How should the West contain Russia?

[Yeekim]

Or Serbia, Belarus, Armenia, the Central Asian former SSR's, a large part of the Ukraine.... so tell me this, if Estonia should deny citizenship to people who can only speak Russian, should Ukraine do the same? Its 100 % comparable, now stand on your principals. should Ukraine do the same?

This is not 100% comparable, both historical background and legal background are vastly different. Plus, it is not possible to speak Russian only. I have never learned a word of Ukrainian, yet I could understand roughly 2/3 of Ukrainian texts due to their similarity with Russian, when I visited Kiev and Simferopol this summer.

Next, Estonia does not deny citizenship to anybody.
People who had been Estonian citizens in 1939 and their children were automatically recognized as Estonian citizens in 1991. Including Russians, few as they were back then. All the rest were considered illegal immigrants (as they are according to international law) who have to adhere to few perfectly reasonable demands to get their citizenship. From 1991 till 2008, roughly 150 000 Russian-speaking people have acquired Estonian citizenship. Among the rest, many do not want to, because then they'd lose option to get to Russia without visa.

 

[Yeekim]

Regardless of past Russian sins, why shouldn't Estonia be bilingual given that people there speak both languages?

I discussed this issue with Gelion at length here: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=286537&page=61
(in retorspect it looks like we pretty much hijacked the Georgian thread)

 

[Winner]

Chinese reaction to Russian recongnition of the separatists is interesting (I expected something like this). Moscow is disappointed, the China don't want to support them (they'd be idiots if they did, the West could then recognize Taiwan ).

 

[RedRalph]

Chinese reaction to Russian recongnition of the separatists is interesting (I expected something like this). Moscow is disappointed, the China don't want to support them (they'd be idiots if they did, the West could then recognize Taiwan ).

the west already picks and chooses who it recognises, it wouldnt change its position on formosa/Taiwan because of chinese recognition of Abkhazia. and Moscow is not dissapointed, because they knew full well thats there was no way China would officially recognise it.

 

[Arwon]

Because Estonia is not bilingual in nature, the "Russian minority" has been come here vastly in 1978-1988 when Estonian SSR was Ruled by Karl Vaino who called himself as Russian-Estonian. He didn't know anything about Estonian language but who was perfect tool for Estonian Russification. In other hand Estonia doesn't consider himself as new country born in 1991, we are 50 years occupied by Soviet Union and then restored our independence. Almost same goes for Latvia. Making Estonia and Latvia officially bilingual and giving citizenship to everyone makes great danger for our countries, it just doesn't fit here. Also I think in Germany there is not even meant to make Turkish language as official. Also Arabian language in Old Western-Europe because there are a lot of immigrants.

PS : If you would live in Estonia then you would see that it is not easy to get job when you can't speak in Russian(in Tallinn at least) because you have to speak with customers who are local Russians who cannot count to ten in Estonian language.

Yeah, I'm aware of this, but I'm not interested in "nature", I'm interested in reality, on the ground, now. If there's two widely used languages in a country, both should be official and supported. A country doesn't lose anything by making a second minority language official. If 25% of Germany spoke Turkish then it would be best for it to make that an officially supported language. Language policy should follow social reality, not try to lead and change it. And countries certainly shouldn't be denying citizenship based on this, particularly when the people being denied citizenship were living there before the country made those rules.

I can't see how reversing the discrimination that existed previously helps anybody.

Also, this is probably a comparatively minor point but your language is very very different and, I imagine, quite hard for speakers of slavic or Indo-European languages to learn compared to, say, Ukrainian or even Polish.

 

[Desert-Fox]

Yeah, I'm aware of this, but I'm not interested in "nature", I'm interested in reality, on the ground, now. If there's two widely used languages in a country, both should be official and supported. A country doesn't lose anything by making a second minority language official. If 25% of Germany spoke Turkish then it would be best for it to make that an officially supported language. Language policy should follow social reality, not try to lead and change it. And countries certainly shouldn't be denying citizenship based on this, particularly when the people being denied citizenship were living there before the country made those rules.

