Tag: xenophobia

Green Party hopeful Pekka Haavisto and the Perussuomalaiset

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

After the Green Party declared war on the Perussuomalaiset (PS) party before the April 17 election, its presidential hopeful Pekka Haavisto has made an about-turn: He has become a “friend” of PS MP Teuvo Hakkarainen, who became a household name thanks to his racist gaffes, and now displays a show of  support for his candidacy by PS MP Jussi Halla-aho.

Certainly forgiveness is an important but how can you forgive somebody for their hostile racist behavior if they don’t even consider it wrong?

Another sad matter that Haavisto is doing by extending his hand to racists and far-right Islamophobists like Halla-aho is that he gives them legitimacy.

Moreover, his approval of these types of politicians shows that at the end of the day Haavisto is a white Finn.

Do you agree?

Is Finland's path that of Hungary's?

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

This is not a far-fetched question taking into account what is happening in Hungary and the rise of populism in Finland. How many in Hungary ten years ago could have envisioned what is happening today in that country?  

The architect of Hungary’s ever-autocratic grip over its democratic institutions has been  Fidesz party prime minister, Viktor Orbán. Daniel Cohn Bendit, the leader of the European Green group in the European Parliament, is not too happy in the video clip below about the reforms that have taken place under Orbán.

Says Bendit: “Europe was born in a struggle against totalitarianism and the basis of democracy, the basis of liberty, is quite precisely freedom of expression. And that disturbs. A democracy never died of too much freedom, democracies died through throttling freedoms.”

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X65AT_yJpAw]

Here is a link to a massive protest in Hungary by tens of thousands of people against the government’s reforms.

What we are seeing in Hungary last decade and especially today is of concern: The rise of Antisemitism, xenophobia, hostility towards the Romany minority, increased government monitoring of the media and other institutions like the central bank by the government to name a few.

The guardian.co.uk sums it up pretty well: “…the new constitution is the source of most anguish. It came into effect on 1 January, and, combined with at least 350 laws that have been rushed through during Fidesz’s 20 months in power, has, say critics, all but removed checks and balances to the power of the government and ruling party…There have been crackdowns on Roma rights, and funds for education and social care have been shredded, campaigners say.”

The question that I’d like to ask our bloggers is if Finland could ever follow Hungary’s xenophobic and increasingly anti-democratic path if a party like the Perussuomalaiset (PS) got an absolute majority in the election as did Fidesz in 2010.

Fidesz election victory, which gave them two thirds of the seats in parliament, is as impressive as what the PS gained in April.

Another big winner of the 2010 election in Hungary was the Antisemitic and neo-fascist Jobbik.

If any party were to swing Finland on Hungary’s path, the place to start is the Constitution.

I am certain that there are a lot of sympathizers in the PS and in Finland of the anti-democratic reforms  in Hungary.

Thank you JusticeDemon for the heads up!

We can contain the PS' populist threat to Finland

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

The more I read about Timo Soini the more I am convinced that the Perussuomalaiset (PS) party is a threat to this country, especially to those who do not fit the PS’ narrow view of the world. I am not contesting the election result, which I respect, but what the  cat has brought in from the back door.

Marianne Lydén will publish in a few weeks a book, Jag är inte rasist. Jag vill bara ha främlingsfientliga röster [I’m not a racist. I am just out to get the votes of those who hate immigrants], that highlights the role of the media and political parties in fueling the rise of the PS,  according to HBL.

Fear = Hate forums in Finland (Hommaforum, Scripta and others), Ignorance = bloggers who visit these sites, and hate = hostility towards immigrants and visible minorities. Thank you Hannele Kosonen for sharing this very revealing cartoon with us.

While we at Migrant Tales have repeatedly criticized the media’s lack of teeth and the complacency of the largest political parties to the xenophobia and racism of the PS,  Lydén raises the important question again in her book.

