According to a new survey on the police service, an editorial in Finland’s largest daily Helsingin Sanomat claims today that trust in the police runs high, even if the survey showed that confidence in the police had fallen by four percentage points to 91%.
The editorial also puts in a favorable word for the media, which it claims enjoys strong acceptance from Finns because it is a trusted source due to the lack of fake news, and the high literacy levels of its readers.
While there is a lot of trust in the police and national media, we have to make a further important question: Which groups trust the police and media?
If we look at the question from the perspective of the radical right and the rise of populism and far-right ideology in Finland, about 18%, or about half a million voters, question the latter two institutions.
Finland’s largest opposition party, the Perussuomalaiset (PS)*, is openly Islamophobic, misogynist, and openly hostile of the mainstream media, and in many cases of the police.
The rise of anti-Muslim racism and other forms of discrimination in Finland are a cause for concern. How much do minorities like the Roma, Saami, migrants, and their children trust the police and national media?
If you asked some members of the Roma community what they think about the police service, the answer you may get may or may not surprise you. The same goes for people of color who commonly accuse the police of systematic racism and ethnic profiling.
Why are such groups usually sidelined? Why aren’t their opinions important?
The Helsingin Sanomat editorial forgets, like commonly other sectors of society, to ask what these minorities’ opinions are. Not asking them is denial and systemic racism; both our blind spots that continue to see Finland as a monolithic slab of whiteness.
It is hoped that these surveys about the police service and media don’t sideline minorities.
We have recently read about two cases where security guards use force to handle a passenger that does not have a ticket. In both these cases, there is a link: both are black passengers. Both passengers were also on a transport or at a station operated by the Helsinki Regional Transport Authority (HSL).
The first case took place on June 23 in Espoo, while an East African nursing student was escorted violently out of the train. One security guard allegedly held her hand while the other had her in a chokehold.
“It was quite shocking when I saw this recent case,” said the East African nursing student. “I get nervous when I board a train because of what happened to me.”
The woman said that her lawyer has asked the police for the video footage of the incident but they have refused because the case “is still under investigation.”
The Helsinki Regional Transport Authority (HSL) announced today that the company plans to arrange “social equality” courses for ticket inspectors, according to Yle.
If the victims of both cases are correct, it exposes what we’ve known for a long time: Some have more rights in our society than others despite the social equality rhetoric we often hear and made possible by our exceptionalism.
Almost two weeks past when a 17-year-old black adolescent was allegedly violently assaulted by security guards for not having a valid ticket. The black adolescent ended up handcuffed and held on the floor while his white friend was allowed to leave.
The violent treatment of the security guards should not surprise us since a comprehensive study in 2018 on ethnic profiling by the University of Helsinki showed how ethnic profiling, especially by security staff, was a source of particular concern.
“Many said [in the study] that security guards were often rude and treated them roughly, even violently,” said the University of Helsinki Professor Suvi Keskinen of one of the ethnic profiling study’s findings.
The two cases in the story are a good opportunity to expose how systemic racism works in Finland.
How many black policemen are there in Finland? What about those that work for security firms? Too few to make a significant impact on policy.
And let’s not forget as well the racist trolling against the victim’s mother on social media.
The confidence of their impunity and ther racist arguments reveals how far some have stooped and how much work there is still to do on the anti-racism front.
Migrant Tales insight:Dr. Faith Mkwesha’s child was was held and mistreated by security guards who handcuffed him and resting his knee on her child’s back. Apart from being a traumatic experience for her child and the mother, all of this happened because he did not have a valid metro ticket, which he thought incorrectly that they were valid for two hours.
The year is 2020, and still, people of the Romany minority are refused entrance to a hotel and spa in Rantsalmi, located in the region of South Savo. Jim Crow is alive and well in some parts of Finland.
The receptionist of the Hotel & Spa Resort Järvisydän refuses entry in the video below to Roma women. When they ask if this is the hotel and spa’s policy, the receptionist says, “yes.”
It is shameful that this is still happening in a country like Finland, which claims to have one of the best education systems in the world, a comprehensive welfare state, and laws that are supposed to ensure that everyone is equal before the law.
Bewilderment emergeswhenever Seida Sohrabi, who identifies herself as an expert on Kurdish affairs and elementary school teacher, comments on her narrow views of how migrants should adapt in Finland.
Having read her opinion pieces, I feel sorry for her Muslim students at the school she teaches. I hope their parents denounce her if she prohibits their daughters to wear the hijab or give them water-downed teachings of their religion by white Finns who are prejudiced.
Sohrabi is playing the “foreigner” and the media – and herself as well – loves it. Have you ever wondered how such eternal “foreigners” of our society speak perfect Finnish without any accent?
The reason for the latter is that they are Finns with non-white backgrounds but play the role of the “eternal foreigner” because it suits them, the media, and their peers.
