Racism Archives - Page 139 of 208

Councilman Mika Hiltunen gets sentenced for ethnic agitation but gets pat on the back by the PS

Posted on May 15, 2013 by Migrant Tales

After Perussuomalaiset (PS) party Kontiolahti town councilman Mika Hiltunen was sentenced Tuesday by a court for ethnic agitation, we saw once again a familiar balancing by the PS: stating to moderates it doesn’t accept racism but at the same time assuring the extreme right that the party accepts racist outbursts by its members.

We have seen this time and again. The PS and Timo Soini, who said in 2009 that any party member who got sentenced for ethnic agitation would be sacked from the party, are political Houdinis. How can you be against racism and support it at the same time? That takes special politcial skills and a public that is by and large pretty ignorant of what racism is.

It’s too early still for the PS to count it’s promising political chicks. Soini and the party leaders know that its double talk and political chicanery on intolerance could backfire badly.

Let’s see how the latest balancing act by the PS works. In order to stand out and award the extremist and racist voters of the party, councilman Hiltunen claims on his Facebook page that asylum seekers and refugees are “social-welfare bums and rapists.”

Ethnic agitation charges are then brought against Hiltrunen and gets sentenced by a court in May He is forced to pay a 2,000-euro fine.

Now here’s how the balancing act happens: Eero Bogdanoff, PS North-Karelian region chairman, publicly defends what Hiltunen said by asking him to not resign as member of the PS’ regional board and continue as if nothing happened. Well, as almost as if nothing happened…

“Hiltunen has mend his ways pretty well,” Bogadanoff is quoted as saying on YLE. “The publicity he got is punishment in itself.”

What would have happen to Hiltunen if he made such racist public comments and lived in a country like Sweden or Britain? There are two options: He’d be either sacked from the party or forced to give an apology for what he said.

He or the PS did neither.

DNA, Saunalahti, IF, Nordea: “Backward-looking” rules and laws mirror Finland’s anti-foreign sentiment

Posted on May 14, 2013 by Migrant Tales

A comment on Migrant Tales by Chef summed up pretty well how “several backward-looking” rules used arbitrarily by mobile phone and insurance companies continue to discriminate and make life difficult for immigrants. Why does this still happen in Finland, a Nordic welfare state country that promotes and bases its values on social equality (tasa-arvo)?

The suspicion that some Finns have of foreigners is very real. It hinges on our difficult history with the former Soviet Union and being under Swedish and Russian rule for over 650 years. Irrespective of such explanations, they sound more like excuses than proactive solutions.

Our suspicion of foreigners is not only evident in our actions and attitudes but in our laws.

Take for instance the Restricting Act of 1939 (law 219/1939), which became redundant in 1992. The aim of the law was to keep key sectors of the economy off limits to foreigners.

The act prohibited foreigners from owning real estate and acquiring a majority stake in Finnish companies – limiting this to 20% normally and 40% under special permission. It stipulated as well that foreigners could not own shares in key sectors such as forestry, securities trading, transportation, mining, real estate and shipping.

When I moved to this country permanently in December 1978, non-Finns weren’t allowed to establish a newspaper, organize demonstrations, no habeas corpus never mind appeal a deportation.

Until 1983, or about 65 years after gaining independence, Finland got its first Aliens’ Act. Before and even after new act came into force, foreigners were at the mercy of the aliens office, whose aim was to hinder immigrants from moving here.

Why was it so difficult for a foreigner to establish a business in Finland or move to this country in the last century? The answer is clear: They didn’t want you to invest or move here.

We rarely speak about how our anti-foreign sentiment continues to influence us today. How do you think an anti-immigration and anti-EU party, the Perussuomalaiset, was able to score a historic election victory in 2011?

Fortunately matters have changed for the better after we became EU members in 1995. Even so, the remnants of Finland’s anti-foreign sentiment can still be found in some of its rules, laws and what’s most important in attitudes.

“Several backward-looking” restrictions imposed by mobile phone companies, insurers and banks are some examples.

The sooner we throw them in the dustbin of history, the better.

How ideologically alike is the PS with the UKIP and BNP?

