I just read up on Estonia on Amnesty International. According to them there are language police that make sure workers can speak Estonian whether the employer asks for it or not. I presume that many of the ethnic Russians in Estonia are people who were actually born there, not immigrants.
Depends what you count as "Born time" - those who were born in deep soviet reign are problematic. But Many (60-70%) of Russian youth, who were born in '90s, speak Estonian language very - We have no problem with them and we get along very well. They speak both languages and their chances to find work in public sector are quite a bit higher than for a person who only speaks Estonian.
Problematic are ex-soviet time "half-russians" who refuse to understand that Estonia (as country) exists and is independent of Russia. They often protest and demand russian laws to be accepted in Estonia, Russian language to be accepted in government as legal language and that Russians should have more rights in Estonia than Estonians - cuz they are from russia and yadda-yadda-yadda. They also highly protest against anyone saying that Soviet era (and its "achivements") was same bad as Faist rule (Truth to be told Estonians suffered quite a bit more under Soviet rule than under faist rule.)
NovaKart said:
One person wrote this to Amnesty:
"I used to work as a taxi driver but lost my job thanks to the Language Inspectorate. They call you to the transport commission for the slightest infraction of the high way code where the ladies from the Language Inspectorate are waiting for you. Everything is well planned. They call only the Russian speakers. They can sack you not because you are a bad worker, not because passengers have been complaining but because you don't know Estonian well. I have three children, a mortgage and an alcoholic husband but nobody cares. I have to pay for language courses and they are not cheap -- two or three monthly salaries. I don't have a job and I cannot pay for the Estonian language courses. How am I going to live? Isn't this discrimination?"
['.
This is propaganda, most speakers who get fired don't understand much else besides street names and don't know even them sometimes. This includes dealing with money, clients and understanding wishes (for an example you cannot say taxi driver that "wait here for 5 minutes I'll bring my stuff"). I've been forced to use Russian language with many low-cost business employees and it is very difficult to ask them something and them to do their work assignments.
Language courses take roughly a month that involves learning to speak Estonian on very basic (required) level) and cost 1-2 month worth of wages, there are many cheaper courses and even free courses.
How could you expect to work in USA without knowing more than 3 words in English?
Gangor said:
I suppose that to Estonians, Russian speakers are remnants of the Communist era, and would be better off leaving the country. I sympathise with this. However I also doubt that Russia would take them back, as they provide an excellent excuse for later invading Estonia, so it puts everyone in a difficult position.
I have same opinion on ex-soviet "veterans", however half of Russian youth knows that Estonia is not part of russia and USSR is gone - they cause no problems and are even good for the country(increasing trade and etc.).
Moonbat said:
Not defending Estonia here, I think they're in the wrong here, but the heck is it with the Russians hardon with anything about Estonia? I know the Russian state is using propaganda against Eastern European states leaning more towards the west than ever before, but this is just silly. Can't the Russian people seriously see through all this manipulation? Russia is becoming a dangerously undemocratic country.
Estonia has good geographical location, Russia lacks ports to access Baltic Sea. This is main excuse for invasion over past few centuries.
Russian news repeat daily that Soviet Union is good and those who died fighting Faism are heroes. Everyone who disagree are faist and thereby enemies of Russia. To most Estonians, Soviet Union was an invader who caused far more damage than Faist did.
woody60707 said:
Russia needs to man up and start taking responsibility for the harm their actions are still causing today. None of these countries asked for Russia to dump a load of it's population in to all these Eastern European nations. Russia granted citizenship to the ethnic Russians in Georgia. I see no reason why Russia couldn't do the same here. That would go along ways in fixing some of these problems. (oh wait, Russia only did that for propaganda).
That'd would not fix problem due many of these people already have passports/citizenships. Russia would then complain Estonia mis-treats Russian citizens and would have even more reason to invade. Of course mistreatment means not giving public jobs (what require speaking both or only Estonian languages), governmental jobs (that require writing in Estonian language), besides that Estonian government does not respect Soviet Heroes while glorifies faism. (We treat both WWII sides same, they were invaders who damaged and killed us)
Soviet era remnants refuse to leave and they refuse to respect local language and/or laws, for them "everything is ours" still works (soviet rule). However things are different with youth, where about half speak Estonian(without accent!) and accept that Estonia is not a Part of (soviet) Russia - we have no problems with them. Just "war veterans" who were "dumped here" are causing problems, living in Estonia for 40 years not even learning to speak very basic Estonian during all that time.
NovaKart said:
The problem here is nationalism. It generally leads to prejudice
You learn fast, as while ago you said:
NovaKart said:
I know nothing about Estonia but it would have to be pretty bad to be worse than Turkey in the human rights department. Turkey isn't in the EU though.
Problem here is that we do not accept that Russia > Estonia in Estonia. Problem here is we do not accept Soviet War Heroes to be War Heroes, instead we compare them to Nazis. Problem here is that we live in a Country called Estonia, what is not part of Russia.
