We will win the battle against hate speech and intolerance

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Much is at stake as Finland and Europe speeds into the depths of the new century. One of the greatest  threats to our way of life and society today is hate speech and far-right ideology. Our resolve to identify and challenge these menaces is crucial during these times.

Even if the media, politicians and public opinion have preferred to remain largely silent in the face of these threats, it is an encouraging sign that our reaction as a society to such hazards is an ever-growing reaction.

Source: P.a.p.-Blog. Human Rights Etc.

One is off track if he or she believes that hate speech and intolerance only have an impact on immigrants and minorities. It would be naive to believe that the rise of an anti-immigration party like the Perussuomalaiset (PS) hasn’t impacted our country.

The shadow of the PS is clearly evident in our country: in the government’s EU and immigration policy we well as in our attitudes.

A debate taking place on social media about male circumcision is a case in point. Who else but the anti-Islam hardliners of the PS would be behind a bill to criminalize circumcision of under-fifteen-year-old male minors.

Like most arguments by a party that is openly anti-Islam, they are nothing more than red herrings and slippery slopes towards more radical measures like prohibiting Muslim women from wearing Islamic veils.

Every time a party takes steps to undermine minority rights, cultural diversity and our right to make lifestyle choices, we are eroding our civil liberties.

It is one good reason why we should challenge hate speech and intolerance.

 

The Rautiainen scandal: The PS’ short and selective memory

Posted on by Migrant Tales

The Amon Rautiainen* scandal, the Perussuomalaiset (PS) municipal council candidate in Kotka who suggested on Facebook that Muslims should be boiled alive, reveals the Finnish anti-immigration party’s short and selective memory. 


Freddy Van Wanterghem, the PS chair of the local association in Kotka, is a good example of the party’s double talk, or first I will say something vague to the media and then erase it vaguely and offer you a snow job instead.

The PS city councilor is quoted as saying on YLE in English:

“He [Rautiainen] is a candidate, and voters can make up their minds who they want to vote for.”

He first hints in the quote above that it is sort of ok to write that kind of hate speech on Facebook, but then disassociates the party form Rautiainen’s controversial posts.

For those who might have forgotten, Van Wonterghem was sentenced for inciting ethnic hatred in March for suggesting that it was good matter that a Muslim woman would be killed because ”it would be one less Muslim giving birth.”

Sorry Van Wanterghem but you’ve been caught with your hand in the double-talk cookie jar.

*Does anyone know if Amon is Rautiainen’s original first name? 

 

EU Commissioner for Human Rights: Protection against discrimination should be strengthened in Finland

Posted on by Migrant Tales

 

This is a statement by the EU Commissioner for Human Rights:

Strasbourg, 25/9/2012 – “The Finnish Government has started a timely reform of the national equal treatment legislation. It is now crucial to ensure accessibility of the protection framework to all victims of discrimination and avoid unnecessary fragmentation of equality bodies” said today Nils Muižnieks, the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, releasing a report based on the findings of his visit to Finland carried out on 11-13 June.

The Commissioner welcomed the new National Action Plan on Fundamental and Human Rights, but pointed out that it lacked measures for human rights education. “The recently created independent Human Rights Centre and Human Rights Delegation should aim to fill in some of the gaps of the National Action Plan. It is important that these two bodies, which are going to constitute a National Human Rights Institution together with the Parliamentary Ombudsman, are provided with adequate resources and means to fulfil their extensive mandates.”

The Commissioner is concerned that a gender pay gap of 17.9% still remains, and that violence against women continues to be a serious problem. “The authorities should improve coordination in their responses to violence against women and extend the network of emergency shelters.”

Commissioner Muižnieks is particularly concerned about racist hate speech, also coming from certain politicians, and the extreme marginalisation of young Somali persons. “Further efforts are needed to address discrimination experienced by Roma, Russian-speakers and Somalis who face considerable obstacles in many fields of life, including employment.”

While welcoming the Finnish plan to deinstitutionalise persons with intellectual disabilities, the Commissioner recommends the prompt ratification of the UN Convention on the rights of persons with disabilities and the involvement of disabled people in its monitoring.

The Commissioner also urges Finland to recognise Sámi rights to land and to reindeer herding in the traditional manner, and to ratify the International Labour Organization Convention No. 169 concerning indigenous peoples. ”The close participation of Sámi representatives in the ratification process is essential.”

Press contact in the Commissioner’s Office:
Stefano Montanari, +33 (0)6 61 14 70 37 ; [email protected]

Keep up to date with the Commissioner on Twitter

 

Perussuomalaiset candidate: Kill the prime minister, finance minister and boil Muslims alive

Posted on by Migrant Tales

What is more serious: encouraging people to kill the prime minister and finance minister of your country or suggesting that Muslims should be boiled alive? The police are presently investigating whether to launch an inquiry against Perussuomalaiset (PS) Kotka municipal election candidate Amon Rautiainen, reports YLE in English. 

Rautiainen has publicly apologized for what he wrote on Facebook.

