Lieksa, Finland, again in the news about the r-problem

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

Even though the troubled city of Lieksa is taking bold steps forward in its fight against racism, it ends up taking some giant leaps back. A social worker, Soile Syrjäläinen, and her department have been the victims of harassment by some townsfolk. On Friday she got a bomb threat, and she has been harassed on a daily basis. She even got spat at by a client, according to the Joensuu-based daily Karjalainen. 

A very simple and honest question: What’s going on in Lieksa, again?

Lieksa, a small city of 12,800 inhabitants with about 250 immigrants mostly from Somalia, has been in the news for all the wrong reasons.

Located near the Russian border in far-flung Pohjois-Karjala, this city is the home of  the very blogger that suggested that foreigners should wear sleeve emblems to help the police in ethnic profiling.

Alain Minguet, a Joensuu resident who has done good work on the anti-racism front in the region, says that despite the present setbacks in Lieksa matters are improving.

“These are the same people who were on the [now closed] Facebook page, who are doing these things [like harassing social worker in Lieksa],” he said. “The mayor of the city has been more outspoken against what has been happening in Lieksa.”

Minguet is chairman of Joensuun seudun monikulttuurisuusyhdistys (Jomoni). He says that the association has worked closely with authorities and researchers to speak to people in Lieksa about the problems that racism can bring to the city.

Abdisalam Mohamed Abdulah: Returning to Finland’s Black February

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

Remember Black February? Over about three weeks we read about the deaths of three Muslims , a suicide and a Perussuomalaiset (PS) councilman who offered to give a medal to a white Finn for killing one of these victims in cold blood. On Monday Migrant Tales had the opportunity to meet the father and a family friend of one of the victims, Abdisalam Mohamed Abdulah. 

The first thing that you notice when you meet Abdisalam’s father is his grief.  Anguish inhabits all of  Mursal Abdulah: It’s in his eyes, in his face, in his posture, in his voice,  in his persona.

The death of his eighteen-year-old son was such a strong blow that he is still recovering from the shock when two policemen broke the tragic news to him and his wife on a Friday February 17 at 10am.

“I couldn’t believe what I was hearing,” he said returning to that terrible moment of his life. “My wife fainted.”

Abdisalam’s father and wife were in the first group of Somali refugees that came to Finland in August 1990 by train from the former Soviet Union. Their son was born in Finland. Abdisalam was a good athlete,  student and son, according to his father.

“He [Abdisalam] planned to study medicine,” he continued. “I was ready to send him abroad so he could become a doctor.”

Abdisalam Mohamed Abdulahi was a Manchester United fan. In August he would have turned nineteen.

The last time that Abdisalam’s father saw his son was on Thursday night. “His last words were that he was going to take a shower, go to a [high school] party and return,” he said. “He never did.”

Abdulah isn’t at all happy with how the police have handled the case.  Apart from not expressing any empathy for the parents’ grief, it was difficult to get any information from them about the crime.

“We were treated coldly and felt like we were the criminals,” he said. “The police appeared to be more concerned about keeping the case under wraps because they feared a revenge attack by Somalis.”

Abdulah says that if a crime were committed by a Somali it would have received a lot of  media attention.

“The thing that struck us the most was when we went to the police station,” he said. “The same information that they wouldn’t give us, we then read in the tabloids right after we left the police station. How is it possible that the papers knew more about Abdisalam’s death than us?”

Abdisalam’s death happened between midnight and 7am.  The suspect and the victim were school acquaintances.  Abdulahi says that his son died from a mortal blow to the head.  The suspect’s father was present at the crime scene as well.

I asked Abdulahi if he feels that justice will be done? “I don’t know,” he said trying to be diplomatic. “I’m not sure that I trust the police.”

One of the matters that the father has a big question mark is the complicity of the father in the whole affair. He doesn’t believe the police that the father was not an accomplice in the crime. “Abdisalam was big and physical compared with the attacker,” Abdulah said. “There must have been somebody else helping him [that could have been the father].”

A friend of the family present at the interview speaks.

“The worst thing in Finland is that if you have a different religion, culture and language, you are left on the  fringes of society,” he said. “No matter how much you try to integrate you are always left outside.”

Abdulah concludes: “Those Somalis that went to Australia and Canada are living better lives than I in Finland. All I have to show for over twenty years in Finland is a cold country with long winters and the death of my son.”

Migrant Tales expresses to the parents, relatives and friends its condolences for Abdisalam.

