Refugee

refugee.png

Here's a video by a group called One Earth. The fact is there are few who understand the truth about the current refugee situation, the context, the reasons. Most people have no fucking idea. Our government "leaders" are psychopaths who don't care about the lives they destroy, remember Madeleine Albright, hatefully. None of them care, it's a big game to them. While children die, people suffer.

[video:https://youtu.be/R-PB20ZAEp4]

Share
up
0 users have voted.

Comments

Keep on keeping on. The day is coming . . .

up
0 users have voted.

Only connect. - E.M. Forster

Big Al's picture

@dancingrabbit good to see ya. You're absolutely right, the day is coming.

up
0 users have voted.
janis b's picture

I hope this music offering matches the sentiment in some way. Thank you Al.

[video:https://youtu.be/oUUANzSB2Uc]

up
0 users have voted.
janis b's picture

@janis b

to accomodate the pain that is experienced by so many innocent people.

Thank you again, for bringing attention to what is so tragic, in such a sensitive way.

up
0 users have voted.
Big Al's picture

@janis b The picture I posted of the man with his kids, I'm sure many have seen. I've posted it before. I can't forget this picture and the look on that man's face. Pure anguish. I've known and know people like that, people from other countries, people of other religions and countries. I know they're just humans, the same as all of us, and to watch our government continually do things to cause this type of misery is very hard.

up
0 users have voted.

@Big Al man in the boat wants to come to America, establish Sharia law, and subjugate American women.

up
0 users have voted.

The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.

Big Al's picture

@UntimelyRippd I've seen many comments referring to the refugees as "savages". It's incredible to think so much of the population is still stuck in the middle ages.

up
0 users have voted.
janis b's picture

@Big Al

Seeing and knowing of the anguish and misery is very painful.

up
0 users have voted.
Oldest Son Of A Sailor's picture

The Message is Strong Today...
Everyone Get On The Peace Train...

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLG91tOLPdQ]

up
0 users have voted.
"Do you realize the responsibility I carry?
I'm the only person standing between Richard Nixon and the White House."

~John F. Kennedy~
Economic: -9.13, Social: -7.28,
janis b's picture

another day ...

@Oldest Son Of A Sailor

[video:https://youtu.be/Az7kDXa7lLk]

up
0 users have voted.
snoopydawg's picture

their leaders and troops have done to way too many countries. And this carnage wasn't done to defend this country, defend our freedoms or spread freedom and democracy to other countries, it was done so that corporations can steal those people's resources, overthrow elected leaders who won't bow down to our government's wishes or to make Israel the only superpower in the middle east.
Since 2011 over 400,000 Syrians have either been killed, maimed or had to flee their country.
Yes definitely remember Madeline Albright and so many other people who were okay with the results of their votes for the carnage and suffering in this video.
And damn the people who say that this country shouldn't have to accept any of the refugees who wouldn't be refugees if this country and its allies hadn't committed these atrocities.
You are right Big Al that people don't have a fucking idea about what this country has done to other countries since its inception.
Or why there are people who want to attack our country and give them a taste of what they and their families have experienced.
While it's nice to see people finally protesting the government, where the hell were they when Obama was doing the same things that Trump did in Yemen?
I agree with Rev. Wright.
Listen to his whole speech and not just the sound byte that the media quoted.

up
0 users have voted.

Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

mimi's picture

@snoopydawg @snoopydawg
too, but I wonder, if he had ever heard the voices of Africans, who flee from or suffer under their own misery in their own home countries, in which the misery was caused by their own African 'black' governments (who have decided to be serfs of colonialists to save their own butts for their own profit, including clergy). When do folks flee and try to survive in foreign countries, they have no clue about and don't even understand the new host country's language and culture and history?

I believe it's when the 'future to-be-refugee' believes that in his own local environment of his current home country there is no hope for him/her to 'make a living of his desires and liking'. It is that general and that fuzzy.

For some that means escaping a situation where they can barely make a buck without being killed or starved or accept life-long dependencies, for other it means to escape dependencies from their own local environments, be it very personal ones, family, tribal or other cultural driven ones, before even general, economic or political ones are counted.

It's always personal and always local, a personal decision, driven by personal perceptions of your own local situation. Who cares WHY a person decides to flee and emigrate out of a place? Who UNDERSTANDS why a person flees"?

