As an ex muslim, I am worried that the nightmare i left will now take more control here in Finland in the name of multiculturalism,. where certain negative aspects of beliefs are not allowed to be criticized, killing freedom of speech, killing the voice of victims of oppression to a new naive oppression.
When you import immigrants to a country, you also import some of their culture aswell. Sometimes this imported culture can cause problems, sometimes it can even solve problems. But every single time when a different culture is imported, it leads to changes in society. Every nation should be able to have an objective conversation about the degree of changes to their society people are willing to accept.
This is true and I agree. But at least for me, the issue with the immigration conversation here in Finland at least (and I've seen it elsewhere in the west) is that a lot of the people who are the most passionate opposers of immigration and aren't willing to have any nuanced conversation about it are genuinely often times just racist, and therefore very difficult to have any meaningful dialogue with. I've seen more people defend their racist views with the guise of "culture" than people actually making any nuanced criticism of a specific culture. Which I've noticed is because they only want people who they are afraid of or feel distaste towards based on their appearance/ethnicity, language or perceived religion out of their line of sight, not because they actually even know the first thing about any of the cultures that Finland's immigrant population represents and are therefore even capable of critiquing them. And while I agree with Chico, I also quite dislike this narrative of "I haven't experienced racism here so therefore anyone who complains about it is overreacting". I don't mean to put words in Chico's mouth or misrepresent his views so he can correct me if I'm wrong, but I have noticed that especially in immigrant communities there are many immigrants who do form some kind of a superiority complex and internalize this view that because they don't experience racism, that must mean that racism directed towards anyone else is probably partly because of their own wrongdoing. My father being one of them. I was probably also one of them some years ago. Until I grew up and got friends from other immigrant backgrounds (mainly somalians) and noticed that just like most other European countries, Finnish people aren't so much racist based on skincolour, but on perceived nationality and perceived religion. I noticed that I have gotten away with very minimal racism here because I am light skinned, a native Finnish speaker, if I do speak a foreign language in public it's usually English which is favored here, and don't have anything on me that would indicate that I am a muslim. It actually took me one time during a very cold day, unknowingly wrapping my scarf around my head like a hijab, for someone to start screaming "terrorist" at me. I have also on numerous occasions been witness to blatant racism towards somalians literally just existing with their veils on and their children around. Things that I didn't witness or experience during my time living and spending time in my previous neighborhood of Kallio which is kind of a bubble in and of itself. Just because we are from an immigrant background doesn't mean that we are immune to ignorance ourselves.
@@whaleacademic7750 I agree with you 100%. I am from Seinäjoki, more conservative part of Finland. Here I find racism all around me, to a point where it bothers me. Because I'm white and native born, other white Finns don't feel like hiding their racism in font of me. Racism is pretty much cultural here. So many people here are racist or tolerate racism, that often they assume that they can use the N word safely, as long as only white people are listening. If you try to discourage them from using racist terms, they often get upset or even offended. Even as late as 1970's, the N-word was used to to describe black people in Finland. Even schoolbooks used the word when telling about black people. Interestingly, during 1970-1990, the N word was often used to describe almost any non-European ethnic group that had darker skin. Even asians could be called with that word. To me this tells just how isolated Finland was until the 2000's. We had so little contact with other countries that apart from people coming from countries like Sweden, Germany and England, foreigners were considired outsiders. Millenials were the first generation to be taught that N word is a racist slur, but people from older generations try to defend using the word, since the word was taught to them in school. But the racism here goes beyond just slurs, there often is genuine hatred towards immigrants from certain countries. Somalians are possibly the most hated ethnic group where I live. In the town where I was born, people would stare if they saw a muslim wearing a hijab, and you would not be welcome there. When I was in school in 2005, the first black people moved in to my home town. They were professional basketball players from USA and the entire town was talking about them. My teacher was a woman in her 60's the held us a lesson about black men arriving to the town and she taught us how to behave if we encountered them. She had one of the kids pretend to be a black man and he had to walk back and forward in front of the class, and we were not supposed to stare. And yeah, she used the N-word the entire time. When looking back today the whole ordeal was just absurd, it could be from a comedy scetch. But it was the world where I lived in 2005. The world has changed a lot in 20 years. When I grew up, almost everyone around me was white. Now when I walk the streets, there are now people from different ethnicities and you can sometimes hear foreign languages. This wasn't the case 10 years ago. I guess many people haven't adapted to the change yet. Helsinki however is very different, the values there have always been more liberal, and Helsinki was the first place in Finland to experience multiculturalism. And with like many capitals, Helsinki is quite different place when compared to the rest of Finland. Usually the capital does not represent the entire country well. I think that maybe Finnish racism comes partially from the history of our country. Outside from trade, other countries were usually just a threat to Finland. When we had to deal with foreign countries, usually it meant bad news for us. During second world war, when our country was fighting for it's life, the only ones who offered us help were the Nazis. Perhaps that the memory of Nazi Germany being our only ally during our darkest hour, we feel a sense of gratitude to them. This gratitude can perhaps lead to respect, and in some cases even devotion. It is easier to adapt parts of Nazi ideology , if you have deeper connection to them already. Only recently Finland has started to see foreigners and immigrant as an opportunity, rather than just a threat. And in many cases, being naive has led Finland to make poor strategies when it comes to immigration. Finland has often just hoped for the best and decided to ignore arising problems, rather than adressing them. Just like what Sweden did, but luckily we didn't go as far as them. When you have a nation that has a traumatic past and is just getting used to multiculturalism, every time when immigration causes problems, there is a strong defensive reaction and fear among people. If the government does not address these problems and acknowledge the fear, the defensive reaction can turn into hate, which is only a step away from racism. I accidently wrote an entire book :D
Glad to see a Finnish black man speaking common sense here regarding this topic. I strongly oppose the policy of open borders and mass immigration of foreign people, especially of foreign races and religions. Yes, we are one people, and people need to be allowed to move and marry who they want, but there are races and protectionist ethnic nationalism is natural and important I think. A small amount of well integrated foreigners enriches, but ethnic Finns should remain in a strong majority. We should celebrate diversity, and say No to the globalist melting pot agenda! The foreign refugees should be helped in a way so that we doesn't follow through the globalist Kalergi-Plan.
The topic is indeed highly polarized in Finland. Even though you are allowed to talk about it, remaining silent about immigration is often adviced, since people are very eager to label you either a "racist" or "libtard".
Today I happened to see a glimpse of a comment in "Finnish" from a troll-factory opposed to Finland joining the NATO. It was easy to notice it was not from a genuine Finn, because of a blatant language error. So as a protection against the negative aspects multiculturalism it is necessary to keep insisting that Finnish (and to a lesser degree Swedish) is the language in Finland, that every citizen should know well. All kinds of foreign crooks, traffickers, and pushers will not care to learn it, so they'll try to use automatic artificial translators, which are not good enough to conceal a foreign origin, though good enough for good faith communication. In the USA you do have to learn English. In Finland you have to learn Finnish, to keep the Finnish culture living, that culture makes the country the happiest in the world. It may sound like it would not be egalitarian, but egalitarian is just what the Finnish culture is, which we sadly may not call every other country's culture, to be honest. Finns like to be honest, it is one of the foundation pillars! Please, Chico, help making it acceptable for immigrants to Finland, to struggle a bit with learning Finnish, we will help you. I do see many immigrants making huge efforts to communicate in Finnish, to get better opportunities on the job market, and better contacts with Finns in general. English is more difficult for adult Finns to pronounce, than Finnish is for adult fluent English speakers. There is only one sound in Finnish that is not represented in English dialects, and that is the Finnish Y sound. But there are many English sounds which are not at all representented in Finnish, like church, judge, shirts, pleasure, etc. And I'm not talking about the letters in the alphabet, but of the sounds themselves. So any immigrant should be a bit humble and put in two-three hours to work with the *Finnish alphabet* because then they can easily pronounce any written word they happen to see, be it: juustoa, maitoa, junat, kauppahalli, alennusmyynti, tervetuloa, erikoistarjous, leipä, pyörä-tarvikkeet, lasten vaatteet, kengät, pysäkki, or any slang words like bändi, mutsi, or even swear-words like perkele. (Compare the pronunciation of these with google translate, in two speeds.) This effort with for the Finnish alphabet will speed up learning immensely! So any written word you see will give you an opportunity to practice: keskusta, läpikulku kielletty, maistiaiset tänään, uudet talvirenkaat, pesäpallokisat Säynätsalossa, Hämeenkatu, Kyminlaakso. All the best wishes! Lykkyä tykö!!!