They claim to represent other migrants but in fact, all they represent is their own unique group.
There are many others in the same league as her. Some of these are Morocco-born Junnes Lokka, Marco de Wit, who is of Dutch background, Miki Sileoni, whose father is Argentinean, and Gleb Simanov.
While Sohrabi and the people above come from different backgrounds, all of them hate one religious group: Muslims.
In the United States and according to the Urban Dictionary definition, an Uncle Tom “is a black man who will do anything to stay in good standing with the white man including betray his own people.”
In Migrant Tales, we have translated Uncle Tom to “Tuomo-setä,” “setä Tuomo” and “mamu-setä.”
Like in the United States, an Uncle Tom in Finland is a non-white Finn who will do anything to suck up to white Finnish culture even if it means sticking a knife in the back of his or her own people.
In the simplest terms, intersectional feminism is a tool to gain a broader view of how gender discrimination works. When studying gender discrimination, intersectionality enables us to take other factors as opposed to just one into consideration, like ethnic background, sex, disability, and sexual orientation.
One of the most preposterous affirmations Sohrabi makes is that new terms like intersectional feminism are not needed because social equality, gender equality, and fairness have characterized Finnish culture.
Really?!
How do you then explain high unemployment among some ethnic groups in Finland? Remember in October when they published a study by Akhlaq Ahmad about labor market discrimination in Finland? The study reinforced what we’ve known all along: ethnic discrimination is commonplace in Finland’s labor markets.
How come people of color or non-white Finns are underrepresented in almost in the media, politics, and policymakers? How come do people with foreign-sounding names earn smaller salaries and get less social security than white Finns?
We wrote Wednesday that the Finnish Air Force quietly dropped the swastika as the symbol of the Finnish Air Force Command. But not so fast. The swastika continues to adorn the Air Force Academy.
An article in DW of Germany asks how an anti-Semitism symbol like the swastika made its way to Finland.
Writes the BBC: “The symbol will always be intrinsically linked with Nazi Germany and its crimes, even though its roots go back many thousands of years.”
“The swastika entered Finland’s air force through a Swedish nobleman, Count Eric von Rosen,” the article reports. “He had gifted a plane to the air force of Finland in 1918, with a blue swastika painted on it. Rosen used to consider the swastika a good luck charm.”
Even if the use of the swastika is different than in Germany, one wonders why Finland persisted in its use way after World War 2?
History is one answer and how we played down our role and alliance with Nazi Germany. If some historians are to be believed, Finland fought a separate war against the former Soviet Union.
Would the removal of the swastika from the Finnish air force after the country signed an armistice with the USSR in September 1944 have incriminated Finland and put it in the same league as minor Nazi allies Hungary, Croatia, Bulgaria, and Romania?
There are much more facts that that are still hibernating. One day they’ll come out.
I remember right after the demise of the Soviet Union in 1991, I spoke with a commander of the Finnish air force and asked him if there were plans to replace the white-blue-white roundel again with the swastika.
Taken slightly aback by my question, he answered that there were no such plans.
Even if swastikas were not placed as markings on airplanes, it was still the symbol of the Finnish Air Force Command.
All of this, however, changed very quietly. Helsingin Sanomat reported on the change thanks to a tweet by Teivo Teivainen, a professor at the University of Helsinki.
It is highly likely that since the swastika always raised eyebrows especially abroad, the era of removing statues thanks to the #BlackLivesMovement which made it easier to remove the old Finnish air force symbol.
Air Force Chief of Staff Jari Mikkonen admitted in an interview with Helsingin Sanomat that the symbol often attracted negative and even “angry” attention abroad.
“We are not ashamed of the swastika we use, it is not related to Nazi Germany,” said Mikkonen.
In the new era of bringing down old statues and raising new ones, one of these that should go up is of Rosa Emilia Clay, a teacher and Finland’s first African who got citizenship.
The Finnish parliament voted Friday not to lift Juha Mäenpää’s parliamentary immunity, which needed a five-sixths majority; 121 voted in favor and 54 against. A total of 24 MPs were absent.
Those who voted against were 37 Perussuomalaiset Party MPs, 6 Center Party MPs, 5 Christian Democrat MPs, 4 National Coalition Party MPs, 1 Movement Now MP, 1 MP Ano Turtiainen.
The Finnish parliament (Eduskunta) showed once again its racism, bigotry, and fascism in an over four-hour debate on lifting Perussuomalaiset (PS)* MP Juha Mäenpää’s parliamentary immunity from prosecution.
Lst week, the constitutional law committee voted 12-5 to lift MP Mäenpää’s immunity after he compared asylum seekers last year with “an invasive species.”
Another worrisome matter that the debate about Mäenpää’s parliamentary immunity showed is the snail pace of justice. Prosecutor General Raija Toivianen’s decision to charge Mäenpää for ethnic agitation happened in January, about six months after Mäenpää’s infamous outburst.
