Why Does Our Collective Empathy So Often Fail to Manifest in Our Treatment of Refugees?

There are moments where, with stomach-churning speed, our lives rearrange themselves around us and, when the dust settles, their familiar patterns and grooves are destroyed.

For most of us these will be times of personal tragedy or wild success. They won't be our country's collapse into war, politically-motivated murder of loved ones or the police hammering at our door in the night.

CARA - the Council for At-Risk Academics - deals with stories like this all the time. In their work with academics facing persecution and violence, they supported the 26-year old Syrian who was tortured in the same rooms he used to learn and teach in. They helped the Iraqi Physics lecturer who dared question conventional religious beliefs and received threats to her life and children. And they backed the Zimbabwean human rights lecturer beaten by the state police for his political activism.

Refugees consistently face some of the toughest choices imaginable - whether to stay where they are and face rape, torture or death or leave behind their family, everything they have and know to embark on a dangerous - all too often fatal - flight into the unknown.

Here's where I'm supposed to say: 'Imagine if it were you, facing such a choice. Imagine if it were your mother or brother". But you don't need to be patronised. We're all more than capable of empathy.

Yet we continue to treat refugees with ignorance and even contempt. Why does our collective empathy so often fail to manifest in our treatment of such a vulnerable group? Is it an emotional distance that allows us to forget their stories so fast? Is it all those scare stories about foreigners lying to get into Britain to milk the NHS? Perhaps it is our perception of geographical distance and a preference for avoiding the horrible things that happen far away. And so we sit and smugly tut or even complain about the shame of horrors "over there." As long as it doesn't come "over here" where we might be forced to act.

The truth is we have many reasons to be ashamed of things happening right now and on our own doorstep. Tell the 'not-here' myth to the Pakistani woman violently attacked by her husband's family for the audacity of wanting to finish her PhD. When she fled to the UK she was left so destitute that she was forced to scavenge food from dustbins to survive. CARA found her with severe food poisoning and she used the emergency grant they gave her to buy those extravagant luxuries - food and clothes.

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/shami-chakrabarti/refugees-uk_b_5495524.html?utm_hp_ref=uk

Some people will even feign concern for refugees, even when we all can tell they have nothing but hatred for them.

http://www.newsfixboard.com/t3971-first-ever-female-from-sierra-leone-to-compete-in-london-marathon

Ben_Reilly wrote:Some people will even feign concern for refugees, even when we all can tell they have nothing but hatred for them.

http://www.newsfixboard.com/t3971-first-ever-female-from-sierra-leone-to-compete-in-london-marathon

Just read through that and bang on the money again Ben..

Proves the point even more about what she is saying in this article.

Thanks

I think a large part of why the British have a problem with refugees and asylum seekers is the point of asylum is you seek it in the first safe country to come to, as opposed to the economic migrants who come to the one with the best benefits system then claim asylum

Didge wrote:

Ben_Reilly wrote:Some people will even feign concern for refugees, even when we all can tell they have nothing but hatred for them.

http://www.newsfixboard.com/t3971-first-ever-female-from-sierra-leone-to-compete-in-london-marathon

Just read through that and bang on the money again Ben..

Proves the point even more about what she is saying in this article.

Thanks

No problem! It just goes to show how people can utterly fail to place themselves into another person's point of view, regardless of how much they know about where that person comes from.

Reminds me of how the Abbott government made hay over rejecting people in truly dire situations from Australia; I believe the Australians' (sarcastic) expression for that is, "I'm all right, Jack!" Yeah, sure, that's all that matters ... http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=I%27m+all+right+Jack!

Nems wrote:I think a large part of why the British have a problem with refugees and asylum seekers is the point of asylum is you seek it in the first safe country to come to, as opposed to the economic migrants who come to the one with the best benefits system then claim asylum

But why should that be the case people have issue?
I mean surely if helping people persecuted is the objective, why should it matter where they go to seek refuge, when to them it will be a nation they know of for a start, know its history, feeling to them that place would be where they feel safe?.

So by your last statement adds again to what she is saying, your view has little to do with the first country they stay in but you see them as coming here to get benefits, even though the vast majority suffer destitution. So basically you already hold a poor stereotype view of Refugees, based on your post, showing how right the article is again.

