Do we cultivate hatred language?

I was a panelist on journalist debates in the framework of Barents Spektakel festival in Kirkenes.We discussed prejudices about each other. Journalists from Russia, Norway, Finland and Sweden put forward their own versions. I shared mine: media themselves ultivate hatred language. I presented  examples of headlines in Karelian media over the past six months. Those headlines present Finns, Norwegians and Swedes as quite criminal people.

«Finnish citizen brought down a Petrozavodsk column», «Finnish maniac confessed committing  murder», «Norwegian fascists left marks in Karelia».

 These are the most popular themes, on the second place – articles about visas, work abroad, adoption of children. And in the “tail” there are some articles about cultural exchange, the society of friendship and some other positive things.

                                                 Russian journalists visit Norwegian border station

Elena Larionova, the head of Russian Barents Press who has organized our trip together with the Norwegian Barents Secretariat and NJC, admits that when she was in Norway for the first time in 90s,  she wanted to carry a poster declaring «I am not a prostitute and I do not sell vodka» — foreigners perceived Russian women in this way.

Panelists (from right to left): Natalia Sevets-Ermolina (Russia), Jonna Pulkinen (Finland),Arne Egil Tønset (Norway),Jon Hedstrøm (Sweden), Arne Store (Norway)

 Foreign debators met our frankness and cofessed ordering their correspondents in Russia  to write grisly stories about prostitutes and criminals and poverty - no wonder that very quickly formed prejudiced opinions about Russians.

- We honour greatly our journalistic code of ethics and we try to present two points of view in all disputable items. But because of some reasons this rule is not applied to foreigners. And especially to Russian people - bitterly acknowledged Gunnar Sætra, a journalist with 25 years of experience, an expert on Russia and the Russian character.

Barents Spektakel opening

What are we to do if we smile to each other, organize cultural festivals but in the articles we are still happy to write the nationality of each other in criminal news headlines? There was no answer to that. We repented our sins called for friendship and left for concerts and plays. In Karelian folklore there is such a saying: "Eat, eat or else the Swede will come".  It appeared in very old times when our territories near the Ladoga Lake were devastated by vikings but grandmothers in countriside still frighten kids with the Swede. Will joint festivals and grant projects not change the Russian mind? Do we need the image of the enemy so much (may be like they too) that culture won’t help?

  Natalia Sevets-Ermolina

Translated by Tatyana Kotova

  Full text on the site http://rk.karelia.ru

 Photo of Anna Lopatkina and Elena Larionova