Category: Enrique

Finland Bridge: Chrismtas and Winter in 2035

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

What kind of Christmases will we be celebrating in the mid-2030s? Like past generations, will we set aside our worries, demographic and environmental problems and allow the Christmas spirit to overtake us for a moment?   

Twenty years from now I will form part of the ever-growing army of pensioners in this country and the developed world.  Where will I retire? Will I move to southern Spain, which is starting to look like the Sahara Desert? Will I stay in Finland, where global warming is changing weather patterns for good?

One of the questions I’d like to know about the future is if we’ll become wiser. Or will our actions and reason for being twenty years on be guided by the same vices: greed, indifference, wars and the usual excuses for doing nothing.

During ”normal” demographic times, when pensioners made up a small part of the total population in the twentieth century,  most over-64-year-olds played a passive role in society. Turning into a revolutionary or social activist was a no-no.

Edgar Lee Masters’ Spoon River Anthology created quite a commotion when it was published in 1915. The 200 free-verse epitaphs of his book spoke openly about sensitive issues like sex, moral decay and hypocrisy.

One of the poems he called ”Unknown” reveals perfectly the paradox between youth and old age. Masters writes:

In youth my wings were strong and tireless 

But I did not know the mountains. 

In age I knew the mountains 

But my weary wings could not follow my vision

–Genius is wisdom and youth.

Does this remarkable poem tell us why humankind is still incapable of breaking the vicious cycle of greed, war, and apathy?

Is there hope that such a circle could be redrawn in the future? Could new medical breakthroughs in gerontology help resolve the problem?  Could new medicines help us at age 80 to ”fly over mountains” with enough strength and wisdom?

If we resolved such a paradox, how to balance our youth with our old age, humankind would be capable of many things. It could help us for instance not to commit the same mistakes of past generations that have kept us buried in our human squalor.

”Granny-phobes?”

Staying on the topic of pensioners, Helsingin Sanomat columnist Riva Liisa Snellman took a peek at 2035 as well. By then, one in three Finns will be over 65 years old, with nearly a million people who are over 75.

Will such a large number of pensioners cause an adverse reaction in our society? Semi Purhonen, a generation researcher, told Snellman that she doesn’t believe so since family ties play a crucial role in our society. No generation will ever declare war on its grandparents, according to her.

The Helsingin Sanomat columnist offers some light-hearted views of the future. She believes that we’ll all carry chip locators to alert relatives if we forget where we are supposed to go at a certain time. Loss of memory will not be an impairment since we’ll be assisted by ”memory assistants.” They will help us with all our memory problems.

We’ll all wear bracelets in the future and they will form a standard part of our attire. ”The bracelet can distinguish sleep from a sudden illness, and it also enables the wearer to ask for help,” writes Snellman.

We’ll have so-called loneliness centers for the elderly located in countries like Germany and the United States.

Christmas 2035

Christmas Eve falls on a Monday in 2035, which means we’ll be enjoying an extra long weekend then.

I hope on that day I’ll see many grandchildren spending Christmas with us around a large table peppered with friendly chit-chat, giggles andlaughs iced with the cake of anticipation.

Since children of the future will learn how to ask serious questions, my grandchildren will ask me about how life was like when I was young. I will tell them that in the last century we had snow, which will be a rare commodity due to global warming.

I will tell them as well about the financial hiccups that Europe suffered due to countries like Greece.

”Can you imagine that a long time ago, well not that long ago,” I’d tell them as they’d hold their breathes, ”we had groups that hated other people like us because we were different from them.”

”But we won the battle,” I’d continue. ”Thanks to our war against ignorance, all types of Multicultural Finns can live today in peace in this country and be at the same time proud of their ethnic backgrounds.”

A Multicultural Finn is any person who considers himself a Finn but comes from a multicultural background. ”You are all good examples,” I’d say. ”Your great grandparents and your relatives before them were from many countries and knew the ways of many cultures. I have lived in many places during my lifetime.”

They’d ask about wars and how they ended for good on Earth.

I’d return to Master’s poem about the mountains, but recite it to them differently:

When our countries were young they waged war, turned their backs on the suffering of the world

They did not know the mountains of humanity. 

