GYPSIES

Introduction

CCRH PRESENTS: AMERICAN GYPSY

STRUGGLE FOR CIVIL RIGHTS

Difficulties affecting the Roma in Europe are widespread. Centuries old stereotypes of Roma as lazy thieves, combined with emerging nationalism in countries that recently gained independence from the USSR, make Roma populations targets for racist actions by citizens and governments in many countries.

As recently as 1999 one community in the Czech Republic erected a wall to segregate the Roma people from the Czech population.* Lawmakers in Italy have provided shelter for Roma people that essentially keeps them out of the cities.^ One researcher interviewed police officers in Finland concerning their impressions of the Roma populations. Quotes from those interviews include:

It's very expensive for the rest of us to keep up such a culture.

It is in their blood, the desire to wander. That pulls them on the road, heredity. They seldom stay indoors. And if heredity has nothing to do with this, then the children learn it from their parents. If the parents are rats, the children rarely become anything different.*^

In 1971 Roma from around the world gathered to convene the First Romani World Congress. In an effort to unify the global Roma population, the Congress adopted an official flag and anthem. They have also made petitions to political institutions, including the United Nations, in order to establish legal protection and recognition of past and present injustices.

*Royce Turner, "Gypsies and Politics in Britain" Political Quarterly, vol. 71, Issue 1, p. 68 Academic Search Elite online

^author unknown, "Mistreatment of Gypsies" the Observer of Business and Politics, on the web, 27 November 2000, www.hvk.org/articles/1100/95.html

*^Martti Gronfors article, see bibliography, pgs. 353 and 347, respectively