IMMIGRATION thread

[Fragony]

Immigrants/Guest workers from Southern Europe are a bargain, they are well educated, speak perfect English, and highly qualified. That's not true for the majority of the 'refugees' though. Even if they are highly educated, our standards are much higher.

[Viking]

Isn't a refugee someone forced to seek refuge? And why is that definition silly? If you say it is silly, it would help if you explain why.

A simple definition like that makes it very obvious what the problem is: a potentially perpetual refugee status. With that definition, a refugee who refuses asylum in a perfectly safe country with good living standards could still be a refugee, because they at some point were forced to seek refuge.

A more robust definition of 'refugee' would provide good ideas for when a refugee is no more a refugee.

How would the informal version help with anything if the legal one stays the same?

The words media and ordinary people use can have an impact no matter what the legal definition is.

Population decline would help with a lot of issues though, such as pollution etc.
It's just that noone sees this and many have previously claimed that the planet could house a whole lot more humans.
It also seems counter-productive for any country by itself to reduce the population.

The goal is not population decline, but population stability (an average growth of 0 over x years, where x is not too large).

Yet it is natural that the population size oscillates before it settles to something more permanent. The first oscillations might have the largest amplitudes - e.g. once the growth decreases, it might decrease until it is highly negative before it shoots up again (more space might make parents feel like having more kids), but still significantly lower than what it was earlier, provided that the factors that started the first decrease in population are still in place.

[Montmorency]

A simple definition like that makes it very obvious what the problem is: a potentially perpetual refugee status. With that definition, a refugee who refuses asylum in a perfectly safe country with good living standards could still be a refugee, because they at some point were forced to seek refuge.

A more robust definition of 'refugee' would provide good ideas for when a refugee is no more a refugee.

Not checking for EU countries or the UN, but for the US:

U.S. law allows certain people who cannot or do not want to return to their home country because of past persecution or the danger of future persecution to live in the United States as refugees or asylees. However, the source or danger of persecution sometimes disappears after a refugee or asylee has already been granted status but before he or she has obtained U.S. citizenship. The question then becomes whether the person will be allowed to continue living in the U.S. under these changed circumstances.
For example, if you obtained asylum on grounds of political opinion because your home country’s government persecuted you as a member of the opposition, and your party has now come to power, then you might wonder whether the U.S. government could terminate your asylum on account of this change in your country’s conditions.
The answer will depend in key part on whether you are a refugee, on the one hand, or an asylee, on the other.
The main distinction between these two is that ordinary refugees apply for their status from outside the United States and resettle in the United States through the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP), while asylees are a special type of refugee who apply for their status directly from within the U.S. (or from a U.S. border). Because of this difference, asylees and ordinary refugees get treated differently under U.S. immigration law.
If you are a refugee, then you are unlikely to lose your status in the United States on the basis of improved conditions in your country, such as a new government, a newly signed peace treaty with a rebel group, or a new law protecting people who were being persecuted for the same reasons you were. However, loss of status is more of a possible concern if you are an asylee.

http://www.nolo.com/legal-encycloped...e-country.html

But that's for the United States, and it is relatively difficult for Syrians to apply for asylum given the geographic barriers.

What indicates that no type of refugee in Europe can ever lose that status? At any rate, in most cases it shouldn't really be relevant anyway once the process of naturalization goes through. Remember that the plan has so far been for either settlement or deportation, not for locked-down camps as in the neighbors of Syria.

As for more general questions for the future and around the world, well - why is it an issue there either?

[Fragony]

What good are rules if someone just decides to change them? Germany does just that. How can we ever trust them again? Bankrupting Greece in a covert bailout of German and French banks, np toll. Screwing up badly, deal with it. Got to respect Germany for throwing Europe into chaos three times in just a century.

[Gilrandir]

Got to respect Germany for throwing Europe into chaos three times in just a century.

I may be wrong, but I heard that about 15 years ago we entered kinda new century. Or has anything changed?