Totally agree on the Finnish language. As a native English speaker I was shocked when a candidate for Helsinki mayor proposed making English an official language. In my country we have a very high population of Polish nationals that I’m totally cool about but I couldn’t imagine a local official saying that Polish should be an official language. Your language is part of what sets Finland apart, it’s where your culture, your music, your art, your humour come from as a people. And while Swedish is also culturally relevant here, English speaking cultures is a slippery slope to dull cultural monotony. My country once had its own language but because it was wiped out by English we fell less independent and more influenced by what happens in the rest of the English speaking world. And as much as I struggle with the Finnish language (a lot) I couldn’t imagine people in this wonderful place communicating any other way.
I'm planning to move to Finland one day. I will not consider buying my one-way ticket before: - I am confident I can get a job and/or start a company - I have enough money to live without a job at the beginning if things go wrong for whatever reason - I am at least B2/C1 in Finnish. I couldn't agree more with you about the alphabet. It's totally worth it to invest more time into the basics. That's what I started with while learning French years ago and I decided to take the same approach to Finnish. I was basically practicing pronounciation of different sounds and simple, short words for hours. Repeating, repeating, repeating until I got them right and pronounciation patterns were burnt into my brain. Personally, I don't find the Y sound so bad, I struggled more with the double sounds (aa, ll, ee, etc.). Longer pronounciation didn't feel right at the beginning, especially with the vowels but once I got it right, I didn't have to worry about learning the intonation at all because it comes naturally with correct pronounciation :) Additional benefits: all the words in the language look much less intimidating all of a sudden and you memorize them more easily. It also improves your listening skills because you're able to differentiate better between for example spoken e and ee more easily once you actually repeat it yourself intentionally a hundred times :) That being said, I will probably never speak as good as native speakers and I don't think that's even possible. But I don't think that matters. I'm Polish, and I've worked with foreigners speaking our language (Slovakians, Hungarians, Ukrainians). Polish is also very difficult to learn and we know that. And for real, I have yet to meet a Polish person that would give a damn about a foreigner having a slight foreign accent or conjugating one word in a hundred wrong. As long as you make a real effort to learn our language and bring it to a level we can easily understand each other, work honestly as everyone else does instead of ripping the state off of the benefits, you're going to be fine. I think you will get the same aproach from all other nations in the world. It's a cliche but oftentimes, what you give is what you get.
@@iwona917 '- I am confident I can get a job and/or start a company - I have enough money to live without a job at the beginning if things go wrong for whatever reason - I am at least B2/C1 in Finnish.' I would suggest either setting your sights a little lower or consider another country. - Firstly, unless you're good at tech or have an extremely individual and in-demand talent, as a foreigner, you can never be confident of getting a job in Finland. As for starting a business, it's possible but this will hold back your integration into society here and ruin your chances at long term residence if your fail. There are no certainties in life.' - Finland is expensive, especially Helsinki so unless you are willing to sacrifice luxuries you consider normal in your own country you'll need A LOT to survive in Finland until your first pay check. - This last one is an insane standard to set yourself. Learning Finnish isn't like leaning to code or make a dovetail joint. People I know have lived here 30 years and can't hold a conversation whereas some people (non English speakers usually) learn it in a matter of months. To do this before you're immersed in the culture is nigh on impossible unless you have some access to a pocket of Finnishness where you live. Claiming welfare is not some shameful aspect of life. We all pay for it through our taxes and through our unemployment insurance contributions. During integration training I was reminded not to feel guilty about being on welfare as the country was investing in me. I should've listened because I left the first chance I could get a job, didn't complete the training and to this day struggle with Finnish which has had a knock on to my career prospects. Don't get me wrong, I love your confidence but for your own mental health, give yourself a break. The standards and principles that you set out for yourself now may have to be sacrificed when they meet reality. Or try a country that's a bit easier to move to.
@@Whatshisname346 - I actually work in tech :) And in the field I specialize in you either work in-house for a company that offers these sort of services to their clients or you work as an independent consultant/subcontractor. The latter usually requires registering yourself as a business - that's why I mentioned starting a company because that's what the industry often requires. Finland or not, that's what I aim for eventually but I need more experience. And all the companies I worked with so far are multinationals anyway because there's very little demand for these skills in my country on the local market. So the alternative already is being unemployed, without me even setting my feet in Finland (which actually has higher demand for these jobs). Also, considered my profession is pretty much project-based, I'm pretty used to saving money whenever times are good. In a year from now the project I'm working on will be finished and I don't know if I'm going to have a job afterwards. I might as well get laid off and have to figure it out. I get your point, it's just you're referring to a risk that I had to accept and learn to live with a long time ago. It's definitely not for everyone though, for many people it would cause a lot of unnecessary anxiety. - I've been comparing prices and cost of living in Finland with my country for a couple of months and trust me, with the inflation we have here, Helsinki is in some ways cheaper than my city which is not even the capital. True story: this month my domestic (sic) business trip request was rejected because the cost of accomodation was ridiculous - and I chose the cheapest option in the area, nothing fancy. Even basics like food are super expensive here and people are cutting down on fruits and vegetables in their diets because they can barely afford bread all of a sudden. We have now prices and taxes of the Nordics but without any benefits because public services are close to non-existent. I could go on with examples for hours but my point is, I don't remember sense of stability ever being the status quo here. Today I'm lucky, tomorrow I might not be, change is the only constant, don't ever take anything for granted. - Conversational Finnish... It's 2024 :) You can have classes on Zoom with a native speaker of any language. Good for starters. The reality of course will be different but at the same time it's so much easier when you know at least something because you have some foundation to work on. I had that setback when as non-English native speaker I got exposed to Scottish accent for the first time... Took me a while to understand it and get which sound is what but if I didn't know English at all, I would probably just shut down and wouldn't even try to learn to understand it. Everyone learns the second/third language a bit differently and I think it's important to find the methods that will be effective for you. - I don't have a problem with benefits, unless they're abused. But I simply like working and having a job :) Overall I get your points. And to be honest, I'm not confident it will work out. I'm not confident at all actually, I don't even believe in such thing as confidence, the way I live my life is just try to do my best. Sometimes it works out, sometimes it doesn't. You know, I've met so many people in my life who did everything by the book, followed all the best advice you could think of, always played it safe and reasonable. And failed miserably in the end anyway and had to start from scratch. That's just life, at some point everybody will get kicked in the face even if they did everything right. You gotta find it in you to move on.
I agree. Successfully integrating requires effort both from the people who are immigrating and from the society they are immigrating to, and there is room for improvement on both sides. In my opinion, Finland needs to learn from other countries that are further along, where it has and hasn't gone well. Currently, I am worried that a Rotherham situation is building in eastern Helsinki where immigrant gangs are exploiting young girls. But not many people know or want to talk about it.
Loved the video and couldn't agree more! As a native Finn I found this a very insightful and really quite a unique perspective. Most people with immigrant backgrounds I know experience racism on a weekly if not daily basis so it's nice to know that not everyone has to go through that. We absolutely have to develope an efficient sysytem on integration for immigrant's and a big part of that would have to be making primary and secondary education more available for adults and more importantly more effective methods of teaching our unbelievably complicated language. Without said system the whole nation will collapse because of the aging populace and declining birth rate. As a bonus to that love hearing that at least someone in this country wants to raise kids😂 Best wishes to you in the future and may this awesome channel keep growing!
The language is an incredibly important issue for me as a migrant. The integration system isn’t set up for continuous language education though. I left the system, through employment, with a B1 level of Finnish but since I’ve stated working it’s declined to the point where I’m back to learning verb types and the past tense. If I could recommend something for the system to work on it would be a more pro-active approach to language learning encouraging understanding among employers to facilitate more language learning and better strategies. Secondly I’d put in place more bridging courses for different skills and degrees. These exist in healthcare but are virtually nonexistent in some sectors which have their own regulations and work cultures.
