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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To keep shouting, they are refugees! !!

290 replies

ginmakesitallok · 02/09/2015 21:35

And not migrants!!!!

The people who are dying on Europe's shores are not migrants! They are not coming to Europe for jobs, for benefits, because they think it will be an easy life. They are escaping war, ISIS, starvation, rape, death. They just want to live and give their children an opportunity to live.

Stop calling them migrants, as if they just fancy living somewhere else. Brits rearing abroad are migrants. Other eu residents coming here are migrants. The dead baby on a beach in Greece was a refugee.

OP posts:

Likelystory · 04/09/2015 14:42

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Werksallhourz · 04/09/2015 15:24

Likely ... the Gulf states will not take Syrian refugees. Absolutely no chance. And if they do, those Syrians may very well disappear. I would not send any ordinary Sunni Muslim Syrian to the Gulf, never mind a Syrian from another sect or religion. To the Gulfies, Syrians are expendable.

I also doubt very many Muslim Syrians would agree to going to the Gulf. Gulfies did not have a very good reputation in Syria; they were pretty much despised in Damascus.

Besides, who do you think is funding ISIS in the first place?

JohnCusacksWife · 04/09/2015 16:03

CrumbledFeta's post at 14.05 is the most sensible take on this issue I've seen to date.

TheCunkOfPhilomena · 04/09/2015 16:22

Janet, I am so appalled at your casual comparison to taking your children kayaking or wherever the hell you took them. Fuck off. I'd like to see how you would respond if ISIS were to set up in London and start their reign of terror here. You'd be clamouring for any passage to proper safety possible. Actually you'd probably use your private jet or whatever.

Likelystory · 04/09/2015 16:37

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

ElkeDagMeisje · 04/09/2015 17:30

Theres a couple of things I'm puzzled about, so can anyone shed any light?

The figure quoted by the father of the drowned family that he paid to the people smugglers was £2900, which he raised by selling family belongings and funding from his sister in Canada, and by working in his profession when he could in Turkey as a barber and also as an odd job man.

Its possible to buy a house in some parts of Turkey, and certainly the parts which have traditionally had a Turkish majority, near the Syrian border, for that. And that would be a house with a bit of land so as to keep a couple of animals, hens, etc.. Its also possible to buy in Hungary for that amount. I appreciate there may be difficulties in buying, but few buyers turn down ready cash and if you work to integrate yourself into a community, there can be few objections.

And surely all the women who drown in these unsuccessful crossings are not wearing traditional Muslim garb, which would cause them to be dragged down? Its like a suicide mission if the boat capsizes.

PHANTOMnamechanger · 04/09/2015 17:31

I'm deeply shocked by the statement from Hungary. Just awful.

And utterly incredulous at the few heartless posters on here who appear to be compassionless, unable to think outside of their own comfy lives.

Blaming that grieving father for the death of his children. Saying 'well it cant be that bad if he's off back home to Syria'. Unbelieveable. He has lost everything. he does not have anything left to make life worth living. He does not care if he's going back there to die too.

The UK needs to be leading by example, we can take thousands of people without any real impact.

Dawndonnaagain · 04/09/2015 17:32

This is very serious stuff. You don't fuck about with it.
Ahh, so unless we're all 100% politically aware we are unable to discuss it.
Who appointed you boss?
It's entirely possible the very quick bit of research I did was not enough, but a polite pointer would have been nicer.

InimitableJeeves · 04/09/2015 17:38

Elke, we know they wouldn't be allowed to stay in Hungary. And is a house near the border with Syria necessarily safe? Plus, of course, it's not just a matter of being able to buy a house but of having support wherever you end up (which is presumably why the family opted for Canada where the father's sister was) and being able to earn a living.

livingzuid · 04/09/2015 17:48

I'm well aware of the fact that western Europe uses water cannon. I live in the Netherlands which has far harsher methods to put down civil disobedience than the UK.

The protests in Turkey turned into demonstrations against the way a peaceful protest was quashed with unnecessary force against people doing no harm. You are wilfully missing the point.

ElkeDagMeisje · 04/09/2015 17:54

Inimitable And is a house near the border with Syria necessarily safe?

Turkey is a NATO country. I'm sure its far safer for a Syrian Kurd than if you or I were to go there. I'm sure its a lot safer than being bombed or risking recruitment by ISIS.

But the tragic family weren't in the area of Turkey where the Turkish Kurds live, they left from the tourist resort of Bodrum.

JanetBlyton · 04/09/2015 17:56

Also even worse news - apparently his relative in Canada was still waiting to hear about the asylum application there so even with that in prospect he chose to take those poor little children out on that boat! It's unbelievable. I doubt most mumsnetters would do that.

wotoodoo · 04/09/2015 18:04

The lack of women and girls being 'allowed' to flee is sickening. But that is to be expected in cultures where women have no rights.

Yes there is a monumental humanitarian crisis. Where are all the women and girls while the men flee?

