Category: Enrique

Xenoholism is a behavioral disorder caused by foreigners

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Have you noticed how some people get violent and turn into Mr. Hydes from Dr. Jekylls whenever they start speaking about other ethnic or religious groups? Could we call those that suffer from such split personality disorders xenoholics?

Xeno derives from Latin meaning “foreigner” or “outsider.” Thus a xenoholic is any person who suffers from “a disorder caused by foreigners.”

Contrary to alcoholic, the xenoholic consumes dry rhetoric. There are different types of xenoholic like there are different types of alcoholic drinks such as gin, whiskey and vodka. Xenoholic “drinks” include: racism, prejudice, bigotry, ethnocentrism or a mix of the mentioned into one potent atomic-bomb cocktail.

Isn’t it incredible that some of these xenoholics are the nicest persons when they interact with their group. Everything changes, however, when they take a sip or shot of xenohol.

But let’s stop whining and look at what we can do to help xenoholics kick the habit.

Since its founding in 1935 in Akron, Ohio, Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) has played an important role in helping people rebuild their lives after alcohol addiction.  What about if we establish Xenoholics Anonymous (XA) to help those who suffer from xenoholism? I can see it now at the first-ever XA meeting in history… “Hi, I’m Jussi or James and I am a xenoholic…”

Since xenoholics, like alcoholics, rarely admit they have a “drinking” problem,  I suggest the following AA test* for potential XA members. Simply replace “drinking” to “consuming racist rhetoric” in the AA test below:

  1. Do you lose time from work due to drinking?
  2. Is drinking making your home like unhappy?
  3. Do you drink because you are shy with other people?
  4. Is drinking affecting your reputation?
  5. Have you ever felt remorse after drinking?
  6. Have you gotten into financial difficulties as a result of drinking?
  7. Do you turn to lower companions and an inferior environment as a result of drinking?
  8. Does your drinking make you careless of your family’s social welfare?
  9. Has your ambition decreased since drinking?
  10. Do you crave a drink at a definite time daily?
  11. Do you want a drink the next morning?
  12. Does drinking cause you to have difficulty in sleeping?
  13. Has your efficiency decreased since drinking?
  14. Is drinking jeopardizing your job or business?
  15. Do you drink to escape from worries or troubles?
  16. Do you drink alone?
  17. Have you ever had a complete loss of memory as a result of drinking?
  18. Has your physician ever treated you for drinking?
  19. Do you drink to build up your self-confidence?
  20. Have you ever been to a hospital or institution on account of drinking?

If you answered YES to any one of the questions, there is a definite warning that you may be an alcoholic.

If you have answered YES to any two, the chances are that you are an alcoholic.

For alcohol and drug dependency issues, you can also get in touch with the National Council on Seniors Drug & Alcohol Rehab.

If you answered YES to three or more, you are definitely an alcoholic.

*Steward Brand: The Next Whole Earth Catalog. Sept. 1981. p. 328.

 

 

 

Julkisen sanan neuvoston päätös oli voitto sanavapaudelle

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Enrique Tessieri

Julkisen sanan neuvoston (JSN) vapauttava päätös Kirkko ja kaupungin lehdelle oli mielestäni voitto sana- sekä lehdistövapaudelle Suomessa. Miten on mahdollista, että yksi maamme suurimmista poliittista puolueesta kehtaa alkaa vaikuttamaan sekä rajoittamaan lehdistövapautta maassamme? Mielestäni tämä on juuri se tärkein kysymys koko JSN:n päätöksessä.

Neuvoston mukaan pilapiirroksista on tullut erittäin vähän kanteluita sen olemassaoloaikana vuoden 1968 jälkeen. JSN on myös ottanut käsiteltäväksi vain poikkeustapaukissa pilapiirroksia. Neuvosto kirjoittaa lehdistötiedossa: ”Tämä kertoo siitä, että yleisö ymmärtää pilapiirroksen erityisluonteen ja hyväksyy niissä käytetyn kärjekkään ilmaisutavan.”

Jos JSN:n olisi antanut Ville Rannan pilapiirroksista vastakohtainen päätös, olisivat seuraamukset hyvin arveluttavia ja kaunankantoisia lehdistövapaudelle.