[Fragony]

I may be wrong, but I heard that about 15 years ago we entered kinda new century. Or has anything changed?

century just means 100 years, just as a millenium means 1000 years, so 1914-2015, about a century

[Husar]

A simple definition like that makes it very obvious what the problem is: a potentially perpetual refugee status. With that definition, a refugee who refuses asylum in a perfectly safe country with good living standards could still be a refugee, because they at some point were forced to seek refuge.

A more robust definition of 'refugee' would provide good ideas for when a refugee is no more a refugee.

What do you mean by more robust? The way you sound it seems like you want them to basically get locked up in the first "safe" country they cross into, regardless of how strenuous that is for the country or how they are/can be treated there, but that's only an assumption since you are very vague the entire time. I would argue that this is not a very fair or useful way to handle this. Assume a worst case where all countries around Lebanon break into civil war and according to you Lebanon then has to host something like 10 times its population in refugees. Maybe you don't care about the Lebanese as long as those people don't come to Norway or something?

[Fragony]

See it like this Hussie, if you would have to explain yourself to a deeply cynical and calculative person how far would you get beyond a moral appeal. (don't mean you Viking in case you think I do)

[Husar]

See it like this Hussie, if you would have to explain yourself to a deeply cynical and calculative person how far would you get beyond a moral appeal. (don't mean you Viking in case you think I do)

I would shoot them because in my very cold calculation that solves my problem of having to show them why being a cold calculative person is not something one should advocate to others as it can literally backfire.

[Montmorency]

No Husar, that's too naive.

You should have tried playing Mafia. Then you would know.

[Husar]

No Husar, that's too naive.

You should have tried playing Mafia. Then you would know.

I played lots of Mafia when you were still a young forum-whippersnapper. The idea is that the other guy wouldn't expect such a move from me.
Not sure how that relates to WIFOM.

[Fragony]

I would shoot them because in my very cold calculation that solves my problem of having to show them why being a cold calculative person is not something one should advocate to others as it can literally backfire.

Question stands, if you have to go beyond a moral appeal how reasonable can you get it given the rather disastrous policy of Merkel. Give me something to just dismiss, why should you get all the fun

[Viking]

At any rate, in most cases it shouldn't really be relevant anyway once the process of naturalization goes through.

Indeed, this is for the time before refuge/citizenship/similar has been granted.

What do you mean by more robust?

A definition that is less likely to give incorrect classifications relative to what is intended.

The way you sound it seems like you want them to basically get locked up in the first "safe" country they cross into, regardless of how strenuous that is for the country or how they are/can be treated there

That's a rather weird interpretation. A more immediate interpretation is that refugees that pass perfectly safe countries without seeing if they can stay there, are no longer counted as refugees (does not include obvious exceptions like travelling by air to countries they have been granted refuge in).

I would argue that this is not a very fair or useful way to handle this. Assume a worst case where all countries around Lebanon break into civil war and according to you Lebanon then has to host something like 10 times its population in refugees.

Refugees should first and foremost be settled in the nearest possible countries with populations that are similar culturally. If refugees don't have to learn a new language completely from scratch, that's a huge benefit. If refugees don't have a different religion (or follow a different branch of the same religion), they are less likely to stand out as a separate group from the rest of the population a few generations later - they might even have completely assimilated within, say, 10 generations.

This is best for everyone. The descendants of the refugees don't have to live in a country where they are stigmatised and discriminated against, and the majority population of the countries where these refugees did not settle do not have to worry about hostile individuals among the descendants of the original refugees, nor general friction between the two groups. When the refugees settle closer to their home country, it is also easier to move back home when it is safe, or, if they don't, visit relatives and friends who still/now live there.

Of course Lebanon shouldn't have to take all the refugees themselves, so look at the map for Arab and/or Muslim countries relatively close, and you'll find a very long list of countries that can take their share (both in Africa and Western and Central Asia).

[Montmorency]

Indeed, this is for the time before refuge/citizenship/similar has been granted.

But then, where is the issue of the "perpetual refugee"? Are you worried about people hiding under a rock for 20 years, emerging when their original country is in order, and technically counting as refugees by international standards? Even given that outlandish scenario, well, they might as well be since by that point they likely have no material connection remaining to their homeland.