Nobody really, the whole vetting process of refugees is a futile, arrogant and a fallacious endeavour imo. The 'vetting side' and the 'refugee side' they all can fake it, so much so in these days with all its dangerous technologies, that it becomes an idiocy to believe you can even do justice trying to 'vet' someone.

As Al said, nobody seems to understand the context under which a person becomes a refugee. All of what Rev. Wright said is true, but it is not all what has to be said, imo.

Try to ask why a person flees from its own home and country, he had roots in? I think, if you honestly try to listen and if the refugee would honestly tell you why, you would hear millions of different personal reasons and all of them have very important meaning ... to themselves first, to politicians second.

Why would many black Africans flee and seek asylum, work permissions and 'their luck' in the United States? It's a question Rev. Wright has not touched in this speech, or may be I have missed it.

I always asked myself why the Germans fled to the "regions in Germany that where under American occupation" during the end of wwII and afterwards? Do you understand that Merkel switched from West to East twice after the war? Just because you may understand the evil of your own country's 'empire', doesn't mean you understand your new host country's evil 'empire'. How many people live long enough and had the experience of living and understanding two different evil 'empires'?

Al, I miss your old avatar. I remember seeing a kind man working in his garden. What has become out of your garden? I miss good, ripe tomatoes here in Northern Germany. I miss my garden.

Sigh, I feel so defeated. First time in my life. But, there will be another day, it is said. I wait til tomorrow. May be then I understand better what's going on with us. And sorry, re-reading my comment I think I repeated the same thought several times, that was unintentional, so I leave it as it came out of my mind.

up
0 users have voted.
Big Al's picture

@mimi @mimi flee your home and country with just a few belongings.

Thanks mimi, maybe I'll put my old avatar up when I start gardening again this spring. Can't wait for it either, almost time to start some seeds.

up
0 users have voted.
mimi's picture

@Big Al @Big Al
many of them had no belonging to begin with, others came with diamonds hidden in the seams of their clothes. Changing your environment, where you had roots in, is always some sort of misery on a personal level. Depends on how deep your roots were in your home to begin with. It's hard to imagine any other person's misery and then one doesn't realize that one's imagination does often not compare to the realities. I don't believe anymore to know what's in the heart and mind of a person who emigrates, immigrates or flees. It's just very nice to experience when other folks try to win your heart and mind and are kind and try to protect your human rights. And that's often a matter of luck, as banal as it sounds.

up
0 users have voted.
WaterLily's picture

@snoopydawg But fuck Madeline Albright. To use her own lovely words, I hope there's a special place in hell for her. (I try really hard not to be this angry but she and her fellow warmongers make it impossible for me to succeed).

up
0 users have voted.
CB's picture

@snoopydawg
we were being sold a bill of goods.

up
0 users have voted.

for everything you post. It's hard to find words to describe the absence of humanity on the part of so many people in our government leadership. It's so foreign. Most of us grow up with exposure to love, compassion, identification and understanding of the people we know and meet. I don't think we have the language to describe people who don't have that. We don't know how to react or respond. And we've set up a system by which they become wealthy by being craven killers.

I'm hoping the internet is going to help us sort this out until we find a way to pull the plug on these people, these psychopaths who are, as Eisenhower called them, the merchants of death.

up
0 users have voted.
Oldest Son Of A Sailor's picture

"You can't bargain with the truth
'Cause whether you're rich or you're poor
You're going to meet at the same door;
You're going to know the real score - in the end

And if you want to help your fellow man
You better start with what is in your hand"

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fy_mytEQB-Q]

up
0 users have voted.
"Do you realize the responsibility I carry?
I'm the only person standing between Richard Nixon and the White House."

