I believe the issue is not the people, but the social security system.
That's true. In Finland also those without citizenship (of any EU country or Finland) are entitled to social security system as long as they aren't illegal immigrants. That's what makes it easy to leech - a system flaw.
Who causes the clash, the one that expresses themselves, or the one that does not accept that expression?
People that come need to adapt in the sense that they have to accept the local culture, maybe find some solutions for issues resulting out of their habits, they do not need to turn into locals.
Good point. I understand there would be no clash if everyone could get on with each other, but different behaviour always causes some tensions between the locals and immigrants. But I can't disagree with you on this one.
Do you want to be restricted in your expression?
Shall I emigrant somewhere, yes. In my opinion it would be respect for their culture.
I work with one, a very competent and hard worker. However everyone at work not open to his culture still has trouble with the person, since the Asian way of communicating is different from the European. It is not the issue of the immigrant, but the people that are not open.
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For me it is very African to be loud and full of confidence. I also find it arrogant at times.
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--it is very difficult to change that, but it does not always mean they have no respect.
Yeah, but in Finland the communication isn't such a problem. There is no such thing as "awkward silence" here (due to us having few words to say to each other the loud Somalians were so much different from us). The fact that the Vietnamese were hard workers made it easier for the reserved people to accept them, as that has always been viewed as one of the best aspects here.
It wasn't only that the Somalians felt arrogant because they had got used to the African culture, but that they were the upper, Soviet-supported class who were used to easy life with Soviet money and didn't uderstand they don't belong to the upper class in our country. But so are other Africans louder, though less so. I understand habits such as these are hard to change. Anyway, the black children born in Finland are pretty much like us, and a good thing that has also happened in Finland is that younger people aren't as reserved as before and are more open to express their feelings, similar to people in Central Europe.
The lazy is a difficult one, people do things in different ways, I worked in the most productive places in Europe (Germany and North Italy), the Germans are lazy they go home early, the Italians are lazy they start the day late. Actually both worked very well, just differently. You need to see this on individual (person by person) level though, not on the level of immigrants, Germans or Italians, ...
The laziness was quite a part of their culture, as they have told, in Somalia men give the orders and women do the household chores. Even more so, again that upper-class position they were at and the money they got for free had made them lazier than usual. Over time, most of them got used to work like normal.
By the way, I sure prefer the German way of laziness. That gives you freedom without having to worry about the work you eventually have to do - it's easier to be lazy after the work is done.
Overall, I can't disagree with your points - we've reached some kind of a compromise, or at least I understand your points above.
About that swastika thing, I have to say its ban doesn't really work (in matter of preventing neo-Nazi movements). It is only revenge by those suffered from the actions of the Nazi party and ideology (Germany, Austria and Axis states that got conquered, only because of Hitler's warmongering, no wonder they don't like Hitler in that aspect and then Allied states that were under Nazi rule during the war or suffered heavy losses in the war). We, despite being an Axis country from 1941 to 1944, don't enforce a swastika (or "hakaristi" in Finnish) ban as we didn't suffer from the Nazi's actions. Though, our Army and Air Force were pressured by the Allies to change their swastika symbols to something neutral. Despite this, it (though not 45 degree rotated nor with the Third Reich dimensions, ours had shorter "hooks") is still in use in some governmental connections (such as military decorations). Such bans aren't needed if there has been very little problems with those who used the symbol/item in case like there were in Finland.
Do you find these swastikas offensive? Or would you find them offensive if painted on a modern tank that's in use?
They have nothing to do with Nazis except the StuG III are German built and those are Finnish troops, and Finland was allied with Germany. But the origin of the symbol is unrelated to Nazi ideology (apart from it being an ancient symbol in both German and Finnish culture).
But if burqas are a part of islamic culture, so are swastikas religious or traditional symbols of luck or something like that in some cultures (ancient German, Indian, Native American etc symbol of luck, for example). If burqas shouldn't, so shouldn't swastikas be banned - after all, one extremist party's actions shouldn't define a symbol, like KKK's use of white face-covering cloaks doesn't define all clothing like that (for example, burqa is essentially similar minus the pointed headpiece) as a symbol of racial discrimination.
I didn't intend to refer to swastikas, but as you brought it up, I had to voice my opinion.
variant characters for 萬 or 万 meaning "all" or "eternity", it was popular as a good luck charm with early aviators. However The German (and Austrian) postwar criminal code makes the public showing of the Hakenkreuz (the swastika) and other Nazi symbols illegal and punishable.
