The media is very bad at knowing the difference between asylum seekers, illegal immigrants, legal migrants and, indeed, people who were born in Britain but aren’t white. However most people agree that if you have a decent reason for getting asylum in the UK – and many coming here are escaping truly hoorific situations – they should be allowed in.
We don’t make it easy though, despite what the likes of the Daily Mail would have you believe, as in most cases you have to prove exactly why you deserve asylum, despite the fact that often the reason they had to leave mean they aren’t going to be able to bring vasts amount of evidence with them. It can be even tougher for those hoping for refuge due to the fact they are gay.
The short film Rats That Eat Men follow gay refugee Ritah, who has escaped persecution in Uganda and is now homeless on the streets of London, squatting in an abandoned building with only a knife to protect herself. She discovers that she’s not living there alone, as a young Polish man is sleeping upstairs. After some intial distrust they begin to bond, with Ritah revealing what she left behind and how much it cost her to get out, which leaves the viewer to think about why squatting in London is better than her life before, as well as considering the dangers and anonymity of living on the edge of British society.
Take a look below.
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Rats That Eat Men from Imagefiction Films on Vimeo.
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