Posted on May 11, 2013 by Migrant Tales

The recent local election victory of the anti-EU and anti-immigration UKIP of Britain is a good example of what Finland experienced with the rise of the Perussuomalaiset (PS) in April 2011. While the United Kingdom and Finland are vastly different countries, the knee-jerk reaction of the ruling parties to right-wing populism and rhetoric is strikingly similar.

Instead of challenging the anti-EU and anti-immigration stance of the UKIP or PS, the Tories of the UK and Kokoomus and Social Democrats of Finland bowed to the political threat by mimicking the UKIP’s and PS’ message, respectively.

In Finland, Kokoomus and the Social Democrats have paid a dear price for their lack of leadership in challenging an anti-EU, anti-immigration and especially anti-Islam party. The only party that didn’t parrot too much the PS’ rhetoric was the Center Party, which was the biggest loser in the 2011 election.

Apart from being aided by being in the opposition, the Center Party’s decision to not mimic the PS appears to have paid off handsomely.

A recent YLE poll showed the Center Party to be the most popular in the country today. Cameron, Kokoomus and the Social Democratic Party of Finland prove that you pay a high political price if you don’t challenge a threat posed by parties like the UKIP and PS.

Sweden offers a good example of how to deal with groups that rely on the far right extremist, anti-EU and anti-immigration vote. All of the mainstream parties in Sweden have given the political cold shoulder to the Sweden Democrats. I am certain that in the long run, the Swedish answer to an intolerant party will pay off politically.

The political problem in Finland is the opposite to what is happening in Sweden. By accepting to sit at the same table as a party that promotes intolerance is synonymous to accepting their views and undermining your principles and values.

We must stand up for what we think is right. Accepting a society that basis itself on intolerance of immigrants, visible minorities and the outside world will end up doing more harm to a country than good.

What kind of country will Finland and Britain be if Timo Soini and Nigel Farage of the PS and UKIP, respectively, became prime ministers?

The answer: disaster.

One of the consequences of a UKIP and PS election victory would be to instigate a witch hunt against immigrants and visible immigrants.

That will happen in the UK when they reform Britain’s immigration system. Apart from regulating migrant access to the National Health Service (NHS), landlords will be able to check on immigrant tenants.

It is surprising that Cameron, who should know better, wants to scapegoat migrants and the EU to save his party’s hide from the UKIP.

Numerous studies show that immigrants use less social welfare than natives. This is logical since immigrants have to work twice as hard and be twice as good to match a native. Using social welfare would undermine a migrant’s competitiveness in the labor market.

Cameron will end up paying a costly political price for his anti-EU and anti-immigration stances.

Who are the PS?

One way of understanding who the PS is ideologically is by asking what are the differences between its close ally, the UKIP, and the far right anti-immigration and openly racist British National Party (BNP).

A survey published by The Guardian sheds light on this question.

The ideological similarities between the UKIP and BNP are strikingly alike on how the PS markets itself politically and its relationship with far right groups such as Suomen Sisu and Suomalaisuuden liitto. Is it a surprise why the far-right Islamophobic English Defence League supports the UKIP and why some members of the PS support the Finnish Defense League?

Writes the Guardian: ”UKIP is not a right-wing extremist party, but on the doorsteps of voters it is often pushing the same message as the extreme right, and this is reflected in our results.”

This latter conclusion unveils the PS for what it is: A party like the UKIP that attempts to give a moderate view of itself because it would lure more voters but appeals to the extreme right. Thus there are more similarities between the UKIP, BNP and the PS than there are differences.

That is one of many reasons why Soini has spoken in the past to three UKIP party conferences as in this video clip.

The Finnish media should stop picturing immigrants on social rollators

Posted on May 10, 2013 by Migrant Tales

One of the problems when we challenge intolerance is to find its many hiding places and sources. Intolerance has many ways of surviving. One of these is microaggression that appears innocent on the surface but reinforces your exclusion, inferiority and to walk about in your new homeland with a social rollator as a marked human being.

A social rollator will appear before you if you accept your low standing in society. Not allowing people to attain their potential because of prejudice and discrimination is a form of social exploitation.

Picturing and spreading stereotypes of immigrants as “helpless” is wrong. I personally raise my hat to Muslims, Africans and visible immigrants who move to Finland. It takes a lot of guts to live in a country where too many are openly hostile to you.

