Racism Archives - Page 120 of 208

The new look of anti-immigration parties: Over-simplify complex social issues like cultural diversity and racism

Posted on April 1, 2014 by Migrant Tales

Observing for a number of years the language and behavior of how anti-immigration and especially anti-Islam parties operate in Europe, it’s clear that the codewords used by such parties has changed in countries like Finland. Eyeing power, the compromise that parties like the Perussuomaliset (PS) have made recently is to look more mainstream by toning down their hateful populist rhetoric.

This doesn’t necessarily mean that they have changed their views on cultural diversity and migrants, which they loathe and consider a threat to “their culture and identity,” but instead offer simplistic solutions to complex issues.

Thus it is in the simplistic solutions to matters like cultural diversity, racism, Roma panhandlers, youth unemployment, poverty and crime in general where the prejudice and racism of politician are exposed. This doesn’t only include the PS of Finland, but members of all political parties.

Over-simplistic solutions to social issues has always been a dead giveaway of those that house intolerant views. We should be worried especially today because those that house such views are appearing more mainstream.

Disagree? How many politicians from your country speak in favor of the Romany minority? Cultural diversity? Civil rights for everyone irrespective of your background?

What politicians aren’t defending is what is leading us on a slippery intolerant slope.

PS MP Maria Tolppanen, like so many of her anti-immigration and especially anti-Islam party, have become master trolls of simplistic solutions to complex social problems.

In the blog entry below, Tolppanen asks if forcing Romany panhandlers from registering with the police if a new law is passed by parliament, will turn these people into migrants and thereby be eligible to social welfare.

Read full blog entry here.

Other examples of simplistic solutions to our ever-growing cultural diversity were offered in 2011 by another PS MP, Teuvo Hakkarainen. He said that homosexuals, lesbians and Somalis should be relocated to the Åland Islands.

Another extreme example of a politician crossing the line and burning their fingers by simplifying a solution to cultural diversity is Geert Wilders of Holland, who told a crowd of supporters that he’d ensure that there would be less Moroccans in the country.

There are many examples I could cite about how anti-immigration parties like the PS over-simplify complex social matters. Why is this wrong? Because when we simplify a social issue we take our focus away from the real issues. Instead, we feed our prejudices, which in turn permits the plant of racism to bloom its poisonous fruits.

When we simplify a social issue we not only reveal our intellectual laziness and lack of resolve to challenge our own prejudices, we end up giving racism the benefit of doubt.

Romany minority discrimination case sparks government outrage in Sweden

Posted on March 27, 2014 by Migrant Tales

The Swedish government has called a crisis meeting due to a discrimination case of a Roma woman at Stockholm’s Sheraton Hotel, reports Helsingin Sanomat. The woman, who was invited by the government to speak at a seminar on discrimination of the Roma in Sweden’s capital, was escorted with her traditional dress out of the hotel’s breakfast room.

The government published at the seminar a white paper on the abuses and rights violations of the Roma in the last century.

The incident has received wide media coverage in Sweden.

The woman, Diana Nyman, is a native Finn who lives in Sweden.

“I felt so disgraced,” she was quoted as saying to Swedish news agency TT. “It was so embarrassing at the breakfast room where there were a lot of people who didn’t understand why I was being discriminated.”

Nyman said that as she while she was escorted out of the room, people must have thought she wanted to eat breakfast without paying.

Read full story (in Finnish) here.

Sweden’s integration minister, Erik Ullenhag, said that Nyman’s case shows that discrimination happens daily in Sweden and that there is a need to debate the issue.

One positive matter about Sweden is that the government does take a stand against discrimination and shuns the xenophobic and far-right Sweden Democrats.

Finland could learn a lot from Sweden on how to combat intolerance and discrimination.

MPs in Finland should not seek populistic and quick fixes to issues like poverty

Posted on March 25, 2014 by Migrant Tales

Is it a coincidence that MPs of Finland’s four largest parties aim to pass anti-begging legislation in the face of ever-growing poverty in this country as a survey by YLE showed? Aren’t the four MPs, who claim the bill has the backing of 102 lawmakers, concerned that the anti-begging motion is a copy from Norway, which came into force thanks to the anti-immigration Progress Party in government?

