Romania insulted once again - on an FN blog

(Photo source: EVZ) Here we go again... Romania feels the swipe from France once more with yet another racist 'joke'. It is one thing to make fun of individuals, but that is rarely the case when it comes to Romania. Instead, the whole country is tarnished with the same negative brush.

Last night on Europe 1, Louis Aliot, number 2 of France's National Front Party, had to explain the presence of racist caricatures on the blog of an FN member.

Clearly embarrassed, Aliot said he was surprised, as the caricatures were clearly distasteful.

One of these drawings, signed by Stéphane Poncet, an FN candidate for Villeurbanne (Rhône), shows a Romanian Father Christmas "easy to recognise" as he "goes in through the door" (rather than down the chimney) and leaves "with a flat screen" tucked under his arm. The black community in France were also insulted in other offensive sketches.

Louis Aliot vowed to get to the bottom of the issue and promised there would be consequences. Read the full story HERE in French and HERE in Romanian.

The one comfort this time, if one can call it such, is that this comes from the FNP (headed by Marine Le Pen) - a party known for its racial intolerance throughout France, and thus, few people pay much attention - except those that support the party, of course. However, this falls at a time where the Romanian reputation is poor to say the least and few bother to make the difference between those that thieve and those that do not. To many, all Romanians are thieves, wear long skirts and headscarves, heartlessly traffic their children, belong to mafia groups and beg on the streets throughout the west. This kind of slander aimed at a whole people does nothing to calm such perception. No one ever bothers to report on the Romanian diaspora who hold down good, decent jobs, work damn hard and pay their taxes, nor those at the Sorbonne studying for secure and promising futures. They are Romanian, too - and proud to be. And so they should be.

"But it's just a joke!" I'm told. Hilarious. Not. Interior Minister Claude Guéant's nauseating comments, Christophe Lambert's "salut roumain", attacks by commentators of the radio station Europe 1 and Larqué and Roland's "le sport national en Roumanie n’est pas le football, mais la mendicité" are NOT funny. They are offensive and insulting.

The French media (and any other country's media) has huge power in the cultivation of certain views about reality and should be FAR stricter about what is said and what is not - along with the reprisals dealt out when things like this happen. In a country that professes to be 'tolerant' (the very use of the word shows it is not), this is simply unacceptable.

Romania has the largest community of gypsies (about 2 million) in Europe, in which the majority have Romanian nationality and Romanian documentation. Since 1st January 2007, everyone has been given the same right to travel freely within the EU using an ID card. Since then, the Rroma and the Romanians have been thrown into the same bucket and all racial distinction aimed at the two parties has been in bad faith, leading to very dangerous stigmatisation. Through ignorance and a complete absence of will to understand both cultural and ethnic differences, the problem grows larger and more serious as time passes. No one seems able to solve it - and those in positions of responsibility don't even bother to try. The question remains as to whose problem it actually is. Should Romania crack down on certain people's rights to 'free travel' or should the rest of Europe be dealing with it? Probably both, because the 'problem' now belongs to us all - whether we are Romanian or not.

Briefly, here's the bottom line: Romanians are not Rroma, but many Rroma are Romanian. Some are also Albanian, Slovac, Bulgarian... Nationality and ethnicity. All Rroma are not thieves and neither are all Romanians. As Mehdi Chebana writing for Roumanophilie says, "c’est comme les agents de la SNCF, il y a les bons, et les mauvais…" Like everywhere. Stereotyping is ignorant, uneducated, stupid - and dangerous.

Got it? It's NOT funny.

However, news just in: a response to Mos Craciun (Father Christmas) has been prompt and IS funny - full marks for sense of humour in the face of adversity - "Watch out for the Romanian Father Christmas! I'm easy to recognise. In through the door, and out with your wife":

Bravo!

Comments

[valentin]

Thank you, Sarah, for defending with arguments,as always, Romania.

I hope the new Minister of Foreign Affairs will do it to. Its his duty to issue a protest and defend its citizens.

No,its NOT a joke, is pure racism. But I DO know that France is not a tolerant country and I didn't forget that the country who prides tself on being 'tolerant' and a heaven for artists and all those oppressed in their country was ready to send to Hitler's gas chambers Marc Chagall, Igor Stravinski, Heinrich Mann, Hanaah Arendt, Max Ernst, Andre Breton,Hans Habe, Valeriu Marcu (Romanian), Franz Verfel and his wife, Alma Mahler Werfel,Lion Feuchtwanger (who was already in a concentration camp, sent by the French) and the list goes on and on. I didn't forgot that French authorities sent Romanian poet Benjamin Fondane (Benjamin Fundoianu) to die at Auschwitz. So France IS NOT a "tolerant" country and its jokes are deadly. That's why I am just sad, but not surprised that racism and cruelty are so often surfacing on French media. Who forgets that Gypsies may also be French.In this case I myself, prefer to be Gypsy than French.

[patredeggs]

As always, France is in the lead for mediocrity and hatred but who opened the box and went away with the key ?

Patredeggs and his Romanian French crew