Europe’s Last Remaining Wall

It's a wall that was started 500 years ago. It's invisible. It is the
wall that separates Europe from her largest minority –the Gypsy people.
Ever since they first set foot on European soil, they were stripped,
layer after layer, of the essence of their harmonious culture – the
freedom to travel, which in turn curtailed the plying of their trades,
the performing of their ancient crafts and the display of their talents
in music and dance, their art.

Increasingly they were pushed into the shadows of Europe's many
cultures, without in return according them the most basic human rights.
They received no schooling to adjust to cultures that were foreign to
them. They were not protected by the prevailing laws of the land. Often
their only means of survival was theft and other petty crimes. This in
turn, reinforced the mediaeval perception of the Gypsy as thief, as
lazy, as untrustworthy. Contrary to many racist misconceptions, Roma are
not criminal by nature, even the Nazis admitted there was no crime among
nomadic Gypsies. Crime among Roma themselves is extremely rare, and
severely condemned and punished by their own.

The time has come for the new United Europe to tear down this last
remaining wall, give the Romani culture the same respect it offers all
other European cultures, reverse this trend of pushing the Roma into
abject poverty and thereby petty crimes in order to survive. The Roma
are an intelligent, peace-loving people. Many have long since integrated
into the majority population. After centuries of marginalization, abuse
and humiliation, the rest of them, the poorest, the most vulnerable
deserve to be helped with patience, education, love and understanding to
join the dignity and right to a decent life accorded to all other
Europeans.

By Criticizing Madonna For Not Doing Enough, Are We Looking A Gift Horse In The Mouth?

"Welcoming Madonna for supporting Roma people, Hindus have urged her to
'wholeheartedly' undertake Roma cause and do substantially more than
just donating a used pair of shoes for Roma charity." [Roma Daily News],
Friday, November 6, 2009.

It is not about the $ 16,600 Modanna raised for Roma children by
auctioning a pair of her shoes, it is about the fact that Madonna did
what few do – rebel openly against the centuries-long injustice and
inhumanity committed against Europe's Roma people. As those of us, who
for decades now have tried to raise awareness to the continued
persecution and/or marginalization, know – the majority of non-Gypsies
either doesn't care, or looks the other way. I have no idea whether
Madonna was or is a Gypsy activist, or whether she is simply a human
being who cares and has the guts to make her feelings known. To me the
question is not, should the famous pop-star do more, but rather how do
we attract more people like her?

WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO THE ITALY I ONCE KNEW AND LOVED?

During Fascist times of World War II, Italy’s racists were definitely a minority. Her Jews, although persecuted by Italy’s racist minority, never felt hated by her people. Many scientists and intellectuals who fled the persecution, after the war returned to what they still considered their homeland and the people they loved. Now Gruppo Everyone and the anti-racist networks, from where I stand sound like a tiny chorus in a tumultuous sea of racial hatred backed up by indifference.

“The situation of Roma citizens in Italy is getting more and more desperate every day,” writes Gruppo Everyone. “A persecution taking place among the indifference and silence of the media.” Of course most newspapers and TV stations are controlled by both Right and Left Wing political parties. Berlusconi is the boss of many.

In the Germany of World War II, the extent of the genocides were made possible by the overwhelming numbers of Germans turned persecutors and the indifference of the rest of the population. Opposition was almost non-existent.

Has Italy’s once human heart turned into a heart of darkness?

GERMANY SENDING KOSOVAR GYPSIES HOME

That condemns roughly 10,000 Roma to a life of daily threat, harassment, and a life of fear in a segregated community.

Roma rights Organization Chachipe states:

“Contrary to what is said by the German authorities the situation of Roma in Kosovo has not improved drastically. Roma continue to be victims of widespread discrimination and violations of their human rights.”

In 2002 I stayed with a Roma family in Kosovo. They lived in ramshackle houses with out- houses and water from a communal pump. Some lived on toxic dumps, where children were born deformed, all children tested extremely high on blood levels of lead. Parents were afraid to send their children to school. Roma who sat on the backseats while some of us Westerners drove through towns, ducked so as not to be recognized and attacked. There was fear of attacks during the night. There was very little food, lack of firewood for the cold winters. Gasoline was purchased on the black market in one-liter wine bottles.