Racism Review: Free Speech for Anti-Semites and Other Racist Folks: Debates in Europe

Posted on by Migrant Tales
By

There are some important and interesting debates on hate speech in Europe, with critics of new and old hate-speech laws often parroting “first amendment” arguments one often hears in the US.

The useful e-zine called Eurozine has several interesting article now on various sides of this debate. Check it out here.

And there seem to be more interesting websites debating “free speech,” such as this one, Free Speech Debate.

Read original blog entry here.

This piece was reprinted by Migrant Tales with permission.

Will the PS succeed at its vicious campaign against immigrants and visible minorities?

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

 Will Matias Turkkila, the new Perussuomalaiset (PS) editor-in-chief that aims to jump start the party’s website into a Hommaforum phenonmenon, succeed? In order to answer that question we’d have to rephrase the question in to the following way: Will Turkkila and the PS succeed at luring Finland’s biggest nationalist and multiculturally challenged crowd to the party’s cause whatever that may be?

You don’t need to be a brilliant analysts with a crystal ball to figure out that PS chairman Timo Soini is very concerned by the party’s waning popularity as the crucial municipal election nears in October.

In order to slow the PS’ demise as one of Finland’s four largest parties,  Soini has turned to his favorite weapons of choice that helped him last year: bigotry, prejudice, nationalism and anti-EU sentiment.

Soini will never admit that he wants to incite nationalist sentiment because “he is a Christian.” He will tell you this with a poker face as he has said repeatedly: There isn’t one racist in the PS or that racists will be baned from running for office in the municipal election.

The latest appointment of Turkkila by the PS is a last-ditch effort by the party to save its political hide and vie for a respectable result in the 2015 parliamentary election. The PS is looking at new ways to disguise its bigotry, prejudice and nationalism in order to lure voters. What better way than by appointing as their new editor-in-chief a person who made Hommaforum the most successful hate site in Finland?

This present period, 2011-15, is a wretched and dangerous stretch especially for immigrants, visible minorities and sensible thinking Finns.  It would be naive, even an exercise in self-deceit, to claim the contrary.

The big question that we should ask is if the PS will succeed at turning their poor poll showings into something that we saw before their impressive election victory last year.

I doubt it but at the end of the day that depends on each and everyone of us.

Be warned: Whatever argument the PS uses to inject nationalist sentiment and make bigotry acceptable in Finland  is part of a vicious campaign that will at the end of the day hit immigrants and visible minorities.

Study: Homophobia and racism hinder young minority athletes from joining Finnish sports clubs

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

Helsingin Sanomat reported that homophobia and racism are two factors that hinder young minority athletes from joining a Finnish sports club, according to a study. If the story is true it is not only another indication that some Finns live tucked deep in the values of the previous century, but for this to be going on still today is shameful, self-defeating and above all unacceptable. 

Another factor that stops minorities from joining a sports club is cost.

Even if  discrimination is an obtacle in some sports clubs it is a reflection of our society as a whole and our acceptance by too many of these types of social ills.

Like any social ill, racism and homophobia are difficult but not impossible to show.  Even so, the study shows that prejudice and racism do not foster inclusion but fuel social exclusion.

What to do? When battling discrimination we have to first make a decision that we will actually challenge this social ill. Secondly, we must be persistent and patient because eradicating decades of near-unchallenged racism and homophobia in Finland will take many generations.

Despite the challenge, the sooner we begin the better for the sake of our future generations.

Migrant Tales Literary: Mother and daughter ???? ? ????

Posted on by Dana

   Mother and daughter ???? ? ????

By Dana

?? ? ??? ??? ?? ???? ??                                       ????? ??? ?? ?????? ??

Ur my night and day oh mother mine         My imagination, mind, thought and spirit

??? ??? ? ????? ??? ? ????                               ??? ?? ?????? ??? ?????

All intelligence, my attention, thought and mention           Prayer, my single request, heaven sent

????? ????? ?? ??? ????                                ????? ????? ?? ???? ? ????

U look at the photo inside the frame               U call me in my dream and inhabit my thoughts

 ?? ???? ??? ??? ??? ?????                            ?? ?? ????? ? ?? ??????? ??????

Ur the only good storyteller I know in the whole world       Ur in Iran and I am here in Helsinki

?????? ???? ???? ? ????????                                     ???? ??????? ??? ????

Dialysis made u skin and bones           I sent you long-distant blessings for your spirit

?? ????? ??? ?? ??????                                        ?? ????? ??? ?? ???????

Ur my dream and my wish              Ur my meaning of all my searches

 ????? ???? ?? ?? ???? ??                                            ??? ????? ?? ????? ??

