Reform cruel Australian migrant centres

  • by: Michael Taylor
  • recipient: Tony Abbott, Prime Minister of Australia

Life is worse in Australia’s detention centers than the bleak lives desperate families left behind.

You live a life of misery; you may be the targets of bigots, a minority group faced with genocide, oppressed, or forgotten by your government, you have fallen through the cracks, and you have nowhere else to turn. A police force that is as likely to attack you, as they are to protect you. Your children have a better chance of being kidnaped and enslaved than of learning to read. You get by, you protect your family as best you can. Your life a constant battle to survive, to protect your family. With no other options, you do the unthinkable. Leave everything you have, and take your family to a better place in hope of a better life.

These are the people that are refugees in the Australian detention camps. These are the men, woman and children who came to the land of Australia looking for the life that they would never else have had. Not terrorists, not thugs and thieves, but desperate people who want what you have: A better life for themselves and their families.

Yet, they end up facing what they did back home: racism, cruelty and abuse.

No longer are they human beings, or even refugees, but they are “boat people.” Dehumanized, and striped of heir dignity almost as if to make them regret “invading” Australian shores.

Mothers Forcibly separated their husbands and children, parents woken up four times a night for “head counts.” They have limited access to health care, parents and children are being turned away when they seek medical treatment. Children are developing mental illnesses. The affects of keeping young children in detention have long term affects on their mental health.

They live in terrible conditions; this system is destroying families.

No longer do they have that glimmer of home in their eyes when they took that perilous journey to reach the land of hope. Their eyes have lost their glow; listless they stare ahead without hope. The people they have looked to for help, are now their jailors.

No more do they talk of dream jobs, schooling for their children, walking around without fear, but they speak of not being allowed to see their children, being ill treated, and they talk of suicide.

Australians are a people of unrivaled affection. I see random acts of kindness every day. I see strangers reaching out and helping each other all the time.  These detention centers do not reflect what Australia is about! 

Australia, a land built on diversity, a country forged through brotherhood, out of a need for men and woman from different walks of life to stick together. With the never say die attitude that resounds from the very ground you walk on, through the toughest of tests and a history that most would not have survived, Australia has become a land of opportunity for all.

We cannot allow our government to treat the helpless this way. We cannot allow refugees to feel worse off than when hey first left. Life was hard enough that that they risked their lives just for a glimpse of what you have, the “Australian dream.” Lets at least treat them with some Australian hospitality. Tell Tony Abbott to improve the living conditions for refugees.

 Lets remind Tony Abbott of what it is to be a true Australian: to put your hand out and pull your brother up when they are in need, to help the helpless and to extend the spirit of freedom to all who reach our shores.

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