@@Whatshisname346 I've read about those issues in newspaper before and really I struggle to understand why so often not knowing the language is a deal breaker for employers and then the Job doesn't even require it. I've also heard that speaking finnish to finns is almost impossible when it isn't near perfect as they swap to english immideatly. Is that like a usual problem I don't really know bc I never do the swap when the converstaion begins in finnish. I would really like to also hear the input of a learner of the language on teaching spoken vs written finnish in language courses.
@@leooivio It's a deal breaker because most of the Finnish applicants applying have the same/more recognizable qualifications AND can speak the language (and probably English and another European language) fluently. Like it or not if you can communicate with your boss better in an interview than the other candidates that usually lands you the job. And it does sound unfair to some but I know from experience that that dreaded day will come when you get a call from a customer and all you can reply is 'Ehhhhh en puhuu suomea, voisitko puhua englantia?' and the dude hangs up. Then imagine social situations with your colleagues and you're missing 90% of whats going on. So it's not good for you either. As for the speaking Finnish to Finns thing, I think it's changed. When I got here, yes you had this issue because a lot of young people are overly cool, chatty and helpful, regularly changing to English. But all you need to do is try to bring the conversation back to Finnish and they get the message. In conversation with the older generation; there are a lot who don't know a word of English or think they'll embarrass themselves if they try. I've had 1 hour conversations with 60 year old Finns because they also don't talk much! Finally as a learner; trying to learn puhuu kieli (street Finnish) in class is an absolute waste of time. You just need to talk and you'll pick up some of it. But Finns are kind of accommodating even if you use Kirja kieli (proper/written Finnish) all the time. They know it's a tough language and the vast majority are very very patient.
@@Whatshisname346 Thanks! Great poonts in the first paragraph, I hadn't really thought of it that way before. Goodluck in the future you may sadly need it with the 3 months before deported law... wishing All the best to you :).
@@leooivio Nah I'm EU with a Finnish wife and kid. I'll be fine. My fault for picking an industry so tied to economic ups and downs I guess. Look after yourself too. Good luck learning Finnish!
Color/Race does matter. If Finland would become 45% non-Finish, it will almost no longer be considered Finish. Let's take this following hypothetical scenario as an example. Country A takes in many green-color angelic people. These green people are perfect in every aspect. Even better in all metrics when compared to the natives. They are hardworking, kind, clean, non-violent and highly intelligent. They are truly an asset to any country that they migrate to. They are PERFECT! But they have a habit of breeding like rabbit. It has been projected that in 100 years they will become the dominant demographics. And will of course take over, installing their culture, politics as dominant one. Now, is this ok or even preferable even if these green people are PERFECT angelic beings? Race does matter. If you think of China, you think of Han Asian people. You dont think of a Black guy. If a black guy called himself Chinese, people would look at him sideways. A little immigration is not an issue. I would say that a country should strive for keeping the native population at 95% of the total inhabitants. A country doesnt owe any person from another country access to their country. Wanting a better life is no problem of anyone but the person seeking it. Its not a human right to move to another country. Each country should be able to decide whether they want newcomers or not. IF you are fleeing your country, you are fleeing your OWN people. Let that sink in. Remember this. Newcomers will inevitably seek out power to advance their own interest or of those of their groups. We can see this play out at the moment with the Muslims trying to take over. It is human nature. Remember what happened to the Native Americans and the Aboriginals when the Europeans arrived? History keeps repeating, yet so many people fail to learn the lessons.
As a fellow immigrant in Finland (albeit European/white) I understand your point, although I do respectfully slightly disagree with part of it. I speculate the reason places like Sweden have gotten down the drain in regards to immigration and problems with immigrants is because they let immigrants in without having demands. This is of course speculation, but I have heard many times in media and online, people saying that it's somehow racist and/or xenophobic to demand that immigrants learn the local language(s) and assimilate into the culture. Even in my birth country there have been people living there for 20 years who still don't speak the language. That was one of the things that urged me to start learning Finnish as soon as I got here (and yes, it is a different language from what I grew up with, and since I have only lived here just over 1½ year, I still got a long way to go before I can go to the Dr without having to ask for English, but I understand more and more and feel way more confident speaking than when I first came here). I would be ashamed of myself if I thought I could just waddle into Finland and not try to learn Finnish, especially when looking at the history of the Finnish language. (That is also part reason why I don't understand when people say there's no reason to learn Finnish because "practically everyone speaks English anyway") There's more to learning a language than just how to conjugate a verb. It's a whole new world that opens up, and I think it should be required that a person moving to another country at least try to learn the language to the best of their abilities I don't agree 100 % that immigrants always want to overtake the places they go to, and prefer their own culture to the culture of their new home. I moved to Finland because of my relationship, but I new pretty much from the moment I landed the first time I visited the guy who would later become my husband, that this is where I want to grow old and I consider Finland my home and I don't tell people about what's going on where I came from (unless they ask about it, or if it's to my husband) I do read news from there, but I don't go around telling about or expecting anyone else to know or even care about it. Here it is about Finnish news and happenings, and I respect that and embrace that. There are small signs that I am an immigrant (apart from mispronouncing Finnish words) but those small signs are for me, and not for other people I also don't think the race/skincolour is so much the problem here. If a black person or asian person (or anyone else who doesn't look typically white) takes on the task to try and learn the langauge, get's assimilated into society, and embraces the culture, then I don't see why they shouldn't be able to call the host country their new home. It IS a problem if you don't respect the place you go to, or you expect it to change for you. That's what happened in Sweden and it's not a pretty sight. Another immigrant to Finland youtuber said that the country that you move to is like a mother and you should respect her, and I love that analogy
@@Benovip Make no mistake about it, whatever is happening in Europe has been planned well in advance - decades ago. They want to create a global communist dystopia. In order to achieve that, Europe must fall. That is what they mean with the slogan "Build B@ck B€tt€r". One cant build a new house on a lot if its already occupied by an existing house. First the existing house must be destroyed. What better way to achieve this than by importing a demolition team (migrants/soldiers of a particular faith who have a track record of destroying the host country that is stupid enough to give them refuge). It saddens me that majority of people still lack the wisdom to spot their enemy. And the biggest one of them all has always been Big Broth€r. It matters not who is in charge... a m@fia it still remains. We are witnessing the controlled dismantling of the West. All planned... And people who work for Big Brother are professional actors (read professional liars, who obviously cant be trusted) Culture is downstream from Race. This is clearly visible by observing the type of societies different races build. Asian societies for the most part look very identical. Everywhere Europeans take root they build the same type of society and culture. I find it very naive of you to belief every race is the same. Would you say that about any other species? Are golden retrievers behavior similar to a pitbull? We clearly see differences in animals but for some reason we wont accept this is also the case in humans. Being different is ok. Besides. You a foreigner of another race may call your country home, but he will never be Finish. That is just a fact. He may call himself that, but the reality is, he will never be Finish. Just like a black person born in China will never be considered Chinese. Having a Chinese passport dont make you Chinese. Its only white people who dont seem to have any pride in their race. Nor do they want to preserve their history/culture. It is a sickness. Lastly, what exactly is considered integration? Everyone has their own definition. Just ask your boyfriend or any of your friends to define the word. You'll be surprised to find out that majority cant give a clear answer to your question. Notice how they seem to just pull stuff out of their @ss on the spot just to concoct a response. Just expect the cliche answers (language, paying taxes, is nice), which indicate that they are just regurgitating whatever they've heard someone else say. Integration to me is not only the ability to speak the language. Truly integration is to shed your old identity (culture, religion, habits, morals, clothing style, ties to your former home etc) and embrace every aspect of the host country. You no longer see yourself as a member of your former clan. You are reborn. That is what true integration means. But most people have a service level understanding of what it means. You should check out the movie "Midsomar" which is a great thriller about a cult that assimilates a troubled girl. A really good movie to see if you have the time.
