Pia Growchoski asks an important question on her recent blog entry on Migrant Tales: Why is the national media so interested in far right groups and their resentful rhetoric? Why do we give space to Perussuomalaiset (PS) chairman Timo Soini’s blatant incompetence on our Facebook pages? Are we in denial about what these groups represent or just being entertained by them?
In many respects, far right politicians are like show wrestlers. We know about their antics but we don’t mind being fooled.
Soini is one politician who plays the show political game very well. He plays it so well that it took a year and ten months after the PS’ historic election victory of 2011 to be grilled on HARDtalk about racism in his party.
How many in Finland have done the same?
After some major adjustments and training, lots of far right politicians could make it as show wrestlers and even become as popular as Ric Flair. Source: Best of Ric Flair going nuts.
A good example of the public’s fascination with the far right in Finland is the media coverage that PS MP Olli Immonen got as the new president of the extremist Suomen Sisu association.
Some of the most outrageous matters that Immonen, who is a security guard by profession, has claimed is an inevitable so-called clash of cultures between “Christian” and “Muslim” Europe.
Sensible people understand that this is a lot of hogwash like 99.99% of what show wrestlers rant theatrically in front of television cameras.
Immonen writes on the Suomen Sisu website that it is a good matter that anti-immigration groups are not taking the law in their hands but organizing legally.
Then the show wrestler appears like from a jack-in-the-box bouncing from side to side: “I personally condemn racism and I don’t accept that any person is marginalized or favored in working life based of his ethnic background,” he continues. “Similarly, I condemn all forms of political violence be it from persons belonging to the left, center or right.”
Why would Immonen state such things?
If you want to see what people really think and represent, see what they deny.
Irrespective of the political theatrics, it would be a mistake to underestimate the influence and potential harm these types of groups can inflict on our society. That is why we must be vigilant and ready to confront and defeat them wherever they me be.
Today these far right groups are active in countries like Greece and Hungary.
In Finland they already have a beachhead.