If I Didn’t Laugh…
Published by deviousdiva November 26th, 2007 in Immigration.
Following on from the “lively discussion” on Living without Papers
From Kathimerini
Greece only recognizes citizenship by blood, not by birth, meaning that even being born on Greek soil does not bring citizenship if the parents are foreign. The authorities only issue birth certificates to parents listed on municipal registries, which are only open to Greek citizens. All other requests for birth certificates are forwarded to the parents’ respective embassies.
“This practice assumes that the embassies are actually functioning and willing to cooperate, which is not always the case, particularly with African embassies,” said Sonia Mitralia, a migrant rights activist.
The Hellenic Migration Policy Institute (IMEPO), the top Greek organization researching migrant figures and trends and a state adviser on immigration policy, calculates that the number of young people in Greece born here to migrant families numbers about 20,000, since migration largely started in the 1990s.
“This problem affects a limited number of people,” IMEPO Chairman Alexandros Zavos told AFP in an interview. He added that the law is fundamentally sound and blamed the low number of beneficiaries on the difficulty of applicants to get through Greece’s cumbersome public bureaucracy.
But the issue will only grow in importance in coming years: In 2006, there were 108,000 migrants’ children – mostly Albanian – enrolled in Greek schools according to IMEPO. Half of them said they wanted to stay and make a living in Greece. Zavos says he recently proposed to the government a broad naturalization of foreigners born in Greece.
“Such a step would be wonderful,” said Dolores Kacorri, an Albanian immigrant living in Greece for the past 10 years and exhausted from having to perpetually renew the annual residence permits of her three children. Each renewal costs 150 euros and is compulsory for minors over 14 years old. After a decade of legal residence in Greece, Kacorri’s two eldest children can now apply for Greek citizenship. But as their mother noted, “each application costs 1,500 euros, more than twice the minimum salary. These applications are almost always rejected but the money is not reimbursed.”
Just wanted to say
This problem affects a limited number of people
So that’s OK then because it’s only a hundred thousand+ people involved and it’s OK that Greece has
a cumbersome public bureaucracy
because
fundamentally the law is sound
Well, blow me down with a proverbial feather!
So Greece is right even when it’s wrong.
Great.
We have no leg to stand on.
Watch us as we all fall over.
COME ON PEOPLE…
Even those who disagree with me, can see the holes in this ?
This is wrong because THIS IS WRONG.
There are fundamental problems with Greek law and the fact that Greece is making money by taking fees for applications that don’t stand a chance of getting through, is wrong. This is wrong. You know that. We know that.
Discuss…
UPDATE: There might be some hope for a change in the law at some time in the future. Recently, I spoke to Loretta from the Union of African Women (who have been instrumental in bring the issue of birth certificates to the forefront) who was very skeptical as to whether this will actually happen. She said “I’ll believe it when I see it”.
The young girl in the photo, despite probably being a lovely person, does not look Greek. Giving her naturalisation will only give her the wrong impression that she is accepted when in reality she will not be. Let’s not be selfish and consider her long term future.
With your reasoning, legein: allowing Greeks to be part of the European Union is only giving them a wrong impression that they are accepted. We should consider the long-term future of Greece, which is not part of the western world.
@legein:What kind of logic is this? :-S
So, even if SHE WANTS to get the greek citizenship, you say that THEY (=Greek state) KNOW BETTER and they care about her future and that’s the reason they don’t give her the citizenship. So, for humanitarian reasons, she doesn’t have the right to be a citizen in the country she chose to live and work.
I assume that you have the same opinion about “Greeks of diaspora”. They should not be accepted to US, Australia, South Africa, Canada etc because they “don’t look like ‘native’ people”??? Since when the citizenship issues are based on the criterion of “how you look”??? I don’t know you personally and i really don’t intend to offend you with what I am going to say, but this logic reminds me some other, difficult times full of racism around the world (let’s say Hitler’s arianism or discrimination against black people in US).
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DD, I am not getting shocked anymore with the situation in Greece. No comments
Ummm….it’s actually not about giving her naturalisation it is about citizenship, and forgive me if i’m wrong but doesnt citizenship which is about citizenship rights and citizenship responsibility have absolutely nothing to do with “acceptance”…. i mean if we waited for people to be “accepted” who would ever a. be granted citizenship and b. feel like a citizen. I’m a greek citizen (by blood of course) and i certainly dont feel accepted by certain other “greeks”.
also: if the test you propose for citizenship is acceptance - who get’s to decide?
i think your confusing the issue of being greek with being a greek citizen.
there is a huge difference.
also its rather patronising to disguise racism with concern for “her long term future”
It’s pretty much the same in the UK, DD, and in a lot of other countries around the world. In fact, acquiring citizenship by birth in a country (ius soli), rather than by a blood link (ius sanguinis) is probably the exception rather than the norm. In the UK, until recently, it was not even enough to have a British father - nationality was passed down the female line only. It’s all tied up with immigration, of course, and not necessarily wrong. After all, almost everybody - in theory at least - must be entitled to the nationality of one country or another on the basis of a blood tie. A person may not be entitled to be Greek, but they probably are entitled to claim the nationality of their parents, which, presumably, is not all bad news. Truly stateless people are usually given special recognition.
Also, there are usually provisions for acquiring citizenship other than by birth, such as having lived in the country for a period of time. The EU laws can be pretty helpful in that regard especially if you have moved from one EU country to another (irrespective of your original nationality) and can be classified as a “worker” …
Ius sanguinis is not, I think, necessarily wrong, and rarely exists in its pure form.