Mitä ero on Rannan pilapiirroksessa ja tuomiot, jotka saivat persussuomaalisten kansanedustaja James Hirvisaaren ja kotkalainen kaupunginvaltuutettu Freddy van Wonterghemin kiihottamisesta kansanryhmää vastaan? Vaikka nämä poliitikot haluavat suojella oma moukkamaista käytöstään politiikkoina sanavapauden avulla, tässä on toki kysymyksessä jotain muuta ja vakavampaa.

Tietyt maahanmuuttajaryhmät ovat samaa kun viina joillekin maahanmuuttovastustajille, koska he käyttäytyvät loukkaavasti toisia ryhmiä kohtaa. Tämä ”känni” nähdään harvoin kun he ovat omassa ryhmässä.

Kun olin nuori toimittaja Buenos Aires Heraldissa, päätoimittaja antoi minulle tärkeää ohjetta. Hän sanoi, että sanat ovat kun tehokas ja tappava ase. Ei voi hävittää muurahaista tykillä, eli on oltava oikeudenmukainen ja huomaavainen kun kirjoittaa toisista. Ihmisarvoa on kunnioitettava eikä sitä pidä tuoda esiin halventavalla tavalla kuten JSN (JO 26) suosittelee.

Onko niin, ettei mm. Jussi Halla-ahon, Hirvisaarin ja van Wonterghemin kirjoitukset loukkaavat toisten ihmisarvoa? Mitä arvo heidän argumentit antavat, jos ne hyökkäävät, leimaavat ja solvaavat toisia ryhmiä?

Tuskin ei mitään kun vihanlietsonta, pahamieltä ja lopulta kansankunnanhäpeä.

JSN exonerates Kirkko & Kaupunki cartoon that mocks PS MPs

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By Enrique Tessieri 

The Council for Mass Media in Finland (JSN) has exonerated  Kirkko&Kaupunki after a cartoon was published on December 14 mocking a group of Perussuomalaiset (PS) party MPs telling everyone who wasn’t a Finnish heterosexual and white conservative to leave Finland. The JSN said in a statement that Ville Ranta’s cartoon was neither degrading nor insulting.  

Kirkko&Kaupunki is a weekly published in Helsinki by the Evangelical-Lutheran Church of Finland.

The decision by Finland’s watchdog organization for journalistic ethics was no surprise except to the PS, which had filed the complaint.

PS MP Anssi Joutsenlahti, one person pictured in the cartoon telling foreigners they should leave the country, wasn’t happy about the ruling. “How could they ever publish this cartoon in a periodical?” he was quoted as saying on Uusi Suomi.

JSN said that politicians are public figures and therefore must stand heavy criticism.

The JSN-PS cartoon ruling reveals the sheer ignorance of Timo Soini’s party of the role of the media in our democratic society.  It is alarming that a political party in Finland wants to set limits and guidelines on what the media can publish.

 A Merry Christmas to you all Finnish heterosexuals and white conservatives! We wish the rest a shitty Christmas!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ethnic minorities now make up more than half of all births in the U.S.

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By Enrique Tessieri

How did some pocket-calculator demographers in Finland and Europe take the news that for the first time in U.S. history minority births surpassed over half of all births?  

A pocket-calculator demographer is anyone who uses birthrate and calculates it with years to warn us that group x will outnumber us in numbers and take us over.   

Kyösti Tarvainen, a senior lecturer at Aalto University, is one such pseudo-demographer who has warned us with his trusty pocket calculator about the Muslim population threat in Finland.

Similar predictions were made about the Jews of Finland in the 1880s. Today, however, our Jewish population totals a mere 2,000 souls. 

The whole assumption that membership in our society is based on ethnicity instead of  values and inclusion reveals what is terribly wrong in the ongoing debate. People are not a group per se, but are individuals with free will. They are not robots guided by an autocratic god called Culture as some would want us to believe.

The most important variable missing from the calculation of these pseudo-demographers is that cultures change constantly. Cultures takes in, rearrange, exchange and balance new ideas from their environment on a constant basis.   

