Comments about the Yle television series on far-right young women, Suomineidot (Finnish Maidens), went viral, and for a good reason. Apart from revealing how much in the dark Yle is about racism and the far right, it also exposes white privilege in Finland.
In a nutshell, the series is about three young women:
Meri Kartta is a far-right ethnonationalist who hangs out with neo-Nazis.
Liisa Siira is a member of the Islamophobic Perussuomalaiset (PS)* party.
One of the best arguments against the program is that it lacks context. The journalists who did the series acted as obedient stenographers instead of critical reporters.
Despite the criticism of the program, Yle defended the program in a tweet below:
“Improving our understanding of each other and the world is one of Yle’s aims. By confronting different points of view, we increase our understanding and empathy and challenging confrontation. If we understand the reasons behind a particular point of view, we may feel that it isn’t so threatening.”
Este 24 de marzo, conmemorando a esta fecha infame en la historia argentina, dedico este humilde escrito a Rodolfo Walsh quien murió un día después del primer aniversario de la dictadura militar de Jorge Rafael Videla.
Aquí publicamos su “Carta abierta a la Junta militar en 1977, al cumplirse un año del golpe de Estado de 1976:”
CARTA ABIERTA DE UN ESCRITOR A LA JUNTA MILITAR
1. La censura de prensa, la persecución a intelectuales, el allanamiento de mi casa en el Tigre, el asesinato de amigos queridos y la pérdida de una hija que murió combatiéndolos, son algunos de los hechos que me obligan a esta forma de expresión clandestina después de haber opinado libremente como escritor y periodista durante casi treinta años.
El primer aniversario de esta Junta Militar ha motivado un balance de la acción de gobierno en documentos y discursos oficiales, donde lo que ustedes llaman aciertos son errores, los que reconocen como errores son crímenes y lo que omiten son calamidades.
El 24 de marzo de 1976 derrocaron ustedes a un gobierno del que formaban parte, a cuyo desprestigio contribuyeron como ejecutores de su política represiva, y cuyo término estaba señalado por elecciones convocadas para nueve meses más tarde.
En esa perspectiva lo que ustedes liquidaron no fue el mandato transitorio de Isabel Martínez sino la posibilidad de un proceso democrático donde el pueblo remediara males que ustedes continuaron y agravaron.
Ilegítimo en su origen, el gobierno que ustedes ejercen pudo legitimarse en los hechos recuperando el programa en que coincidieron en las elecciones de 1973 el ochenta por ciento de los argentinos y que sigue en pie como expresión objetiva de la voluntad del pueblo, único significado posible de ese “ser nacional” que ustedes invocan tan a menudo.
Invirtiendo ese camino han restaurado ustedes la corriente de ideas e intereses de minorías derrotadas que traban el desarrollo de las fuerzas productivas, explotan al pueblo y disgregan la Nación.
Una política semejante solo puede imponerse transitoriamente prohibiendo los partidos, interviniendo los sindicatos, amordazando la prensa e implantando el terror más profundo que ha conocido la sociedad argentina.
2. Quince mil desaparecidos, diez mil presos, cuatro mil muertos, decenas de miles de desterrados son la cifra desnuda de ese terror. Colmadas las cárceles ordinarias, crearon ustedes en las principales guarniciones del país virtuales campos de concentración donde no entra ningún juez, abogado, periodista, observador internacional. El secreto militar de los procedimientos, invocado como necesidad de la investigación, convierte a la mayoría de las detenciones en secuestros que permiten la tortura sin límite y el fusilamiento sin juicio. (1)
Here is the plot of a new TV series Suomineidot (Finnish Maidens):
Meri is a far-right ethnonationalist who hangs out with neo-Nazis.
Jasmin is an avid follower of Pentti Linkola, who promoted population decline.
Liisa is a member of the Islamophobic Perussuomalaiset (PS)* party.
Apart from the radical political views of the three participants, YLE launched the television series during the UN week of the elimination of racial discrimination (March 21-27).
Great timing, Yle, I know it was intentional.
It’s not the first time that the state-owned national broadcaster, Yle, has fallen flat on its face due to its shoddy programs.
Below, are two recent examples of programs on racism and the far right that backfired:
If a program promotes or tries to understand what racist and far-right people think, there should be an opposite opinion.
With minorities having a pitifully illegible voice in the media, programs such as Suomineidot normalize and only strengthen institutional racism and thinking. A lot of historical whitewashing happens as well. We forget how our hatred and racism led us to terrible wars.
The TV series is another example of shoddy journalism driven by white Finnish privilege that don’t have a faint idea about racism and its harm.
Migrant Tales, the oldest anti-racism blog in Finland, will celebrateits 15th anniversary on May 30.
We are planning to publish an online magazine to commemorate the event. Apart from a section with greetings from people and associations, we will publish poetry, pictures, drawings, essays from our activists and readers in Finland and abroad.You can submit your writings in the language of your choice.
The online magazine will also offer an historical timeline of our most important achievements and the impact they had.
The interior ministry estimates “tens of thousands” Ukrainians moving to Finland as a result of the war in that country, according to Yle News. There are about 7,000 Ukrainians in Finland, but Anna Rundgren, a ministry of interior senior specialist, believes that the actual figure is several times higher.
