Despite my usual rationality, every picture I see of a young, healthy male “migrant” or “refugee” disgusts me on a visceral level. Nearly each and every one is a strong, capable young man who should be at home fighting for his country, fighting to protect his countrymen, fighting to prevent new territories from being overrun, and fighting to take back what’s been lost to extremist militant groups. They should be fighting, not fleeing. They should be fighting for their freedom and homeland — as my ancestors fought, and as I would fight if my home were threatened. They, and their cowardice — and/or their selfish guile — are a big part of why ISIS has so easily taken so much. On a visceral level, I cannot help but be disgusted at seeing these selfish cowards. Each smiling face is hiding a cowardly deserter, an opportunistic invader, or both. Each one shares a sliver of personal responsibility for all of the thousands dead and enslaved — in large part because so many chose to run away instead of standing up for themselves and their fellow countrymen, and for the women and children who deserved protection instead of desertion.
The women and children — I can understand the desire for them to get away to safety, especially given the Islamic extremist groups’ methods. And there would be room to send many hundreds of thousands more endangered woman and children to safety, if the vast majority of the “migrants” weren’t healthy young fighting-age males. But if so many young men weren’t fleeing in waves of thousands, would there even be a need to send so many women and children away? Wouldn’t there have been enough resistance to break the extremists’ advances at some point? Wouldn’t their grip on towns and cities be more tenuous, if there were a much larger effective guerrilla resistance? I confess: I don’t understand; these young men must be so culturally different that I can’t understand them at all, to flee their homeland in such extreme numbers rather than fight for it.
What if all our young fighting-age ancestors had fled like this during conflict? “The British are coming! The British are coming! Run away and hide!” “Well, the Nazis are bombing England every night — it’s unbearable! Let’s all just move. I hear Canada’s nice, and there’s an ocean to protect us.” “The Mongol hordes are closing on the gates of Vienna, and we know what they do to captured men and women — let’s get out now!” “The Moors have taken control of Iberia and treat us horribly; let’s seek safety in the Holy Roman Empire.” I don’t understand these young “men,” or any sympathy for them —even if they really are refugees. But most of them are probably cowardly opportunists.