Margaret: you are wrong. Until the 1981 UK Citizenship Act, the UK granted full British nationality to all born on its soil. The provisions of ius sanguinis in UK law [for children born to UK nationals outside of the UK] were gender discriminatory until about 1985 [I forget the date]. The 1981 changes made by Thatcher were a disgrace, and openly anti-immigrant: now a period of registration is required for children born of non-UK parents.
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However, as I posted on the other thread, every EU (15) country other than Greece grants nationality [some after several years' delay] to children born on their territory. Greece is unique in refusing any possibility of giving citizenship to immigrant children. It is also unique in having removed Greek citizneship from 60,000 people over the period 1955-97 for not having “Greek national consciousness”. There are still some 250 stateless Greeks in Greece, who were made stateless by the actions of the Greek state., and many thousands living elsewhere.
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Greece is not a normal country, by any stretch of the imagination.
I think we’re both right. It just depends on whether the parents are married or not …
which I should have said.
http://www.workpermit.com/news.....edlock.htm
I do not know what the position is in Greece, so cannot comment on that.
Ahhhhhhh….. these are new changes for the cohabitation rules of the UK. Thanks, because I didnt know about that!
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Greece refuses to accept that unmarried couples or gay couples have any rights. [Are we surprised?]
No problem.
Greece can refuse away, but EU law says otherwise … as long as they are workers. And Greece is bound by EU law whether it likes it or not. I imagine that enforcing the right might be difficult, but it is there. There are all sorts of creative ways of using EU law - it often produces a more generous result than the national law (true in the UK for family reunification, for example).
All for today.
Yes, in the early 1990s the British immigration lawyers [I used to be a member of the Immigration Law Practitioners Assocation] started using EC Treaty free movement provisions to get immigration rights for married couples, where one partner was EC national and the other was from outside the EU.
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The problem in Greece is that the Greek state just refuses to obey the law. Look at all the cases which have gone to the European Court of Justice and also to the Strasbourg Court: time and again, they refuse to accept EC law and precedent caselaw from the ECHR.
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By the way, if anyone is confused by what Clea wrote, this is the same Greek race mania as mentioned on the other thread. Greeks consider nationality to be “belonging to the greek nation” and citizenship is possible for for those who do not belong — allogeneis. So those who are “proper” Greeks [homogeneis] can get Greek citizenship free and immediately [unless they are Albanian or Turkish], and the rest of us have to prove that we have lived in Greece for 10 years, paid taxes etc, learned perfect Greek, and then pay them E1,500 just to apply [and likely be refused].
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Of course, as is well-known, there is no racial discrimination in Greece!
“Greece refuses to accept that unmarried couples”
Why should we? Marriage is a binding legal contract - women in the UK can elope with 50% of her husbands money. I am glad this is not the case in Greece. Enjoy your ‘healthy’ society with massive divorce and teen pregnancy rates.
Martin, I’m sorry if the situation is so dire in Greece. It’s not perfect here either, though I cannot imagine an ECJ or ECtHR judgment getting ignored…
Interesting to hear your background. I’m not exactly ignorant either, as you may have gathered. I wrote my degree dissertation, all those years ago, on the inequalities produced by the British Nationality Act 1981. No doubt my interest was fuelled by having an Iranian boyfriend whom I presume is British by now :).
AgainstCommunism,
You have chosen to quote half of the sentence to suit your own agenda here. The full sentence was:
which again is WRONG. Discriminating against people because they are not married (and this affects “real” Greek people or because they are gay (and this affects “real” Greek people) is wrong. This is 2007 in case you hadn’t noticed and there are laws that protect the RIGHTS of all people regardless of your personal opinion of them.
legein,
I am just reiterating what others have said already, but I wanted to respond to your flawed argument. Please explain how appearance can possibly have anything to do with anything here! She doesn’t LOOK Greek ?! By this measurement, many of my Greek friends are not really Greek then. And most of my British friends are not British and most Americans are not American etc etc…
What is your stance on children who happen to be from other countries who are adopted by Greek parents ? Are they Greek ? What about the children of interracial couples where one parent is Greek ? Are they Greek ? What about people who can identify a grandparent as being Turkish or Albanian or Russian ? Are they Greek ?
Please enlighten me as to how you are going to determine who is really Greek using your “logic”. Are there going to be measurements ? Or is there a particular Greek look that people can be compared to ?
As in the title of the post, if I didn’t laugh…
Devious Diva, I have travelled to China many times on business and there are excellent opportunities there. I’ll assume she is Chinese but should could be Cambodian. Even there are excellent opportunities for a bright person. My friend was recently contracted to Phnom Penh to build bridges and he said he had a great time. Unfortunately, I have never been there. Why separate this girl from her homeland and her community who can give her the spiritual nourishment that she may not obtain in Greece? In Greece she will always be an outsider. Trust me I know how it feels to be one. Why remove people from their community on the false hope they will somehow shed their skin and become someone else? Migration is an awful thing. You become separated from your family, community, signs and symbols which make you human.
I am not going to answer your questions because no matter what I say will be misconstrued as being racist. I would not like to be your friend in real life. One would be afraid to say anything. It would be awfully boring. Let’s just say that lovely girl does not look remotely like the prototypical Greek who is usually tall, athletic, handsome, highly intelligent, olive skinned with European physiognamy. Sometimes they wear an olive wreath in their hair and walk around with a sword and shield. Other times they wear chitons and ponder dialectics and epistemiology.
