The Perussuomalaiset (PS)* parliamentary group unanimously expelled Thursday MP Ano Turtiainen [1] until the end of the year for posting a racist tweet about the death of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer.
“The suspension is permanent,” PS parliamentary group leader Ville Tavio was quoted as saying in Yle. “We had a discussion that if he wanted, Turtiainen could apply for membership in the [parliamentary] group after the end of the year if he’s corrected his behavior for good.”
Turtainen’s Facebook page is strangely quiet and makes no mention about the suspension. Source: Facebook.
Why wasn’t Turtiainen sacked permanently from the party? Because he wasn’t, it is difficult to assess if the outrage of the PS is genuine or just a publicity stunt.
I suspect the PS parliamentary group to be disingenuous. No matter how racist your ideas are, you will always find a home in the PS even after you’ve been expelled.
Apart from placing George Floyd’s purple-colored face on the pavement before he was killed with the words “Pink Floyd,” it is the comment the former PS MP made that was equally disturbing.
In the racist tweet, which he took down Wednesday, claimed that as blacks get more rights, the more unruly they become and the more difficult it is to put them in their places.
Turtainen did not offer any apologies to George Floyd’s family, #BlackLivesMatter, Finnish people of color and people of African decent, but stated that he took down the tweet because it harmed the party.
[1] ”Ano” is a real name in Finland. The equivalent name for women is Anna. The translation of “ano” in Spanish is the anus.
Poor timing by Ano Turtiainen? Today, people in Helsinki demonstrated in solidarity with George Floyd and #BlackLivesMatter, according to Yle News. At the same time, Perussuomalaiset (PS)* MP Ano Turtianen mocks at the death of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer.
Today’s demonstration to show support for George Floyd was a great show of solidarity by the people of Helsinki. What didn’t sit well now or ever a racist horse’s ass tweet by PS MP Turtainen denigrating George Floyd’s memory.
Demonstrators show their support for George Floyd and against police brutality at Helsinki’s Senate Square this afternoon. Source: Twitter
Turtiainen’s “joke?” It was apparently George Floyd’s wide-eyed face full of terror colored purple with the name of the 1960s rock band “Pink Floyd.”
Cruel, racist, and unbecoming of an MP but that’s not all he tweets. Turtainen stated that as black people get more rights, they become more unruly. He suggested that going back to Jim Crow and slavery would be an effective way of keeping blacks in line.
People should organize to do everything possible that MPs like Turtiainen don’t get reelected in 2023.
Meanwhile, PS parliamentary group leader Ville Tavio told Iltalehti that Turtiainen would face disciplinary action for the tweet.
Disciplinary action?! Why not sack him from the party?
Turtiainen’s latest tweet is really from the “ano,” or anus in Spanish. He tweeted a picture of George Floyd’s face on the ground as police officer Derek Chauvin kneels on his neck.
The tweet is not only a slap in the face of George Floyd and to all the suffering black people are experiencing, it is also a swipe at Finland black community.
The “joke?” George Floyd’s wide-eyed face full of terror colored purple with the name of the 1960s rock band “Pink Floyd.”
Cruel, racist, and unbecoming of an MP but that’s not all he tweets. Turtainen stated that as black people get more rights, they become more unruly. He suggested that slavery would be an effective way of keeping blacks in line.
George Floyd and Turtiainen’s racist humor. In the tweet, he states that as blacks get more rights the more difficult they become.
As a matter of policy, Migrant Tales no longer publishes racist pictures by racist politicians.
MP Turtiainen is a meber of Finland’s biggest opposition party.
Thank you Reija Härkönen for the heads-up!
[1] ”Ano” is a real name in Finland. The equivalent name for women is Anna. The translation of “ano” in Spanish is the anus.
The European Islamophobia Report (EIR) will publish in early June its findings. Should we be surprised that the party that is associated with Islamophobia in Finland is none other than the Perusuomalaiset (PS)*?
The forthcoming European Islamophobia Report 2019, which will be published in early June, lists the central figures in Finland’s Islamophobia network. In 2018 there were:
Read the full European Islamophobia Report 2018 here.
