The West hates us for the caste system. Yet it has its own system of extreme and worse discrimination. Gypsy kids like the Roma children are not allowed to study in mainstream Czechoslovakian schools. Now the European Court of Human Rights has ruled that Roma kids have to be allowed into any school of their choice, including mainstream ones. This discrimination has no name but is not less segregation for that. The parents of the Roma children in the Czech Republic were right to approach the court for justice.
BBC News reports that 13 out of 17 judges voted for their integration into the mainstream education system. The focus here should not be on those who agreed about the necessity to stop this racism. Rather we must enquire about the minority four judges’ decision. Why are they still for racism?
The Nazis under Hitler hated the gypsies. Neo-Nazism is ravaging Europe today. European literature over the centuries demonized minority ethnic groups. Very recently Elizabeth Kostovo in her bestseller The Historian carries on the trend of demonizing the ethnic peoples of Europe. In fact, Romanian gypsies are thought to have links with that famous vampire in Transylvania.
Notice the extent of the prejudice. It is not sufficient to hate others, for good measure one must accuse them of witchcraft and vampirism. This is the unsaid reason why mainstream schools refused to admit Roma children. The parents of the majority-Czechoslovakian children had threatened to pull out their kids if the Roma kids were accepted by the schools. Racial and ethnic fears run deep within European society.
Are these the reasons which might have compelled the remaining four judges to oppose the acceptance of the Roma children into the so-called civilized world? Pro-active humane judgments as these are steps in the right direction. Yet one cannot wonder whether an essentially primitive social psyche can ever be changed by court-rulings. The blight of caste is endemic to our bighted earth.
Via: BBC
Image Credit: Calpeacepower
