Category: Enrique

Separating urban myths from facts in the Finnish immigration debate (Part 2)

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

Staying on the topic of urban myths, other ones that we could mention are: immigrants do not want to integrate, immigrants live off social welfare and are lazy. Politicians such as Angela Merkel and David Cameron reinforce these types of urban myths by pinning their countries’ integration policy failures unfairly on immigrants. 

Any serious student of society knows that humans are social animals. Since we survive in groups, our main aim is to adapt. Some of us learn this skill better and faster than others.

Believing a stereotype like “immigrants live off welfare” is illogical. Why would people travel thousands of kilometers to live off social welfare?

Immigrants are ambitious people. Some are so determined to seek out opportunity and a better life that they are willing to sacrifice everything to start life anew in a new country.

If adaption is an important skill learned and reinforced during our childhood and formative years, what logic is there in not adapting to a new society?

In order for any integration program to be successful in Finland or elsewhere, it must have a clear vision of the role that newcomers and their children in the society. Is the host society hostile or receptive to them? Are newcomers and their children doomed to be eternal outsiders? Does society envisage a place for them?

In the same way that society creates pathways to integration for its own people, how well do they work for other groups? Are immigrants or the host society to blame, or both?

If we want to start on the right foot in Finland concerning our ambitious integration program, the first and foremost matter we should do is truly embrace cultural diversity as an important value.

Compared with the last century, Finland has made important progress on this front but a lot of work must be still done to weed out the ignorance and urban myths out there.

If we could get politicians to address proactively an issue relating to immigrants rather than pin the blame and failures “of multiculturalism,” we’d do our society a service rather than cause it harm.

The following words should always ring out when building our society in the new century: mutual acceptance, respect and equal opportunities.

PS will not take any disciplinary action against MP Teuvo Hakkarainen

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

What kind of a message does the right-wing populist Perussuomalaiset (PS) party send to their supporters and Finland when they decide that it’s OK to turn a blind eye to one of their many controversial MPs, Teuvo Hakkarainen, who publicly insults homosexuals, lesbians and Somalis? Hakkarainen was quoted as saying on tabloid Ilta-Sanomat that these types of minorities should be relocated to the Åland Islands.

Is this what Timo Soini recently meant by the “PS not hating anyone?” OK, maybe the PS doesn’t “hate” but it sure has a lot of serious issues.

Even though PS MP Hakkarainen meant his Åland Island comment to be a “joke,” it shows that his sense of humor and that of the PS’ is out of line with the majority of the country.  I am certain that most children in Finnish elementary school could tell us that it’s wrong to insult people because of their background.

I see Hakkarainen’s comment and the PS’ inaction as a direct slap in the face of Finland’s good name. For some it may even bring eerie memories of how “undesirable” people, like the Jews and Romany minorities of Nazi Germany, were packed and sent in box cars to concentration camps.

If Finnish voters seriously believe that a party like the PS still has the credibility and vision to change Finland, they should think twice and hard. One only has to look at the already-long list of  racist and anti-democratic “jokes” made by a number of PS MPs.

What kind of a Finland does the PS wish for our children and grandchildren? The answer is simple: A highly polarized nation where politicians cultivate a culture of hatred.

On a more light-hearted note, YLE reported that Swedish People’s Party MP Elisabeth Nauclér has sent an invitation to Hakkarainen to visit the Åland Islands, her home province.

“Åland is home to 92 nationalities,” Nauclér was quoted as saying on Tuesday’s Iltalehti,  “even Hakkarainen is welcome.”

Green Party presidential hopeful, Pekka Haavisto, who is gay, commented on Hakkarainen’s gaffes on Wednesday’s Iltalehti.

YLE in English: Immigration rules to be tightened

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Comment: Am I surprised? No way. Christian Democrat Minister Päivi Räsänen was chosen to head the interior ministry after the right-wing populist Perussuomalaiset (PS) party won an impressive election victory on April 17. If her views on homosexuality are applied to immigration, it suggests that matters will get worse for the immigrant community before they improve. 

