Critical Response On The Article On Illegal Immigration To The United Kingdom

Dear Mr. Gallagher (Chief Editor of the Sun Newspaper),

I am writing to respectfully protest about the article which was published on the Sun newspaper dated April 17th, 2015 whereby Hopkins presented her
extremist view about illegal immigration to the United Kingdom. I am absolutely disgusted that her article was allowed to be printed, this was beyond any comprehension. Hopkins’ article provided an extremist view to illegal immigration and several unproven conjectures were presented by her article with intention to only satisfy her extreme-right fanbase. I believe that Ms. Hopkin’s article is completely unfounded, highly offensive and has a total lack of compassion for fellow human beings.

The article started with the phrase “No, I don’t care”, already presenting the readers with an immediate negative feeling followed by the usage of phrases from the lexical field of death. Hopkins included vivid yet dehumanising imagery where she referred to the refugees with the terms “coffins” and “bodies in the water” which wholly discredits Hopkins as an author and suggests the uncivilised nature of her view. I believe that it is without doubt, unethical to neglect members of our society that are suffering in ways that may even undermine their human rights, similar to how Hopkins is dehumanising refugees. This is further emphasised when she labelled the migrants as “aggressive norovirus”, “feral humans” as well as comparing them to “cockroaches”. The bombardment of these phrases demonstrates her strong hatred and and should have triggered a full rejection of Ms. Hopkins’ article from being published in the Sun newspaper.

Furthermore, Hopkins stated that the UK should follow the footsteps of Australia by exerting demoralising and inhuman treatments of refugees. It is understandable but not acceptable that the European far-right factions fall in love with Australia’s immigration policy. The Guardian newspaper has issued a study about Australia’s immigration policy and found that the Australian government paid a huge sum of money (approximately 400,000 AUD per detained asylum seeker per year) to keep the migrants out of side in concentration camp ran by private contractors in nearby islands such as Papua New Guinea and Indonesia. It is a high cost to keep the problem out of sight. The money spent could have been used more effectively to help the migrants into Australia rather than keeping them out, which is much more positive and compassionate. Studies from the Brooking Institute stated that accepting refugees or migrants is a win-win-win situation for the refugees themselves, for the country of destination and for the country of origin. By accepting migrants or refugees, and allowing them to come into the country, the country is providing them with safety, security and protection. In many instances, this could be lifesaving towards them. Moreover, it can be beneficial towards the country receiving the refugees. Once the refugees are in their host countries, they have access to education and health which could help them start productive lives and become employed, making them beneficial towards the economy of the host country. The countries where the refugees originated from may benefit from their resettlement as well because new business networks would be created between them and the host country of the refugees.

This article, however, raised a valid issue about illegal migrants into the UK and other European countries. However, one must understand the cause of the problem in order to find suitable solutions. Hatred and aggressive measures do not solve any issue and this is where I strongly disagree with Ms. Hopkins. People do not just leave their home countries and engage in a life threatening journey just for the sake of doing it; there are legitimate reasons and it can either be economic, social, political or environmental. Economic migrants leave their home to find work where none is available in their home country. Social migrants want to be in another country to be together with their families and friends. Political migrants wish to escape their country due to political disputes or persecution and lastly environmental migrants move to escape from natural disasters such as flooding and earthquakes. A more positive approach to solving the issue of illegal migration would be to try and solve the problem that caused them to move in the first place. This could help prevent mass migration.