An 18-year-old woman was assaulted on Wednesday evening by a pair of Finnish-speakers because she was speaking Swedish. The incident happened in at restaurant Amarillo in Åbo-Turku.
According to news reports, the Finnish-speaking pair of a man and a woman first asked the 18-year-old woman to leave the restaurant. When she refused to leave, they pulled her by her hair.
The man escaped, however the woman was taken in for questioning by the police. The 18-year-old victim has repoted the incident as a crime to the police.
According to the police, such incidents are very unusual and this is an individual occurance. However, the chairman of the student union at Åbo Akademi, Finland’s largest Swedish-speaking university which is based in the city, said that he is aware of violence occuring against people just because they speak Swedish. He told the internet newspaper Peppar.fi, “If one is in town or in a pub in the evening, one often makes sure to speak Swedish quietly. It’s simply a matter of one’s own self preservation instict”.
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Monday 29.6.09 at 11:19
Norm
That’s really weird. I have never experienced or heard of anything like that in Helsingfors and I tend to speak swedish most everywhere. There are stories, of course, but I have never heard of anyone getting assaulted. A friend of mine (an exchange student from Sweden) told me some guys at a pub had started to act aggressive when he had told them he was from Sweden. And once, some teenage girls in the subway, whom me and my friend sat next to, changed seats when they heard us talk swedish. One of them muttered something like “lets change seats, I don’t want to hear any swedish”. But that’s about it. I have never been afraid of speaking swedish anywhere.
Monday 29.6.09 at 15:45
Jonas
Hi Norm! Luckily, I tend to think these are rare events.
However, discriminatory attitudes certainly exist as you have experienced yourself on the metro. Obviously, most often they do not evolve into verbal confrontations and certainly not violence. Thankfully.
Unfortunately, in the last two years the culture of political populism by not just the obvious party, the True Finns, but even by certain elements in the Centre and National Coalition/Kokoomus parties have not helped to create a tranquil language climate. This is unfortunate.
Personally, I seldom start a conversation with a stranger in Swedish in Helsingfors. I would in certain locations (e.g. Stockmann, Aktia etc) and if the sales person has a Swedish name badge, but for the most part I must admit I just go with Finnish. I should probably not, but I am afraid it is essentially down to laziness on my part. It is often simply too much hassle to try and get served in Swedish in the capital these days. This is obviously regrettable. That said, I will often deliberately choose firms that I know speak Swedish over those I know do not. So, it is in the commercial interest of businesses to offer bilingual service.
In my hometown, I always start conversations in Swedish with strangers. It is not always possible to continue in Swedish, but I expect that in a town with a third Swedish-speakers, they should expect Swedish-speaking customers. I have been met with a few occasions a bad tone, but rarely. I also remember once an incident at the checkout in a supermarket in which the Finnish-speaking customer in front of me told off the checkout cashier for addressing her in Swedish (she had in fact greeted in both languages with päivää go’dag), which I thought was particularly unnecessarily rude.
Wednesday 14.10.09 at 19:04
Dim Ffineg plîs, Ffinwyr ydyn ni
[...] do’n i ddim yn gwybod bod y sefyllfa rhwng grwpiau ieithyddol yna mor fregus ei fod yn beryglus siarad Swedeg weithiau. An 18-year-old woman was assaulted on Wednesday evening by a pair of Finnish-speakers [...]