Refugees should first and foremost be settled in the nearest possible countries with populations that are similar culturally. If refugees don't have to learn a new language completely from scratch, that's a huge benefit. If refugees don't have a different religion (or follow a different branch of the same religion), they are less likely to stand out as a separate group from the rest of the population a few generations later - they might even have completely assimilated within, say, 10 generations.

This is best for everyone. The descendants of the refugees don't have to live in a country where they are stigmatised and discriminated against, and the majority population of the countries where these refugees did not settle do not have to worry about hostile individuals among the descendants of the original refugees, nor general friction between the two groups. When the refugees settle closer to their home country, it is also easier to move back home when it is safe, or, if they don't, visit relatives and friends who still/now live there.

Of course Lebanon shouldn't have to take all the refugees themselves, so look at the map for Arab and/or Muslim countries relatively close, and you'll find a very long list of countries that can take their share (both in Africa and Western and Central Asia).

I can see the relationship to other aspects of your philosophy discussed in other contexts, but one of the big complaints remains that this is only viable and conducive to the benfits you describe under the prior condition of one-world government.

[AE Bravo]

Refugees should first and foremost be settled in the nearest possible countries with populations that are similar culturally. If refugees don't have to learn a new language completely from scratch, that's a huge benefit. If refugees don't have a different religion (or follow a different branch of the same religion), they are less likely to stand out as a separate group from the rest of the population a few generations later - they might even have completely assimilated within, say, 10 generations.

This is best for everyone. The descendants of the refugees don't have to live in a country where they are stigmatised and discriminated against,

The idea that refugee assimilation into culturally similar countries would be smooth sailing relative to traveling to alien countries is not true. Reality is that not only will they inevitably be discriminated against due to the overall social dynamics of the Arab world, they will not have a voice and the cultural disparity is not as minor as you make it out to be, in fact Arabs of the Levant have just as much similarities with the west than they do with fellow Arabs I'd argue. Admitting more Syrians in countries with questionable long-term sustainability is recipe for disaster, and cannot be dealt with by those countries unless you want to deal with MORE refugees in the future.

It's very difficult to acquire citizenship in Gulf countries and they all have a ceiling set for foreigners so as not to upset the native population. Because the satisfaction of natives are of utmost importance to the regimes (besides ksa/bahrain) any refugees will not be able to get the basic needs that can be afforded by governments elsewhere. They will, like the Iraqis before them, have to pay for their child's education since all public schools are for citizens only and won't have enough money due to the cost of living.

[Fragony]

And so Europe should take these people why?

If you freely admit that it would be difficult for surrounding countries to take the refugees, why should it fall on Europe?

good question ain't it

[Husar]

A definition that is less likely to give incorrect classifications relative to what is intended.

What is intended and who intends it? Has it occurred to you that the UN definition could be what most countries intend it to be?

That's a rather weird interpretation. A more immediate interpretation is that refugees that pass perfectly safe countries without seeing if they can stay there, are no longer counted as refugees (does not include obvious exceptions like travelling by air to countries they have been granted refuge in).

How is that different from what I said other than that you want to remove the element of forcing them to stay in the first safe country they pass? And if you don't force them to stay, what do you do with them when they move on? Accept them anyway but as migrants instead of asylum seekers? Or send them back to the first safe country they passed? (that would be the same as forcing them to stay there, only more expensive, no?) Or maybe send them back to the war-torn country they fled from? Your "solution" still seems incomplete and not entirely thought through or there is something you are not telling.

Refugees should first and foremost be settled in the nearest possible countries with populations that are similar culturally. If refugees don't have to learn a new language completely from scratch, that's a huge benefit. If refugees don't have a different religion (or follow a different branch of the same religion), they are less likely to stand out as a separate group from the rest of the population a few generations later - they might even have completely assimilated within, say, 10 generations.

And how do you settle them there? By force or by kindly asking them to turn around? Or do you trick them into signing a contract? How would you explain to a refugee that he is better of in country X or would you just say you are sure of it even if he can't see it?

