Gypsies

[AndySpeed]

We have gypsies at lancaster university. Is there anything that can be done? Is a university campus with a strong collective student population the best place?

I think not

[gadjo_dilo]

You have my sincere sympathy. I hate gypsies from the bottom of my heart.

[Eki]

Leave racism out of this forum.

[Rudy Tamasz]

Keep Eki happy, invite Islamic militants to replace Gypsies.

[Erki]

What have the gypsies done to you?

[gadjo_dilo]

Eki should come here for a few days and after a few trips by bus 139 will share my feelings. :laugh:
Wish him a gypsy family as neighbours, just to share the experience of their imposible music played at max. , the joy of gypsy weddings and funerals, their scandals, their will imposed by knives and ninja swords, their "lovely" smell, etc.
As I think his only knowledge of gypsies is related to the roles of the likes of Johnny Depp or maybe Brad Pitt in the Snatch , I'll show him a sample of some genuine gypsies and ask him to imagine how it's like to meet these guys every day.
http://www.abandonedtkids.com/gypsy.jpg
These guys don't respect any law but their own, are organized as a mafia structure with many clans who usually work hand in hand with police.
Some of them are incredibly rich but despite living in palaces ( with toilets outside and no sewerage :laugh: ) and having great cars ( usually Mercedes ) they don't make any effort to integrate in modern society. More than that they defy everybody because they know nobody dare to face them.

[AndySpeed]

The inbred travellers have no succesfully destoyed the rugby pitches with their inconsiderate camp. The tihng that gets me is how these people think they can turn up on anyone's land and take over the use of it, in this case preventing sports matches going on. Then of course when they leave there will be rubbish, waste and several totally destroyed sports pitches.

Like gadjo_dilo has said they have 'new' caravans and cars etc.

I don't usually lock my door, but now its always locked!

There is talk of a sizable student flash mob.

[Eki]

Keep Eki happy, invite Islamic militants to replace Gypsies.
There was once a poll on which foreigners the Finns like the best. Somalis and Russians were the least liked. I'm sure most Finnish racists and nationalists are so ignorant that they'd happily lump Belorussians together with the Russians. In Lapua they have recently been burning cars of Russian students. How would you like your car to be torched?

[Dave B]

We have gypsies at lancaster university. Is there anything that can be done? Is a university campus with a strong collective student population the best place?

I think not
I susupect your visitors are travellers, not gypsies. There's a huge difference, which I'd suggest you research before you open yourself to accusations of racism.

[Flat.tyres]

It amazes me how the authorities not only tollerate them but seem to encourage them. gipseys are no longer some quaint romanian travelling clan but an organised band of travelling criminals as dave said. yet the government want to treat them as some sort of persecuted race. Rubbish.

They pay no tax, work illegally, are responsible for lots of crime, criminal damage, intimidation, you name it. you have my symapathy Andy

[tintin]

We have gypsies at lancaster university. Is there anything that can be done?

Organise a mob to burn, pillage and rape.

They won't be back in a hurry.

[Dave B]

gipseys are no longer some quaint romanian travelling clan but an organised band of travelling criminals as dave said.
That's not what I said at all :s

[Donney]

Very nice, tolerant an open minded thread.

[Brown, Jon Brow]

What have the gypsies done to you?

A black eye, in 2001 :mad:

[Eki]

A black eye, in 2001 :mad:
And what did YOU do to the gypsy?

[Brown, Jon Brow]

no comment :o

[Eki]

These guys don't respect any law but their own, are organized as a mafia structure with many clans who usually work hand in hand with police.
Some of them are incredibly rich but despite living in palaces ( with toilets outside and no sewerage :laugh: ) and having great cars ( usually Mercedes ) they don't make any effort to integrate in modern society. More than that they defy everybody because they know nobody dare to face them.
I'm sure some non-gypsy Romanians do that as well (except they maybe have indoor toilets)?

[gadjo_dilo]

I'm sure some non-gypsy Romanians do that as well (except they maybe have indoor toilets)?

Very funny. I'm afraid your knowledge of this part of Europe is probably nule. That's not to blame but in the future don't be so sure. :laugh:

[Eki]

Very funny. I'm afraid your knowledge of this part of Europe is probably nule. That's not to blame but in the future don't be so sure. :laugh:
Are you sure there aren't? You said they "work hand in hand with the police". Are the police also gypsies?

[Hawkmoon]

If they're breaking the law, or the rules that govern the University then they should be dealt with accordingly.

If someone else decided to pitch a tent in the middle of the football field would they be allowed to get away with it?

The law applies to gypsies just the same as it applies to everybody else, no?

[Eki]

If they're breaking the law, or the rules that govern the University then they should be dealt with accordingly.

If someone else decided to pitch a tent in the middle of the football field would they be allowed to get away with it?

