Estonia the worst human rights abuser of EU

No, we are not talking about the same rights - since you can't give Russians even those citizenship rights which Estonians had in horrible USSR, where evil communists ate Estonian babies.
All right, we promise that should we once conquer and annex Russia, all Russians shall have the right to vote for our hand-picked single party candidate.
Happy now?
EDIT: Those who live in cities shall also receive passports, which will enable them to travel abroad - in the unlikely case that our Gestapo gives their permission.
Men, of course, shall also get the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see foreign countries, when they'll be conscripted for 2-3 years and sent to fulfill their international duty by conquering Pakistan in our name.
 
Seriously lacking in this thread seems to be Tekee´s own country which features yearly in Amnesty International´s reports.
 
All right, we promise that should we once conquer and annex Russia, all Russians shall have the right to vote for our hand-picked single party candidate.
Happy now?
That's a deal.
But if for some reason Estonia won't be able to conquer Russia (your tank driver will be sick, or something), Chukhonsky district of Russian Federation will not have Estonian as official language.

...our Gestapo gives their permission.
And members of your Gestapo will need to seek refuge somewhere.

Seriously lacking in this thread seems to be Tekee´s own country which features yearly in Amnesty International´s reports.
His home country is Canada IIRC.
 
Heck, as I can make up on many of the posters here, it's probably a classic closed-mindedness toward the local culture story. It would all be solved if the younger(!) generation of Russians wouldn't shut themselves up inside their proper ghettos and learn Estonian (which doesn't equal 'unlearn Russian') already, which they probably don't even think of doing (which is exactly why Estonian authorities don't trust them).
It's very similar to some Francophone Belgians who'd rather be 'chômeurs, mais dignes'. Mayhap more Estonians know Russian than vice versa today. How ridiculous is that?

How superiour that Swiss Germans are in this regard.

Just taking a piss out of you guys and over-generalizing mayhap, but the best way to reduce tensions is to work toward the future. Make sure the other community has fewer reasons to complain. Credibility is to be earned. If Estonian Russophones would nowadays learn Estonian, know that the local Estonian authorities would have to change their ways or lose their credibility. So it also works for you.
 
Wait, so when Estonia got its independence 30% of the country didn't end up getting citizenship automatically because they weren't ethnic Estonians but rather (mainly) ethnic Russians?

And after 15 years only 7% are left who still don't have citizenship?

Are these statistics accurate? 3/4 of Russians went through the language requirement process and got citizenship? 75%? Or am I just reading that way wrong..
 
Heck, as I can make up on many of the posters here, it's probably a classic closed-mindedness toward the local culture story. It would all be solved if the younger(!) generation of Russians wouldn't shut themselves up inside their proper ghettos and learn Estonian (which doesn't equal 'unlearn Russian') already, which they probably don't even think of doing (which is exactly why Estonian authorities don't trust them).

Most young Russians (16-20, who have either Russian parents but Estonian citizenship or Russian Citizenship) I know (and am friends with) speak fluent Estonian with (mostly) no accent. Problematic are only people who "get high off" USSR and/or current Russia foreign politics. These people refuse learning Estonian, scream at anyone who they don't like "Fašist!" and blame Estonian government for not being civil enough, like current thread does. Of course they claim that Soviet Union freed us all and we should be thankful for them saving our "fašist butts". That means all Soviet Union landmarks are holy and sacred - to me (and many others) they are monuments of conquerors who did much more damage than Fašist rule. Just to mention that to me (and many others) both dictatorships were and still are both conquerors and destroyers who deserve no place in history. Soldiers who fell are victims/casualties of war and deserve proper burials and respect.

Same force was behind the Bronze Night.

red_elk said:
For 20 years, many of them died or emigrated.
Or got citizenship of Estonia.
 
Wait, so when Estonia got its independence 30% of the country didn't end up getting citizenship automatically because they weren't ethnic Estonians but rather (mainly) ethnic Russians?

And after 15 years only 7% are left who still don't have citizenship?

Are these statistics accurate? 3/4 of Russians went through the language requirement process and got citizenship? 75%? Or am I just reading that way wrong..
Sounds about right.

The Estonians have held out for this for rather a long time, against international criticism. Clearly it's important enough for them to weather rather a lot if it.

