Canada bashing is misplaced

Re Canada to blame for Alan’s death, father tells

paper, Sept. 11 I was flabbergasted to read about this misplaced blame by the father of the Syrian child Alan Kurdi, who died in most unfortunate circumstances, which Canada did not create.

There are probably one billion people on this planet who would love to move to Canada. I was one of them 23 years ago hoping to improve my family’s life while I was working in the Middle East. I applied for legal immigration and luckily I was accepted, for which I am eternally grateful to Canada.

It would have been ludicrous for me to blame Canada for any untoward event occurring to me or my family, if Canada had denied my immigration application. Every sovereign country, based on its economic and social conditions, has a right to decide who it will admit.

Similarly, Canada has a right to defend its borders and determine who it will allow and under what terms. Sadly, most immigration lawyers just care about themselves and don’t consider these people will be an immediate financial burden on the economy, which the Star has been telling us for six months is “sputtering” and in “recession.”

Finally, there is the issue of assimilation with our society — we are all seeing the events unfolding in the Thorncliffe school, when the latest changes to the sex-education were implemented.

Stephen Harper is right in taking extraordinary pains to ensure due process is followed so Islamic State terrorists do not come in the garb of asylum seekers. Rajeev Chopra, Toronto I am as saddened as anyone else about that little boy’s needless death, but to hear his father say it is Canada’s fault just made me mad. Did any Canadian put that child and his family in an unsafe boat? No; he did that himself.

I am sick and tired of Canada being painted as the bad guys for not opening our doors wide and letting thousands of these migrants in without proper screening. We do not have affordable housing for the people already here. How can we house thousands more? We can’t. No country can. Elaine Booth, Toronto