The law applies to gypsies just the same as it applies to everybody else, no?
Yes, sorry, I misunderstood Andy's first post. I thought he was talking about some fellow students who are gypsies and who had done nothing wrong but being gypsies.

[gadjo_dilo]

Are you sure there aren't? You said they "work hand in hand with the police". Are the police also gypsies?

Actually I was talking about corruption. :laugh:

Generally, police men aren't gipsies but they represent another category, those with a low IQ ( no offence guys, I speak only for this area, I suppose the way they're recruited is different from country to country ). They are the main theme of the jokes.

[Iain]

The thing that really annoys me about travellers, is that they have all these special sites set up for them by local authorities, but they don't use them because they'd have to live side by side with other travellers they don't see eye to eye with. So the police and council just let them pitch up wherever for the sake of a quiet life. One of these sites is going to be built next to my village, after the council's rejection of the plan was overturned by the Scottish Executive.

There was a group of them in the industrial estate where I work, living in a carpark of a disused factory. They left after 3/4 weeks and left behind a load of human waste to be cleaned up. :s

[Flat.tyres]

That's not what I said at all :s

I was trying to make the point that what people regard as gipseys is 9/10 not the case but are groups of illegal travellers.

[Rudy Tamasz]

There was once a poll on which foreigners the Finns like the best. Somalis and Russians were the least liked. I'm sure most Finnish racists and nationalists are so ignorant that they'd happily lump Belorussians together with the Russians. In Lapua they have recently been burning cars of Russian students. How would you like your car to be torched?

See, that's why I don't fancy a trip to Finland. It ain't much fun to meet a bunch of slow-speaking, hard-drinking knife-fighters. Or is it Nokia-fighters these days? You can really kill somebody with a 3310.

But jokes aside, you hints that I side with racists are ridiculous. There are groups of people like terrorists, criminals and just anti-social dirty types regardless of their origin that everybody is entitled to have an opinion about. Most criticism towards them is absolutely justified. Unfortunately, there are also activists who stand for the rights of whatever minorities and make their careers out of it. In the best case they just put on verbal fights on Web forums. In the worst case they agressively bully lawmakers, newspapers etc. and try to bend the public opinion in favor of those minorities, be it self-declared Gypsies, Palestinian terrorists or people living an alternative way of life on the verge of crime. In case of success the governments appease the minorities with welfare, affirmative action and legal exemptions, activists get their awards, minorities have their tents and open air toilets in the football fields, and middle class people who live peaceful and quiet lives put up with that and pay for that. That's what I don't like.

[schmenke]

There was a gypsy family here in Canada that recently made the news. They were here awaiting landed immigrant status and they travelled across the country cunningly robbing small corner stores and petrol stations. They were eventually aprehended by the authorities and are now awaiting deportation... All except one who will be allowed to remain in Canada because she is pregnant :mark:

[LotusElise]

Following on, if my parents had decided to live like some travellers do, not using toilets and expecting others to clear up their s****, not sending my brother or me to school after the age of twelve, indulging in antisocial behaviour and generally acting like they own everywhere, I would have been carted off by social services, and quite rightly.
It's the children I feel for - adults can choose (to a certain extent) whether they want to be responsible members of society or not, children do not have that luxury.

[Hazell B]

The law applies to gypsies just the same as it applies to everybody else, no?


As it happens, no in this case.

I forget how it all works, but the basics are that if you didn't protect your own land enough and they got in, it's your job to make them go. Rather like if you leave the car keys in the car and it's nicked, you're not covered by insurance - if you leave open land open, tough luck when travellers use it. Six months seems the time it takes to get them moved on, and by then they've crapped everywhere and ruined everything so are going anyhow.

Eki, travellers and gypsies aren't the same thing, but we tend to call them gypsies when they're travellers who steal, beat and ruin all around them. It's not exactly PC but not everything is. Pikey is another term (I'm called one on here from time to time! :p : ) meaning dodgy folk who turn up, trash and travel.

They're forever pestering me to sell them one of my dogs. They are also the only people I have ever been afraid of :s

[Alfa Fan]

Leave racism out of this forum.

Its not racism to hate gypsies. The whole ethos of the "race" as you call it is try to benefit (for free) from something you pay. I absolutely hate them and cannot believe that University security or police are not allowed to move them.

Tonight is quite possibly the roughest night on campus (its a comparative thing - campus is usually very peaceful). There's a significant dislike of the gypsies by the student population, so I think there could be trouble tonight when people return from the Carlton (Andy will know what I'm talking about).

[Gannex]

Let me tell you about travellers. I can, because I know them well. I met my first band of travellers in about 1996. At the time I was in charge of a ten-acre industrial estate in the north of England, when I received a phone call in the late evening from my site guard.

"Daniel," he said, in a trembling voice, which told me immediately that there was trouble. "You're not going to believe this, but Blakeridge Mills has been invaded. There are about forty to fifty caravans on site, an equal number of cars and vans, and probably a hundred-and-fifty rough-looking people, setting up satellite dishes, barbecues and God knows what. It looks like they're settling in for a long stay. You'd better come down."

