How do you revive interest in a story that has been around for more than five years? A story, that actually feels like a cliché from a region regularly rocked by one conflict or another?
One social media user dared to do something, well, different, something that triggered a virtual debate.
Making headlines, the “Hot Migrants” Instagram account is posting screen grabs of “handsome men on their journey to Europe”, according to the page’s bio. “Their countries might be falling apart but their sex appeal still goes strong.”
The images are taken from news footage of refugees making the treacherous journey from conflict zones like Iraq and Syria to western Europe.
Reaction to the account has ranged from being attacked as “inappropriate” – given what those in the photos must have gone through to reach their destination – to feeling that the men featured are being “objectified”.
At the same time, others are praising it for humanising the refugees as people who have distinct looks instead of the almost generic gloomy-looking battered images of fleeing people.
The creator, who is in the United States and wants to remain anonymous, fired back in interviews that it should not be taken too seriously, and that the aim is to shed a different light on a humanitarian crisis and make it more understandable to the average social media user.
It is interesting to contemplate whether there would have been such a strong reaction if the page was focused on beautiful refugee children or women. That one is risky, as vultures and predators would hound and try to find these vulnerable figures.
Let us pause a bit and take a step back. While we don’t like to admit it, we do this sort of thing in the media all the time.
We focus our lens and writings on that one extra “attractive” or distinct-looking refugee child or woman – because, as shallow as it sounds, people do take more notice of someone attractive or distinctive-looking regardless of their plight and story.
Here’s one example: a photo of a blond, blue-eyed Syrian refugee child that got many likes and was making its rounds last year was accompanied by ignorant comments such as: “Oh! She doesn’t even look Syrian. She looks European.”
What is coming out of the continuing crisis is that stories that trigger strong emotions get noticed and reshaped.
It is not enough to feel outrage and write emotional comments on social media and under articles on this. Something active needs to be done – and there are projects that allow us all to help out refugees and the vulnerable.
Then there are those stories that touch a chord with the public, as they can imagine themselves in the shoes of the refugees.
In this category is the case of Kunkush the cat, a beloved pet who was reunited with his Iraqi refugee family in Norway after he was lost on the Greek island of Lesbos. The family was fleeing ISIL militants in Mosul and took their pet with them. But along the journey the cat panicked and slipped away. Eventually, through social media and volunteers, the cat was brought to Norway and reunited with the family.
I know I teared up along with the mother and her children when she held and kissed Kunkush and called him “hayati” (my life), a term of endearment.
The refugees and migrants, like everyone, just want to live. They want a home, they want to love their pets, they want to feel, look and be human. They don’t want to live up to some image of a refugee we have in our minds.
They are survivors and want to move on, and we need to help them do that.
rghazal@thenational.ae
On Twitter: @Arabianmau
