NPR's Tell Me More posted this interview last October. In it, Michael Martin talks to Rob Kushen (executive director of the European Roma Rights Center) and Patrick Weil, a professor of history at the Sorbonne about their views on the expulsion of the Roma from France.
These people have been discriminated against since they first arrived in Western Europe centuries ago. The cycle of racism and discrimination that we have seen in this country with minorities continues there. Nicolas Sarkozy is taking an approach opposite to the "color blind theory" that many white Americans take; that is, he is abruptly taking a stance against a minority, something that many Americans would have a difficulty facing. The color-blind theory is one that ignores race completely, and with it, the issues that do challenge minority groups on a day-to-day basis; many white Americans believe that it is the best approach.
Nicolas Sarkozy may be taking a much-too-abrupt approach to the situation at hand, and Americans tend to ignore them completely. What we need to do is find a middle ground where everyone is accepted and race and ethnicity are not ignored, rather they are embraced and respected, not only in France and America, but the entire world. It wont be easy, but optimism would not hurt.
Race, a construction of society, will continue to be an issue and of relevance in Europe as it will in America due to its unfortunately deep-seeded roots. Hopefully the Roma will someday lose their stigma as a nomadic nuisance so that the world can see who they truly are: human.