I went down, and my conversations that night with the invaders was my introduction to the "Irish travellers", as they were called, since they were of Irish descent, as their very strong accents attested.

As I strode onto the land, I was horrified. The mill yard, which was about four of the ten acres, looked like a ramshackle city. Children were running around, playing and shrieking as children do, adults were sitting around drinking and chatting, and the whole scene filled me with despair. You see, the site was home to about twenty businesses, every one a small operation, typically with just three or four employees, including the owners. We had a stone-cutter, a pallet-maker, a paper-processing operation who made envelopes, primarily, an indoor go-kart track (in our largest building, a former weaving shed), a mattress manufacturer, and several others. The only things these businesses had in common was that they were all small, owner-operated concerns, run by decent, hard-working Yorkshire people, and that they could not possibly survive with a huge encampment of intimidating travellers on site, scaring away customers, preventing goods vehicles from making deliveries, making employees unwilling to come to work, or even think of leaving their cars outside their units. The entire site, I knew, would be at a complete standstill as long as the invasion lasted.

First, I telephoned all the tenants, told them what had happened, and assured them that I would immediately lay on extra security, as an attempt at preventing break-ins. It costs big money to get security guards in the middle of the night at a moment's notice, but it had to be done. Most of the tenants arrived on site within a few minutes. Some cried, others stood in shocked silence, and others demanded to know how quickly I was going to remove these trespassers. I felt very alone that night.

(Continued in next post. . .)

[Gannex]

I then set about the task of getting the travellers to leave. I wandered into the thick of the encampment and asked a randomly selected person, one who seemed less drunk than the rest, who was in charge. "No one," he replied. "We don't have any boss. We're all equal here. Those who want to join us, join us. Those who don't, leave. There's no one in charge."

This, as I learned over the years, was part of their standard way of operating, and it was clever. How can you negotiate, if the party you want to negotiate with claims to have no one who can speak for them?

Frustrated by being unable to find a negotiating partner, I engaged in conversation anyone who would talk to me, and I was told this: that there were more caravans coming tomorrow, that they were only here for a short while, would be moving on within a week, at most, and would cause no problems. I was also told that there was nothing I could do to move them because it would take a court order, which would take more than a week to obtain, and by that time they'd be gone anyway.

I slept badly that night, and in the morning, after talking to our lawyers and finding out that the legal position was even worse than my travelling friends had told me, I went back to the site to try and stop the arrival of more people. This proved impossible. I closed all the gates to the site, but as soon as I did so, travellers howled in protest that they were unable to leave, and they had to be able to leave. This one had a wife on board, who was heavily pregnant and had just gone into labour: she needed to go to the hospital now. That one had to visit a relative who, he had been told, was dying at that very moment in a house not far away. And so it went. As stoutly as I tried to resist, I was unable, because a crowd would surround me as I "discussed" the matter, and the crowd did not look as if they were very patient.

I called the police. They advised me to allow the travellers to come and go as they pleased, because they, the police, could not possibly protect me against such a large crowd.

So the gates were opened, and the manner of our life for the next several weeks was established. The travellers would come, would go, would argue, would intimidate, but would always, in the end, have their way. There was nothing I could do about it but watch, as they set up their carpet-selling operation, or spread their sofas around the site on sunny days, and set up a massive market, which was a boon to the local population who had never seen carpets and furniture for sale so cheaply.

Meanwhile, our tenants were in mourning. Businesses built up over a lifetime were being bled dry with every day that passed, while the travellers had the life of Riley, drinking, producing mountains of trash, selling their wares, making money, and all on land which they did not even have the legal right to enter, never mind completely take over.

That was my first introduction, that summer invasion of 1996. Over the next several years they came back many times, but each time they arrived, I was better prepared. One time, I was in a car, which I had used to block the entrance, and a mob of them were rocking it, in an effort to roll it over, before pulling me out and beating me to death. But I survived. Another time, I organised an army of bailiffs and police, and we organised an orderly evacuation. But never was it easy, and never have the experiences convinced me of anything other than that "travellers", as they so innocently call themselves, are parasitic criminals whose very lifestyle is thievery. How can it be racist or bigoted to despise a group of people whose very existence is based on organised crime, more specifically, organised criminal trespass? Some hate the mafia, others hate drug barons; me, I hate Irish travellers, and I'm not ashamed to say so.

[BDunnell]

It is simply a case of rights and responsibilities. It seems to me that many — not all, by any means, but still many — groups of travellers are quick to claim their rights, without taking any of the responsibilities. I believe that it ought to be possible to take firmer action against disruptive traveller groups without being 'racist' towards the genuine, peaceful, law-abiding Romany and gipsy communities.