Adamantius Judaeus (a Jewish writer) described the Greeks like this:
‘just sufficiently (autarkos) tall, sturdy, pale-complexioned, with well-formed hands and feet, a medium-sized head, strong neck, fine brown softly-waving hair, square-faced (prosopon tetragonon), that is not oval but with fairly strong cheekbones), the lips delicate, the nose straight, the eyes lustrous and expressive, (opthalmous hugrous, charpous, gorgous): they have the most beautiful eyes of any people in the world’
Apart from being an incredibly apt description of myself, I think he is very accurate in describing my people.
legein: you are massively deluded and also racist. Modern Greeks bear no physical resemblance to the Ancient Greeks, according to the world’s experts, even in such a clear genetic detail as hair colour.
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Furthermore, your obsession with the past does not hide your clear racism and arrogant nationalism: this is not a personal remark against you, because I am aware that most Greek people have your attitude. I feel sorry for you.
Apart from being an incredibly apt description of myself, I think he is very accurate in describing my people
Good grief! I actually did laugh but for all the wrong reasons…
Try and answer my questions anyway ! So what do you care if I think your answers are racist or not ? We are not friends. You have nothing to fear from me. Answer the questions if you can.
I made Devious Diva laugh! Imagine that…..a racist opening up for the Diva at one of her shows. Maybe even Plevris can open for legein. And then all three can do an encore together of an old Demotic song from the Morea. That would bring the house down because all the people who know they are right about everything would think it is a Roma song. Musical people. Very musical. Gaitlif taught us that. They remember all those songs but forget their land registry papers. Hell, just give it to them. No one wants to live in Menidi anyway when there is so much free land going at Mt Parnitha. Ring Remax and speak to your local PASOK member.
On the advice of the gentle and wise Martin I bought a history book from Panteion University bookshop yesterday and I discovered so many new things about the Greeks. They were responsible for the gas chambers, Apartheid, Darfur, the Killing Fields, Colorado boots, Madonna’s Immaculate Conception album….bloody well everything! They created everything right? So then they must be responsible for Ta Mok? Those evil little Greeklings. When is someone going to take the whole nation to the European Court. Put my yiayia up there in the box. Send her to Yedikule for 50 years. The evil old woman. Sentence her for spreading racism and Balkan peasantry. And my papou. He is dead now but sentence him in absentia. He gets a longer sentence for having the temerity to be decorated in Albania in one of Greece’s innumerable imperialist ventures. And to top it all off give them both hard labour for being heterosexual, hard working and Orthodox Christians.
What about their human rights? They do not have any. The Cypriots do not have any. The Northern Epirotes do not have any. The last remaining Greeks in the City, who recently had one of their churches vandalised by the Turkish forestory department, do not have any. You do not realise that only certain people have rights. That is the end result of the Enlightenment. Rousseau and Voltaire will be glad to know that the only people who have rights today are Roma and Chinese immigrants.
The Greeks do not have human rights because they are not human. They are sub human. And the Pakistanis need Lebensraum because Bhutto is back in town. Demonisation is the first step to genocide. I think Theodore Adorno said that after he told us to stop writing poetry. It’s a pity Elytis and Gatsos were living in a peasant country and did not read him. Round up the Greeks and put them on cattle trains. Along with their goats and olives. Stupid peasants. We can sing the Axion Esti as we march them to the port of Smyrna and Sinope and then watch them drown. Peasants would not know how to tread water. And let’s make a Greek salad with all those evil little Greeks and their silly stubborn culture. Let’s wipe them out. Turn the place into a New Jersey car park. That is what they deserve.
Has anyone seen Russian Ark? By Sukorov. Awful movie. Russians are killers. Autocrats and tsars. Tolstoy was a Kazakh. Turgenev was a Turkmen. Tarkovsky was Chinese. Bulgakov was a Roma. Have you read any of these books or seen these movies Diva? Don’t worry, Russians never did anything of any value. Peasants also. Just like their Trojan horse brothers the Greeks. The only culture is found to the east of Odos Patission.
But for some reason I have always found the last words to this film very touching. I nearly cried when I first saw it. Nothing gives me more hope than these sentiments.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....re=related
Let’s imagine that Legein is part of the Greek diaspora. That he lives in, let’s say, Australia, but it could have been London. He’s said that he knows what it is like to be an outsider, so let’s imagine that he has been on the receiving end of discrimination ever since he can remember from the majority stock, probably white Anglo Saxons. However intelligent he is, however educated he is, however handsome he is, they will still set out to show him that he does not belong, that he is part of the inferior minority. Let’s imagine that is what happened.
Legein would have been hurt, probably very hurt, but he would probably have covered up the hurt with anger, and, then, in order to feel good about himself (nobody can stand to feel bad about themselves for long) he would have convinced himself that he was not only not inferior to the Anglo Saxons, but actually superior to them, both mentally and physically. This defence, this belief, would be terribly important to Legein, and understandably so. The fault lies with the Anglo Saxons who treated him like they did, not with Legein trying to deal with their horrible discrimination.
So, having built up all of these defences, he needs to maintain them. It threatens him when anybody denies his defence that Greeks are superior. He needs to confront their challenge and overcome it, because if his defence falls down then he is left with the Anglo Saxon position. I imagine that he would find attacks on Greeks coming from Anglo Saxons the most difficult to deal with.
So, I am not sure that he is racist. I imagine that he does not like those who discriminated against him, and that is understandable. If a little unfair to tar everyone with the same brush …
But he also has a point, which perhaps I could illustrate thus.
At the present moment in the UK there is much discussion, mainly instigated by the Conservatives, about the West Lothian question and the Barnet formula, both of which relate to Scotland with its relatively new devolved Parliament. The Conservatives say that both are unfair and want them abolished or reformulated. giving more power back to the Westminster Parliament. In doing so they risk tearing apart the Union between Scotland and England.
“So what?” you might say.
