In Finland, we have had a number of arson attacks against asylum reception centers. We even have one substitute MP of the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* party who wrote that “god had answered his prayers” when a building, which was supposed to house asylum seekers, was razed to the ground earlier this month.
Does Finland play down crimes carried by their nationals but magnifies those committed by asylum seekers, migrants, and minorities?
Green League chairman Ville Niinistö said during the weekend that the police doesn’t take attacks against reception centers seriously enough. If such attacks were carried out against senior homes or day care centers the reaction of the police service would be different, according to him.
Why don’t the police and politicians brand arsonists who attack asylum reception centers as terrorists? I wouldn’t even want to think what our reaction would be if an asylum seeker carried out similar acts. Why does the prime minister call an emergency crisis meeting because of a suspected rape case when there are thousands of shameful rape cases that go unreported and are committed daily by suspected white Finns?
The post on Samuel Turtianen’s Facebook wall offers us more hypocracy. The posting was published on PS MEP Jussi Halla-aho’s, MPs Olli Immonen’s, Teuvo Hakkarainen,’s and Laura Huhtasaari’s wall, all of whom are well-known Islamophobes.
The PS is a government party that shares power with the Center Party and National Coalition Party.
Turtiainen appears to be a supporter of the PS.
He writes:
“Dear Citizens, those of you who have taken to some extent personal risks in acting and eliminating already functioniong and planned asylum reception centers. Your work is and has been in many respects important to our independence and defending our security. The hands of the police are politically tied, which means that the people have to act on their own. These acts have thanks to the media became widely known to all of us and we know what’s the question. Is the time right to expand our actions to the enemy’s main centers, where this [asylum reception center policy] is managed. In the shared article it become clear that our worst enemy [Finnish Red Cross] cheers [a person down] when a cirtizen expersses her personal fears.”
The “article,” or opinion piece by Tiina Palovuori, a PS member, was about her recent visit to an asylum reception center in Tampere. She asked if she had to take precautions because she feared being raped.
When we label Others terrorists and criminals we permit scapegoating to live anther day and justify our exclusiveness, entitlement or white Finnish privilege. It makes us feel like saints.
The mixed response of the police, politicians, and the general public in the face of ever-growing xenophobia in this country reveals the extent of our own moral problem.
In the Finnish language, it would read something like the following below:
* The Finnish name for the Finns Party is the Perussuomalaiset (PS). The English names of the party adopted by the PS, like True Finns or Finns Party, promote in our opinion nativist nationalism and xenophobia. We, therefore, prefer to use the Finnish name of the party on our postings.