[Gannex]

BDunnell, who are these "law-abiding" groups of Romany and Gypsy communities? Is there any such group which obeys the law of trespass? I know of none.

[Gannex]

We have gypsies at lancaster university. Is there anything that can be done?

Andy, in my haste to tell you my story, I forgot completely about answering your question: can anything be done? It can. My recommendation is as follows.

In consultation with lawyers, post notices around the encampment stating that the occupation is not permitted and that the trespassers must leave within a given period of time. Meanwhile, seek a court order for vacant possession from the local magistrate, who will issue the order to take effect once the notice period has expired. Consult with the police, and the court bailiffs, and ask for their help on D-Day, dispersal day, ensuring that all law enforcement know in advance when that day is to be.

As D-Day approaches, ratchet up the pressure. Block all exits from the site. Allow no vehicles to leave under any circumstances. Have people posted at each exit, twenty-four hours a day, with video cameras, so that any breaking of gates will be observed and recorded for prosecution purposes. Ensure that all the trespassers know about the surveillance, and the intention to prosecute for criminal damage if any exit structures are damaged. Make sure that persons, as opposed to vehicles, are allowed to leave, otherwise you will be liable for false imprisonment. The trespassers have no right, however, to remove vehicles from the site. Make clear that the only way any vehicle will be able to leave is if all the vehicles leave with it, at the same time, and are in a line, engines running, trailers and caravans hitched up, ready to go as soon as a gate is opened.

Assuming the number of vehicles on site exceeds six, the trespass is not only a civil offense, but also a criminal one. The police often do not know this, as the law is new (one of Blair's eight zillion new criminal offenses, and about the only sensible one). Have your lawyer brief the police, and do not let the police say they don't have the resources to evict the trespassers on D-Day. Offer to pay for the overtime, if necessary.

Keep the trespassers completely apprised of all the preparations you are making. They must know you mean business. Alert the media as well. They will be keen to be there on D-Day, and their reporting will help keep the trespassers in line.

Consider digging a moat around the encampment, if that will help prevent movement of vehicles. Also consider putting skips loaded with rocks as barriers, for the same purpose. If there's one thing the travellers can't live with, it's an inability to move their vehicles on and off site.

The most important single thing to maintain is camera surveillance, 24/7.

Obviously, Andy, you can't arrange this yourself, and I'm not suggesting you do. What I do suggest, though, is that you pester the Students' Union and the University authorities to take these steps. That way, you'll get your land back. Without taking those measures, or some others like them, you'll just have to wait for months, until the travellers are good and ready to leave. And you wouldn't want that, now, would you?

[Brown, Jon Brow]

We have a feeling that one of my brothers sheep dogs was stolen by gypsies a few years ago :bigcry:

[gadjo_dilo]

Wow. Your gypsies are more stylish than ours. Maybe because of their irish descent. Our nomads are still living in tents and travel by waggons with horses. However the dangerous ones are those who became sedentary and live ( most of them ilegally ) in big cities. Sometimes a powerful landowner manage to obtain their evacuation and it's a show to remember. The " pirandes " rise their skirts and show their shameful parts to policemen. Some of them would pick up their little kids by feet and start to whirl them.

Anyway I've just found a suggestive pic.
http://www.mediafaxfoto.ro/thumbnail.php?photoId=14195&thumbSize=large

[Daniel]

Call me simple but you should be able to beat the **** out of anyone who simply arrives on your land. If the Police were allowed to beat the living daylights out of people legally we'd have a lot less crime and no travellers/gypsies.

[Caroline]

Call me simple but you should be able to beat the **** out of anyone who simply arrives on your land. If the Police were allowed to beat the living daylights out of people legally we'd have a lot less crime and no travellers/gypsies.

Say what you feel eh? :eek:

[Hazell B]

BDunnell, who are these "law-abiding" groups of Romany and Gypsy communities? Is there any such group which obeys the law of trespass? I know of none.

In all my years dealing with the Irish horse dealing community and their travelling lifestyle (see, I can be polite even about them :p : ), I've only met one perfectly law-abiding one - and he hates the rest with a vengance!

He arrives in this area every few years with his horse and caravan, lives green and from an honest wage (having been invited by the land owners to work on their land) and when he goes he drops his rubbish off at the nearest legal dump.

All the rest are anything but law-abiding citizens. And I should know, I'll be spending next friday with a few hundred of them at a horse auction. I've already bought some anti-flea spray, mace and am lodging all the documents and photographic evidence of ownership of the horse I'm selling with a third party in case the swines try grabbing the animal from his lotted stable and banging him in the auction as their own. Yes, they are that brazen :s

[luvracin]

Dumb question....

If the "vacant" land, for example the University Sports fields, or Gannex's Industrial Estate are Gated - ie: surrounded by a fence and only accessible through a security gate - are the Gypsie's/Travellers allowed in? OR can they be arrested on the spot for Trespass.