After we nearly destroyed our environment and almost killed each other off we finally learned to know those mountains 

But our planet and humanity were in too bad shape to fly over those mountains

–Genius is living in a world without greed and wars.

How did wars end? How did we learn to live in peace with each other? another one asked.

People got so fed up with their governments and armies that one day a huge war was declared war but nobody showed up.

The column was published in Finland Bridge issue 6/2011

 

A matter of perspective and the real issue in the Finnish immigration debate

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

Perspective is one reason why Migrant Tales has grown especially after the April 17 election and become a home for a large and ever-growing number of bloggers. Thank you for your support! We have, in my opinion,  become for some that critical “voice for those whose views and situation are understood poorly and heard faintly by the media, politicians and public.”

No matter what your opinion may be about the ongoing debate on the role of cultural diversity, immigrants and immigration to Finland, perspective and the role of institutional racism are some factors we must take into account when looking at the issue.

A white Finn may have a different view of the impact of racism compared with a visible immigrant or minority.

An interesting editorial by Ismo Söderling in the recent issue of Siirtolaisuus-Migration offers some interesting food for thought on the present debate.  Söderling is the director of the  Migration Institute.

He writes: “Researchers and experts have been familiar with anti-immigration sentiment since the 1990s — the events that took place in Joensuu are probably among its best known manifestations. There is ample research on the topic. But to put a stop to the public name-calling and labeling, we needed an experienced researcher to send a calm, modulated letter to the editor of said newspaper [Helsingin Sanomat].”

“Special researcher Minna Säävälä at Väestöliitto, the Family Federation, noted in her response that “Support for racism seems to be waning.” According to Säävälä, “a change in attitudes cannot be established on the basis of a single statement.”

Söderling drives home a valid point. Can we judge a whole country on a single survey whose sample size numbers 1,000?

In the same way we can measure a certain social ills in Finland like racism, have these polls fueled the rise of  certain parties like the Persussuomalaiset (PS)? Migrant Tales has questioned some recent polls  that ask loaded questions like “do you want more immigrants to move to Finland?”

Which country in the world believes there are too few immigrants? Very few if none today.

Certainly there are a lot of racist views in the PS but we unfortunately find them in other Finnish parties as well.  Some are better at hiding their views on this social ill than others.

When we correctly criticize a party like the PS and some of its most notorious anti-immigration MPs  like Jussi Halla-aho, are we pulling a fast one on the issue and not confronting it? Are we conveniently brushing the widespread problem under the rug?

In order to make out who holds the high ground in the ongoing debate on our ever-growing cultural diversity as a society, we have to return to perspective. Who are the alleged culprits and who are the victims. Are we hearing the victims?

Thus the way to confront racism, populism and the rise of the far right in Finland is not by attacking a single party but the issue on a national level.  What role does institutional racism play in the rise of the PS. How does the silence of other parties maintain and fuel the institutional racism status quo?

I have learned an important lesson after working as a writer and journalist for about 25 years. It’s not the answers that are revealing in an interview but what the person does not say.

What is the silence emanating from of the ongoing debate on immigration in Finland?

Not hearing and acknowledging the victims of racism and exclusion but scapegoating the problem to a single party or to a group within that party.

By no means are we claiming here that two wrongs make a right. However, if we are to challenge the problem of racism and the rise nationalist populism in Finland, which gets its fuel from xenophobia, we have to attack the real culprits: ourselves and especially our institutions.

A bitter taste of the PS’ idea of press freedom

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

I read with some dismay that 12 Perussuomalaiset (PS) party MPs have filed a complaint to the Council for Mass Media in Finland (JSN) about a cartoon that was published in the  Helsinki Lutheran Church’s weekly Kirkko ja Kaupunki, according to Helsingin Sanomat. The cartoon showed PS chairman Timo Soini and a number of MPs wishing those who weren’t white, conservative and heterosexual Finns a shitty Christmas.

This story and the action taken by a group of PS MPs is highly revealing since it shows that some in the PS are just as much in the dark about free speech as they are about racism and other cultural groups.