”I wrote the posts with humor and in the heat of the moment,” he said.

Is “humor”encouraging readers to kill Prime Minister Jyrki Katainen and Finance Minister Jutta Urpilainen as well as suggest that Muslims should be boiled alive?

Like many racists and social media bullies, you will find cowardice and low self-esteem behind their ignorance and bravado.

What would happen if an immigrant, visible minority, never mind a Muslim, would have suggested the same fate for the PS and its leadership as Rautiainen did for members of the government and Muslims?

There would be a public outcry.

The fact that these types of characters appear almost constantly from the PS suggests the extent of the social illness that has inflicted Finland.

Their racist and ultra-nationalist ideology grow in PS greenhouses of hatred.

Sad but true.

But there is something positive to mention: Finland’s reaction to racism is an ever-growing a reaction.

PS of Pori: Nazi motto to kick off the municipal elections of October

Posted on by Migrant Tales

The Perussuomalaiset (PS) party of the western Finnish city of Pori have come up with a catch phrase to launch their municipal election campaign: “One city – one leader,” reports Uusi Pori. The motto of the Nazis regime (1933-35) was chillingly similar to what the PS in Pori are using: Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer (One People, One Nation, One Leader). 

Janne Salonen, the head of the PS of Pori, doesn’t see anything wrong using catch phrases that are poor copies from Nazi Germany.

“Hitler used catch phrases when he spoke as a leader,” he said, “we’re speaking of the city of Pori. Every inhabitant of Pori knows the difference.”

Do they?

Does Salonen?

I doubt it.

Another example of how some members of the PS flirt with Nazism and fascism.

Meanwhile, the police are investigating whether or not to launch an inquiry into the Facebook posts of PS Kotka municipal election candidate Amon Rautiainen. The candidate wrote that it would be “patriotic” to kill Prime Minister Jyrki Katainen and Finance Minister Jutta Urpilainen.

Rautiainen wrote as well that Muslims should be boiled alive.

Read whole story (in English) here.

 

YLE in English: Three Afghani asylum seekers continue hunger strike

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Three Afghani asylum seekers been on hunger strike since September 10 after their applications for asylum were rejected by the authorities, writes YLE in English. The three asylum seekers have appealed  the Finnish Immigration Service decision to the administrative court. 

One of the asylum seekers, Abdullahi Gulamesdiq, said that he fears for his life in Afghanistan because he was active in politics in the war-torn country.

”If I have to go back, my life is in danger,” he was quoted as saying on YLE in English. ”We undertook a hunger strike because the decision by the Finnish Immigration Service is inhumane.”

Another Afghani asylum seeker on hunger strike said that Afghanistan isn’t a safe place to live.

“How could we live safely in Afghanistan if even the president of the country and his relatives are in constant danger?” said Golkhan.

The Free Movement Network (Vapaa liikkuvuus -verkosto) and the Federation of Iraqi Refugees organized on Friday a demonstration in support of the asylum seekers who are camped in front of parliament. Some 100 people took part in the march.

Europe and the West have to take a long and hard look at themselves. First we attack and wreak havoc in countries like Afghanistan and Iraq, then we oblige these people to stay put and live in these war-ravaged countries.

Thank you Sini Savolainen @xRebelGrrrlx  for bringing this story to Migrant Tales’ attention.  

 

Finnish Lutheran Church says family reunification from Africa is costly and dangerous

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Archbishop Kari Mäkinen said that family reunification of Africans with their families in Finland is not only costly but dangerous, reports YLE. Since Finland does not have an embassy in war-ravaged Somalia, Somalis are required to apply for residence permits in neighboring Ethiopia or Kenya. 

The Finnish Immigration Service has a backlog of about 10,000 family reunification applications. Most of them are from Somalia.

Family reunification is a normal part of immigration. Finns who emigrated to the North America from the 1860s not only encouraged their relatives to follow them but their neighbors and friends as well.

Migrant Tales has written about the expensive ordeal that Somalis have to endure when applying for a residence permit in Ethiopia or Kenya.

The first blog entry, The long and costly ordeal of family reunification from Somalia to Finland, revealed that a two-and-a-half year wait in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, can cost a family of  six between $9,000 and $12,000.

The second blog entry,  Feeding Somalis and poor immigrants to the loan sharks of Finland, showed how some immigrants in Finland have to turn to loan sharks in order to help their relatives finance their residence applications from the Finnish embassy in Nairobi, Kenya.

If the aim of Finnish immigration officials is to make family reunification as difficult as possible for some immigrants, then they are doing an effective job. It explains why the whole process takes so long, is expensive and even dangerous.

 

An interesting discussion with some PS members about Finnish identity

Posted on by Migrant Tales

I had an interesting discussion on Saturday with a Perussuomalaiset (PS) candidate for Mikkeli city council. The woman, who claimed that her mother is Russian, stressed that the PS strives to look after everyone’s interests in Finland, including that of immigrants. 

Good news.