Mass killer Anders Breivik was temporarily a member of the Progress Party before he murdered 77 people on 22/7.

The MPs, Arto Satonen of the National Coalition Party, Social Democrat Kari Rajamäki, Center Party’s Antti Rantakangas and Reijo Tossavainen of the Perussuomalaiset party, can’t be serious. It appears they are since the Euro MP elections near on May 25 and want to show how tough they and their parties are against Europe’s most oppressed minority.

Is this the best these MPs can do? Is this how they plan to eradicate the problem of a minority like the Roma by sweeping the issue under the carpet?

The other question that this new bill brings to light is why is it so important for these lawmakers? Finland isn’t being invaded by thousands of Roma panhandlers. According to the MPs that drafted the law, an estimated 300-500 came to Finland last year from countries like Romania and Bulgaria, reports Helsingin Sanomat.

So what gives? Satonen claims that a register would permit the police to determine if the panhandlers are victims of human trafficking or organized criminals. This is an odd excuse considering that the police stated in July 2013 that these Roma beggars aren’t victims of human trafficking or linked to organized crime.

The anti-begging legislation is in my opinion racist because it singles out a single group, the Roma, as the culprits.

Read full story here.

The survey by YLE interviewed 48 welfare and religious leaders as well as charity and social workers in Helsinki, Espoo, Tampere, Vantaa Oulu and Turku. A clear majority of them, or 42, agreed that poverty has increased under the present government’s mandate.

In 2012, 18.3% of Tampere residents were low-income earners, while in Helsinki those receiving income subsidy rose to 65,000 in 2013 from 60,000 in 2010, reports YLE in English.

Matters are not expected to get better. Statistics Finland announced today that unemployment rose to 9.1% in February from 8.7% a year ago.

Even if dark clouds have gathered over the Finnish economy and there is every indication that poverty will grow instead of retreat for the time being, one matter is for certain: We shouldn’t succumb to populism and simple solutions and fixes to a social ill like poverty.

People like the Roma should be helped, not victimized.

Finnish skier rudely shows her ethnic privilege over the Saami

Posted on March 24, 2014 by Migrant Tales

When I saw last week Finnish alpine skier Tanja Poutiainen put on a Saami costume to crown her career, I knew she was heading for trouble unless she was a member of that ethnic group. In countries like the United States, dressing up as a member of another culture is considered racist and a rude way to show your ethnic privilege.

Bitchmedia puts it in the following terms: “Not only does it lead to offensive, inaccurate, and stereotypical portrayals of other people’s culture, but is also an act of appropriation in which someone who does not experience that oppression is able to ‘play,’ temporarily, and ‘exotic’ other…”

There hasn’t been any official statement by Poutiainen apologizing for the incident.

Alpine skier Tanja Poutiainen is from the region of Lapland but is not a member of the Saami community. Read full story (in Finnish) here.

Saami youth president Anna-Maria Magga asked why Poutiainen didn’t wear a Finnish national costume if she was so interested in showing her Nordic roots.

“If we look at the costume, it’s a salad of different things,” said Magga. “It’s not a woman’s costume but it’s not either one for men…[Wearing such a costume] is immoral [and] against indigenous people.”

Thanks to the reaction that Poutiainen received, the retired Alpine skier will most likely think twice before she wears a Saami costume in public.

Cultural and ethnic diversity are who we are

Posted on March 23, 2014 by Migrant Tales

When you do everything possible to undermine diversity you end up letting out the genie out of the bottle.

If we look at the political climate in Finland today with the rise of an anti-EU, anti-immigration and especially anti-Islam party like the Perussuomalaiset (PS) in 2011, it’s clear that the genie that came out of the bottle is out for blood.

Despite the hostility of some Finns and Europeans to our ever-growing culturally and ethnically diverse societies, the million-euro question is how to we challenge those very values that are stoking and fanning hatred?

Is the answer in educating present and future generations on how culturally and ethnically diverse we Europeans have always been?

Finland is a culturally and ethnically diverse society. For one, over 1.2 million Finns emigrated from this land between 1860 and 1999. Moreover, we all came from somewhere else. Some of us have been longer and others a shorter time in Finland.

We are all, however, Finns of different backgrounds and orientations. Most importantly we live in a society that permits us to determine our identity and lifestyles.