If our white media in Finland were to be believed, you’d think that immigration is not only a problem but that the biggest groups are Muslims, Somalis and Africans. Why are these groups monopolizing our attention in the media and in the speeches of some politicians when they only comprise a small fraction of total immigrants?

Finland’s immigrant population in 2012 accounted for a a mere 3.4% (183,133 persons) of the total country’s population, according to the Population Registration Center (Väestörekisterikeskus). Of these 183,133 non-Finns, the majority were Europeans and non-Muslims. Somalis, for example, only account for 0.26% of the country’s total population.

What about religious affiliation? Surprise: The overwhelming majority (77.3%) of people in Finland are Lutherans compared with 1.47% classified as “other” religions.

Here’s a “standard” story published by the Finnish media on immigration. While the story is about the rise of racism in Europe, Suomenmaa uses Muslim women and a child to drive home the point. The majority of immigrants living in Finland are white Europeans with Africans and Muslims acquiring for a fraction of the foreign population.

If those groups that receive so much attention in the public are a tiny minority, why do they receive so much attention by the media, politicians and general public?

The answer is clear: It shows a heavy dose of ignorance and prejudice.

I’ve learned the hard way: The next time I publish an opinion piece in the Finnish media, I will ask the editors not to put a picture of a Muslim woman, black African or Asians working for a cleaning company.

When we speak of immigrants, the Finnish media too often uses Muslims and black Africans to picture this phenomenon like on this Savon Sanomat story above. In the picture we see a black man learning to crochet from a white Finn, which again could suggest that only black immigrants are fit to do menial work.

Spreading stereotypes about immigrants is just as bad – if not worse – than a racist who comes out of the closet. At least some of us know that what the racist is saying is wrong.

Too few of us, however, don’t see how the media reinforces the same social illness in an acceptable manner.

Microaggressions: How “law-abiding” community members discriminate

Posted on May 10, 2013 by Migrant Tales

Microaggressions, the subject of a book by Derald Wing Sue of the Teachers College, Columbia University, highlights perfectly one of the ongoing problems in Finland. Microaggressions occur unconsciously and underline inclusion-exclusion and superiority-inferiority. They are everyday putdowns, insults that aim to undermine the dignity of visible minorities, women, LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) rights or those who are marginalized, according to Sue.

One example of microaggressions that the video shows is between a student (Oriental background) and a university official (white). The official thinks he’s offering the student a compliment: “You know you speak excellent English,” he says.

The seemingly innocent comment disturbs the student, which implies that he isn’t a true US American and is made to feel like a perceived alien in his country.

How many times have we been in the same situation in Finland?

My son, who was born in Finland, was once told by a manager at work that he spoke “excellent Finnish.”

While the manager meant no harm, the comment revealed his narrow view of who he considers Finns. His comment suggests that Finns have Finnish first and last names.

Says Sue: “Microaggressions often appear to be a compliment but contain metaommunication or a hidden insult to the target group…it is delivered by people who engage in microaggression [and] are ordinary folks who experience themselves [as] good moral decent individuals.”

And adds: “Microaggressions occur because they are outside the level of conscious awareness of the perpetrator.”

So how should we challenge daily microaggressions?

Sue offers five points that we need to do individually:

Learn from constant vigilance (study your own biases and fears)
Experiential reality (interact with people who differ from you in terms of ethnicity and culture)
Don’t be defensive (don’t take it personally)
Be open to discussing your own attitudes and biases and how they may have hurt others
Be an ally (stand up against bias and discrimination)

Thank you Glenn Robinson of Community Village for the heads-up.

Enough is enough! I’ve had it with you Finns!

Posted on May 5, 2013 by Dana

By Dana

Yesterday was a dark black day but a blessed one even if it brought so much sadness. A racist couldn’t kill who I am and yet again, like so many times before in my life, God helped me to overcome a very difficult situation. For you racists out there, and those who support you, even those who are racist but yet don’t know it, even those of you who are racist but are still in denial, let me tell you the following: I can hear your thoughts and hate.

Here’s what happened to me at work a day before Vappu, or Labor Day:

I began work on Tuesday in the morning and I knew that the following day would be Vappu. I don’t need to prove to anyone how good of a worker I am. I’m just as good as any of my Finnish coworkers. Even so, I still don’t understand how people can be so cruel and rude to anyone before a day like Vappu.