Nems wrote:I think a large part of why the British have a problem with refugees and asylum seekers is the point of asylum is you seek it in the first safe country to come to, as opposed to the economic migrants who come to the one with the best benefits system then claim asylum

As Didge said, why would you blame someone for trying to get to a country where they have a better chance? It just seems like the refugee-bashers want to doom people to dying in a horrible place and condemn anyone who seeks anything better.

And I never, ever hear these people complain about the hundreds of billions of pounds concentrated among the few already-wealthy bankers that their country bailed out. They only ever complain about desperate people who get a tiny amount of taxpayer money, not about people who did not need the money in the first place who got more than most of us could ever dream of having!

Nems wrote:I think a large part of why the British have a problem with refugees and asylum seekers is the point of asylum is you seek it in the first safe country to come to, as opposed to the economic migrants who come to the one with the best benefits system then claim asylum

Correct


If you can pay for a ticket to gravy train Europe you aren't seeking asylum you're seeking benefits

smelly_bandit wrote:

Nems wrote:I think a large part of why the British have a problem with refugees and asylum seekers is the point of asylum is you seek it in the first safe country to come to, as opposed to the economic migrants who come to the one with the best benefits system then claim asylum

Correct


If you can pay for a ticket to gravy train Europe you aren't seeking asylum you're seeking benefits

Pay?
Also what a load of complete gobbldeygook, so why would you leave being on good money to come here to be worse off financially if you were coming here for the benefits?
If the benefits that they will have a life without persecution, then why would you deny them that benefit?
The article did not factor in one point, you have no empathy full stop.

my name is didge  :-:bravo:-: 

Ben_Reilly wrote:

Nems wrote:I think a large part of why the British have a problem with refugees and asylum seekers is the point of asylum is you seek it in the first safe country to come to, as opposed to the economic migrants who come to the one with the best benefits system then claim asylum

As Didge said, why would you blame someone for trying to get to a country where they have a better chance? It just seems like the refugee-bashers want to doom people to dying in a horrible place and condemn anyone who seeks anything better.

But the genuine ones who really need the safety of a decent country, usually the women, are the ones left behind. Only the ones with enough guile to pay the traffickers make it here, usually young men. My sympathy lies with the women and children left behind.

Ben_Reilly wrote:

Nems wrote:I think a large part of why the British have a problem with refugees and asylum seekers is the point of asylum is you seek it in the first safe country to come to, as opposed to the economic migrants who come to the one with the best benefits system then claim asylum

As Didge said, why would you blame someone for trying to get to a country where they have a better chance? It just seems like the refugee-bashers want to doom people to dying in a horrible place and condemn anyone who seeks anything better.

Because they are supposed to claim when they get to a safe country, Yes?
So why are there thousands of them sitting in Callais trying to get to the UK?

smelly_bandit wrote:

Nems wrote:I think a large part of why the British have a problem with refugees and asylum seekers is the point of asylum is you seek it in the first safe country to come to, as opposed to the economic migrants who come to the one with the best benefits system then claim asylum

Correct


If you can pay for a ticket to gravy train Europe you aren't seeking asylum you're seeking benefits

Economic migration thats it

Tesstacious wrote:

Ben_Reilly wrote:

As Didge said, why would you blame someone for trying to get to a country where they have a better chance? It just seems like the refugee-bashers want to doom people to dying in a horrible place and condemn anyone who seeks anything better.

But the genuine ones who really need the safety of a decent country, usually the women, are the ones left behind.  Only the ones with enough guile to pay the traffickers make it here, usually young men.  My sympathy lies with the women and children left behind.

my sympathy lies with the Uk women and child who will no doubt be raped by these asylum seekers as soon as they hit the streets as happens all too often

Ben.we are a small country and you can't get a quart in a pint pot!!!

So as per usual no empathy for people being persecuted, instead yet more poor excuses are given, proving the article right.

Nems wrote:

Ben_Reilly wrote:

As Didge said, why would you blame someone for trying to get to a country where they have a better chance? It just seems like the refugee-bashers want to doom people to dying in a horrible place and condemn anyone who seeks anything better.