The facts of the matter also seem to include that the vast majority of young Estonians of Russian extraction are fine with their Estonian citizenship, and usually speaking Estonian in Estonia. A smaller number, for whatever reason, isn't. Then there are the older generations.

If however the figure in now down at 7%, I would think it entirely feasible, and advisable, for the Estonian government to just offer this remainder citizenship with no conditions (based on years of residence probably). They would seem few enough for this by now. Wipe the slate clean, start a fresh page, so to speak.

Of course, it would then become apparent which persons of Russian extraction in Estonia would actively refuse Estonian citizenship if offered unconditionally. Some would I imagine, either for reasons of not accepting Estonia as a legitimate state (but very few of those I would think), or much more likely because they want and need their Russian citizenship, and Russia possibly won't accept them having double citizenship. Of course, it would be a nice gesture if the Estonian authorities then offered to help them sort this out with the Russian authorities, but in the end these individuals might have to chose between Estonia and Russia.
 
I also highly doubt that the Russian population was 'that' grey. 20 years isn't that much.

Most young Russians (16-20, who have either Russian parents but Estonian citizenship or Russian Citizenship) I know (and am friends with) speak fluent Estonian with (mostly) no accent. Problematic are only people who "get high off" USSR and/or current Russia foreign politics. These people refuse learning Estonian, scream at anyone who they don't like "Fašist!" and blame Estonian government for not being civil enough, like current thread does. Of course they claim that Soviet Union freed us all and we should be thankful for them saving our "fašist butts". That means all Soviet Union landmarks are holy and sacred - to me (and many others) they are monuments of conquerors who did much more damage than Fašist rule. Just to mention that to me (and many others) both dictatorships were and still are both conquerors and destroyers who deserve no place in history. Soldiers who fell are victims/casualties of war and deserve proper burials and respect.

Aside from the monuments thing. Using the fascist card is a well-known tactic to try to unjustifiably shove (false) guilt upon a population. It's a propagandist political tactic. In Belgium they also tried to make Flemish believe they were more 'fascist' during World War II because a slightly higher percentage collaborated with the Germans. They even abused our history to make it seem as if Flemish nationalists were the only collaborators and as it all Flemish nationalists were. This worked until internet made people wiser (and you have to know that people who lived during the World War were traumatized in different ways, but sometimes there are more winning camps than just the major players). In fact, most Flemish had more different motivations than many Francophone ones who were less likely to be mere opportunists and did it more often out of real conviction.

Nowadays the answer is mostly, 'and what then?' when used the 'fascist' card against. Also the 'Flanders is rich'-card doesn't work that well anymore. It doesn't mean people are romantic nationalists here, but the obsequiousness of the past is gone.
Still, I don't think Belgium will exist for very long anyway, especially since the leadership doesn't think Belgian and actually never did so (unless it was 'Francophone Belgian' which also had to encompass Flemish territory). Most people are indifferent to all of it, but it's a fact that neither community knows much about the other in general.

I know Estonia has a wholly different history, but I understand quite well how communitarian tensions arise.
 
This is a deplorable method of argument, red elk and immonimatu. The respective merits and ages of the two languages are utterly irrelevant to the matter of whether Estonia's citizenship laws are unreasonable. Even if all the Estonians spoke Esperanto, the issues would be precisely the same; the fact that Esperanto actually was invented would still be no reason at all for the Estonians to respect Russian as if it were somehow superior.

Besides, two centuries of Estonian is plenty of history. If there were an enormous number of Pontic Greeks left in the Crimea, would you expect the Ukraine to accept Greek as a second language on the basis that Greek is older than Ukrainian? No, of course not.

Please use a less blatantly absurd argument.

It's not an absurd argument when you understand that the whole problem of european nationalism was built upon the creation of "national identities" based on language. The whole mess which was Central Europe between the Napoleonic wars and WW2 was a product of that. And that is recent enough to matter for this discussion still.
These national languages were indeed created in the 19th century by intellectuals with political ambitions. The most successful went on to become politicians and rulers in their brand new countries, and to cause the deaths of millions of their countrymen in unnecessary wars. All for the sake of the "freedom" of their countrymen - though the "citizens" they forcefully drafted into their armies had not asked for that freedom, for the indoctrination about belonging to a nation. Just as slavery or serfdom was being abolished there, another form of serfdom was invented. Now the citizen was to be serf to the nation - which, in practice, means to its rulers.

