3/15/22

By Josh Rubin

It isn’t easy. The flood of coverage of the dire situation in Ukraine is driving a wave of refugees that is being seen by millions who have never watched a border before. And those watching are feeling pain and sympathy that are more familiar to those of us who have stood ourselves at the border and at the gates of detention camps. Then, the media reports were sparse, the sympathy sporadic, alternating with tales that explained our closed doors with made-up stories about danger from marauding barbarians. All the while as we watched the weeping eyes of children, the beseeching of the many thousands whose desperation drove them to our country.

Desperation has no skin color. But there is little doubt in our hearts, as witnesses, that the plight of certain people gets a lot more attention than a similar plight of others. We watch people fleeing evil. Evil is bombs and Putin, but evil is also poverty and hunger. Evil is the driving force behind the desperation. We must learn to see it, wherever it is.

We have tears enough for all, don’t we? We have enough for all.

Painting detail by Melissa Bowen Rubin