I'm taking a step away from poetry tonight because I am angry and disgusted with the attitude shown by people who ought to know better.
I was in my local club this afternoon when the conversation turned to immigration and the current Syrian refugee situation.
A person who I thought of as a decent guy said (and I paraphrase somewhat as I was so shocked that I couldn't take in what he was saying at first) we should invent a gas to drop on Muslim countries to kill them all, that would solve the problem, he then went on to say maybe we could use the refugee boats as target practice and the fact that there aren't many "darkies" around here is because we don't want them here.
Now I'm a fairly broad minded chap but those sentiments I find abhorrent.
How anyone could even think such things never mind say them is beyond my comprehension. These are people he was talking about; fellow human beings who eat, sleep, make love, laugh and cry. They are not some weird alien species to be disposed of like trash or left to die at the hands of people smugglers in leaky boats unfit to be used on The Serpentine never mind The Mediterranean Sea.
The thing that struck me even more so was that others were agreeing with him and they were amused that I found what they were saying and agreeing with so utterly wrong. It isn't the first time that people have said such things, non-white folk are regularly referred to in pejorative terms with absolute casualness. One chap said similar things the other night and when I remonstrated with him he said that as he worked hard all week he was entitled to come out for a beer and say what he liked since it is a free country. I beg to differ.
I can't find it in myself to go back into that club any time soon, if ever. If those are the sort of people I have to mix with in order to have a beer I'd rather go without and sit in my flat with Thomas Kitty.
Such beliefs have no place in civilised society and make me embarrassed to come from the same area as those who hold them. I don't hate anyone but I certainly hate the opinions they expound.
I despair when I hear such utter ignorant uninformed piffle and wish I could find somewhere to be where such attitudes are frowned upon. I think I may struggle to do that.
I'll finish now and head off to bed much sadder than I was when I woke up this morning.
Until next time. Peace and Love. ttfn x
What you have experienced is exactly the sort of Xenophobic bullshit that my recent FB status was directed at. This is not a simple problem and there are no simple solutions. I doubt we would agree on what the solution is but uninformed prejudices have no place in trying to resolve it.
ReplyDeleteSuggesting we resort to the sort of genocide that our parents and grandparents fought to rid us of is the home ground of the intellectually impaired and the hard of thinking. It will never prevail in a civilised democracy. However it may have seemed at the time this is not a view shared by many. You don't have to look far to see it outweighed by more compassionate views.