Disclaimer: This is pretty much a pro-refugee myTake, don't read it if you think you'll get triggered :)
What went wrong?
Since 2014, Europe was confronted with the highest number of refugees since the last world war. The main reason for this is the current crisis in Syria, and the rise of the Islamic State in the Middle East. For a very long time, Syria had been lead by a family of dictators rather peacefully. It was quite a developed country. Things started to change in 2011, during the Arab Spring. Many authoritarian regimes, for example Tunisia, Egypt and Lybia, fell as a result of a rising number of protests and conflicts. However, the Syrian dictators refused to step down and accept a change. Instead, they turned to military forces to surpress the starting revolution. Different ethnicities, religious and political groups started fighting each other, and the situation became grim. The rising Islamis State took advantage of this, and started to cause an even greater mess in the already struggling Syria. All hell broke loose, literally, with an increasing number of public executions, murders of civillians and the use of chemical weaponery.
Where did they go?
Understandably, the Syrians didn't like being trapped between IS, a horrific political regime and a bunch of rebel groups. About of the third of the population was forced to move within the country, while another 4 million have decided to flee abroad. The vast majority of them settled in refugee camps in Turkey, Jordan, Iraq, Lebanon and Egypt. It should be pointed out that the richest nearby countries, such as Saudi Arabia, UAE and Qatar have accepted NONE of the refugees. The poorer neighboring countries were not prepared for so many refugees, resulting in a shortage of food, medicine and shelter. Meanwhile, the situation in Syria didn't seem to get any better. Therefore, many of the refugees decided to go for a long-term solution instead of a temporary one - Europe.
How did Europe take it?
Not well, of course. Just like Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon, the European Union was not ready for such an enormous influx of refugees. This put a huge amount of pressure especially on the countries in the South - Italy, Greece and Hungary. These countries weren't able to take care of them, causing a similar situation as in the refugee camps mentioned above. Most of the European countries saw the trouble the border states got into, and refused to take large numbers of refugees themselves. Germany's counceller Angela Merkel was the first one to take action, announcing that she will accept 800,000 refugees in 2015 alone. Not everyone was happy about this, natural.
Arguments for and against refugees:
1. Many Europeans fear that the ongoing influx of refugees will slowly turn the continent into a Muslim "territory"
Even if the European Union were to accept all 4 million Syrian refugees, the number of Muslims would only rise about 2%.
2. Muslims generally have a higher birth rate that Europeans. this leads to speculation that there will soon be more refugees than natives in some of the countries in Europe.
While the higher birth rates have been proven true, it has also been studied that as the standard of living increases, the birth rates decrease. Therefore, if Europe accepts the refugees and makes an effort to integrate them, their birth rates will drop and everybody will be happy.
3. "They will either take our jobs OR they will live off of our governments support."
Yes, some of the refugees will definitely take advantage of the system. However, the majority of them are educated individuals who are willing to work if given the opportunity. The refugees can help strengthen the European infrastructure, as they'd be willing to take the jobs that most europeans consider "dirty", similar to the Eastern European workforce in the UK or Germany.
4. Refugees travelling with smartphones etc. lead to the belief that they don't really need help.
Yes they do. Syria was quite a developed country before the war, as mentioned above. The families are about to embark on an extremely dangerous journey. If you were in their place, would you leave your phone behind?
5. They commint violent crime and make Europe less safe.
Yes they do. I will get to this below.
How would I solve this?
Bear in mind that I am no politician, and I only know what the news tells me. However, I have pretty clear idea on how I would solve this. i would controll the influx of refugees, and take their fingerprints, photos and documents. They'd ba allowed to move around the country freely, of course. However, the moment they commit a crime, however petty it might be (for example riding the bus without a ticket, underage drinking etc), they'd be deported and denied the opportunity to come back. This might be difficult to establish, especially given the huge numbers of refugees. However, it gives everyone a chance if they behave, and if they don't they'll be gone. At the same time, if we were merciless and really kept this rule strict, the refugees would be motivated to behave well for fear of deportation.
We are writing history right now. This is what kids will learn about in school a hundred years from now. Do we want to be remembered ass xenophobic rich bastards? Lets help while we can, and be he best we can possible be :)
I took a lot of this info from this YouTube video (Kurzgesagt - The European Refugee Crisis and Syria Explained). It's an awesome channel, I highly recommend it :)
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