Tightening immigration policy and making family reunification more difficult is another example of how the PS is breathing down the neck of the government. 

Reports YLE: “At present, the large number of applications for immigrant status under the rules of family reunification has led to a backlog in processing. Officials have around 10,000 applications on file, most from Somalis.”

The key word in the paragraph above is “Somalis.” Finnish immigration authorities are speculated to be doing everything possible to hinder family reunification especially from countries like Somalia. 

A plan to tighten immigration policy reveals as well that the government, like most of Finland, is still pretty much in the dark about what immigration is and what should its role be in this country. 

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Interior Minister Päivi Räsänen has told the newspaper Helsingin Sanomat that she considers Finland’s practice in the reunification of the families of immigrants to be less strict than that of other countries. She added that while a review of immigration has only started, Finland will be imposing tougher criteria.

Read whole story.

HS.fi: CITY LIMITS: Pillars of salt at McDonald’s in Helsinki

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Comment: Here is a very unfortunate case where a one- and four-year-old child got a taste of racism at a MacDonald’s fast-food chain in downtown Helsinki. HS.fi reports that a Finnish woman did not apparently like the family next to her table to speak in a strange language. Her reaction was totally out of line as she began to shout and hurl abusive language at the family. 

It is a positive matter that cases like these are reported and published in the media. 

In May, an African student got harassed publicly and hit by a Finn on the bus in Jyväskylä. While some customers slowly started to react to the enraged woman’s remarks at MacDonald’s, nobody stood up for the African on the bus. 

We called the police and after many phone calls we were able to speak to a policeman in Pieksamäki, who said that if you are harassed on the street you should not call the police but look the other way. The Ombudsman for Minorities had a different opinion than the police and recommended that the incident be reported.

Migrant Tales believes that that type of a response by the police shows that they do not take hate crimes seriously.  

One important matter that the police could so is state clearly what one must do if you are harassed publicly. That would be a good step in the right direction. 

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Pauliina Grönholm 

A father of immigrant origin and his two little sons were eating at McDonald’s in Helsinki’s district of Hakaniemi two weeks ago, early on a Friday evening. The boys were excited about their new Happy Meal Smurf toys. They were being a little noisy, as one- and four-year-old children are often wont to be. A woman sitting at the next table did not like to hear the family speaking a strange tongue. She began to shout at them, using abusive language.

Read whole story.

Separating urban myths from facts in the Finnish immigration debate

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

To confirm whether anti-immigrant politicians are spreading urban myths or not, I recommend taking a look at the 2010 Finnish Immigration Service (FIS) annual report. What you may find may startle, even anger you.

I’m not speaking specifically of Perussuomalaiset (PS) party MPs like Teuvo Hakkarainen, who are walking political time bombs packed with ignorance. The source of your irritation may be more credible politicians who should know better but are spreading and enforcing urban myths about immigrants in their opportunistic bid to gain votes.

There is nothing “patriotic” about spreading urban myths about immigrants because great harm is done to Finland economically, socially and politically.

If you look at last year’s FIS report, we will see some startling facts that blow the cover off the urban myths that are fed like “facts” to the public by some politicians. Here it is (and it does not harm to repeat this fact over again): The main reason why foreigners moved to Finland in 2010 was for family reasons (31%), study (25%) and work (17%). Asylum seekers accounted for  only 10%.

While these figures attempt to give a clean-cut division of the reasons for coming to Finland, the issue is a bit more complex. Just because a person come to Finland due to family reasons, he can end up employed like the ones that came for work.

What does a mere 17% (3,030 people) of foreigners who got work permits last year on the grounds of employment and self-employment tell us?

For one, it reveals that too few skilled people move on their own will to Finland for work. It tells us as well another disturbing fact: We are far behind other countries in attracting skilled labor as our ever-growing army of pensioners swells this decade and the next.

