Olemme pieni ryhmä nimeltä Suomen mediaseurantakollektiivi, jossa on edustettuina ihmisiä eri vähemmistötaustoista. Julkaisimme tänään ensimmäisen raporttimme suomeksi ja englanniksi.
Onko media uutisoinut “katujengit”ja vartijaskandaali reilusti?
Mielestämme uutisointi on ollut ongelmallista. Lue raportti ja tutustu havaintoihimme.
Fool me once shame on you fool me twice shame on me.
The question is neither far-fetched nor provocative: The xenophobic Perussuomalaiset (PS)* party has used and exploited in the past three elections of 2011, 2015, and 2019 the migrant crime theme.
Understanding the success that the Sweden Democrats, a party with neo-Nazi roots, and the Moderate Party in September had in the Swedish election with criminal gang violence, PS head Riikka Purra bet she had found the “perfect” story to succeed in Finland’s April election.
But did she? The jury is still out on that one.
About eight formerly undocumented immigrants were found guilty of sexually abusing minors in the Oulu cases four years ago. However, a skewed and unfavorable narrative supported by the police, politicians, and media came close to hysteria. Yle published 77 articles on the topic between 14 November 2018 and 13 February 2019, including 13 articles alone on 14 January!
Thanks to the Oulu sexual cases, the PS almost won the election. Even so, the whole issue faded into the background after the election.
Will the same happen to the “youth gang” [1] story?
Continue reading “Have the Perussuomalaiset succeeded in their quest for a migrant crime story to attract voters?”Ville Nurmela, a candidate for the openly racist and fascist Sinimusta Liike convicted for ethnic agitation and vandalizing the Turku synagogue in 2020, is running for parliament, according to Helsingin Sanomat, Finland’s largest daily.
A former member of Finland’s neo-Nazi group, Nurmela has convictions for using and possessing explosives, assault rifle cartridge cases, and drugs.
In an interview with STT in December, Sinimusta Liike chairperson Tuukka Kuru admitted that the party could be considered openly racist and fascist.
According to investigative journalism by Helsingin Sanomat, other Sinimusta Liike candidates for parliament were convicted of various crimes.
The role of the media in shaping public discourse about minorities before the April parliamentary election is evident. We saw this in the case of Oulu in 2018-2019 and its present coverage of “youth gangs” from the fall. It is disheartening that no media has challenged politicians about how they exploit a topic like “youth gangs” and if there are links with Sweden’s and Finland’s parliamentary elections.
In December, we even saw President Sauli Niinistö, no friend of Finland’s culturally and ethnically diverse communities, give impetus to the toxic labeling of brown and black youths.
The coverage of “youth gangs,” which are referred to in Sweden as criminal gangs to avoid blanket labeling of whole groups, exposes in Finland how the media, police, and politicians collaborate to spread a toxic narrative about marginalized groups.
Each of the three groups involved (media, police, and politicians) have a vested interest in exploiting stories about minorities:
– The media gains viewers and advertisers.
– The police can secure more funding.
– Politicians attract voters.
More and more Ukrainians are fleeing for their lives to Europe as we mark the first anniversary of the Russian invasion. It seems the EU and NATO lack the political imagination to do more than worsen the refugee situation in the year ahead. So far 4 million have fled Ukraine and over 40 000 to Finland.
More tanks and weapons are promised weekly for the Ukrainian military, and peace talks continue to be dismissed and scuttled by NATO powers.
This week, President Sauli Niinistö announced that he would not let the nuisance of a parliamentary democratic election get in the way of Finland’s NATO membership if the Turkish president agreed to support it. What nonsense, indeed!
Who’s in charge of this crisis anyway?
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg will be in Helsinki next week to make final arrangements and it would be embarrassing indeed to mention complications like elections.
Migrant Tales comment: Today’s news that Parliament’s constitutional committee voted against the Sámi Parliament Act is a big blow to Europe’s only indigenous group. The parties that voted against the act were the Center Party, National Coalition Party (Kokoomus), and the radical-right Perussuomalaiset.*
I wrote in the forthcoming European Islamophobia Report 2022 the following: “Another big test for Prime Minister [Sanna] Marin is the Sámi Parliament Act, which the Centre Party has relentlessly opposed. The long-overdue act will give Europe’s only indigenous group the right to self-determination as envisaged in the ILO Convention 169 (Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention, 1989). Opposition to the act reminds other minorities, like Muslims, how Finland views different minorities and their rights.”
