An absurd and awful moment in Switzerland's legendarily bonkers citizenship process

I assume your blog is loaded with such stories? Link to some of those.

2 Likes

Nope, Switzerland is not racist

They are widely considered one of the most racist European nations for no reason

No reason at all

5 Likes

If 25% of the population doesn’t hold cititzenship, and can’t possibly get it for reasons like the ones in the post… yep. That’s what racism looks like.

Maybe you were expecting confederate flags and dogwhistles? Is racism only marches by skinheads and graffitti hate slogans? Because they’re options, add ons to stuff like the clearly racist citizenship process described for Switzerland.

Racism OTHERS people. This story is about someone who has been ‘othered’ by a majority - despite the same upbringing as neighbors.

8 Likes
1 Like

Also why don’t you add some details on their social status? I am sure the vast majority are poor hard working or destitute, because in Switzerland, unlike everywhere else money doesn’t talk :laughing:

I just can’t stop here…

Just to add that Germany has relatively well funded public services and that the local council / Kommune has legal responsibility to look after those who have been placed in their area.

Wow. WOW. wow.

sigh.

2 Likes

And that’s why we’re a (nominally, these days) Republic, kids. Direct Democracy is just a polite word for “Here come s the Lynch mob”.

And why the phrase “a nation of laws” has a lot more meaning than most people understand. The Founders knew what can happen when people with power get to make decisions based on their emotional state du jour.

4 Likes

want to like that a 1000 times.

I hope that we don’t run the Swiss users off.

2 Likes

So while technically the law allows it, an assertion that immigration to China is a real thing is bullshit.

Maybe China should change its practices to be more in accordance with the law, then.

Well, actually, once you delve deep into those issues, you’ll find them to be alive with contradictions.

A bit content free with all due respect. Perhaps you could point some out for the class? Or suggest a superior system (evidence-based preferably.)

Not meaning snark but your post could apply to any statement ever written in the history of writing statements.

I suspect, humans being demonstrably imperfect beings, that any political system has contradictions and flaws. Certainly the assorted ones ordained by one deity or another are no better and invariably worse.

1 Like

This is the part where Turkish parliament emulates US Senate retardo-symbolism and urges its citizens to stop eating Swiss cheese.

Welcome to BoingBoing!

3 Likes

As to that 25%, what types of work do they do, and how would those compare – in general – to native-born Swiss citizens?

2 Likes

Isn’t Ikea Swedish (goes to look - yes, it is Swedish, but it has Dutch headquarters)? Maybe that’s the joke?

2 Likes

There was a time when in the US, you had defacto second class citizenship if you weren’t white. That was popular among many white Americans at the time (and none too few would enjoy going back to that). Because it was popular, should we have continued with that “tradition”?

5 Likes

After giving it some thought in the shower I think I came up with a good compromise: Each canton defines its citizenship test. People submit questions, then you put it to a vote. The submitted questions (or most submitted, depending on how many they receive) go onto a ballot, which is essentially just giving everyone a copy of all of the chosen questions, their accepted answer(s), and a yes/no tick. The n most-yessed questions become the canton’s test. That should remove some of the luck factor like this woman happening to get shitty neighbors by spreading it out, while still keeping things local and directly democratic.

5 Likes

In theory of course, it’s a wonderful ideal. Historically, it hasn’t always been smooth since the passage of the 14th amendment (birthright citizenship, meant to make African Americans full citizens), especially if you were Chinese (Chinese exclusion act). And not to mention the 1924 immigration act, which tied available slots for immigration and naturalization to the percentage of immigrants from your country previously.

And there are those who would happily repeal the 14th.

7 Likes