It’s wrong to think that we are first and foremost an ethnicity.  The fact that we have been educated and brought up to think in this way reveals why racism, ethnocentrism and prejudice are so ingrained in our society.  

Martin Luther King Jr. said it well in his famous I have a dream speech of 1963:  “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.”

 

 

 

Do we write too little or too much about a social ill like racism?

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

A friend of mine recently said that one of the reasons why some don’t like Migrant Tales (MT) is because we write too much about racism.  Do we treat a social issue like racism fairly on MT? Do we write too much or too little about it?

Certainly I would be happy if there were no reasons to write about such a social ill in this country. I even hope that what I write on this blog isn’t true.

Having written a lot about this topic, given talks and debated with many Finns for a number of years, there’s one matter that must be taken into account:  Some Finns feel offended if a foreigner tells them that there’s racism in their country.

Our aim on MT is certainly not to offend anyone but to debate an issue openly. If we can identify the problem, we can take  steps to challenge  and correct it.

Racism, xenophobia and hatred are greater threats to our values and society than some may believe.  Apart from ruining lives and holding back the  potential of a country, these social vices have been the smoking guns behind almost all the wars that have ever taken place in Europe.

Why do we still write about Nazi Germany if the fall of Berlin took place 67 years ago?  Why would we even want to bring to justice, never mind write about the crimes committed by Bosnian Serb wartime commander, Ratko Mladic, whose trial began Wednesday in The Hague?

Among the many war atrocities that Mladic is believed to have been responsible for are the deaths of up to 8,000 Muslim men and boys in Srebrenica in July 1995.

You may correctly ask why crimes like the Final Solution or ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia took place?  Haven’t we learned from our past wars and mistakes?

Even if our collective memory is too short for comfort, those same phantoms of xenophobia, racism and hatred that spooked us into war in the past continue to roam those same streets inhabited by our fear and ignorance.

But let’s return to the original question: Do we write too little or too much about racism on MT?

There’s probably no consensus, but there are two answers:  Those who are most affected by racism believe too little attention is given to the issue, while those who are least affected by it claim the contrary.

Whatever the case, we should never give refuge to a social ill like racism through our silence.

 

 

 

 

 

The long and costly ordeal of family reunification from Somalia to Finland

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Ever wondered about the hassle and red tape a Somali resident of Finland must face to bring his family here? Apart from the long two-and-a-half year wait on average, the whole process is especially costly for a person from Somalia, where annual income totals about $600 (471 euros), according to the CIA Factbook.  

There are three ways to be reunited with your loved one in Finland if you live in Somalia: either apply for political asylum in Finland or turn to the Finnish Embassy in Ethiopia or Kenya.

The fastest of the three routes is applying directly for asylum.

Finnish immigration authorities have around 10,000 family reunification applications on file, mostly from Somalis. While the Finnish Immigration Service blames a lack of personnel for the backlog, some believe that this is done on purpose to reduce the number of Somalis seeking to move to Finland.

Family reunification can be a long and costly ordeal if you are a Somali. Administration fees alone charged at the Finnish Embassy in Addis Ababa amount to 415 euros per adult, according to the Finnish interior minsitry. For minors they are a bit cheaper (180 euros).

According to a Somali resident of Finland, the cost of traveling from Mogadishu to Addis Ababa by car is $100 and you’ll need $30 for food. The journey to the Ethiopian capital takes about seven days from Mogadishu.

“Some who apply at the Finnish Embassy in Addis Ababa may wait in the capital for those two-and-half years to get the green light to move to Finland,” the Somali said. “Waiting is expensive. Rent in Addis Ababa for a family of seven can cost about $100/month, or between $300 and $400 if all living expenses are included.”

A two-and-and-half year wait can cost  a family $9,000-$12,000 if you plan to wait it out in the Ethiopian capital.

If you are a minor in Finland and want to bring your parents and four brothers and sisters to live with you here, administration costs alone for your family would amount to a hefty 1,550 euros. To the sum we’d have to include interpretation fees, which amount to about 20 euros/person (450 Ethiopian birrs).