One typical complaint by victims of racism, hate speech, and hate crime is that due justice takes too long in Finland.
While it appears that Mäenpää’s immunity will not be lifted on Friday, the likely vote will be another blow to the parliament’s credibility by Finland’s anti-racism, migrant and minority communities.
Mäenpää can lose his parliamentary immunity if five-sixths of parliament or 167 out of 200 MPs vote in favor. The PS can block the proposal with its 38 MPs.
Wednesday’s debate in parliament revealed as well how racism, especially Islamophobia, has deep roots in Finland. Left Alliance MP Paavo Arhimäki highlighted some of the excuses given by MPs for Mäenpää’s racist behavior.
According to Arhimäki, some of the excuses used by PS, National Coalition Party, and Christian Democrat MPs were, “choosing his words incorrectly, it was a gag, a joke, a slip [of the tongue], a bad joke, those who don’t understand [what he said] have no sense of humor.”
Social Democratic MP Hussein Al-Tee said that he hoped that members of parliament would stop using labels that Other people like himself.
“I don’t deserve it, nobody else deserves it, and this hall should be a place that unites Finns,” he said and continues later on. “I hope that this hall will not be used to Other people like myself and people belonging to my [ethnic] group.”
MP Hussein Al-Tee speaking bfore parliament on Wednesday. Source: Yle.
Al-Taee pointed the finger at PS Chairperson Jussi Halla-aho, who labeled him last week a fake refugee (partalapsi).
“He [Halla-aho] gave incorrect information about my [refugee] background and It felt really bad [what he said],” he added. “Finns are those people who are ready to commit to our laws, regulations, work and pay taxes. If they are unable to do so, society will help them get on the right road.”
Even if Mäenpää and the PS continue to deny that they didn’t mean to label any group with “invasive species,” few will disagree that he meant asylum seekers and Muslims.
In Finland, asylum seeker is code for Muslim.
According to the National Geographic, “An invasive species is an organism that is not indigenous, or native, to a particular area. Invasive species can cause great economic and environmental harm to the new area.”
PS MPs played down what Mäenpää said as did others of the Christian Democratic Party, National Coalition Party, and Center Party.
PS MPs like Kristian Laakso considered the whole parliamentary debate “nonsense” and a waste of time. “Is this debate worth it ?” he asked.
Another PS MP, Mauri Peltokangas, who is a member of Suomen Sisu, slammed the debate an “inquisition.” PS parliamentary group leader Ville Tavio went as far as to say that if we take steps to limit criticism of Islam, it is a step from being a civilized country to one that is “a stone-age Islamic state.”
Opposition Christian Democrat MP Päivi Räsänen said that lifting Mäenpää’s immunity is questionable since hate speech isn’t clearly outlined in the law (sic).
As mentioned, a number of PS MPs are members of the far-right Suomen Sisu association, which recommends white Finns not to marry outside their group.
Some PS MPs who are Suomen Sisu members include Olli Immonen, Jenna Simula, Mäenpää and Peltokangas, among others who were former members like Halla-aho and Juho Eerola.
Suomen Sisu chairperson Henri Hautamäki published on the same day as the debate in parliament a provocative blog entry titled “Total cultural war.”
While most of the text is a rant for Finnish white supremacist consumption, Hautamäki claims that the #BlackLivesMatter movement is a Marxist conspiracy by minorities to destroy Western culture and institutions.
Encouraging people to take action against such a conspiracy, the Suomen Sisu chairperson said that universities and the education system should be “cleaned” of non-nationalistic influences. Other institutions that should come under the control of the people is the media, the role of the state must be changed, according to him.
The only Finnish media to comment about Hautamäki’s column was Kansan Uutiset.
What would you say if you were a black East African nursing student in Finland and were aggressively escorted out of a train by two security guards? One held you by the arm, and the other had her in a chokehold.
What about if you are forced out of the train, you end up scraping and bruising your knee and elbow on the ground? And what about if the security guards, who saw your bruises, ordered you to leave the station?
A comprehensive study in 2018 on ethnic profiling by the University of Helsinki showed how ethnic profiling, especially by security staff, was a source of special concern.
“Many said [in the study] that security guards were often rude and treated them roughly, even violently,” said the University of Helsinki Professor Suvi Keskinen of one of the ethnic profiling study’s findings.
One migrant told Migrant Tales that some ticket inspectors can act in a racist manner. “They can be racist because they profile you [because you are not white],” he added. “The worst of the lot can sometimes be the non-white Finnish ticket inspectors.”
The unfortunate incident happened to the black woman on a local train one stop before her stop at Koivohovi in Espoo. The reason? Her phone went dead, and therefore could not show her monthly pass to the inspector.
