The Economist slams Amnesty International

Volrak · 12-16-2006, 05:28 AM

http://www.economist.com/agenda/disp...32808&fsrc=RSS

An excess of conscience
Dec 14th 2006
From Economist.com

Estonia is right and Amnesty is wrong
AMNESTY International used to be an impartial and apolitical outfit, focused on the single burning issue of political prisoners. Your correspondent remembers its admirable letter-writing campaigns during the cold war on behalf of Soviet prisoners of conscience such as Jüri Kukk, an Estonian chemistry professor. He died in jail 25 years ago with the hope—then not widely shared—that his country’s foreign occupation would eventually end.

It did. Since regaining independence in 1991 Estonia has become the reform star of the post-communist world. Its booming economy, law-based state and robust democracy are all the more impressive given their starting point: a country struggling with the huge forced migration of the Soviet era. The collapse of the evil empire left Estonia with hundreds of thousands of resentful, stranded ex-colonists, citizens of a country that no longer existed.

Some countries might have deported them. That was the remedy adopted in much of eastern Europe after the second world war. Germans and Hungarians—regardless of their citizenship or politics—were sent “home” in conditions of great brutality.

Instead, Estonia, like Latvia next door, decided to give these uninvited guests a free choice. They could go back to Russia. They could stay but adopt Russian citizenship. They could take local citizenship (assuming they were prepared to learn the language). Or they could stay on as non-citizens, able to work but not to vote.

Put like that, it may sound fair. But initially it prompted howls of protest against “discrimination”, not only from Russia but from Western human-rights bodies. The Estonians didn’t flinch. A “zero option”—giving citizenship to all comers—would be a disaster, they argued, ending any chance of restoring the Estonian language in public life, and of recreating a strong, confident national identity.

They were right. More than 100,000 of the Soviet-era migrants have learnt Estonian and gained citizenship. In 1992, 32% of the population had no citizenship. Now the figure is 10%.

In 1990, before the final Soviet collapse, your correspondent tried to buy postage stamps in Tallinn using halting Estonian. The clerk replied brusquely, in Russian, “govorite po chelovecheski” (speak a human language). That was real discrimination. Estonians were unable to use their own language in their capital city. Now that’s changed too.

Reasonable people can disagree about the details of the language law, about the right level of subsidies for language courses, and about the rules for gaining citizenship. Nowhere’s perfect. But Estonia’s system is visibly working. It is extraordinarily hard to term it a burning issue for an international human-rights organisation.

Yet that is what Amnesty International has tried to make of it. It has produced a lengthy report, “Linguistic minorities in Estonia: Discrimination must end”, demanding radical changes in Estonia’s laws on both language and citizenship.

The report is puzzling for several reasons. It is a bad piece of work, ahistorical and unbalanced. It echoes Kremlin propaganda in a way that Estonians find sinister and offensive. But most puzzling of all, it is a bizarre use of Amnesty’s limited resources. Just a short drive from Estonia, in Belarus and in Russia, there are real human rights abuses, including two classic Amnesty themes: misuse of psychiatry against dissidents, and multiple prisoners of conscience. Yet the coverage of these issues on the Amnesty website is feeble, dated, or non-existent.

Amnesty seems to have become just another left-wing pressure group, banging on about globalisation, the arms trade, Israel and domestic violence. Regardless of the merits of their views—which look pretty stale and predictable—it seems odd to move to what is already a crowded corner of the political spectrum. To save Jüri Kukk and other inmates of the gulag, people of all political views and none joined Amnesty’s campaigns. That wouldn’t happen now.

xoa · 12-16-2006, 06:23 AM

If 10% of the population of any other nation were stateless persons: deprived of the basic right to a nationality; I'm sure Amnesty International would protest that as well.

Estlander · 12-16-2006, 06:59 AM

Bump for the great read!

Volrak · 12-16-2006, 07:03 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by xoa
If 10% of the population of any other nation were stateless persons: deprived of the basic right to a nationality; I'm sure Amnesty International would protest that as well.

If 40% of any other nation had been illegal and entirely unassimilated foreign colonists, and if peaceful and positive assimilation had happened to where 15 years later only 10% remained without citizenship (and that largely as as result of their own specific decision to remain thus), any unbiased observer would praise that country's exemplary record. Exactly as they praise Estonia today.

And what are you blathering on about, about people being "deprived of the basic right to a nationality." Read the article again, dumbo. The colonists had -- and have -- free choice to Russian citizenship, Estonian citizenship, or permanent residence in Estonia with no citizenship. Some deprivation, all right.

