AIBU to think Europe should let refugees in

[Gin96]

Surely Europe has room for these people?

www.thelondoneconomic.com/news/world-news/eu-accuses-turkey-of-using-desperate-migrants-for-political-purposes/07/03/

I agree with you. It’s awful how we ‘other’ these people and try to keep them out. If my home was being bombed and suffering constant war than I would be fleeing somewhere I perceived as safe with my family too. Who the hell wouldn’t?

It’s awful that people turn their noses up at them because they don’t want things to be a bit more cramped or have to share resources.

YANBU
(As long as you mean “and the UK should take a decent proportion of them as we’ve shirked our responsibility for years”)

Yes, Europe and the UK should. We should help those in need not turn our back on them.

Indeed. But then europe wasnt very responsive during the whole yugoslave conflict either and that was right in our heart.

I dont know what the answer is. I feel very guilty about the fact that we do so little but I do understand the views of those who are so against it, when schools, NHS etc can't cope with the people we have.

I've probably burned my bridges with MIL (a proper stereotypical Daily Mailer) by "reminding" her that FIL's family came here from Germany. The timing's not quite clear but it was some time before/during/agent the war. But apparently that's different, those refugees had no choice

But they're not refugees. They are supposed to seek asylum in the first safe country, ie Turkey. After this they are economic migrants.

I think we should be making the homeless and hungry in the UK a priority before helping anyone else.
That comment probably makes me a racist nazi in the eyes of some.

Turkey is sheltering £4m refugees and the fact that the rest of the world is doing nothing to help is one of the reasons the situation in that region is at risk of escalating so badly.

DH, ex Army, has a real problem with the demographic of the refugees though. He doesn't understand why there are so many young men. He'd expect refugees to be elderly and children (who he'd feel duty bound to protect) while he'd expect the young to be staying to fight/deal with the situation at home.

Women and children, probably. Even whole families. However the vast majority seem to be single men and i dont think thats right.

@ElderAve I’m sure that I read somewhere that the males often go on ahead to find somewhere safe and then send for their families, or just find work and send money back.

Also I think that the media (looking at you Daily Mail) deliberately uses images of the men rather than the women and children to envoke exactly this kind of response.

@gobbycop the uk is one of the richest countries in the world, the fact that we have significant numbers of homeless and hungry people here is a matter of political choice, not because there aren’t enough resources to go around. Same point to the previous poster who said nhs and schools can’t cope- they only can’t cope because of the choices we as a nation make about how we structure our economy and distribute our wealth. We could easily “afford” to allow more refugees in if we chose to.

Also for anyone who thinks people should stay home and fight, google the Syrian pub brawl analogy. Not every fight has a side worth fighting for.

The political landscape in Europe is changing. Letting everybody in, the way they did two years ago might tip some countries to the right.

Refugees should be given shelter, many of those on the Greece border are from Pakistan, Morocco and other safe places though.

Turkey is about to explode from the number of refugees they're hosting. And it's a bloody small country as well. Ofcourse people are going to try and find elsewhere.

Also to the poster who mentioned claiming asylum in the first country you arrive at- that’s an eu rule so doesn’t apply to Turkey (and won’t apply here soon). There was a fairly sensible logic behind that idea when the rule was introduced but while we have the pattern of recent years of people fleeing wars and oppression it doesn’t really make sense anymore- there are a small number of countries which are much easier to reach for many of these refugees, does that mean for example that Greece should take millions of people and the uk none because it’s unlikely to ever be the first country people reach?

Perhaps people feel men should be at home fighting for democracy and freedom for their wives, mothers, children, disabled, old and sick? Many people would be 100% happy to help refugees in fact lots of us do but male economic migrants not so much.

'@ElderAve I’m sure that I read somewhere that the males often go on ahead to find somewhere safe and then send for their families, or just find work and send money back." Yes, its exactly that that DH has an issue with, mostly because he doesn't believe it but also because who's caring for the vulnerable while the young men are away doing this taks that the women could do equally well?

Turkey is about to explode from the number of refugees they're hosting. And it's a bloody small country as well. Ofcourse people are going to try and find elsewhere.

Turkey demanded and received big concessions and money from the EU for the migrants. Now they are using them as pawns in their spat with Russia. If Turkey didn't want all this than maybe they should stay out of Syria and stop fucking with the Kurds.

Turkey is a small country? Based on what map?!?

I do think Europe could be doing more. It has given a fairly substantial sum of money to Turkey but I'm not sure that's enough. I also think some of the wealthy Islamic countries should be doing a lot more. Where is the "Muslim brotherhood" when these poor people need help?

I think we should let them in too.

I don't see why the uk feels it has a right to decide who is worthy to come to the UK or not. Of course we should check who is coming in in case someone is wanted by interpol etc, but to my mind, it everyone was welcome wherever they wanted to go there would be much less pressure on services because it would be easier to try living in X and then move on if it wasn't working for you. Places where there weren't enough jobs or doctors etc would naturally empty out as it would be much easier to move on to somewhere where there was, both for refugees and residents of those places.

Sorry to be petulant but why are we assuming women can’t fight/look after the vulnerable?

In reality, if it was your loved one, I don’t think you’d want them staying behind and fighting either. This isn’t the same as the wars we’ve seen in the UK.

Agree with other posters that we could be helping easily if we wanted to, but our government chucks money at absolute shite rather than helping those in need (British or otherwise).

Who are the men staying to fight supposed to fight? Their government, their own people fighting their government; the Russians, the americans. Everyone has had a little go in their country. I cant imagine they even know who the enemy is.

To the poster who said that Turkey is a really small country, it's about 3 times bigger than the UK. To the poster who said Turkey didn't get any help from Europe for hosting refugees, they got a shit-load of money from the EU.
I'm not belittling the situation in Turkey though.

@ElderAve I’m sure that they could but that’s not really the mindset in the Middle East is it. Plus I imagine the men are lot stronger, more streetwise and able to make the journey. Far easier than the logistical nightmare of dragging your whole family across the globe without knowing where they are going. If they only sent the women I’m sure they would get slammed for that too.

But it’s beside the point, because there are plenty of women too, the media just focus on the men because it suits our narrative.

I thought the 'claim asylum in the first country' rule is a UN rule.

I often think 'what if I was one of the refugees' how would I want people to react. However how many should we let in 1M, 2M? It would seriously alter the state of the country.