Many have taken the liberty of writing their opinion of the new development in the Refugee Crisis and I am no exception. Originally, the United States had planned to relieve 10,000 refugees in addition to the 70,000 foreigners already accepted into the country annually. However, in light of the Paris terrorist attacks, many states have declared that Syrian refugees will be unwelcome.
America has a right to be afraid, but not the right to deny freedom. Despite the attacks in Paris, none of the other countries have gone back on their promise to take in refugees. Germany, especially, is taking in a generous amount, and they have a significantly smaller body of land. Speaking of land mass, most of the refugees are located in Greece.
As you might recall, Greece is having some issues of its own. Just to name a few: they are millions of dollars in debt, might be voted out of the UN, have a broken economy, and have millions of refugees popping up on their shores. If nothing else, we should take refugees because we are one of the biggest political powers in the world. Greece needs relief, and we can’t send the refugees back to Syria. Politically, I don’t know we have a choice but to take them.
Political obligation should not be the main reason we accept refugees, though. Are we not the land of foreigners and refugees? We are so quick to brag of the refugees we rescue and hide the shame of those we turn away (most notably the Jewish refugees from Nazi-occupied Europe). We should be glad to embrace these refugees, these people who have risked their lives for freedom.
The Statue of Liberty, America’s most famous monument, is captioned:
“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
Do these words not apply to the Syrian refugees? Does the golden door not open for them, too? I’m not saying we shouldn’t be cautious. Quite the opposite; I think the refugees allowed into our country should be screened to the best of our ability and successfully assimilated into American culture (i.e. retain their Syrian heritage while becoming completely American). If all this is done, we should have nothing to fear from them. We will gain brothers, wives, friends, artists, and teachers and lose nothing! It’s possible that terrorists are hiding amongst the refugees, but it’s certain that terrorists are already hiding in our current civilian population. Should we punish the innocent because we fear the guilty? Should we shun those who yearn to breathe freely as we cower to ISIS? No.
We are the United States of America: land of the free, home of the brave. That should mean something.
