Why a three year old on a beach may preserve our humanity

Why a three year old on a beach may preserve our humanity

Finnley (shark blanket) and
James (Photo: A. Kane)

My nephew Finnley celebrated his third birthday on Tuesday, surrounded by loving family in beautiful upstate New York. My brother posted a little video of him in an orange t-shirt leaping down some stairs and grinning proudly as he heard his father’s encouragement. Later, my sister-in-law shared a picture of Finnley in his new shark blanket, sitting on his father’s lap and smiling.

One day later, Aylan Al-Kurdi, another three year old surrounded by loving family, got into a boat dressed in a red t-shirt and shorts. His leap, likely involuntary and caused by waves overtaking the over-packed boat, did not end in smiles and applause. It ended in eternal slumber, face down on a beautiful Mediterranean beach, where tourists promenade. He, too, will be in his parent's arms tonight (at least in my belief system). Most of his family also perished. His family loved him so much that they risked his life and paid thousands of euros to smugglers to escape a deadly and indiscriminate war in Syria that, over a protracted period of five years, has killed civilians and forced over 11 million people to flee for their lives.

Aylan drowned in a failed attempt to reach the Greek island of Kos.
His body was found on the shore in Bodrum, Turkey. (Photo: DHA)

Aylan’s story is now in the center of the maelstrom of the migration and refugee discussions. These discussions race from terms of art to use of images and from Europe’s capacity and willingness to accommodate the influx of people to what needs to be done politically to halt the conditions that force families to risk their lives and abandon everything.

Terms
The word migrant often used, particularly in the pejorative sense. Aylan is more precisely part of a large group of refugees or asylum-seekers who are forced to leave their homes, in this case due to a conflict that is over five years old and that has taken unacceptable tolls on civilians. Aylan and his brother Ghalib are also children, people, humans.