They expose as well their distorted view of the world. It is ok to insult Muslims but not ok to make fun of the PS.

Moreover it shows that the PS considers the cartoon more offensive than the racism and hatred of some of its MPs like James Hirvisaari, who got fined for hate speech or if its members belong to neo-Nazi and racist associations like SKV.

Getting a taste of one’s medicine can be humbling experience although I think these MPs are out for blood.

They are not going to get it for a number of reasons. For one, the PS is a political party and those portrayed in the cartoon are public figures.

Another important fact is that the cartoonist, Ville Ranta, succeeded at portraying the PS as seen by some Finns: A narrow-minded racist and conservative party.

Of course the PS will try to level the playing field in favor by cheating.  It will try to make a point that racism against white Finns by immigrants is the same thing. Before the PS sticks its foot in the mouth again, they should read a column on  Psychology Today that asked a timely question,  “Racism against whites vs. minorities: Is it the same thing?”

Argentina’s dirty war: A couple I never met but always knew

Posted on by Migrant Tales

It’s a long story how I ended up conscripted in the Argentinean army during the dirty war (1976-83). Being part of a country that was at war with itself was like taking a one-way stroll  down the ally of hatred with a sack over your head. Even if no sack was placed over your head, your eyes could neither see nor your ears hear what was going down. Terror has a way of numbing your senses.  

Taking into account the rise of racism and xenophobia in Europe and horrific examples of World War 2 and ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia, it’s clear that we cannot make a pact with the devil by remaining quiet to the threat of right-wing populist and far-right parties that are gaining strength throughout Europe.

One of the reasons why too many white Europeans aren’t too concerned about the situation is because these anti-immigration parties don’t pose a direct threat to them. As we know, these parties have declared indirectly and directly war against immigrants and other minorities.

I am grateful for the years (1977-78) I spent in Argentina. Even if  it changed my life as a young man, I now understand what it is to live under a ruthless dictatorship and why we must defend every day our civil rights.

In many respects populist and far-right parties are very much like those military dictatorships that ruled Latin America in the 1970s. I am certain that all hell would break loose in Europe if these types of parties got the chance to set their policies in motion.

The biggest losers would be our present democracies and civil rights, which are supposed to be inalienable.

How can I make such a claim? Easily. If you exclude and bash one minority by watering down their rights the impact is on the whole of society. Promoting social equality has the opposite effect.

I have adopted a couple out of the over 30,000 victims that disappeared in Argentina during the dirty war. They appeared by accident 33 years ago when I read about their disappearance on September 14, 1977.

Today Jorge Donato Calvo’s and his wife Adriana María Franconetti de Calvo’s story sits quietly on my desk.

Kuvankaappaus 2013-7-12 kello 11.01.51

Jorge Donato Calvo and Adriana María Franconetti de Calvo.

According to the Buenos Aires Herald clipping, the couple left their one- and two-year old baby daughters in their home under the care of the children’s paternal grandparents and went to see a movie at the Ritz Cinema, not too far from where I used to live in Buenos Aires.

Their tragic stories was published in gruesome detail years later on a website of the victims of the dirty war of Argentina:

Adriana and Jorge were students of Buenos Aires’ National School. Jorge was a medic and he worked at the Ramos Mejía Hospital. The couple lived in Sarandi, Buenos Aires province.

The couple was kidnapped when they were standing in a line of the Ritz Cinema in the neighborhood of Belgrano in Buenos Aires. They were seen at the ESMA (Navy Petty-Officers School of Mechanics); Adriana was “transferred” one or two days after.

Adriana’s sister and brother, Anna María and Eduardo, are also missing. Her father Eduardo was kidnapped together with her sister and brother and taken to the  “Club Atlético” detention center where his children were tortured in front of him. His abductors interrogated him about Adriana’s whereabouts. They freed him but he died a short while later of a cardiac arrest.    

*The term dirty war came about when a reporter asked an officer how he’d describe the civil war in Argentina. He said: “It was a dirty war.”

