This is such an important topic which gets forgotten in American centric Western online presence. Stating that no white people ever faced racism, slavery and/or oppression erases a ridiculously huge amount of European history. For example:
- Oppression of Irish
- Oppression of Samish
- Oppression of Estonians
- Oppression of Karelians
- Oppression of Finnish
As I'm a Native Finn I can speak a bit about the oppression, racism and slavery Finnish people have faced, mainly by Russia and Sweden, all to way till 1917 when we got our independence and even after that Soviet Union tried to invade us. The horrible history of being a Finn is long so I have only a few things here:
Different attempts to invade Finland and Finnish from 4th century forward till 1940's (all invasions and wars listed here in Finnish)
Vanha Viha - Old Grudge - a war between Russia and Sweden in 15th century destroyed and erased enormous parts of east and south Finland. Locals, who had nothing to do with the war, suffered the most.
Pitkäviha - Long Hate - lasted 25 years and damaged enormously Finnish population in mid 16th century. Again, it was Russia and Sweden fighting against each other whilst destroying Finns and their homes and lands on the go.
Crusaders forcing Finns to abandon their native faith and gods by beheading them if they refused. This is called Miekkakaste in Finnish; Baptism by the Sword. 12th century.
Christians and Catholics destroyed native Finnish faith so badly that it doesn't exist anymore. Small pagan groups are trying to revive the ancestral faith and witchcraft back to normal but for many it is simply just a curiosity instead of a real faith.
Finns were kidnapped and send to slavery to other countries, especially to Siberia. Some were shipped all the way to Middle-East. This took part in the Middle-Age but also during WW1 and WW2.
In late 17th century, Finland faced a horrible famine. 30% of the population died within 2 years and it is one of the most catastrophic famines in the Europe ever. This was caused by the bad weather and by the fact that the crops grown in Finland were shipped to Sweden by the decision of Sweden's government instead of letting Finns to keep them. The famine was not taken seriously by Sweden, which increased the death toll.
Finnish were described barbaric, unsophisticated and uneducated by other European countries. Finns were said to be dirty mongoloids and thus not part of pure European (white) race. Our native faith and rich folklore was worth of nothing, as we clearly "didn't" have any.
Finns was ruled either in Latin, Swedish or Russian. It wasn't until 20th century or so that Finland got ruled in Finnish language.
In the early 20th century it was illegal, under the law of Soviet Union, to have anything Finnish going on. A composer Jean Sibelius was making a song called Finlandia in secrecy when Soviet Union heard about it. He lied to authorities that the hymn was called Fantasia and they had just heard the name wrong. Good for him, the authorizes believed him. If not, Jean Sibelius would have been executed.
During WWII, Finnish families send their children to Sweden for Swedish families to stay safe and not get killed. They would be returned back home after the war. These Sotaorpo, War Oprhan, or Evakkolapset, Refugee Children, kids were treated horrendously in many of the adoptive families because of their nationality. There are lots of studies made from the traumatic events these poor children had to face during their stay in Sweden.
On the other hand, Karelian people were treated horribly by Finnish when they ran away from Karelia during WWII
Finland was pretty much 3rd world country by most of it still in 1960's, though a life in the cities was better. My grandmother was born in 1920 and she lost 6 of her 9 siblings due famine and being poor. My father, born in 1950's, never finished his schooling as he had to head out to work at age of 9, which resulted him getting his back broken and damaged permanently. This all is due the fact that Finland never got a change to flourish properly as people and the country were constantly oppressed and treated badly. Life has changed DRAMATICALLY for the past decades and now we're the happiest country and one of the best places to live in in the whole world.
In the Europe oppression, racism, genoside and slavery has always based on your nationality and your religion. People were rarely hunted down because of their skin color. It wasn't mandatory, if not important at all, though we're not free from the skin color based racism. Just in the context of history, your skin color didn't matter as much as it mattered who are you, where you live and what you believe in.
In Finland, indigenous Samish are still fighting for their rights and they struggle to keep the language alive (as Finnish and Swedish are mandatory native languages in Finland but surprise, surprise, Samish isn't, even when the population of native Samish and Swedish speakers is about the same). There was some years ago a big fight between this big company and Samish. The company wanted to utilize a river which is sacred to Samish. The Samish won the legal battle.
Karelian language, native faith and native culture is pretty much completely vanished by now because of the constant oppression of Karelians that has been going on for centuries. Despite of living most of my live near Karelian area, I have met only one native Karelian speaker in my whole life. Her daughter tried to keep the language alive by studying it with her son but she said it's extremely difficult to find any ABC-books in Karelian.
So, please remember that the world is wide and not everything works, has worked, is happening and has happened like in the USA. It is important to live today but also look at the past to understand the mistakes we have made as a humanity so that we wouldn't repeat them. AND, this is not a fight who has had it the worst. Humanity should never argue with one another but come together as sisters and brothers and siblings we truly are.
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