Cultural diversity Archives - Page 21 of 30

Where are you from?

Posted on June 10, 2013 by Migrant Tales

Even if I have lived most of my adult life in Finland and my mother is Finnish, I’m still asked occasionally where I’m from. In a spirit of mutual respect, I ask the person the same question. Some don’t like it.

The innocent question, where are you from, reveals a lot about our prejudices and ignorance about who we consider Finns.

In order to emphasize their Finnishness at the cost of your Otherness, you’ll even get sometimes a lesson in race-and-blood myths and how their ancestors have lived for centuries in Finland.

When faced with such exclusive views of who is a Finn, I ask them how many ancestors they’d have if they went back 20 generations. The answer is about one million.

Read full story here.

Then there are those who claim they are as old as Methuselah, a biblical figure who died at the age of 969. Those who play Methuselah claim that their great grandparents fought in this and that war and built this land from scratch even if they had never seen war never mind suffered poverty.

I ask them a simple question: Are you 150 years old?

One matter that gives hope about building a more inclusive society is that we are still a young nation. Our national identity, which is nothing more than a social construct, was built by and large on wars and our loathing of Russia. This must change in order to make our society more inclusive and acceptant of cultural diversity.

Certainly we should respect our veterans. Even if they had no choice but to fight in trenches and die in battlefields, we don’t have to be there with them since the Winter (1939-40) and Continuation War (1941-44) ended over sixty years ago. We have to forgive and move on. The longer we stay in those trenches the longer we’ll be resentful and suspicious of the outside world.

Despite all the challenges facing us during this century as we become a culturally diverse society, I’m confident that we’ll succeed at the task.

Our Nordic democratic social welfare state values and the spirit of our laws ensure success.

“Only Finnish spoken here” versus cultural diversity

Posted on June 8, 2013 by Migrant Tales

What would you do if you saw on an elementary school classroom door the following message: Only Finnish spoken here? Would you ask if speaking Swedish is ok? Would it raise disturbing memories of how minorities like the Saami were persecuted and discouraged at school especially after World War 2 for speaking their own language?

The Saami minority were one of many groups that were victims of white Finnish assimilation.

Here’s the double-standard and conflict: It would be disturbing to see such a sign at a school in Lapland today but we wouldn’t think anything of it if the message was intended for third-culture children, or those who have one or two immigrant parents.

One of the issues that we see over and over in the ongoing debate on immigration and immigrants is our acceptance of cultural diversity. In the last century, Finland dealt with cultural diversity in the following way:

discouraging “Otherness” and assimilation of minorities like the Saami, which began in the nineteenth century*
systematically prohibit immigration and foreign investment to the country

If we consider that it took Finland 65 years after independence to have its first Aliens Act in force in 1983, and that the Restricting Act of 1939, which severely undermined foreign investment to the country and was shelved in 1992, our assimilation policy included immigrants and foreign investment.

Finland is a very different country today than it was in the last century. We live in a globalized world and our society is becoming ever-culturally diverse. Since our assimilation policy was systematic in the last century after independence, it’s easy to understand why some Finns oppose and are hostile to cultural diversity.

A good example of the latter are anti-immigration parties like the Perussuomalaiset (PS), which would never suggest to their voters the things they do for immigrants. It explains as well why we don’t think twice about “only Finnish spoken here” signs at schools.

“While I believe that our school system in Finland strives to promote cultural diversity, the truth is that we have a long way to go. Killing and discouraging diversity has distorted our view of ourselves and how we accept others in our society.

One example of the latter is how some schools continue to label third-culture children as “students with immigrant backgrounds,” even if they were born and grew up in this country. Such labels serve in too many cases to promote social inequality.

If you want a culprit that is holding us back today and which promotes intolerance, you’ll find it in our assimilation policies and the way we were brought up and taught to see ourselves as an exclusive national group. With more immigrants moving to this country, we need to promote inclusion and acceptance.

One association that played an important role in our assimilation policy in the last century was Suomalaisuuden liitto. Should it surprise us that the association, which has been taken over by the PS, has spearheaded a campaign to demote the Swedish language to elective status at schools.