I disagree with some of your points. Throught history there have been many instances of mass migration or invasion which ended with that population assimilating into the people of the land they arrived to. There is no people today that is 100% one race as humans have always intermixed with one another. Lets look at the finns for a moment through a little historical look. They are a uralic people that originate from the Ural mountains. They arrived in Finland around 2000 years ago which was already inhabited by other uralic people. Later Sweden colonized Finland and suppressed their culture and identity. Many Finns today have swedish ancestry too. So the point I'm trying to make is that race itself is not something that plays a too big a role in the context of national or cultural identity
@@alexandrosproko9589 There are sub groups in all races. They are very much related and look very similar. All Europeans look similar. You cant mistake a European for an Asian or Black. Sub-groups tends to assimulate better since they look very identical hand share many genetic markers. That is not the case if you compare Europeans to any other race
One thing I strongly disagree with here is that countries fail at integration because of a perceived ‘worshipping at the alter of multiculturalism’. The real reason they fail is because actually integrating people is complicated and expensive. They’d rather wing it and deal with the secondary social problems than create programs which attempt to integrate immigrants. With these programs; you’ll probably get backlash, they may even fail initially so politically it’s easier to ignore this duty. This is a shorttermist attitude but you’re mainly looking at political cultures with 4-5 year cycles; by the time you’ve failed most people can’t remember whose responsibility it was in the first place. The days of profoundly proclaiming your love of multiculturalism for electoral purposes is long gone even if you believe in it.
Governments aren't driven by ideology they're driven by economics and population management. Have a look at the Italian country side, she is literally dying.
Also theres a problem with the political parties and governments here. The right wants to cut down on immigration thinking it will solve all the issues, while they ignore the existing immigrant population who need support and help to assimilate. And the left would like to open up the country for immigration and they dont have a plan to prevent situations such as Rinkeby arising here. Reality is always more complicated than immigration/multiculturalism = good or bad. The fact is that Finlands population is aging and people arent having enough kids to replenish the society and workforce. We will have to find a balance between a working immigration policy and keeping a cohesive society with the future in mind.
I have to be the one to disagree, I have more in common with working class people from Durban then some wealthy property owners from around my place.. The divide has always been around class.
There's a lot of unrest in the Western world related to immigration these days, to put it lightly. I don't think it's all about cultural differences. I'm not saying it's not important, you touched on many important topics, like the fact that there should be no tolerance for violent individuals. But on the other hand, humans have been migrating since forever and majority of people are more than able to sort this stuff out between themselves and even enjoy the experience. The other day I was on a fair event in my city and there were stands run by a couple of people from the Middle East. I live in Poland and you will not find people in Europe who are more afraid of the Middle Easterns than the Poles. But they will also have no problem buying hibiscus flowers from Baghdad. Simply because appreciation for quality product is universal, and trade is more beneficial than extreme competition. I even saw a guy having an open, polite conversation about food rules in Middle East. I might be naive but I really believe that if you simply create a space for people to just talk and get to know each other, they will slowly begin to build their own bridges over the differences. But instead the political reality in the West is that you're either told to accept everything by default, even if you completely don't understand it, or your frustration is used to cause unrest and you become a walking weapon for someone else. Either doesn't really benefit anyone. On top of that, economic reality is not the best. The quality of life in Western countries has been dropping for a while. You have many people who work really hard and still live from paycheck to paycheck just to see their government giving out free apartments, necessities and benefits to migrants who haven't worked a day in the country they came to, using taxpayers' hard earned money. From my own personal perspective - it's annoying enough when my fellow Polish people abuse the state benefits. But what people fail to see is that if your fellow countrymen rip you off, it's usually culturally ok to at least give them sh*t for that. That's how communities and cultures self-regulate and ensure that the groups' behaviour is more or less consistent with the commonly accepted rules. So for example, in Poland, if I meet a lady that's basically been doing nothing in her life except making babies and getting benefits from the state for that which she spends on alcohol instead of the kids, I can freely express my opinion, call her whatever and call the cops if I see child abuse. I do the same with any migrant and I'm racist, intolerant and whatever-phobic. Also, additional influx of people means higher global demand... You take in a couple thousand people in a year and you're not going to notice that but take in a couple of million and you're going to feel the difference. Because if those people don't produce anything and only consume, you're just going to get endlessly growing inflation due to shortage of supply and the quality of life will be dropping even further because production (supply) is not growing so fast as the population that's driving the demand. On the micro level - your salary will not be catching up with the prices. So I can understand the overall frustration that's going on and it has very valid reasons behind it. I don't see any government trying to address those reasons. They're just talking endlessly about demographics but completely fail to put demographics in the context of basic economic laws and analyze the demographic problems while taking into consideration more factors than x and y, ceteris paribus. Reality is not x versus y ceteris paribus, it's a constant mix of x, y, z, a, b, c, d e and f influencing each other all the time. Simple models are good for educational purposes to understand certain phenomena but they're useless for managing real life scenarios. It seems to me it will get worse before it gets better. I really hope Finland will manage to stay more or less away from the madness.
i think the difference is that many of the people coming to these western countries have been colonised at some point by these same european countries. so now when their country of origin have been wiped of resources they go to where those resources are (the western world). Colonisation is normally the beginning of most of these issues
As a mixed raced Aboriginal/white person in Australia, which ostensibly is a pretty racist country, I really appreciate your nuanced discussion about this topic. I don't think people understand the depth of emotions/history which underlie the issues which we all face when it comes to multiculturalism. This was really well made ❤
I would recommend to watch the finnish gangster movie "Rööperi". Or look up the documentaries about Tom Sjöberg, one of Finland's notorious criminals. Which the movie is based on.
About Sweden gang violence isn't new. It’s been like that way since WW2. In the 60s a town called Gävle was called as Sweden's Chicago. Due to the all shooting. Or headlines during those years such as: "The Finns imported the American gang violence's". Sweden never been safe like many people believes. Many of those ghettos, was known as Finn ghettos. I live north of Stockholm projects, where there was a high raise apartment block was known as a "Finn ghetto". Many Finns to whom lived there, was substance's abusers. Weekly died many Finns, that the ambulance had a shuttle services. Personally, had a late uncle that he was a hitman for a notorious biker gang. And why is that? Is because the multi culturism. Everyone haves their own agenda. Included me. We can criticize the society or as a people, we need to pull up our self and to be transparent. With our self.
Ok, lets keep this point in mind. Don't call yourself immigrant (You are not a pink color bird who lives 15 days in in each place) Call yourself Expat "Someone who moves out of the country for work" or asylum seeker. This word Immigrant got really bad reputation in these days.
Point taken. Just want to say, you shouldn't downplay the existence of the far right either, even with them staying mostly in check. Wasn't too long ago the openly fascist and racist Sinimusta Liike (their own words by the way, their leader Tuukka Kuru openly described them as such) was an official political party, and just last year the minister Junnila was openly sharing pictures of swastikas and other far right whistleblowing. Now, Sinimusta's status as an official party has been retracted and Junnila has since resigned, so as I said, they're mostly kept in check, but the movement is still there. This is not to say I disagree with you though. There's already been examples of gang violence here and there at least in Espoo, Vantaa and Vuosaari, so the shit is hitting the fan as we speak, and the problem should be tackled head on much more efficiently and aggressively, if for nothing else then at least to just make the point across that that sort of thing will not be tolerated. Just wanted to point out the threat of violence is stirring from the native Finnish side as well.
Thanks!
Thank you so much!! 🙏🏾🙏🏾✨
As an ex muslim, I am worried that the nightmare i left will now take more control here in Finland in the name of multiculturalism,. where certain negative aspects of beliefs are not allowed to be criticized, killing freedom of speech, killing the voice of victims of oppression to a new naive oppression.
Native Finn here and I couldn't agree more. Subbing!
You are a wise man my friend!
Thank you! As an immigrant myself, living in Helsinki, that's also how I feel, but I'm far right now I guess
Yeah, common sense is called “far-right” nowadays…
Chico being the voice of reason once again. Thanks, man!
When you import immigrants to a country, you also import some of their culture aswell.
Sometimes this imported culture can cause problems, sometimes it can even solve problems. But every single time when a different culture is imported, it leads to changes in society.
Every nation should be able to have an objective conversation about the degree of changes to their society people are willing to accept.