I can't see how reversing the discrimination that existed previously helps anybody.

Also, this is probably a comparatively minor point but your language is very very different and, I imagine, quite hard for speakers of slavic or Indo-European languages to learn compared to, say, Ukrainian or even Polish.

I do not share this point of view. When Estonia was illegally occupied then a Geneva convention tells that it is not allowed to settle your people into occupied lands and Russia have been joined with this. These people who moved here illegally cannot have automatically citizenship also their language cannot be official.

What If in China the situation comes very mad and 200k people will escape to Australia, then Chinese should be official language and you must learn it to speak with them??? If things goes that way then it would be a tool to colonize the world by nations who have very large population.

 

[Defiant47]

Chinese reaction to Russian recongnition of the separatists is interesting (I expected something like this). Moscow is disappointed, the China don't want to support them (they'd be idiots if they did, the West could then recognize Taiwan ).

As you can see, China is not picking any sides. It did not recognize Kosovo or Abkhazia. (Whereas the US recognized Kosovo and not Abkhazia, and Russia recognized Abkhazia and not Kosovo)

 

[Arwon]

There's a lot more than 200K Chinese folk here already, I don't know whether you're trying to appeal to some racist anti-Chinese sentiment or what, but yeah there's a lot of ethnic-Chinese migration here and I'm all in favour of that. And yeah, I think we need more language education here so I'd be all in favour of teaching Mandarin (even though there's more Cantonese speakers here: southern Chinese, Malaysian, Singaporean, Hongkonger, etcetera) as a second language in schools.

Although there's actually more Italian-speakers in australia than either Cantonese or Mandarin at the moment, though.

"Official language" doesn't mean everyone has to speak it, it means it should be taught in schools and used in administration, and not be used as a basis for discrimination in citizenship. When 25% of your population speaks a language and doesn't speak the same language as the other 75%, I don't care how that language community got there (and you speak as though thousands of ordinary Russians moved to Estonia over the last 50 years with the sole plan of destroying it), the facts on the ground demand the language be recognised. Anything else is social engineering.

 

[Desert-Fox]

and you speak as though thousands of ordinary Russians moved to Estonia over the last 50 years with the sole plan of destroying it

You got the point. They moved here to get job and quarter in first queue while Estonians didn't get it. It was a plan to Russianize Estonia directed from Moscow. The majority came here during 1978-1988 when we had Karl Vaino as I wrote before. Lithuania was lucky because they didn't have such **** ruling them and they have only 7% Russians. Giving them automatized citizenship and making Russian equal as Estonian here first justifies Russian acts in Soviet Era and the second It may be dangerous for Estonians. A lot of Russians in Estonia think that one day Putin come here and destroys Estonia. Such people can't have citizenship.

 

[RedRalph]

You got the point. They moved here to get job and quarter in first queue while Estonians didn't get it. It was a plan to Russianize Estonia directed from Moscow. The majority came here during 1978-1988 when we had Karl Vaino as I wrote before. Lithuania was lucky because they didn't have such **** ruling them and they have only 7% Russians. Giving them automatized citizenship and making Russian equal as Estonian here first justifies Russian acts in Soviet Era and the second It may be dangerous for Estonians. A lot of Russians in Estonia think that one day Putin come here and destroys Estonia. Such people can't have citizenship.

hold on now I thought you said they should have citizenship once they learned Estonian? get your fascist arguments straight you xenophobe

 

[Desert-Fox]

hold on now I thought you said they should have citizenship once they learned Estonian? get your fascist arguments straight you xenophobe

Yes, usually people who have learned language and know some facts about history then they(not all) deserve citizenship more. But people who do not want to learn Estonian and dream about Estonian SSR still doesn't deserve Estonian citizenship.