~John F. Kennedy~
Economic: -9.13, Social: -7.28,
mimi's picture

@Oldest Son Of A Sailor
to google Cat Stevens. I so much regret to not have lived in the US in the sixties and seventies. It would be so much easier to understand many comments here. Just found this
Cat Stevens live .Williamsburg.Virginia.1976
and wanted to know why Cat Stevens didn't sing and perform for thirty years.
I recognize songs and most probably he was featured here, but I can't keep up with the music offerings here at the EB and have not own memories like most of you probably have. So sad, I need two lives to listen and read all about it.
Yusuf Islam Cat Stevens, Festival de Viña del Mar 2015, Somos el Canal Histórico

up
0 users have voted.
Oldest Son Of A Sailor's picture

@mimi
When he underwent a conversion to Islam in 1977 and left behind his pop star music career...
He felt that placing himself on a stage was elevating himself beyond what he should be...
Instead he used the money from his music career as an Ambassador of Islam, Assisting Refugees in many conflicts from Bosnia to Syria, and starting and maintaining 4 Islamic Schools in Great Britain...
Happily today he's returned to music realizing that it is a tool which he can use promoting his Faith in God, and Peace & Brotherhood of All Mankind, along with raising funds for those in need...

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMls9j5unFA]

“Trump is no accident,” chuckles Yusuf Islam, almost indulgently. “He’s meant to raise the flag of Trumpism, and he calls it a new flag, but it’s actually the same old flag, of paranoia and fear, and it’s basically ignorance.

“However, you wouldn’t be a truly moral person if you didn’t believe in forgiving him. Let’s hope.”

If I wasn’t sure that God wasn’t in control of the final destiny, I’d be very scared,” he admits. “Faith is a very important component of human life and ambition.

“If you only see life as a journey towards the grave, you might make a lot of misjudgments along the way. I think it’s important for people to take action, rather than simply sitting back, thinking my religion is better than yours.”
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/yusuf-islam-refugee-crisis_uk_5750...

And one more Refugee Song...

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGthQ73VPHQ]

up
0 users have voted.
"Do you realize the responsibility I carry?
I'm the only person standing between Richard Nixon and the White House."

~John F. Kennedy~
Economic: -9.13, Social: -7.28,
gulfgal98's picture

Is the number one reason I became active in a Peace vigil. Most Americans are clueless as to the death and destruction our government has spread worldwide. One of my personal reasons for participating in the Peace vigil was to try to educate people about the massive amount of suffering we are spreading throughout the world in support of empire.

Lately, Al, you have been hitting them out of the park with your essays here. I really appreciate the hard work you have put into them and your sharing them with us.

up
0 users have voted.

Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy

@gulfgal98

I second the emotion/appreciation!

And am so very, grateful for C-9 and the spirit/sanity/people here as one of those huddling on this little life preserver in the swamp, so to speak, forming such a great platform on which to build from.

up
0 users have voted.

Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.

Lookout's picture

has caused many to become refugees. The ME has been hit particularly hard:

Unlike other parts of the world where climate change has led to milder winters, in the Middle East it has intensified summer extremes, studies show. Daytime highs, notes an academic study published in the Netherlands in April, could rise by 7ºC by the end of the century. Another study (by the UN) predicted that the number of sandstorms in Iraq would increase from 120 to 300 a year. The UN’s Environmental Programme also estimates that the harsh climate claims 230,000 lives annually in west Asia (the Arabian Peninsula and the Fertile Crescent), making it a bigger killer than war.

http://www.economist.com/news/middle-east-and-africa/21703269-more-war-c...

As climate changes expect more migration and refugees. And here we are perpetrating a war for pipelines and more oil in order to accelerate warming. Kinda crazy don't you think?

We are both foolish and inhumane.

up
0 users have voted.

“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

is just heartbreaking. All of those lives ruined for the greed of the 1%.

Add to that, all of the pain and anguish of our service members, who will never be the same, after having served as an instrument of policy.

If there is any justice in the universe, these 1%er warmongers will get theirs one day.

up
0 users have voted.
Arrow's picture

I've been posting about peace a lot lately.
My current avatar is probably 'too inflammatory' for 'polite company'.
It's important to push the message out there. Move people out of their comfort one.
I posted that pic as a comment over on TOP and got blasted for not blaming Trump for it.
Voices for peace need to be heard.

up
0 users have voted.

I want a Pony!

Raggedy Ann's picture

We must not forget that we, too, might one day be refugees. I'm already feeling it - most evenings, Raggedy Andy talks about leaving America. We'll see.

You comment about starting seeds for your garden reminded me of the saying that goes something like, they thought they could bury us but found we were seeds - I'm feeling like that now under the regime that is trying to bury everything America has ever stood for.

Resistance! Power to the People!

In solidarity!

up
0 users have voted.