Because they are supposed to claim when they get to a safe country, Yes?
So why are there thousands of them sitting in Callais trying to get to the UK?

Wrong:

There is nothing in international law to say that refugees must claim asylum in the first country they reach.
It is recognised in the 1951 Convention that people fleeing persecution may have to use irregular means in order to escape and claim asylum in another country – there is no legal way to travel to the UK for the specific purpose of seeking asylum. (United Nations 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees)

The first safe country thing is an accepted principle of seeking asylum.







We care about genuine refugees, but have seen the system abused too many times as being just another way to get here and stay.



Many illegal immigrants only claim asylum when caught here and threatened with removal.


Others lie about their age etc.



And it should only be a temporary thing if granted, they should be returned home as soon as safe enough.



Not a license to stay forever.

smelly_bandit wrote:

Tesstacious wrote:

Ben_Reilly wrote:

As Didge said, why would you blame someone for trying to get to a country where they have a better chance? It just seems like the refugee-bashers want to doom people to dying in a horrible place and condemn anyone who seeks anything better.

But the genuine ones who really need the safety of a decent country, usually the women, are the ones left behind.  Only the ones with enough guile to pay the traffickers make it here, usually young men.  My sympathy lies with the women and children left behind.

my sympathy lies with the Uk women and child who will no doubt be raped by these asylum seekers as soon as they hit the streets as happens all too often

You especially have to watch out for the little ones, you can see they carry their own rape-mats. Monsters!

I think anyone that has actually lived around refugees and heard their stories knows how wrong people like smelly are.
My Opinion on Refuges is simple it was formed as child and Multiple other people in my life have Cemented it.

when I was about 6, a Tamil Boy, David, from Sri Lanka came to my school and we became friends as kids do, when we were about 9 there was a class assignment, everyone had to make a speech about what "travel" meant to them. I like most of the class wrote about some family holiday I cant even remember but David story will forever be etched in my memory.
He told the story of His families travels from Sri Lanka, He lived in a mixed village and one day Militants came to the village to kill all the Tamil people, the militants Rampaged through the village Killing Tamils and Burning their Properties. David's Family only Survived because a neighbour who wasn't Tamil hid them in a chicken coop. when the came out after the militants left everything they owned had been reduced to ash and most of their extended family who lived in the village were dead.
Fearing the Militants may return they fled, taking a boat east across to south east Asia and then onto Australia. they arrived here 'illegally' to claim refuge. David is now an Australian Citizen and a Doctor, a valuable member of our community.
 :asdrnkbudsas: 

veya_victaous wrote:I think anyone that has actually lived around refugees and heard their stories knows how wrong people like smelly are.
My Opinion on Refuges is simple it was formed as child and Multiple other people in my life have Cemented it.

when I was about 6, a Tamil Boy, David, from Sri Lanka came to my school and we became friends as kids do, when we were about 9 there was a class assignment, everyone had to make a speech about what "travel" meant to them. I like most of the class wrote about some family holiday I cant even remember but David story will forever be etched in my memory.
He told the story of His families travels from Sri Lanka, He lived in a mixed village and one day Militants came to the village to kill all the Tamil people, the militants Rampaged through the village Killing Tamils and Burning their Properties. David's Family only Survived because a neighbour who wasn't Tamil hid them in a chicken coop. when the came out after the militants left everything they owned had been reduced to ash and most of their extended family who lived in the village were dead.
Fearing the Militants may return they fled, taking a boat east across to south east Asia and then onto Australia. they arrived here 'illegally' to claim refuge. David is now an Australian Citizen and a Doctor, a valuable member of our community.
 :asdrnkbudsas: 

And that is what should happen to refugees, they have suffered enough.

Yes.... of course Sassy.....



That was a very heart warming story there veya, and obviously a good person and credit to society.


Lucky to find sanctuary after fleeing genuine persecution and get on in life etc.



Now here's a story from the other end of the scale.....


And there are plenty more like this and worse....



http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1180151/Adult-asylum-seeker-raped-girl-13-lied-age-placed-childrens-home.html

Tommy Monk wrote:Yes.... of course Sassy.....