No wonder there is a confusion between migrant and refugee!

When my dh's family fled after WW2 it was the family who fled, not thousands upon thousands of healthy males who abandon their mothers, daughters, sisters, babies to a violent and dangerous fate.

The sheer gender imbalance is staggering and this point makes this humanitarian crisis like no other on earth.

It is the invisible, the disabled, the elderly, the WOMEN and GIRLS and babies who are off the social media radar, the ones who are too poor to pay for people smugglers.

Why isn't the spotlight for help on them??

PHANTOMnamechanger · 04/09/2015 18:04

I doubt most mumsnetters would do that

the thing is, thankfully for most of us, the sheer good luck of where we were born means that the vast majority of MNers will NEVER find themselves having to make decisions like this. A few years ago, those Syrian families would never have thought their lives would have got to this stage.

wotoodoo · 04/09/2015 18:10

The mother of the tiny boys who drowned did not want to go. She could not swim. But in a culture where women are second class to the men she was forced to go by her husband and take her babies with her. He has blood on his hands. No wonder he has returned to Syria. They were already safe in Turkey and he knew well about the dangers of trying to cross a sea at night without life jackets for his children. He put his family at risk and he will probably never get over his guilt.

I say again but the lack of women and girls being 'allowed' to flee is sickening. But that is to be expected where women have no rights.

ElkeDagMeisje · 04/09/2015 18:18

The mother of the tiny boys who drowned did not want to go. She could not swim.

I find it so utterly horrific what she must have gone through that night in the water. This is a woman who will probably have never been permitted to learn to swim, on the open sea in a fragile dingy. She will most likely have been wearing clothes similar to those in the photos of her in the newspapers, including head covering and heavy long skirts. She had no chance if she went in the water, and she had her two children with her. How fortunate that her husband out of all 4 of them managed to make it back alive to the shore.

I'm also a bit horrified at the abusive comments at the poster who tried to understand the situation by drawing parallels with her own life where she could. Death by drowning is death all the same, and many people have lost their lives in the UK by drowning, not least because we are an island surrounded by water and full of lakes and rivers. Many parents make decisions about water safety and I think it makes it all the more tragic that desperation and lack of education didn't enable these parents in Turkey to make the right decision. Because it clearly wasn't worth it.

CatMilkMan · 04/09/2015 18:22

It's nice to see some of the hysteria on mumsnet is being put aside to legitimate concerns and discussions, especially from werk and others.

wotoodoo · 04/09/2015 18:27

This the worst gender imbalance of any humanitarian crisis the world has ever seen. It is the invisible, the disabled, the women and children the people too poor to pay for people traffickers, why isn't the spotlight on helping them?

MadgeMidgerson · 04/09/2015 18:30

If only he had been a mumsnet poster, we all, with our collective experience of the right way to flee murderous regimes could have advised home on the naice way to run for your fucking life.

Hey ho. Let that be a lesson to you Syrians!

JanetBlyton · 04/09/2015 18:36

Yes, she didn't want to go and now her husband is back in Kobane, Syria. What a sad waste of lives.

The spotlight should be on those who do not have the funds to flee which is actually exactly what the Govenrment has been doing - we pay more to help them than every other country in the EU put together. We have concentrated our help where it is needed most. Yes the current hysteria means Cameron will have to accept under 10,000 of the most needy from probably the camps in Turkey and Turkey have upped their patrols and are damaging boats used to ship people out so that will help too.

Dawndonnaagain · 04/09/2015 18:39

When there are no benefits, a bare minimum NHS and lawlessness (from indigenous population as well as newcomers) I think some people might reconsider their "Refugees Welcome" placards.
What nonsense.

Borderterrierpuppy · 04/09/2015 18:41

I hear you op, David Cameron is a disgrace, he has fanned the flames of refugee haters with his bile.
Luckily most of of population have a better moral compass than him.

CatMilkMan · 04/09/2015 19:02

Oops, never mind.

SoThatwasSummer · 04/09/2015 19:09

It is the invisible, the disabled, the elderly, the WOMEN and GIRLS and babies who are off the social media radar, the ones who are too poor to pay for people smugglers

I agree where are the women?

Its the Yadizis taken for sex slaves I feel most sorry for. All the poor women left to awful fates.

he spotlight should be on those who do not have the funds to flee which is actually exactly what the Govenrment has been doing - we pay more to help them than every other country in the EU put together.

Indeed.

IKnowIAmButWhatAreYou · 04/09/2015 19:16

The spotlight should be on those who do not have the funds to flee which is actually exactly what the Government has been doing - we pay more to help them than every other country in the EU put together.

Exactly, but now policies will change due to "mob rule" and the press playing their own silly games.

Everyone is rushing to show that they're doing their part by putting their shit old tent they'd forgotten to throw out and some clothes that were in a bag waiting for collection anyway in a van to go to Calais - to the wrong people - but it's not as trendy to just donate £20 to a Syrian based charity is it?

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