Ter Apel, a small, unassuming Dutch town near the German border, is a place tourists rarely have on their itinerary. There are no lovely old windmills, no cannabis-filled coffee shops and on a recent visit it was far too early for tulip season.
When foreigners end up there, it is for one reason: to claim asylum at the Netherlands’ biggest refugee camp, home to 2,000 desperate people from all around the world.
Many of the American refugees, like Jane-Michelle Arc, a 47-year-old software engineer from San Francisco, are transgender. In April last year she flew into Schiphol airport in Amsterdam and, sobbing, asked a customs officer how to claim asylum. “And they laughed because: what’s this big dumb American doing here asking about asylum? And then they realised I was serious.”
Arc said the US had become such a hostile environment for trans people that she had stopped leaving the house “unless there was an Uber waiting outside”. She said she had been abused on the street and using the ladies’ toilets, and resolved to leave the country after a frightening incident when she feared a woman was going to run her over with her truck.
I know it’s a tough time but I have trouble imagining it being that bad in SF. I know the situation isn’t ideal but there are only so many places available for refugees each year and some people applying are actually expecting death or worse if they go back.
Seems to be a bit tone deaf imo, we aren’t at that point yet, at least not in San Fransisco. I would be livid if I was from somewhere with an actual civil war, where whole villages are getting wiped, and see my spot get taken by someone from Cali.
I want to be clear I think there is a problem with how transgender folk are being treated, but I think the asylum system has a lot of bigger ones to deal with and its already struggling with those. I wish other countries stepped up and offered easier immigration if you’re transgender or something. This just feels like the wrong way to do it.
Some Jewish folk left Germany right when the Nazis started gaining ground. I imagine there were plenty of versions of you saying the same thing.
Fair point. I guess I don’t consider the war on Christo-fascism to be lost and can’t really imagine it getting that bad but you’re right, it could very well come to that.
Humans have been wiping out slightly different humans since before we had words to name them. It’s the most normal thing humans do.
I don’t imagine there are many people who pay taxes to the Christofascists and who work for corporations in the Christofascist economy who are managing to do more good than harm.
So fleeing is a perfectly legitimate strategy, probably the best strategy short of sedition or similar crimes. Call it “scorched earth”.
It’s even more valid given the propensity of “moderates” to throw trans people under the bus. When you say you “can’t imagine it getting that bad”, I wonder what you imagine the transgender policy to be of the party that wins the election in 2028…
I think the tone deaf thing here is you telling trans people, who are being actively targeted by an increasingly fascist goverment and conservative media, that it’s not bad enough yet for them to leave.
Any person who wants to leave and has the means to leave should absolutely leave by whatever means, and your judgment of them is of no value.
If you have a problem with worldwide asylum quotas, maybe take that up with a foreign government or something. People who are just trying to survive and make the best decisions they can in an increasingly high-stakes situation should disregard everything you’ve said and continue doing whatever they want, and you should support their ability to do so.
Well I do have a problem with worldwide quotas and immigration in general, I wish our borders were much more open. Look, I’m just saying that someone from San Fransisco probably has other options available and shouldn’t lean on a system that’s already strained. There’s genocides and civil wars going on. Being gay is a death sentence in 8 countries. A lot of displaced women and girls have asylum or sex trade as a choice, they simply don’t have options.
I don’t think it’s wrong to say we need to triage and prioritize certain problems because of lack of resources. It doesn’t mean the ones not chosen don’t exist or that the whole system shouldn’t have more resources.
We agree that the problem is that countries would deny asylum to those in need, but sounds like your solution that those in need should preemptively disqualify themselves based vibes or something.
I think anyone who wants to should apply for asylum. If they are rejected and choose to migrate anyway, more power to them.
The system is only strained because liberals and fascists make it strained. People in Ter Apel are not allowed to work, they aren’t even allowed to hang out with citizens to integrate or to do informal work.
The housing shortage is the result of half a century of liberal dismantling of the robust social housing system, resulting in a deficit of which migrants are less than 5% of people that want a home.
If we built housing like China does and just let people work under the same collective labor contracts as citizens, there wouldn’t just be no problem; we would flourish.
Moreover, with climate change the amount of migration will only increase. The only options we have are (1) growing the migration system or (2) a war of annihilation in which the nations that set quotas try to murder enough migrants that the survivors fit under their quotas.
I would prefer option (1), so any migrant we get now who liberals and fascists struggle to classify as subhumans worthy of death is a win.
sees people choosing to live in camps rather than the US
“But I’m having a tough time imagining it being that bad”
Yeah bro, people typically give up their entire lives and move halfway across the world for minor inconveniences. You would have criticized gays for leaving Germany in 1934.
They’re just giving up their lives and moving halfway across the world to virtue signal
I wish I could afford to flee to California. It’s night and day from this shithole state I’m stuck in.
I’d still prefer to be out of the US entirely.
People who literally study fascism for a living have fled, and they’re ostensibly not even lgbtq+
Upvoted for the good faith argument and conversation.
I don’t entirely agree or disagree with you. I think they have basically no chance of getting asylum because the dutch government doesn’t see the US as an unsafe place and so in a way this is taking away time and resources from people who, like you said, are fleeing from things like civil wars.
Also as an american you can move to the Netherlands legally relatively easily! You need money, yes, but it’s waaaaaay easier for an american than for basically any other non European. You can start your own company here, invest not even that much and you get a residency permit. I know multiple Americans here who have done this, including a non binary person (irrelevant but for them it was a reason to leave the US).
At the same time I can’t blame anyone from wanting to escape a threatening and dangerous situation. Just getting on a flight is the quickest way to safety, so of course I empathise (and clearly so do you, just to make that clear).