[oily oaf]

While I take fully on board the sage and detailed steps outlined by Gannex (Can I call you Dan Dan The Raincoat Man?) and bow humbly in the face of his prior experiences with the travelling folk, personally I would plump for an emergency call to none other than Slightly Effeminate Pikey Putdown Boy :batman:

Dressed in a satin shirt with ruffle and periwinkle cravat accessorised with skin tight leopard skin jodhpurs and slingback mules this scourge of the Irish Diddycoys would simply barge into the head pikeys caravan and offer to sort out the interior decor.
When the enraged Gippo threatens to job him with a baseball bat and throw him to the dogs our boy would render the lout speechless with one of his withering put-downs such as "You stink like a turd" or "Your Donkey's a wrong un" and hey presto the whole festering lot of 'em will be up on their toes and out of there before you can say "Cross my palm with silver"

Thank me later.

Nice bit of baked hedgehog for tea tonight I reckon.
Yeah a few chips and a mess o' Tesco stripey beans. Job's a good un :s anta:

[Hazell B]

Nice bit of baked hedgehog for tea tonight I reckon.


As it happens one of our hedgehogs passed away last night after a four day mystery illness. The stoat's had a quarter, but I'll roll the rest in clay and send it over, yes? He'll be tender after a few days under the hedge in all this rain :)

:facelick:

[oily oaf]

As it happens one of our hedgehogs passed away last night after a four day mystery illness. The stoat's had a quarter, but I'll roll the rest in clay and send it over, yes? He'll be tender after a few days under the hedge in all this rain :)

:facelick:

That's enough of your POINTED remarks. You're clearly trying to give me the NEEDLE. You must think I'm absolutely SPINEless. You won't PRICK my concience with that type of BARBED repartee...........etc :(

[Hazell B]

Much like the hedgehog fighting the rat, you won on points :p :

[schmenke]

Hmm... thorny subject...

[Mark in Oshawa]

I know I am in trouble when I find myself agreeing with Eki over a lot of you.

The reason I laugh at many from Europe in their dismissive attitude towards the Americans is that they can demean the Americans for their poor racial past towards blacks, yet you have many "open minded" and "libreal" European citizens who harbour such hostility towards the Gypsies. The fact remains, as Hawkmoon has pointed out the solution is to enforce the law. What is more enforce the law and not treat every crime as an excuse to dismiss the crime and instead look for the cause as if the person responsible has no free will, and is just a victim.

If the princples of law and order are not respected, they must be punished. If the European union is going to allow people to come and go as they please, then the Gypsies will take advantage of whatever nation is the most tentative in enforcing the law. This shouldn't be seen as a racist thing. IT should be seen as a social issue. If you have people who wont live within the boundries of civilized society, then they must be given the hard reality that society wont tolerate squatters on public or private property, and they must be shown that there are ways out. This isn't the lawless time where Europe was a mess of mixed boundries and chaos that followed the last two continental conflicts, this is a time when there are no excuses for this crap.

The thing is, they need to be treated firmly and with respect, but if the law is broken, punishment has to make the law breaking not worth it. I don't see why this has to be so tough.

I just know that the Gypsy phenomena must be something unique to Europe, because they have survived a lot to keep going.....

[Hazell B]

The thing is, they need to be treated firmly and with respect, but if the law is broken, punishment has to make the law breaking not worth it. I don't see why this has to be so tough.



You're from a nation that's only two or so hundred years old, with laws to match. We have laws on land use and so on that are far older, and that's what they use.

Those same laws also cover things like taking up wasted land for use, so do good far more often than bad - that's why they stay in place.

We are too soft on travellers, but we don't tend to be soft on guns - horses for courses you might say ;)

[jim mcglinchey]

You're not wrong Mark, alot of it is down to Hitler- had- the-right -idea, blind racism. Im not dieing about gypsies, they stole a van load of tools from us, disappeared the tools and burnt the van but I still wouldnt go on a public forum making offensive and sweeping insults about all travellers.

[LotusElise]

The reason I laugh at many from Europe in their dismissive attitude towards the Americans is that they can demean the Americans for their poor racial past towards blacks, yet you have many "open minded" and "libreal" European citizens who harbour such hostility towards the Gypsies.

"Traveller" is not a race, it's a lifestyle, despite what certain people say. Once we can stop seeing things in racial terms, we can have a logical discussion.