The interesting question to ask is why some Finns, or why our official history, still speaks of Finns in terms of one group if there are many?

We all came from somewhere else. Why did it take me so many decades to uncover the Jewish side of my family? Why did many of my relatives rarely bring this up? Why was it swept under the carpet for so many decades?

All Finns, like all Europeans, have a fascinating history to tell but which has been intimidated by intolerance, nationalism, war and a deep suspicion for cultural and ethnic diversity that still exists today.

As we race deeper into the new century, we should take bolder steps to teach present and future generations about the our cultural and ethnic diversity and, most importantly, that we should respect such an order of things.

Geert Wilders crosses line, highlights European anti-immigration politicians’ master plan

Posted on March 22, 2014 by Migrant Tales

We’ve seen a lot of xenophobia and anti-immigration rhetoric thrown at us in the past by politicians like Geert Wilders, who likes to test the waters of hate to see if he can take another step towards his grand plan, which is to make Holland white again.

Wilders’ plan against cultural and ethnic diversity is a recurring message we read over again from anti-immigration politicians. In plain English it means that we must do everything possible to stop the growth of cultural and ethnic diversity.

An interesting question we could ask is what does “white” mean? Sensible people understand that Europe has always been ethically and culturally diverse so what does “white” mean in the anti-immigration context? Coming from the mouths of politicians like Wilders, it’s a declaration of war against migrants and minorities.

The “everything possible” to keep our society white poses a scary question. How far will politicians like Wilders and others go to make their society white? If Wilders’ party or that of the Perussuomalaiset of Finland get enough support, what will they mutate to?

Many far-right anti-immigration politicians, however, won’t reveal their master plan for fear of losing and outraging voters.

That is exactly what Wilders did this week when he crossed the line and ensured a group of supporters that there would be fewer Moroccans in Holland, reports The Guardian.

Read full story here.

Wilders’ comment not only sheds light on such a politician’s Islamophobia, it is the penultimate step on a slippery slope.

Wilders isn’t the only anti-immigration politicians who plays with fire. Marine Le Pen, Pia Kjærsgaard, Timo Soini, Nigel Farage and many others play the same dangerous game.

Racism and intolerance know no master. It might serve you and you may keep it on a short leash. But the truth is that it can bite back and hard as we saw on 22/7 in Norway, the former Yugoslavia of the 1990s and in the extermination camps of Nazi Germany.

The racism and intolerance we are seeing today across Europe didn’t come recently but has always been with us. It has taken many forms and has its roots in European colonialism and imperialism from 1492.

Keeping a society white is not only a pipe dream but a racist ideal based on hocus-pocus myths.

The answer against such intolerance in acceptance, respect and equal opportunities for everyone irrespective of their background.

It’s all about respect and inclusion – not exclusion or spreading ethnic hatred.

European Network Against Racism report highlights Finland’s racism and discrimination challenges

Posted on March 21, 2014 by Migrant Tales

Shadow reports on racism in Europe by the European Network Against Racism (ENAR) reveals something we’ve not known and written about on Migrant Tales for a long time. Apart from racism and discrimination happening in employment, the question behind the question is why is this still an issue? Why are governments still doing too little?

Read full report here.

Unemployment in Finland is three times higher than the national average, which stood at 8.5% in January, according to Statistics Finland. Even so, you rarely if ever hear politicians or the media bring this fact to public attention. Certainly some do but to show how much of a problem and burden migrants are to our society.

While there are some bold moves to change the current situation like the municipality of Helsinki, which is trying out job applications from anonymous job applications, too little is being done.

The Social Democratic Party of Finland is calling that anonymous applications for state and municipal jobs should be standard practice throughout Finland.

While anonymous job applications clearly show that the migrant unemployment problem may reside with the employer’s prejudices when hiring, one of the key arguments used not to hire migrants and visible minorities is poor Finnish- language skills.

While this may be in some cases, too many Finns, like Finnish-language teachers, place too much emphasis on language. While learning Finnish or Swedish is crucial, it’s not a panacea.

One has only to go to Spain, where there are large Latin American migrant groups who speak Spanish as their native language and are even Catholics. Despite having the same language and religion, discrimination and racism still take place. It shows that adaption and integration are a complex process that hinges on many factors.

