Part one and two: Vet
en finländare något om
rasism?
Does A Finn REALLY Know
Anything...
About Racism?
2007
Österbottningen tidning: 11th February 2007. Original Swedish text
speak no evil, see no evil, hear no evil.
Interesting subject! Yet again, it seems the problem of man's inhumanity to man creeps up yet again in our city. Recently, I have read in this newspaper and K-P newspaper about the ongoing subject of racism in Karleby. People are asked if they think it exists or not? Some are upset to read that Karleby has been put in a boxed and labeled "the most racist city of Finland". I am not sure if it is in fact.
In Lahti for example, one drunk man, early in the morning, began
screaming at me that, in his words: You are stealing all the
money from us Finns and you are also stealing our women!
(Referring to dark skinned foreigners in Finland). I tried to reply
to him that I work for whatever money I have gotten here, pay taxes
like any other, and that a foreigner cannot: "steal
women". I went on to inform him that If a finnish woman
decides to be with a foreigner, that is her prerogative. This is not
the stone age... However the man was too drunk to really understand,
but it gave me some perspective of how some folk
perceive us here.
Years later I moved from Lahti to Tampere in the late 1980's. I had a professor friend of mine visiting me from the University of New York. It was a beautiful summer day and I invited her to lunch. It was her first time to Finland and she was excited to meet the people and learn of the culture, customs.... I took her to this nice restaurant on the river there in the center. As we walked in, suddenly everyone immediately stopped talking... We took a table and just went on with our conversation, when seemingly out of the blue, a drunk woman approached our table and began harassing us.
She went all to call my friend and me, everything but children of God. The next thing I knew, she literally pushed my friend out of her chair, on to the floor. While all of this was taking place, not one waiter, nor the manager of the establishment, nor any of the customers did anything to help us, or to get the drunk woman off of the premises... No one did nothing at all? I picked my friend up from the ground, said a few ignited words to the management and we left. When I shared this with some of my closest finnish friends they did not believe me at all. It was a sad feeling because if your friends do not believe you, then where do you turn?
The next day we were in the city of Imatra, where I was appearing at the Imatra Big Band Festival. Again, a beautiful day as we strolled along the street near the water dam. Suddenly, from across the street, a car full of young men started screaming all kinds of vulgar slang about my friend and me. She asked if or not I heard what they were saying, but I tried to tell her to ignore it, thinking these guys would eventually stop. But no! They drove on the other side of the street, where we were, and began to heckle and carry on, all while hundreds of festival on-lookers either laughed, or tried to act as though they saw and heard nothing.
Long story short, my friend "promised" me at her departure at the airport, that as soon as she returned to New York, she would write a full 4 page article for the university, on her experiences in Finland. I tried to tell her that these were isolated situations, but for her, that is the impression she had of a country that I am still happy to call home.
While ministering at a gospel festival in the city of Joensuu, my friends that live there, would not even let me go out on the streets alone at night, because they were worried about my safety. When one friend saw me walking alone in the city one night, he ran up to me and offered to stay with me and walk me back to my hotel (for my own safety).
The fact was, was that evening, some guys were calling me all kinds of disgusting names while I was trying to enjoy the city while working there, but I ignored them. Others who heard the ugly shouts, appeared to have been deaf, for they said nothing in my defense. My friend was saddened by all of this though it was not his fault. Still he was ashamed. It is like the world has lost all of its compassion for another human being.
In K-P newspaper, I also read that 6 people were asked if or not they were afraid to go out at night in Karleby. Out of all the people interviewed, only one was a young man. It is odd to me that it is usually women and foreigners that are often abused and usually at night.
I have written before over the decades in various articles about racism. However I find it odd that still, when I read articles today, that 99% of the people interviewed about the subject, are not foreigners but Finns? Now there is nothing wrong with asking Finns what they think about the matter. But I think it is even more interesting, to ask those who actually have to live these kinds of things, on a daily basis. It is then that we are begin to understand the reality of it all.