[Mark in Oshawa]

Hazell, First off Canadian Common Law is BRITISH Common Law, so about 90% of the laws that govern soceity in this nation are probably identical to yours. Second of all, squatters are squatters. Pure and simple. It doesn't matter whether they are in Kent, Sussex or Downtown Toronto Canada. If you have people without a right to be on the land for the purpose it is designated for, they are squatters. If British society wants to allow people to live like vagabonds and steal what they want to survive, then they wont enforce their own laws against vagrancy. Blaming the Gypsies for taking advantage of soft or socalistic left wing do-gooder policies that allow this to continue is the worst form of a)racism and b) naiveity. We have the same issue with street beggars in Toronto, where the Mayor wont enforce vagrancy laws nor put these people in shelters on nights where the winter cold can be -20 C before the windchill. This isn't compassion, it is stupidity, and people in Toronto wonder why the tourists, many Americans are no longer interested in coming....could it be they are tired of watching two or three homeless guys every block chase them for money? Gypsies are a lot more complex I know, but the principle is the same. You allow them to have rights to property and do things against the law, then you cant blame them for your societies' naivety...

[Mark in Oshawa]

It is racial to an extent, it is the Gypsies that are a particular ethnic group from Eastern Europe, and in many nations, it is definately racial from what I understand....

[nicemms]

Let me tell you about travellers. I can, because I know them well. I met my first band of travellers in about 1996. At the time I was in charge of a ten-acre industrial estate in the north of England, when I received a phone call in the late evening from my site guard.

"Daniel," he said, in a trembling voice, which told me immediately that there was trouble. "You're not going to believe this, but Blakeridge Mills has been invaded. There are about forty to fifty caravans on site, an equal number of cars and vans, and probably a hundred-and-fifty rough-looking people, setting up satellite dishes, barbecues and God knows what. It looks like they're settling in for a long stay. You'd better come down

Isn't blakeridge mills in Batley,because if it is I know where it is. A bit of a dodgy area really.

There were some travellers in Morley once on council land, not really used by anyone untill they turned up, wasn't fenced or anything but took a bit of time to remove them but now council have put rocks round land.

[jim mcglinchey]

Its racial because the term has become interchangeable with Romanians and then with the Irish.

[BDunnell]

Hazell, First off Canadian Common Law is BRITISH Common Law, so about 90% of the laws that govern soceity in this nation are probably identical to yours. Second of all, squatters are squatters. Pure and simple. It doesn't matter whether they are in Kent, Sussex or Downtown Toronto Canada. If you have people without a right to be on the land for the purpose it is designated for, they are squatters. If British society wants to allow people to live like vagabonds and steal what they want to survive, then they wont enforce their own laws against vagrancy. Blaming the Gypsies for taking advantage of soft or socalistic left wing do-gooder policies that allow this to continue is the worst form of a)racism and b) naiveity. We have the same issue with street beggars in Toronto, where the Mayor wont enforce vagrancy laws nor put these people in shelters on nights where the winter cold can be -20 C before the windchill. This isn't compassion, it is stupidity, and people in Toronto wonder why the tourists, many Americans are no longer interested in coming....could it be they are tired of watching two or three homeless guys every block chase them for money? Gypsies are a lot more complex I know, but the principle is the same. You allow them to have rights to property and do things against the law, then you cant blame them for your societies' naivety...

Neither is it possible to blame every single societal problem on left-wing policies. I am sure that there are difficulties with travellers in areas that have long been governed by right-wingers.

[BDunnell]

It is racial to an extent, it is the Gypsies that are a particular ethnic group from Eastern Europe, and in many nations, it is definately racial from what I understand....

This is a very good point. It has been a real problem for the governments of east European countries, especially Slovakia.

[Gannex]

Isn't Blakeridge mills in Batley,because if it is I know where it is. A bit of a dodgy area really.

There were some travellers in Morley once on council land, not really used by anyone untill they turned up, wasn't fenced or anything but took a bit of time to remove them but now council have put rocks round land.

It is indeed in Batley, and you are right; Batley is no Beverly Hills. But it gets a hell of a lot dodgier when the travellers move in, I assure you.

I'd like to respond to those who say that slagging off travellers is bigoted or racist. I say it isn't. I'm not slagging off the Irish, or the Romany, or any other ethnic group. I am slagging off those who trespass as a way of life, and the ethnic group they belong to is irrelevant. Similarly, if there are travellers who rent the ground they camp on, or get permission to remain, or stay only on sites where they are welcome, I have absolutely no problem with them, regardless of ethnicity or lifestyle. So perhaps I should rephrase my position: I despise habitual trespassers.

[Mark in Oshawa]

Neither is it possible to blame every single societal problem on left-wing policies. I am sure that there are difficulties with travellers in areas that have long been governed by right-wingers.

Well, in Toronto, coddling the beggars had only created more of them....

Right wing solutions are often run down and labelled as harsh and "racist" but often they are not. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don't. My point wasn't so much the fact the right has more answers, but I can tell you that the problems with the Gypsies wont be solved by being nice and gentle either. Any nation that has had to contend with the Gypsies has found they will take advantage of any leniency, and THAT was the essence of what I was trying to convey. A society that is persmissive those who would take advantage of it to the extreme such as the gypsies have, has only itself to blame.

