Stop being so ignorant

I recently read about a Syrian refugee seeking asylum in Sweden, and while he might just be a ‘migrant’ now, he was once an athlete, a doctor and a father. Reading about his struggle for the past two years, simply just waiting around, whereas once upon a time, his schedule used to be filled is truly frustrating.

However, I can’t help but wonder who to blame: Syria for letting go of such success or Sweden for failing to make use of such resourceful people? Who’s responsibility is it really and is it fair to point fingers at Sweden for making him wait for two years? Being a Swede, I would like to put the blame on my homeland because of the fact that we are wasting such talent. Instead of making use of such people, we make him wait around, and learn to memorise every street in the city he resides.

There are all these debates about how refugees add to crime rates in the country, but how fair is it to make such remarks when we make athletes and doctors spend two years just roaming around the city, waiting for an answer. I think that we need to think twice before we start creating stereotypes because if one refugee commits a crime, it doesn’t mean that they all come just to add to our crime rate. It is time to come up with policies and guidelines on how to deal with these refugees, because whether we believe it or not, they will benefit our country in one way or another.

— The reader is a Swedish teacher based in Karlskrona, Sweden