Many people in modern day’s Türkiye views Western countries with multiple cultures to be more modern and civilised. Many even wish to move abroad to build careers and lives there, with expectations of acceptance.

 However,the same fraction of people seem to despise the presence of refugees who are in need. They mask their prejudice under the guise of fear. When asked for their reasoning for fear, they resort to the overly-used harmful discriminatory generalisations, such as ‘they are dangerous’ or ‘they are all rapists’ or the ‘they are dirty.’ When confronted with the fact that these sweeping generalizations are essentially a form of racism, their response is often, “I’m not racist, I just don’t like Arabs.”

When the dangers and reasons for them even being in the country are mentioned some say ‘Then only the women and the children should be here. The men should go back and fight. We see everyday on media channels what the men are doing’  and they overlook the fact that the media often fuels xenophobia and perpetuates a one-sided narrative.

It is as though many of them forget that Western media uses the same racist remarks they make about the refugees, to describe the Turkish immigrants. It is as though many of them forget that they too, will be viewed just the same in the West.  

Clarification: This post is not a generalisation. It only refers to a group of people.