If anything, the media and politicians can learn from their past mistakes and now see what can happen when we are too complacent to parties that hold in contempt the rights of other groups in society.

“We journalists did Soini’s work by spreading his hatred of foreigners sometimes unknowingly,” the staff reporter at the Swedish-language daily HBL is quoted as saying, “but if we wouldn’t have written about him we wouldn’t have been doing our job.”

Lydén points the finger in her book at the following politicians for boosting the PS: Kokoomus MP Ben Zyskowicz, Jutta Urpilainen and Eero Heinäluoma of the SDP as well as Center Party veteran politician Paavo Väyrynen.

While you’ll find the same anti-immigration hardliners in all Finnish parties as in the PS, it explains why a politician like Urpilainen can flirt with Soini’s one-way integration model for immigrants and why Wille Rydnman has been christened by his party as Kokoomus’ Jussi Halla-aho.

The HBL reporter shows how an Islamophobist like Halla-aho and Soini complimented each other in the historic April election.  “Without Halla-aho Soini would have never got the anti-immigration vote. Without Soini Halla-aho would not be chairing the administration committee,” she said.

Another important observation that Lydén makes is that nothing happens immediately or by chance in Finland. Racism has been festering in the undercurrent for a long time in Finland.  “What is it and nothing of the sort happens [xenophobia] in Finland was the normal answer,” she said of the 1990s.

I have worked as a foreign correspondent and journalist in Finland for a long time and totally agree with Lydén about turning a blind eye to racism, bigotry and prejudice. If you didn’t you were blacklisted by the foreign ministry which did everything possible to smear your good name.

I am certain that Lasse Lehtinen, Rolf Friberg, Pekka Karhuvaara and Finnfacts can give us more details about how the foreign ministry “worked” with foreign journalists during the cold war and tried to convince us that Finlandization did not exist.

We are in big trouble if we deal with this threat of the PS in the same manner as we did before the election.

However, I believe that Finland is slowly but surely learning a stinging lesson from its pre-April 17 mistakes.

Finland & Cultural Diversity 2011

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

In many respects 2011 was a watershed year for Finland and Europe concerning the rise of anti-immigration parties and xenophobia. The biggest news to hit Finland this year was without a doubt the April 17 election, which saw the anti-immigration Perussuomalaiset (PS) party win 39 seats compared with only 5 in 2007. On July 22 Anders Breivik gunned down most of his 77 victims in Norway. 

If you are an immigrant or a visible minority in Finland,  2011 will go down as one the worst years in a very long time. Certainly anti-immigration parties in Europe have gained strength by the ever-worsening economic situation, the euro crisis and financial bailouts of countries like Greece, Ireland and Portugal.

Below is a quarter-by-quarter account of what made news on the immigration front in Finland during 2011:

First quarter 

The year kicked off in January with news of the death of Eveline Fadayel, an Egyptian grandmother who was granted a  residence permit after a lengthy process with immigration officials. The late woman’s legal battle to remain in Finland with her naturalized Finnish son triggered lots of concern and public debate over her plight as well as on immigration policy.

Her case highlights problems with our immigration policy and family reunification. A similar example are minors who have been granted refugee status by this country but who are forced to live separated from their parents. The government has announced plans to tighten family reunification rules further.

With the PS looking better in the polls as the historic April election neared, the party published its election manifesto in February. What is odd about the PS’ manifesto is that it does not differ radically from the government’s immigration policy, which suggests that most political parties in Finland take a tough line on immigration policy.

PS chairman, Timo Soini, told a group of German journalists in April before the election that he supported the government’s immigration policy.

With the anti-immigration atmosphere thickening in Finland, concern over the rights of minorities like the Swedish speakers in Finland was expressed by Sweden’s Integration Minister Erik Ullenhage. Then foreign minister, Alexander Stubb, said the debating atmosphere on immigrants and refugees in this country had become “oppressive.”

