the bird on fire

Senior Blog Writer, Henry Huang, weighs in on the subject “How Americans should Respond to Syrian Refugees.”

First, I’d like to apologize for this article. I made myself a promise that I would not put anything political in my column. People perceive me too much as a “political geek.” I wanted to expand my horizons. My life is not just about politics; it’s about everything. However, I reached a point where I felt the obligation to write this piece.

The topic is, Daesh, otherwise known as, ISIS. More specifically, I want to talk about the refugee issue created by Daesh.

Daesh has created so much chaos in our society. It has destroyed so many things that we treasure in our lives–freedom, liberty, the simple happiness of life. They attempted to diminish the innocent Parisian victims, calling them “apostates engaged in prostitution and vice.”

Now, after such barbaric behavior, there is an outcry, getting stronger and stronger, saying that accepting refugees from Syria and Iraq should come to an end. Some people think that it is too dangerous to host those people from embattled, radicalized regions. What is even worse is Muslin communities around the world fearing attack and recrimination and feeling generally unsafe. On Dec 7, Donald Trump directly stated that all Muslins should be barred from the “Land of the free and home of the brave.”

I couldn’t witness this rhetoric any longer.

My attitude is simple; the United States should welcome all refugees from Syria and Iraq. Like Matthew 26:33 said, “Though all men shall be offended because of thee, yet will I never be offended.” We should always open our warm hugs to them. These are my reasons.

First, accepting Muslims is an attitude of resisting Daesh. It tells the world that we, as human beings, will never surrender to Daesh. The Western society with the Renaissance walked out of darkness and let the spirit of humanitarian democracy flourish. It was a long process, and it took us more than four centuries to achieve what we have today. Now, Daesh wants to destroy our principles. Daesh creates fear, sadness, and anger. Daesh wishes to distort our conscience and our courage. However, only those precious things in our lives, such as love, friendship, and strength, could ignite the torch of our souls and resist Daesh. Simply refusing to accept the refugees is indeed surrendering to Daesh and its cruelty and violence.

Also, if we make one exception to keep Muslims outside of the U.S., it will eventually take away our precious freedom! Later on, the regulation towards immigration might spread to Latin America, Africa, Asia, etc. The poem from Martin Niemoller states,

Then they came for me,
and by that time,
there was no one left to speak up.

We need to speak up. Finally, I would like to point out that it is an absolute violation of the Constitution of America for a state to announce the decision to not host Muslim refugees in that state. I personally recommend the United States government learn from Hong Kong of the 1970s. Hong Kong hosted more than two hundred thousand Vietnam refugees during the chaos of Vietnam unification. Hong Kong only had 5 million people at that time. Even though it was a highly expensive thing to do, Hong Kong still did it. What’s more, hosting the Vietnam refugees didn’t create a huge conflict within Hong Kong society. Hong Kong managed a rigorous vetting process in the identification of refugees and their reason for departing Vietnam. Hong Kong set up refugee centers with food and shelter until the refugees could be integrated into Hong Kong or other Western countries.

Europe and America could definitely learn from Hong Kong.

Americans stood up against fascists in World War II. People didn’t kneel before fascists. Now, when the new evil, Daesh, challenges our values, challenges our beliefs and tolerance, challenges our democracy, is when we, as people, should open our arms toward the Syrian refugees. It is not the duty of Americans only, but an obligation of all mankind. It is time for us to share our brotherhood and internationalism toward these suffering people. Like Emma Lazarus said,

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-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!