What will post-migration Europe look like in the future?

The German election result was what it was because of the kind of immigration policies that have been pursued in Germany and the EU in general. And these policies have not been beneficial either to the native European population or to immigrants arriving from elsewhere—let alone to their descendants.

Right now, however, it seems that many immigrants want this negative development—especially from the perspective of their own reference group—to continue. As a sign of this, two Afghan men were recently arrested in Germany for planning a terrorist attack on the Swedish parliament.

Fortunately, the plans of these men, who were linked to the ISIS-K organization, were uncovered, and as a result, they received prison sentences of four and a half years. However, one would have to be quite the optimist to believe that this case will improve the behavior of other immigrants who share the convicted men's mindset.

That is why I believe that the shift in support towards genuinely nationalist parties, as seen in the German elections, will continue in future elections across the EU. And this makes the entire European future uncertain because these parties are not really united by much except for their critical stance on immigration policy.

A case in point is Germany’s Alternative for Germany (AfD), which is socially conservative and at least partially pro-Russian, and Finland’s Finns Party, which has clearly understood the threat posed by Putin’s Russia to Europe and advocates right-wing conservative economic policies. Beyond immigration issues, the only real common ground between these parties seems to be value conservatism.

Thus, the question must be asked: What will post-migration Europe look like in the future? Will it be a united continent capable of competing—economically and in terms of security policy—with the world's other power centers, a fragmented collection of quarrelsome states, or even a collapsed and underdeveloped society? Or even a province of Russia?

I do not have an answer to this question, but I am certain that the decisions influencing it will be made within the next ten years. And that is why Europeans should pull themselves together sooner rather than later.

Previous thoughts on the same topic:
Will Tomorrow’s Elections in Germany Be a Turning Point?
The Complete Demilitarization of Gaza: What Would It Mean for the Palestinians?
Do Belarusians Have the Will and Ability to Preserve Their Independence?

Immigration Policy Should Be Based on Evidence

Finland is one of those countries where the native population has, on average, just slightly more than one child per family. As a result, the number of ethnically Finnish people is set to decline rapidly over the coming decades.

This poses a problem for the demographic structure of society, as the number of working-age people decreases while the number of elderly individuals in need of care increases. This fact is often cited as a key reason for the need for immigration to Finland—a position supported by both the liberal right and the green-left political spectrum.

Only the national-conservative Finns Party has clearly disagreed, advocating for stricter controls on humanitarian immigration, particularly from developing countries, as well as on forms of labor-based immigration where wages are insufficient to support the newcomers, leaving taxpayers to cover part of the costs.

This discussion has been further influenced by the immigration minister of Sweden, a country that has pursued even more open immigration policies than Finland. According to the minister, "there is a dramatic difference between receiving 100,000 asylum seekers and 100,000 highly educated labor migrants."

This fact has often been overlooked by Finnish proponents of immigration. For this reason, I hope they will carefully examine Sweden’s experiences with its immigration policies, listen to the relevant Swedish government minister, and draw the correct conclusions from all of this. 

The fact is that even in immigration policy, Finland does not need polarization but rather an acknowledgment of the facts. And after that, decision-making based on evidence.

Previous thoughts on the same topic:
10% of Foreign Students in Finland Failed to Meet Residence Requirements
Finland’s Minister of Finance Believes Not All Cultures Are Equally Good
Immigration Policy Must Take Artificial Intelligence and Robots into Account

The Difference Between Left-Wing and Right-Wing Envy

In Finland, a humorous anecdote is occasionally shared, in which the ethnicity of the characters change. One version goes as follows.

When a person from Kainuu sees that his neighbor is becoming wealthy, he becomes envious and immediately starts to think about how to bring the neighbor back to being as poor as he is. However, if someone becomes rich in South Ostrobothnia, the neighbor also becomes envious but instead starts feverishly thinking about how he could achieve the same success.

The anecdote is said to illustrate well the cultural differences between the populations of these two Finnish regions. The same story is also often told with the Kainuu resident replaced by a Finn and the Southern Ostrobothnian by an American. In this version, the story is said to depict the cultural differences between the inhabitants of the two countries.

In reality, the story best illustrates the difference between the political right and left. A socialist always aims to equalize income differences, so they naturally start thinking about how to tax the income and wealth of the rich as effectively as possible. In contrast, an economic liberal sees successful people as role models, whose achievements he should aspire to emulate.

This applies both to economically poor Kainuu and to the stronghold of Finland's political right in Southern Ostrobothnia. And it applies just as well to largely social-democratic Finland as to the United States, which thrives on market economy principles.

Previous thoughts on the same topic:
Freudian slip, 9-year-old girl and cultural appropriation
Traditional beliefs turned out to be wisdom
Current status of mankind and its culture

Mistreatment of Women at the Olympics?

The world seems to have gone completely crazy. I mean, in women's boxing at the Paris Olympics, there are two men: Imane Khelif and Lin Tu-Ting.

The International Boxing Association (IBA) held the World Championships of the sport in New Delhi, India, in March 2023. During the competition, Algerian Imane Khelif and Taiwan's Lin Yu-Ting were disqualified based on gender tests, but they are once again participating in the mistreatment of women.

Behind this, of course, is the international DEI movement, which has sought to blur the differences between biological sexes and mistakenly believed that hormone treatments for men would make them equal to women in sports like boxing. This is not the case, as boys' bodies develop in adolescence in ways that do not disappear even with hormone treatments.

Hopefully, Khelif and Yu-Ting will be sidelined from the Olympics or moved to the proper category, the men's division. This would by no means be chauvinism or against equality, but rather the protection of women and the defense of equality among people.

Previous thoughts on the same topic:
Impact of Diversity in Films
Women full of testosterone

Discrimination against women?