Where the dream ended for Aylan Kurdi ...
It arrived in one photo: one harrowing image, from a beach near the Turkish Mediterranean resort of Bodrum. There in the surf was a lifeless body, a little boy of three years old who, along with his elder brother, had drowned attempting to make the crossing to the Greek island of Kos. His name was Aylan Kurdi. His legacy has been to hold up a mirror to the ranting and frothing press pack and expose their repellant behaviour.
... here with his elder brother, who also drowned
The further tragedy is that our country did nothing to help Aylan Kurdi while he was still alive. Even when the German Government, and the country’s top-selling paper Bild, campaigned under the slogan “Wir Helfen” (“We’re Helping”), the Sun was yesterday crowing “BAD NEWS … Migrants laying siege to Budapest … GOOD NEWS … They want to go to Germany not UK”. They were only “migrants”, and they didn’t care.
This is how much the Sun really cares ...
Even in today’s Daily Mail - yes, the inmates of the Northcliffe House bunker had the chance to pull the column, but they too don’t give a shit - Stephen “Miserable Git” Glover airily opines “Before Germany lectures us about refugees, perhaps it should reflect on its own past” before he graciously concedes “Doubtless it is small-minded of me”. Yes Stephen, it f***ing well is small minded (the Mail’s craven editorial today blames the EU).
... so save us the handwringing drivel
Faced with the photo of the drowned toddler, though, the Sun has stopped crowing. But it’s too little, too late. So when petulant victimhood player Dan Hodges bleats “The Sun has called on the government to help the refugees. Just for once could we put down the pitchforks and say ‘well done’”, he too can f*** right off. It’s too late, Dan. Aylan Kurdi and his brother are dead. Morte. All the years of bigotry cannot be instantly cleaned away.
Yes, she didn't care ...
And then there are those who didn’t give a shit, and are now jumping on the bandwagon to generate a few thousand clicks. Yes, I’m looking at you, the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines and your repulsive rabble at the Guido Fawkes blog, trying to gain the moral high ground by putting the boot in on your fellow Sun pundit Katie Hopkins. You too weren’t fussed when she called refugees “cockroaches”.
... and you didn't care that she didn't. Until today
Some politicians - all the Labour leadership candidates, led by Yvette Cooper, for instance - did not need prompting to call for us to take more refugees. Honourable mentions on the right must go to Sam Bowman of the ASI, and LBC presenter Iain Dale. But as for our Prime Minister, and the rest of the right-wing press, to paraphrase Ms Hopkins, show me your lame excuses, show me your weasel efforts to shift blame, show me your crocodile tears, you just don’t care.
12 comments:
What. sort of a nation have we become that our PM, who has had every privilege, needs to be shamed into offering help to refugees?
From his body language on TV yesterday, he looks as though he's had a very tiring beach holiday and doesn't want to be bothered with anything difficult.
Well Dave, this is difficult, you are PM, so get on with it.
I have signed the online petition - I wish I thought it would make a difference.
As the descendant of Huguenot refugees who were given sanctuary in this country, I am ashamed to be British.
Tim,
I have never felt more shame for my country than I do right now. I don't mind admitting it has been accompanied by an equal share of tears and outrage at the sight of that tiny, helpless body washing up like so much flotsam and jetsam.
The truly dreadful thing is that it is "only" the latest symptom of what has been done to millions of innocent people. There are many more much worse sights.
I am ashamed of David Cameron and his party of dessicated, cold heartlessness.
I am ashamed of Andrew Mitchell and his grubby money calculations, a man who knows the price of "asylum" and not the value of a single human being.
I am ashamed of Tony Blair and his supporting gang of mass-murdering war criminals who played a crucial role in triggering this latest human misery.
I am ashamed of a political system that is rotten to the core.
I am ashamed of the capitalist system we allow to rule our lives, a system which knows no limits to its avaricious evil.
And I am ashamed of the mainstream media and gutless hacks who underpin the whole disgusting, rotten mess. Murdoch's and Dacre's boot boys and girls are the worst of the lot, but only by a small margin. Broadcast media isn't far behind.
You think you have seen the last of this? Not, literally, on the lives of helpless children. Just wait until Ukraine is deliberately wound up, together with other Eastern and African targets. It can and will eventually get much, much worse.
This is NOT "a refugee problem." It is a question of a millenium old Western "culture" that will leave nobody alone to live in peace, a "culture" that will rob your childhood, your mature adulthood and your old age. All of it for profits and power.
Shame on Britain. Shame on the West.
To be fair to Shiny Dave, he has a plan. Bring peace to the Middle East. I wonder why nobody has thought of that before.
Is this the same Dan Hodges who only yesterday morning on 5live was saying we should pull up the drawbridge by removing any assistance ships in the Med?
He then fell into the "that's what they did in Australia and it worked" argument. Forgetting that the distance between the EU and a non EU country by sea is about 3 miles.
You have to hand it to the Sun.
After all these years they can still find a crack where they can sink even lower through the nearest gutter.
And all this before Cruella is officially back in the chair. How very depressing.
They have been discussing the situation on the Jeremy Vine show. Among the comments on his Facebook page, there are quite a few who are saying the photo is a propaganda stunt. In other words, a hoax. He then went on to call the Afgan interpreters who need to be removed from Afgan for their safety as "migrants." I'm glad I'm home now and don't have to listen to such disgusting tripe.
Hope he sprains his ankle with all that dancing.
@Ann Kelly
The Jeremy Vine show is an audible version of the Daily Mail so, don't expect anything other than xenophobic bile, right-of-sensible political claptrap and people calling themselves doctors when they're really 'nutritionists' with PhDs selling quack solutions to the worried well.
Re-blogged this on The Union.
I need to lie down.
"PIERS MORGAN: Don't shut your eyes to this picture because WE did this. Now we have to make it right"
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3221090/PIERS-MORGAN-Don-t-shut-eyes-picture-did-make-right.html#ixzz3kgyeNF74
Why, incidentally, would refugees have to be a "burden" to be shouldered? A number were professionals and skilled workers in the countries they'd still be living in, if not for the illegal war in Iraq and environmental problems, authored here. And even those who couldn't adapt so well would work extremely hard, since by definition they're determined to survive and carry on in life (which is why they weren't butchered long ago).
If not for the absurd NuLab restrictions on asylum seekers working, they'd be making a useful contribution to society rather than having to exist on a pittance of benefits. They are blamed for it when they are only out in that state by the government!
Well said, Tim. The hypocrisy of the press and some politicians is breathtaking even by their own standards. An honourable mention should also be made of Tim Farron, who was stressing a humane approach to the Calais refugees from the start of the problems there.
In his latest column, the odious Littlejohn uses the expression "photogenic dead child".
Post a Comment