Fair warning and disclaimer: these opinions are, in fact, my own.
Move.
Families across the globe move because they are forced to flee. Many more remain in hiding, are tortured, and die a long, slow, and painful death of body and spirit.
Homes are ripped away due to war. Discrimination. Segregation. Oppression.
Asylum, a word of hope.
A process of desperation.
Shall I ever have to plead for Asylum? I don’t know. Policies, as they stand currently, mean my family is not welcome to relocate in most English-speaking countries. We are born Americans. However, if we want to emigrate, or if circumstances worsened, forced to flee…we would have few options. To be honest, as it stands, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, even the UK would not receive my family.
I am not exaggerating.
As of now, we are blessed and privileged. Privileged enough to read of asylum seekers on the technology I carry in my hand. Blessed enough to write this while my son unloads a dishwasher.
Also, frightened and angry. Selfishly frightened for myself. Angry at my country and its leaders.
Who has the courage to change this course of brutality to the powerless? Children lost, some to human traffickers there is little doubt. Children separated from their parents and their siblings. And, even assuming the fairest and safest conditions (which I do not) this is an inhumane and cruel act. Cruel and unusual in fact, in the extreme. Making it unconstitutional in addition to unspeakably traumatising and unnecessary. Additionally, those separated and left to fend for themselves among other frightened children, include those most vulnerable due to age and/or disability. There has been little mercy, if any.
Today I Will
TODAY I am moved to write to my representatives. Today I share my outrage with you. My heart is broken. Is our country so far gone?
Today You Can
If you are moved to act on these horrors happening under our nose, here are some starting points:
A U.S. policy has kids being taken from parents at the border. Here’s what we can do.
And this link complete with action script for advocacy: https://momastery.com/blog/2018/05/30/lawmakers/
This is the directory to your government representatives.
This has been a Finish the Sentence Friday Freewrite with the prompt: “Move.” There’s still time to tell us what moves you, how it feels to move, what move means in your world right now. Link up here.
I’ve called and am outraged but also confused because you and your family wouldn’t be able to flee to the UK, Canada, Australia, or New Zealand????
What’s happening here is just so wrong and so terrible and I am almost unable to process. I process it when I know it because how can I not. How can we not stand up and call for what’s so very unjust?
None of those countries allow a person with Down syndrome to emigrate.
For real.
PS just clicked on your link to see if we’d been on the same sites and I’d donated to Glennon’s a week or two ago so yay to the same page.
Disgusting. I’m reading Kristi’s question and your answer. Just appalling. Thank you for sharing this. I feel moved to do SO MUCH.
<3!
What are the limitations on emigration for individuals with Down syndrome? I’ve never seen anything on this.
Yeah, I hadn’t either, until a few years ago. Australia and Canada both have advocacy groups arguing this policy, but it is still in place.