@maregarbagehole3205

2 years ago

God. The segment on the Syrian refugee crisis took me back; I had forgotten how vitriolic and widespread the pushback was against Syrians trying to flee to the West from countries that we devastated. It's like my brain has repressed memories from that time because of how tumultuous it was for me. I grew up in the Church and was a pretty devout believer through my adolescence and teen years. The Syrian refugee crisis was the first domino that set off the chain of events that would make me question my faith and discover my political beliefs. I was never a "conservative" really, I always felt like a hippie growing up, maybe because of my affinity for music and art and fascination with countercultural movements, but I felt an allegiance to the Church broadly and so I entertained their backwards notions at least partially. Hearing and seeing how they felt and reacted to Syrian refugees was enough to make me realize that I am not one of them. The arguments I had with longtime friends and leaders in my Church were still some of the most heated i've had to this day. Here I was, the fool, believing in the things Jesus taught about the outcasts, the sojourners, the "least of these". It was made even more clear when I became friends with a Syrian refugee in senior year; Soula, a lovely, reserved, curious girl, who I tutored in Math because she struggled quite a bit and had a lot of catching up to do in our curriculum (you know, from being a refugee and all arriving in the middle of the school year). She introduced me to her brother, Mousa, and the rest of her family (which I am unfortunately forgetting the names of) who welcomed me into their home on many occasions, fed me, and treated me like their own. One of the sweetest and most well knit families I've ever had the pleasure of meeting; certainly more put together than mine. All of this made me wonder how anyone could ever hold such hatred and believe in such a warped image of Syrians, especially followers of Jesus. This is not to take part in some self-humiliating ritual, mystifying the Other, "oh, people of other cultures are so much better than us, we have a lot to learn from them" and so on (i'm sure we're all familiar with Zizek's criticisms of this type of behavior). It's just my anecdotal experience at the microlevel of the macro phenomenon of the Syrian refugee crisis, and this video reminded me of all that encompassed. Hard, ugly times made more beautiful by my fortunate encounter with Soula and her family, a target for populists looking to gain political clout through xenophobia. TL;DR this video made me remember how the Syrian Refugee Crisis revealed a lot of supposedly hidden darkness in our country and effected me personally by making me question my religion due to other Christians xenophobia. I also got to meet an amazing family of Syrian refugees at that time.

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