refugees because they paid. I realise now some of you are rolling your eyes and reciting Godwin's Law, but my point is it's the push factors that matter, and not the amount of money someone spends to get over here.
Push Factors there are, and plenty of them, whether it's the Sri Lankan government committing Genocide (Yes they do that) or Americans and Allies bombing the hell out of a country because of a war on a concept. Push Factors in recent years have gone up, and they are only going to get worse, global warming is going to put a lot of islanders out of a home and Bangladesh will also suffer, so make way for new waves of people who aren't white to come in to our country.
The other big objection I hear is that of "Queue Jumping" for those of you who are unaware, this is what a refugee camp looks like. Photo from http://eventingnation.com/home/international_security_image_6-_refugee_camp.jpg
note the conspicuous lack of a line or and sort of basic comforts. A queue as people envision it simply doesn't happen, it's not first comes first served, corruption is rife and life in these camps can be a living hell a hell which without the right connections you may be living in the rest of your life. Finally if we are going to talk about queue jumpers keeping the proper refugees (obviously false as seen by the statistics above) Lets talk about visa over stayers, This is the actual blight on our society, people who come from countries where they are quite welcome, who are taking up room in this country that could be given to actual refugees. Some how though, these majority white illegal immigrants don't seem to make such a splash with the media, gosh I wonder why that is?
There are legitimate concerns that you can have about asylum seekers, I'm sure, but none of them are the sexy headline sort so they never get mentioned, "boat people" on the other hand create the sort of knee jerk reaction that keeps people buying papers.
posted by Leah Jaclyn at 11:48 PM
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