That was a very heart warming story there veya, and obviously a good person and credit to society.


Lucky to find sanctuary after fleeing genuine persecution and get on in life etc.



Now here's a story from the other end of the scale.....


And there are plenty more like this and worse....



http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1180151/Adult-asylum-seeker-raped-girl-13-lied-age-placed-childrens-home.html

So because it is possible a bad person may get through (if you don't do decent checks) you will force a good one to suffer and probably die? to me that is cowardice I would not accept it, I would be ashamed to have that opinion because I hate cowardice         

And.... plenty of Anglos rape kids too...
So as I have implied Plenty of Times IF you want to do that, well No Anglo man from Britain is allowed near children as statistically they are a bigger danger.
          
But of course if a criminal is foreign the they did the crime because they're foreign but if there are Anglo then they did the crime because they are.... "Some excuse" to so you can keep denying that Anglo men are still the biggest threat to children in the UK.

reality is FAR more immigrants are beneficial than not, UK becomes no more dangerous because it was already dangerous. NONE of your crime stats have actually gone up      
there was more Crimes 33 years ago when you didn't have the immigrants
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/apr/24/crime-rate-england-wales-falls-lowest-level-33-years


SO AGAIN you opinion is based on non-factual Fear driven rubbish from racists and political parties that would prefer you focus on that than the real issues. IF you were actually concerned about the crimes then you would be pushing for greater restrictions on Anglo men around children as Statistically that group has much higher likelihood of abusing children.

I think people use the whole 'UK is over crowded, pull up the drawbridge' argument to distance themselves for the realities that asylum seekers are trying to escape. Monk raises those on who come in and commit crimes, but they are a very few, and denying people the right to live in safety because there is less than 1% chance they will commit a horrific crime is blatantly cruel and over kill. If people could put to one side their own selfish nationalistic hostility to immigrants they would actually be able to start empathizing with some of those who come here.

I don't say all should come here of course, and certainly a big part of solving these problems is to put pressure on those countries seek to escape from to change their ways, but the hostility should not be to those who come here- in their position many of us would probably do the same.

Thankfully the world, for the most part, does not run on the Tommy Monk Philosophy of Humanity, under which (apparently) people are automatically assumed to be criminals because of the actions of a few. We'd have no freedom of movement, no civil rights, no freedom of any sort, really, because we'd be so obsessed with the minority population of criminals that we would never allow people to be innocent until proven guilty; it would be the other way around -- basically, a police state.

This is what happens when you become a shut-in who only understands the world through news sites, and never experience it for yourself -- or, if you do occasionally leave the house, you think everyone's a bastard out to get you. In which case we're talking about transference

What a lead of leftie drivel from you three!



I merely highlighted one of a huge number of cases where someone has abused our asylum system to gain access to our country and financial support and were not a genuine asylum seeker at all.


The traveled over many safe countries to get here, lied about their age and circumstances, and then when here raped a young girl.


And What we have heard is that British people rape girls too, the old classic 'it's only a few' rubbish, and then the straw man argument from Ben being that we want to be a totalitarian police state and a persecutor of all.....


Quite pathetic really....



I think that most asylum seekers who arrive here are not genuinely fleeing any sort of persecution at all.


They are just economic migrants.


They just use asylum claim as an alternative route into the country and get housed etc, then quickly go out and get cash in hand work.


Illegal immigrants and 'asylum seekers' are found every day working illegally in places up and down the UK, with many of these illegal immigrants then claiming asylum as a way to try to stay longer.


All at massive cost to tax payer.



Just like most immigrants who arrive here are not highly skilled and well needed hard workers.



We don't want or need any more immigrants, although I would make acceptinmp for genuine refugees who are desperately in need of sanctuary, but this should be on a temporary basis and They should return home as soon as possible when situation improves.



Maybe we should have an asylum system that is more like Australia.... house them off shore in camps to be assessed and bogus/economic migrants removed or allowed to voluntarily go back....


http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/policy/bogus-asylum-seekers-sent-home-from-png/story-fn9hm1gu-1226771748834#mm-premium

Ben_Reilly wrote:

smelly_bandit wrote:

my sympathy lies with the Uk women and child who will no doubt be raped by these asylum seekers as soon as they hit the streets as happens all too often

You especially have to watch out for the little ones, you can see they carry their own rape-mats. Monsters!

yeah because Muslim children are so innocent

Three Royal Marines were killed in Afghanistan by a 13-year-old suicide bomber who carried his explosives in a wheelbarrow, an inquest heard yesterday.

