From: werner@cs.utexas.edu (Werner Uhrig)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.german
Subject: REALITY CHECK - Der Unterschied zwischen politischem und oekonomischem Fluecthling (was Re: Grundsaetzliches...)
Date: 13 Nov 1992 04:47:54 -0600
Organization: CS Dept, University of Texas at Austin
NNTP-Posting-Host: dimebox.cs.utexas.edu


 Josef Moellers <mollers.pad@sni.de> writes:
|
|| Es haelt uns aber auch niemand davon ab, reine Wirtschaftsfluechtlinge ab-
|| zuschieben. Nur - was ist ein "Wirtschaftsfluechtling". Alle, die nicht
|| unter Art. 16 fallen? - Hervorragend, dann brauchen wir das GG nicht zu
|| aendern. Auch Leute, die unter Art 16 fallen? Kann eigentlich nicht sein -
|| siehe Art. 16. Wenn man also nun die Zahlen der nicht anerkannten Asyl-
|| suchenden mit den Abschiebungszahlen vergleicht, dann erkennt man eine
|| gewisse Diskrepanz.
|
>Das ist ja gerade das Argument der Aenderungs-Gegner:
>Art 16 II 2 GG steht Asylrecht _politisch_ Verfolgten zu. Also NICHT
>Wirtschaftsfluechtlingen. Wir brauchen also keine Aenderung des GG, was
>wir brauchen sind Verbesserungen in der Bearbeitung der Faelle.

	Let's have a "reality check" here:  you know what the difference is
	between a political and an economic refuge?  The first spoke up in
	protest against the economic (political?) injustice - and survived
	and got away to tell the tale.  The second didn't like his chances 
	(and likely outcome of such a challenge) and went directly to phase 2...

	Economics are at the root of nearly everything political (these days)
	and it seems naive and foolish (to me) to take an attitude of "you are
	welcome here as a (political) refuge if you can prove that you annoyed
	"your country's s.o.b.'s" enough to take notice (and to persecute you);

	In a way it's like saying that 'unless you, at least, tried to argue
	with the street bully over his turf (and the immorality and injustice
	of being bullied) we are neither sympathetic nor offer protection; not
	to think of going out of our way to spot and "go after" bullies, wherever
	they may have "set up shop" ....

	our dilemma was maybe best expressed by Martin Luther King:

		"Injustice ANYWHERE is a threat to justice EVERYWHERE!"

	and as long as "we" hesitate to establish a line and level of
	"injustice" which the community of man and nations will not tolerate
	being crossed anywhere and by anyone without resulting in swift and
	definite punishment action against the transgressors, we are fighting
	wind-mills and survive in our cozy coocoon of industrial well-being
	only by turning our backs (and a couple of blind eyes) to what we
	know to be happening elsewhere and "to others"....

	how many Rumanias, Bosnias, Kuweits, Somalias, South Africas can
	we afford?!?  the next Iraq may well use one or several of the ABC
	weaponries ...  and not much of mankind may be left around to grieve
	over the shortsightedness of having failed to act in time to prevent
	it....

	
ps: I am glad for students, artists and intellectuals (and other courageous,
    and relatively independent) wo/men who criticize and oppose LOUDLY....
    but should we REALLY refuse the young couple with 3 children, who did not
    dare to run the gauntlet (required to be recognized as "political") before
    fleeing the hopeless situation?!?  Maybe we all should live and work in
    third world countries for a while to understand the reality of "hopeless"
    and "injust"...  I left the countries of South America with the conviction
    that taking up arms was the only dignified and self-respecting option
    available; of course, the fact that murderous armed gangs of hoodlums
    do not welcome a troop of armed political/moral/ethical ideologist makes
    you understand why getting into a riggedy sailboat as a Haitan (or as
    a Vietnamese 10-15 years ago) is a perfectly logical and reasonable
    decision, given the odds...   and why it would be such a damn shame to
    see the Cuban revolution (against the Batista dictator as well as the
    dictatorship of American Mafia and economic and political imperialism)
    get sacrificed at the altar of "total victory over communism"...

    it is bad enough that "the worst elements of American capitalism" are
    allowed to ruin all chances of a peaceful transition to a more just
    and democratic socialism in the once Communist Europe, however if the
    social democrats in the industrialized democracies of the first world
    do not show an interest and a commitment to support social democrats
    in Latin America (to the point of creating the possibility that
    social democracies are viable in countries such as Costa Rica, Nicaragua,
    Cuba and Mexico, to name just a few), a "Return to the Future" of a
    class and power structure of the feudal imperialism of the 19th century
    is truely all I can see ahead in the next quarter century (which is all
    that is of immediate relevance to me, personally)
-- 
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