Second quarter

The election on April 17 dominated national and even international attention for quite a while. Newly elected PS MPs like Teuvo Hakkarainen became instant household names and the darlings of the tabloids with their racist and derogatory statements about blacks, refugees and immigrants. Racism, holocaust denial and off-the-cuff remarks by PS MPs and others would put Soini under the media spotlight throughout the year.

While Soini tried to calm Europe after the election by stating that the PS wasn’t an extremist party and that “Europe could sleep safely,” the news of the PS’ election victory did not go down well with some. Writer Sofi Oksanen was quoted as saying on Rome-based daily La Reppublica that the PS has its roots in Hitler’s Germany.

Emboldened by the election result, the Finnish media started to report more closely hate crimes. One of these that was reported by a tabloid about the speaker of parliament, Ben Zyskowicz, who was almost attacked by an unidentified person after he was called a Jew.

PS MP Jussi Halla-aho, who leads the far-right Suomen Sisu anti-immigration wing of Soini’s party, was elected to chair the administration committee, which among other things oversees immigration policy.

Despite the election victory fanfare of the PS, a group of 1,000 immigrants and Finns demonstrated in front of parliament against the PS.  The demonstration was organized by My Finland is International on Facebook. It was a historic event since the last time that immigrants and Finns demonstrated together in such large numbers was in October 1982.

The PS decided to sit it out in the opposition instead of forming part of government due to differences over EU policy. Even if the PS are now in the opposition, it does not mean that the other parties can’t feel its shadow. This became clear when the government appointed Christian Democrat Päivi Räsänen to head the interior ministry in charge of immigration policy.

The PS has approved and expressed satisfaction with Räsänen’s appointment. The Christian Democrat’s provocative views on homosexuality caused a large exodus of people to abandon the Lutheran Church.

Third quarter

The holiday month of July in Finland was rudely awoken when news of  Breivik’s mass-killing crusade to save Europe from “Islamization” and “cultural Marxists” became known to the world.  While Breivik had quoted Halla-aho in his manifesto, far-right parties and Islamophobic websites like the Gates of Vienna and anti-immigration politicians distanced themselves from the mass killer.

Others like PS MP James Hirvissari blamed the mass killings in Norway on the “100% rapes” committed by foreigners in Norway.

Europe and especially the Nordic region was never the same after 22/7. The ever-growing support that anti-immigration party’s thought that would never end hit a wall. For some Finnish parties like the Social Democrats, it was a wake up call to the threat that the far right and populist parties pose on society.

The tragic evens in Norway had as well an  impact on elections in Norway and Denmark.  Even the far-right Sweden Democrats had taken a hit in the opinion polls. One explanation why we haven’t seen a big fall in support for the PS in Finland is because it has profiled itself for now as an anti-EU party as one opposed to immigration and Islam.

There was more news that we read about in the third quarter like the  Romany minority evictions in Helsinki, former President Martti Ahtisaari asking Finns to invite immigrants for coffee, and news of hate crimes and racism emerging in Eastern Finnish towns like  Iisalmi and Lieksa.

Like in the beginning of the year, another poll showed that parents in Southern Finland want to limit at their school the number of children with immigrant backgrounds.

The Police College of Finland reported in October that hate crimes had fallen in 2010 by 15% compared with the previous year. Some, like Migrant Tales, treated this news with skepticism.

Finns learned in the end of July of Ulla Pyysalo, PS MP Juho Eerola’s aide, who posted a racist joke  on Facebook about Green Party MP Jani Toivola, who is black and gay.  She would gain more notoriety in early November when hackers uncovered her name on a neo-Nazi association membership list. MP Eerola, who has written positively about Benito Mussolini’s economic policies, does not believe belonging to a neo-Nazi association is grounds for dismissal.

Researcher Vesa Puuronen claimed  at the end of July that there are “tens of thousands” of far-right supporters in Finland. Secret police Supo does not consider the far right to be a threat in Finland  but is keeping a close eye on such groups.