Yes, I do have a pet peeve about european nationalism, especially the 19th century breed of it. And yes, what happened long ago eventually becomes irrelevant for the present, but while some older national propaganda has died down, the 19th century myths about nations are still strong and causing damage within Europe - Yugoslavia was just the most recent example. I guess that they'll just have to fight it out until they cleanse all the "wrong nations" within each nation, just like others did before... such a waste to see the same foolishness repeated over and over again. At least the EU seems to have lessened the problems within its member countries, perhaps the only positive thing to have come out of that experience.

And, just to be clear: I understand that present day estonians still fear russian influence and have good reason for that. But perhaps they, and the russians living there, would be more willing to compromise if they didn't believe in myths about each nationality, and understood the political process through which the country came to be. The requirement of having a single national language within a country which already has more than one in use is a myth (one language -> one people -> one country) of nationalism, a tool used by politicians first to justify secession from some more distant government (with themselves as rulers of the new country, or course!), then to justify action again perceived enemies (internal or external) who might threaten their new power, or just for the sake of expansionism. Estonia didn't need to engage in that kind of politics today, not once it became clear that it would be accepted in the EU and had its independence (as much as a one million people country can be said to be independent) secure. In any case the fact that once it got out from under Moscow's influence it threw itself under Brussels' influence says a lot about the pointlessness of nationalism for small countries today.
 
We should make a new identity that encompasses whole of Europe. Mayhap we should all use English. Or we should make Esperanto a working language after making it mandatory in whole of Europe. Or we should instruct children in Latin (has some history as a written language for centuries until Modern times) and revive that language in a modern form (cfr. Modern Hebrew).

But seriously, until a 'bigger project' has attained support I stick to the 'nationality idea'.
Also, 'one language one nation' isn't exactly true everywhere. Swiss people consider themselves Swiss, but that's because they have mutual respect. They even follow the 'change of canton change of culture' rule. Irish people didn't like to be under British rule, despite them mostly being Anglophones, it didn't make them less Irish one bit (though all Irish children are required to follow Gaelic at school).

Nationalism indeed is a concept that grew big in the 19th century, but nations exist for longer, so does linguistic imperialism.

Anyway, I think you're also a bit seeking a reason for Russian Estonians to not have to learn Estonian. I don't think people are entitled to the freedom of not having to learn the local language, in fact I think such phenomena strengthen the nationalism which can potentially tear Europe apart.
 
These national languages were indeed created in the 19th century by intellectuals with political ambitions.
You do understand the difference between describing something which already exists (or maybe agreeing on a correct ortography by elevating one dialect above another) and creating something from a scratch, do you?
Yes, I do have a pet peeve about european nationalism, especially the 19th century breed of it.
You might have just left it at that, because mostly everything else you said is massive oversimplification of things.
And yes, what happened long ago eventually becomes irrelevant for the present, but while some older national propaganda has died down, the 19th century myths about nations are still strong
What "myths" exactly? The very concept of "nation" as such?
 
innonimatu said:
But perhaps they, and the russians living there, would be more willing to compromise if they didn't believe in myths about each nationality, and understood the political process through which the country came to be. The requirement of having a single national language within a country which already has more than one in use is a myth (one language -> one people -> one country) of nationalism, a tool used by politicians first to justify secession from some more distant government (with themselves as rulers of the new country, or course!), then to justify action again perceived enemies (internal or external) who might threaten their new power, or just for the sake of expansionism.

AFAIK Estonia has only one language in use. There are Russian newspapers and info portals but these are private businesses, focused on serving Russian-speaking minority for making money. Or are you talking about languages that are in everyday use?

Does it matter what language I use to talk with family and friends? Few examples: There's quite fun game to speak w/ others using English-only among teens. And there are some people who speak with their mother using Russian and mother using Finnish language. I am posting this message in (poor) English to converse with you. Does that mean that people of Estonia use two or more languages daily and these languages should be made official languages? ... Then why is Spanish not official language in US, that's in about same position as Russian language is in Estonia.

Estonia didn't need to engage in that kind of politics today, not once it became clear that it would be accepted in the EU and had its independence (as much as a one million people country can be said to be independent) secure. In any case the fact that once it got out from under Moscow's influence it threw itself under Brussels' influence says a lot about the pointlessness of nationalism for small countries today.

