“Because No One Would Buy My Photos, Here They Are For Free. Mosul 2017”

Part 3: We need to fund true Journalism to make sure we all get to see our shared humanity. Thats the only thing that will make us care for our fellow humans abroad. And thats important, cause we here have the power to stop the war. Only the powerfull can deside to stop te war (on terror) and we can make our leaders stop. But we need to care enough to go out and demand it. No more bombs on computer generated targets and their families, no more interfering with democracy's, no more military interventions and regime change for the benifit of our company's and no more supporting terrorist and oppressive regimes. If we leave the middle east there humanity we will also be able to keep ours.

part 2: we like to tell ourselves Islam is the problem. but almost 70 years ago we already knew our greedy governments were the problem, they still are. I'm not saying the killing of Westerners is justified, don't get me wrong. But the systemic neglect for arabic lives by our leaders is the fuel for this rage, not the Islam. This is the time for Journalism to step up to the plate. Leaders and papers are trying to tell us they (muslims, terrorist) are evil because they are different, believe weird stuff that makes them hate, that makes them dumb. Thats BS. We need the journalist to tell us the truth. We need them to explane to us where this hatred came from, so we can understand. See the humanity behind the rage, so we start to care again. About their lives, their kids, their trauma's. When I see the kids at the youth centre from Iraq, their humanity is apparent to me. Its easy to feel for them, they didn't deserve the cards they where dealt. but its not enough for just me to know this.

Some kids at the youthcentre I work for are from mosul. They were forced to pick a side to fight, but lucky there dad got them to europe. Its heavy stuff these guys went through, and now they are here people hate on them for being muslim. its the dumbest thing and it doesn't help. We need people to be informed about Iraq. Everybody needs to see and know the humanity of the people involved. And we need a media who is honest about the involment of our governments in the violence and warcrimes commited. Last week I read in a book by Noam Chomski a report by the CIA. It was about the rise of hatred for America and the West in the arabic world in the 50's. They concluded that the people where angry because there natural weath (oil) was stolen and the governments where corrupted by the west. They didn't have an anser to counter this anti-western uprising in the culture because, the inverstigation stated, there claims were true. Now almost 70 years later and decades of intrusion.

Petar (part 2). My point is the post above is this. I believe that everyone in the USA and in the world should have a basic standard of living. Access to food, clean water, shelter, healthcare and safety. We, as a country, and we, as a planet, right now, have the ability to achieve 4 of those 5 needs for everyone. Safety is the only thing that we may never be able to fully achieve. Americans do a lot of good things (as do many other countries). But here, it seems that we have a healthy dose of hubris going for us. If you come here (or possibly even have some of us visit you), you will see an attitude present in a large portion of the population that thinks America is the best. It is the most free place on earth. It is an attitude that is incorrect. To me, no country can be called great when its' children go to bed hungry or when 1 in 8 of its' people are (or have been) in the criminal system. Or when a citizen has to make a choice between food and medicine.

Petar: 1. Poverty is not a competition. 2. The average cost of living seems to actually be about 50% below that of the US, so no, things are not actually more expensive in Bulgaria. A very large portion of Americans also don't have pension funds, or wildly insufficient ones, so they're forced to work for most of their lives. 3. Yes, extreme poverty is relative, but in a country like the US where a ridiculous amount of all the world's riches is amassed among a very small number of people, the contrast is extremely stark.

Petar, I understand what you are saying. Both Laury M and Leni have provided good answers to which I will add only a few points. You are missing the context. Yes, if you live in the Bulgaria and work in the US (UK, Germany, etc.), you may indeed have a comfortable living. In fact, here in the US, we have version of this with people from Mexico coming here and working at below minimum wage levels in order to send the money home to their families. I don't know what the real impact it has on those families, but the folks that are here working don't have it easy. I guess you could tell the costs of thing in Bulgaria. What is the average price and size of a home? ($188.900 here), a new car ($33,560), gasoline ($2.32/gal or 0.61/liter, if my math is right), healthcare ($10, 345 per person ((2016))). As you can see, healthcare alone is double the poverty level.

Petar, I don't know much about how poor Bulgaria is, but 10k a year is really s**t poor in the US. 800 dollars gets you almost nothing. Especially food (especially healthy food) and housing is really bloody expensive there. I'm not sure this idea that you have that everything is more expensive than in the US is true, because if you had to live off 160 dollars a month you'd basically be living on the street with barely enough to buy some food for yourself. Things aren't that great in the US really. I think they're still living on the glory days of sixty years prior, when they were the heroes of the world and were economically in the rise. They still kind of think they're that awesome and they're hanging onto it, but ... I mean I only lived there for like 3 months and I pretty much ran screaming back to Europe. *shrug*

Excuse me Mr.Mathers ,but when you write that to live with $10k/yr-family of 4 is extreme poverty it seems like a great hypocrisy! I'm living in Bulgaria ,country member of EU ,where with this amount is a very normal to live a family of 4. To live with $20k/yr(or more)-family of 4 ,is a privilege for not more than 10% of the families in Bulgaria. And if you want to give you an example for extreme poverty in civilize country ,I can tell you that my aunt which worked like a high school teacher more than 30 years ,now live with $162.50 per month (or $1950/yr). In a country where everything is more expensive than in USA. So ,seems that "extreme poverty" depends from the point of view.

Wezbie, if you've been able to even blend in visually with the locals, then you have not truly experienced the struggle that refugees, or immigrants, from Middle Eastern countries, especially Muslim women. They're trying - and willing! - to integrate societies where islamophobia is on the rise, and the fear of foreigners in general is also high because of political lies. How can they integrate a society where they are regarded with distrust, where business will refuse to hire them, outrightly or otherwise, because of their looks, their religion or even their name? And that's an issue with the vast majority of non-white migrants. Then they keep to their own communities, if only for the sake of not feeling like a pariah anymore, to speak a language they master instead of being sneered at for not perfectly speaking the local ones.

I agree with you 100% on everything except that radicalisation is just because the society has not tried to bring them into the society. It is definitely part of the problem. But it is a two way street. I've been an immigrant in 2 different countries for the majority of my life and you get as much as you put in. That said, I am privileged in that my skin colour does not make me look 'foreign' in the eyes of the locals. However, there are a lot of immigrants that move and don't learn the language or remain in their groups once in their country. Although this is more of an immigrant rather than refugee issue as every refugee I've met will work their arses off to pick themselves back up. I think these are things both parties have to understand. It was to be a relationship between the two and the only way that will happen, as you say is to stop giving in to fear and try to start a dialogue

There are a******s in every demographic, but I guarantee you that there are far more of those in the local population than among the refugees. Remember that the media does very little to shine light on the good things migrants achieve - charity, compassion, entrepreneurship - but they will jump on every little thing they do wrong. They're showing you a specific side of it, one that cannot be 100% eradicated - your brother or your best friend could end up being a rapist, except they might not get caught, or get consequences, and it wouldn't make the national news. You're gonna need to question the integrity of what is shown to you, or you will only contribute to Daesh's plan to disrupt the West.

Most of those rape stories were fake news, intended to get you to react exactly like that. The reason 20 yo men come is because the trip is incredibly dangerous, and because men are actually in the most danger because they are the ones being forced to fight for the one side or the other. Those who don't want to fight only have the choice of leaving, or being killed themselves. Women and children have it hard, but are left out of the fighting to a greater extent. Plus for them to make the trip.... I can't even get my toddler to walk 10 minutes to the supermarket. Do you see yourself crossing deserts and forests without proper gear or supplies for fear of your life with 4 kids?! Get real.