This is best for everyone. The descendants of the refugees don't have to live in a country where they are stigmatised and discriminated against, and the majority population of the countries where these refugees did not settle do not have to worry about hostile individuals among the descendants of the original refugees, nor general friction between the two groups. When the refugees settle closer to their home country, it is also easier to move back home when it is safe, or, if they don't, visit relatives and friends who still/now live there.

So you're saying these refugees don't know what's best for them if they move to a country that is too different from their home country? And one of the reasons is that people are just too racist and intermixing just won't work. So let me change the theater for a minute and ask you what you propose the USA do with their black and native American populations? Send the blacks back to Africa and the native Americans back to...America? How to proceed with Israel, it's like a ghetto surrounded by native Arabs, no? Impossible to ever integrate.

It's also funky that you talk about stigmatization and discrimination as though they were inevitable. So the gay movement is doomed as well? Women could never possibly gain voting rights or equal pay because men will always be men?
That's a super-defeatist attitude, well, either that or someone is just too comfortable not having to change.
I fully expect someone to call me a meanie now.

Of course Lebanon shouldn't have to take all the refugees themselves, so look at the map for Arab and/or Muslim countries relatively close, and you'll find a very long list of countries that can take their share (both in Africa and Western and Central Asia).

Why should Central Asian countries take them? And why should reasonable people pack all their things and leave for a far worse life? Would you? When Europeans fled from oppressive regimes to America, there was no one in New York Harbor telling them to go back to some European country that was more likely to allow them to fit in and their ideas of getting a better life there were not criticized as greed. Why is America so much better than Europe?

But we can't either, it are too many, on the plus side, it's also bankrupting that horrible IS

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_Cooperation_Council

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union

The video I linked said if we took all of them, the number of muslims in the EU would increase from 4% to 5%, is that really such a massive change?

[Fragony]

Yes that would be massive change as they won't be spread over entire countries but in the bigger cities that allready have problems. Number wizardy They don't want to go to entire Europe, they want to go to Northern Europe, Germany and Sweden mostly, iactualbmpact kinda changes with these numbers no. Eastern-European countries are not going to listen to the EU, good for them they are right, Southern-Europe has problems of it's own, so they simply can't. These statistics mean absolutily notning as they assume a spread over the whole of Europe and that ain't going to happen. UN-reports, 8000 a day.

[Viking]

But then, where is the issue of the "perpetual refugee"? Are you worried about people hiding under a rock for 20 years, emerging when their original country is in order, and technically counting as refugees by international standards? Even given that outlandish scenario, well, they might as well be since by that point they likely have no material connection remaining to their homeland.

Not hiding under a rock, but being extremely picky about where and how to stay while still being able to both claim and be entitled to refugee treatment.

I can see the relationship to other aspects of your philosophy discussed in other contexts, but one of the big complaints remains that this is only viable and conducive to the benfits you describe under the prior condition of one-world government.

All it takes is that one is able to delegate such tasks of taking in refugees. The problem is that European politicians for the most part aren't particularly interested in anything like this - either they want to play the humanitarian superhero, or they just shut their country's borders.

There are different ways to make countries accept their share of refugees - both with carrots and sticks. But there has to be a will to make these changes happen, and currently there is not.

The idea that refugee assimilation into culturally similar countries would be smooth sailing relative to traveling to alien countries is not true. Reality is that not only will they inevitably be discriminated against due to the overall social dynamics of the Arab world, they will not have a voice and the cultural disparity is not as minor as you make it out to be, in fact Arabs of the Levant have just as much similarities with the west than they do with fellow Arabs I'd argue. Admitting more Syrians in countries with questionable long-term sustainability is recipe for disaster, and cannot be dealt with by those countries unless you want to deal with MORE refugees in the future.

It's very difficult to acquire citizenship in Gulf countries and they all have a ceiling set for foreigners so as not to upset the native population. Because the satisfaction of natives are of utmost importance to the regimes (besides ksa/bahrain) any refugees will not be able to get the basic needs that can be afforded by governments elsewhere. They will, like the Iraqis before them, have to pay for their child's education since all public schools are for citizens only and won't have enough money due to the cost of living.

Now is a good time to change. Always is a good time to change. If there is a will, there is a way. The kind of argumentation you present quickly becomes circular.