Soviet Union/Moscow = Dictatorship with central management. Could not leave.
EU = Trade alliance + free borders + open work market + scholarship + many other deals. You may leave from EU and won't be declared and attacked by all EU members.

Brussel(EU) = Europe
Russia = Not-so-Europe
 
AFAIK Estonia has only one language in use. There are Russian newspapers and info portals but these are private businesses, focused on serving Russian-speaking minority for making money.
...also all websites of government agencys and most NGO-s and most private companies (from banks to retail chains to movie theatres to restaurants to e-shops) are three-lingual, the third being English.
 
...also all websites of government agencys and most NGO-s and most private companies (from banks to retail chains to movie theatres to restaurants to e-shops) are three-lingual, the third being English.

Finnish and Lithuanian coming just after English.
 
Response to innonimatu:​

Your original argument was based on the lack of a substantial Estonian corpus of literature. That is completely irrelevant, regardless of whether the origins of nationalism are relevant. Many languages do have a pre-nineteenth-century substantial corpus of literature, and so unless you were trying to imply, as I supposed, that Estonian is inferior to Russian, which does, I believe, have a substantial corpus of pre-nineteenth-century literature, then the relative extent of Estonian literature is quite irrelevant, isn't it?

In other words, what you just posted does not even try to defend the argument that I was criticising.

---------------------------------------

However, that does not mean that I don't also dispute the relevance and substance of what you just posted. I certainly do. What is Estonian citizenship but a manifestation of nationalism? To be an Estonian citizen is to accept and adhere to the very bases of nationalism that you object to so vehemently. To be Estonian is (however much you find the concept of being any sort of -----ian revolting) to speak Estonian and to behave, at least to some socially acceptable extent, like an Estonian. Nationalism is an accomplished fact.

Therefore, if these Russians assert their rights to Estonian citizenship, that is for them to assert that they actually are Estonian. The objection is that to be Estonian is based on nationalism, and on this nationalist principle, based largely on language, they simply are not Estonian.

---------------------------------------

However, even that does not mean that I don't also dispute your argument that nationalism is a bad thing. It serves very useful social purposes, but I will not go into that here because that would derail the thread.
 
Is it just me, or is there Russians in this thread complaining about other countries lack of human rights?
Do you feel it this right is reserved to all humanity or just particular nationalities?

Seriously lacking in this thread seems to be Tekee´s own country which features yearly in Amnesty International´s reports.
Tekee is NOT Russian.

However, that does not mean that I don't also dispute the relevance and substance of what you just posted. I certainly do. What is Estonian citizenship but a manifestation of nationalism? To be an Estonian citizen is to accept and adhere to the very bases of nationalism that you object to so vehemently. To be Estonian is (however much you find the concept of being any sort of -----ian revolting) to speak Estonian and to behave, at least to some socially acceptable extent, like an Estonian. Nationalism is an accomplished fact.

Therefore, if these Russians assert their rights to Estonian citizenship, that is for them to assert that they actually are Estonian. The objection is that to be Estonian is based on nationalism, and on this nationalist principle, based largely on language, they simply are not Estonian.
The Swiss and the Belgians seem to be doing fine having two national languages. Maybe it is possible to be a citizen of the country without this nationalist basis of one language? Furthermore in more advanced countries like France and Spain, minority langauges gain more and more rights to be regional means of ciommunication on par with the state language. Seems fair to me.

Let me gain your attention to the following document:

International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
Article 27
In those States in which ethnic, religious or linguistic minorities exist, persons belonging to such minorities shall not be denied the right, in community with the other members of their group, to enjoy their own culture, to profess and practise their own religion, or to use their own language.

Lets take a definition of minority from (for our convenience) from wikipedia:
A minority is a sociological group that does not constitute a politically dominant voting majority of the total population of a given society.
I think Russian minority qualifies for all parameters. It is a sociological group (people that interact with one another, accept expectations and obligations as members of the group, and share a common identity). The sociological group of Russians living it Estonia certainly does not constitute a politically dominant voting majority of Estonia.

Russian minority can be identified as ethnic and linguistic minority in the sense of article 27. It think it is self evident. The question here is that Estonian government does not recognise them as such and therefore does not see the problem that it doesn't respect the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. That government does not recognise them as citizens, but as "aliens", immigrants.