* Vesa Puuronen: Rasistinen Suomi. Gaudeamus, Helsinki 2011. pp. 111-163.

The Stockholm riots reveal in the raw our prejudices and loathing for cultural diversity

Posted on May 25, 2013 by Migrant Tales

Apart from being a wake-up call to ever-growing social exclusion, discrimination and outright intolerance that is alive and kicking in Sweden, the riots in the northern suburb of Stockholm have revealed in Finland our prejudices and loathing for cultural diversity.

The Local writes: “Stockholm is not on fire. Let’s get that clear immediately.” Read full story here.

The riots in Husby even encouraged anti-immigration commentators on Migrant Tales to radicalize and step up their attacks on those who defend the good name of this blog.

Since riots are a desperate call for attention, reaction to such turmoil can reveal our deepest fears, prejudices and shameless doses of political opportunism as we have seen by Perussuomalaiset party politicians.

For me, the riots in Sweden are a sad reminder that a part of our society is still incapable of coming to terms with cultural diversity. Their response is defensive instead of proactive.

What does all of this reveal to us? That the lives of certain immigrant groups in this country are going to get far worse in the future.

By ”far worse” I mean greater social exclusion, prejudice and discrimination. Instead of finding proactive solutions, our prejudices will continue to cripple and impair our good judgement.

Another unsettling fact emerges from the Stockholm riots: Finland has serious issues of its own in accepting its ever-growing cultural diversity.

What will all of this lead to? The answer is simple: Similar riots in Finland in the future as in Sweden.

If the riots in Husby show that that a model Nordic welfare state like Sweden has issues concerning cultural diversity, it suggests that matters in Finland are in far worse shape.

It’s not too late, however. A lot can be done to avoid the mistakes of Sweden on the integration of immigrants front.

The most important of these is to live up to the spirit of our laws, which promotion of acceptance, opportunities and social equality for all.

Migrant Tales Literary: Boycott ?????

Posted on May 15, 2013 by Dana

By Dana

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Land of walls: Finland Finland or prejudice

Prejudice, maybe banter Banter, wow, a hunter

A hunter of humanity Humanity screams out in this land

Land of doubts, a sick land of doubts Thoughts that doubt, a land of colossal hurt

Land of hurt or Finland Finland, yes, a land of sin

Land of sin or ding dong land Ding dong land or land of hate

Land of hate or land of fakes Land of fakes and land that shakes

Scam scam scammers I give you fair waning: scam is a shark

Walls oh walls look at those walls Here, there and everywhere

They play games behind the walls Behind the walls that are inhabited by the darkness.

How can we challenge racism if it isn’t a problem?

Posted on April 30, 2013 by Migrant Tales

As long as we don’t see racism as a big enough problem in our society, our response to it will be inefficient. Just like any illness, we must first diagnose it and then prescribe a cure.

It’s disappointing to read how some people can insult others in a racist manner.

Yesterday’s news story published on Migrant Tales about a single mother and her son, who moved to Helsinki from Mikkeli because they were harassed in a racist manner, sheds light on a social illness inflicting our society today and which we must challenge.

The comments to the story on Iltalehti and Hommaforum could reveal the extent of the problem in Finland.

The Migrant Tales blog entry was mentioned on Länsi-Savo, Itä-Savo and Perusopetus.fi.

How can immigrants and visible minorities clear the minefields of misinformation?

Posted on April 15, 2013 by Migrant Tales

There is an interesting news story on today’s YLE that raises a timely question: Not why there is so much misinformation spead about immigrants, but what does this reveal about us as a society?

Does it bring to light ignorance or a subtle conspiracy that permits us to have and eat our racist cake simultaneously?

While it is a welcome matter that Finnish officials speak out against prejudice and racism in our society, why has so little been done on this front in the past, especially by those who claim to be anti-racist and work to better the lives of immigrants?

You’ll probably find the answer to that question in the eerie silence and tacit approval of that misinformation being spread against immigrants. It is telling you as well that we must raise our voices and lead ourselves if anything is to change.

What kind of wise tales are being spread in public about immigrants?

