Cyprus-Forum.com

[brother]

School survey finds high levels of racism
By Leo Leonidou


EIGHT OUT of ten students at a Nicosia high school say they wouldn’t marry a non-Christian.
Responding to a survey carried out at the Koutsofta-Panagides Lyceum in Nicosia, only 8.3 per cent replied that they would do so.

The students also said they would prefer to marry a Briton or a Russian rather than a Filipino.
The survey, titled ‘Racism and Xenophobia’, claims 50 per cent of the student population have racist views, with 14 per cent admitting to being racist.

Most students questioned said their preference was to marry a Cypriot and when asked if they would consider hiring a foreign worker, the average student replied that they would not do so.
The average student also believes that the Greek race and orthodox religion are the best in the world.
Seventy per cent would oppose the building of a mosque or Buddhist temple in their neighbourhood.
Discussions between the students, which took place at the school after the survey, came up with the idea of introducing anti-racism programmes into the curriculum.

These could take the form of debates, conferences and events, such as meeting people from a variety of different backgrounds.

Students also said the government should implement an assimilation programme for foreign nationals living in Cyprus. This should be done with the co-operation of the church, education system, media and families.

Christina Loizou of the Cyprus Sociological Association yesterday told the Cyprus Mail that “scientific research should be conducted to cross-check the findings of the survey”.

She said that “in my opinion, Cyprus has a problem with racism and xenophobia. We don’t have any research on this so we can’t compare countries”.

Nicos Peristianis, President of the Sociological Association, believes many of today’s attitudes can be traced back to early childhood.

“In Cyprus, the orthodox religion is what you are born into – you do not have a choice. It’s part of your environment and is something you identify with. Cypriots consider the presence of other religions and races as violating their society, with the presence of foreigners seen as threatening.

“Cyprus is an inward-looking society and for the people, the world is the Greek Cypriot community”.
Peristianis suggested the problem could possibly be one of unfamiliarity.

“Most Cypriots, up to now, have not been exposed to other nationalities, except to Turkish Cypriots, where there is a bad recent history. Our community is definitely not multicultural in the sense of not having experienced and lived with different cultures”.

[brother]

Now this report had me a little concerned as the people interviewed were students who are obviousley the people that will form the future of cyprus.

[Saint Jimmy]

High school students... hmmm...
I'd rather believe that they're just immature youngsters who will come around in due time (just like so many of us did ).

[boulio]

guys i dont know about your family upbringing,but living here in the states all greek americans have two objectives in life(the 11th and 12th commandment for greeks)make money and see your children prosper and get married to a nice greek boy or girl.Unfortunatly times change and people including kids and parents know that this is a unrealistic demand,im sure things in cyprus are not as bad as well,specially if there is a solution.besides there are some many more ethnicities living in cyprus these days both in the south and north that your chance of marring a non-greek or non-turk or non-christian or non-muslim are diminishing with each passing day.

[brother]

That is true bulio but this was a very recent article, todays actually and that is why i bought it here for discussion, but for those of you not in the u.k there are many marriages between gc and tc and we are finding that most famalies have no problem with it.

But a short story from my life:

This was around 12 years ago and i was dating a GC girl who i was very much in love with, we dated for nearly six months and our love just grew by the day to the point we were ready for marriage, i took her home and my parents loved her, my mum would call her my bride or my daughter.

Until she bought me home to meet her parents, it was all going well and she told them i could not speak greek, as the night moved on her dad kept mentioning greek words in conversation but i would just smile until he said to me 'why you speak no greek' are you no cypriot' and i replied 'yes i am' ' so what you speak just english' and i replied' i speak some turkish'.

He jumped up called my girl who went to the kitchen to help her mum and when she walked through the door he punched her and started to shout in greek all i got was the turko bit and some of the swearing i understand.

After many beatings a few days later he took her to cyprus and i have not seen her since, this incident broke my heart and i have never forgotten her and never will, as i write this my eyes are full and my heart aches and i know the only thing that stopped me from being with the women i love was her racist father.

[uzan]

High school students... hmmm...
I'd rather believe that they're just immature youngsters who will come around in due time (just like so many of us did ).

I too prefer to believe that they are just immuture youngsters but My own life experience and empirically recognized research conducted in 1979 proved almost exactly the same findings and concluded that the Greek Orthodox religeon influnces the primary and secondary socialization of its followers. As I stated on my previous input to this form the Greek Orthodox
Church is to be blamed for the current xenophobia and ethnocentricity if nor racism that exist in South Cyprus. I believe that such attitude may also exist in the North part of Cyprus, So what should be done to minimize such negative attitudes? I suggest that the Greek Ortodox Church and the Islamic clergy form some positive relationships and be invited to eachother's schools to talk about theit respective faiths inother words educating both communities abaut both religeons and even visit eachothers placed of worship . Greeks are generally Natialistic race and can be mistaken at times as being racism. They are also antagonistic towards Black people too. who are mostly Christioans . iN SHORT I AM AT A LOSS AS TO HOW TO ADDRESS THIS PROBLEM I SUGGEST A FURTHER DISCUSSION IN THIS FORM MAY PROVE FRUITFULL.

[Saint Jimmy]

My sentiment is that the Church has grown too big for its own (and ours) good. I think the only way out of this mess is to start enforcing a strategy that will make the Church a weaker organization, so it can focus on its real mission (if such a notion still exists).
In that draft that Alex put forward for improving the A-Plan, the point that got me the most thrilled was the part that provided for taking away land from the Church. That would be a huge step forward, in more than one ways and dimensions.

[boulio]

separation of church and state.

[Saint Jimmy]

separation of church and state.

Umm... Jail-bird, you got things mixed up. This isn't a forum about the States

Seriously, the problem isn't that the Church isn't separated from the State. It is.
But what happens behind the curtains is a whole different thing. The priests have accumulated so much power that they can influence almost anything. And what they can't influence, they can buy. Separate that!

[boulio]

they have extreme ifluence in the state,do they not dictate to the minister of education,do they not have influence in the armed forces,do they not swear in the president of the republic.why does a priest swear in a mp or prime minister and not a supreme justice?