Y'know, I don't think a person like me can write a blog about Hungary without mentioning, as I may have before, how comfortable too many Hungarians are with their racism. The discrimination runs the spectrum from crass and blatant to civilized and reserved.
The Roma occupy a despised, oft spat upon ring of hell in the hearts of many non-Roma Hungarians.
The extreme right wing, melodramatically nationalist political party, Jobbik, whose main platform rests on the vilification of the Hungarian Roma, posts ridiculously stereotypical and menacing photos of the Roma on their, um, enlightening web site when it's not posting pics of obese Roma children and toothless old women.
The middle right, Fidesz, seems to basically feel the same way Jobbik does about the Roma, the difference being that Fidesz is more polite about their racism. Brother's keeper and all of that.
Sadly, apparently liberal Hungarians are no less disappointing. Still more polite than the center right wing folks, they nonetheless "did not want their kids hanging out with Roma friends".
Leave it to the editors Pesticide to calls it like they sees it.
http://www.pestiside.hu/20111206/hungarians-put-aside-differences-to-aid-romanian-children-hate-roma/
Sadly, it gets even more cringeworthy. I have played devil's advocate more than once and asked some of my tutoring students how they feel about the Roma. The statement I have heard the most, verbatim, as if it was being read from a script, is "They live like animals." When I ask what they mean by that they answer with generalities like, "they don't like to work" or "they kill each other and live in terrible conditions". Since it is not my job to preach, I leave these answers alone and move on. But I wonder if these kids consider the fact that the continued marginalization of the Roma may cause and exacerbate these conditions.
The adults are not much better. If they are not subtlely stoking the racism by avoiding real, honest discussions about the Roma they pay lip service to the idea of improving the lives of these Hungarians only to treat the Roma like naughty children, viewed as unintelligent and incapable of self sufficency. I've found it's best not to ask anyone about the Roma if you dont want to be profoundly, sickeningly disappointed.
I've not had many experiences with the Roma...the one time I did was on the tradional "leave your trash out" day in my district. A Roma family asked me, very politely, if I needed help getting rid of any unwanted stuff in my garage. I tried to explain to them that I had nothing, that I moved here from the U.S. and that any stuff that I have is there. They must have misunderstood me because they came back the next day, with an English speaker, to ask if I found anything I did not want . I simply answered no, smiled, they smiled back, and were on their way. I never felt in danger or that they would try to break into my house...I think it's safe to say most Hungarians would have been on high alert after such an exchange.
The following is the bulk of my direct knowledge about the Roma:
Yes, they keep to themselves. Who wouldn't amid the palpable hatred?
They do seem, like many marginalized, impoverished groups, to resort to petty and/or organized crime. I've never been impacted by it, except by the blatant prostitution that takes place below Nyugati trian station. But who makes up the market for this crime? The non-Roma, by far.
Speaking of the Nyugati basement, plenty of honest businesses are run down there, many by Roma proprietors.
A friend of mine was once hassled on a bus by a group of Romani men...they were teasing her, demanding her groceries. She handled it with typical aplomb, planned an escape route and everything, only to watch these men leave the bus before she did. The bus was full...certainly most of the other riders knew what was happening, but none of these saintly folks did anything to help her.
It is assumed that Romani children do not want to learn, although many educators beg to differ. All children want to learn.
The Roma have been ruthlessly hassled by Jobbik and the Magyar Garda for no other reason that the assumption that "gypsy crime" is a humongous problem and needs to be monitored by a group of nasty, racist, "citizen" police.
The Roma suffered under Nazism more than any other group, second only to Jewish citizens.
The word "cigány" is the Hungarian word for "gypsy". Both terms are deemed derogatory by the Roma themselves (although there may be a kind of "taking back" sentiment among the Roma as far as the term is concerned) and yet it is everywhere in Hungary...from "cigány limonadé" to "cigány wine".
I'm indulging in an on-going research project, about the Roma, of my own design. My knowledge is below elementary so I'm on a quest to know more. I will most likely be sharing my findings from time to time on this blog.
If you are interested, here are some links to check out, concerning the Roma, a people rejected by almost every nation on earth.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-13544903
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/sep/16/roma-europe-pariah-people
http://peshasgypsyblog.blogspot.com/
http://hungarianwatch.wordpress.com/2011/03/18/neo-nazis-terrorize-roma-in-hungarian-village/
3 comments:
I had a really hard time understanding how a society that seems to understand its complicity in the crimes against Jews and memorializes the fact (like the shoes by the Danube) but cannot see that the vitriol directed at the Roma is the same damn thing that leads to de-humanizing a whole minority ("they live like animals") which is one step closer to eliminating them. I suspect that stateless people everywhere suffer similar discrimination, but its appalling that the Hungarian Government practically promotes it. I wonder if EU rules may help begin to address this problem. Although that big experiment seems pretty shaky at the moment. Would you say there's a country that treats Roma decently?
Jewish Hungarians are still treated with suspicion in some circles here and I've heard some people claim the Holocaust was "not that bad". (Tell that to Raoul Wallenburg). This is not as prevailing and across the board as the hatred of the Roma, of course. A lot of Hungarian artists, writers, and designers were/are Jewish and I think, as such, they are respected and revered (Ormeny Istvan, for example). But Hungary is now officially a "Christian" country, in which other religions are freely practiced but must succumb somehow to the superiority of Christianity. Yes, the cognitive dissonance concerning the Roma is maddening. The whole of Europe treats its Roma populations like shit as far as I can tell...France was trying to fly them back to Romania last year. However, I'm still learning about them and maybe I will find out if there are countries which are better than others.
Very good observations about the problems with Roma, although i think more studying gives you bit more understanding on the problematics and some fundamental issues that makes the integration with post-industrialized very complicated.
However, i am afraid you might be guilty yourself of exactly the same concering your opinion about Fidesz - or do you have some real facts to justify the claim: after all there is lot of examples of just the opposite: http://www.eu2011.hu/news/roma-strategy-quality-stake, http://jarokalivia.hu/en, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%ADvia_J%C3%A1r%C3%B3ka,there are exactly four members of parlament in Hungary of Roma: 3 from Fidesz, 1 from LMP, none from socialists, http://www.economist.com/blogs/easternapproaches/2011/04/europes_roma
http://www.cafebabel.co.uk/article/29840/livia-jaroka-female-mep-roma-elections-europe.html
http://www.politics.hu/20110216/ep-committee-approves-hungarian-proposal-on-roma-inclusion/
Maybe you have your own prejudices...
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