Monday’s A-studio talk about racism confirmed that Prime Minister Petteri Ospo’s plan to tackle racism and discrimination will most likely end up dead on arrival. One of the guests on the talk show, National Coalition Party (NCP) third vice president, Mari-Leena Talvitie, could not name one concrete action that the government would take to address the social ill.
Taking into account that Prime Minister Opro was willing to go to bed with the Perussuomalaiset (PS)*, a party with a solid track record on racism, raises some questions about the government’s anti-racism plan, which it plans to give to parliament in September.
Can we trust it? Or is it a ploy to save the government from a no-confidence vote?
Talvitie could not list any concrete measures about such a plan.
“The concrete measure and goal is that everyone has the right to live in a safe society in Finland,” she said, but the host asked the MP to be more concrete.
“The [concrete] measure I see is that [racism] must be tackled, whether it happens at schools or hobbies or elsewhere,” she said. “You get that through discussion, through education, through the involvement of organizations, and through the clear involvement of our society.”
So, according to Talvitie, the government washes its hands and tells the public to speak out against racism if it occurs in places like bus stops and schools.
PS MP Joakim Vigelius had another take on Finland’s racism problem.
Source: Twitter
@Muksunen tweets above: “[Joakim] Vigelius used classic whataboutism and started talking about the disabled when the topic was RACISM.
Vigelius made a reference to the “old 15-year-old [racist] posts [by Riikka Purra]” but forgot to mention a video by the Perussuomalaiset Youth yesterday depicting and ridiculing Muslim women [wearing black plastic sacks]. It [the video] supposedly “defends women.”
Vigelius added that PS followers have a different view of what is racism. He said that the word has suffered inflation.
I wonder if victims of racism consider the social ill to have suffered “inflation.”
Another question: Why does the PS send a junior MP to A-studio to speak about racism? Does it show that the party sees racism as a low priority?
Source: Twitter
Sofia Virta, the chairperson of the Green Party, put forth a good question about the government’s futility in finding a way to tackle racism and discrimination: “The NCP states we can tackle racism at bus stops and schools, but at the same time you are in a government with a party that has very racist elements in its values.”
It is unfortunate to see that parties like the PS and NCP have little to offer in the way of tackling racism. But this is expected since they are part of the problem.
In my opinion, Finland’s racism issues are due to a lot of factors like long isolation during the Cold War, small migrant population, its education system and society in general that have not learned basic social graces like how to treat people with respect and dignity.
How do we correct this?
By speaking out, demanding change, and understanding that the struggle for equal rights will be long and hard.