This would suit the Conservatives quite nicely since they have almost no voters in Scotland and it would ensure that they had a parliamentary majority in the new English parliament that would have to be created. There would be no more Britain, only its component parts. Each component part is comprised of an ethnicity, much like Greece historically. I am a white Anglo Saxon: I am also English. They mean pretty much the same thing.
A very prominent human rights activist of Indian extraction commented to my husband last week that the breaking up of the Union would be alright for him (he, too, is Anglo Saxon) but terrible for her because she felt British, but she could never be English. “British” (or “American”) is a wonderful umbrella of a label under which many different ethnicities can shelter, and all feel they belong (I hope). “English” is something very different.
I think Legein is saying that “Greek” as a matter of fact, whether we like it or not, is more like English than British. Perhaps he is right.
I have a friend who left her North African repressive country to live life as a scientist in the UK. Her daughter is being taunted at school for her faith background, and my friend is so upset. She wonders if her daughter will ever feel that she belongs. She wonders if she did the right thing leaving her country and having children in another country where they stand out. Of course I very much hope that her daughter will feel she belongs, but she will have a more difficult time of belonging than an Anglo Saxon, but if the mother can ask herself that difficult question of whether her daughter would have been happier in that North African country, cannot Legein ask about the girl, without being racist?
I’ve only been discriminated against on the grounds of my race a couple of times in my life (both hurt like hell), but I’ve jumped a couple of social classes and fairly frequently experience snobbery and discrimination from those who would rather I knew my place. It doesn’t endear me to those who practice social snobbery, and hardly anything makes me more angry.
Perhaps some of you also want to belong in Greece, and are finding it difficult because the majority Greeks insist that nationality is bound up with ethnicity. There are many Anglo Saxons who would argue the same thing in the UK, which makes keeping the Union with Scotland alive all the more important, and the all embracing nature of Britishness or being American so important to defend.
So, I understand Legein. Not all Anglo Saxons are bad, but neither are all Greek racists.
legein: your post is incoherent. Along with everyone else in this forum, I am pro-Hellene, and I suppose that we all support the Greek people in their difficult past and (for some) difficult present. And, I imagine, that we also all admire the Ancient Greeks for what was an important period of the development of western civilisation. So: what is the problem here?
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My answer is that I cannot cope with the lack of humility, the antithesis of the great Sokrates and others, which prevails in contemporary Greece. Where is the recognition of past failures, as well as successes? Where is the empathy for refugees and immigrants who have looked to Greece for shelter from war and economic disasters in other [non-European] countries? Where is the Greek sense of noble spirit and leadership, that we think we can see in Ancient Athens and Sparta, etc.?
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Instead, we have petty little speeches about how clever the Greeks are, what a superior and distinct race, and nobody else has any rights in this land called Greece. It is such a disappointment…
Oh my Goddddddddddd reading some of these replies is so *infuriating*. She doesn’t look Greek? What the hell is that? I mean really?! What planet are you from? She doesn’t look Greek! I am in shock!
The children born on this soil are GREEK!!!! Well what did we expect though, Greece does whatever it wants. For this cloaked racism to change is as likely as a smoker looking at their ciggie packet one day and going “Oh my God, smoking kills? I better stop!!”
Makes. Me. So. Mad. Doesn’t look Greek! This girl has probably only ever known Greece all her life, so where exactly do you plan on sending her back to??!!!
*too frustrated to type*
And by the way. We are citizens of this world and Plato himself proposed the abolition of the family because it promoted feelings of selfishness and keeping all the good stuff for your own kind rather than equality and sharing. This model is an extension of the nation state. So if you’re going to start throwing the great Greeks of olden times, also include those radical thoughts such as Plato’s which promoted equality.
Margaret: legein lives in central Athens, if he bought a book from Panteion university bookshop. Where he comes from, I have no idea, but perhaps he will tell us.
Martin, I fear he might have been being ironic … or perhaps I am being too generous.
It’s a shame to stifle the debate, though, when the real challenge is how to make the notion of being “Greek” switch from being an “English” type ethnic label to something more accommodating of immigrants. I’ve written a few posts about similar ideas on my own blog - I suppose I’ve been quite influenced recently by reading Thomas Nagel’s Equality and Partiality (there’s a post about that on the blog somewhere). In the past I’ve been too ready to shout “equality” all the time, without taking account of other people’s partiality, and have got nowhere as a result - even if I have been quite sure that equality was the right argument. Any debate about the meaning of being Greek really needs to carry along the majority with all their partiality, otherwise it will never get anywhere, I think.
Maybe the racists of Greece wouldn’t be so smug if they knew that the American KKK thought that the Greeks were among the bottom dwellers. I read a report from the 1920s that said the KKK used to attack Greeks as well.
I would think that Greeks of all people would be more charitable to immigrants considering they themselves were the toilet cleaners and servants of Americans, Brits and others long before they suddenly acquired wealth.
Maybe some racist Greeks have a short memory?
“you are massively deluded and also racist. Modern Greeks bear no physical resemblance to the Ancient Greeks, according to the world’s experts, even in such a clear genetic detail as hair colour.”
Would you mind explaining yourself here? All details from non-idealized classical art (especially from black figure amphorae and frescoes in Alexandria) show a clear resemblence between Ancient and Modern Greeks. Hair colour was predominantly black, as the evidence from primary sources as well as the large amount of blonde wigs from theater productions show. You have already stated, twice, that you are not ‘familiar’ with Ancient History. Why must you humiliate yourself repeatedly when dealing with someone who does understand the subject?
Greek undergraduate student in London: although I am no expert, my colleagues who are international authorities on archaeological matters have told me this. Since I am an academic, I give priority to the judgement of people with more than 100 publications and PhDs over students who are just starting to learn their subject. For my part, I have no opinion.