A shake up of the system might not be so bad in the long run. It's worth noting how Algeria is still stable despite some unrest during the "Arab spring", war in neighbouring Libya, and the civil war in the 90s. I don't think Algeria has reached its final state, but they might be more wary of creating a new civil war and be more inclined to find more peaceful ways to settle differences.

What is intended and who intends it? Has it occurred to you that the UN definition could be what most countries intend it to be?

Anyone, really. Your second point relates to the definition itself, which can to some extent be considered as separate from what it is supposed to classify: sometimes, a less complex definition might be preferred even if it will misclassify more cases (and hence is less robust).

that would be the same as forcing them to stay there, only more expensive, no?

No. The world is bigger than Europe and Syria. They can go other places. If some European countries are willing to let them in, then I am not necessarily opposed to migrants passing through other countries to get there (as long as they actually only pass through) - which directly contradicts the idea of forcing them to stay somewhere.

And how do you settle them there? By force or by kindly asking them to turn around? Or do you trick them into signing a contract? How would you explain to a refugee that he is better of in country X or would you just say you are sure of it even if he can't see it?

Should be rather obvious: they have countries that will deport them, and countries that will accept them. Some of them might try to stay in the first category of countries anyway, hoping that they will be the special snowflakes. The rest will opt for the second category of countries, provided that this category isn't exclusively made up of unpleasant places.

So you're saying these refugees don't know what's best for them if they move to a country that is too different from their home country?

Per above, there is not that much of a choice for the moment. They typically choose the countries that they hope will accept them and that they have heard positive things about.

And one of the reasons is that people are just too racist and intermixing just won't work. So let me change the theater for a minute and ask you what you propose the USA do with their black and native American populations? Send the blacks back to Africa and the native Americans back to...America? How to proceed with Israel, it's like a ghetto surrounded by native Arabs, no? Impossible to ever integrate.

Y'know, if I thought it was OK to evict people from their home country, there would be no problem accepting refugees - I'd just evict them too once the danger in their home country is gone. I "believe in the sanctity of citizenship". I also believe in states and regions cleaning up their own mess, not dumping it onto others; like the Middle East has had habit of doing recently.

It's also funky that you talk about stigmatization and discrimination as though they were inevitable. So the gay movement is doomed as well? Women could never possibly gain voting rights or equal pay because men will always be men?

It's funny you should ask. As long as people who count themselves as men, women, gays etc. see these their category as a fundamental social and/or cultural identity, then there is likely to be hostility between the groups. I claim that the degree of hostility is closely linked to how strong these identities are.

If the goal is zero hostility, then yes, by my logic, such movements are doomed. Other aims, on the other hand, require different assessments. Legal changes are probably the easiest goals to reach - it's just writing things on paper and asking the judicial and law-enforcing systems to keep an eye on the matter.

[...] either that or someone is just too comfortable not having to change.

Change? Change what? Before a new minority population has arrived, there is no one to discriminate against. Once the population is there, they could go on about their usual business and continue their old habits of not discriminating against this population (previously impossible to do), or opt for a change and start discriminating. Since many people start discriminating, they evidently love change.

Why should Central Asian countries take them?

If there are any reasons anyone at all should take them, then these apply to Central Asia as well.

And why should reasonable people pack all their things and leave for a far worse life? Would you?

A variant of the rhetorical question that is often asked: "what would you do if you were a refugee?" Step one would be to avoid becoming one in the first place. That's what I am doing right now: protecting my home country from internal strife. At the same time I am supportive of my home country's membership of the world's most power military alliance as protection against external hostility. I am hard at work as a would-be refugee already, you see.

When Europeans fled from oppressive regimes to America, there was no one in New York Harbor telling them to go back to some European country that was more likely to allow them to fit in and their ideas of getting a better life there were not criticized as greed.

Which European countries would allow them to 'fit in' better? The US was founded by European immigrants; you can just as well consider it an extension of Europe from a cultural point of view.

[Fragony]

aww, the arab spring. Maybe I was right that was ogoing to be an islamist winter way before you guys realised it, Just saying, not patting