Fresh idea, which seems to be useless

Today in Päevaleht online the article of Andres Kollist, the first head of the Department of the Citizenship and Migration has been published, tomorrow it will see the light also a a hardcopy. This person (BTW, it seems he's also chemist) was the one who had to follow all the decisions of Riigikogu according to the citizenship. Now he tells, that one reason of the present social splitting are the wrong choices of the state, which have complicated the possibilities of Estonian residents without Estonian citizenship to go across the western border. One can say, that this way the Estonian state pushed those people to Russia's arms, and it's true. Moreover, if according to the initial plans of the government all the Russian speaking people would take Russian citizenship, it would be great pain you-know-where, we'd get the little Russia in Estonia, fortunately this scenario didn't work.

His idea is to give to all non-citizens the "citizenship of third type" (that's the original name, as we already have born and naturalized citizens). It would be given without any exams, just to exchange the Alien Passports, moreover it's defined as "quasi-citizenship". The holder of it could have all the rights of citizens except to vote in parliamentary elections, but including diplomatic support abroad and the freedom of movement. Something alike Netherlands have done for the people coming from old dutch colonies.

Basically it's a deal about so called "zero" citizenship, it would help to solve some problems as the enormous amount of non-citizens or aliens. In the light of AI report and the bronze night events this issue got in focus of many human rights organizations, actually OSCE was reporting about it quite long time ago.

As it was to expect the idea has found its opponents, Mart Nutt replayed immediately telling that there's no way of giving the citizenship to aliens, the masses immediately claimed Mr. Kollist as a red, traitor and collaborator. Paul-Erik Rummo gave more weighted opinion, telling thatit the fact of offering of such "citizenship of third type" itself would be offensive to aliens.

My opinion is similar to that of Rummo, in some meaning it would be offensive, but anyway people would take it. Even if they'd prefer to have Russian citizenship, nowadays it's pretty difficult to get it. The candidates have to pass the language and history exam and as I've heard it is pretty sophisticated.

The other side of this act is the loyalty the state would like to win with this action. I'm afraid it will be turned upside down by Russian propaganda, which still surrounds those people. Moreover many will take it as a tip the state gives to stay still, especially after the bronze night events. I'm afraid it's a bit late to do such steps, but should be noted that it's one of the best ideas suggested so far.

One possible solution of the problem of intolerance

What has to be done first? One has to get free from it's hate, hate is the real cause of all the troubles happening between people. It's easy to grow up your own hate, private or collective, but it's more difficult to get rid of it. Sure the collective hate is more dangerous due to the synergistic effect. Anyway, loosing some ndividual components of the collective hate makes it weaker. Try to leave your one here It's a pretty old resource but might be helpful ;)
Don't forget to visit it time to time.

There was a coup d'etat planned on 9th May? They've got mad?

Today in "Sakala", an add-on to "Postimees", were published some expressions of Rein Lang, our minister of justice. The main point is that on 9th of May were planned some great disorders having the coup d'etat as a main goal. Unfortunately no proofs of it were provided, it was only sad, that the expectations are based on the analysis. According to the information the Office of Public Prosecutor has there were really some disasters to expect.

It was also mentioned, that the operation of transfer of the monument broke the plans of the conspirators, most of them got to jail after the bronze night.

Original article

I just can't believe someone can be that sick, it's incredible! But thinking more i can propose that exactly this information can stand in the KaPo (secret police) top secret analysis, which, according to the official version, have led to the beginning of the operation.

Unfortunately discussing that matter without any proofs we'll roll to the theory of conspiracy, and everything will be sad can be accepted only as the speculation.

The only question is bothering me really a lot: why the city government of Tallinn gave the permission for "the history lesson" of Juri Liim on 9th of May? IMHO it was obvious, that in such situation conflicts of some kind were unavoidable. On the other hand would they prohibit it, the reputation of Savisaar would be damaged immediately. I can't be sure, but it is quite possible, that the russophonic electorate of Savisaar would not participate in the events of the 9th of May (those, who are Estonian citizens are thinking more adequately, than ones who do not want to take the citizenship, at least it's what could be expected), but this time no one knew, that Tonismagi will be booked by Kaheksanda Mai Liikumine for the 8th of May.

The spokesman of the city government: "if the chief of the police department or the Ministry of Internal Affairs will find, that this event might have negative consequences for public order, they have right to cancel the meeting. City does not have this right, we only have to register the event."

According to this exclamation it seems that from the very beginning they started to push away the responsibility, what is in correspondence with general behavior of the Central party. As far as i remember from 1995 a public meeting should be allowed by the local government but before the issue of public order should be fixed with the police, which gives also a signature on the formal request.
So, there are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio,than are dreamt of in our philosophy. Let's wait fore some information on the night watch, may be it will explain the situation.

