Anita Rani has said the West is “in danger of turning away from tolerance” over the refugee crisis and warns the “Brexit bubble” must not distract the country from helping solve the ever-growing issue.
The Countryfile presenter recently visited a Syrian refugee camp home to 80,000 refugees in Jordon and recalled her experiences in an article for the Radio Times.
Rani says she didn’t hesitate to visit the camp after her time on Strictly Come Dancing at the end of last year as she’d become “sickened by some of the rhetoric used to describe fellow humans in their most extreme hour of need”.
The 38-year-old said she was “acutely aware” how lucky she was to live in Britain and discussed her father’s decision to move to India for work in the 1950s after being invited as he was from a Commonwealth country. She also noted many of the refugees she spoke to did not want to come to Britain, but instead return to their “beloved” home country.
“When we portray refugees as ‘other’, we distance ourselves from them,” Rani wrote. “I’m deeply concerned that we are increasingly unable to see beyond someone’s colour or accent.
“The West is in danger of turning away from tolerance, from the progressive, forward-thinking countries that we pride ourselves on being. Instead we are becoming close-minded and extreme, all within living memory of the Second World War.”
The presenter encouraged “humanity and kindness” and said that although the UK may be in a “Brexit bubble” the continuing refugee crisis cannot be ignored.
“At the moment Britain is living in a Brexit bubble, but we cannot ignore the most important story of our times. What shows character is how we react in a crisis. Right now the world is in crisis and we are one of the best-placed countries to help.”