Just out of curiosity here's the definition of "regional or minority languages" according to European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages (that Estonia has not ratified, Russia and most progressive Europe did ):

Article 1 – Definitions
For the purposes of this Charter: "regional or minority languages" means languages that are: traditionally used within a given territory of a State by nationals of that State who form a group numerically smaller than the rest of the State's population; and different from the official language(s) of that State.


I do not know how far "traditionally" goes back in time. This is what lawyers get paid big money for. However, it can be argued that Russian has been spoken in Estonia for three centuries (on par with two centuries of German) and its native speakers still exist today in a given country. I would say that the situation is much the same as with Sweedish in Finland, where it has been spoken for centuries, is the language of a former occupying power and it is an officially recognsised MINORITY LANGUAGE. I don't understand the difference between Russians in Estonia and Sweeds in Finland, except that Russians don't enjoy the same rights.

Now to the political question of citizenship. Lets take the same document:

International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
Article 3

The States Parties to the present Covenant undertake to ensure the equal right of men and women to the enjoyment of all civil and political rights set forth in the present Covenant.

Article 4
1 . In time of public emergency which threatens the life of the nation and the existence of which is officially proclaimed, the States Parties to the present Covenant may take measures derogating from their obligations under the present Covenant to the extent strictly required by the exigencies of the situation, provided that such measures are not inconsistent with their other obligations under international law and do not involve discrimination solely on the ground of race, colour, sex, language, religion or social origin.

Even this article and "in time of public emergency which threatens the life of the nation" the convenant still does not approve of discrimination on the ground of language and social origin.

Article 26
All persons are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to the equal protection of the law. In this respect, the law shall prohibit any discrimination and guarantee to all persons equal and effective protection against discrimination on any ground such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status.

From where I stand, the descision to make most Russian people as "aliens" and non-citizens violates the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

EDIT2:
and Russia possibly won't accept them having double citizenship.
Russia accepts double citizenship.
 
The Swiss and the Belgians seem to be doing fine having two national languages. Maybe it is possible to be a citizen of the country without this nationalist basis of one language? Furthermore in more advanced countries like France and Spain, minority langauges gain more and more rights to be regional means of ciommunication on par with the state language. Seems fair to me.

Actually, Belgium consists of three communities. It has one monolingual Dutch-speaking region, Flanders, one monolingual French-speaking Wallonia (minus the East Cantons which are monolingual German-speaking). In some towns there are facilities for French-speaking, Dutch-speaking and German-speaking. Very still there is a nuance. There are still many tension about French speaking who refuse to learn Dutch and still live in Flanders in hopes of annexing those municipalities. Why this aggressive stance? Contrary to Switzerland Belgium is not a 'real nation' but a combination of different ones who are actually quite hostile to one another (and I have friends from the other community, doesn't help to get along politically/ none of them are emotionally attached to Belgium, and one of them wants to have the country split and to join France, a minority, but as of last years not a rarity anymore because we're still in a huge political crisis for years without end). Then there is the Brussels Capital Region, which is officially bilingual, but which is very hostile to Flanders and vice versa. They also try to do anything to make the town as monolingual Francophone as possible and nowadays 10% votes for Dutch-speaking parties there. Also the only facilities that are really respected are those for Francophones.
All of this has an historical reason behind it, but few know this history or would even believe it. Most people are ignorant in Belgium, especially Flemish.
In Switzerland there are three main languages: German, French and Italian. Also a minority of Rumantsch speaker who are protected (quite strictly I might add; the German-speaking children living there are taught in it). Also, in Switzerland no community seeks to aggressively annex other town nor do they treat the other community's language as 'that of the enemy'.

Switzerland is a real stable country and a nation, whilst Belgium is likely to split in the future (as politicians act to it; as the francophone media at least is assuming, the Dutch-speaking one is too closed-minded sadly...) Belgium is not a stable country mate... When Flanders would become a poor region again, I think it would be the end of it.

In the case of Estonia is about many Russian-speakers who are glad to learn Estonian, and others who refuse learning it because they deem it inferiour, so they seek excuses to not have to learn it. This creates an atmosphere of mistrust, because just like in Belgium it could lead to the other group abusing their granted right and still remain monoglots 'out of principle' and eventually try to assimilate the locals (of course not without accusing them of it themselves, with the usual 'fascist' remarks). Imperialism pur sang versus protectionism.
 
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