Volrak · 12-16-2006, 09:45 AM

Like I've been saying here for a long time, Russia's ceaseless anti-Baltic propaganda has exactly the opposite effect to what Russia intended. It has increased the reputation of the Baltics and brought highly favourable worldwide publicity to them. And it continues to make Russia look like an idiot.

arbus · 12-16-2006, 10:49 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Volrak
Like I've been saying here for a long time, Russia's ceaseless anti-Baltic propaganda has exactly the opposite effect to what Russia intended. It has increased the reputation of the Baltics and brought highly favourable worldwide publicity to them. And it continues to make Russia look like an idiot.

Only in your mind. British Tories, German Christian Democrats, and US Republicans are the main patrons for your version of Baltic history; they do not comprise the world's majority opinion by any means.

arbus · 12-16-2006, 05:12 PM

And -- "The Economist" is a neo-liberal publication that believes in capitalist nostrums like the flat tax, ruthless Friedmanitism, and the "golden era" of Pinochet's Chile. Amnesty International shows it's not just Estonian nationalists exposed as dupes of voodoo economics.

arbus · 12-16-2006, 05:20 PM

In 1990, before the final Soviet collapse, your correspondent tried to buy postage stamps in Tallinn using halting Estonian. The clerk replied brusquely, in Russian, “govorite po chelovecheski” (speak a human language). That was real discrimination. Estonians were unable to use their own language in their capital city. Now that’s changed too.

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

Now there's an outright lie. As such, no doubt it will be defended by poster Volrak with effusive flatulence. Unless someone can refute my statement - not with just another bad experience from one clerk at one place, but across-the-board proof that "Estonians were unable to use their own language in their capital city," - it remains a lie and anyone who defends it a conscious liar and deceitful propagandist.

Estlander · 12-16-2006, 08:55 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by arbus
In 1990, before the final Soviet collapse, your correspondent tried to buy postage stamps in Tallinn using halting Estonian. The clerk replied brusquely, in Russian, “govorite po chelovecheski” (speak a human language). That was real discrimination. Estonians were unable to use their own language in their capital city. Now that’s changed too.

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

Now there's an outright lie. As such, no doubt it will be defended by poster Volrak with effusive flatulence. Unless someone can refute my statement - not with just another bad experience from one clerk at one place, but across-the-board proof that "Estonians were unable to use their own language in their capital city," - it remains a lie and anyone who defends it a conscious liar and deceitful propagandist.

You, who has NEVER been to Estonia, has the nerve to call it a lie. You can't imagine how insulting such stupidity and ignorance is to an Estonian.
You don't exactly have to be a genius to realize that this scenario was VERY likely in the early 1990's in former Soviet Republics. And guess what, azov - it STILL is, especially in Eastern-Virumaa, and even Tallinn.
You have this extremely rosy picture of Russians, that would never ever be arrogant and imperialistically-minded.
And experiences like that are wide-spread among Estonians. Just about every Estonian can tell you their similar experienses with Russians, and so can i. And no, i do not have just one experience like that, but a whole Santa's bagful of them.
You shouldn't judge all Russians by your wife, azov. She may be a decent Russian, but that doesn't mean they all are.

Zharkov · 12-16-2006, 09:17 PM

Amnesty International seems to have a multicultural agenda to push cultural disintegration and social disruption by rating countries according to how they react to a REFUSAL of minorities to assimilate and adopt the culture of their chosen country.

If governments allow themselves to be torn apart by racial strife and corruption, they get a better score than if they attempt to force the refuseniks to assimilate.

More details at:
http://engforum.pravda.ru/showthread...hreadid=186092

arbus · 12-16-2006, 10:05 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Estlander
You, who has NEVER been to Estonia, has the nerve to call it a lie. You can't imagine how insulting such stupidity and ignorance is to an Estonian.
You don't exactly have to be a genius to realize that this scenario was VERY likely in the early 1990's in former Soviet Republics. And guess what, azov - it STILL is, especially in Eastern-Virumaa, and even Tallinn.
You have this extremely rosy picture of Russians, that would never ever be arrogant and imperialistically-minded.
And experiences like that are wide-spread among Estonians. Just about every Estonian can tell you their similar experienses with Russians, and so can i. And no, i do not have just one experience like that, but a whole Santa's bagful of them.
You shouldn't judge all Russians by your wife, azov. She may be a decent Russian, but that doesn't mean they all are.

I'm not painting a rosy picture, just using common sense. I defy you to prove this article's contention, that "Estonians were unable to use their native language in their own capital." A personal squabble every month with some Russian does not count as massive across-the-board national-linguistic subjugation.

Using common sense, it is quite easy to unravel the scenario of the writer's so-called example. Walking into a Tallinn post office, he deliberately hones in on a Russian clerk and deliberately speaks in Estonian. The clerk, recognizing at once that this is a foreigner speaking a language not his own, solely as a provocation, gives it back to him. A mildly nasty scene, exposing the clerk's prejudice; but not instigated by him, and not proving the writer's jerk-knee assertion of "linguistic oppression."