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On the matter of “humiliation”: exactly who do you think you are? You are a kid who just started to learn from his betters. I suggest you try to find a small amount of modesty, lest you look even more stupid than you clearly are. When [rarely] I encounter a student with your arrogant attitude, I tell that person to either cut the crap or leave my class.
Yet you have provided no sources, no citations, no evidence for your claims. Nothing whatsoever except your word, your word which changes every day or so. Dancing a semantic piroutte until you trip up, for example, claiming that there is no such thing as ‘race’, and evidently subscribing to the theory of ‘language groups’, in which case Greeks have been around for 4000 years, as we have one of the most contiguous languages on earth. Then claiming, as you did in this thread, we have no connection with our ancient predecessors based on what you percieve to be differing racial features.
Quit humiliating yourself like this, it’s as embarassing for you as it is for me. Either show some evidence or slink away.
Just to clarify incase I was misunderstood:
What i was trying to suggest is that linking citizenship to notions of “acceptance” is completely ridiculous. In my opinion citizenship has no relationship to being “accepted”. Citizenship is a legal concept first and foremost. To me, it is inane to advocate that citizenship should be tied to nationality. Of course I come from a multicultural country and therefore my views are going to be influenced by the fact that I have grown up somewhere that technically has no prevailing nationality. Even in Australia, where “illegal immigrants” are locked up like criminals, children born to those said “criminals” in Australia acquire citizenship by virtue of birth.
If citizenship was linked to acceptance, the question I was asking is who gets to decide? Who gets to decide who is accepted? Many immigrants in Australia for example enjoy citizenship and the privileges it entails without ever being “accepted” as Australian. It greatly saddens me that it is all to often these same immigrants who seek to deny citizenship to immigrants of their own country.
As for my own example - both my parents were greek (thus the greek blood) - i grew up in Australia as the “greek girl” though I was born in Australia and therefore an Australian citizen and here in Greece, after applying for and gaining citizenship - i am the xeni foreigner who can go home if she doesnt like it. So, my point is - if acceptance is the test for citizenship - i should be a citizen of nowhere.
AgainstCommunism: just carry on with your studies, and when you have learned how to think and conduct debates I will consider a discussion with you. Until then, I am not interested in your opinions, which are mostly offensive recycled propaganda anyway.
There is no material difference between Greece and the United States and Australia. Upon further reading of the books recommended to me by the wise, gentle and academically rigorous Martin I learnt Greece was discovered several hundred years ago by a Portuguese explorer trying to find an eastern route to India and the Moluccas via the Middle East. When he arrived in Greece he thought he had found the Moluccas Island. The native population was easily conquered. However, the Portuguese were amazed that this destitute people were once probably responsible for many architectural and artistic wonders spread over what we today call Greece. However, like Easter Island, they stood as sentinels of a once golden age. The Portuguese already had to contend with settling Brazil so they opened the country up to anyone who could prove they could till the land. Immediately, the poor and destitute of Europe, Africa and the Middle East poured into this almost empty land. After several years the new settlers began to agitate for independence from the crown of Portugal. There was generally a peaceful handover of rule. The country was called Greece but people still know the inhabitants as Moluccas or more colloquially Balkan peasants. Due to the mixed population the new state was built on the principles of universal suffrage and rights for all. The state expanded its immigration program in order to fuel economic growth and gradually phased out the sub dialect of Portuguese which had become known as Greek in favour of English and Mandarin as a second language. The population grew rapidly due to a lack of wars that inflicted other places and was now nearing 200 million. Today, Greece is known worldwide for its mining and IT industry. It has a very large military with bases in 40 different countries and as far as the Pacific Ocean. There are many large shopping centres and car parks. Just recently there was a motion passed in the Parliament to rename the country Zone G214 with a view to restructuring the country into a virtual state . All popular songs and books of any historical content have also been banned. Children’s education had also been completely overhauled with credit card instruction and channel surfing making up the early school curriculum. There is no material difference between Greece and the United States and Australia and that is why immigrants should be treated exactly the same. One rule for all. No context.
I’ve already told you that feigning apathy is a poor tactic and you have betrayed it many times by replying to me when you said you have not ‘familiar’ with Ancient History in the first place. Setting up strawmen about how established historical consensus (contiguity of the Greek language, varying centers of Hellenism) are ‘propaganda’ only makes you look ignorant. You do not deserve this much humiliation. Either stop taking pot-shots at Greek History or I will continue to undermine the spurious arguments you make.
“I would not like to be your friend in real life. One would be afraid to say anything. It would be awfully boring. ”
DD, i have been trying and trying to formulate a resonse to some of this stuff, and all i can say is, the world is changing, and so are these neat little national identities! if you want to exclude people from being a part of your nation because they are not of the same ethnicity as you, that is, yes, racist. if it’s written into law, that is a racist law.
as far as the quote above, i DOUBT it. xoxo
Hephaestos: I recommend that you seek professional counselling. I can only presume that you are not well.
I’m really surprised at the lack of response to this:
“Why separate this girl from her homeland and her community who can give her the spiritual nourishment that she may not obtain in Greece? In Greece she will always be an outsider. Trust me I know how it feels to be one. Why remove people from their community on the false hope they will somehow shed their skin and become someone else? Migration is an awful thing. You become separated from your family, community, signs and symbols which make you human.”
Legein, you can obviously read, so how is it you failed to read the sign the woman in the picture is holding? Her homeland is Greece; it’s where she was born. You may not want to accept that, but the place where you are born and raised is the only home you know.
