If there is one lesson from the bizarre, shocking massacre in Norway that our Caribbean region – a microcosm of peoples and cultures of the world – should pay heed to, it is the avoidance of any involvement in spreading hostility, worse hatred, against nationals of other countries who come as immigrants.
The 32-year-old ethnic Norwegian, Andres Bering Brievik, whose slaughter of 68 fellow citizens at a youth camp on Friday, July 22, following bombing attacks in the capital city of Oslo that same day of horrors, has boasted of opposition to his government’s immigration policy and fostering of multiculturalism.
Having identified himself with a doctrine of hatred against non-white immigrants, often associated with the raw racism of ultra-conservatives and far right groups, Brievik had seemingly nurtured enough bitterness and passion against the liberal policies of the Labour Party government to write his infamy into history with the unleashing of what the Norwegian Prime Minister, Jens Stoltenberg was to describe as the worst human tragedy to afflict Norway since the Second World War.
Brievik would have been quietly lurking in the shadows, plotting his terroristic crimes, as immigrants from various countries and in particular non-white nationals, were being openly insulted, physically abused and worse in various European states where far right politicians and activists are increasingly on the offensive against immigrants and multiculturalism.
The hate-driven Brievik was to remark with venom to his lawyer – the killings of his victims were “gruesome” but “necessary”. That “necessity”, evidently, was consistent with his warped thinking that Norway’s governing party had gone quite wrong in its pursuit, like some “other European states” of policies that encouraged immigrants and the fostering of policies in support of multiculturalism.
CARICOM citizens familiar with the chronicling of the history of slavery and indentureship in the building of western civilization and institutionalisation of capitalism (currently in deep crisis), cannot afford to ignore the divisive political messages against immigrants (Muslims in particular), as reported flowing from either Germany’s Chancellor Angela Markel; France’s President Nicolas Sarkozy, or Britain’s Prime Minister David Cameron over a period of the past five months.
For this trio of European heads of government, multiculturalism – the cohesion of various ethnic, religious and cultural groups living, working and building together – has proven to be a massive political failure.
In our own region, there is a creeping xenophobia in some Community states that manifests itself in propaganda against non-nationals, along with distortions often made in the media, to justify opposition to free intra-regional movement of fellow CARICOM citizens.