The Martlet

Evidently many Canadians are bigots.

The ignorant, xenophobic, racist reaction to 492 Tamil refugee claimants who arrived by boat on Aug. 13 is shameful and frightening. This bigotry stems partly from ramblings and falsehoods printed in newspapers like the Times Colonist(TC).

On Aug. 12, TC columnist Jack Knox likened the Tamils to wild animals.

“It’s just strange to see Ottawa pouring so many resources into what has, in effect, been a catch-and-release fishery, one branch of government snaring migrants in its net and another releasing them back into to the wild (a.k.a. Toronto),” he wrote.

Knox’s column ended by asking “how can you tell a legitimate refugee escaping oppression from a queue-jumping terrorist?”

The obvious answer: with the same rigorous security screening and background checks that all refugee claimants are subject to.

There is not a shred of evidence that any of the Tamil migrants are terrorists.

Knox’s baseless fear-mongering is the sort of thing that often causes real harm to innocent people.

Worse still, the TC’s front-page stories on Aug. 11 and 12 erroneously called the Tamils “illegal migrants.” And Postmedia News circulated a story under the headline “Victoria General Hospital prepares to treat illegal immigrants.”

The term “illegal” is a complete falsehood.

Most — if not all — of the Tamils are legitimate refugees who fled unimaginable horrors in Sri Lanka: civil war, genocide, concentration camps, “disappearances” and torture. Therefore, they are perfectly legal migrants who should be welcomed.

The term “illegal” did not appear in subsequent TC reporting. But the falsehood was planted, and bigots too stupid to know better lashed out. Hateful letters poured into the paper, many regurgitating the misnomer “illegal.”

“Is this onslaught of so-called refugees who bring absolutely nothing but disease, crime and a desire for everything we have to offer them ever going to end?” wrote Victoria resident Bob Gracie in an Aug. 13 letter.

Court Stevens from Sidney warned against “accepting this ship of illegal migrants.”

“Opening the seventh floor at Victoria General [Hospital] for illegals!” fumed Gabriola Island resident Sue Sharp in the Aug. 14 TC.

“This makes my blood boil when one of my own kids has been waiting six months for a scan,” she wrote.

Remarkably, instead of blaming B.C.’s inadequate healthcare system for her son’s long wait, Sharp attacks foreigners who have nothing to do with the problem. This is the peak of xenophobic scapegoating.

Ironically, after the hysteria about “illegals” and “queue-jumping terrorists” using our scarce medical resources, just eight Tamils were hospitalised, including two pregnant women and six-month-old baby. And the federal government paid the bill, not the Vancouver Island Health Authority.

The bigoted vitriol on the TC’s online comment boards was also astounding. One commenter even called for mass murder, saying the boat full of Tamils should have been sent back out to sea and torpedoed.

This is the not first time local media has fueled anti-immigrant bigotry. The TC also stirred up xenophobia and racism after Chinese asylum-seekers arrived by boat in 1999. On Aug. 15 of that year, the TC ran the front-page headline “GO HOME” in a massive font after conducting a poll of readers.

There are a few good journalists at the TC, and some letter-writers expressed compassion for the Tamils. Also, sensing the dim bigotry and hatred it helped unleash, the TC ran a somewhat sensible editorial on Aug. 17 entitled “Cool the panic on sea migrants.”

Still, the ignorant, xenophobic bigotry that greeted the Tamils was scary and vile, and due in part to rants and falsehoods printed in Victoria’s local media.

Those of us who value compassion, reason and facts must denounce this swell of ignorance, racism and xenophobia, and the media outlets that helped cause it.

As a Canadian citizen, I say to the Tamil refugees: Welcome! I can’t begin to imagine the horrors you’ve been through. I hope you are all OK after your harrowing escape from your war-torn homeland. And may you soon be Canadian citizens too.