The revolution across Lebanon has sparked nationwide controversy, to say the least – exposing politicians, businesses, public servants, and political parties over the last two months. And although Lebanon’s latest revolution has revealed quite a few truths about the dire situation the country is currently facing and continues to face as the Holidays approach, it has also started a few upsetting rumors in the process.
A few weeks back, I was asked by a friend of mine about a circulating rumor that Canada was willing to take on the cases of Lebanese-Christians who wished to immigrate in light of Lebanon’s recent developments.
I quite simply dismissed it as a rumor and informed that friend that no public or official statement on behalf of the Canadian government was ever issued in that regard – nor about taking “Christian” Lebanese at all (wonder who started that rumor).
And as the only things that spread faster than viral revolutionary memes are rumors, this rumor even got to the Canadian Ambassador Emmanuelle Lamoureux herself, who felt obliged to publically deny these rumors in a tweet on her official Twitter page.
She publically confirmed: “Given false rumors which continue to circulate, I confirm that there is no special program in place for Christians in Lebanon who want to immigrate to Canada. Requests from around the world are reviewed in a consistent manner, according to the same criteria.”
She went on: “Here, you can find a list of services offered by the Embassy and how to access them, including consular services to Canadian citizens,” sharing a link to the Embassy’s official website. (Surprise! No special button for you if you love Jesus, nor one because it is his birthday soon).
Lamoureux went on to tweet the statement out in French for our fellow French-speaking crowd, which has since garnered a few likes and retweets since yesterday.
Canada is one of the most beautiful countries in the world because IT DOES NOT segregate people based on their religion. It would be one thing to circulate a rumor about “Lebanese” being given priority, but exclusively the “Christian-Lebanese”? Now how did we manage to come up with that?