If, by a stroke of luck, the family gets the green light to be reunited with a family member in Finland, they will have to get a travel document issued by the United Nations that costs 120 euros/person, or a total of 720 euros for a family of six in Ethiopia.

Even if Interior Minister Päivi Räsänen said last year that one of the aims of the government is to tighten family reunification rules still further, this isn’t necessary because of cost and the long wait.

Probably one of the problems with the ongoing debate about family reunifications in Finland is that it makes us forget about the tragedy and suffering of people who made it here but  who still live separated from their loved ones.


A family reunification interview request to appear at the Finnish Embassy in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. This invitation kicks off a long and expensive process for Somali families. 

 

Language is not always your passport to inclusion and acceptance

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

Some politicians and social workers in this country believe that integration is only possible after an immigrant learns  the Finnish or Swedish language. This may be true but there are other factors that  play equally important roles in the integration process of an immigrant.  

An immigrant will have to pass many checkpoints before he is accepted as a member of Finnish society. How many and what those checkpoints are is open to debate.

Promising an immigrant that he’ll be integrated as soon as he learns the language is a bit like telling a child: “When you grow up you’ll have a wife, children and be successful.”

If language were a panacea to an immigrant’s integration problems, why is social exclusion still a problem among the Romany minority, which have lived in this country for centuries?

Another interesting group we could cite are the Latin Americans of Spain. The majority of them speak Spanish as their mother tongue, they are familiar with Spanish culture, and are even Catholics. Despite their command of the most widely spoken language of Spain and knowledge of the local culture, why do some groups like the Bolivians, Ecuadorians and blacks suffer from high unemployment and social exclusion?

What would you say if a person has lived most of his life in Finland, speaks Finnish as a native but admits: “The worst thing in Finland is that if you have a different religion, culture and language, you are left on the fringes of society. No matter how much you try to integrate you are always left outside.”

Would enrolling in a Finnish-language course be the solution?

Probably not.

The three examples above suggest that integration is a more complex matter than just learning a new language. Attitudes and acceptance by the host society may play equally important roles in the integration process of an immigrant.

One of the reasons why too many politicians and social workers like to speak of integration in simple learn-language terms may be because they are unaware of a wider problem.

As long as we don’t address that side of the integration problem, which is acceptance by the host society, we will never challenge the wider problem of integration effectively.

Lieksa, Finland, continues to be a thorn in Pohjois-Karjala’s side

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By Enrique Tessieri

Lieksa is a troubled city in the eastern Finnish region of Pohjois-Karjala.  We have read too many stories on Migrant Tales and in the Finnish media about the racism that has struck the city after some 250 immigrants mostly from Somalia moved there. The Joensuu-based  Karjalainen reported Monday that an immigrant’s car had been vandalized on Sunday.  

The car, which had its rear and side windows smashed, had the following text written in lipstick: “I hate niggers.”

The police are investigating the matter.

Karjalainen reported that the owner of the car is concerned about his safety in the city of 12,800 inhabitants. “If they can do something like this to my car they could come to my home [as well],” he said.

While the situation in Lieksa is problematic to say the least, the consensus is that matters are improving, according to Alain Minguet, chairman of Joensuun seudun monikulttuurisuusyhdistys (Jomoni).

Migrant Rights’ Network: Voters’ verdict: Immigration not as important as the economy, Europe, or taxes

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By Awale Olad

Election junkies in the UK and Europe have had a satisfying fix over the last couple of weeks. From the historical win of Francois Hollande in France to the local election gains in the UK mid-term elections for the Labour Party and Greece’s new political turmoil and looming elections – a further stage has been set for Barack Obama and Mitt Romney for a showdown on the debate over global economics and in particular, the direction of the USA.

France

Let’s begin in France where the electorate for the second time in France’s history elected a Socialist president, Francois Hollande, by ousting Nicolas Sarkozy after only one term in office. Hollande’s key policies were huge tax-rises on the rich and wealthy (75 percent marginal rate on those earning €1,000,000), housing, and reduction in corporation tax to boost business output and tackle unemployment.