 

guardian.co.uk: Tory MP Aidan Burley sacked over ‘Nazi’ stag party attendance

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Comment: The Perussuomalaiset (PS) and other Finnish parties should look at countries like Britain to see how political parties in that country deal with politically embarrassing situations. Conservative Tory MP Aidan Burley got the boot as Commons aide after he attended a Nazi stag party while at a French ski resort.

A party spokesman was quoted as saying on guardian.co.uk: “Aidan Burley has behaved in a manner which is offensive and foolish. That is why he is being removed from his post as parliamentary private secretary at the Department for Transport. In light of information received the prime minister has asked for a fuller investigation into the matter to be set up and to report to him.”

Yes, I know that we are living in 2011 and the Third Reich came down in flames in May 1945. Even so, some of them like Burley have forgotten the racism and war that Adolf Hitler’s Germany reigned over Europe. Up to 60 million people are believed to have perished in World War 2.

What is surprising is that politicians in Finland appear not to be worried about their members belonging to neo-Nazi associations like Suomen Kansalinen Vastarinta (SKV) never mind far-right ones like Suomen Sisu. 

Finland’s politicians could learn a lot from countries like England. A key explanation for the firing of  the Tory MP is his “offensive and foolish” behavior. Without mentioning any names, I am certain we can come up with a list of politicians in Finland who have been behaving in such a manner as of recent. 

Thank you JusticeDemon for the heads up!

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A Conservative MP who attended a stag party where guests dressed as Nazis has been sacked as a Commons aide for “offensive” behaviour and placed under investigation by David Cameron.

Read whole story.

A bad week for the PS and Timo Soini

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

Three cartoons that appeared in the Finnish and Swedish media this week gave the Perussuomalaiset (PS) party a taste of its own medicine. The Helsinki Lutheran Church’s newspaper, Kirkko ja Kaupunki, published on Wednesday a cartoon where Soini and the PS wished all those who weren’t white, conservative and heterosexual Finns a shitty Christmas.

That was followed by Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter’s cartoon of PS MP Timo Soini dressed as Moomintroll  with a rat’s tail walking to parliament.

But that wasn’t all. On Saturday PS chairman Soini’s nose was widely distributed on social media sites. His nose was used to draw a 1980s cartoon hero, reports MTV3.

The outrage of some PS members of the cartoon that appeared in Kirkko ja Kaupunki shows the hypocrisy of some politicians. They can insult other groups wholesale like immigrants but when they become similar victims they cry foul.

The reaction of some PS members highlights their ignorance of how the media works and what role does free speech play in our society.

Fairy tale worlds with the help of hate speech in Finland and elsewhere

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

The recent anti-immigration killings in Norway at the hands of Anders Breivik and this week in Italy by Gianluca Casseri show how xenophobic fairy tales can turn a person into a killer. As populist and far-right parties in Europe continue to throw petrol at the flames of their hate speech, it is only a question of time when new Breiviks and Casseris will appear on the scene. 

The delusion and lack of resolve by our societies does not only hinge today on the EU’s lack of resolve to tackle its serious financial issues, but the belief that we can keep our rising nationalism and hate speech on a short leash.

This social ogre, which has been let out of the cage in Finland as well, is trying its hardest to convince us that its pathological social behavior is normal. There is nothing normal about racism never mind spreading hatred of other groups especially if our society is based on social justice.

These groups that the term “fatherland” to justify their actions are playing with fire. Not only are they weakening our national icons and cherished symbols of our society that are supposed to stand for noble values such as acceptance, they are shooting them in the head.

When looking at any far-right or right-wing populist parties in Europe, we should as concerned citizens walk that extra mile and ask what is the real message behind their populist soundbites. The fact that they don’t tell us what they are is the clearest indication of not only of their reckless opportunism, but the fact that society would never accept their real views.

Certainly spreading urban myths peppered with racism and xenophobia have an impact on Europe. Apart from threatening to weaken our present values, they encourage and offer smoking guns for future and present killers to terrorize our societies with real weapons and/or hate speech.

Breivik and Casseri are fresh examples of what Europe has in store for itself if it does not face the challenge posed by parties that attack society with their hate speech.