Creation of russian ETV channel is postponed

The main news of today seems to be that the creation of the russian ETV channel is postponed. This decision was obvious for me, nevertheless the idea of such channel isn't bad itself. The question is that it should be done long time ago, now it would look quite artificial, moreover russian speaking people don't trust to information is provided by the state. Main problems is that this community is too deep in the media-space of Russia mostly because the Estonian media in russian language is very, very bad (IMHO).

One time i was working with Swets Blackwell sending different printed media from Estonia to Russia, this time i could observe the degradation of newspapers in russian. All of them got really yellow sooner or later, there's no good authors. May be i just can't stand the way the information is presented. Here it should be noted, that the deviation of information was slightly changing, when the newspaper changed its owner, but general trends were still the same. At the same time Russian TV has been evolved rapidly and got its important place in life of most of russian speaking inhabitants of Estonia. That's why such channel would be necessary 15 years ago, but I'm not sure someone except Veidemann and few more was thinking on this issue, it was Jelzyn's era and no hostile propaganda came from foreign ether.

I'm not sure the expenses of creation of russian TV channel would ray off, anyway the coverage of such channel would be minimal. Moreover ETV in estonian is good as an infochannel, and not that much suitable for masses as a source of entertainment, as private ones.

In my opinion the best possible solution would be to subtitle the estonian programs, it's also helpful for learning the language, and at the same time it would be the same information as is provided for estonian speakers, it would be much more effective tool of integration. Digital TV would also allow to broadcast the additional voice channel, it would be also an option for those who don't like the subtitles. Let's see what will be next steps of National Broadcasting Company.

One more notice on russian media in EST

In addition to censorship on russian Delfi it seems that last days the Aktuaalne Kaamera vene keeles got more dry and shrinked from 15-20 to 10 minutes. No news is good news?

Suggestion of Laine Jänes, the Minister of culture

One interesting opinion on the matter of integration in Estonia was published yesterday in Eesti Päevaleht, the author is the Estonian Minister of culture. As many others it's one of the edges of the solution of existing problem. I'll try to summarize this text briefly.

Original article

After the bronze night one very positive thing has happend in Estonia - we have really noticed, that in Estonia live many people, whose mother tongue is not Estonian but in spite of this they have full right to live here with dignity and feel them self comfortable.

We adore the wish of foreign Estonians to preserve the Estonian language and culture - their identity. Foreign Estonians can be compared to the Russians in Estonia, and as there exist many "Estonian Houses" there could be "Russian Houses" in Estonia to keep the society together and to develop the culture. Local language should be learned but it shouldn't be done by the price of loosing the native language. But for the accusation of language the linguistic environment is essential, so it should be our goal, to create the united cultural space for all the inhabitants.

It's impossible to compete with Russian TV in meaning of entertainment, but at least the neutral news reports for Russian speaking society should be provided. ETV and Eesti raadio should play an important role in creating the common infospace, the way it has to be done is still unclear but hopefully will be developed in closest future. It's important, that the state will express it's own vision to the national broadcasting company, which will provide the suggested solution and correspondent expenses. There are researchers, who've managed to Russian culture to the Estonians, now we need such ones, who would do the same in opposite direction.

As a part of infospace also the governmental web pages should be available in Russian, not only Estonian and English. Even the page of G.W.Bush exists also in Spanish, which is spoken by 15% of population, but the percentage of Russian speaking people in Estonia is twice higher.
People should be interested in Estonian life and culture, but it can be achieved only by doing something. The knowledge of language is essential for both sides. The good point of crises is that they push the wheels to spin, thou the goal is to change Estonia to a state, where people understand each other's mind and language.

* * *

Yes, the idea of "Russian Houses" is not bad, the question is, can the state support them? The main problem is to find young people (preferably with no soviet thinking it their heads), who could start such culture centers. As far as i know there are kind of Russian Houses in Tallinn, Narva, Kohtla-Järve, the one in Tartu has died long time ago. I can't be sure about the financial support of them, in Tartu it was kept by one company owned by Russian speaking people and after the company got bankrupted, activity of the house was significantly reduced.

The other problem is IMHO in old-time soviet administrators, who mind first about their purses. There was some info in media, that the most of money provided for renovation of the center of Russian culture in Tallinn have been spent suspicious way. I suspect the same concerns the program of integration, just many people have seen in it the way to easy money.
What can be done with it? I think it's the social responsibility, what is missing in our society, the soviet heritage, there was such an expression "everything belongs to the state belongs us". But in order people to be more responsible their confidence to the state should raise as well. And it's a big question, how the state could manage to get the confidence of the majority from both sides, i mean the supporters and the opponents.

