There’s been a lot of handwringing in the Canadian press over the last forty-eight hours after the photo of Aylan Kurdi dead on the beach went viral. (If you don’t know what I’m talking about and don’t want to see a picture of a dead toddler but also want to know what happened, click here.) A lot of “what can we do” stories. All of the major political party leaders currently engaged in our federal election discussed the issue; Justin Trudeau of the Liberals was clearly and honestly upset, Thomas Mulcair of the NDP was almost crying. John Tory announced that he will personally sponsor a Syrian family for refugee status. There is a sense that Something Will Be Done about this.
SPOILER ALERT: nothing will be done about this. Nothing substantive, anyway.
Mulcair was promising if the NDP win the election they’ll immediately allow an additional 10,000 Syrian refugees into Canada. Trudeau upped it to 25,000. Those numbers would represent a vast improvement over Canada’s current and nearly non-existent contribution (2,300 as of last week). Those numbers also represent a pathetic, nearly non-existent response to the Syrian refugee crisis. They can be both at the same time.
Stephen Harper also spoke yesterday on the Syrian refugee crisis and, because he is Canada’s answer to Richard Nixon, lied through his teeth in order to provide a sense of righteousness to Canadian voters. Using misleading metrics he pretended that Canada takes in a disproportionately high number of refugees, which it does not – and then, of course, he explained that the crisis just demonstrates how necessary Canada’s participation in the military action against ISIS is, because so far as Harper is concerned everything demonstrates how Canada’s participation in the military action is terribly important, down to and including his breakfast grapefruit.
All of those responses – Mulcair and Trudeau’s well-intentioned but wholly inadequate promises, Harper’s misdirection to re-emphasize that the real problem is the one he wants to deal with – are a result of one simple fact: this country does not care about poor Syrian refugees, and the entire political class knows it.
Canada accepts far fewer asylum seekers per capita than most first-world countries. As an counter-example, Germany plans to accept over eight hundred thousand refugees this year. Granted, Germany’s population is two and a half times that of Canada’s – but proportionally speaking, Canada could accept 200,000 refugees and still not be accepting as many per capita as Germany is. We take in a paltry amount of refugees, which is all the more embarrassing because Canada used to be at the forefront of refugee homing; in 1986 we became the first country to ever be awarded the UNHCR’s Nansen Refugee Award, typically given to individuals – we’re still the only country that has ever received it – because we housed so many refugees (including over 110,000 Vietnamese boat people).
And the reason we don’t any more is that at some point, Canada The Good fundamentally stopped caring about other people.
Yes, everybody is horrified by the picture of Aylan Kurdi and the idea of drowning children, but the Syrian refugee crisis has been international news for months now and a large part of that story has been the fact that thousands of refugees were drowning while trying to travel by sea to potential safety. Aylan Kurdi is not the first drowned Syrian child refugee; he will not be the last drowned Syrian child refugee. He’s not even the first drowned Syrian child to be photographed; here, for example, you can click on a story from almost two years ago and see a drowned Syrian child refugee. And in time, Canadians will manage to forget about that photo of Aylan Kurdi.
Trudeau and Mulcair know full well that 10,000 and 25,000 are amazingly inadequate numbers for dealing with this crisis. They’re not stupid. Stephen Harper knows it too, and as much as I dislike Stephen Harper I do in fact believe that he feels awful about this. But they all also know that if they proposed a truly proportional response to the Syrian refugee crisis – or the Rohingya refugee crisis, or the Nigerian refugee crisis, or the Congolese refugee crisis, or the Malinese refugee crisis, or even the hey-they’re-white Ukrainian refugee crisis – and said “Canada can reasonably afford to settle several hundred thousand refugees here,” they would be political toast. A large and politically active number of Canadians have become able to care about other people only to the point where the costs of caring about them do not significantly impact them: whether that impact comes in the form of slightly higher taxes or depressed home values because all these Syrians moved in across the street doesn’t really matter. Hell, I’m doing it right now because I was refusing to post a link to the picture of the dead kid, so you know what, here you go. Click on it and look at it, because morally speaking, you probably deserve to look at it.
I don’t know what the answer is; I’m not even going to pretend to guess. But Canada has become a grasping, selfish country. Some might say it’s the result of decades of conservatism or neoliberalism or whatever; I think that gives those philosophies too much credit. I think it’s simple: if you give people an excuse to be selfish, then as a general rule they will be. We’re pack animals, maybe, but pack animals don’t think in terms of the species, only the immediate pack. And we have trouble even managing the latter.
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As much as I’d like to say you’re wrong, the cynic in me knows better… we have fallen from where we once were. Too many people will just turn their backs on this.
It’s not just Canada.
It’s the world and everyone in it.
There are no longer any shining cities on the hill… the only ones that exist guard their light jealously by raising walls up to the sky so that nothing of it can be seen.
(Oh and welcome back MGK)
Stephen HarperTony Abbot also spoke yesterday on the Syrian refugee crisis and, because he isCanada’sAustralia’s answer toRichard NixonGeorge W Bush, lied through his teeth in order to provide a sense of righteousness toCanadianAustralian voters. Using misleading metrics he pretended thatCanadaAustralia takes in a disproportionately high number of refugees, which it does not – and then, of course, he explained that the crisis just demonstrates how necessaryCanada’sAustralia’s participation in the military action against ISIS is, because so far asHarperTony is concerned everything demonstrates howCanada’sAustralia’s participation in the military action is terribly important, down to and including his breakfast grapefruit.Oh, look how easy it is to swap Canada for Australia currently.
and as much as I dislike Stephen Harper I do in fact believe that he feels awful about this.
Ahh, here we have a clear difference, because I honestly don’t believe that Tony Abbott gives the slightest damn about any human being other than himself, and just maybe his Dark Lord and Lady, Gina Rinehart and Rupert Murdoch.
Even then, it’s probably more about how they can affect his pitiful hide than any actual affection.
That said, based on your post, Canada is still better off than Down Under, because you don’t have such winning human beings in government as Senator Eric ““Christians are the most persecuted group in the world, and especially in the Middle East” Abetz and Cory “The father sent them on that boat so the father could get dental treatment. They were in no fear, they were in no persecution and they were in no danger in Turkey.” Bernardi.
Look Bernardi in particular up if you want to feel ill.
They were in no fear, they were in no persecution and they were in no danger in Turkey.” Bernardi.
Look Bernardi in particular up if you want to feel ill.
To be fair Turkey is pretty safe unless you think just because it’s brown there a war over there
@ratman:
Pretty safe. Unless you happen to be a child trying to sell tissues to people to pay the rent on the fetid hole where you and your family live.
Still, not being shot at, so much safer than Syria.
MGK, what do you make of this video of Chris Alexander being interviewed about the crisis? I don’t know much about him or the CBC. http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/chris-alexander-immigration-syria-refugee-crisis-conservatives-1.3213514