The Great Satan once told me that refugees should be considered foreign investors temporarily obstructed from their material wealth, and that by delaying in accepting refugees, Canada was giving up the opportunity to have essentially the first draft. Like choosing a sports team basically.

It’s damning that the response to the refugee crisis by the government is to worry over the niqab at citizenship ceremonies.

I realize the very context of my work makes me an alarmist, but it’s hard not to be when the government passes bills like C51 and the TPP – the last being trade deal laws with nations Canada should theoretically have sanctions against for human rights violations.

There are currently in Australia mass detention centres for refugee processing, with walls made from razor wire. These camp occupants are desparagingly spoken of by Australian parliament if at all.

It has only been a few weeks since photos of Aylan Kurdi’s little broken body on the shoreline made international headlines, yet we are quibbling over a bit of cloth.

Aylan Kurdi was as much a victim of trafficking as he was a refugee, a point no one wishes to discuss.

Canada has a long and proud tradition of humanitarian efforts, yet this government has chosen to turn a blind eye to trafficking within her own sovereign borders. Yet the government refuses to acknowledge that it’s endemic and refuses to have national rational discussion about the missing aboriginals. This despite being found in violation of several United Nations declarations such as the need to redress grievances against the crown by First Nations groups.