To think attitudes towards Syrian refugees is mostly unsympathetic

[Thebrowntrout]

Would you agree? It seems that last autumn emotions were running high but sense and pragmatism has now kicked in instead,

The plight of the millions of non-Syrian refugees in Africa, Asia and South America should not be forgotten either.

Compassion fatigue occurs and is completely predictable. I'm not saying it's good but people tend not to be able to sustain feelings of sympathy and horror etc.. endlessly. If we did we'd all be walking around with ptsd unable to function.

Plus the refugee crisis has been going on long enough now for some of the negative problems to have surfaced such as crime, attacks on women etc... Although these are a small minority they impact the compassion we feel.

Its terribly sad and a very muddy situation.

In the WWII for instance, it was a very clear situation. One man - Hitler, one party, The Nazis against most of the world and a clear manifesto to kill the Jews.

We Knew the Jews were being killed and we had to try and rescue them.

This situation is so much more complicated and its been complicated by so many other factors, the EU, the lack of external borders, the fact that non refugees are also using this as an opportunity to get into the EU, which is easy as there is no border security, ISIS using migrant routes to get in and out of the EU and back to Syria. The chaos in Syria, with Assad, Russia, ISIS. And now the brewing issues in Libya about to explode, the Bataclan, its a hell of a mess. Merkels call to ALL encouraging mass movement to Germany, the lack of cohesion with other EU nations not accepting any migrants. Cologne, Norway, Denmark suffering mass sex attacks by migrants and death.

This is why, I am pleased we go directly to the camps near Syria and rescue people from there. It really is the best solution.

I think at a national/international there is possibly compassion fatigue along with concerns about practicalities. However, on a local level, there is quite an active group in my town campaigning for the borough council to take on more refugee families. They have very long and well-attended meetings with people organising how they are going to help the few families that the town is taking in all possible ways - if anything, they've got more volunteers than they need. There are also people who continue to organise collections of food, shoes and clothing.

I think people are still sympathetic, but it's coupled with knowing that apart from donating money (and there are numerous worthy causes to donate money to, not just Syria) there's not much that most people can do. Dwelling on it is unhelpful and depressing for most of us in our day to day first world lives.

It's no different to the summer before when people were thinking a lot about the horrific treatment of people in Gaza, but despite the fact that the Palestinian situation is only getting worse, it's forgotten about.

As a whole, we are mostly directed by the media to have sympathy for these things, and when there's other stuff going on because of UK politics and issues, the rest of the world doesn't get called on to provide something to fill the papers and rolling news channels.

I don't think being pragmatic means you aren't sympathetic.

I completely agree with you and think it is shameful how little compassion is shown in this country.

There is still compassion. You do have to be sensible and think things through with your head rather than heart.