It’s all foreign to me

There is a debate going on at the moment as to whether the media really needs to specify the nationality of someone who has made the news for whatever, reason, whether the person is a criminal or a victim.

“Male nurse touches Iranian woman’s breast”

“Foreigners held after flight in Golden Bay”

“Theft by 18-year-old Somalian, resident at Hal-Far”

“Swedish man charged with hotel room theft”

“Somali caught driving stolen van jailed one year”

This is just a sample of the many headlines/descriptions which have made the news recently. I will leave it to your imagination what type of comments each news story provoked, leading to me to wonder whether more harm than good is being done by zooming in on the nationality to such a degree that it becomes the focus of the story.

While I understand that for the press these details are added to a story to give it context, there is the risk that the actual incident becomes loaded with an underlying meaning, especially in a society where hostility against “the foreigner” seems to be growing.

Non-Maltese nationals have, for a while now, been getting that uneasy feeling that being branded a “foreigner” in Malta implies more than just the fact that the person is not Maltese.

A crime is a crime, so does it really matter where the person comes from? Does it colour or influence our interpretation of the story with the added detail that the person perpetrating the crime is not Maltese but came from another country? Do we feel angrier if the person was an EU national or a refugee? These are some of the questions we need to ask ourselves as Malta (whether we like it or not) becomes more and more of a cultural, ethnic mix.

The most “interesting” case was the story in which “A Somali man was arrested… after he was allegedly caught raping a Swedish girl”. After the by now predictable flood of comments poured in, it turned out that it was not rape after all and that the Swedish girl is originally from Turkey, which elected this gem of an observation by a reader on a news portal: If so she can have it. Turks are animals also.

How charming.

Non-Maltese nationals have, for a while now, been getting that uneasy feeling that being branded a “foreigner” in Malta implies more than just the fact that the person is not Maltese, but a whole range of hidden subtexts lying just below the surface. In a gross over-simplification it could probably be reduced to:

Foreign = not like us = bad •  Maltese = one of us = good

Obviously, whoever commits a crime needs to be held accountable, but the danger in harping on the “foreign” aspect of the person’s identity is that anyone not Maltese is being viewed with more and more suspicion that they are somehow up to no good. It reminds me of when newspapers used to make it a point of saying that someone who died of an overdose was “A youth from Cospicua” in the headline, further perpetuating the stereotype that The Three Cities are all no-go areas rife with social problems. Holding on to prejudice and bigotry because of where someone comes from are ugly traits and similarly, xenophobia against anyone who is not Maltese is just as unpleasant.

The barriers of mistrust need to be broken, and we need to start relating to people as people no matter where they come from, rather than as unwelcome intruders.

I can certainly understand how the ceaseless insistence on the “foreigner” label and its connotations can make those who are visitors (whether permanent or temporary) feel they are not wanted and unwelcome. On the other hand, I do realize that the influx of so many nationalities over such a short span of time has been a major culture shock for our country, with which it is still grappling. For a long time (except for a few mixed marriages) we were practically a homogenous country; now this is no longer the case. That takes a lot of getting used to.

I can also perfectly relate to those who get upset and irritated by uncalled for arrogance and a snooty sense of superiority by non-Maltese nationals which I have come across as well (both in person and on Facebook). I am willing to give everyone the benefit of the doubt, and be pleasant and welcoming to those who have chosen Malta as their residence, but frankly, a constant stream of snideness gets on my last nerves. After all, no one is being forced to live here against their will and if I, for one, loathed Malta so much, I would leave and never look back.

There needs to be a middle ground somewhere. The barriers of mistrust need to be broken, and we need to start relating to people as people no matter where they come from, rather than as unwelcome intruders. Punish those who commit crimes by all means, but let us not tar everyone with the same brush. After all, if a Maltese person breaks the law abroad, we would not like it if we were all collectively viewed as criminals.