Some studies claim that vote share for Eurosceptic parties has more than doubled in two decades, according to the Guardian. This problem has many answers. One of these is that Europeans have not done enough to root out all forms of racism.
Our colonial legacy still hangs as an onerous shadow that encourages us to delay and deny our history and who we are today.
Alan Kurdi who washed ashore after drowning in 2015. During 2014-2019 there were a total of 18,328 people (2019 410, 2018 2,299, 2017 3,139, 2016 5,143, 2015 5,054, 2014 3,283) who died attempted to cross the Mediterranean to Europe.
Millions of Europeans emigrated in the 19th and the first half of the 20th century to other shores. Ever asked why? Social inequality, nationalism, ethnonationalism, and war.
Let’s return for a moment another factor that characterizes the Marine Le Pens, Matteo Salvinis, Boris Johnsons, Viktor Orbáns, Geert Wilders, Jussi Halla-ahos and a long list of others.
Captain Gustave Mark Gilbert, the US Army psychologist at the Nuremberg trials (1945-46), said what the Nazi war criminals on trial had an incapacity to feel with their fellow men. That fellow men and women are today Muslims, among other groups.
“Evil, I think, is the absence of empathy,” he said.
After the populist anti-immigration Perussuomalaiset (PS)* was left out in the cold from the government in 2017, the election blow suffered by the Danish People’s Party in 2019, and now the exit of the Progress Party (FrP) from the Norwegian government, the Nordic region is momentarily free of Islamophobic populist parties in government.
After six years and two months as part of Prime Minister Erna Solberg’s government, FrP party leader, Siv Jensen, announced her party’s decision.
Then Finance Minister Siv Jensen landed in hot water in 2017 after posing with a Pocahontas dress and mocking the Saami at a ministry costume party. Source: bydeposten.no.
Apart from differences with the conservatives, the FrP ditched the government because of the repatriation of a woman allegedly linked with Isis and her five-year-old child who needed medical treatment.
Writes the Local: “The Progress Party has strongly criticized the decision, arguing that that the risk of allowing a person linked to Isis into Norway outweighs the country’s humanitarian duty to help the child.”
FrP’s decision will be interesting to watch how it impacts matters in Finland. The government of Prime Minister Sanna Marin has agreed to accept women and their children from the al-Hol refugee camp in Syria on a one-by-one basis.
Even if there are no longer any openly Islamophobic parties in any of the Nordic countries, it does not mean that the threat is over.
In Sweden, the far-right Sweden Democrats lead in the polls as do the PS in Finland.
In the meantime, the news of FrP’s exist from government is good news.
Dedicated to the racist politicians, political parties and groups in Finland.
And let’s be clear. I am talking about the Perussuomalaiset (PS)*, National Coalition Party (Kokoomus), Christian Democrats, neo-Nazi groups and websites like Hommaforum. Some politicians that come to mind are Jussi Halla-aho, Riikka Purra, Ville Tavio, Matias Turkkila, Ano Turtiainen, Mauri Peltokangas, Juha Mäenpää, Junes Lokka, Tiina Wiik, Wille Rydman, Petteri Orpo, Sari EssayahPaula Risikko and a long list of others.
The late Toni Morrison (1931-2019) exposed the tiny soul of the racist.
“[but] when you take it [from the racist] away, I take your race away, the only thing you got is your little self, and what is that? What are you without racism? Are you any good? Are you still strong? Still smart? Do you still like yourself?”
The reaction to what Finland should do about 10 Finnish women who are alleged wives of ISIS fighters and their 30 children at the al-Hola camp in northeast Syria has all the characteristics of social media lynch mob populism and Islamophobia.
The biggest trolls are not anonymous persons but opposition politicians of parties like the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* and the National Coalition Party (NCP). They are a worrying sign of the stranglehold that populism has over Finland.
Imagine. A country with one of the best education systems in the world, one of the highest standards of living, a social welfare state that serves as a safety net for those that need it, is acting like an unruly mob ready to lynch its victim.
Part of the blame for the present hysteria is the former government of Prime Minister Antti Rinne, who has shown reluctance and dragged its feet concerning the repatriation of the wives of ISIS fighters.
The sooner Finland repatriates these women and children, the better.
And why shouldn’t they if these women and children are Finnish citizens?
“The people are scared! What does an ISIS child look like?” Source: Ville Ranta, lltalehti.
The best way to cast away the hateful trolling of the social media lynch mobs shadow is to bring back the wives and children stranded at the al-Hol camp.
Let the rule of law and our justice system do the rest.
A total of 234 Euro election candidates answered Alma Media’s election compass, a total of 85 (36.3%) stated that they either “strongly disagree,” “disagree” or are “neutral” (have no opinion) about the following claim:
“Is it the obligation of the EU to save all those migrants who attempt to come to Europe and who are at risk of drowning in the Mediterranean?”
Of those parties that have a seat in the Finnish parliament, all of the 19 Perussuomalaiset (PS)* candidates strongly disagreed, disagreed or were neutral about the above claim. That was followed by the National Coalition Paty (9/45% of candidates), Center Party (7/35%), Swedish People’s Party (4/20%), Christian Democrats (4/20%) and the Social Democrats (1/6.3%).