We must act now or suffer the consequences by others who paint our world with the somber colors of hate speech.

Spiegel International Online: Italy Killings Underscore European Extremism Problem

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Comment: One of the biggest threats to Europe these days is not the Euro crisis and the economic downturn but the rise of xenophobic far-right groups. Saverio Ferrari, an expert on right-wing terrorism, described the latest far-right killer Gianluca Casseri “a classic lone wolf.”

The neo-fascist and xenophobic CasaPound attempted to distance itself from Casseri by claiming that the killer was a sympathizer of the but that the killer was “a dog without an owner.”

Surprisingly, some in Italy now praise what Casseri did. “Meanwhile, Casseri has been become a hero of the right-wing extremist scene in the country, praised as a true Italian and a “white hero” worthy of renown and respect on the racist website stormfront.org. Casseri ‘cleaned up,’ a task for which he deserves thanks, a statement on the website read,” writes to Spiegel International Online. 

Let’s admit it, the only reason why far-right groups have risen in popularity in Europe these days is because they have  more support as a result of the worsening economic situation. Another factor has been the complacent silence of too many politicians, the mass media and the general public.

Ferrari assured us that Italy will react to the killings. This may be difficult to believe considering that xenophobia against non-European immigrants never mind the Romany minority has been on the rise.

Here is a video clip in Italian about a black man stating that the killing was expected taking into account the years of hatred spread against immigrants by politicians belonging to the former government who insult these people wholesale. 

“The terrible murders could be the impetus to finally think about this and draw some conclusions,” Ferrari said. “Either way, Italy will react.”

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The murders of African street vendors by a right-wing extremist writer in Florence have shocked Italy. Questions are now emerging about whether the gunman acted alone. But one thing seems certain, he was close to a right-wing radical group that has a pop culture appeal admired even by Germany’s neo-Nazis.

Read whole story.

YLE in English: Supo looks into possible Finnish connection to Florence shooter

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Comment:  The tragic killing of two Senegalese men and wounding of three others by a far-right anti-immigration extremist in Florence on Tuesday may have a Finnish connection with Suomen Kansalinen Vastarnta (SKV), a neo-Nazi association, according to YLE in English. 

The mass killings in Norway in July and this week in Florence should be seen as wake up calls of the threat of far-right groups in Europe and how far they plan to go in order to get their hate message across.

In a recent poll by MTV3, presidential hopefuls Timo Soini of the PS, Kokoomus’ Sauli Niinistö and Christian Democrat Sari Essayah believed that the far right do not pose a threat to Finland.  

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The Finnish Security Intelligence Service (Supo) is taking an interest in the racist shooting in Florence. The shooter, who killed two African immigrant street traders, belonged to a far-right organisation that also has Finnish members.

Read whole story.

Finland’s PS Soini plays down racism in his party to “one, two or three” cases

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrque Tessieri

Perussuomalaiset (PS) party presidential hopeful Timo Soini’s excuses about racism in his party are getting more surreal by the day. At a presidential debate Wednesday on MTV3, Soini claimed that racism wasn’t a problem in the PS and confined to  “one, two or three” cases compared with a half a million people who voted for the party in April. 

Is Soini in total denial about this serious issue in his party? It appears that as more of these cases come to light in the PS, the more fantastic Soini’s explanations get.

Let’s analyze what he said on MTV3 and ask who are those “one, two or three” cases that the speaks of?

The most recent one is that of PS MP James Hirvisaari, who got fined for hate speech and incitement against an ethnic group. We have as well PS MP Jussi Halla-aho, Teuvo Hakkarainen, Freddy van Wonterghem and others…  Oops!  That already makes more than three without mentioning Ulla Pyysalo and Tuomas Okkonen, who applied for membership in the neo-Nazi association, SKV.

Soini conveniently forgot to mention PS MP Olli Immonen, who believes that a “race war” is imminent between Europeans and Muslims.

If you go to Immonen’s official website, you will see a smiling Soini pictured behind the PS MP.  Just below him are links to “Just say no to Islamisation” and anti-immigration forums like Homma and Scripta.

Only “one, two or three” cases?

I don’t think so.