The Kjuus affair
Thomas Hylland Eriksen
Norway Now, spring 1997
[Image]
[Image] In recent weeks, the main object for publicly expressed
hatred and contempt in Norway has been a kindly, elderly
About this man with considerable personal charm and polite manners.
site It is nearly as if the country's politicians, writers and
other prominent figures have taken part in a public
[Image] competition of invective and scorn, targeting the
defenseless old man in all the main media. Who is he, and
what on earth might he have done to deserve such massive
Relational criticism?
index
Mr. Jack Erik Kjuus is the founder-leader of a small
[Image] political movement of a kind which is depressigly familiar
in Western Europe nowadays. A typical representative of
Thematic the loony right, his party is called "The White Alliance"
index (Hvit valgallianse). The party programme, rather more
narrow in its scope than one would expect from a
[Image] fully-fledged political party, denounces non-European
immigrants as the source of social ills in the country and
Alphabetic calls for their immediate sterilisation in a bid to
index prevent what Mr. Kjuus sees as the racial degeneration of
the Norwegian people.
[Image]
This kind of view, while perfectly legitimate in Norwegian
Recent politics as late as the 1930s, is no longer considered
compatible with human rights and common decency. Racial
discrimination is now illegal, and although few have
[Image] actually been convicted of racism, overt racism is
theoretically considered a crime.
World
Mr. Kjuus had gone further than most in his invectives
against ethnic minorities. He did not restrict himself to
woolly talk about "the incompatibility of Norwegian and
immigrants' culture", as many others do, but spoke
explicitly about racial degeneration. Eventually, he was
brought to court, and -- surprisingly -- he lost. Many
liberals were unhappy with the verdict, arguing his right
to freedom of speech even when it could offend a large
group of Norwegians.
Mr. Kjuus' defeat was not unconditional. He was in effect
only convicted for one of his many views of non-white
people; namely, that adopted children should be
sterilised. In other words, the court distinguished
between immigrants and their children on the one hand, and
adopted children on the other hand. This, in my view, is
even more problematic than the question of guilt and
responsibility.
Adopted children born in Asia, Africa or South America do
not, of course, constitute a cultural or ethnic group.
They are, culturally speaking, as Norwegian as the rest of
us. It is doubtless true that most immigrant children are
more different from the majority in terms of culture;
after all, their parents have immigrated from a country
which in many ways differs from Norway. On the other hand,
many of them have lived in Norway their entire lives, and
to call for their departure is no less morbid than to
claim that adopted children are not Norwegians. Mass
sterilisation as a political programme is disgusting
whether it is aimed at Jews, Gypsies, adopted children or
the children of immigrants. We cannot, obviously, afford
any fine distinctions here.
The Kjuus verdict is depressing in that it condemns racism
vis-α-vis a largely middle-class group of children, who
grow up in solid Norwegian homes, while implicitly
accepting the same attitudes when they are directed
against a much weaker, largely working-class group. Not
least for this reason, one hopes -- paradoxically, perhaps
-- that the Supreme Court supports Mr. Kjuus' appeal and
that he is acquitted. Otherwise, the Norwegian legislative
system has unwittingly justified racist discrimination as
long as it only affects powerless groups and individuals.
⌐Thomas Hylland Eriksen 1997
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