Sing me a lullaby           Let the feathers inside the pillow feel our head

????? ??? ?? ??? ?? ??? ????                              ??? ? ??? ???? ? ? ?? ?? ??

I have no more than this tolerance housed in my spirit     Seven years we’ve been separated, from u my flower

????? ??? ??? ??? ? ?????                                       ??? ??????? ?? ?? ??????

There is no door and key to open this cage          Dana has been separated from witnessing the dawn of day

 ???? ?  ???? ???? ??? ????                                      ??? ?? ???? ???? ?? ????

Black clouds rumble over Dana              Her tears turn to sea

 ????????? ?? ??? ? ????                                ?? ???? ???? ??????? ? ????

She scrambles from day-to-day, from moment-to- moment       She knocks on every door weeping and tired

????? ????? ???? ?????                                           ????? ????? ??? ?????

The canary is not comfortable in the cage       Waiting patiently for spring to appear

????? ???? ? ?? ?? ?? ?????                                      ????? ???? ?? ??? ?? ??

Canary injured a piece of her here a piece there        Broke wings this bad cat

 ??????? ????? ??? ?????                                          ??? ???? ????? ???? ???? ?

There’s no guard outside the cage              Come mother and sing a song to cure my pain

Anti-immigration Hommaforum editor to head PS’ party newspaper

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

What kind of message does the Perussuomalaiset (PS) give when it names Matias Turkkila as the new editor-in-chief of the party’s newspaper and web page?  It reinforces what Migrant Tales has been saying all along: the PS will step up their nationalistic and anti-immigration campaign up to the do-or-die municipal election in October.

Turkkila, who used to be a member of the far-right Suomen Sisu association, was PS MP Jussi Halla-aho’s campaign manager in the 2011 parliamentary elections. Halla-aho received 15,074 votes in Helsinki, which is the second-highest amount after Left Alliance chairman Paavo Arhimäki, who got 17,226.

The newly appointed editor-in-chief is editor of Hommaforum, an anti-immigration messageboard site where Migrant Tales has been mentioned on numerous occasions. Hommaforum is closely related to Scripta, Halla-aho’s blog.

Critics of the PS politicians who based their campaigns on anti-immigration and especially anti-Muslim rhetoric are naturally not surprised. Green Party Uusi Suomi blogger Pekka Siikala recently described PS Chairman Timo Soini as “Finland’s most immoral person” over this latest appointment and his sustained failure to deliver on a promise to throw racists out of the party.

Some political observers see Turkkila’s appointment as a last-ditch attempt to repair the PS’ image, which has been tarnished by numerous scandals. Whether he succeeds is a totally different question.

But Soini must succeed in the October municipal elections. If his party does as poorly as in the presidential election, it will mean a long and painful march to the 2015 parliamentary election.  The 39 seats won by the party last year are in serious jeopardy.

Turkkila’s appointment as editor-in-chief suggests that he may become the party’s unofficial spokesman after Matti Putkonen has burned all of the its bridges with the Finnish media.

 

Anti-immigration Facebook group: “One small step for Finland one giant leap for Lieksa”

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

The rise of right-wing anti-immigration populist parties and Counter-Jihadist groups mushrooming from the undercurrent of nationalism and prejudice show how we have failed on many fronts as a society. Is there anything we can do challenge this threat?

The small city of Lieksa located in eastern Finland is a good example of how a community can regain lost ground in the fight against racism and xenophobia. This battle cannot be left to a few brave inhabitants but should become a top priority for the whole community.

Lieksa is a small city with 12,800 inhabitants and about 250 immigrants mostly from Somalia.

The law and its interpretation play crucial roles as we saw Thursday, when a court in Pohjois-Karjala sentenced a man from Lieksa for his comments on Facebook to 60 days imprisonment. Five other people from the same city were fined between 150 and 500 euros for taking part in the same Facebook group.

Charges against two others were dropped.

The Facebook group, called “Mamu keskustelu ilman sensuuria (Lieksa),” or “Immigrant debate without censorship (Lieksa),” was deactivated as well. This is good news and encouraging. It shows that racism can be challenged and beaten where it flourishes.

It demonstrates as well that those that  spread racism sow the seeds of the destruction of their cause. Mamu keskustelu ilman sensuuria (Lieksa) was subsequently deactivated because a member of that groups had published without permission the bank statement of a Somali resident of Lieksa.  The police are investigating the matter and the woman who made public the bank statement could be charged with invasion of privacy.