My coworkers were in a festive mood and already partying in the kitchen and I heard their laughs all the way from there. Their joy brought me to them. It was wonderful to see my people in such a happy mood. There was food on the kitchen table: cakes, sweets and fruits.

To my surprise, the Vappu they were celebrating a day before was not for me because I was not like them. I’m a foreigner. It was hard blow being excluded. Oh my God, I said to myself, how could they hurt me in such a way?

It was clear that they didn’t want to be with me. Their clear “you’re not one of us” look and their laughs told me that loud and clearly.

When I returned to the kitchen a little later for my lunch break, I saw them eating ice cream on the other side of the room. It was the same message over again: This ice cream is for us and not for you.

How did I know?

Because nobody in the room was considerate enough to ask me to join them.

It’s not the first time I’ve been in these types of situations. Only 1% of all the Finns I have met have accepted me and been kind to me.

Sitting as I usually do in the kitchen and eating my lunch by myself, I was careful not place my food on the table because I didn’t want their food to touch mine. Everybody could see I was in the room but no one cared to notice.

I finished eating lunch and went back to work.

Even while I was working, nobody called me to join my fellow coworkers in the kitchen. I felt that I had turned into a ghost before them and Vappu. I didn’t exist.

When I left work I wanted to scream at the top of my voice but where and to whom? In the market? On the street? In shops? At Lidl?

I’ve had it with you Finns! I’ve lived here for five years and I give up!

Believe it or not, I’m actually happy that I gave up on the Finns because I won’t waste my time anymore on false expectations.

Enough is enough!

_______________

More blog entries by Dana:

A warning: Finland

Don’t leave me

Poetic essay for tomatoes and cucumbers

An immigrant’s life in Finland: Dana misses her family

We speak of two-way integration but too many still believe in assimilation

Posted on May 3, 2013 by Migrant Tales

Finland’s integration law is exemplary in many respects because it aims to integrate newcomers as equals in our society. No law is, however, written in stone and is only as good as the institutions and people that enforce it. One of the matters that some have a difficult time grasping is what two-way adaption, or integration, means and implies.

Integration is the opposite to assimilation, which is one-way integration. Those who are in favor of assimilation, believe that most if not all of the adapting to cultural diversity will be done on their terms. One of their favorite arguments is: “Why should I adapt to them if they are in my country.”

Assimilation is a lazy and convenient way to exclude and keep others corralled with the help of our suspicion. This integration model is one of the reasons why intolerance is still the rule instead of the exception in many European countries.

Assimilation not only is a lazy model and sustains itself with the help of ethnocentrism, prejudice, white privilege, outright discrimination of whole groups and, worse, by defensive and repeated denials that we don’t have any issue with intolerance.

Take for example Finland’s Romany minority, which have suffered the greatest hostility in our society. They are a good example if any of outright social exclusion.

A US state department human rights report stated recently: ”Groups of Roma have lived in the country for centuries, and Roma are classified as a ’traditional ethnic minority’ in the ombudsman’s report. The Romany minority was the most frequent target of racially motivated discrimination, followed by Russian-speakers, Somalis, and Sami.”

Some Finns are still waiting after 500 years for the Roma, which number about 10,000 in Finland, to turn “white.” By turning white, I mean giving up their traditional dress, identity and ways of life in order to gain greater acceptance.

The paradox, however, is that if they gave up their identity they’d be in worse shape then they are today. The aim of intolerance and the victimization of groups like the Roma, is to wipe them off the Finnish cultural map.

One matter we should be careful to avoid when promoting two-way integration is exclusion by default. The best of example of this is when elementary schools continue to call third-culture children as students with immigrant backgrounds (maahanmuuttajataustainen) irrespective that they were born and have lived all their lives in this country.

Living in a culturally diverse society where two-way adaption, or integration, is the rule is the most effective and less-expensive way to adapt newcomers.

Even if our society promotes mutual acceptance, our laws and human rights play important roles.

The greatest integrators of all are social justice and equal opportunities – the very values we promote in our laws.