About the internet media in Russian I'd say it's also in really bad condition. Giustino just pointed out, that there exist russian versions of Postimees, Paevaleht, and Estonian television. I'm sorry, but it's impossible to compare those versions with the originals, actually i didn't use the russian website of Estonian television, but the ETV daily news report in russian is significantly different from the one in estonian. Es ist ja zum kotzen! The same about Postimees and P'evaleht, the amount of information differs drastically, there are almost only the news from BNS in the russian version.

The most annoying fact is that frequently the provided information is not neutral, and you have to read/watch both versions to get the real picture. IMHO the newspapers should be just straight translated, TV programs - subtitled. Would be better, if all the programs on ETV would be subtitled, but it's not so easy. BTW, yesterday i've read that the information on russian Delfi will be censored, today there's almost nothing to read. This must be the policy of the owner, not the state? No idea...

Flashback: Putinjugend monopolized the patriotism

I can't tell why i didn't search for this information before, may be because I didn't really mind about National-Bolshevistic Party (NBP) those days. Only today I've managed to find their declaration on the known events.

Among other it's sad there, that police special forces around the Estonian embassy in Moscow detain all the protesters who don't belong to movements blessed by Putin's administration.

It was to expect that Limonov's party will be strictly against any actions made to the monument. Actually the reflection motivated me for research was that Putinjugend might perform their attacks on the Estonian embassy in order to be quicker than NBP, and so, to get all the glory. Already in January, after the law about military burial places was passed, NBP performed some attacks on Estonian consulates in Saint-Petersburg and Minsk. In last case by mistake the ink bottles have hit the consulate of Latvia, which is located in the former building of the Estonian consulate. One should admit, that usually NBP is the quickest force to perform some public protests, moreover the Baltic countries or, better say, Russian-speaking minorities are among their interests.

On the other hand, Putinjugend gathered next to the embassy only 27.04 afternoon, sure they needed some preparation like inflatable tank, the uniform and so on. There's no need of such preparations for an ink-bombing action. BTW, meetings were going on for several days already from 11:00 to 18:00, but no one didn't really mind about them until that day. So, why the NBP did nothing? The most probable explanation would be, that NBP is an ally of Kasparov and Kasyanov, performing together Marches of Objectors. All those forces form the movement "Russia without Putin", so can be that the old thesis "The enemy of my enemy is my friend" is working here as well.

What i find to be funny, that here we've got the reaction which is diametrically opposite of what would be expected: "radicals" write a declaration and "governmental organizations" go to attack the embassy. Quite a nice projection of the situation in the state.

Breaking news: Opinion of the PM Andrus Ansip

http://www.postimees.ee/160507/esileht/arvamus/260939_1.php
Original article in Estonian

There's almost nothing new in this text, but the last paragraph I'd like to translate:

...Sure I've sad some excessional words as well, I regret it now. But I'm sure, now Estonians understand Russians much better compared to the time before 26.04, hope it's also valid vice versa. Slowly it will be understood, that one doesn't have right to blame Russians who live here as occupants, as well as to blame Estonians to be fascists. Only getting knowing each other better will help to exchange the mutual suspicion by the confidence. [EOA]

Estonia vs. France

Reading comments to the article posted below i got some thoughts about the stereotypes about Russians in Estonian society. Some people think that the situation is completely different, than in France. In my opinion the situation is more similar, than it appears to be. Let's take a look:

1. Russians have been brought to Estonia to displace the native people in contrary to France, where migrants were invited to do the dirty job.

It's not correct 'cause there is a significant part of Russians who were living here for centuries, and most of the people who've been moved to Estonia after WWII have been sent here to work, to build up industry, infrastructure and so on. If you don't know it was not that easy to move within the Soviet Union on your own will. So we have common goals of migration, but somehow different motivators, in case of France migrants moved on their own will searching for better fate. In soviet times there was almost no difference in quality of life in urban areas, the income depended only on the job position. Only in northern regions the salaries were significantly higher, but in general it was defined by the state, who will be sent to the certain position. Hence, most of the people got here by fate, with minor influence of own will.