A point that also must be made is that this isn't a right/left problem and I shouldn't have made it that even indirectly. Democracies have to balance the rights of the individual off with those of the society all the time, and this is an issue for Europeans to deal with that really tests that balance.

[gadjo_dilo]

The thing is, they need to be treated firmly and with respect, but if the law is broken, punishment has to make the law breaking not worth it. I don't see why this has to be so tough.


Well said but what's to do in the case when they are organized as mafia structures? In my country we have to deal with a fearful unbreakable entity with only one law: OMERTA- the law of silence. How these clans work and what are their connections with police and political structures? I can fill in a few pages of this thread.

Even at the entrance of a cemetery there is a disgustful funerary construction with the inscription " Cornel Ragalie - the biggest mafiot from Romania ".

[BDunnell]

A point that also must be made is that this isn't a right/left problem and I shouldn't have made it that even indirectly. Democracies have to balance the rights of the individual off with those of the society all the time, and this is an issue for Europeans to deal with that really tests that balance.

I agree. Well said. :up:

[Eki]

Maybe (some of) the Gypsies don't settle down in permanent housing with municipal sewage system because they have difficulties in finding housing due to discrimination from neighbors and landlords? Here's what the US State Department says about the Roma in Finland:

http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2006/78811.htm


Although no exact figures were available, the country had approximately 10,000 Roma, some of whom were native to the country and others who had arrived as asylum seekers or immigrants. According to the ombudsman for minorities, problems encountered by Roma extended to all areas of daily life, which resulted in serious marginalization, often extending to de facto exclusion from Finnish society.

Roma were frequently discriminated against in the areas of services and housing. In 2005 the NGO Finnish League for Human Rights conducted a study to test the extent of discrimination against Roma by sending Romani groups to several Helsinki restaurants. Many restaurants refused them entry, offering the Romas' own safety as justification. The human rights group criticized the government's slow response to their complaints.

Roma continued to experience difficulties in obtaining housing, and the minority ombudsman stated that such difficulties were on the rise throughout the country. Between 2004 and 2005, the number of housing complaints by Roma more than doubled.

In 2005 the minority ombudsman lodged complaints against at least two municipalities, Oulu and Lahti, for discriminatory housing practices toward Roma. The authorities found in favor of the Roma, and the Roma were granted apartments in the areas in question.

[BDunnell]

Maybe (some of) the Gypsies don't settle down in permanent housing with municipal sewage system because they have difficulties in finding housing due to discrimination from neighbors and landlords? Here's what the US State Department says about the Roma in Finland:

http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2006/78811.htm

Another very good example of why this is such a complex issue.

[gadjo_dilo]

Maybe (some of) the Gypsies don't settle down in permanent housing with municipal sewage system because they have difficulties in finding housing due to discrimination from neighbors and landlords?

Lol. In the communist period gipsies were offered apartments in houses and even in blocks. Some of them put the horses inside and they lived outside in tents. Not to mention that despite central heating they made fires on the floor. Neither in the past nor now neighbours were asked if they want them. If a house is left they install there without legal papers, don't pay any tax and steal electricity.
This winter the electicity company unplugged some blocks who stole electricity and gipsies started a riot complaining they'll die because of cold. Asked why they didn't pay the bills for electricity they said they lived there illegally. Finally, the owner of a football team paid for all of them and as he's also the head of a party secured a few more votes. :laugh:

[Mark in Oshawa]

Gadjo, if people like the guy who owned the football team wants to pay their bills, he is part of the problem, not the solution for sure.

I chuckle at Finland having problems with the Roma, for Eki is always using Finland as an example of how countries SHOULD do things, but apparently, they too have their problems, and Eki should be commended for bringing that post forward. I don't think the problem of the Roma/Gypsies is easy. As Gadjo has pointed out, they are pretty much obstinate and difficult to be made to adapt to the rules of the land, but it always comes back to enforcing the law. IF someone is living where they are not entitled to by paying rent, they should be evicted and charged. If they steal, they should be CHARGED. If they are found guilty they should be PUNISHED. It isn't hard when you put it in those terms. The problem always lies in the political will of the society to enforce its own laws, and this is where I said in an earlier post the example of the Mayor of Toronto. There is laws on the books to stop begging and laws in place to stop the "squeegy kids" (they clean your windshield when you stop for a light, often making a greater mess, while holding your wipers in one hand and a hand outstretched for a buck or two. You pay or they tear the wiper off the car). The laws however are not enforced. The police were told by the Mayor's office at one point to not harass these people if they are not "bothering" anyone. So you have a situation where the law is being broken, people are being "bothered" yet if it isn't overt or obvious, they are left alone. The Roma I suspect are a far tougher group then the bums on the street in Toronto, but I do know that the princples hold sway. If you make life tough for those who break the law, they either go elsewhere, or they conform. Is every nation in Europe afflicted with the Roma? How do others deal with it?