Simplifying a social ill like exclusion, racism and discrimination waters down our response to challenge such issues because we lose sight of the other culprits that play equally important roles in the problem.

Just like the U.S. Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s, improving employment among migrants and minorities should be a key priority. It should also be a clarion call of migrants and minorities in Finland and Europe.

So what does the ENAR shadow report on Finland, which cites Migrant Tales as a source, say?

Below are some of its recommendations in the 2013 report:

There should be a concerted campaign through for, instance, diversity training and race awareness education to counter Finnish employers’ prejudice towards hiring migrants and ethnic minorities.
Migrants and ethnic minorities should be encouraged to report discrimination and discriminatory practices at work. They need to be assured by, for example, by NGOS and employment protection bodies such as the Regional State Administrative Agencies about the safeguards against victimisation and harassment prescribed in Finnish legislation.
Recruitment regulations should be clear and straightforward, and enshrined in law, with clear penalties and sanctions for violating them.
Finnish anti-discrimination legislation should be streamlined, and being able to file complaints under it should be made easier for migrants and other ethnic minorities. At the moment, there are diverse provisions of anti-discrimination legislation, which makes it difficult for migrants and even representatives of the native population to understand them.
As a result of the dismantling of the labour offices, which were part of a nationwide reform, such offices should again be available to all unemployed migrants and ethnic minorities.
The labour offices should be structured to cater for the employment needs of migrants and ethnic minorities.
Trade unions and other non-governmental organizations should be more active in fighting labour market discrimination and promote multiculturalism.

The PS ratchet up their anti-immigration rhetoric as Euro MP elections near

Posted on March 17, 2014 by Migrant Tales

It’s clear that as the Euro MP elections near on May 25, anti-immigration parties like the Perussuomalaiset (PS) will ratchet up their hate rhetoric. Attempting to give a more middle-of-the-road appearance to their familiar hostility towards migrants, it’s clear that PS MP’s like Juho Eerola, who is running for Euro MP, is saying the same thing as he always has.

Eerola suggested on daily Kouvolan Sanomat that migrants in Finland live off welfare and are a strain on the system.

He said: “In the place of quantity we should speak of quality. Why would any state want to bring migrants that are a drain on society? Even [basketball team] Kouvot doesn’t ask players to join the team so they can sit on the bench.”

But isn’t that the issue, MP Eerola? Finland accepts refugees from war-torn countries in Africa, Middle East and elsewhere but the grand majority of migrants who live here speak Finnish, work and pay taxes. Why do you want to pick on a minority and victimize them?

Your party’s constant negative stance towards migrants and cultural diversity is scaring away those qualified and skilled migrants you claim you would want to see more of in Finland. Why would I want to bring my family to live in a country where people like you and the PS are hostile towards migrants?

Read full story here.

When Eerola speaks of migrants in quality as opposed to quantity terms, he’s really speaking about an ideal called super migrants. It’s a fairy tale story where Prince Charming kisses Sleeping Beauty and both live happily ever after.

The bottom line is the following. With poker faces, politicians like Eerola, will state that they are not against immigration (sic!) but against immigration they consider harmful to Finland. Who are these “harmful immigrants?”

They are their usual scapegoats: Africans, Muslims and especially anyone who undermines the white ethnic landscape of Finland.

Migrant Tales published recently on Savon Sanomat, Kainuun Sanomat, Karjalainen, Etelä-Suomen Sanomat and Fennia a column about these so-called super migrants.

What can the PS mutate to if the political conditions are right?

Posted on March 13, 2014 by Migrant Tales

In order to understand what a party like the Perussuomalaiset (PS) are, look at how it rose to become Finland’s third-largest party in parliament in less than ten years.

The growth of the anti-EU, anti-immigration and especially anti-Islam PS has been impressive to say the least, rising from 5 MPs in the 2007 parliamentary elections to 39 MPs in 2011.

While many played down the party’s historic victory of 2011, the Euro MP elections in May and next year’s parliamentary elections in April will determine whether the PS will remain as one of the country’s biggest parties or return back to the minor political leagues where it came from.

The presidential and municipal elections of 2012 were a clear disappointment for the PS, mustering only 9.4% and 12.3% of the votes, respectively, which were a far cry from its historic victory of 2011, when it gained 19.05%.

