Europe's migrant problem
 

I'm surprised no one has started a topic on this. It's all over the news here. Thousands of migrants trying to get to Germany, England, and Sweden, among other countries. Greece is overrun, Hungary erecting a fence, thousands of Syrians and Africans drowning in the Med or dying in lorries. What the heck's going on over there?

Refugees trying to get away from a nutjob organization that was left after a certain war Europe didn't start left a power vacuum.
Certain nutjobs are abusing the situation to smugle themselves back in Europe to make a mess.
Certain nutjobs abusing the situation to score cheap political points.
Certain morons listening to above nutjobs, making quite heated debates at the pub.
Certain morons going the other way of the spectrum crying about the poor refugees but wouldn't lift a finger to help them. FB justice warriors.
Me stuck in the middle waiting for certain ''experts on Europe'' to pop up in this thread giving me a headache.

But good point Neal, Europe is right now facing a crisis that could be handled better and hopefully we won't screw this one up. We can't turn those refugees away, it's barbarism. But we can't feed and clothes them out of our own money we bloodily need to fix the financial mess that still haunts our economies.
We can have our armies to set up camps and open a voluntary donations accounts. We're known for our solidarity. A European will rather give €50 voluntarily than see €20 of his taxmoney go to outsiders. And then have our and your inteligence combing the camps for known ISIS fighters.
But that makes too much sense and anyone trying it will take flak from the left and right :nope:

No European has started the thread because they don't want to appear racist.

Migrant workers I welcome, as I'm sure do most. Benefit-seeking migrants (come to Europe to be given money (sending some back to family), clothes, and accommodation, I do not welcome*. We aren't in the best fiscal situation, we already give away far too much in aid to other countries (India, I am looking at you, any country that can willingly put craft into space does not need more money, it merely needs to reassign funds better).

*These benefit tourists are under the impression this is what they will get. Interviews in Africa show that UK has a reputation for giving all-comers the life of Riley but in reality that isn't necessarily the case.

Now to asylum seekers. They should stop in the first safe place and plead asylum there. Therefore in the UK we should only get asylum seekers from Nordic states, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, France, Spain and Portugal at a push, Ireland, and Iceland. I don't think we should not take asylum seekers, but they should be distributed throughout Europe (I want to say evenly, but I mean on a per capita basis), nobody should actually arrive here and plead.

I know other countries have it worse than Britain. I'd love to hear Eichhornchen's take as he lives near a high migrant area, I know some areas of my home town are now taken over by seemingly endless rows of Polish shops and gangs (groups perhaps is less inflammatory as there's little 'gang' action).

Well, a certain country was destabilized not so long ago by a foreign power that then left it without a proper competent military to fend for itself while another neighboring country went up in a civil war. A certain ultra Islamic organization took the chance and started a holy war overrunning large parts of both countries and terrorizing the citizens who have neither faith in the extremists nor in their corrupt and/or incompetent governments to safe them from the savages. So there is a mass exodus to Europe. The refugees will of course want to stay even after the wars are long over and we have another couple of million Muslim citizens in parallel societies.:yeah:


Don't get me wrong, of course I feel the need to help them and have already donated clothes and money to relief organizations to help the refugees but I fully expect a fist in my face and a dagger in my back in 10 years from now as thanks.:-?

I did mention it in the Terrorism thread as being the other side of the problem caused by Daesh.

It's pretty sick what happens in Europe especially with the human trafficking gone wrong like the Truck in Austria with the aprox 70 refugees choking to death in that small truck :down:, the Neo Nazi's in Germany burning down an asylum centre :nope: and the UN just expects it'll eventually blow over. :damn:

Bush did it, check. :arrgh!:

Actually, I am not disagreeing, the war in Iraq was a mistake. As you remember, I supported it. There was intel on WMD, Saddam did nothing to dispel that, and I am naïve when it comes to helping people under the boot of a dictator. You know, the whole "if someone had shot Hitler in 1934"*; but we who thought the people of Iraq had some kind of sense and vision would have seized the chance to become a free and prosperous country...overestimated them by a mile. :shifty: As well as did not understand all the crazy religiousosity, middle ages customs and sectarian hatred. But, I guess if you want to go back just a little further, European colonization....:hmmm:

But that aside, there have been wars, famines, and desperation in Africa and the Muddle East for decades, that's not new. What is new is the current and growing migration pattern. One analyst on NPR said that these thousands of migrants are only the tip of the spear, the hardy first pilgrims who will face death to get there. He said once Europe begins to open the doors and make the path safer and resettle the migrants, a real flood will begin. :06:

We have Mexico and Central America, you guys are facing the wave of the rest of the third world.