Dark green, fully agree; light green, agree; grey, neutral/no opinion; red, disagree; dark red, totally disagree. SDP = Social Democrats; Kokoomus = National Coalition Party; Keskusta = Center Party; Cihreät= Green League; Vasemmistoliitto = Left Alliance; RKP = Swedish People’s Party; Kristillisdemokraatit = Christian Democrats. Source: Iltalehti.
Of the parties mentioned above, 44/152 (28.9%) disagreed or were neutral about people drowning in the Mediterranean.
Foreign Minister Timo Soini, 56, who inspired Islamophobes, racists and conservative nationalists to have a political voice and platform to lash out at migrants and minorities, announced that he will not seek a new term in parliament, according to Helsingin Sanomat. Soini, who calls himself a devout Catholic, will be remembered as a conservative populist politician who led the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* to national prominence by capitalizing on populist anti-immigration sentiment.
Soini, who hails from Rauma, led the PS as chairman for twenty years (1997-2017), served as MP during 2001-09 and 2011-2019, EuroMP 2009-2011, Espoo city councillor 2001-2009, minister for European affairs (2015-2017), and foreign minister (2015-2019).
Despite Soini’s long list of political merits, some see him as an anti-immigration populist and nationalist who objected women’s and gay rights and anti-abortionist. His fondness for far-right politicians like Morten Messerschmidt of the Danish People’s Party, which the PS has close ideological ties, have not gone unnoticed.
Soini has shown support against EU plans to put Poland under greater scrutiny of nationalist conservative Polish Law and Justice party and shown support as foreign minister for Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. He also took part in anti-abortion marchesand has participated in the prayer breakfast sessions organized by the US Congress and hosted by the US President Donald Trump.
Soini’s political history is a rise-and-fall tale when he rose to prominence after the 2011 parliamentary elections but came down in flames after his chief rival, Jussi Halla-aho, took over the helm of the PS in June 2017.
It is sweet irony that Soini, who used Islamophobes and far-right voices to opportunistically rise to power, became his downfall.
One of the most important signals to emerge from the end of Soini’s political era is that “moderate populism” has given way to “extremist populism.” After the 2011 parliamentary election, Soini and the PS’ anti-immigration wing debated the main reason for the party’s good showing in the election. Soini claimed it was anti-EU sentiment while politicians like Halla-aho said it was anti-immigration.
Monday’s A-studio talk show debated Finland’s low birthrate and what the country could do to challenge the threats of an ageing and shrinking population as well as how migration could ease such woes. Present at the talk show were Left Alliance chairwoman Li Andersson, Justice Minister (National Coalition Party) Antti Häkkänen, and Nordea bank economist Olli Kärkkäinen.
While there was nothing new that said at the talk show, there was one question and one image that summed it up.
Kärkkäinen asked a very important question: “Even if politicians are so much in agreement that we need migrants, especially labor migrants, why has so little been done?”
The host asks the Nordea economist to answer his question.
“It’s easy to speak here [in these talk shows] about students staying to live in Finland and get a residence permit if they search for work,” he continued. “We can slash red tape, give out residence permit faster, but for some reason, there is little progress [in changing the present situation]. Let’s hope that demographic pressures will bring changes [faster] when the next government takes power.”
One reason why the present government has done so little is the Perussuomalaisiet*, and Blue Reform, which are populist anti-immigration parties. The former was in government but after it split into two factions in 2017, the Blue Reform is in government even if it popularity in opinion polls hovers around 2%.
Finland will hold parliamentary elections in April 2019.
Another striking feature of the talk show was the background picture of a migrant working as a cleaner.
Is this how YLE and Finland see migrants? Are they just cheap labor to do menial work that Finns don’t want to do?
Watch the full A-studio talk show here. Can’t foreigners do anything better than work for cleaning companies?
Sanna Ukkola, a YLE journalist married to Matias Turkkila, the editor of the xenophobic Perussuomalaiset (PS)* party publication Suomen Uutiset, not only exposes in a columncolorblind racism* and white fragility, but wider issues about Finnish society on racism, ethnicity, and identity.
Writes Julian Abagond about colorblind racism (1970- ): “…also known as aversive racism, is racism that acts as if skin colour does not matter – even when it does.”
Robin Diangelo states that white fragility, which acts as a form of white bullying, functions to take ethnicity off the table and avoid discussing social ills like racism.
Ukkola has gained a reputation in Finland for writing about migrants in a populist and offensive manner. On too many occasions her opinions show her ignorance on the topic.
Even if Ukkola gets away with her views, which are highly contradictory, she sometimes sticks her foot in her mouth big time. One such case was last year, when she put on an Amerindian feather hairpiece that caused outrage from the Saami community and accusations of cultural appropriation.
Tweets Outi Länsman: “Finnish journalism. The year is 2017.” Read the full story here.
Like with the Amerindian feather headgear stunt, Ukkola does the same thing in her latest column headlined, “Migrants aren’t your stuffed animals.”
One of the biggest problems, apart from her column that reveals colorblind racism, is that as a white person Ukkola is telling how migrants should be identified by Finnish society.
“Populism is like pissing in your pants in freezing temperatures. It may feel good for a moment, but you soon understand it was a dumb idea. You now have two problems instead of one: freezing temperature and your freezing-cold urine.”
Hungary’s Viktor Orbán is an example of pissing in one’s pants in freezing temperatures. Read the full story here.
