by Michael Smith (Veshengro)
Would the Roma movement disappear after George Soros? Is there someone else who will continue his mission? Have Roma organizations across the region understood the point?
The above are questions that have been raised recently by a Rom on some other place on the Web. And he continued to say that in his opinion, if we need to announce the messiah in the Roma movement that should be the initiator George Soros.
And the mission, he says, is passed on to Roma generations who continue their studies thanks to the scholarships, conferences, and seminars and the small fees they receive from projects.
The latter is more or less poppycock, in my view, as the seminars and conferences certainly have not and will not help the Romani cause one little bit.
However to the rest of what he said one can only say that, far from thinking Mr Soros to be the messiah of the Romani Movement and the saviour of the Romani People, would it not be a good idea if we, first of all, had a very close look as to who and what George Soros is. He is not, regardless what he and the OSI may claim, doing this out of the goodness of his heart. That is absolute bull dust, as the Australians would say. George Soros is a very shrewd operator and knows exactly what he is doing and he is using the Roman(ni) and the Decade of Roma Inclusion as a cover for other activities. When we uncover those we know what he is up to.
It is hard to believe, said the author of the open letter, the Rom mentioned, that the Roma movement is going to continue in the same manner after Soros, because an initiative needs self-sustaining internal initiatives. We neglect that because we are satisfied with what we have and what they give to us a good trait but not for a longer time.
This is where he has great insight and is saying what I have been saying for a long time, namely that the Eastern European Roma, especially the Vlax and the Balkan ones, (still) have a slave mentality, the “Uncle Tom” mentality that Ian Hancock once mentioned and that we have discussed previously. The attitude of being satisfied with the crumbs from the rich man's table and with the slave existence rather than to work themselves out of the quagmire.
But they are not prepared to do that and until they do so they are not worth even given any money or any other help to get on in the world. The problem is the People and their very attitude. They are not willing to get off their hands and get the finger out that is so deep inside themselves that their hands are nearly buried too, but they expect funds from European sources, from the UN, and from the likes of Soros for their self-advancement projects. More like money to be put into the pockets of the already filthy rich Buli Bahas, those self-made kings and emperors and tsars and exploiters of the People. Oh yes, and the Sinti in the West, such as in Germany and Austria have such exploiters too only they call them “judges”.
It is not just the Roma that sit on their behinds and nurse their fat bodies. No, the Sinti do the same, especially the so-called leaders, the “judges”, who hold sway in the same way as they be kings or emperors.
Those leaders talk big talk to the leaders of Europe as to this project for the advancement of the People and that, but very little if anything ever happens, whether among the Sinti in the West or the Roma in the East, not even with the Decade of Roma Integration. We are now many years into that decade and what has been achieved. I mean what has been achieved in real terms. I do not mean how much money has been wasted on stupid language projects and the establishment of the Romani Esperanto and such like. I mean what has been done to get the Roma, and Sinti, but then again the latter were never in the equation as the decade was ONLY for the Roma and then only for the Roma in Eastern Europe.
Still no one cottoning on as to what Papa Soros is doing. He is working, purportedly, for the Roma in the countries of the former Soviet Bloc – with the exception, as I can see it in Russia itself – and is getting very strong political influence in those countries, such as in Romania, Bulgaria, the former Czechoslovakia, and other former USSR satellites, as all his money for projects – which is, basically, given to the state where the project is, comes with strings attached. Strings that give Soros influence, political influence and power, in those countries. So, ask yourselves, “what is Papa Soros up to?” While he may be pretending to help the Roma he is, in fact, working on something entirely different, all the while using the Romani People as a front.
Can we ever get the Romani to do things for themselves and the answer here is that while this may be possible for those in the West, but even there it seems to be a very limited affair as they seem to be hellbent on calling Gadje do-gooders in again and again who usurp everything and then try to channel things the way they, the Gadje, think things should be, it seems to be very impossible with regards to the Rom in the East.
Self-help groups and livelihood projects are not rocket science and do not need people with degrees in writing and degrees in business studies. It needs members of the People who know what's what and what's needed and some of the People with vision. The only visions the majority, however, seem to have, are those induced by substance abuse, whether alcohol, drugs or the sniffing of glue. Even when someone from the People comes along and makes suggestions for self-help, even if this be only that they look after their homes better and fix leaking roofs themselves rather than getting everything wet and waiting for this or that charity to come along, no one wants to listen and has every excuse under the sun. And I am not just referring to Roma in the eastern European nations.
Then we have the great majority who, while being well aware of the fact that they are Romani will hide under different ethnicities, as I have said already so many times, and then those that, while they could get involved in assisting in self-help and livelihood projects as they have some spare cash or such, they also deny their ancestry in such instances.
The most important part of the Romani self-emancipation is learning from those who have done it, be those the American Blacks or the Native Americans or the Aborigines of Australia or the Maori of Aotore, and as they have done, remembering that they are Gadje, and do it without the White Man, without the Gadjo.
Human rights in Europe, thousands of strategies, documents and hundreds of Roma Decades are only slogans if you do not understand that you will need to learn to articulate yourself and especially no just use your voice but your own hands and heads to do the work instead of sitting their demanding this and that to be done for you.
Not only the Roma are at fault in this. No, the Sinti too, and the Romanichals in the UK too.
Therefore, instead of celebrating April 8, Roma Day, and to have all those lovely congresses and other gabfests, and to play this “Roma, Gypsy and Traveller History Month” in the UK – how can you in the first place do that as at least one of the groups mentioned there has not the same history and culture and do the Rom, the Gypsy? – the so-called leaders should work with the people and teach them how to raise their voices high enough when presenting their opinion for integration and against discrimination against Rom in Europe and elsewhere.
Then again, as I have said before, I someone of the People comes along with a vision or more than one vision as to way of emancipating ourselves and getting our own representation working he or she gets shot down in flames by the leaders and also by many of the People because that would be work to do things for themselves. They demand that the Gadje give them this, that or the other, but never seem to be able and prepared to do things for themselves. Even if you, as a Rom, do things for them; things that you have laid out money for and offer it to them, basically, for free they still are not prepared to take it up for, as I have been told myself on more that one occasion, they cannot believe that someone would be prepared to do this or that without expecting to be paid for it somehow. Therefore they always believe that somewhere, while one says that one does it for free, one gets money for it. I assume they do thus believe for they would never be prepared to do anything for the People for nothing.
No document, strategy, or policy is not a purpose of its own if its background does not represent the politics of power and might, supported by the voice of the PEOPLE.
© M Smith (Veshengro), May 2008