While some politicians warned us in 2006 that the entire Estonian workforce, or half a million people, was ready to invade Finland, the truth is that we are no magnet for skilled labor.

Why would a skilled immigrant move with his or her family to Finland if there are easier and friendlier countries in Europe? Why would they move to a country where a right-wing populist anti-immigration party, the PS, gained 19.1% of the votes in April from 4.05% in 2007?

Why would a foreign company invest in this country and create more jobs?

While the recession may be an important factor why there were 25.2% less permits given to foreigners compared with 2009 for work and self-employment, other factors like the weather, high taxation, language certainly play a role.

What to do?

Send each politician an electronic copy of the FIS annual report and ask them why they distort the facts in order to hide the real issues, which is dealing with our ever-growing demographic challenges.

Note: There are other urban myths that I could have brought up. These can be discussed as well.

Digital Journal: Swiss Government Bans Video On Execution-Style Deportation

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Comment: Ever thought what it feels to be caught and deported from a country as an undocumented immigrant? The reconstruction of how people are deported from Switzerland these days was made by humanitarian group Augenauf (Open Your Eyes). The video clip was shortly banned after it was broadcast on Swiss television, according to Digital journal. 

After passage of a referendum in November, Swiss authorities can deport today foreigners if they are undocumented immigrants or foreign residents convicted of certain offenses. 

The humiliating way people are deported from Switzerland looks like a convict who placed on an electric chair. The Digital Journal continues:  “The procedure involves the shackling and gagging of deportees, presumably to prevent any effort to escape or protest or to make it as unpleasant as possible to return to Switzerland.”

 Augenauf claims that a Nigerian refugee died of heart attack when he was shackled. 

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=16He1I274Xk&feature=player_embedded]

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Digital Journal: Swiss Government Bans Video On Execution-Style Deportation

A documentary by humanitarian organisation Augenauf was banned shortly after it was broadcast on Swiss television. It depicts a reconstruction of the execution-style deportation practiced by Swiss Government.

Read whole story.

Ilta-Sanomat: Homot ja somalit Ahvenanmaalle asumaan

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Comment: Perussuomalaiset (PS) party MP Teuvo Hakkarainen has come up with another one of his ideas on how to improve ethnic and minority relations in Finland. He was now quoted as saying in tabloid Ilta-Sanomat that homosexuals, lesbians and Somalians should be relocated to the Åland Islands.

Hakkarainen is a good example of what goes on inside the heads of some PS MPs. Imagine if people like him, never mind the PS as a party, would get a chance to rule Finland. This country would be a very sad and dangerous place to live for some people.

It should be clear that the only reason why PS MP Hakkarainen continues to make these types of racist statements is because he has the silent approval of the party.

Hakkarainen tells us as well the PS is a ticking time bomb that will polarize our society in to two camps: us (PS and like-minded conservatives) and them.

They are a direct threat to our way of life and our values as a society.

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Kansanedustajan Teuvo Hakkaraisen (ps.) Ilta-Sanomille antamat lausunnot herättivät tuoreeltaan vilkasta kommentointia lauantaina muun muassa netin keskustelupalstoilla. Ilta-Sanomien mukaan Hakkarainen ehdotti, että homot, lesbot ja somalit pitäisi laittaa Ahvenanmaalle keskenään asumaan.

Read whole story.

HBL: Lipponen tar ställning mot svenskfientlighet och slutenhet

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Comment: Even if some may disagree with Social Democrat presidential hopeful Paavo Lipponen, you have to give him credit for his stand against the far right wing of the Perussuomalaset (PS) party. It’s too bad that there are too few politicians in Finland that have the courage to follow Lipponen’s example. 

In the HBL story below, Lipponen does not directly blame the PS but the far-right faction of the party led by PS MP Jussi Halla-aho.

