“Surprised that Syrian refugees have smartphones? Sorry to break this to you, but you’re an idiot”
“Syria is not a rich country, but it is not a poor country either: it ranks as a “lower middle income” according to the World Bank. In 2007 (the last year stats for both were available) Syria had a Gross National Income (GNI) per capita of $1850 which is more than Egypt at the time, which was only at $1620. Mobile phone penetration is similarly high in Syria as Egypt too. According to the CIA World Factbook in 2014 Syria had
87 mobile phones per 100 of the population, compared to Egypt’s 110 per 100 (the UK has 123 per 100 people)… So we know that Syria isn’t dirt poor and we know that there’s a lot of mobile phones: but why smartphones? Well, why not? In the West many people own desktop computers, laptops and tablets as well as smartphones. But if you had to give up many of your possessions and live on $1,850 a year, after clothes and food, what would you buy next? It is hard to think of a more useful thing to own than a smartphone, especially if you’re fleeing your home. Even when utility isn’t considered, the reason Syrians are using smartphones and not old Nokia 3210s is the same reason that benefits claimants have (gasp!) “flatscreen” TVs… have you tried buying any other kind lately?”
I think this is also about the idea of saving people, and how sometimes we build this image in our head of who we would like to be saving and get mad when people turns out to be more complicated. And how saving is how we prove that privileges are ‘deserved’ and signal that we are ‘good people’. And when it turns out that they just need our help, not some kind of full saving that the savior gets to crow about their the rest of their life. Related: football-adopting woman and White Savior Complex.