According to what Pirjo Puolakka of the city of Kotka’s immigration office, they are the following:

Immigrants and refugees are the same thing;

Immigrants get more social welfare than Finns.

Another topic that could be added to this list are rape and crime statistics.

Misinformation could be pictured in the following manner. It could be seen as the deadly mines up ahead of our path towards greater social equality and acceptance. Since clearing that minefield would be suicidal, it’s clear that few white Finns will do the job. This only leaves us.

But beyond those killing fields we’ll eventually confront the greatest foe of all: ourselves.

It’s the cultural diversity, stupid!

Posted on April 11, 2013 by Migrant Tales

Would it be fair to say that the biggest challenge facing Finland during this century is accepting its cultural diversity and deconstructing our white national identity in order to make our society more inclusive? Will this happen easily?

The central issue being debated in Finland today about immigrants boils down to one question: How much cultural diversity are we willing to accept?

There aren’t any political parties in this country, except for the Perussuomalaiset (PS) and its extremist Suomen Sisu faction, which are openly against white Finns marrying people of different ethnicities. Even so, it’s clear that this attitude is quite widespread in our society.

If we’d like to see an even bigger picture of how this works in practice, we could take Cuba’s Fidel Castro example of how he got rid of his political dissidents by allowing them to flee en masse to neighboring Miami.

Less dissidents, more perceived unity.

Finland has seen over 1.2 million emigrants move mainly to the Americas and Sweden between 1860 and 1999. Just like Castro, Finland benefited in the same way. Apart from the socialists and communists that fled Finland after the Civil War of 1918, Finland was able to forge unchallenged a social construct like the “noble” white Finn.

It didn’t matter that hundreds of thousands of Finns had moved to other parts of the world and intermarried with other ethnicities. The way Finnish language evolved in Finnish immigrant communities, and how our view of our changing identity changed as a result, interested only a few.

Paradoxically, we wanted our Finnish expats to retain their Finnish culture and identity at all costs. Today, however, we want our immigrants and newcomers to do totally the opposite: Be like us (white Finnish) we tell them. Learn our culture, speak our language adopt our way of life.

The Finnish Lutheran Church has started to take a strong stand against racism like this story about multicultural families reveals about the discrimination their children face in our society. If there are people who are on the frontline of our ever-growing cultural diversity, they are these exemplary mothers.

Any person who thinks that immigrants don’t want to adapt and succeed in their new homeland know very little about immigration. An unsettling question arises: How can you integrate into a society that doesn’t accept you?

It’s clear that white Finland will not cede much of the high ground to cultural diversity. Expect then the following: lip service about two-way integration but what is really happening is one-way integration (assimilation) in most cases. Wherever two-way integration occurs, it usually happens on a short leash.

A good example of the latter is the following statement I heard from a politician in private. “There is room for immigrants in this country” but “building mosques is out of the question.”

Since it was easy to assimilate “foreigners” in the last century into Finns, it’s a bit more complicated in this century. It was easier in the previous century. All you needed was language, be white, adopt a Finnish surname and substitute your “foreign” background for ardent nationalism.

You’ll need much more than a surname change and a few nationalistic sound bites to be accepted as a Finn with equal rights in this century.

Finland’s tolerance for cultural diversity is being tested to the limit these days

Posted on April 7, 2013 by Migrant Tales

Finland’s tolerance to Otherness is being tested to the limit these days. If we look at it from a political perspective, the knee-jerk reaction is clear. Denying that there isn’t a connection between the stellar rise of an anti-EU, anti-immigration and anti-Islam party and our ever-growing cultural diversity is understanding a little or erroneously the issue at hand.

It would be wishful thinking to believe that the Perussuomalaiset (PS), which won 39 seats in the 2011 election versus 5 in 2007, that there is a return to the past when the political landscape was dominated by three major parties: National Coalition Party, Social Democrats and Center Party.

Returning back to the political good old days without Timo Soini’s PS is just as unrealistic as stopping Finland’s ever-growing cultural diversity. Intolerance and cultural diversity are here to stay and will set the pace of things to come in Finland in the future.

