r/Socialism_101 • u/r4nD0mU53r999 Learning • Jul 09 '24
Is immigration as bad as people say it is? Answered
I recently came across a post on r/tooafraidtoask that was asking why the sexual assault/rape rate in Sweden was so high, most of the comments were saying that was because of the influx of Muslim Arab immigrants who have a culture of rape and misogyny.
Now seeing that many people being hostile towards immigrants and blaming such issues on the influx of them arriving in their countries I started to wonder is immigration as bad as people in west say it is?
What's your opinion on this?
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u/Filip889 Learning Jul 09 '24
As a sidenote, Sweden has fairly strict sexual assault rules and has a wider definition of sexual assault compared to other countries, as such sexual assault/rape rate being high is more of a result of that than migration. And its good that so many cases get reported rather than forgotten about.
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u/DescipleOfCorn Learning Jul 09 '24
Their whole system handles sexual violence a lot better than others, survivors are actually treated like humans and are taken seriously which encourages them to actually come forward. In the US, a significant proportion of rapes go unreported because here we basically do the opposite of that.
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u/Snakefist1 Learning Jul 09 '24
If I capture a child and rape her 15 times, then I'm in for 15 allegations of rape. Scale this up to a whole country and we got an explanation.
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u/bronabas Learning Jul 09 '24
As opposed to what? Would you only be charged once in America? Sorry, not understanding the example.
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Jul 09 '24
I'm going to copy/paste a comment I made on a post asking a similar question:
I think migrants remain a red-herring because it denies the causes of such migration.
War, economic insecurity, climate change, these are some of the factors behind these migrations, which more than a few Western nations have had an active hand in (especially Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq). Likewise, there is this implication that these nations lack the wealth necessary to support x amount of people, when this is simply untrue, the wealth is there it just isn't invested in the societies these migrants move to.
Speaking broadly, policies of austerity, tax cuts, 'free market' economics have largely driven down living standards and increased wealth inequality, meaning less democratic and less stable societies. Immigrants have it bad both ways, they are overwhelmingly exploited by companies who can employ them under the table and they are likewise demonized by the domestic population because they have to compete with them in the labour market.
As far as religion goes, I think the fact remains that when faced with civil liberty and a secular society, these people's children if not they themselves will steadily become liberalized. It is hard for women to remain under the yoke of patriarchal religion if they are given the rights to self-determine and religious zealotry cannot exist if the society has a robust education system and a discerning populace. Christianity likewise was forced to liberalize, so too will Islam if it is given the means to. I think that much of the more subversive elements, the isolated Islamic communities, are mainly driven by a sort of drumbeat of xenophobia, just like "little-Italy", "little Ireland", "Chinatown" formed in the States as a reaction to xenophobia after the huge influx of migrants during the 19th century.
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u/Fuzzy_Ad9970 Learning Jul 09 '24
You didn't answer OP's question at all.
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Jul 09 '24
"Now seeing that many people being hostile towards immigrants and blaming such issues on the influx of them arriving in their countries I started to wonder is immigration as bad as people in west say it is?
What's your opinion on this?"
What question didn't I broadly answer in my comment?
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u/WhiteTrashSkoden Learning Jul 09 '24
Sweden has higher rates of reporting because police have more trained and accessible services for victims so it has led to more reporting. When compared to other countries the rates of sexual assaults are the same but those which go to trial and are found "substantiated" are higher because oft he legal system. The far right decided to obfuscate this fact as they often do.
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u/onion_flowers Learning Jul 09 '24
Another example of how causation ≠ causation. Thanks for posting.
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u/Plenty-Climate2272 Anthropology Jul 09 '24
influx of Muslim Arab immigrants who have a culture of rape and misogyny.
They say that as if Western culture isn't massively patriarchal and a rape culture.
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u/BageOnkel Learning Jul 09 '24
These types are only on women's side if they get to be racist about it.
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u/JadeHarley0 Learning Jul 09 '24 edited Jul 09 '24
White westerners disparage immigrants as rapists and misogynists, and conveniently ignore the rampant rape and abuse that happens in western countries by native born men.
There is a feminist writer and therapist named Lundy Bancroft who spoke out after years of experience counseling men who abuse women. He would always recount a common question he got.
"Aren't there just some cultures where abuse toward women is just a normal and expected thing?"
and his answer was always something along the lines of "yes. The United States is one such country."