This is true and I agree. But at least for me, the issue with the immigration conversation here in Finland at least (and I've seen it elsewhere in the west) is that a lot of the people who are the most passionate opposers of immigration and aren't willing to have any nuanced conversation about it are genuinely often times just racist, and therefore very difficult to have any meaningful dialogue with. I've seen more people defend their racist views with the guise of "culture" than people actually making any nuanced criticism of a specific culture. Which I've noticed is because they only want people who they are afraid of or feel distaste towards based on their appearance/ethnicity, language or perceived religion out of their line of sight, not because they actually even know the first thing about any of the cultures that Finland's immigrant population represents and are therefore even capable of critiquing them.
And while I agree with Chico, I also quite dislike this narrative of "I haven't experienced racism here so therefore anyone who complains about it is overreacting". I don't mean to put words in Chico's mouth or misrepresent his views so he can correct me if I'm wrong, but I have noticed that especially in immigrant communities there are many immigrants who do form some kind of a superiority complex and internalize this view that because they don't experience racism, that must mean that racism directed towards anyone else is probably partly because of their own wrongdoing. My father being one of them. I was probably also one of them some years ago. Until I grew up and got friends from other immigrant backgrounds (mainly somalians) and noticed that just like most other European countries, Finnish people aren't so much racist based on skincolour, but on perceived nationality and perceived religion. I noticed that I have gotten away with very minimal racism here because I am light skinned, a native Finnish speaker, if I do speak a foreign language in public it's usually English which is favored here, and don't have anything on me that would indicate that I am a muslim. It actually took me one time during a very cold day, unknowingly wrapping my scarf around my head like a hijab, for someone to start screaming "terrorist" at me. I have also on numerous occasions been witness to blatant racism towards somalians literally just existing with their veils on and their children around. Things that I didn't witness or experience during my time living and spending time in my previous neighborhood of Kallio which is kind of a bubble in and of itself. Just because we are from an immigrant background doesn't mean that we are immune to ignorance ourselves.
@@whaleacademic7750 I agree with you 100%. I am from Seinäjoki, more conservative part of Finland. Here I find racism all around me, to a point where it bothers me. Because I'm white and native born, other white Finns don't feel like hiding their racism in font of me. Racism is pretty much cultural here. So many people here are racist or tolerate racism, that often they assume that they can use the N word safely, as long as only white people are listening. If you try to discourage them from using racist terms, they often get upset or even offended.
Even as late as 1970's, the N-word was used to to describe black people in Finland. Even schoolbooks used the word when telling about black people. Interestingly, during 1970-1990, the N word was often used to describe almost any non-European ethnic group that had darker skin. Even asians could be called with that word.
To me this tells just how isolated Finland was until the 2000's. We had so little contact with other countries that apart from people coming from countries like Sweden, Germany and England, foreigners were considired outsiders.
Millenials were the first generation to be taught that N word is a racist slur, but people from older generations try to defend using the word, since the word was taught to them in school.
But the racism here goes beyond just slurs, there often is genuine hatred towards immigrants from certain countries. Somalians are possibly the most hated ethnic group where I live. In the town where I was born, people would stare if they saw a muslim wearing a hijab, and you would not be welcome there.
When I was in school in 2005, the first black people moved in to my home town. They were professional basketball players from USA and the entire town was talking about them. My teacher was a woman in her 60's the held us a lesson about black men arriving to the town and she taught us how to behave if we encountered them. She had one of the kids pretend to be a black man and he had to walk back and forward in front of the class, and we were not supposed to stare. And yeah, she used the N-word the entire time.
When looking back today the whole ordeal was just absurd, it could be from a comedy scetch. But it was the world where I lived in 2005.
The world has changed a lot in 20 years. When I grew up, almost everyone around me was white. Now when I walk the streets, there are now people from different ethnicities and you can sometimes hear foreign languages. This wasn't the case 10 years ago. I guess many people haven't adapted to the change yet. Helsinki however is very different, the values there have always been more liberal, and Helsinki was the first place in Finland to experience multiculturalism.
And with like many capitals, Helsinki is quite different place when compared to the rest of Finland. Usually the capital does not represent the entire country well.
I think that maybe Finnish racism comes partially from the history of our country. Outside from trade, other countries were usually just a threat to Finland. When we had to deal with foreign countries, usually it meant bad news for us.
During second world war, when our country was fighting for it's life, the only ones who offered us help were the Nazis.
Perhaps that the memory of Nazi Germany being our only ally during our darkest hour, we feel a sense of gratitude to them. This gratitude can perhaps lead to respect, and in some cases even devotion.
It is easier to adapt parts of Nazi ideology , if you have deeper connection to them already.
Only recently Finland has started to see foreigners and immigrant as an opportunity, rather than just a threat.
And in many cases, being naive has led Finland to make poor strategies when it comes to immigration. Finland has often just hoped for the best and decided to ignore arising problems, rather than adressing them. Just like what Sweden did, but luckily we didn't go as far as them.
When you have a nation that has a traumatic past and is just getting used to multiculturalism, every time when immigration causes problems, there is a strong defensive reaction and fear among people. If the government does not address these problems and acknowledge the fear, the defensive reaction can turn into hate, which is only a step away from racism.
I accidently wrote an entire book :D
if the influx happens, everything we enjoy in Finland will be lost. American living in Finland here. in America the crime is out of control.
Glad to see a Finnish black man speaking common sense here regarding this topic. I strongly oppose the policy of open borders and mass immigration of foreign people, especially of foreign races and religions. Yes, we are one people, and people need to be allowed to move and marry who they want, but there are races and protectionist ethnic nationalism is natural and important I think. A small amount of well integrated foreigners enriches, but ethnic Finns should remain in a strong majority. We should celebrate diversity, and say No to the globalist melting pot agenda! The foreign refugees should be helped in a way so that we doesn't follow through the globalist Kalergi-Plan.
Sad thing on this subject is that i, as a white person, am not allowed to talk about this subject...
Of course you can criticize immigration and multiculturalism but it is the question of HOW you do it.
You just did talk about it.
@@Whatshisname346 Not really. He spoke about it, in a secondary sense...
mfs that say shit like this are just racist and are mad they get called out for it
The topic is indeed highly polarized in Finland. Even though you are allowed to talk about it, remaining silent about immigration is often adviced, since people are very eager to label you either a "racist" or "libtard".
This is an incredibly important video for many Finns to see. Sadly, they will not hear this message from their own.
Thank you fot this video. I 100% agree with you. Have a nice life here in Fnland!
It is about your attitude and respect for a new culture, and how you integrate into it.
Today I happened to see a glimpse of a comment in "Finnish" from a troll-factory opposed to Finland joining the NATO. It was easy to notice it was not from a genuine Finn, because of a blatant language error. So as a protection against the negative aspects multiculturalism it is necessary to keep insisting that Finnish (and to a lesser degree Swedish) is the language in Finland, that every citizen should know well. All kinds of foreign crooks, traffickers, and pushers will not care to learn it, so they'll try to use automatic artificial translators, which are not good enough to conceal a foreign origin, though good enough for good faith communication. In the USA you do have to learn English. In Finland you have to learn Finnish, to keep the Finnish culture living, that culture makes the country the happiest in the world. It may sound like it would not be egalitarian, but egalitarian is just what the Finnish culture is, which we sadly may not call every other country's culture, to be honest. Finns like to be honest, it is one of the foundation pillars!
Please, Chico, help making it acceptable for immigrants to Finland, to struggle a bit with learning Finnish, we will help you. I do see many immigrants making huge efforts to communicate in Finnish, to get better opportunities on the job market, and better contacts with Finns in general. English is more difficult for adult Finns to pronounce, than Finnish is for adult fluent English speakers. There is only one sound in Finnish that is not represented in English dialects, and that is the Finnish Y sound. But there are many English sounds which are not at all representented in Finnish, like church, judge, shirts, pleasure, etc.