Cecile Kyenge: Italy’s first-ever black minister

Posted on May 2, 2013 by Migrant Tales

The appointment of Italy’s first black cabinet minister, Cecile Kyenge, 48, is a good example that we can pull together on a difficult issue like race for too many European countries. Kyenge’s appointment has ushered in a new era in Italy politics. Even so, her appointment has exposed in the raw the nation’s ugly race problem.

Read full story here.

Writes the Hufington Post, quoting AP, about Kyenge’s appointment: “One politician from a party that not long ago ruled in a coalition derided what he called Italy’s new ‘bonga bonga government.’ On Wednesday, amid increasing revulsion over the reaction, the government authorized an investigation into neo-fascist websites whose members called Kyenge ‘Congolese monkey’ and other epithets.”

A mother of two who lived in Modena with her Italian husband, Kyenge moved to Italy from her native Congo thirty years ago to study medicine. She is an eye surgeon.

Premier Enrico Letta said in his first speech to parliament that Kygenge’s appointment as minister for integration was a “new concept about the confines of barriers giving way to hope, of unsurpassable limits giving way to a bridge between diverse communities.”

How long will it take for Finland to appoint its first-ever non-white minister?

Thank you Anne Ceesay for the heads-up!

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.

Sara speaks out against the racist harassment her son endured at a school in Mikkeli, Finland

Posted on April 28, 2013 by Migrant Tales

What would you do if you heard that an African single mother decided to leave Mikkeli for Helsinki because her eight-year-old child was a victim of racist harassment or bullying at school? Would you just register the news and brush it conveniently under the rug and reassure yourself that these types of things don’t happen where you live?

Migrant Tales got in touch with Sara, an African single mother that spoke on condition of anonymity, to ask what had happened to her son at school. She said that her problems began when her son Julian, then a seven-year-old boy, went to Kattilansilta School.

Migrant Tales published in October 2010 a blog entry about racist spray paintings that were on the school’s walls for months.

While Sara believes that the teachers and principle did everything possible to stop the racist bullying of her son, a teacher in 2010 didn’t seem too concerned about the racist graffiti on the school’s wall. After the teacher admitted that the racist graffiti above had been there since spring and didn’t represent his values, he asked why anti-immigration groups like the Perussuomalaiset and Muutos 2011 are labelled racist whenever they criticize immigrants for getting more social welfare than Finns.

By Sara

I had heard before that racism is a problem in Mikkeli but my child and I were never its victims. My problems started when I finished my studies and when my son Julian started first grade at the local school. Finding real work in Mikkeli was impossible for me. I served as an intern at different workplaces but never got a job that paid me a salary.

One day my son Julian came home and told me that a boy at school was bullying him in a racist manner. He was too young to understand why he was bullied. He asked me why I had given birth to him as a black African and why he wasn’t white like the rest of the children at school.

Soon the majority of his classmates started bullying him. They named him a black monkey and told him to go to the toilet bowl because the color of his skin was like the color of feces. (Sara stops for a moment to contain her tears. She succeeds).

Matters got worse for Julian as the months passed at school. There were fights and nobody wanted to play with him. One day he said he didn’t want to go to school because nobody liked him.

The teachers and the principle were understanding and they spoke to the classmates’ parents. Things got better but for Julian for a while but then things returned to “normal” and the bullying started again. Julian’s classmates are the same age as he so what they know about racism is what they learned from their parents and other children.

Not only did my son complain that he didn’t have friends at school, but he didn’t have anyone to play with after school either. At the apartment block where we lived in Mikkeli, he did have a friend who wanted to play with him but the boy’s mother forbade it.

Last year for the first time in my seven years in Mikkeli, I got two hate mails telling me to go back to where I came from.

Taking into account what was happening at school to Julian and the feeling that things had changed for the worse in Mikkeli for us, I decided to move to Helsinki last fall.

Since then my life has changed for the better. There are more Africans where I live and my son is no longer bullied at school.

It’s incredible, but if you are the only black child at school like Julian was, you’ll get bullied. If there are more black children, bullying doesn’t happen that easily.

I sincerely hope that what happened to me and my son won’t happen to anyone. I don’t wish such pain to befall anyone.

Silence is not the way to challenge intolerance.

Read story in Finnish here.

Tag: Racism