In the United States, where I live, many Asian Americans and African Americans, including those who are the children of immigrants and even those who immigrated at a young age, have returned to their “homelands” only to find that they are considered outsiders and foreigners, that they don’t comprehend the pop culture or the recent clues, that their understanding of their culture is antiquated. I can’t imagine it would be any different for someone who was born in and grew up in Greece.
The girl in the photo was not separated from her homeland or community. If she were to move to her “ancestral homeland” she would be as much an outsider as you consider her now. She was not separated from the “signs and symbols” of her “community” — those signs and symbols are from Greece, where her community lives, because she was born there.
Thanks Vox. However, the project of Greece was not built on abstract principles like the United States but on providing refuge for Greek people. Karaiskakis did not fight for Chinese people but for people like me. Therefore, the young girl would never have the same emotional attachment I have for the signs and symbols of Greece.
The project of Greece was built on revolution against the Ottomans and the nationalist ideas of a re-invented Greece supposedly related to Ancient Athens and anywhere where any sort of dialect of the old Greek was spoken. Since the majority of the revolutionaries did not even speak Greek, the whole venture was fraudulent from the outset. Hence the need for political propaganda [legein's signs and symbols] which took -and still take- priority over realities and people’s actual needs.
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This is modern Greece, Vox: where all that matters is political propaganda and political power. Knowledge and those who seek it are openly mocked, as you will see in this forum: this even occurs to the extent that many Greeks will assure you that black is white and day is night. They always know better than the rest of the world, because “they” invented philosophy and we should all be grateful to them for eternity.
All this speculation from a single photograph, legein. Did you even read the article that followed?
The problem isn’t that the young woman “looks different,” the problem is that Greek racism exploits her for cash while denying her legal rights. Yet you obfuscate that problem by celebrating racism as patriotism and appealing to antiquated notions of nationhood.
Most of the nation-states in this world were founded long ago by unjust means. The imagined memory of their citizens is a weak basis for continuing those injustices. Who cares about the founders of Greece? They are long dead and the world has changed. Why are you proud of injustice?
DD, I don’t think legein is contributing anything productive. In fact, the olive wreath & chiton comments make me wonder if he isn’t a troll (of course, he leaves women out of the picture entirely. At the very least, his own blog celebrates fascist dictators and plunderers as “heroes”. Why play host to such views, especially when they are as intractable as these? This discussion has unfolded over several weeks, and legein has not changed. Is it going to make a difference to the woman in the photograph, or the women marching behind her, or the thousands of people who live in Greece but are denied legal rights, that we’re beating our heads against this particular brick wall?
I don’t mean to invalidate what you’re trying to do here, DD, or deny that these arguments need to be had. They are starting to become repetitious, though.
I have to agree with Fire Fly. Obviously, it’s impossible for legein to say whether she would have the same attachment to Greece as not, or whether she will ever be accepted or not. And you know what? Even if she doesn’t and she never is, it doesn’t matter. If she is contributing to Greek society by working and being involved in her community, paying taxes (or residency application fees), etc., she is entitled to the protection of citizenship.
Diverting the argument into speculations over whether someone who was born in Greece but is not ancestrally Greek is acceptable or feels the same connections to the country is a distraction tactic meant to derail the thread, and those are pretty standard troll tactics. In fact, I think number 3 and number 6 have been pretty heavily overused here: http://coffeeandink.livejournal.com/607897.html
As long as countries like Greece and other backward parts of Europe continue to snub their nose at immigrants, countries like the USA will laugh to themselves as they take the best and the brightest of these immigrants and welcome them into American society to become citizens of a greater alliance.
Greece: Snub your nose at the Asians, Africans, but in the end America just gets stronger by putting their clever minds to good use. Then one day, maybe this Asian young woman in the photo will return to Greece, but not as an immigrant, but as the AMERICAN AMBASSADOR in Greece to oversee Greece for her four year post.
HA!!! How do you like me now?
Fire Fly what do you mean by “of course, he leaves women out of the picture entirely”?
Fire Fly and Martin, you are welcome at the legein site to comment at anytime. There will be no threats or banishments.
What I am trying to do is to question some contemporary dogmas or preconceived ideas as part of the project of autonomy. Contemporary dogmas come in all shapes and sizes i.e. Christianity, free market economics, multiculturalism, nation-state, human rights etc. Over the next week or two there should be a post on Pier Paolo Pasolini and his intellectual relationship with Antonio Gramsci. Particularly through one of his poems.
In addition to Vox’s excellent comment, an example from a friend’s experience: I’m a 20-year-old greek girl. My best friend (she’s 25) was born here to chinese parents. She has lived in Greece her whole life and has never visited China. When she turned 18, she found out that she really is considered “a foreigner” by her homecountry. The first time she went to renew her papers she asked the guys at the immigration office to explain to her the reason behind this law. She was told “But why would you want to stay here anyway? Don’t you plan to return to your country sometime”? And she replied, very angry “Which country? I have no other homecountry except for Greece”.
So far, nobody has been able to give me any valid reasons on why a person born here, raised here, educated here, working here should not be a citizen of the country.
By the way, Corbett Canyone, you’re absolutely right. (By your comment you also raise the issue of meritocracy in Greece which, as you may know, is a huge problem on its own… )
DeviousDiva, I’ve come across your blog through the expatinterviews site. I really like it.
Thank you Georgia for sharing your story about your friend. The situation here makes no sense. That someone can be born here, live here, get educated here and then once they are 18 suddenly they become non-citizens. It’s sick and I don’t believe there are any VALID reasons why she shouldn’t be a Greek citizen. Welcome to my blog and best wishes to your friend. I hope things will change for her, and the thousands of others like her, very soon.
Thank you for your comment Fire Fly.