And I'm not talking about the letters in the alphabet, but of the sounds themselves. So any immigrant should be a bit humble and put in two-three hours to work with the *Finnish alphabet* because then they can easily pronounce any written word they happen to see, be it: juustoa, maitoa, junat, kauppahalli, alennusmyynti, tervetuloa, erikoistarjous, leipä, pyörä-tarvikkeet, lasten vaatteet, kengät, pysäkki, or any slang words like bändi, mutsi, or even swear-words like perkele. (Compare the pronunciation of these with google translate, in two speeds.) This effort with for the Finnish alphabet will speed up learning immensely! So any written word you see will give you an opportunity to practice: keskusta, läpikulku kielletty, maistiaiset tänään, uudet talvirenkaat, pesäpallokisat Säynätsalossa, Hämeenkatu, Kyminlaakso.
All the best wishes! Lykkyä tykö!!!
Totally agree on the Finnish language. As a native English speaker I was shocked when a candidate for Helsinki mayor proposed making English an official language.
In my country we have a very high population of Polish nationals that I’m totally cool about but I couldn’t imagine a local official saying that Polish should be an official language.
Your language is part of what sets Finland apart, it’s where your culture, your music, your art, your humour come from as a people. And while Swedish is also culturally relevant here, English speaking cultures is a slippery slope to dull cultural monotony.
My country once had its own language but because it was wiped out by English we fell less independent and more influenced by what happens in the rest of the English speaking world.
And as much as I struggle with the Finnish language (a lot) I couldn’t imagine people in this wonderful place communicating any other way.
I'm planning to move to Finland one day. I will not consider buying my one-way ticket before:
- I am confident I can get a job and/or start a company
- I have enough money to live without a job at the beginning if things go wrong for whatever reason
- I am at least B2/C1 in Finnish.
I couldn't agree more with you about the alphabet. It's totally worth it to invest more time into the basics. That's what I started with while learning French years ago and I decided to take the same approach to Finnish. I was basically practicing pronounciation of different sounds and simple, short words for hours. Repeating, repeating, repeating until I got them right and pronounciation patterns were burnt into my brain. Personally, I don't find the Y sound so bad, I struggled more with the double sounds (aa, ll, ee, etc.). Longer pronounciation didn't feel right at the beginning, especially with the vowels but once I got it right, I didn't have to worry about learning the intonation at all because it comes naturally with correct pronounciation :) Additional benefits: all the words in the language look much less intimidating all of a sudden and you memorize them more easily. It also improves your listening skills because you're able to differentiate better between for example spoken e and ee more easily once you actually repeat it yourself intentionally a hundred times :)
That being said, I will probably never speak as good as native speakers and I don't think that's even possible. But I don't think that matters. I'm Polish, and I've worked with foreigners speaking our language (Slovakians, Hungarians, Ukrainians). Polish is also very difficult to learn and we know that. And for real, I have yet to meet a Polish person that would give a damn about a foreigner having a slight foreign accent or conjugating one word in a hundred wrong. As long as you make a real effort to learn our language and bring it to a level we can easily understand each other, work honestly as everyone else does instead of ripping the state off of the benefits, you're going to be fine. I think you will get the same aproach from all other nations in the world. It's a cliche but oftentimes, what you give is what you get.
@@iwona917
'- I am confident I can get a job and/or start a company
- I have enough money to live without a job at the beginning if things go wrong for whatever reason
- I am at least B2/C1 in Finnish.'
I would suggest either setting your sights a little lower or consider another country.
- Firstly, unless you're good at tech or have an extremely individual and in-demand talent, as a foreigner, you can never be confident of getting a job in Finland. As for starting a business, it's possible but this will hold back your integration into society here and ruin your chances at long term residence if your fail. There are no certainties in life.'
- Finland is expensive, especially Helsinki so unless you are willing to sacrifice luxuries you consider normal in your own country you'll need A LOT to survive in Finland until your first pay check.
- This last one is an insane standard to set yourself. Learning Finnish isn't like leaning to code or make a dovetail joint. People I know have lived here 30 years and can't hold a conversation whereas some people (non English speakers usually) learn it in a matter of months. To do this before you're immersed in the culture is nigh on impossible unless you have some access to a pocket of Finnishness where you live.
Claiming welfare is not some shameful aspect of life. We all pay for it through our taxes and through our unemployment insurance contributions. During integration training I was reminded not to feel guilty about being on welfare as the country was investing in me. I should've listened because I left the first chance I could get a job, didn't complete the training and to this day struggle with Finnish which has had a knock on to my career prospects.
Don't get me wrong, I love your confidence but for your own mental health, give yourself a break. The standards and principles that you set out for yourself now may have to be sacrificed when they meet reality. Or try a country that's a bit easier to move to.
@@Whatshisname346
- I actually work in tech :) And in the field I specialize in you either work in-house for a company that offers these sort of services to their clients or you work as an independent consultant/subcontractor. The latter usually requires registering yourself as a business - that's why I mentioned starting a company because that's what the industry often requires. Finland or not, that's what I aim for eventually but I need more experience. And all the companies I worked with so far are multinationals anyway because there's very little demand for these skills in my country on the local market. So the alternative already is being unemployed, without me even setting my feet in Finland (which actually has higher demand for these jobs). Also, considered my profession is pretty much project-based, I'm pretty used to saving money whenever times are good. In a year from now the project I'm working on will be finished and I don't know if I'm going to have a job afterwards. I might as well get laid off and have to figure it out. I get your point, it's just you're referring to a risk that I had to accept and learn to live with a long time ago. It's definitely not for everyone though, for many people it would cause a lot of unnecessary anxiety.
- I've been comparing prices and cost of living in Finland with my country for a couple of months and trust me, with the inflation we have here, Helsinki is in some ways cheaper than my city which is not even the capital. True story: this month my domestic (sic) business trip request was rejected because the cost of accomodation was ridiculous - and I chose the cheapest option in the area, nothing fancy. Even basics like food are super expensive here and people are cutting down on fruits and vegetables in their diets because they can barely afford bread all of a sudden. We have now prices and taxes of the Nordics but without any benefits because public services are close to non-existent. I could go on with examples for hours but my point is, I don't remember sense of stability ever being the status quo here. Today I'm lucky, tomorrow I might not be, change is the only constant, don't ever take anything for granted.
- Conversational Finnish... It's 2024 :) You can have classes on Zoom with a native speaker of any language. Good for starters. The reality of course will be different but at the same time it's so much easier when you know at least something because you have some foundation to work on. I had that setback when as non-English native speaker I got exposed to Scottish accent for the first time... Took me a while to understand it and get which sound is what but if I didn't know English at all, I would probably just shut down and wouldn't even try to learn to understand it. Everyone learns the second/third language a bit differently and I think it's important to find the methods that will be effective for you.
- I don't have a problem with benefits, unless they're abused. But I simply like working and having a job :)
Overall I get your points. And to be honest, I'm not confident it will work out. I'm not confident at all actually, I don't even believe in such thing as confidence, the way I live my life is just try to do my best. Sometimes it works out, sometimes it doesn't. You know, I've met so many people in my life who did everything by the book, followed all the best advice you could think of, always played it safe and reasonable. And failed miserably in the end anyway and had to start from scratch. That's just life, at some point everybody will get kicked in the face even if they did everything right. You gotta find it in you to move on.
Well put, you seem to be a very smart dude👏
I agree. Successfully integrating requires effort both from the people who are immigrating and from the society they are immigrating to, and there is room for improvement on both sides. In my opinion, Finland needs to learn from other countries that are further along, where it has and hasn't gone well. Currently, I am worried that a Rotherham situation is building in eastern Helsinki where immigrant gangs are exploiting young girls. But not many people know or want to talk about it.
Wise words!
Thank you!
Loved the video and couldn't agree more! As a native Finn I found this a very insightful and really quite a unique perspective. Most people with immigrant backgrounds I know experience racism on a weekly if not daily basis so it's nice to know that not everyone has to go through that.
We absolutely have to develope an efficient sysytem on integration for immigrant's and a big part of that would have to be making primary and secondary education more available for adults and more importantly more effective methods of teaching our unbelievably complicated language. Without said system the whole nation will collapse because of the aging populace and declining birth rate.
As a bonus to that love hearing that at least someone in this country wants to raise kids😂
Best wishes to you in the future and may this awesome channel keep growing!