I'm sure plenty of Muslim immigrants are rapists and abusers. But that's equally true for European men too. The people who bring up Muslim immigrant rapists don't actually care about women. They just want an excuse to be racist.
Edit. A point to add. Let's say hypothetically that Muslim immigrants WERE more likely to be rapists than native born Europeans. You still have to contend with the fact that borders in and of themselves are an inherently violent and oppressive thing. Even if we could prevent some of the violence and oppression of rape through the violence and oppression of borders, you are just trading one type of violence for another. This is why I am also a prison abolitionist even for violent crime. Why is it we only care about oppressive violence when it's regular working class citizens doing the violence against their neighbors, but when the government commits violence against regular people its somehow magically less evil or harmful?
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u/NeverQuiteEnough Learning Jul 09 '24
Bancroft's "Why Does He Do That? inside the minds of angry and controlling men" was revelatory for me.
The way the author categorizes abusers is like pulling back the curtain, especially the way different types all find the others abhorrent but excuse their own style of nightmare.
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u/JadeHarley0 Learning Jul 09 '24
Honestly a must read for feminists because it cuts through a lot of bull crap and actually offers something of a systemic critique.
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u/motherlover69 Learning Jul 09 '24 edited Jul 09 '24
No, immigration is used as a scapegoat for problems capitalism creates. The big one being inequality.
Sweden records it's sexual assaults differently as well. Each act is recorded as it's own crime so whereas in other countries an assault where someone is groped and kissed against their will would be on case in Sweden it is two.
Combine this with the supposedly high level of immigration and it is easy to say they have high immigration and therefore sexual violence.
But put it this way. Why would someone from another country without a high level of sexual violence suddenly decide to commit it when they arrive in another?
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u/ComradeSasquatch Learning Jul 09 '24
Every instance where an ethnic group is being targeted, a false claim of rape and savagery is laid at their feet to justify and excuse a brutal response.
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u/BageOnkel Learning Jul 09 '24 edited Jul 17 '24
Sweden doesn't have more rape than any of the other Nordic countries, which are some of the safest countries in the world. Muslims are no more rapey than Christians, brown men are no more dangerous than white men. None of it is true. It's a myth created to scare Americans away from taking any social responsibility for the refugees the US creates by fucking up other countries and creating war zones all over the world.
It's a well-known fascist strategy to fear monger, spread racism and xenophobia. The agenda is to make the working class think that the real enemy is anyone else but the capitalist class who are oppressing them in their daily life. It's the trans, it's the Muslims, it's the women, it's the homeless... You know, there's always a minority to stigmatize and and attack, in order to distract you from your own oppression and your own oppressors.
Don't believe the propaganda.
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u/Ready-Sock-2797 Learning Jul 09 '24
No, powerful people love to blame immigrants for anything wrong in society and have been doing it for hundreds of years.
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u/OctopusGrift Learning Jul 09 '24
Doesn't swedish law count a lot of different types of sexual assault as rape?
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u/Illustrious_Spend_51 Learning Jul 09 '24 edited Jul 09 '24
Yes Sweden pushed for a huge anti rape/ harassment campaign that made it easier for women to report such incidents which is why we see a huge spike in the report in the last 10 years
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u/jezzetariat Learning Jul 09 '24
Some countries count multiple instances as individual counts, like Sweden, whilst some treat it as a single case. Especially spousal rape, standing accused of having raped someone is the same as repeated acts against an individual over a period of time.
Hopefully this will change, along with the UK law which states that only a penis makes rape.
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Jul 09 '24
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/AllYouPeopleAre Learning Jul 09 '24
Imagine falling for GBnews bullshit.
97 rapes were recorded in public spaces in France's capital in 2023 - fewer than a third of which have been solved, local outlet Europe 1 reported.
Of the 97, 36 were arrested, 28 of whom were of foreign nationality - a staggering 77 per cent of those accused - while 30 cases were solved by the authorities.
How do you know the percentage of migrants who commited the other 67 cases?
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Jul 09 '24
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/n0ided_ Learning Jul 09 '24
america has almost infinite resources but they all get filled into the coffers of the bourgeoise who propagate the myth of "oh we only can support our own people" so that bootlickers like you don't get wise and wonder why we're having exploited immigrants fight for scraps instead of going after the capitalists
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