Those who claim that these type of discussion groups are not harmful to our society, immigrants and visible minorities should think twice. They are the social-media platforms where old hatreds survive to see another day and where new suspicions grow and impact people’s lives. They are the monkey wrenches thrown constantly in the gears of many immigrants’ integration process.

Prejudice, racism and all type of hatred that divide groups are extremely hazardous to a society’s health.  It is costly as well for tax payers like you and I.

 

Anti-immigration groups in Finland care less about immigrants and visible minorities

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

Behind all the rhetoric spread by anti-immigration groups in Finland and elsewhere a fact emerges: they are out to destroy the lives of as many immigrants as possible with their prejudice and racism. When a Justice Ministry official hands over rape statistics on various immigrant groups he gives a power weapon to slander and victimize people from various countries.

Such statistics have little value apart from hindering the integration of hard-working immigrants and those that want to make and build their future in this country.

Risto Laakkonen said on YLE’s Historiansarjoja: Raggarit, rasismi ja suomalaiset program how Swedish newspapers stopped linking crimes to national origin in 1970. The Finnish Embassy in Stockholm was instrumental in reaching an agreement with the editors-in-chief of Sweden’s major newspapers, who agreed not to publish the nationality of individuals committing a crime.

Things had gotten so bad in Sweden that the media had a common saying whenever a Finn was involved in a crime: En finne igen, or Yet another Finn.

Racist perceptions of different groups in Finland is more widespread than people would like to think, and the media have played a key role in spreading racism and prejudices among the population.

The fact that a political group openly spreads and distorts crime statistics about another national group is the worst form of chicanery.

If anti-immigration groups like the Perussuomalaiset (PS) party are honestly interested in promoting the integration of various cultures in our society, why do they commonly single out immigrants and never suggest the same things for Finns?

A case in point of the latter can be found in a good opinion-piece by Hussein Muhammed.  PS MP Jussi Halla-aho has suggested that unemployed immigrants should be put to work, even if this means digging and refilling holes.  Muhammed asks: “…why must this kind of work only apply to “newcomers?” Shouldn’t it apply equally to “natives” or to the majority population that are unemployed?”

Why do anti-immigration groups apply two standards? One of these are for “newcomers” and the other for “natives?” Why are they so eager to use crime statistics and point the accusing finger at the whole group?

The answer to that question is simple. It is prejudice with a capital P, and racism with a fat R.

Mitä monikulttuurisuus on?

Posted on by Susannah

Susannah

Kansanedustaja Saarakkala (ps) näyttää kuvittelevan, että monikulttuurisuus olisi joku poliittinen agenda: 

http://www.iltalehti.fi/uutiset/2012050315527919_uu.shtml?fb_ref=flb&fb_source=home_oneline

Mietitäänpä paria asiaa: mitä Suomen perustuslaki takaa Suomessa asuville?

Suomessa pitää elää maassa maan lailla. Se tarkoittaa sitä, että voimassa on uskonnonvapaus, sananvapaus, kokoontumisvapaus jne. (ks. tarkemmin luku 2 perusoikeudet).

http://www.finlex.fi/fi/laki/ajantasa/1999/19990731

Monikulttuurisuus ei siis ole mikään poliittinen agenda, vaan joukko menetelmiä ja ajatuksia, joilla moniarvoinen (vaan yhtä lakia noudattava) yhteiskunta pystyisi toimimaan (§6) yhdenvertaisuuden mukaan. Monikulttuurinen siis sitoutuu käsitteenä tiukasti Suomen lain hengen toteutumiseen.

Miten propagandaa tehdään termikaappauksilla?

”Saarakkalan mielestä esimerkiksi se, etteivät muslimitaustaiset naiset kulttuurisista syistä johtuen juurikaan solmia avioliittoja kristittyjen miesten kanssa, ei ole asia josta pitäisi monikulttuurisuuden edistämisen nimissä vaieta.”

Länsimaissa on perinteisesti annettu naisten valita omat puolisonsa. Saarakkala näyttää vieläpä kuvittelevan, että Suomessa asuisi natiiveina vain kristittyjä miehiä.

Tämä on klassinen esimerkki siitä, miten propagandaa koitetaan salonkikelpoistaa ”kaappaamalla” termejä ja vääntämällä ne oman agendan käyttöön. Tässä käytännön esimerkissä voidaan kyllä nähdä, miten tuollaiset yritykset päätyvät usein sellaiseen lopputulokseen, jossa ei ainakaan Suomen lakia tai kulttuuria kunnoiteta.