As always Gypsies do the best with what they’ve got: The inside of their shacks were clean and cozy, their children unfed but well looked after, as is their custom, they were protective of their guests

Having grown up in Europe during the war, I know for a fact that attitudes in Europe change slowly, if at all. The resurgence of racism 60 years after the holocaust seems prove that the same hatred has kept on smoldering under promises of modern-day democracies. Activist over here in the U.S., human rights activists from all over the world,

have to unite to prevent this new version of a previous genocide. Kosovo would be a good start to keep an unrelenting vigil, because when I was there, NATO soldiers seemed to look the other way.

GYPSY DIVINATION, PART 1: THE REAL THING

Having known Gypsies or Roma for most of my life, I have always looked upon fortune-telling as a form of entertainment, to my eyes harmless entertainment. I myself, whenever life dealt me a dirty blow and I needed my spirits lifted, rather than seeing a psychiatrist, who would approach my problem by digging it up and spreading it wide, I personally did not hesitate to visit a fortune-teller instead. Placed in cozy surroundings, it is in such a person’s interest to make me feel better, otherwise no return business. By the way, I never sought out a Gypsy for that sort of service, knowing how they feel about it, and afraid that with their keen eyes they would read what I knew about them, namely that those with the true gift would hardly steep down to the entertainment business.

So what about the true gift? Not only born to it but born with the patience to develop and belief in their natural abilities? Urania Boswell, was born in 1852 in England and became famous for her special sensitivity to the approach of danger and/or death. She was able to predict not only the time of her son’s and brother’s death, but the year of Queen Victoria’s death, four years before it happened. Such power not only impressed non-Gypsies, or gadje, but it is a power that frightens fellow Gypsies.

I myself, ever since I was a child growing up with partisans and people on the run in the woods of Germany and Poland during World War II, had this horrible sensitivity to feel either the actual moment of death of people close to me but fighting at great distances away, or foresee the early death of people I love. Something to think about.

EARLY MARRIAGE A CHARECTERISTIC OF GYPSY CULTURE

[Roma Daily News] Romania: Roma, between tradition and law

“The marriage is one of the characteristic elements of the Roma culture, tradition and way of life, and the subject of early marriages attracted international attention. Adapting to European legislation determined significant changes inside Roma communities, which try to adept their traditions to the modern law provisions.”

Roma/Gypsies have always considered children to be the true wealth of their culture. Early marriage not only kept the young women virginal till marriage, thereby assuring true bloodlines, but assured a great number of offspring. The number of children was also the greatest trump card in the Roma fight for survival. And these children are brought up to survive the harshness of Gypsy life. They receive much love, but from early on they are taught to contribute to their family means of survival. In the past they earned their living within traditional Gypsy trades, arts, and craftsmanship. Unfortunately modern life has eliminated the need for many of these traditional occupations. But as far back as Roma history is recorded in Europe, the rulers of the majority population have focused on attacking this greatest wealth of Roma culture, their children. Already under Maria Theresa of Austria children were taken from their Roma families and placed into Christian foster homes, Roma women were and to this day are sterilized against their will, and on and on. This has never met with ultimate success. The Roma family is a warm circle of life. It was and is the culture’s core strength.

Unfortunately on this more and more overcrowded planet, we all have to compromise, stick to laws that apply to all. I have no doubt that, once those Roma will be presented with the equal rights and the protections that go with those laws, to which they have a right as citizens of Europe, they will bend their laws to conform. Chaucer had a saying: The stick that bends doesn’t break. The Gypsies are masters at flexibility; it is how they have survived on their long trail of tears.

THE DANGEROUS ABSENCE OF WOMEN IN GYPSY LEADERSHIP

Friday, October 2, 2009 [Roma Daily News]:

“Gypsy women consider themselves as inferior to men and vulnerable because of lack of education, a Soros survey has revealed. Gypsy women have low self-esteem and are vulnerable to poverty, lack of social assistance and illnesses provoked by repeated early pregnancies.”

A society where leadership is balanced by male and female input is proven to serve its people best. Women will add the necessary caution for survival to male leadership which may exhibit too much aggression. Studies of dealing with juvenile delinquency have shown that the girls in young men’s life are often the best means to bridle their lawlessness. There are indeed among Gypsy tribes, namely the Lovara, the horse-dealers, where leadership at the top was divided between a male and a female leader. Unfortunately, among today’s Roma majority, the women are indeed kept suppressed and illiterate. If this is subconsciously maintained to enhance the confidence of Roma men, and as a result they have a lot of self-interested, divisive male leaders, these leaders are not only cutting their own flesh, but that of their people. Roma must unite. Their women’s voices have to be heard. They have to stand as equals, side by side, to avert the disaster that is brewing all over Europe, and if successful there, will spread like a virus to Roma over here as well.