“A part (of the PS) wants to attack immigrants and the Swedish-speaking Finns,” he was quoted as saying. “I am of the opinion that the grand majority of Finns disagree with these extremists. We must actively challenge the far right (in Finland).”

Recently, two xenophobic associations, Suomen Sisu and Suomalaisuuden liitto, have challenged the role of Swedish-speaking Finns in the country. Many of the members of these associations are card-carrying PS members. Suomalaisuuden liitto chairman Sampo Terho is a PS EuroMP. 
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Peter Buchert

– Jag stämplar inte Sannfinländarna som parti, men det finns högerextremister i partiet och Timo Soini måste vara tydlig mot dem, sade Lipponen på FSD-kongressen i går.

Read whole story.

 

Immigration and world without borders

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

When looking at a problem, I have learned that the answer is usually found under one’s nose. There are many factors that impair our ability to see under our noses. Take a serious challenge like building a world without borders and tackling effectively poverty, hunger, strife and chronic social inequality.

A question always stares back and haunts us no matter how much we’d like our societies in the developed world to be Mr. Nice Guys: In order to be that nice person t home we must pillage and spread misery on most of the world’s population. We act like Dr. Jekyll at home but are enraged and out-of-control Mr. Hydes in other parts of the world.

It would be hypocritical for me, who has a multicultural background thanks to the restlessness of many of my relatives who were immigrants, to deny access to our society to people who are fleeing poverty and strife. Many times I wonder where I’d be today if countries like Finland, the US, Brazil and Argentina would have refused my late relatives entry.

Why is immigration seen as a threat today? Why have we failed to build a better world without borders?

In order to find the answer to those questions, we’d have to figure out what interest groups profit from the culture of fear of the outside world in which immigrants form one component.

US President Dwight Eisenhower (1890-1960), a Republican and former commander in chief of the US forces in Europe during World War 2, warned us about the dangers of the military industrial complex.

He states in the video clip below: “The conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence, economic, political, even spiritual, is felt in every city, every state house, every office of the federal government. We recognize the imperative need of the development yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications, our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved…”

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8y06NSBBRtY]

If we look at only this last decade and the strife that has torn our world apart, the impact of the military industrial complex is clear.

Past presidents like Abraham Lincoln (1809-65)* warned us about the danger of too large corporations: “I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. . . . corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.”

Karl Sharro, an architect, offers an interesting talk* about building a society without borders. Is this possible and why and how we must accept the challenge.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZZOer0Y2_c&feature=youtu.be&t=56s]

*Thank you @mahilena and Migrants Rights Network for the heads up!

ESS: Ylen romaniohjelma sai palkinnon

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Comment: Tero Koskinen won the European Parliament Prize for Journalism this year for his documentary of Eastern European Romany who moved to Helsinki, Finland in search of a better life.  These people, who are escaping poverty and persecution in the EU, are no different from other immigrants who are searching for opportunities and a better life for their families. 

The plight of the Romany minority in Europe has been to say the least disgraceful throughout history.

Can Finland offer them a better life and help restore their dignity?

A better standard of living yes. Even though they won’t be attacked in Finland like in their home countries in Eastern Europe, prejudice will unfortunately continue to follow them like a somber shadow. 

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Ylen A-studion juttu Romanien paluu on saanut Euroopan parlamentin tämän vuoden journalismipalkinnon. Toimittaja Tero Koskisen ohjelma kertoo romaniaikuisten ja -lasten oloista karavaanialueella Helsingissä. Palkintoraati katsoi, että aihe on mielenkiintoinen tämän päivän Euroopassa. Se myös kiitteli siitä, että ohjelmassa annettiin puheenvuoro romaneille itselleen ja valotettiin paikallista näkökulmaa. Palkinto jaettiin neljässä eri sarjassa: lehdistö, internet, televisio ja radio. Romanien paluu esitettiin A-studiossa 21. huhtikuuta 2010.

See the whole interview.