When she was 7 years old, Mila Kunis came to the United States. She and her family emigrated from Ukraine. Now 32 years old, she's an actor known for her role on That '70s Show and beyond. In the latest issue of Glamour, Kunis weighed in on Donald Trump and his comments about immigration. Her comments may make you rethink your stance on refugees, as well as Trump's candidacy as a whole. She was asked how her background played into her views on how Trump seems to "stoke anti-Mexican-immigrant and anti-Muslim-immigrant fears," as Glamour puts it. Kunis told the magazine,
"It's even more than that. The whole Syrian-refugee thing—we came here on a religious-refugee visa, and I’m not going to blow this country up. I’m clearly paying taxes. I’m not taking anything away. So the fact that people look at what’s happening and are like, 'Pfft, they’re going to blow sh*t up'? It saddens me how much fear we’ve instilled in ourselves."
When you think of refugees, a prominent Hollywood star like Kunis may not come to mind. Same goes for the fact that the late Steve Jobs is the son of a Syrian immigrant. The notion that all refugees are dangerous is a dangerous thought in itself, because it's not an accurate reflection of what refugees are really like, as seen in Kunis' comments. She drops some serious wisdom about not judging a group of people for the actions of a few extremists.
But as she continued her comment, Kunis explained that she doesn't necessarily blame Trump for instilling that fear. Instead, she added,
"Going from there to the whole, 'Hey, let’s build a wall between Los Angeles and Mexico'.… I don’t even have to answer that one. There’s no point. It’s a really great sound bite. And it got him far. Nobody should be mad at him; we did it to ourselves."
At first, I was going to disagree about not wanting people to be mad at Trump, but in some ways, she highlights a point that many people haven't. While the presumptive Republican nominee may spur such comments about building walls or banning certain religions from entering the country, it's his followers that perpetuate that idea and applaud it. In some ways, she is saying that it's Americans own fault for adding to the hype and voting for him; if he didn't have any fans, he wouldn't be the leading GOP candidate.
Still, even if the public is partially responsible, that doesn't make Trump's comments any less distressing. As Kunis' remarks highlight, it's unfair to lump all refugees together, since they're such a diverse group. And if someone had stopped Kunis and her family from entering the country simply because they were religious refugees, who knows where she'd be today.