Racism and Islamophobia are such a problem in Finland that these two social ills have become a major political force in the last decade. Concerning the rise of anti-Islam racism, YouGov published one of these studies in 2015, which was reinforced by a PEW Research Center studyin 2018.
Both studies showed that Finland had the most negative attitudes of the EU countries surveyed against minorities. In YouGov’s findings, negative attitudes extended to the Romany minority, black people, gays, and Jews. In the PEW study, 62% of religiously unaffiliated and 67% of church-attending Christians considered Islam to be incompatible with Finnish culture and values.
Another disturbing fact that exposes Islamophobia in Finland is hate crime statistics, which showed in 2018 that of all national groups, the Iraqis faced the highest frequency of hate crime due to national and ethnic origin. As in previous years, the highest amount of hate crimes (86.8% in 2018) were due to ethnic and/or national origin.
Further proof of Finland’s anti-Muslim sentiment is the emergence of the PS as a significant political force.
In the 2011 parliamentary election, the number of seats won by the Perussuomalaiset (PS) party soared to 39 from 5 previously. That was followed by good showings in 2015 (38 seats), and in 2019 (38 seats).
Of all the parties during the past decade, only the PS have had the greatest success. A great part of this success is attributable to their racist anti-Islam message shrowded in suspicion.
The PS has tried to deliver to its campaign promises voters with its exclusive and racist policies but this has run into problems with the Finnish constitution.
If the PS had its way, it would ditch as well as international agreements like the 1951 Refugee Convention and the UN Declaration of Human Rights.
Below are the political trademark of the PS:
As seen in the previous government, many of its plans to tighten immigration laws were in conflict with the Constitution (Section §6) since migrants would not be equal before the law;
There are a lot of fakes out there imitating the Finnish coat of arms and distorting and corrupting what it stands for. If you are going to become a naturalized Finn, you cannot fail this part of the citizenship test.
On paljon feikkejä, jotka imitoivat olevansa Suomen vaakuna ja vääristävät ja korruptoivat mitä se edustaa. Jos sinusta tule Suomen kansalainen, et voi vastata väärin tämä kysymys kansalaisuustestissä.
The correct answer is D. A (Juha Mäenpää), B (Ano Turtiainen, PS), and C (Mauri Peltokangas) are fakes and are members of the Islamophobic Perussuomalaiset* party. Oikea vastaus on D. A (Juha Mäenpää), B (Ano Turtiainen) ja C (Mauri Peltokangas) ovat feikkejä ja perussuomalaisia. Sources Facebook and google.com
Kuka levittää valeuutisia maahanmuuttajista ja turvapaikanhakijoista? Olennainen kysymys on miksi he levittävät valetietoa?
Jos katsotaan tietyt ryhmät kuten Perussuomalaiset, valetieto ja pelonlietsonta houkuttelevat äänestäjät.
Kaikki eduskuntavaaleissa jossa Perussuomalaiset ovat menestyneet on ollut valeuutisten, liioittelun ja/tai pelonliestonan avulla. “Jytkyvuosi” 2011 oli täynnä kirjoituksia joka leimasivat kokonaisia ihmisryhmiä; vuonna 2015 ja 2019 eduskuntavaaleissa tuli apu Perussuomalaisille Tapanilan ja Oulun seksuaali hyväksikäytön tapauksista.
Molemmissa tapauksissa Perussuomalaiset saivat ilmasta mainonta lehdistössä, joka ylireagoi ja leimaasi kokonaisia ryhmiä kuten Somalit tai Muslimit.
Here are some symptoms of the coronavirus: fever, dry cough, sore throat, tiredness, headaches, loss of taste, and smell. Here are some symptoms of the PS virus: racism, Islamophobia, bigotry, climate denial, conspiracy theories, mediocracy, pro-Putin, and incompetence.
Like Covid-19, which fools and infects healthy cells, the PS virus also enters and infects institutions like parliament. The PS got a foothold in the Finnish political system by pulling fast ones on voters, spreading hate, and giving overly simplistic answers to complex questions.
