Quick note: I wrote this rant on my Facebook page this morning after unfriending a few people who posted some seriously ignorant stuff. I’m on a roll today, done with being quiet about some of the hateful shit I’ve been reading since Friday. Hope you don’t mind...thought I’d post it here too because what I’ve found after posting on FB, lots of my friends have similar backgrounds and it’s nice to discuss ancestors, family histories, etc. I am sure many of us here have similar stories, and I find them fascinating.
My Dad had to flee the Nazi's when he was very young. He was fortunate because he was British and the British gov't sent young jewish children to the Bahamas. So my Dad and my aunt spent part of WWII on a caribbean island. I think my grandparents had to pay a lot of money to get them safely across the ocean from Hitler, not sure. Doesn't suck except you're a young kid thousands of miles away from your parents and you are old enough to know there is grave danger where your parents are. Later, long after the war, he emigrated to Canada and married my Mom (who had spent her war years separated from her parents in the northern part of Scotland). Together they entered the US and I was the first US citizen in our family.
Thousands of young European jewish kids weren't as fortunate, and MANY of them died because countries didn't give them safe harbour. I used to work for a man who was in that position as a young kid...he had to walk from Germany all the way across France at great peril. In fact, one of his sister's died during that trek. His name was Wolfgang Grajonka and after France fell to the Nazi's he was able to get into the US. Not an easy feat since many were turned away because people in the US were afraid the jews were communists. Once in the Bronx he changed his name to become more American...he changed it to Bill Graham.
Both men became proud Americans and contributed greatly to our American way of life. My dad became a rocket scientist (no really...a genuine rocket scientist working on nuclear weapons during the Cold War) and Bill was a leading pioneer of the concert industry that I've worked in for most of my adult life.
From both I learned how lucky we are here in the US...our lives are so much better than many other people on this planet. I also learned how great the gift of citizenship and a chance to start a new life is...neither man had the slightest interest in jeopardizing that. They excelled at what they did...they took advantage of their opportunities like so many immigrants have done here for hundreds of years. They taught me never to take for granted what being a US citizen is, to always be grateful.
They also taught me the valuable lesson of tolerance and not judging a person based on where they came from. I believe this country is as great as it is because we accept so many people from so many places on the earth into our country and we all manage to blend to a certain extent. It's ugly sometimes, but eventually things have a way of working out.
The images I've seen of children trying to flee absolute evil in the Middle East have me thinking a lot about what my Dad and Bill Graham went thru. Seeing children feeling such horror rips my heart out. I want our country to help...to not turn our backs on genuine need. To not give in to fear and intimidation.
I can't believe some of the stuff I'm reading in my feed the last couple of days. I've unfriended a few people. I just can't read hateful lies about desperate people frantically trying to keep their families alive. Spouting "facts" that are either completely wrong or completely missing the point. False comparisons that justify their fear of the "other". Just stop, please.
The US has been vetting and admitting tens of thousands of displaced people from the Middle East for over a decade now...if you're afraid of letting Syrians in it's because your being played. There are some in this country cynically using this issue to scare you...to get you think they know how to be a leader. They are fear mongers, please don't fall for it. Let's not repeat the error of turning refugees away and leaving them to their doomed fate. Let's be better than that.