My Finland is International organized in the end of July a demonstration in show of support for Breivik’s victims and against a culture of silence with respect to hate crimes and racism.

The PS change their English name to “The Finns.”

Fourth quarter

As in the previous three quarters of the year, there was no shortage of news on the immigration and hate-speech and crime front.  Migrant Tales has criticized on a number of occasions the Finnish media, politicians and public officials for their lack of leadership concerning the growth of racism and parties like the PS.

Helsingin Sanomat editor,  Riikka Venäläinen, offered in early November a humble mea culpa.  She said: “…our job is to give background information, analysis and develop the story from a certain angle.When that is done  on a tight schedule, it’s pretty certain that we are guilty of very short-sighted conclusions. I accept the criticism that has to do with reporting on immigration issues.”

Former Helsingin Sanomat Janne Virkkunen was not as apologetic. He expressed concern over the anti-immigration atmosphere in Finland and partly blamed its rise on the PS.

If the media turned a partial blind eye on PS candidates for their membership in extremist associations like Suomen Sisu,  the silence of too many politicians and the PS’ lame stance on racism and neo-Nazi groups is equally worrying. One of the biggest anti-immigration extremists of the PS and Suomen Sisu member, MP Hirvisaari, got fined in mid-December for hate speech.

All eyes are now on PS chairman Soini, who has said publicly that any member who got “convicted for racism” would be kicked out of the party. Soini said that he will make a decision on Hirvisaari after an appeal has been heard by the Supreme Court.

PS MP Pentti Oinonen refused to attend the president’s independence day reception on December 6 because he thought homosexuals dancing together at the reception were an insult to veterans. A local party boss of the PS claimed the homosexuality led to pedophilia.

In order to show the government’s get-tough stance against immigrants, refugees and in the process steal some of the political thunder of the PS, Minister of Interior Räsänen reinforced plans to tighten family reunification rules.

One of the bright spots in December has been President Tarja Halonen, who has been outspoken against discrimination and exclusion.  In early December she said   on a popular talk show that racism will not do away with injustice. She said that journalists, politicians, the clergy and teachers must break the cycle of hate speech.

Halonen commented as well on a poll by Helsingin Sanomat, which showed that two thirds of Finns felt there is much or a fair amount of racism in Finland. The poll revealed that PS supporters were twice as likely to recognize racism in themselves than others surveyed.  “People who recognise racism in themselves have ended up voting for the True Finns,” said Halonen. The comment angered a lot of PS supporters including Soini.

The credibility of such surveys, which highlight a serious social problem in Finland, have been questioned by researchers like Migration Institute director Ismo Söderling.

With a pretty dismal year ending, what kind of  new year do we expect in 2012 concerning immigration and our ever-growing cultural diversity as a society?

At the present pace it’s evident that there will be no shortages of news next year!

Immigration laws reveal what kind of a society we are

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

Tell me what your immigration laws are and I will tell you what kind of society you live in. Show me how those laws defend minorities and encourage cultural diversity and I will show you hypocrisy.

There is a saying that a person’s true character is not exposed during good times but when there is great adversity.

The global financial meltdown of markets in September 2008 and the euro financial crisis today  is testing our “good will” to breaking point.

Far-right, populist and even right-wing conservative groups in countries like the U.S. have succeeded in making  racism sound fair, according to Colorlines.*

There are worse examples of how the spirit of the laws and that of deeds show how our societies are flirting and have succumbed in some cases to the ways of despotism.

A case in point is Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County in Arizona, who got his wings clipped after the Obama Administration’s Department of Homeland Security stripped him of several federal tools for immigration enforcement, according to Police Patrol. *

Arpaio has been accused of racial profiling and targeting Hispanics in his county. But he isn’t the only case. There are too many others that do what Arpaio does but without such revolting fanfare in the media.