Marine Damien Davies, 27, Sergeant John Manuel, 38, and Corporal Marc Birch, 26, were guarding a bridge when they briefly stepped out of their armoured vehicles.

But as they stood together discussing tactics the fresh-faced bomber ran up to them pushing a wheelbarrow and detonated a huge bomb within 3ft of them

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1248388/The-day-boy-13-blew-British-soldiers bomb-wheelbarrow.html#ixzz355SUkdpZ

aren't they adorable??

Tesstacious wrote:

Ben_Reilly wrote:

As Didge said, why would you blame someone for trying to get to a country where they have a better chance? It just seems like the refugee-bashers want to doom people to dying in a horrible place and condemn anyone who seeks anything better.

But the genuine ones who really need the safety of a decent country, usually the women, are the ones left behind.  Only the ones with enough guile to pay the traffickers make it here, usually young men.  My sympathy lies with the women and children left behind.

Agreed.

smelly_bandit wrote:

Tesstacious wrote:
But the genuine ones who really need the safety of a decent country, usually the women, are the ones left behind.  Only the ones with enough guile to pay the traffickers make it here, usually young men.  My sympathy lies with the women and children left behind.

my sympathy lies with the Uk women and child who will no doubt be raped by these asylum seekers as soon as they hit the streets as happens all too often

oh do shut up with your hatred and ignorance!

SEXY MAMA wrote:

smelly_bandit wrote:

my sympathy lies with the Uk women and child who will no doubt be raped by these asylum seekers as soon as they hit the streets as happens all too often

oh do shut up with your hatred and ignorance!

hello mama

haven't seen you around lately

been helping facilitate the movement of your brothers and sisters to Syria and iraq perhaps??

smelly_bandit wrote:

SEXY MAMA wrote:

oh do shut up with your hatred and ignorance!

hello mama

haven't seen you around lately

been helping facilitate the movement of your brothers and sisters to Syria and iraq perhaps??

Wow you really are a sad fuckwit pathetic weasel all brave behind your PC, you going out on imaginary maneuvers soon in your back garden?

smelly_bandit wrote:

Ben_Reilly wrote:



You especially have to watch out for the little ones, you can see they carry their own rape-mats. Monsters!

yeah because Muslim children are so innocent

Three Royal Marines were killed in Afghanistan by a 13-year-old suicide bomber who carried his explosives in a wheelbarrow, an inquest heard yesterday.

Marine Damien Davies, 27, Sergeant John Manuel, 38, and Corporal Marc Birch, 26, were guarding a bridge when they briefly stepped out of their armoured vehicles.

But as they stood together discussing tactics the fresh-faced bomber ran up to them pushing a wheelbarrow and detonated a huge bomb within 3ft of them

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1248388/The-day-boy-13-blew-British-soldiers bomb-wheelbarrow.html#ixzz355SUkdpZ

aren't they adorable??

Really how many Muslim children have come here as children and killed people as children?

Fear argument again, this is all you have and even nothing to back this latest one

smelly_bandit wrote:

SEXY MAMA wrote:

oh do shut up with your hatred and ignorance!

hello mama

haven't seen you around lately

been helping facilitate the movement of your brothers and sisters to Syria and iraq perhaps??

Nope just been busy with life in general.

I take it you are not going to apologise for your pathetic comment?

be a man and own up to your mistake

Most are not fleeing any sort of persecution at all.



Just use our asylum rules as a way of getting to stay here and get housed etc while then quickly finding cash in hand work.




Mostly they are economic migrants and scammers.




Nothing more.

Tommy Monk wrote:Most are not fleeing any sort of persecution at all.



Just use our asylum rules as a way of getting to stay here and get housed etc while then quickly finding cash in hand work.




Mostly they are economic migrants and scammers.




Nothing more.

Does that make you sleep better at night?