In 2015, the country saw a record influx of people coming here. Thirty-two thousand four hundred seventy-six asylum seekers, mainly from Iraq (20,485) and Afghanistan (5,214), came to Finland in that historic year. The country’s first wave of refugees was in 1921 when some 6,500 Russians from Kronstadt island in the Gulf of Finland fled the Bolsheviks.
Any sensible person should understand that the Ukrainian newcomers are an important human asset to the country. If we want to make Finland their new home, we must also treat them with respect and be vigilant so they will not fall prey to human trafficking and exploitation.
The treatment that some Iraqis, Afghans, and other non-EU asylum seekers received in Finland from 2015 was shameful in some cases. In May 2016, Migrant Tales, Rovaniemi-based daily Lapin Kansa, and the asylum seekers of the Kolari asylum reception center forced the Red Cross to fire the deputy manager of the camp Jari Sillantie.
I talked to a group of students from different national backgrounds today. Two things unite them: they are mostly Muslims and present or past asylum seekers in Finland.
While Europe is opening its arms to 2.809 million refugees from Ukraine since Sunday, according to the UNHCR, the two sets of rules for refugees reveal how little Europe has done to tackle racism.
In November, Finnish politicians talked about constructing a razor-wire fence on the border with Russia to keep keep out asylum seekers from crossing the Polish Belarus border.
Even if our insincerity, or hypocrisy, is upsetting to some of us, it has riled some asylum seekers who have waited for seven years to get a residence permit in Finland.
How do you tell such a person why Ukrainians are granted automatic residence permits, work permits and access to social welfare? Will you be sincere and tell them what James Baldwin said below?
Despite our understanding of the problem, there must be a lot of resentment among those asylum seekers who have waited for up to seven years for their residence permits.
Despite all the objections to racism and Islamophobia in Finland, the silence and sub-rosa nods why such social ills continue to take root in the country. The chair of parliament’s foreign affairs committee, Jussi Halla-aho of the far-right Perussuomalaiset (PS)*, explained why Europe should open its arms to Ukrainians and shut the door on refugees from regions like the Middle East.
In light of these racist and preposterous explanations by a high-ranking MP, their context is the hope that such statements will boost the PS’ slump in opinion polls.
What is a better place to do it than from the foreign affairs committee by a politician who not only built his political career on spreading racism but was convicted in 2012 for ethnic agitation and breaching the sanctity of religion?
Source: Ville Ranta/Iltalehti
Below are the head of parliament’s foreign affairs committee reasoning why Ukrainian refugees are better than others from regions like the Middle East and Africa on a Facebook post:
“Women and children are fleeing Ukraine. Those very children that are [fleeing] hug teddy bears in their arms, not those who claim they are 17 years old with built bodies. At the same time, when Ukrainian women and children flee the bombing, their husbands remain [in the country] to defend their homeland. Tens of thousands of Ukrainian men abroad return to fight against the [Russian] aggressor. The [Ukrainian refugee crisis] offers an average person what a refugee is and the [original] purpose of international refugee agreements.
Ukrainian refugees are grateful for having a roof over their heads. Iraqis state that the porridge is bad and why asylum reception centers are located so far from the city.
Many people already have [direct] experiences and perceptions of Ukrainians. You can see them at construction sites and farms. You can again see Iraqis…Everyone can decide where they’ve seen them.
Ukraine is a European refugee crisis. Naturally, they flee to the closest regions of Europe. [Ukrainian] refugees don’t demand that they go to the United States or Japan…”
On Tuesday, 2.011 million refugees have fled Ukraine since February 24, according to the UNHCR. Some sources speculate that up to 4 million refugees may flee the war in Ukraine.
In light of Europe’s bleak history and the worst human rights abuses, atrocities, and wars in all of history, one wonders how long our goodwill lasts.
The goodwill of the EU has been shown by granting Ukrainians special protection status. Contrary to asylum seekers who came to Europe in 2015 and faced a long and grueling asylum process, Ukrainians receive automatic residence and work permits and access to social welfare.
Even if such a policy is a step in the right direction, we can ask for how long our goodwill towards Ukrainians fleeing war will last?
If we compare what happened to asylum seekers who came to Europe in 2015 from countries like Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia, our goodwill ran out pretty fast.
Ahti Tolvanen, a historian and member of the Migrant Tales editorial board, tackled the question.
“It is high time that we reform the structural abuse in our labor market to make sue that these people [Ukrainians and others] aren’t exploited,” he said.
The far-right Perussuomalaiset (PS)* is already chipping away at our goodwill and patience towards Ukrainians.
The chairperson of the PS, Riikka Purra, is already attacking Ukrainian refugees by fear-mongering. She tweets: “NOW WE HAVE TO ACT. It would be easy for Russia engulf Finland with immigrants. The government must make sure that our border can keep [refugees] out.”Thank you @nopersu and @Reija_Harkonen for the heads-up.
The racist slogan by the PS is an example of how desperate the party is and that it has nothing to offer Finland except to polarize with injections of xenophobia.
Kun muutamat opiskelijat kysyivät miksi ukrainalaisia saavat kaikki viisumi oleskella EU maissa ja toiset, mm. Lähi- idästä, eivät saaneet, kerroin heille sana, joka paljastaa hyvin asia:
