Close Reading

The among us sounds in Tim Hortons took me out 😂😂😂

They walk among us, They sound just like us. They are ... Central Americans. \nThe fools - what the hell did they leave Canada for NYC? People in NYC are digging tunnels INTO Canada!\nUS middle income migration to Mexico, Costa Rica, Portugal, rural Italy, South East Asia increases. \nOopsy swapsy.

Great documentary, but in my opinion, it's terribly one-sided, portraying these colleges as villains and the students as poor, innocent victims. As a former international student from India myself, who had the privilege of attending a prestigious university in the UK, working there, and moving on, the workings of this situation are as clear as daylight and as old as the hills. \nIt wasn't any different back then in the UK 20 years ago, during the heady Blair days, when UK colleges significantly increased their intake of international students, aided by a lax visa regime. This was also in response to tighter visa restrictions in the US following 9/11. Students enrolling in such colleges, as well as the parents funding them, are well aware that these are degree mills. The sole aim here is to somehow navigate through college and stay long enough until permanent residency comes through. \nTears flow and protests erupt only when this unspoken but clearly understood agreement is broken, often with the media conveniently at hand. The reasons driving this insatiable urge are multifarious, but poverty and lack of opportunities in the country (in this case, India) do not really rank high on the list. Social prestige and an imagined better life in the 'West' certainly do, particularly among young people from states like Punjab, Haryana, and parts of Gujarat. \nNothing about this is illegal, and not to sound cynical, these are market forces at work. However, in my view, this represents a more accurate truth. It would be great to see Fifth Estate also report from this side

It's unconscionable that we've invited people to come to Canada without actually following through on the promise we made to them in the first place. Was it all just sloganeering designed to appeal to liberal progressive NIMBYers? Was there ever any intent on actually doing something for these poor people beyond a sound bite or photo op? \n\nThe solution to migration because of war, terror, famine and so on is not by opening up the borders and allowing everyone in, the solution to mass migrations (over 100 million worldwide) is to tackle the conditions that make such migrations necessary. Almost without exception, each one of these migrant/refugee situations are the result of political problems that have to be tackled in those countries where the conditions exist. There are over 100 million people fleeing conditions that make life unbearable, even if we wanted to, how are we to take them all into North America? How does anyone propose we do that, and even if we could manage it somehow, another 100 million would show up on our doorstep next year...or next week...it's simply not possible or reasonable to expect us to be overwhelmed by wave after wave of the poor unfortunate. The solutions to war and famine abroad can't be found here and we need to make it plain that people who live in such conditions must first rise up to help themselves. We can and should help, politically, through foreign aid and individual donations (North Americans are among the most generous donators after all), and even militarily where feasible or possible. The UN and other coalitions of nations, must each take up the burdens before people smugglers take it up for them. We have our own problems to deal with here and I'm not willing to vote for promises made that were never meant to be kept.