One of the reasons that could shed light on the stellar growth of the PS is not only the euro crisis and the financial bailouts of countries like Greece and Portugal, but the growth of intolerance, nationalism and xenophobia throughout Europe. PS chairman Timo Soini, believes, however, that the main factor for the party’s historic victory two years ago was anti-EU sentiment.

Another matter that has made the PS popular with the voters is that it is all things to everyone, if that everyone is a voter who is a middle-aged white Finnish male. In many respects the rhetoric of the party is similar to the Tea Party of the United States, which tries to lure voters by using immigrants as scapegoats and promoting free-market capitalism.

The PS usually speaks in code to its voters and that is why it can have members who house racist views and claim that it doesn’t tolerate racism. Some, like PS MP Jussi Halla-aho, have been sentenced for ethnic agitation and can still enjoy the support of the party’s leadership.

One of the matters that should worry sensible Finns is not what the PS is, but what it can become.

A good sister party of the PS is the UK Independence Party (Ukip). Both parties are very similar ideologically but with some differences. The Ukip, for example, wants the United Kingdom to leave the EU while the jury is still out on the PS’ stance on the matter.

Both the PS and Ukip are anti-immigration and anti-Islam parties that cannot be still labelled as “far right” like the Danish People’s Party or Lega Nord of Italy.

Certainly in the ideological bubble of populist right-wing rhetoric, everything is possible, even changing and rewriting history to suit one’s intolerant views.

If you want to read a comprehensive review of the Ukip’s far-right ties in Europe, read what Rowena Mason wrote on the Purple Rain blog of the HOPE not hate website.

Read full column here.

The Ukip,like the PS, belongs to the Europe for Freedom and Democracy (EFD) group of the European parliament.

While the PS belongs the EFD group and has one Euro MP, Sampo Terho,

Arun Kundnani, author of The Muslims are Coming!, said recently that it was worrying that a party like the Ukip has links to people and parties that are Islamophobic and in the far right.

Why should we believe Soini and the PS when they claim that “they aren’t racist” or have far-right ties?

Jay Smooth’s recent video, How to tell someone they sound racist, offers us an answer. The PS, politicians from different parties, and the Finnish media, hide or wrongly focus their attention on the “they-are-racist” as opposed to the “that-sounded-racist” conversation.

There may be a number of reasons why their focus is away from the ball. Uncovering why would reveal a lot how intolerance has gained an ever-bigger foothold in countries like Finland.

“What they did conversation focuses on the person’s words and actions and why what they did and what they said was unacceptable,” said Smooth, adding that the problem with the they-are-racist conversation is that it will take your focus away from the issue.

The person that made the racist comment wins, you lose.

How to tell someone they sound racist

Posted on March 12, 2014 by Migrant Tales

Here’s a very good video clip with Jay Smooth that I found thanks to Racism Review that will help you challenge a person who makes a racist remark. The first and foremost thing you must do is stick to the that-sounded-racist conversation as opposed to they-are-racist conversation, according to Smooth.

Read original blog entry here. The video clip has gotten close to a million views.

“What they did conversation focuses on the person’s words and actions and why what they did and what they said was unacceptable,” he explained.

The problem with the they-are-racist conversation is that it will take your focus away from the issue.

“If somebody picks my pocket I’m not going to be chasing him down to find out if he feels like a thief deep down inside his heart,” said Smooth. “I’m going to be chasing him down to get my wallet. I don’t care what he is but I need to hold him accountable for what he did.”

We’ve heard it so many times before after a racist outburst the I’m-not-racist defense line.

In a nutshell we don’t care what you are but care about what you did and said.

The advice in the video clip offers the Finnish media, politicians and the public a way to challenge people who make racist comments.

Instead of calling Perussuomalaiset MP Jussi Halla-aho, Olli Immonen, Juho Eerola and James Hirvisaari of Muutos 2011 racists, hold them instead accountable for what they have written and said.

Two of the four above-mentioned MPs, apart from Eerola and Immonen, have received sentences for ethnic agitation. Doing a google search on any of the four MPs will give you enough evidence to understand what they said sounded or was racist.

When the media doesn’t get it and doesn’t understand the difference, racists are usually given a platform to spread their prejudices. They give racists inflated respectability and importance.

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Read Racism Review blog entry here.