Give me one reason while I should have empathy for the Deplorables...

[lambchopp59]

58. And here he is.

His name is Muhammed, and I've been in touch with him in Pakistan for over 5 years now. We always have to code all communications, but he has made it clear his conundrum:
In Pakistan, no one dares place anything but "Islam" in any official blank asking one's religious "preference", including Visa applications. He's been rejected for a visa for failure to prove direct family ties in the U.S., now with the Trumpeteer's notions of rejecting all applications, he's screwed.
Muhammed ran away from home at 16 to his aunt's home in the Punjab. Our stories are similar, I ran away from home to San Francisco at 16 to escape bullying and attempted murder by my father. Muhammed would be murdered at home, as an "honor killing". He is living on borrowed time, counting on that his family and other religious zealots there will not waste the resources to hunt him down. Muhammed is every bit as agnostic as I. He's seen the hypocrisy of the religious zealots.
I'm paying to send him to the local university for a bachelor's in software engineering. Hopefully, some day we can get more reasonable politicians that will lift unreasonable blanket restrictions that cause catch-22's like this.