The truly linguistically oppressed are those who do not speak the native language in the capital, who are bound by maliciously-codified laws actively seeking to hurt them. Not even in the worst years under Stalin was someone stripped of rights just because he did not speak the "republican tongue."

arbus · 12-16-2006, 10:06 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Zharkov
Amnesty International seems to have a multicultural agenda to push cultural disintegration and social disruption by rating countries according to how they react to a REFUSAL of minorities to assimilate and adopt the culture of their chosen country.

Thank you, Dr. Goebbels. You have a patient calling in Camp Z.

The country in question is the Nationalist Estonian Republic, which the affected linguistic minorities did not "choose to live in," even when voting for independence in the 1990 referendum.

Estlander · 12-16-2006, 10:49 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by arbus
I'm not painting a rosy picture, just using common sense. I defy you to prove this article's contention, that "Estonians were unable to use their native language in their own capital." A personal squabble every month with some Russian does not count as massive across-the-board national-linguistic subjugation.

Using common sense, it is quite easy to unravel the scenario of the writer's so-called example. Walking into a Tallinn post office, he deliberately hones in on a Russian clerk and deliberately speaks in Estonian. The clerk, recognizing at once that this is a foreigner speaking a language not his own, solely as a provocation, gives it back to him. A mildly nasty scene, exposing the clerk's prejudice; but not instigated by him, and not proving the writer's jerk-knee assertion of "linguistic oppression."

The truly linguistically oppressed are those who do not speak the native language in the capital, who are bound by maliciously-codified laws actively seeking to hurt them. Not even in the worst years under Stalin was someone stripped of rights just because he did not speak the "republican tongue."

Think whatever the hell you want. I really don't care anymore. Besides everybody here already knows what you are, so it's not like your hypocritical driwel has any effect on their views.

Estlander · 12-16-2006, 11:10 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by arbus
I defy you to prove this article's contention, that "Estonians were unable to use their native language in their own capital." A personal squabble every month with some Russian does not count as massive across-the-board national-linguistic subjugation.

Half the population of Tallinn was Russian-speaking, so that should give you some idea how much of their native language they were able to use in their own capital.

And if every Estonian you speak to tells you that they have had countless of experiences where they themselves have not been able to use their own native language in their native country, then i think that does count as massive across-the-board national-linguistic subjugation.

Avenger · 12-17-2006, 02:26 AM

Volrak, I agree Estonia gets unfairly targeted by Russian nationalists in this forum. But trumpeting this article is just stooping at their level.

Amnesty International is not somehow fixated on Estonia, at the expense of real human right abuses in Russia and Belarus (a simple use of the search feature at the AI website easily demonstrate this is not the case). But Estonia's tough stance to reestablish its national language and identity is a push for collective rights over individual rights which is always controversial.

AI might be overzealous and unknowingly playing the Kremlin's game, but it's still warranted to warn Estonia not to go too far.

12-16-2006, 05:28 AM	#1
Volrak Registered User Join Date: Feb 2003 Posts: 6,525	The Economist slams Amnesty International http://www.economist.com/agenda/disp...32808&fsrc=RSS An excess of conscience Dec 14th 2006 From Economist.com Estonia is right and Amnesty is wrong AMNESTY International used to be an impartial and apolitical outfit, focused on the single burning issue of political prisoners. Your correspondent remembers its admirable letter-writing campaigns during the cold war on behalf of Soviet prisoners of conscience such as Jüri Kukk, an Estonian chemistry professor. He died in jail 25 years ago with the hope—then not widely shared—that his country’s foreign occupation would eventually end. It did. Since regaining independence in 1991 Estonia has become the reform star of the post-communist world. Its booming economy, law-based state and robust democracy are all the more impressive given their starting point: a country struggling with the huge forced migration of the Soviet era. The collapse of the evil empire left Estonia with hundreds of thousands of resentful, stranded ex-colonists, citizens of a country that no longer existed. Some countries might have deported them. That was the remedy adopted in much of eastern Europe after the second world war. Germans and Hungarians—regardless of their citizenship or politics—were sent “home” in conditions of great brutality. Instead, Estonia, like Latvia next door, decided to give these uninvited guests a free choice. They could go back to Russia. They could stay but adopt Russian citizenship. They could take local citizenship (assuming they were prepared to learn the language). Or they could stay on as non-citizens, able to work but not to vote. Put like that, it may sound fair. But initially it prompted howls of protest against “discrimination”, not only from Russia but from Western human-rights bodies. The Estonians didn’t flinch. A “zero option”—giving citizenship to all comers—would be a disaster, they argued, ending any chance of restoring the Estonian language in public life, and of recreating a strong, confident national identity. They were right. More than 100,000 of the Soviet-era migrants have learnt Estonian and gained citizenship. In 1992, 32% of the population had no citizenship. Now the figure is 10%. In 1990, before the final Soviet collapse, your correspondent tried to buy postage stamps in Tallinn using halting Estonian. The clerk replied brusquely, in Russian, “govorite po chelovecheski” (speak a human language). That was real discrimination. Estonians were unable to use their own language in their capital city. Now that’s changed too. Reasonable people can disagree about the details of the language law, about the right level of subsidies for language courses, and about the rules for gaining citizenship. Nowhere’s perfect. But Estonia’s system is visibly working. It is extraordinarily hard to term it a burning issue for an international human-rights organisation. Yet that is what Amnesty International has tried to make of it. It has produced a lengthy report, “Linguistic minorities in Estonia: Discrimination must end”, demanding radical changes in Estonia’s laws on both language and citizenship. The report is puzzling for several reasons. It is a bad piece of work, ahistorical and unbalanced. It echoes Kremlin propaganda in a way that Estonians find sinister and offensive. But most puzzling of all, it is a bizarre use of Amnesty’s limited resources. Just a short drive from Estonia, in Belarus and in Russia, there are real human rights abuses, including two classic Amnesty themes: misuse of psychiatry against dissidents, and multiple prisoners of conscience. Yet the coverage of these issues on the Amnesty website is feeble, dated, or non-existent. Amnesty seems to have become just another left-wing pressure group, banging on about globalisation, the arms trade, Israel and domestic violence. Regardless of the merits of their views—which look pretty stale and predictable—it seems odd to move to what is already a crowded corner of the political spectrum. To save Jüri Kukk and other inmates of the gulag, people of all political views and none joined Amnesty’s campaigns. That wouldn’t happen now. Last edited by Volrak : 12-16-2006 at 05:30 AM.

