Wil Wheaton has a theory, some good points being made, a group we should support, and the word for the day is F-I-N-I-T-E...
I'll admit I'm having some difficulty with the whole idea of the current trends in sailing and cruising while the world is doing it's interesting times Danse Macabre.
The cruising world is a polar opposite to the reality of a growing population of refugees in that we travel for pleasure while those from Ukraine,Yemen, Somalia, Guatemala, Afghanistan, Syria, South Sudan, Venezuela, Myanmar, and countless others have little or no choice in their travels.
One image I see repeated over and over is a refugee clutching their worldly possessions in a small suitcase or bag which, when compared to what even the most budget challenged cruiser carries with them, speaks volumes.
I don't expect that a lot of boat folks have ever had a chance to visit and spend time in a refugee camp or come up close and personal to the sort of cataclysms that create mass exoduses of people moving onward to escape those catastrophic events. More than likely, you're unaware of most of the causes that create displacement of a population or the reality of what sort of life is in store for most people who become refugees.
To be honest, I'd prefer to know a lot less about a world of genocide, mass graves, profit based disasters, and wars.
Ukraine, however is an exception. It's big news and we're seeing it play out everyday in living color but it's just the same old story played over and over again. The only difference is it's availability in the current media cycle. The current number of refugees is somewhere around 90-million people who all need help and a place to settle. It's a very big problem and one you might want to read up on.
By all means we should all support the citizens of Urkraine but let's not forget that there are millions more caught in the trap of being a stateless person and there will continue to be more and more as time goes on until we break the current cycle of madness.
Listening to Billy Joel cover Procol Harum
So it goes...