You have got me thinking (again) about why I am doing this. Blogging about these issues and trying to respond to people who are so entrenched in their views when there seems to be very little point.
I don’t mean to invalidate what you’re trying to do here, DD, or deny that these arguments need to be had. They are starting to become repetitious, though
Yes, the discussion has become mind-numbingly repetitive and several people who are commenting here are not capable of really understanding the issues. This has always been a problem with blogs that deal with sensitive issues. If I allow everyone to respond, some people will see that as giving the idiots a platform to vent their racist views. If I simply delete their comments, there are cries of censorship and the debate is derailed anyway.
On the positive side, there have been more people here who have stated their opinions against the two “repetitious” visitors. That really says something. My aim here has been twofold. One is to bring the issues of human rights in Greece to the attention of people who might not otherwise know about them. Two is to stimulate some form of discussion on those issues. I think I succeed at one (that’s the easy part) I am still working on two.
Thank you Vox for the link you left. I read the whole post and didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Very brilliant. I would recommend everyone to go and read it.
http://coffeeandink.livejournal.com/607897.html
COMMENT EDITED BY DEVIOUS DIVA
I will not allow your racist and appalling comments to remain on my blog. And do not come back to me moaning about censorship and freedom of speech. Permitting hate speech is not the same as freedom of speech. This is my blog and I have the right to delete or ban anyone I like. I would also like to protect others from having to read your drivel.
Don’t come back and moan.
Don’t come back pretending to be someone else.
In fact, don’t come back at all.
To Appalled: Yes, I’m fully aware of the immigration/citizenship policies of other countries (I’ve lived in Japan for years). So what? I don’t agree with them.
Sorry, I didn’t see his comment had been edited.
DD, I wondered if you had seen this article in todays’ Guardian - on immigration in Greece: http://www.guardian.co.uk/inte.....04,00.html.
Martin Baldwin-Edwards is quoted, I see.
I read and enjoy this blog (and also Bollybutton’s hugely entertaining blog) because I’m interested to see and compare how Greece is dealing with what the country that I live in, the UK, first went through in the 1950s and 1960s - an influx of immigrants.
And unfortunately, I find little of any encouragement, other than the fact that far-right-wing parties in Greece have failed to attract significant support.
Now that UK society is at a fairly advanced stage of multiracialism and multiculturalism, and people in big cities generally rub along together relatively well (I said relatively… it’s by no means perfect!), it makes the predicament of people such as the placard-holding woman born to Asian parents in Greece (pictured) rather depressing to behold. I can’t imagine how frustrated and angry she and others in her situation must feel.
As a Briton born in London to Greek parents (and having lived in the UK most of my life), I have to admit I do sometimes struggle to get to grips with the Greek mentality. I can’t help but feel that British and Greek values are irreconcilably different, presumably as a result of their vastly different histories.
Personally I find Greek nationalism understandable, given the country’s past, but nonetheless suffocating, counter-productive, and, at the very least, rather inelegant. I felt embarrassed when, during the otherwise successful Athens Olympics, reports filtered through that Greek spectactors at events where Greeks were competing would boo and jeer the other nations’ athletes. I saw this for myself when the start of the 200m was delayed by booing from Greek spectactors who had secured tickets to the event purely to see Kostas Kenteris win. I was practically quaking with rage at the sheer rudeness of it.
Greeks’ refusal to accept any criticism of Greece from foreigners, even if they themselves would agree it with amongst themselves, must be quite infuriating. Their obsession with their own history, at the expense of their present and their future, saddens me. The fact that they would pick up on the fact I said ‘their’ in the last sentence, rather than ‘our’, speaks volumes. And the fact that whenever I go to Greece I have to put up with people indignantly demanding to know why I can’t speak Greek really pisses me off.
Not surprisingly, therefore, I can’t help but agree with much of what Martin Baldwin-Edwards has to say, although like so many atheists think of Richard Dawkins, it would perhaps be more useful if his thoughts were expressed in a rather less combative manner. Without knowing anything about Mr Baldwin-Edwards, it would be reasonable to imagine that he was once maybe attracted to Greece for the same reasons that everyone is, and has since bitterly turned against the place due to the multitude of harsh realities and for the usual reasons (corruption, racism, contempt for environment, etc.).
Finally, as you might expect given my thoughts above, I of course believe that Greece should recognise citizenship by birth. No one should ever have to feel rejected by the country in which they were born and brought up.
Wow! Only hours after I posted above, look what’s appeared in Kathimerini:
“New reforms being proposed by the Interior Ministry promise to grant the children of immigrants who were born and educated in Greece the same rights as Greek citizens and save them countless bureaucratic hassles and discrimination.”
There seem to be all sorts of provisos, but at least it’s a step in the right direction - and a belated acknowledgment by the Interior Ministry that there is an issue here that needs to be addressed.
Nightboat, thank you for your very interesting perspective and welcome to my blog. I also witness the incredibly embarrassing booing at the Olympic games at the volleyball.
It is quite infuriating, Nightboat. I am used to an environment where people from different backgrounds/cultures/races openly discuss issues and are seeking solutions rather than stumbling at the first step. I know that some of the people who negate and argue over everything I write here just because I’m foreign, are not representative of all Greek people but there is an underlying sentiment of Greece against the world that exists here. The “Greeks invented everything” “If it wasn’t for the Greeks…” attitude. Of course, this exists everywhere but I do feel it is expressed much more often and much more vocally here. Pride in one’s country’s achievements is one thing. Blind nationalism is quite another.
I really feel for you on the subject of speaking Greek. It must be so much harder for you because you are Greek. I get by because I’m the “silly foreigner” who can’t be “bothered” to learn the language (even though I get by very well considering I am not linguistically gifted and Greek is an extremely difficult language).