"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11

PriceRip's picture

          Those that need to see this won't see this no matter how many times this is shown to them.

          Look at the man's face: What do you see?

          I cannot even try to describe what I see without feeling a rage that is way too powerful to contain. I cannot (will not) understand those that are so psychopathic (or sociopathic) as to not understand the suffering caused by our actions.

          I have been told that I just suffer from liberal (or insert your own favorite identity designation) guilt, and I should just ignore this, because the world is a cruel place. There are several (perhaps too many) people to whom I can no longer speak. Maybe that is a good thing as I do not trust my ability for self control. The world can be a better place, and we have to figure out how to make it so for the sake of us all:

[video:https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=VxbNdzJDxqk]

up
0 users have voted.
Big Al's picture

@PriceRip

up
0 users have voted.

@PriceRip has told me the same in essence - I am "too sensitive" and "far too negative" for my own good. And yes, there are people now who I find I have no desire to speak to, including my stepmother who's lost to me in her right wing nut job world. As one of my old friends once asked me though, why do I feel the need to have a relationship with these people? They do nothing for me and we don't have much in common so is there a need for that relationship? While that may sound harsh he's spot on for the way I feel right now.

up
0 users have voted.

Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur

Raggedy Ann's picture

@lizzyh7 you cannot pick your relatives, but you can pick whether or not to have a relationship with them. My brother told me that and I'm with him!

up
0 users have voted.

"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11

PriceRip's picture

@lizzyh7
          There is always hope for reform. But unless you are a professional it is often most healthy to limit exposure to toxins.

          I prefer the notion of the village as the family unit. If we all adopted that approach · · ·

up
0 users have voted.
mimi's picture

@PriceRip @PriceRip
that I was probably manipulated very much by some smart demagogues, because I was a 'victim' of my own guilt feelings for what my parent generation (Germans, ie Nazis) allowed to happen silently.

I remember I was shocked to hear that from a fellow kind Jewish person, who I didn't know and just happened to walk and talk with for 20 minutes and wondered afterwards, if what he said might have been true.

I feel that 'not wanting to be called a racist' made me accept some manipulation from some black Americans and that it took me a long time to tell myself to not 'believing' in their innocent tactics anymore, because I recognized that kind of emotional manipulative efforts.

(My first reaction to Al's photo, he posted, was similar. Having worked in an msm TV news studio I had an overload of images and video clips to look at that were so obviously produced to manipulate your feelings, I got a little oversensitive to them. In that sense I don't need to see more of them either. But Al's still photo is just plainly telling the truth about human misery, no way around it).

It took me quite some time and I had to become rather old to admit that I did 'not want to see' some bullshit and needed to be 'guided' to accept that there was bullshit and just did not want to see it, because I feared being judged as a racist. I still do not easily engage in 'blame' rhetoric for reasons that my conscience athene immediately starts to send me signals, warning me that there might be racism in that kind of rhetoric.

I have seen so many efforts by so many different races and ethnicities to manipulate because they could use the racist history of your 'more distant relatives' to convince anyone easily. I think I will not lose that kind of first gut suspicion anymore.

Burned child fears the fire and all that ...

up
0 users have voted.
Azazello's picture

as though it just came up spontaneously, out of nowhere. I remember reading that the US invasion of Iraq drove 5 million people from their homes, 2.5 million internally displaced and 2.5 million who fled the country. Where did the 2.5 million who fled Iraq go ? Mostly to Syria. Surprise, surprise, then Syria had a problem. Qadaffi warned "the West" that he was holding back refugees on Libya's Mediterranean coast but we came, we saw and he died so refugees are flooding Europe and fueling fascism on that continent. Of course, the US, humanitarian slayers of brutal dictators, bears no responsibility. It all just happened. Bush, Obama and the Neo World Order must not be blamed.

up
0 users have voted.

We wanted decent healthcare, a living wage and free college.
The Democrats gave us Biden and war instead.

enhydra lutris's picture

Somebody needs to work up something similar to "Deportees" (plane crash at Los Gatos Canyon) and totally spam the airwaves with it.

up
0 users have voted.

That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

Tao Joe's picture

But when Humanity is gone out of one, it may never see a rebirth again.

This is the real cost of this ongoing Tragedy.

up
0 users have voted.