We need a vaccine for the Covid-19 and PS viruses.
For the latter, the antibodies to kill the PS virus are empathy, caring, and anti-racism education based on social equality for all.
Perussuomalaiset MPs (upper row lefrt to right): Jussi Halla-aho, Jani Mäkelä, Mauri Peltokangas, (lower row left to right) Riikka Purra, Ano Turtiainen, Ville Tavio and Veikko Vallin. Cartoon by Hamid H. Alsammarraee.
The PS virus cannot be compared with a temporary hiccup. It is more lethal than that. If we are not careful, it can mutate Finland into Hungary and Poland, or worse.
Below are some more examples of the PS virus and what it has infected our democracy from MAGA caps to adulations to Trump.
Two PS MPs, Vilhelm Junnila and Veikko Vallin giving the thumbs up to former President Urho Kekkonen (1956-82). With or without disinfectant and beams of light, the PS is Finland’s most pro-Trump party. Source: FacebookOn June 4, 2019, Halla-aho tweets: “I dig him. Trump is the best thing that has happened in a long time to the United States and to the Western world.”
There was good news if you are against us-and-them rhetoric, Islamophobia, and support for US President Donald Trump’s policies and persona. A poll published Thursday by Yle showed that the southward direction of the Perussuomalaiaset (PS)* party continued to head south.
Compared with a similar poll on December 9, 2019-January 8, 2020, support for the PS dove by 6.4 percentage points from 24.3%, followed by the National Coalition Party (19.3%) and Social Democrats (14.9%).
One of the reasons why support for the Social Democrats has soared is Prime Minister Sanna Marin. Her government’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic has met with approval from the public.
Contrarily, the PS has not offered anything better except for its usual bickering and scapegoating of migrants, especially Muslims.
Two PS MPs, Vilhelm Junnila and Veikko Vallin giving the thumbs up to former President Urho Kekkonen (1956-82). With or without disinfectant and beams of light, the PS is Finland’s most pro-Trump party. Source: Facebook
What is interesting to note is that when a sexual assault case erupts as in the parliamentary elections, the media, police, and politicians help the PS to spread their message of hate.
As xenophobic parties like the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* party blame visible minorities for growing coronavirus infections, the same is being spread by people by people who should know better.
The rise of a racist party like the PS during the 2010s, which reinforced many Finns’ xenophobic views, suggests that labeling and racializing will continue to pick up as do deaths caused by the coronavirus.
While exceptionalism and many other blindspots may keep us from seeing inequality in our health care system in Finland and other EU countries, the European Network Against Racism (ENAR) is spot on by stating, the #inequality doesn’t just make pandemics like #Covid_19 worse – it could cause them.
Despite such good insight by ENAR, PS MPs like Veikko Valin offer their own mumbo jumbo explanation as to why COVID-19 infections are higher among the Somali-speaking community.
He tweets: “Somali-speakers in Helsinki have nine times higher infections than white Finns. They claim it is because they have a poor command of the Finnish language. I suspect it has to do with eating with their fingers, having large families, bending over at mosques, and hanging out all day at shopping malls. Or it could be Trump’s fault.”
Disgraceful and racist. Ladies and gentlemen, an MP of the PS.
Now, as far-right parties aim to capitalize on the coronavirus with the help of fake news, we must stay vigilant to challenge their sinister and selfish aims.
We saw this happen in Finland on Yle’sA-talk when Perussuomalaiset* MP Riikka Purra claimed that a hospital was washing and using disposable equipment.
“I have received information from a hospital that they wash disposable equipment,” she tweeted, declining to say who her source is. state her source.
Purra’s claim that she cannot reveal her source is an old tactic even used by US President Donald Trump playbook: “There’s that guy who told me…” “I’ve a very nice friend who told me…” “Many beautiful experts told me…”…etc. [1]
In the face of fake news and claims by opportunist and irresponsible påoliticians, EU Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA) director Michael O’Flaherty has an important message below.