There is a movement to shame the rich Gulf States into accepting some of these refugees. Here you have the crowded nations of Europe with a Christian or secular history taking in millions of Muslims while their rich Muslim neighbors look away. So much for brotherly Islamic values.

Saudi Arabia is a huge, empty country, much of it desert, certainly, but it supports 27 million people with a per capita GDP of more than $31,000. The United Arab Emirates is smaller, but it is also awash in oil wealth and could take a significant number. And the overflow of Syrian refugees that aren’t resettled in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait or the UAE could be settled, with Gulf money, in other huge, empty Arab countries, like Algeria and Sudan. The 22 member states of the Arab League cover 5 million square miles. Surely, somewhere in there they can find space for displaced Syrians. But, I think they are only too glad to see them moving on.

I suspect as with the decades-old Palestinian refugee problem, Saudi Arabia and the rest will talk the talk, but balk at the walk. The only exception being poor, over-burdened Jordan.

I agree with all you say, HB.

In Boston yesterday I passed a young guy painting a shop front, making it look nice: "Polish Shop" said his new sign, plus another in the window. I thought "Good for you, mate and I hope you do well with it". There were no end of empty shops in the town until recently, and now just about all of them have been opened again. Mostly, it seems, by Polish or other Eastern European immigrants.

We noticed, a few years back, some exotic-sounding accents around town... just now and again. Today it seems that half the people you come across have an Eastern European accent; it's very common to hear it now. They look different too, and usually very good-looking; the women are often gorgeous, including Granny. And they give every impression of being a galvanising presence: fit, active and willing to belong (there were enough stories about the migrants pitching in to help the other residents during the floods in Boston a couple of years back). But at the same time, you can't deny the great pressure on resources they've brought to the area. Not their conscious decision to do so, of course, since it means that they're in the queue with everyone else.

But I hate to hear the muttered comment about the "foreigners" because, guess what, we heard the very same complaint in the very same tone levelled at us, as incomers from the Southeast 30 years ago. Like many other "foreigners" from places like Kent and Sussex, we came then because the houses were so much cheaper, and we'd been squeezed out by the proximity of our home towns to London and its burgeoning population of commuting high-earning house-buyers, so we were ourselves migrants.

No-one except other southerners comments about my accent now... I've got my feet well and truly under the table here and, as one old local countryman once told me, "You've paid your dues, boy". These immigrants are, from what I can see, setting about paying their dues with a will. Things change... suck it up.

Yes, and Obama finished it by pulling out while the country was still an unstable steaming pile of cow dung. I don't know who was more stupid.:/\\!!
What did they expect would happen in a power vacuum in the middle east?

Oh wait a minute now if I remember correctly everyone here, including europeans, were hot to trot aboard the Arab Spring band wagon. Everyone was shouting with glee 'down with dictators', 'bring down those current governments and self proclaimed rulers for life', 'power to the people', etc etc. blah blah. Seems to me everyone back then, including europeans, were all for destabilizing the region.

You got exactely what you asked for. Or are you all now trying to say the immigrants flooding your shores are just coming from Iraq?

Great topic with some honest, thoughtful and interesting views thus far.

I'll leave it at that from myself to enable any potential future moderator intervention.

most european countries just dont have the resources to help the migrants, like here in belgium for example.
most countries have problems to help their own people and everyone expects that those countries help the migrants.
okay they need help, but it always has to come from the same countries.
why arent saudi arabia or dubai or those other rich countries helping them?

You sure about that?

I'm not afraid to appear racist, as I know I am not.
However, I didn't start that topic cause it pisses me of.
In Germany it seems we have only two sides.
Those on the very right, acting as if every single refugee is a criminal just waiting for an opportunity to strike and those on the far left, acting as if all of them are poor poor victims of someone or something and need all the love in the world.
The truth, and the more realistic point of view I dare to say, is somewhere in the middle - yet I hear no one speaking or thinking like that in, say TV talk shows, newspapers, articles, ...

~400m from where I live, we have a small refugee camp, build of containers, just a small one really.
I am glad it is there and I hope people who need help will get it there as this is what humans should do - help another.
Additionally I hope no nutcases are among those refugees.
So far I heard nothing negative.

Haha... good one.

http://religionnerd.com/wp-content/u...itchcraft2.jpg

Saudi Arabia... one of the worlds buttholes.

You've got a very selective memory then as a lot of Europeans have actually warned about the destabilization and the risks that are involved. (can't find the proper links anymore but here is one I found after a quick search:http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/prin...d.php?t=206939)

Not all refugees are from Iraq but a good portion. The majorities actually are from Iraq and Syria.