12-16-2006, 05:12 PM	#7
arbus Registered User Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: On A Roll Posts: 3,133	And -- "The Economist" is a neo-liberal publication that believes in capitalist nostrums like the flat tax, ruthless Friedmanitism, and the "golden era" of Pinochet's Chile. Amnesty International shows it's not just Estonian nationalists exposed as dupes of voodoo economics. __________________ Arguing with fools is like swimming in quicksand May my seeds be upon you.

12-16-2006, 05:20 PM	#8
arbus Registered User Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: On A Roll Posts: 3,133	In 1990, before the final Soviet collapse, your correspondent tried to buy postage stamps in Tallinn using halting Estonian. The clerk replied brusquely, in Russian, “govorite po chelovecheski” (speak a human language). That was real discrimination. Estonians were unable to use their own language in their capital city. Now that’s changed too. -------------------- Now there's an outright lie. As such, no doubt it will be defended by poster Volrak with effusive flatulence. Unless someone can refute my statement - not with just another bad experience from one clerk at one place, but across-the-board proof that "Estonians were unable to use their own language in their capital city," - it remains a lie and anyone who defends it a conscious liar and deceitful propagandist. __________________ Arguing with fools is like swimming in quicksand May my seeds be upon you.

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12-16-2006, 06:23 AM	#2
xoa Registered User Join Date: Oct 2004 Location: Cheney's bunker Posts: 6,442	If 10% of the population of any other nation were stateless persons: deprived of the basic right to a nationality; I'm sure Amnesty International would protest that as well.

12-16-2006, 06:59 AM	#3
Estlander Registered User Join Date: May 2004 Location: EST Posts: 6,201	Bump for the great read!

12-16-2006, 09:45 AM	#5
Volrak Registered User Join Date: Feb 2003 Posts: 6,525	Like I've been saying here for a long time, Russia's ceaseless anti-Baltic propaganda has exactly the opposite effect to what Russia intended. It has increased the reputation of the Baltics and brought highly favourable worldwide publicity to them. And it continues to make Russia look like an idiot.

12-16-2006, 09:17 PM	#10
Zharkov Registered User Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: America, the crazy place. Posts: 13,052	Amnesty International seems to have a multicultural agenda to push cultural disintegration and social disruption by rating countries according to how they react to a REFUSAL of minorities to assimilate and adopt the culture of their chosen country. If governments allow themselves to be torn apart by racial strife and corruption, they get a better score than if they attempt to force the refuseniks to assimilate. More details at: http://engforum.pravda.ru/showthread...hreadid=186092

12-17-2006, 02:26 AM	#15
Avenger Registered User Join Date: Aug 2006 Posts: 54	Volrak, I agree Estonia gets unfairly targeted by Russian nationalists in this forum. But trumpeting this article is just stooping at their level. Amnesty International is not somehow fixated on Estonia, at the expense of real human right abuses in Russia and Belarus (a simple use of the search feature at the AI website easily demonstrate this is not the case). But Estonia's tough stance to reestablish its national language and identity is a push for collective rights over individual rights which is always controversial. AI might be overzealous and unknowingly playing the Kremlin's game, but it's still warranted to warn Estonia not to go too far.