Why Young People Risk The Backway: Understanding The Psychology Behind Poverty And Desperation – The Standard Newspaper

Why Young People Risk The Backway: Understanding The Psychology Behind Poverty And Desperation – The Standard Newspaper

By Ricky Peters When young Africans risk their lives on the backway—crossing deserts, detention camps, and the Mediterranean—it is often judged from a Western perspective as reckless, irrational, or irresponsible. Critics ask: Why would anyone choose such danger? But this question already assumes a level of safety, choice, and future orientation that many people living in deep poverty simply do not have. To understand the backway tragedy, we mus…