On the subject of the manner in which people express their frustration here, it’s a difficult subject. People do write in different styles. Our friend Zardoz has a very distinct and interesting way of putting things (often in capitals which is considered shouting on the internet). He has actually said worse things than MBE but he is Greek so therefore forgiven (most of the time).
I have never succeeded in explaining to the more nationalistic people who comment here, the difference between allowing comments from people who disagree with me (which happens all the time) and deleting racist/xenophobic and generally vile insults and threats to individuals on this blog.
Anyway, I hope you will be visiting often and commenting when you can. I value your insights.
Thanks DD. Although it’s the first time I’ve posted to your blog, I’ve dipped into it for a read many times, and there does seem to be a recurring problem with aggressive comments from Greeks who don’t like what you (or others with a different viewpoint from them) have to say about their country.
But then I thought, well, how does the UK compare? I always think of it as tolerant and fair-minded country. And yet, when I think about it, there’s plenty of evidence here of the kind of ugly xenophobia that exists in the Balkans. I’m thinking not just of the execrable Sun, Daily Mail and (worst of all) Daily Express, but of the comments from ordinary members of the public on the BBC News website’s ‘Have Your Say’ pages. I’m always taken aback by just how virulently xenophobic, jingoistic and right-wing British people are on those pages, cloaked by the anonymity of the internet. The very same people probably keep their opinions to themselves offline. I wonder whether Greeks are just more prone to saying out loud what Brits themselves think but prefer not to voice. British people are terrified of being thought of as racist, whereas maybe Greeks don’t give a shit. I dunno. Maybe someone can put me right there.
Anyway, I’d be interested to know what your experiences with Athenians are like offline, how your relations are with the Greek people in your neighbourhood and with the Greek people you interact with on a day-to-day basis going about your business in Athens. Greece has only had about fifteen years of being a non-heterogenous society, whereas the UK has had more like fifty. When the UK was at the stage that Greece is at now, in many ways the lot of immigrants was worse - riots, “no dogs, no blacks, no Irish” signs, racist sitcoms, etc. The progress the UK has made since then deserves some credit - it at least seems to make an effort, even if it doesn’t always get it right.
So, is there any hope to be derived from your first-hand experiences that, given time, Greece may too mature into a country that’s more at ease with non-Greeks living there, or would you say that most Greeks are too inherently racist and nationalistic for that to ever happen?
Excuse me Nightboat, “inherently racist and nationalistic”? Can you please explain what you mean by “inherently”?
As in, intrinsically. And before anyone takes umbrage, please note that I was asking whether this is the case - rather than stating that it is.
I have experienced blatant racism here. From being refused even a showing of a house based on our “foreignness”, being called the A word (the N word elsewhere), to just being invisible. Mostly I have experienced a kind of naivety about people from other races or cultures.
There is also the fascination of all things “ethnic” especially when it comes to food and music. This is a tough one because on the one hand it is a positive move towards understanding or at the very least reaching out. I do get a bit bored and frustrated with it though. I guess because I have experienced something much more profound and positive than the “exotic” factor.
Having said that, I am a very patient person and always try and take the time to talk to people and answer people’s questions if they have them. That’s just me and I completely understand that others might feel they are being interrogated or held up as an object of fascination rather than a real person.
As for my Greek friends… well, I have so many wonderful, warm, intelligent friends. I feel so lucky. We have our moments… like all people… when some issues arise. I have had many long, sometimes heated discussions about racism in Greece especially about the more “accepted” forms (against Albanians, Turks and Roma).
I am not a saint by any stretch of the imagination. I am always learning, questioning and discovering. How much are MY responses to situations informed by prejudice or ignorance? I really believe that this is the only way to move on. Acknowledging and facing your own racism/prejudice is a painful but necessary first step.
I am more concerned about the way the authorities deal with issues of racism and xenophobia because Greece is relatively new to immigration and has an opportunity to deal with it better than it is doing at the moment, given the models and ideas that have been used in other countries.
There is little or no diversity education in schools which is where fundamental change can happen. It really worries me that we are seeing second generation (and moving quickly towards third generation) of immigrants who are being denied birth certificates or citizenship (therefore their basic rights). We will start seeing large numbers of disenfranchised and disconnected people. And that can only be negative.
Feeling that you are a full and valued member of the society that you live in is a crucial foundation. I am already seeing and hearing the effects of exclusion. The anger and frustration that exists among those who are “non-people” in this country. People who are struggling for many years to secure even their most basic rights after having been born and educated here only to find that on their 18th birthday that they are illegal and in fear of being deported.
So yes, I am impatient and frustrated because I can see the negative results of inaction and denial. There are some utterly brilliant people who are working towards change but it is not enough by itself. There needs to be a commitment on a national level and that is what I do not see happening (perhaps a few nice words at the most).
Am I optimistic ? I used to be. Now, not so much. The rise of nationalism all over Europe is frightening. The development of the “fortress Europe” idea is extremely worrying. Fear-mongering is at an epidemic level. Immigration is not going to stop.
The question is how to deal with it. Treating people like criminals is not going to help. Locking people up in appalling conditions is not going to help. Refusing to grant asylum to people fleeing war and starvation (Greece has a less than 1% recognition rate: the lowest in Europe) is not going to help. We (and I mean “we” as in Europe as well as Greece) need to find long-term solutions not “quick fixes” or ignoring the problem and hoping it will go away.
I don’t have the answers but I still believe that we, as human beings are capable of finding them if we are willing to do so.
Ok, I’ve rambled on enough for now. Thank you for asking the questions, Nightboat. I hope others might respond with their experiences.