“I pleaded with the inspector and later with the security guards to allow me to charge my phone so I could show them my ticket (see picture below).
The monthly pass ticket that a passenger could not show to the inspector of security guards because her phone went dead. She had a charger, but the security guards would not allow her to charge her phone. The whole incident could have been avoided if the passenger had connected her phone and charger to a socket.
Finnish railway operator VR and Helsinki Regional Transport Authority (HSL) require passengers to have their tickets handy even if their phone is dead. In such cases, however, the passenger can be fined but can annul the fine if the person can prove later that he or she had a valid ticket.
VR and HSL have a 5-euro charge for this service.
So what’s the issue? How about if we start from the hostile treatment that the black woman received from the security guards and the ticket inspector who ordered them to get her off the train?
“When I asked the inspector if I could charge my phone, she responded ‘no, no, no,'” she continued. “As she is checking tickets, there are two security guards behind her and she points to me, telling them that I did not have a ticket.”
The woman pleaded with the inspector and security guards to let her plug her phone into a socket but it was to no avail.
“Everything started to get violent when a drunk man by the door overhead what was happening and told the guards that I had no choice but to walk home,” she said. “I was then forced physically off the train [at Kauniainen a two-minute train ride to my final station].”
As the woman was being forced off the train, one security guard held her by the arm while the other had her in a chokehold.
“I told them that, se sattuu mua (you are hurting me), really loudly. Let me go you are hurting me!” she said. “Just as I stepped out of the train I twisted my ankle and fell on the ground scraping my knee and elbow which were now bleeding. My shoes, glasses, and phone were all scattered on the found all about me..”
The woman said that while she was being escorted off the train, a young man started to film what was happening.
“They [security guards] ordered me to leave the station but I told them that I just landed on my knee and I am in pain. How do you expect me to walk home?”
The woman still pleaded with guards asking them to allow her to charge her phone so she could board the train to her last stop two minutes away. Treating her in a demanding way, the guards ordered her to leave.
“Have a good day learn how to behave,” they said and started to escort her from the station.
Noticing that she could not walk because her knee was bleeding and in pain, the woman decided not to comply. She turned back sat on a platform bench. “How can you ask me to walk home [in this state],” she told the security guards.
Since the woman would not comply with the security guards’ orders, they called the police. They waited for two hours before the police arrived.
“When the police came, I stood up, but I noticed they weren’t interested in hearing my side of what happened,” she continued. “So I just sat and started to weep.”
The woman asked the police if the police could see that she was bleeding and hurt. The police were unresponsive. They asked her to leave the platform and station. “We don’t have any legal obligation to charge your phone,” the police responded to the woman’s plea so she could show her train ticket. “We want you to leave this platform now.”
The police gave her an ultimatum: to leave in two minutes or be taken to a detention cell at the police station.
“As the police were threatening to take me to a detention center, the young man who had recorded the whole incident spoke up.
“I have recorded everything,” he told the police. “They [the security guards] were very harsh to this woman. I cannot understand why you are threatening to detain her if she is the one who was abused [by the guards]?”
The woman told the police that they could detain her if they wished. At least she could charge her phone at the police station. The police said it was impossible to charge her phone at the police station.
In the end, the police offered a sensible option to the hurt and distraught woman by taking her home. They told her that the security guards will file charges against her for resisting.
“I didn’t resist,” she told the police. “I will file charges against them for assaulting me.”
Incredibly, all of this could have been avoided with little understanding, which goes a long way in such situations. All it would have taken was to plug the phone into a socket and allow the woman to show her ticket.
It would probably take two to three minutes at the most.
The US owner of Eskimo Pie ice cream will change the product name and marketing because it is derogatory, according to CNN. Foneri Finland, the Finnish company that makes Eskimo ice cream, is expected to follow suit.
“We are committed to being a part of the solution on racial equality, and recognize the term is derogatory,” Elizabell Marquez, head of marketing for parent company Dreyer’s Grand Ice Cream, was quoted as saying in a statement.
Foneri Finland, which produces Eskimo ice cream, said that a name change under consideration for the Finnish ice cream brand name, according to Yle.
“We have identified the issue very thoroughly and it is presently under study [to change the brand name],” said marketing manager Minna Brunberg, who added that social equality is an important value of the company.
While the term “Eskimo” was substituted for Inuit a while back, we don’t go around in Finland, calling the Sámi, “Lapps.”
It’s common respect and such old names that are the product of colonialism and racism.
White supremacy is a bully to put it lightly and does not care if you like what they may call a group. They always do so without permission because they have no respect for the group.
In Finland, we should not be surprised that the Islamophobic Perussuomalaiset (PS)* party are the ones crying foul about the issue.
PS parliamentary group leader Ville Tavio tweeted that there are also plans in Finland to change the name of the ice-cream brand because it is derogatory.
“The green-lefts are for certain elated,” he tweeted.