In Europe and Finland anti-immigration parties and politicians are arguing as well that it is ok to be racist and homophobic.

What kind of a society do we have in our country with immigration laws getting tougher and anti-immigration groups gaining strength? What do our laws and deeds reveal?

That we have a chronic leadership crisis and have lost our way.

*Thank you Community Village Daily Activist for the heads up!

 

Different cultural diversity strokes for different folks in Finland and Europe

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

One matter that shines through after reading and responding to the thousands of threads on Migrant Tales is that multiculturalism, racism and inequality mean different things for different people. One way to make sense of the ongoing debate on Finland’s ever-growing acceptance of its cultural diversity is figuring out what these terms mean for these groups.

Without understanding their meaning and how these terms are employed is to misunderstand the whole debate to put it lightly.

Take for instance how the term “multiculturalism” is used in Finland. While such a term isn’t mentioned in any of our laws never mind our Constitution, officials use it to refer to how our country is becoming more culturally and ethnically diverse.

Finland’s official definition of multiculturalism means in general the same thing as the Canadian social policy, which promotes cultural diversity.

One of the problems when officials use the term multiculturalism they too often forget to define what it means. Moreover, is diversity and equality, just like the Canadian multicultural model, being promoted in Finland? Intentions appear noble but deeds sometimes suggest the contrary.

If we look at anti-immigration groups in Finland, multiculturalism means an objection to cultural diversity, or specifically of Muslims and Africans moving here. Thus multiculturalism is seen by these groups as an immigration policy versus one that facilitates integration.

The Nuiva manifesto is the smoking gun of the PS’ ignorance and loathing of groups like Muslims and Africans. If ever adopted, the manifesto would would not only strengthen institutional racism but promote one-way integration, or assimilation. The aim of any immigration and integration  policy based on the Nuiva manifesto would create those ghettos that these groups commonly warn us of by watering down the civil rights of those that the PS does not see as the “stereotypical prototype white Finn.”

Paradoxically “social equality” for far-right groups means bolstering their rights at the cost of others.  Racism is the chief architect in creating that many tier society they seek.

The Nuiva manifesto sheds light as well on the PS as a far-right populist party.  How do you define the far right? Is it any party that wants to change  the values of society by strengthening their political base by promoting racism, social inequality, xenophobia and nationalism?  Yes.

Moreover, the definition of “multiculturalism” by anti-immigration groups in Finland is similar to other far-right groups in Europe. There is nothing unique about it except for that it is a paste-and-copy job in the Finnish language.  It’s the same hate speech but in the Finnish language.

One of the biggest myths pushed by anti-immigration groups in Europe today is that immigrants in general and specific groups don’t want to adapt.  This could not be further from the truth. Since we are all social animals, our first and foremost aim anywhere is to adapt.

Since cultures constantly change and adapt, we should be promoting that change instead of fixing our view of “others” on stereotypes.

While everyone decides what his or her identity is, having narrow definitions of who is Finnish and who is not is a way of not challenging major issues like discrimination. There are today in Finland tens of thousands of people with “immigrant backgrounds” who have lived most of their lives in this country but are treated like outsiders.

Think about the can of worms we’d open if you started to speak of these “others” as Finns and equal members of society? We’d finally start facing the challenges and real issues confronting our society concerning racism and exclusion.

Argentina’s dirty war: A couple I never met but always knew

Posted on by Migrant Tales

It’s a long story how I ended up conscripted in the Argentinean army during the dirty war (1976-83). Being part of a country that was at war with itself was like taking a one-way stroll  down the ally of hatred with a sack over your head. Even if no sack was placed over your head, your eyes could neither see nor your ears hear what was going down. Terror has a way of numbing your senses.  

Taking into account the rise of racism and xenophobia in Europe and horrific examples of World War 2 and ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia, it’s clear that we cannot make a pact with the devil by remaining quiet to the threat of right-wing populist and far-right parties that are gaining strength throughout Europe.

