Off Topic The Politics Thread

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Should the UK remain a part of the EU or leave?

  • Stay in

    Votes: 56 47.9%

  • Get out

    Votes: 61 52.1%
  • Total voters
    117
  • Poll closed .
The death of the young boy in the pictures was utterly tragic, and his brother and his mother. But tell me what makes them more tragic than the other children that have been killed as a result of this conflice? I find it interesting that people trafficker "boats" have been going down in the Mediterranean for some months now taking the lives of all on board including children - the British people say "how terrible" and get on with their lives. SEVENTY people including children died in a lorry - the British people say "how terrible" and get on with their lives. The British people go on holiday and spend their time on the beach with their children - and come back to see the photograph of the poor child on the beach and suddenly, there's a reaction. Why not when the other boats went down? Why not when dead children were being pulled from the lorry? Is it the Facebook generation that can't relate unless it's in a photograph?

And to Stroller I would say - of course taking these refugees will encourage more to come. There are millions on the move in North Africa alone. Those that have come so far as the ones with money. They can afford to pay thousands of pounds to the criminals that transport them. It's been observed by more than one commentator in Hungary that the refugees with their designer clothes and latest iphones are apparently more affluent that most Hungarian peasants. Most are up and coming young men with ambition which is why Germany, a country whose population is declining, is keen to have them. Those that will inevitably follow will not have the same resources and the people traffickers will take less money and pay even less regard to safety.

In my view, a knee-jerk reaction to one photograph is no basis for a foreign aid policy. Some Politicians have made capital out of it. Harriet Harmen feels she can criticise Cameron's policy of setting up refugee camps and safe havens in North Africa - we're the second biggest financial contributor in the world to this project, while Muslim countries like Saudi Arabia do nothing. Alex Salmond (you may remember him - he was premiere of a country that no refugee wants to go to) apparently believes we should take as many people as want to come. What planet is he living on?

The long term solution has to be safe havens. It will cost the EU money and troops from member states will have to be sent - but it's the best use of foreign aid money I can think of.
 
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Stroller said:
Four million people in the UK voted for people such as this piece of dirt.

This is not that much worse, though, than the Tories I have heard today justifying the government's lack of action on the grounds of 'if you help these people it will just encourage more to risk their lives'.
Click to expand...
He talks sense, where as you talk bollox
 
GoldhawkRd said:
The death of the young boy in the pictures was utterly tragic, and his brother and his mother. But tell me what makes them more tragic than the other children that have been killed as a result of this conflice? I find it interesting that people trafficker "boats" have been going down in the Mediterranean for some months now taking the lives of all on board including children - the British people say "how terrible" and get on with their lives. SEVENTY people including children died in a lorry - the British people say "how terrible" and get on with their lives. The British people go on holiday and spend their time on the beach with their children - and come back to see the photograph of the poor child on the beach and suddenly, there's a reaction. Why not when the other boats went down? Why not when dead children were being pulled from the lorry? Is it the Facebook generation that can't relate unless it's in a photograph?

And to Stroller I would say - of course taking these refugees will encourage more to come. There are millions on the move in North Africa alone. Those that have come so far as the ones with money. They can afford to pay thousands of pounds to the criminals that transport them. It's been observed by more than one commentator in Hungary that the refugees with their designer clothes and latest iphones are apparently more affluent that most Hungarian peasants. Most are up and coming young men with ambition which is why Germany, a country whose population is declining, is keen to have them. Those that will inevitably follow will not have the same resources and the people traffickers will take less money and pay even less regard to safety.

In my view, a knee-jerk reaction to one photograph is no basis for a foreign aid policy. Some Politicians have made capital out of it. Harriet Harmen feels she can criticise Cameron's policy of setting up refugee camps and safe havens in North Africa - we're the second biggest financial contributor in the world to this project, while Muslim countries like Saudi Arabia do nothing. Alex Salmond (you may remember him - he was premiere of a country that no refugee wants to go to) apparently believes we should take as many people as want to come. What planet is he living on?

The long term solution has to be safe havens. It will cost the EU money and troops from member states will have to be sent - but it's the best use of foreign aid money I can think of.
Click to expand...

I was working for a TV news agency in the 80s when the Ethiopian famine was taking place. Our Eastern Africa bureau chief at the time was a Kenyan called Mohamed Amin and he agitated for months to try to get the world to take notice of the unfolding tragedy. Eventually, the BBC were persuaded to send Michael Buerk out to report on the situation, and the resulting film of starving children (shot by Amin) was broadcast by the BBC, resulting in Band Aid and other campaigns for help, saving thousands of lives. Sometimes it takes an image to prick the world's conscience, and the drowned Syrian child is an example of this - a bit like the Vietnamese napalm girl.
 
Stroller said:
Four million people in the UK voted for people such as this piece of dirt.

This is not that much worse, though, than the Tories I have heard today justifying the government's lack of action on the grounds of 'if you help these people it will just encourage more to risk their lives'.
Click to expand...
Is there no truth in that last statement
 
As in after they have travelled across apparently safe countries to get to western Europe
TV news not the greatest in nz
How have they all ended up in hungary
 
kiwiqpr said:
As in after they have travelled across apparently safe countries to get to western Europe
TV news not the greatest in nz
How have they all ended up in hungary
Click to expand...

The family of the drowned child in the photo had crossed from Syria into Turkey and was trying to get to Greece. Their ultimate goal was to get to Canada.
 
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