We have a saying in France, that if someone wants to know the facts or the reality of a situation: "Get it from the horses' mouth". Ok. It is not such a pretty expression, but it literally means: go to the source.
Many foreigners have already come to Karleby as refugees and have experienced hardships in their own land. So naturally they do not want to put themselves in what might seem like an ungrateful light in the eyes of the locals, with a government that has kindly received them and given them refuge. And I understand. Never-the-less, someone has to say something or the problem just goes on and on.
Sometimes people just do not know how to address the problem. But I think that simply asking, simply discussing it, constructively, can be a beginning.
I can personally say, that I have never been physically attacked in Karleby or elsewhere in Finland by neo-nazis, or people that are just against any foreigner coming to Finland. But attacks do not have to be "physical" for them to hurt. And that expression that says: "sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me", is a lie. Words do hurt, especially when you are alone and in an already difficult situation when you arrive in another country.
Sometimes when I have had visitors, and they are looking through my dvds for example; they see a dvd concerning the Nazi Party in Finland and others dealing with racial matters in the country. Most comment that I should discard them; that they are not true and there is no such thing going on in Finland, etc. Even when some have the truth directly in their face, still they sometimes will choose to ignore it. Information is power. But it is how we use it, is what determines what the outcome will be.
More than anything, I am concerned that young people, who are innocent in the beginning, if they are taught such things as seen in some distasteful material, it will plant seeds of hate. I want help at least, in my own small way, to deter that at all costs. There is a positive and a negative force in this world. I prefer the first and believe that good still rules over evil.
It reminds me of the days I grew up in Dallas, when my family and friends had to deal often with the Klu Klux Klan and other such organisations. When white people were interviewed in the newspaper, or on tv, they would always say that such "organisations" did not exist, or sometimes just the reverse and bluntly state that: "we should ship all them niggers back to Africa where they came from!" Some folk, 50 years later, still sadly think the same way...
One man told me that here in Finland just what the klan said above, and me, taking what he had to say with a grain of salt, I smiled and told him that I had recently come back from Africa in fact; that it was a beautiful and fascinating land and I would be happy to go back there again to visit someday. He was speechless... Of course what he said to me about going back to Africa, was not a suggestion for me to have a short holiday there... But I think he was more shocked that I had the audacity to even respond to him...
Many ask me if the Church ever has discussions about racism. If racism exists not only outside of the church, but likewise if it exists in some churches themselves? I have never been approached to speak about this particular subject per se in any church, nor have I ever met any other foreigner that has said that they have been.
However about 20 years ago, before I even moved here from Paris to live, I was invited by the Helsinki Cultural Department, to have a one-hour lecture on Racism in Finland. That one hour lecture turned into a 3 day event, where the conference room was standing room only. Some of the questions were tough and I was not really expecting racists to be in the audience. At the same time, it challenged me to speak directly to them and to find out why they thought what they thought. Others, welcomed the idea of foreigners coming to live and work in Finland. It was fruitful in the end and I think we all left with more constructive information to take home and ponder over, than when we first arrived.
I think it would be a good thing to see more interviews; read more articles, written by foreigners, living in Finland, from their own personal experiences. Who would know better anyway? I think it would be a good idea for all the various denominations of Karleby; the city's' Cultural Department; schools etc, to organise on a more consistant basis, open forum meetings; having everyone openly voice their opinions of such an important matter.
If a racist is dying in a hospital and he needs blood, he is not going to ask if the blood is from a black man or not. He simply wants to live. And that is what it is all about, living. We should respect all people, no matter where they come from or what they look like. Here's part of a lyric that I have sung since childhood and food for thought these days: No man is an island, no man stands alone. Each man's joy is joy to me, Each man's grief is my own. We need one another, so I will defend, Each man as my brother. Each man as my friend.
Christian-Charles de
Plicque
Angel House International Missions Ministries Association
Karleby Finland
available also in Swedish and French
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