Arseholes, Angels, Refugees and My Humble Opinion

Recently, I submitted an opinion piece I had written about my experience volunteering in the refugee camp in Calais to a website for consideration for publication. The editor contacted me and said “Opinions are like arseholes: everyone’s got one.” I will admit, I was taken aback by his lack of diplomacy or tact, but I had to admit, for all his rudeness, the man was right.

Over the course of six years or so of refugee rights activism and advocacy, I have been on the receiving end of many an (uneducated) opinion. It seems as though as soon as you say you are an advocate, everyone feels the need to tell you about so-and-so’s sister’s neighbour’s brother’s dog that used to work at such and such detention centre, or at such and such (insert social service here), and THEY told them that “ those refugees are REAL ARSEHOLES, I mean, they beat each other up and threaten to kill each other and stuff” (-yes, this was really told to me over dinner recently.)

It got me to thinking, is it that opinion’s are like arseholes? Or is it more that every arsehole seems to have an opinion? Or is it just that really, at some point or another, EVERYONE is a bit of an arsehole? I mean, it is quite possible that so-and-so’s sister’s, neighbour’s brothers dog that used to work at such and such detention centre might have seen one person in one angry moment, on one particularly bad day and decided that as a result, all refugees are arseholes. The particular arsehole in question could actually be an angel on any other day of the week for all we know, or could oscillate between arsehole-ness and angelic divinity on odd and even numbered days. We will actually never know.

It is not this opinion that bothers me as such, but it is the logic that usually follows such a statement that goes something like “this is WHY we have to keep them locked up. I mean, I know some of them are probably fine, but we can’t have arseholes like that wandering free in our society, we just can’t take that chance!” Herein lies my big problem. That is, that one person’s subjective opinion about another person’s apparent level of arsehole-ness (according to some autonomously decided spectrum of arseholery (is that a word?)) is deemed sufficient by said person to decide that it is OK to actually ABANDON the notion of human rights and selectively decide who is worthy of enjoying those rights, if at all. This, I am sure you can agree is a big problem, not least for the arsehole with the opinion who has not thought of how this might affect them.

It is a big problem because, just like every arsehole has an opinion, EVERYONE has the right to enjoy human rights. Here is a tip for the arsehole that offered me their opinion — HUMAN rights suggests these are universally applied rights, and no I simply wont debate with you whether you then accept that refugees are human. Just don’t even go there.

Your opinion about whether refugees are angels, arseholes, or something else altogether doesn’t actually matter. You can dislike their character, behaviour, culture, language, big toe, little toe, WHATEVER but none of that actually determines whether or not they are a refugee. The 1951 Refugee Convention clearly states that a refugee is someone who “owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality, and is unable to, or owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country.”

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights also states in Article 1 that:

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

Article 2 states that:

Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.

Article 9 states that:

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.

Article 14 states that:

Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution.

Now I know what is coming. When I put this to them, the opinionated arsehole will say to me “WELL, I AM ENTITLED TO MY OPINION!” — yes, in certain circumstances you actually are. Well done. But according to Patrick Stokes of Deakin University you are not entitled to your opinion IF your opinion is shorthand for “I can say or think whatever I like.” In fact, he argues convincingly that “you are not entitled to your opinion. You are only entitled to what you can argue for.”

So here is my argument: There is no mention of the level of arsehole-ness as a criteria in any of these human rights instruments. Your like or dislike of someone is actually NOT sufficient grounds for you to decide that their human rights can be applied subjectively and selectively. We as humans are collectively deserving of human rights just as much as we are all at times arseholes or angels.

That’s just my humble opinion ;)