 

[RedRalph]

Yes, usually people who have learned language and know some facts about history then they(not all) deserve citizenship more. But people who do not want to learn Estonian and dream about Estonian SSR still doesn't deserve Estonian citizenship.

so citizenship should be based on their political views now?

 

[Arwon]

You got the point. They moved here to get job and quarter in first queue while Estonians didn't get it. It was a plan to Russianize Estonia directed from Moscow. The majority came here during 1978-1988 when we had Karl Vaino as I wrote before. Lithuania was lucky because they didn't have such **** ruling them and they have only 7% Russians. Giving them automatized citizenship and making Russian equal as Estonian here first justifies Russian acts in Soviet Era and the second It may be dangerous for Estonians. A lot of Russians in Estonia think that one day Putin come here and destroys Estonia. Such people can't have citizenship.

Surely marginalising and discriminating against them just makes them more resentful and more hopeful of a return to the empire? Calling them all traitors and potential fifth columnists is a total self-fulfilling prophesy.

Surely Russians that are accepted by Estonians into Estonian society would be less likely to wish for such things, and more likely to identify with the country. Surely an Estonian state that accepted reality instead of trying to construct a new one would have more success in establishing its legitimacy.

 

[Desert-Fox]

so citizenship should be based on their political views now?

Citizenship is based on having met conditions to get it and not just being in that country.

 

[Desert-Fox]

Surely marginalising and discriminating against them just makes them more resentful and more hopeful of a return to the empire? Calling them all traitors and potential fifth columnists is a total self-fulfilling prophesy.

Surely Russians that are accepted by Estonians into Estonian society would be less likely to wish for such things, and more likely to identify with the country. Surely an Estonian state that accepted reality instead of trying to construct a new one would have more success in establishing its legitimacy.

Also these Russians have option to go to Russia where they are not "discriminated". They were resentful even when USSR weren't collapsed. And yes, some of them are fifth column here. And fulfilling Russian dreams here will make that Estonians are bilingual while Russians still cannot count to ten in Estonian as it was in Estonian SSR.

 

[Arwon]

No-one's saying anything about Estonians being "made bilingual" but simply recognising reality and letting Russian-speakers become citizens, and deal with the state in Russian. You can have a bilingual state where not everyone speaks both languages, but both languages are recognised and protected. That's how most of them are.

 

[Desert-Fox]

De Facto Russians have more opportunities with their language than Chinese, Japanese, Zulus etc... They can get secondary grade in their own language. Having Citizenship means that you have vote in parliament election. And if they all can vote then it means a political power who are behind them may go for joining Russia for example. That's the fact that vast majority of Russians vote for only one party(and it is not popular for Estonians).

And don't get me wrong, I may speak in Russian with Russians if needed, that's not problem but the situation here doesn't allow to make Russian equal as Estonian.

 

[leksaaa]

Also these Russians have option to go to Russia where they are not "discriminated".

Also these Jews have option to go to USA where they are not "discriminated".
(c) Hitler Adolf (in mid-thirties)

Perfect argument, anyway

 

[Desert-Fox]

These Jews were not recent colonists/immigrants. And they didn't demand that Germans must speak Hebrean language with them. Please do not make forcible compares.

 

[Cato the Elder]

Could someone please explain to me why the former Warsaw Pact-made-EU is having such a hard time getting over the past? I mean yeah sure the Soviets did terrible things, but the world's still changed and will keep changing whether you accept it or not. To my demise, the only Russians I regularily hear something about are the ones on this forum, but from what I've read in their varying opinions it doesn't seem like most Russians are hell-bent on recolonising the Baltic States.

So please, get over it. At the least, try to make sure it looks like you're the more honourable in this argument and treat Russians, so long as they can articulate themselves decently in the Estonian, Latvian, whatever language, (while still having the possibility of reading official documents in their native Russian) as regular citzens instead of planning to force them into second class fake citzenship just because of what some idiots in government did 20+ years ago.