Even if such views are hard to find in the PS, they do exist. Migrant Tales wrote in November about Jukka Kotimäki, a PS secretary of Siilimäki near Kuopio, who said that he doesn’t want racists in the party.

Others that have voiced objections to the PS’ hardline racists is MP Pirkko Mattila.

These faint voices within the PS are a positive sign and should be applauded. Even so, they are steamrolled by the party’s inflexible Counterjihadists, populist radical right members and shameless racists.

The discussion I had with another member of the local PS party on Saturday revealed the central issue concerning the problematic view the party has of immigrants and visible minorities.

”You speak Finnish well,” the PS member said.

“But I am Finnish.”

After telling him my family history in two seconds, he stated that I’m ”half” Finnish.

”I’m not half of anything,” I responded. ”I’m Finnish.”

I continued: “There are many types of Finns these days:  Muslims, blacks, browns, Catholics.”

The discussion came to an abrupt halt.

Why do some Finns still believe that one has to be white to be Finnish? It’s incredible that a country that saw 1.2 million people emigrate between 1860 and 1999 and whose population is becoming more culturally diverse still claims that one must be white and speak the langauge perfectly to be accepted as a “full” Finn.

Is this what is taught at our schools? Is it what a model Nordic welfare society teaches and reinforces: You don’t fit the ethnic bill if you aren’t white enough?

The good news is that our view of ourselves as a group will change radically during this century.

 

 

La prórroga: Valiente el que vuelve a su país

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Zulma Sierra

Después de la presentación del corto ‘Viaje de vuelta’ en Casa América Catalunya, se generó un debate interesante sobre elretorno de los migrantes a sus países de origen.

¿Es una respuesta fácil a la crisis económica de España? ¿Son cobardes o son valientes los retornados? ¿Y por qué no se plantea un documental sobre los migrantes que aún sobreviven en España?

Público asistente a Casa América para la presentación de “Viaje de vuelta”

Todas las preguntas resultaban fascinantes.

En primer lugar, estuvimos de acuerdo en que no es fácil, ni remotamente, empacar diez o quince años de tu vida en dos maletas y regresar a tu país. Alguien dirá: bueno, ésa es tu tierra, allí está tu familia, tus amigos, todos entenderán tu lenguaje, te sentirás acogido… etc, etc, etc. Y yo le diré: “sí, pero no.”

Cuando vuelves te das cuenta de que has cambiado mucho, pero también ha cambiado el país que recordabas, la familia y los amigos que amabas. Es difícil adaptarse a los cambios y más cuando se trata de lugares y personas que terminaste idealizando. Te cuesta entender que muchos defectos de tu ciudad sigan ahí, cuando hay tantas formas de resolverlos; te dan rabia cosas que creías soportar como el desorden vial, el incivismo, la inexistencia de horarios para casi todo, la corruptela rampante pero tolerada, la resignación social, la apatía política… ¡En fin!

Y no es que llegues con las ínfulas de primer mundo a flor de piel sino que has aprendido que hay mejores formas de sobrellevar la convivencia urbana y te duele que hayan pasado los años y muchas cosas sigan tan mal como las dejaste.

Todo eso sin contar con que muchos de tus amigos ya no están, no tienes historia laboral ni ingresos a la vista ni perro que te ladre. Por tener, sólo tienes tus maletas y, por supuesto, a tus incondicionales (familiares, ex jefes o ex algo que están listos para ayudarte).

¿Son cobardes o valientes los retornados? Pues yo me atrevería a decir que más valientes por reemprender su vida nuevamente en otro país. ¿Que se deberían quedar en España remando hasta que el barco salga a flote? Pues no estoy tan segura. Sin trabajo no hay horizonte y lo peor es que los años han pasado y seguramente será igual de difícil encontrar empleo en el país de origen, pero tal vez se lleven nuevos conocimientos que permitan reinventarse.

¿Y por qué no se plantea un documental sobre los migrantes que aún sobreviven en España? ¡Eso! ¿Y por qué no? Aquí seguimos aguantando mucho y no somos ni mejores ni peores que los que se han ido. ¡A ver cuándo nos reunimos y nos contamos nuestras propias historias!

Pinchar aquí si quieres leer la nota original.

YLE poll: PS seen as big winner of the Finnish municipal elections

Posted on by Migrant Tales

YLE’s latest poll published Thursday shows the Perussuomalaiset  (PS) Party will be the biggest winner of the October 29 municipal elections. The poll sees the PS getting 17.2% of the votes versus 5.4% in 2008.

The poll predicts the Center Party as the biggest loser of the election with 15.9% versus 20.1%.

The National Coalition Party and Social Democrats are both vying for top spot with 21.5% (23.5%) and 19.9% (21.2%),  respectively.

How should we interpret this latest poll? Does it mean that the PS’ anti-EU, anti-immigration and anti-Islam message has got a strong foothold in mainstream Finnish politics? Is it a death knell to the Center Party?

All of these are good questions but one matter is for certain: Finland is becoming a more polarizied society as the euro crisis rages on.