67 years ago, my Mom, her folks and all but her oldest sister (who had reached the age of majority--but that's another story) came to BC by train after a sea voyage from Europe as refugees, sponsored by a cousin who came here 20 years earlier.
How many Canadians reading this have similar stories in their family background?
She spoke German, so her family was looked on after World War 2 with some suspicion (as anyone from the Middle East is now) but she grew, became a citizen, married, had three kids and continues here to this day. But if refugee laws had been then what they are now, her family would have been kept out in the name of "stream-lining" the process.
About that little Syrian boy who's picture has gone viral? We, Canadians have his blood on our hands. His aunt lives in my home town, Coquitlam, and tried to sponsor his family but failed because the "stream-lining" involved making the door so hard to open that another family like my Mom's, fleeing from their war-torn home didn't get here intact--may still not get here, even what's left of them.
And that's wrong. Their blood is on our hands, and especially on the hands of this Conservative government who have done what we ought not to have let them do in locking our doors to our neediest neighbours (yes, I know they're 10 time zones away).
Let me resort to parliamentary language: Shame, folks. Shame! Shame on us all.
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