The language is an incredibly important issue for me as a migrant. The integration system isn’t set up for continuous language education though.
I left the system, through employment, with a B1 level of Finnish but since I’ve stated working it’s declined to the point where I’m back to learning verb types and the past tense.
If I could recommend something for the system to work on it would be a more pro-active approach to language learning encouraging understanding among employers to facilitate more language learning and better strategies. Secondly I’d put in place more bridging courses for different skills and degrees. These exist in healthcare but are virtually nonexistent in some sectors which have their own regulations and work cultures.
@@Whatshisname346 I've read about those issues in newspaper before and really I struggle to understand why so often not knowing the language is a deal breaker for employers and then the Job doesn't even require it.
I've also heard that speaking finnish to finns is almost impossible when it isn't near perfect as they swap to english immideatly. Is that like a usual problem I don't really know bc I never do the swap when the converstaion begins in finnish. I would really like to also hear the input of a learner of the language on teaching spoken vs written finnish in language courses.
@@leooivio It's a deal breaker because most of the Finnish applicants applying have the same/more recognizable qualifications AND can speak the language (and probably English and another European language) fluently. Like it or not if you can communicate with your boss better in an interview than the other candidates that usually lands you the job. And it does sound unfair to some but I know from experience that that dreaded day will come when you get a call from a customer and all you can reply is 'Ehhhhh en puhuu suomea, voisitko puhua englantia?' and the dude hangs up. Then imagine social situations with your colleagues and you're missing 90% of whats going on. So it's not good for you either.
As for the speaking Finnish to Finns thing, I think it's changed. When I got here, yes you had this issue because a lot of young people are overly cool, chatty and helpful, regularly changing to English. But all you need to do is try to bring the conversation back to Finnish and they get the message. In conversation with the older generation; there are a lot who don't know a word of English or think they'll embarrass themselves if they try. I've had 1 hour conversations with 60 year old Finns because they also don't talk much!
Finally as a learner; trying to learn puhuu kieli (street Finnish) in class is an absolute waste of time. You just need to talk and you'll pick up some of it. But Finns are kind of accommodating even if you use Kirja kieli (proper/written Finnish) all the time. They know it's a tough language and the vast majority are very very patient.
@@Whatshisname346 Thanks! Great poonts in the first paragraph, I hadn't really thought of it that way before. Goodluck in the future you may sadly need it with the 3 months before deported law... wishing All the best to you :).
@@leooivio Nah I'm EU with a Finnish wife and kid. I'll be fine. My fault for picking an industry so tied to economic ups and downs I guess. Look after yourself too. Good luck learning Finnish!
Color/Race does matter. If Finland would become 45% non-Finish, it will almost no longer be considered Finish. Let's take this following hypothetical scenario as an example. Country A takes in many green-color angelic people. These green people are perfect in every aspect. Even better in all metrics when compared to the natives. They are hardworking, kind, clean, non-violent and highly intelligent. They are truly an asset to any country that they migrate to. They are PERFECT! But they have a habit of breeding like rabbit. It has been projected that in 100 years they will become the dominant demographics. And will of course take over, installing their culture, politics as dominant one. Now, is this ok or even preferable even if these green people are PERFECT angelic beings?
Race does matter. If you think of China, you think of Han Asian people. You dont think of a Black guy. If a black guy called himself Chinese, people would look at him sideways. A little immigration is not an issue. I would say that a country should strive for keeping the native population at 95% of the total inhabitants. A country doesnt owe any person from another country access to their country. Wanting a better life is no problem of anyone but the person seeking it. Its not a human right to move to another country. Each country should be able to decide whether they want newcomers or not. IF you are fleeing your country, you are fleeing your OWN people. Let that sink in.
Remember this. Newcomers will inevitably seek out power to advance their own interest or of those of their groups. We can see this play out at the moment with the Muslims trying to take over. It is human nature. Remember what happened to the Native Americans and the Aboriginals when the Europeans arrived? History keeps repeating, yet so many people fail to learn the lessons.
As a fellow immigrant in Finland (albeit European/white) I understand your point, although I do respectfully slightly disagree with part of it. I speculate the reason places like Sweden have gotten down the drain in regards to immigration and problems with immigrants is because they let immigrants in without having demands. This is of course speculation, but I have heard many times in media and online, people saying that it's somehow racist and/or xenophobic to demand that immigrants learn the local language(s) and assimilate into the culture. Even in my birth country there have been people living there for 20 years who still don't speak the language. That was one of the things that urged me to start learning Finnish as soon as I got here (and yes, it is a different language from what I grew up with, and since I have only lived here just over 1½ year, I still got a long way to go before I can go to the Dr without having to ask for English, but I understand more and more and feel way more confident speaking than when I first came here). I would be ashamed of myself if I thought I could just waddle into Finland and not try to learn Finnish, especially when looking at the history of the Finnish language. (That is also part reason why I don't understand when people say there's no reason to learn Finnish because "practically everyone speaks English anyway") There's more to learning a language than just how to conjugate a verb. It's a whole new world that opens up, and I think it should be required that a person moving to another country at least try to learn the language to the best of their abilities
I don't agree 100 % that immigrants always want to overtake the places they go to, and prefer their own culture to the culture of their new home. I moved to Finland because of my relationship, but I new pretty much from the moment I landed the first time I visited the guy who would later become my husband, that this is where I want to grow old and I consider Finland my home and I don't tell people about what's going on where I came from (unless they ask about it, or if it's to my husband) I do read news from there, but I don't go around telling about or expecting anyone else to know or even care about it. Here it is about Finnish news and happenings, and I respect that and embrace that. There are small signs that I am an immigrant (apart from mispronouncing Finnish words) but those small signs are for me, and not for other people
I also don't think the race/skincolour is so much the problem here. If a black person or asian person (or anyone else who doesn't look typically white) takes on the task to try and learn the langauge, get's assimilated into society, and embraces the culture, then I don't see why they shouldn't be able to call the host country their new home.
It IS a problem if you don't respect the place you go to, or you expect it to change for you. That's what happened in Sweden and it's not a pretty sight. Another immigrant to Finland youtuber said that the country that you move to is like a mother and you should respect her, and I love that analogy
@@Benovip Make no mistake about it, whatever is happening in Europe has been planned well in advance - decades ago. They want to create a global communist dystopia. In order to achieve that, Europe must fall. That is what they mean with the slogan "Build B@ck B€tt€r". One cant build a new house on a lot if its already occupied by an existing house. First the existing house must be destroyed. What better way to achieve this than by importing a demolition team (migrants/soldiers of a particular faith who have a track record of destroying the host country that is stupid enough to give them refuge).
It saddens me that majority of people still lack the wisdom to spot their enemy. And the biggest one of them all has always been Big Broth€r. It matters not who is in charge... a m@fia it still remains. We are witnessing the controlled dismantling of the West. All planned... And people who work for Big Brother are professional actors (read professional liars, who obviously cant be trusted)
Culture is downstream from Race. This is clearly visible by observing the type of societies different races build. Asian societies for the most part look very identical. Everywhere Europeans take root they build the same type of society and culture. I find it very naive of you to belief every race is the same. Would you say that about any other species? Are golden retrievers behavior similar to a pitbull? We clearly see differences in animals but for some reason we wont accept this is also the case in humans. Being different is ok. Besides. You a foreigner of another race may call your country home, but he will never be Finish. That is just a fact. He may call himself that, but the reality is, he will never be Finish. Just like a black person born in China will never be considered Chinese. Having a Chinese passport dont make you Chinese. Its only white people who dont seem to have any pride in their race. Nor do they want to preserve their history/culture. It is a sickness.
Lastly, what exactly is considered integration? Everyone has their own definition. Just ask your boyfriend or any of your friends to define the word. You'll be surprised to find out that majority cant give a clear answer to your question. Notice how they seem to just pull stuff out of their @ss on the spot just to concoct a response. Just expect the cliche answers (language, paying taxes, is nice), which indicate that they are just regurgitating whatever they've heard someone else say.
