Denmark’s jewellery law and Europe’s anti-immigrant backlash

Denmark requires all recent arrivals to hand over their jewellery to the state upon arrival. 

Pic: Courtesy : BBC

As we discussed earlier, Britain and Italy seem to be the most hostile European countries towards immigration, legal or illegal. Both plan to deport or pack immigrants to Rwanda and Albania respectively. But the sobering fact is that all 27 EU member countries, including its East European members, are hostile towards immigrants in varying degrees. 
Further north, the Nordic countries were the most hospitable towards immigration for several decades. Not anymore.

First, let’s look again at the boiling pot of England, where voices ranging from conservative to the far right have rallied to scream out their frustration and hostility. Former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, often dismissed as lacking a backbone, was trying to put his political act together by taking a hardline stance towards immigration (under the excuse of battling Islamism)  and Russia (the West has a traditional fear of both Muslims and Russians). While the government has permitted arresting and deporting presumed Islamists (including pro-Palestinian students), Sunak said defense spending will have to reach 25% of GDP to meet the Russian threat.

Whether economically rundown Britain can afford such spending is another question. A young Sri Lankan doctor undergoing training in England right now, when contacted, said he can find a job. But, after paying for food, rent and energy bills, he says it won’t be worth it and plans to return home. 

Nordic countries that were the most hospitable towards immigration for several decades are not anymore

Immigrants 

Of course, all this can be blamed on immigrants. But those doing so should take a hard look at what happened to the British automobile industry, which almost disappeared over the past 20 years but was saved by foreign carmakers ranging from Volvo and BMW to the Chinese. Honda has a car factory in the UK, but plans to close it down. Again, the demise of the British automobile industry is often blamed on striking workers – this is the other bogey, left-wing subversion of industry. But Margaret Thatcher is supposed to have dealt with that problem once and for all. She made such a good job of it that many Britons are now facing poverty and destitution.

Back again to the Islamic threat – students in British universities began in-campus camp protests against Israel following the US model, where over 1000 American students have been arrested so far during campus protests. Birmingham University has informed protesting students that they are trespassing on campus grounds. Hence, if they don’t remove their protest site, the police will be authorised to deal with it.

One far-right YouTube video mocks these protesters as people who come from countries with no freedom of speech, hence abusing their privileges in democratic Britain. But this is precisely the point. If you say your constitution guarantees freedom of speech, then you can’t vilify anyone for making use of that freedom. Hate speech would be an abuse of that privilege, and courts are there to deal with it. But when a Palestinian student holds a placard saying ‘Israel, stop the genocide!’, that is not hate speech. A long-time resident Palestinian teacher has been charged after she held up a placard comparing PM Sunak to a pair of coconuts. If that’s hate speech, 99% of cartoons published worldwide would have to be banned.

Britain and Italy seem to be the most hostile European countries towards immigration

Confused country 

In short, Britain right now looks like a terribly shaken and confused country, with ‘British values first’ as its self-righteous slogan against what is seen as a tsunami wave of foreign interference in its culture. It’s a huge step back from the hard-earned democratic values, including guaranteeing the rights of the individual, that Britain was rightfully proud of all the way down from the Magna Carta to Hume, Locke, Darwin and the humanism of 19th-century philosophers and lawmakers. If Charles Darwin were to present his theory of evolution in today’s Britain, one wonders what the reaction from the center to the right would be.

Things aren’t much better in the European Union, either. If we take the Nordic countries, which include Iceland and Finland, with Sweden heading the list, the picture is grim. Social democratic politics dominated Nordic countries until the last decade – centrist, but with very liberal leanings. Today, Sweden and Finland are among four Nordic countries run by right-wing political parties. Denmark is run by a coalition of Social Democrats and liberals, but it’s very strict on immigration.

People of Northern Europe fear that, with increasing waves of mainly Muslim migrants arriving in the wake of post-Bush-Blair Mideast regime changing chaos, their living standards would go down drastically.
Five Nordic states are among the top ten countries in the world when it comes to spending on education, health care, pensions and education. Citizens are taxed up to 40% but they accept it as benefits are obvious. 

Jewellery 

Immigrants too, benefited from this benevolence, but not anymore. Denmark was the most open Nordic country to immigration. But it has closed its doors. Furthermore, it requires all recent arrivals to hand over their jewellery to the state upon arrival. If the total value is above $1500, they are required to hand it over to the state so that part of it goes to pay for their welfare. But Ukrainians arriving in Denmark aren’t required to do this, so there is an element of racism in this law.

Some of these countries have plans to re-locate immigrants to specific areas, where they can be supervised. Critics argue this is a recipe for ghettos. Authorities say they are worried about increasing crime and drug abuse. Sweden is one country which is hard hit by criminal gangs, especially from the Maghreb region (North Africa). 
But it isn’t just crime that’s causing concern and panic. There is one YouTube video about Sweden asking ‘Is this Syria?’ The bottom line is that most of these Syrian migrants are Muslims. They are not running the drug trade. Just being Muslim is enough.