2. The social situation

It's not about the causes of riots but about reasons. In this light the situation is quite similar, first of all the migrants (or the most aggressive part of them) are living in kind of ghettos, where the influence of the state is low. It's probably the most significant factor, so to say the through-time connections between generation are much stronger, than through-space. There's no official discrimination in both countries, but anyway non-native inhabitants have huge difficulties to get a good job position due to the nonacceptance on the emotional level. Such conclusion can be made based on statistics. The language doesn't play important role, all the young people in France and the most of them in Estonia can speak the local language, they are born there but the native people, standing between the choice usually prefer candidates of own race other things being equal. It isn't good but it's the common practice. I don't want to tell that it is unavoidable but xenophobia is really wide spread in Europe, it's in human nature, in some countries it just stays under control of rationality and of course the level of xenophobia is also different from country to country. So, if one wants to change the situation, one should start from own folk. The toleration of people who are different would be the main goal. It's sad but true, that it's pretty idealistic dream. As it was mentioned above xenophobia is a part of human nature and it's impossible to wipe it out completely. Such goal would be similar to the construction of communism. But to increase the level of toleration sounds to be realistic.

3. The influence of the state

In both countries the state prefers not to care to much about the origin of the problem, most probably i wouldn't be wrong telling that the reason of it lies close to the national pride. And in both countries there are political forces who exploit this pride. They do it quite effectively, in France it has happen several times, when Le Pen was close to win the presidential elections (luckily not this time, but Sarco is also not really friendly to the immigrants), same in Estonia every election the nationalistic parties get a significant amount of votes. Such behavior just plants the time-bomb under the society. It should be accepted, that pure national states do not exist anymore, the new stage of development has arrived.

4. The criminality

Such an artificial national stratification leads to formation of large risk groups, where people can't see the perspective of life. The loyalty in such groups is also low, as well as the respect of the laws. One can say the society doesn't pay attention about what's going on in those groups until people step on the way of crime. Even in this case the society prefers not to identify the social reasons of the problem, not going beyond the unique cases. The same can be told about drugs.

Unfortunately I'm not very familiar with the present situation in France, something has been done with the problem during the last year? If someone could provide some information in English, please give me a link.

Who are we, russians!?

http://www.postimees.ee/140507/esileht/arvamus/260589_1.php Original article in Estonian

Here is an adequate article from Raul Kalev, the Estonian guy who lives close to Tõnismägi. He got detained in the night 26.04 just because he went outside to protect his home. This one is his third publication on the matter in "Postimees" , i mostly share his opinion and will try to translate it to English. Sorry for mistakes, language corrections will be appreciated.

Previous articles can be found here (in Estonian):

Detention:
http://www.postimees.ee/280407/esileht/krimi/257698.php



On the problem of the Bronze Soldier:
http://www.postimees.ee/260407/esileht/arvamus/257397.php



Who are we, russians!?

The opinion of PR-manager Raul Kalev declares, that in order to integrate some community into Estonian society it should be clearly understood, who are ones should be integrated.

Once upon a time one pure blood Georgian man with Estonian passport was walking on Viru street. He was happy 'cause his chief raised his salary. It was told him, that now in Estonia we like small folks such as Georgian and Chechen and that you've had worse fate as we've had. We should keep together. On the corner of Vene street southerner with his head in the air bumped into his nephew, half-georgian and half -abkhazian. He was very sad 'cause he just got fired. It was sad him, that you Russians sow the dissension between peoples, you destroy the city, Estonian companies don't need such ones.

I find that the collisions of last time next to the Bronze Soldier and the following rescue operation on the integration of russian people into Estonian society have raised a bunch of tiny problems. We should take care of them before we'll splash the amount of politically correct democracy and freedom of speech into media, as well as before we'll promise to vaccinate with last matters our strategic target group - the Russians. Namely - who are those Russians who live in Estonia and whom we would like to integrate? This question is asked by native russian speakers from them self. One who doesn't believe could perform it's own research on it.

From the really beginning it would be quite slippery way: as it is known from history it has been difficult for several centuries already, to find pure-blood russian. Thanks to historical dramas those who've been living on the originally russian ground got that much mixed with Tatar, Mongolians, Chinese that some researchers suppose that pure-blood russian does not exist. In best case a couple percents. So, actually in our integration-madness we are not searching for ethnic Russians.

Logically, three options are left to define those, who are to be integrated: Russians (russian citizens), russian-minded (independent on what could it mean), and russian-speaking people. We've nothing to do with first ones, their fraction is small enough. With second ones the situation is more difficult because the methods of finding them do not belong to the area of governmental organizations with their small budget. This way we arrive to the point of truth: we should integrate those Russians, who have Russian as their mother-tongue.