Integration to me is not only the ability to speak the language. Truly integration is to shed your old identity (culture, religion, habits, morals, clothing style, ties to your former home etc) and embrace every aspect of the host country. You no longer see yourself as a member of your former clan. You are reborn. That is what true integration means. But most people have a service level understanding of what it means. You should check out the movie "Midsomar" which is a great thriller about a cult that assimilates a troubled girl. A really good movie to see if you have the time.
I disagree with some of your points. Throught history there have been many instances of mass migration or invasion which ended with that population assimilating into the people of the land they arrived to. There is no people today that is 100% one race as humans have always intermixed with one another.
Lets look at the finns for a moment through a little historical look. They are a uralic people that originate from the Ural mountains. They arrived in Finland around 2000 years ago which was already inhabited by other uralic people. Later Sweden colonized Finland and suppressed their culture and identity. Many Finns today have swedish ancestry too. So the point I'm trying to make is that race itself is not something that plays a too big a role in the context of national or cultural identity
@@alexandrosproko9589 There are sub groups in all races. They are very much related and look very similar. All Europeans look similar. You cant mistake a European for an Asian or Black. Sub-groups tends to assimulate better since they look very identical hand share many genetic markers. That is not the case if you compare Europeans to any other race
Hi, Chico love all your videos...Can you make a video about special needs education in Finland? Thank you, more power to your channel🌺
One thing I strongly disagree with here is that countries fail at integration because of a perceived ‘worshipping at the alter of multiculturalism’. The real reason they fail is because actually integrating people is complicated and expensive. They’d rather wing it and deal with the secondary social problems than create programs which attempt to integrate immigrants. With these programs; you’ll probably get backlash, they may even fail initially so politically it’s easier to ignore this duty.
This is a shorttermist attitude but you’re mainly looking at political cultures with 4-5 year cycles; by the time you’ve failed most people can’t remember whose responsibility it was in the first place.
The days of profoundly proclaiming your love of multiculturalism for electoral purposes is long gone even if you believe in it.
And how do you know, you're only dealing with the secondary problems and not the main problem(s)?
Governments aren't driven by ideology they're driven by economics and population management. Have a look at the Italian country side, she is literally dying.
Amazing video. I’m called racist and far right a lot, and would be happy to buy you a coffee
... and multi-culturalism is a misnomer. Each place has its prevailing mono culture.
Also theres a problem with the political parties and governments here. The right wants to cut down on immigration thinking it will solve all the issues, while they ignore the existing immigrant population who need support and help to assimilate. And the left would like to open up the country for immigration and they dont have a plan to prevent situations such as Rinkeby arising here. Reality is always more complicated than immigration/multiculturalism = good or bad. The fact is that Finlands population is aging and people arent having enough kids to replenish the society and workforce. We will have to find a balance between a working immigration policy and keeping a cohesive society with the future in mind.
I have to be the one to disagree, I have more in common with working class people from Durban then some wealthy property owners from around my place.. The divide has always been around class.
There's a lot of unrest in the Western world related to immigration these days, to put it lightly. I don't think it's all about cultural differences. I'm not saying it's not important, you touched on many important topics, like the fact that there should be no tolerance for violent individuals. But on the other hand, humans have been migrating since forever and majority of people are more than able to sort this stuff out between themselves and even enjoy the experience. The other day I was on a fair event in my city and there were stands run by a couple of people from the Middle East. I live in Poland and you will not find people in Europe who are more afraid of the Middle Easterns than the Poles. But they will also have no problem buying hibiscus flowers from Baghdad. Simply because appreciation for quality product is universal, and trade is more beneficial than extreme competition. I even saw a guy having an open, polite conversation about food rules in Middle East. I might be naive but I really believe that if you simply create a space for people to just talk and get to know each other, they will slowly begin to build their own bridges over the differences. But instead the political reality in the West is that you're either told to accept everything by default, even if you completely don't understand it, or your frustration is used to cause unrest and you become a walking weapon for someone else. Either doesn't really benefit anyone.
On top of that, economic reality is not the best. The quality of life in Western countries has been dropping for a while. You have many people who work really hard and still live from paycheck to paycheck just to see their government giving out free apartments, necessities and benefits to migrants who haven't worked a day in the country they came to, using taxpayers' hard earned money. From my own personal perspective - it's annoying enough when my fellow Polish people abuse the state benefits. But what people fail to see is that if your fellow countrymen rip you off, it's usually culturally ok to at least give them sh*t for that. That's how communities and cultures self-regulate and ensure that the groups' behaviour is more or less consistent with the commonly accepted rules. So for example, in Poland, if I meet a lady that's basically been doing nothing in her life except making babies and getting benefits from the state for that which she spends on alcohol instead of the kids, I can freely express my opinion, call her whatever and call the cops if I see child abuse. I do the same with any migrant and I'm racist, intolerant and whatever-phobic.
Also, additional influx of people means higher global demand... You take in a couple thousand people in a year and you're not going to notice that but take in a couple of million and you're going to feel the difference. Because if those people don't produce anything and only consume, you're just going to get endlessly growing inflation due to shortage of supply and the quality of life will be dropping even further because production (supply) is not growing so fast as the population that's driving the demand. On the micro level - your salary will not be catching up with the prices.
So I can understand the overall frustration that's going on and it has very valid reasons behind it. I don't see any government trying to address those reasons. They're just talking endlessly about demographics but completely fail to put demographics in the context of basic economic laws and analyze the demographic problems while taking into consideration more factors than x and y, ceteris paribus. Reality is not x versus y ceteris paribus, it's a constant mix of x, y, z, a, b, c, d e and f influencing each other all the time. Simple models are good for educational purposes to understand certain phenomena but they're useless for managing real life scenarios. It seems to me it will get worse before it gets better. I really hope Finland will manage to stay more or less away from the madness.
i think the difference is that many of the people coming to these western countries have been colonised at some point by these same european countries. so now when their country of origin have been wiped of resources they go to where those resources are (the western world). Colonisation is normally the beginning of most of these issues
Race does matter there is a reason ahy Finland is named Finn land lol
I would think, the Finnish Greens and the left do not like you at all😅
As a mixed raced Aboriginal/white person in Australia, which ostensibly is a pretty racist country, I really appreciate your nuanced discussion about this topic. I don't think people understand the depth of emotions/history which underlie the issues which we all face when it comes to multiculturalism. This was really well made ❤
I would recommend to watch the finnish gangster movie "Rööperi". Or look up the documentaries about Tom Sjöberg, one of Finland's notorious criminals. Which the movie is based on.
About Sweden gang violence isn't new. It’s been like that way since WW2. In the 60s a town called Gävle was called as Sweden's Chicago. Due to the all shooting. Or headlines during those years such as: "The Finns imported the American gang violence's".
Sweden never been safe like many people believes. Many of those ghettos, was known as Finn ghettos. I live north of Stockholm projects, where there was a high raise apartment block was known as a "Finn ghetto". Many Finns to whom lived there, was substance's abusers. Weekly died many Finns, that the ambulance had a shuttle services. Personally, had a late uncle that he was a hitman for a notorious biker gang.
And why is that? Is because the multi culturism. Everyone haves their own agenda. Included me. We can criticize the society or as a people, we need to pull up our self and to be transparent. With our self.
Ok, lets keep this point in mind.
Don't call yourself immigrant (You are not a pink color bird who lives 15 days in in each place)
Call yourself Expat "Someone who moves out of the country for work"
or asylum seeker.
This word Immigrant got really bad reputation in these days.
Point taken. Just want to say, you shouldn't downplay the existence of the far right either, even with them staying mostly in check. Wasn't too long ago the openly fascist and racist Sinimusta Liike (their own words by the way, their leader Tuukka Kuru openly described them as such) was an official political party, and just last year the minister Junnila was openly sharing pictures of swastikas and other far right whistleblowing. Now, Sinimusta's status as an official party has been retracted and Junnila has since resigned, so as I said, they're mostly kept in check, but the movement is still there.
This is not to say I disagree with you though. There's already been examples of gang violence here and there at least in Espoo, Vantaa and Vuosaari, so the shit is hitting the fan as we speak, and the problem should be tackled head on much more efficiently and aggressively, if for nothing else then at least to just make the point across that that sort of thing will not be tolerated. Just wanted to point out the threat of violence is stirring from the native Finnish side as well.