As war rages on in Ukraine and we near the first anniversary of that tragic conflict on February 24, one question we should ask is how Finland’s Russian-speaking community is faring. Katja Marova, who lives in the border city of Lappeenranta, says that matters have not changed much in her home city, even if war rages in Ukraine.
“It seems that as there are now sanctions against Russia,” she continued, “it’s ok to discriminate freely as well [against Russians].”
Apart from discrimination, some Russians complain about racist harassment in public.
Marova, a Left Alliance candidate for parliament in Lappeenranta, wrote on Facebook about an incident at a bar when she spoke to a Russian friend.
“On Friday, we were at a bar in our city [Lappeenranta] when a man walked by us and purposely bumped into my friend,” she said. “The man apologized, and my friend said it was ok. But then he started to say Slava Ukraini (Respect Ukraine).”
Marova said that her friend was shocked by the man’s reaction.
Continue reading “Katja Marova: Living next door to Russia”An example of you-can-eat-your-racist-cake-and-have-it journalism: The chief executive of a private security firm posts a video wearing a uniform about how a member of the Romany minority shoplifts. The security firm’s representative uses his personal TikTok account to publish the racist post.
The security guard chief executive took down the video after a representative of the Romany community confronted him.
An apology follows: “Since my motive wasn’t racist, I was surprised [by the reaction]. When the representative [of the Romany organization] justified its case, I understood that it [the video] could be seen that way. I promised them that I would remove the video.”
In Finland, white privilege is so ingrained in society that one can make a racist video and claim ignorance.
Stealing is one of the oldest stereotypes about the Romany minority.
Even if the media will not publish the chief executive’s name and company, it is FS Security.
Since the end of December, security companies like Avarn Security and Securitas have been under close scrutiny concerning the use of excessive force. In January, they caused the death of a victim they apprehended.
The present story is only a further example of the challenges faced by security companies.
The story’s author did not reply to an email by Migrant Tales on why the tabloid did not publish the name of the security company and its chief executive.
The Finnish parliament’s constitutional law committee voted 10-5 on Wednesday to allow halal and shechita slaughter practiced by Muslims and Jews, respectively, according to Yle. The Parliament’s agriculture and forestry committee recently approved the amended animal welfare act.
Yaron Nadbornik, the head of the Jewish community of Helsinki, said that the law does not ban shechita and halal slaughter.
“This is what we hoped for in the new law,” he continued. “We didn’t want the law to ban shechita slaughter.”
In the new act, as in the current law, chickens will not have to be stunned, only large livestock like reindeer, lambs, and cows, according to Nadbornik.
Even if the animal is supposed to be stunned simultaneously with the cutting, it cannot happen simultaneously at the same time, which means it offers an opportunity to stun the animal immediately when initiating the cut.
Sweden banned stunning animals in 1937, Norway in 1929, and Denmark in 2014.
Looking at the number of stories written about the so-called youth gang problem in Finland, it is interesting to note that reporting of the issue by Yle doubled compared with the eight months of the year.
Stories about Sweden’s youth gang problem started to pick up in the fall after Sweden’s 11 September parliamentary election. Before the election (during 1 January-10 September 2022), Yle published 29 stories, but from 11 September to 16 February, the number of stories soared by 124% to 65.
The number of stories during those periods under review remains stable for Helsingin Sanomat, MTV, Ilta.Sanomat and Iltalehti.
Why did Yle its coverage of the topic? Are politicians pulling some strings behind the scenes?
Considering that we are in an election year and, due to past actions of the police and media in cities like Oulu, is the whole gang “problem” in Finland a storm in a teacup. Is it something that politicians from the Perussuomalaiset – excuse the language – pulled out of their asses? Is it similar to the stolen election lies spread by MAGA Republicans?
If it is true that the whole youth gang story is grossly exaggerated for political purposes, what responsibility does the media have for perpetuating the story?
Law enforcement institutions like the police, Finnish Border Guard, and others must make a case to acquire funds. What better way than to warn the public of a danger that does not yet exist but needs resources?
The media should do a better job and void being taken for rides by politicians and the police.