As far as intolerance is concerned and the rise of parties like the PS appear to throw sand in the gears of cultural diversity, the good news is that history and our sheer numbers will have the final say. We will one day have the power to tell our own narrative as Finns.

Professor Jeremy Gould spoke to Otava Opisto Folk High School students and staff on Friday.

Professor Jeremy Gould of Jyväskylä University gave us the big picture in a recent talk he held near Mikkeli. According to him, there is very little narrative coming from immigrants and visible minorities concerning our ever-growing cultural diversity.

“Nearly everything written about ethnic relations in Finland is by researchers with no personal experience of racism,” said Gould. “Obviously, this limits the depth and relevance of their insights.”

It would be too simplistic to blame only the PS for Finland’s ever-growing intolerance. Such a social ill has been fueled as well by the silence of other political parties, the media and general public.

Not only is silence and lack of leadership a problem, associations that claim to further the rights of immigrants and visible minorities are just as guilty as those who decide to remain silent to the threat of intolerance.

If we accept white Finns, or visible minorities who speak like Uncle Toms, to champion for our rights and to our narrative, we have nobody else to blame but ourselves for our failures.

The big challenge in this century for Finland is deconstructing its twentieth century national identity. In its place there will be a more inclusive Finland where there is a lot of room for everyone to embrace this country as their home.

Migrant Tales Literary with Le monde n’est pas: Around Europe by Miguel Velayos

Posted on April 1, 2013 by Migrant Tales

Comment: I came across this neat website on Twitter called Le monde n’est pas rond (The world is not round). The website describes itself as “an international artistic newspaper, based in Luxembourg, that explores the contemporary realities of migration, borders, and human rights through the publication of articles, art and illustration, photography, prose and poetry.”

Why not pay it a visit.

See original link here.

What will happen to Finland if the PS matches its parliamentary election result in 2015?

Posted on March 18, 2013 by Migrant Tales

Should we be worried by the latest polls, which show the Perussuomalaiset (PS) party vying for second place? What does the rise of the PS say about the present state of Finland? What will happen if the party matches its 2011 election result in 2015?

Right after the disappointing municipal election, PS head Timo Soini promised that his party aims to become the biggest in 2014, when Finland holds European parliamentary elections.

If you are an optimist, the rise of the PS in 2011 could be seen as a knee-jerk reaction to Finland’s ever-growing cultural diversity, globalization and especially to the economic crisis that has hit the European Union and our country.

In my hometown of Mikkeli, we had our first refugee center in the early 1990s. The initial reaction was hostile, sometimes even violently towards the newcomers. That fortunately changed with time and today it’s nothing uncommon to see immigrants in Mikkeli.

While matters have changed for the better, others like institutionalized racism, prejudice and intolerance haven’t. They linger on because nobody has challenged these problems seriously enough.

Kansainvälinen Mikkeli, an association promoting cultural diversity and internationalization, approached by email some candidates before the April 2011 parliamentary election who wanted to tighten immigration policy and cut funding to such groups. Kansainvälinen Mikkeli published these responses on their Facebook page and thereby opened debate with these candidates.

The email was important because it showed these candidates that their views concerning immigrants were being heard.

While it’s clear that time will change matters for the better in this country for immigrants and visible minorities, what if the PS match their last parliamentary election result in 2015? What would happen if they become the biggest party two and a half years from now and its leader, Soini, becomes prime minister?

While the latter scenarios are unlikely, such an election victory by the PS in 2015 would end up polarizing our society ever more. Soini’s and the PS’ answer, with the silent blessing of the bigger and some smaller parties, would play down intolerance by denying it as a minor problem.

It’s pretty clear that immigrants and visible minorities will never be treated as equals in Finland as long as they leave this important work to others. We must rise to the occasion and we must take charge of our own future.

One of the reasons why the PS has grown to such a big party and why our answer to their discourse has been so ambiguous, is because too many white Finns don’t feel threatened by them.

Leadership is needed more than ever today to drive home a fact that Finland is a culturally divers society.

No matter how much the racists and extremists kick and bitch about this fact, that’s what’s written in stone.

Tag: Cultural diversity