His central policies were aimed at confronting the economic woes of the country and implementing a socialist vinculum to the public with a pinch of EU bashing. Most media commentators disagreed with his tax pledges but the electorate swung in his favour in both rounds of the elections.

On immigration, Hollande’s easiest decision was to back a UK-style immigration cap, which airlifted him out of a possible tense battle with National Front reprobate, Marine Le Pen, who Nicolas Sarkozy sought to align himself with in an attempt to win some of the 18 percent she polled in the first round. This didn’t work for Sarkozy and neither did his 5 years as president pummelling multiculturalism and lurching to the right on immigration (read here).

Hollande quietly offered votes to foreign residents who sought democratic engagement in local elections as a second tier policy but came under fire for his soft touch on immigration. This was potentially a lethal manoeuvre by the right and had to be addressed with a response that meant he had to commit to a cap on immigration. Nevertheless, his narrow election win indicates that while migration was a hot potato it wasn’t a toxic enough issue for him to lose.

UK

The local election results were interpreted by most as an indictment of the Coalition’s recent budget proposals and tax cuts for high earners. Former Conservative Party Chairman, Lord Ashcroft, writes:

With turnout at a dismal 32%, no party has fired the imagination in these elections. But what is clear is that we are not managing to keep on board many of those who voted Conservative two years ago, let alone enlist further support.

The United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) has seen an increase in its support from Conservative supporters switching allegiances. It was reported that at least 13 percent of the electorate voted for the anti-EU party. Some argue that this is the result of the ongoing turmoil in the EU. Others comment that Tory radicalism has been lost in the centre ground and a lurch to the right is needed.

However, while most attacks centre on the core anatomy of the Coalition’s programme of policies, namely Lords Reform and Gay Marriage, it could be argued that the questions over the UK’s future membership of the EU and a stronger emphasis on tackling immigration (both policies a strong platform for UKIP) is what enticed disaffected Tory supporters to switch allegiances. Sniffing out the possibility of massive chunks of Tory support being hijacked by UKIP, potentially denying the Conservative Party a majority in 2015, Ashcroft insists that:

The real lesson is that the government should focus on the things that matter. Of course, if we could all agree on what they were, politics would be very much more straightforward. Some, in a manner which is now not so much predictable as Pavlovian, say the answer is to promise a referendum on Europe. But these people would probably give the same answer if you asked them how to stop a soufflé from sinking. I think Britain’s relationship with the EU was unlikely to have been on most voters’ minds as they elected their new councillors.

This is at odds with articles in Conservativehome, the Tory website that in recent months has grown increasingly hostile to David Cameron’s leadership, pushing for a referendum on the UK’s membership of the EU to neutralise UKIP’s appeal. The Tories, however, did manage to avoid a casualty in the shape of Boris Johnson, who secured another term as the Mayor of London, as did the 8 Conservative London Assembly Members.

There is advancement in Europe and a gradual increase in electorates moving towards the centre-Left as austerity measures and increasing unemployment begin to frustrate stagnating economies with centre-Right parties at the helm. Immigration has not yet taken centre stage in the UK but France’s recent wave of support for Marine Le Pen could fuel anti-immigration groups and hostile news outlets to pressure the government into setting a light under the issue. A lesson from France for all the mainstream parties is that immigrant bashing only gets you so far but not over the finishing line.

Read original story here.

This piece was reprinted by Migrant Tales with permission.

Ilta-Sanomat billboard (lööppi) from February 5, 1997

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Migrant Tales publishes on and off Finnish tabloid ads* (lööppi in Finnish) from the 1990s. Taking into account that Finland’s immigrant population started to grow during that decade, it is easy at least through some of the main stories of tabloids like Ilta-Sanomat and Iltalehti to see how some of them reflected our xenophobic, prejudiced, racist or anti-Russian views.

This particular tabloid ad reads in bold letters: A Finnish man’s leg broken by Russians at a brothel in Kotka.

Anti-Russian views were common expressed on tabloid billboards. If it wasn’t the Russian mafia that kidnapped you or robbed you in Russia, Finnish men were in danger of getting their legs broken at houses of ill repute operated by Russians in their country.

*Migration Institute archive.