But the goal is more difficult as it could appear: do Russian-speaking people have a common culture and do they form the group with common interests? Based on long-lasting naive and perfunctory investigations one could arrive at a conclusion that so-called Russians is a group with a lot of identities, the same as a multi-headed dragon. BTW the identity changes rapidly and unpredictably. However some characteristic properties of the group could be defined. For example many of Russians who go abroad, east or west, answer the question about their nationality unambiguously: we are Estonian. Just because they feel them self to be. Other interesting and confusing property is defined within the different groups. It originates from the fact, that many russian native speakers are actually Ukrainian, White-russian, Georgian aso. They don't feel to be Russian, but most of them do not participate their culture societies. Further investigation brings us to the next subculture, which is generally connected with Russian only by the inscription in their passport or the Russian-like name.

Actually they are georgian who has Russian father or Armenian who has Jewish mother or Chechen who grandfather was Mordvinian. They are people, who feel them self Russian only in Estonia 'cause they have been defined this way by the majority, nevertheless they usually feel them self to be someone else. If one would add all the pure-blood representatives of different small folks who've arrived here during uneasy times plus those, who feel them self to be mixed-blood representatives of some small folk (up to one's choice but not Russian), only one group will remain. Author supposes, that this group is much smaller than previous and there belong people, who have Russian as mother-tongue but don't feel to be Estonian or of other small folk and who are brave enough to call them self Russian on both side of the border. But even they have problems with identity - going to Russia or following Russian mass-media starting from early 90's they get a clear message: you are not Russian any more, you are different, you are "estlander". And the biggest part of this group despite the Russian parents recognizes that Russia is not their home. They are Russian but not Russian of Russia. And they know that they are unwanted behind the border. BTW, we have own original Russians who live for ages next to Peipsi lake and on setu grounds. They are loyal and don't need to be integrated.

Sure there are several vulgar but used by both sides possibilities to define russians: for example Russian might be the holders of gray (alien's) passport. Or those, who came here after the beginning of soviet occupation. Or those, who crack sunflower seeds, whose who quarrel in public transport and spit on the ground. It's obvious, that such definitions are absolutely incorrect, for example among the gray pass holders there is a significant fraction of native Estonians, no one among those who arrived within last 50 years does not identify itself with the arrival date, so there's enough of rudeness also for native people.

When my nationalistic mother is telling, that all russians should be sent away and that we have a primitive conflict between estonians and russians, I'm thinking, whom exactly does she mean? Or when the government is speaking about integration it would be also reasonable, to distinguish different groups. Generalization in this situation could be a bad beginning, which will make a bad ending. Also Russia who has declared zero-tolerance policy for Chechen and other southern-looking nations has great problems with the discrimination of it's own citizens, independent on that frequently they don't have any southern blood at all. So it's impossible to assign the person completely based only on the language and the appearance.

If one speaks about integration in more narrow meaning as about forced estonization or about the obligation to speak and to write in Estonian, of course it makes no difference, who should be integrated and how do those people identify them self. Our experience based on 15 years long practice just recently have had demonstrated the bad ending of this approach. But if integration would be discussed in wider meaning, as a creation of a system of trustworthy relation between groups of different identity and education of loyal citizens, then it would be wise to understand, who is living next to us.

I share the opinion of Marianne Mikko that there's no "Putin's Russians" in Estonia, but here we have a great variety of folks with unclear identity and our goal is to help them to find this identity. Only after that we could try to integrate them. They could get to be our weapon against the propaganda coming from Russia. Actually, even before the known events I've been thinking that if the war between Russia and Estonia would start, about 50% of Russian-speaking people would protect Estonia, about 30% would try to escape from the choice and maximally 20% would join the side of Russia. Speaking with the same people after the saga of Bronze Soldier i should admit, that the part of supporters of Estonia has been decreased significantly due to seeded fear and uncertainty.

So, in my opinion the new wave of integration should start with the preparation of Estonian population. I suggest to spend up to 30% of the specified resources on the objective explanation of the history of our ethnic minorities to Estonians. The main goal would be to extinguish the fear and hostility of abstract Russia. Only this way we can transform our foreigners to get our allies and friends instead of seeing the grin of big bear. Other 30% could be spent on the familiarization of the own culture and identity within the minorities and the rest could be used for integration of Russians.

Even if we could feel, that as native folk we should have all the rights to keep our selfs as lords related to other cultures, who came here later, it would be better to bury this idea. France also could publish some cartoons about Muslims or handle broader the position on Islamic terrorism. But they don't do it, 'cause those people are their neighbors and their support is expected.

Opening post

Finally I've also caught blogging decease, it was mostly caused by the events taking part within last weeks in Estonia. It's my home county and i just can't stay silent reading all the opinions about the situation. Anyway, hope I'll manage to write not only about politics, we'll see.