One of the reasons why too many white Europeans aren’t too concerned about the situation is because these anti-immigration parties don’t pose a direct threat to them. As we know, these parties have declared indirectly and directly war against immigrants and other minorities.

I am grateful for the years (1977-78) I spent in Argentina. Even if  it changed my life as a young man, I now understand what it is to live under a ruthless dictatorship and why we must defend every day our civil rights.

In many respects populist and far-right parties are very much like those military dictatorships that ruled Latin America in the 1970s. I am certain that all hell would break loose in Europe if these types of parties got the chance to set their policies in motion.

The biggest losers would be our present democracies and civil rights, which are supposed to be inalienable.

How can I make such a claim? Easily. If you exclude and bash one minority by watering down their rights the impact is on the whole of society. Promoting social equality has the opposite effect.

I have adopted a couple out of the over 30,000 victims that disappeared in Argentina during the dirty war. They appeared by accident 33 years ago when I read about their disappearance on September 14, 1977.

Today Jorge Donato Calvo’s and his wife Adriana María Franconetti de Calvo’s story sits quietly on my desk.

Kuvankaappaus 2013-7-12 kello 11.01.51

Jorge Donato Calvo and Adriana María Franconetti de Calvo.

According to the Buenos Aires Herald clipping, the couple left their one- and two-year old baby daughters in their home under the care of the children’s paternal grandparents and went to see a movie at the Ritz Cinema, not too far from where I used to live in Buenos Aires.

Their tragic stories was published in gruesome detail years later on a website of the victims of the dirty war of Argentina:

Adriana and Jorge were students of Buenos Aires’ National School. Jorge was a medic and he worked at the Ramos Mejía Hospital. The couple lived in Sarandi, Buenos Aires province.

The couple was kidnapped when they were standing in a line of the Ritz Cinema in the neighborhood of Belgrano in Buenos Aires. They were seen at the ESMA (Navy Petty-Officers School of Mechanics); Adriana was “transferred” one or two days after.

Adriana’s sister and brother, Anna María and Eduardo, are also missing. Her father Eduardo was kidnapped together with her sister and brother and taken to the  “Club Atlético” detention center where his children were tortured in front of him. His abductors interrogated him about Adriana’s whereabouts. They freed him but he died a short while later of a cardiac arrest.    

*The term dirty war came about when a reporter asked an officer how he’d describe the civil war in Argentina. He said: “It was a dirty war.”

 

Fairy tale worlds with the help of hate speech in Finland and elsewhere

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

The recent anti-immigration killings in Norway at the hands of Anders Breivik and this week in Italy by Gianluca Casseri show how xenophobic fairy tales can turn a person into a killer. As populist and far-right parties in Europe continue to throw petrol at the flames of their hate speech, it is only a question of time when new Breiviks and Casseris will appear on the scene. 

The delusion and lack of resolve by our societies does not only hinge today on the EU’s lack of resolve to tackle its serious financial issues, but the belief that we can keep our rising nationalism and hate speech on a short leash.

This social ogre, which has been let out of the cage in Finland as well, is trying its hardest to convince us that its pathological social behavior is normal. There is nothing normal about racism never mind spreading hatred of other groups especially if our society is based on social justice.

These groups that the term “fatherland” to justify their actions are playing with fire. Not only are they weakening our national icons and cherished symbols of our society that are supposed to stand for noble values such as acceptance, they are shooting them in the head.

When looking at any far-right or right-wing populist parties in Europe, we should as concerned citizens walk that extra mile and ask what is the real message behind their populist soundbites. The fact that they don’t tell us what they are is the clearest indication of not only of their reckless opportunism, but the fact that society would never accept their real views.

Certainly spreading urban myths peppered with racism and xenophobia have an impact on Europe. Apart from threatening to weaken our present values, they encourage and offer smoking guns for future and present killers to terrorize our societies with real weapons and/or hate speech.

Breivik and Casseri are fresh examples of what Europe has in store for itself if it does not face the challenge posed by parties that attack society with their hate speech.

We must act now or suffer the consequences by others who paint our world with the somber colors of hate speech.

Spiegel International Online: Italy Killings Underscore European Extremism Problem

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Comment: One of the biggest threats to Europe these days is not the Euro crisis and the economic downturn but the rise of xenophobic far-right groups. Saverio Ferrari, an expert on right-wing terrorism, described the latest far-right killer Gianluca Casseri “a classic lone wolf.”

The neo-fascist and xenophobic CasaPound attempted to distance itself from Casseri by claiming that the killer was a sympathizer of the but that the killer was “a dog without an owner.”

Surprisingly, some in Italy now praise what Casseri did. “Meanwhile, Casseri has been become a hero of the right-wing extremist scene in the country, praised as a true Italian and a “white hero” worthy of renown and respect on the racist website stormfront.org. Casseri ‘cleaned up,’ a task for which he deserves thanks, a statement on the website read,” writes to Spiegel International Online. 

Let’s admit it, the only reason why far-right groups have risen in popularity in Europe these days is because they have  more support as a result of the worsening economic situation. Another factor has been the complacent silence of too many politicians, the mass media and the general public.

Ferrari assured us that Italy will react to the killings. This may be difficult to believe considering that xenophobia against non-European immigrants never mind the Romany minority has been on the rise.

Here is a video clip in Italian about a black man stating that the killing was expected taking into account the years of hatred spread against immigrants by politicians belonging to the former government who insult these people wholesale. 

“The terrible murders could be the impetus to finally think about this and draw some conclusions,” Ferrari said. “Either way, Italy will react.”

_____________

The murders of African street vendors by a right-wing extremist writer in Florence have shocked Italy. Questions are now emerging about whether the gunman acted alone. But one thing seems certain, he was close to a right-wing radical group that has a pop culture appeal admired even by Germany’s neo-Nazis.

Read whole story.

Finland’s ignorance of racism and fascism

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

One of the political dramas that Finland is facing today is that it does not know what racism and fascism is. The Finnish media up to the April 17 election not only lost its teeth and forgot its important role in defending our civil rights but helped the right-wing populist Perussuomalaiset (PS) with its complacency.

It’s difficult to say if some journalists preferred not to write critically about PS candidates that belonged to Suomen Sisu because they were ignorant or because the racism of these candidates appealed to them.

While Migrant Tales calls Suomen Sisu a Nazi-spirited association, this was unfortunately the exception not the rule when it comes to the Finnish media.

Expo magazine editor Daniel Poohl said recently that Suomen Sisu ideology is a mirror image of fascist parties in Finland, Germany and Italy during the 1930s and first half of the 1940s.

If the Finnish media has done a shoddy job at reporting the rise of the far-right and populist threat to Finland, politicians haven’t done any better. Instead of trying to show leadership against racism and neo-fascism in Finland, they preferred to remain silent or, worse, assimilate the PS’ anti-immigration message.

Didn’t the politicians of all of Finland’s major and minor parties elect the head of the PS’ Suomen Sisu wing, MP Jussi Halla-aho, to chair the administration committee in charge of setting immigration policy?

It was only after Anders Breivik appeared on the scene in Norway and killed 77 Norwegians in July that some members of the Social Democratic party started to ask question about Halla-aho’s role in the administration committee.

Another tragedy of the media and too many politicians are their treatment of PS head Timo Soini, who tries to portray himself to the public as a good cop of a right-wing populist party that is anti-EU, anti-immigration and especially anti-Muslim.

I totally agree with Poohl.  In the ongoing debate on Finland’s political future there is one important matter missing: knowing what racism and fascism is and their threat to our values and society.

Having lived, worked and traveled extensively in Latin America, I know that democracy can be shelved very easily.

Recovering it will be a real bitch.