This cannot be a situation that people use to a political end. It is a simple matter of enforcing the law. As Gannex pointed out, if they are living somewhere where they have no permission or paying rent for, they should be evicted...and taken to a place for them. At some point, the Roma have to have it put to them that unless they want to be in constant danger of going to jail, they will have to get jobs and conform with society in some form.

Society basically now dictates that people earn an honest living, and pay for where they live. Whether you live in a trailer ( you pay taxes to license it), buy a house or rent one, someone has to be compensated. There is no such thing as a free lunch in this world, but it appears some societies and governments tend to try to blur this hard truth and forgive some in the name of compassion. It is in the end, usually misplaced, as the owner of that football team in Romania will find out. I bet the paying of that electrical bill just encouraged more of it.....

[BDunnell]

This cannot be a situation that people use to a political end. It is a simple matter of enforcing the law.

Not always so simple — especially where common land, often a grey area, is concerned.

[courageous]

What have the gypsies done to you?


A black eye, in 2001 :mad:


I was mugged once by a couple of white english guys - from that moment on I have had a deep mistrust of ALL of them (kill whitey as a wise man once said!)
[for anyone who does not get sarcasm; I am white, english and male too]


Also, why is the romany gypsy (or indeed mere "traveller" which is even worse aparantly) lifestyle the wrong one?

Did humanity not start out as travellers (hunter gatherers) - Could it not be argued that we are deviants?


BTW - Somebody mentioned Hitler - people often forget that it was not just the Jewish community that suffered; estimates of 1.5 million dead gypsies have been suggested by some historians.

[Eki]

Gadjo, if people like the guy who owned the football team wants to pay their bills, he is part of the problem, not the solution for sure.

I chuckle at Finland having problems with the Roma, for Eki is always using Finland as an example of how countries SHOULD do things, but apparently, they too have their problems, and Eki should be commended for bringing that post forward.
I have never claimed that Finland doesn't have racist or xenophobic people, even if discrimination is forbidden by our constitution. In fact, I even pointed that out to Rudy in one of my first posts.

[Gannex]

Also, why is the romany gypsy (or indeed mere "traveller" which is even worse aparantly) lifestyle the wrong one?
courageous, it is wrong because it depends on trespassing which, in England, is criminal, and for good reason. Trespassers take property rights they haven't paid for, and destroy the livelihoods of the people who have paid for use of that property, so trespassing has exactly the same effect as stealing tangible goods. If travellers, or Gypsies, or anyone else wants to roam around the countryside, pitching camp in different places every few weeks, I have no problem with that, AS LONG AS THEY DON'T TRESPASS. That's all there is to it.

[Hazell B]

Mark, etc, you're not used to what we mean by the term 'gypsies' here. We don't mean a race of Romanian, Irish or any other type. We mean a scruffy, flea-riddled, thief who takes what he wants from the world and gives zero back. They aren't a race, so our view sure as hell isn't racism, they are a group of robbing, organised, scavengers.

I'm afraid of nothing in this world besides a silly fear of slugs, yet I genuinely fear these people whenever I have to deal with them. They'd quite openly take a horse from a stable at horse auctions and then sell it two minutes later to a friend, who'll sell it again within ten minutes and so on, so by the time the real owner has called the police nobody can remember who owns it now or who's handled it - they are never prosecuted for it. Same thing with all manner of other goods the country over.

I'm no racist. In fact, I resent being called one very much :(

[gadjo_dilo]

As if we weren't speaking enough about gypsies and how much we love them, we are now in a middle of a racist scandal. Our president was annoyed by a journalist who asked tedious questions and took shots of him with her phone in a hypermarket. He took her phone and then entered his car and told to his wife that the stinking gypsy was so aggressive. Unfortunately for him the phone taped the conversation and all the country could see it ( so could you http://www.antena1.ro/ ). The gipsies organizations, the journalists, his political adversaries are all on his throat. :laugh:

[imull]

The thing that really annoys me about travellers, is that they have all these special sites set up for them by local authorities, but they don't use them because they'd have to live side by side with other travellers they don't see eye to eye with. So the police and council just let them pitch up wherever for the sake of a quiet life. One of these sites is going to be built next to my village, after the council's rejection of the plan was overturned by the Scottish Executive.

There was a group of them in the industrial estate where I work, living in a carpark of a disused factory. They left after 3/4 weeks and left behind a load of human waste to be cleaned up. :s

There is a similar place set up just north of Connel near Oban. Toile blocks, washing machines etc etc. If it wasnt nailed down it was stolen and sold :(

Are we talking real proper bona fide gypsies here or the wannabe Tinkers with their transit vans. They are the real vermin

[Drew]

I remember there was an article where the gypsies were complaining about all the noise that the students were making, perhaps your uni (or perhaps the students) should organise loads and loads of parties?

[Loobylou]

[quote="Hazell B"]Mark, etc, you're not used to what we mean by the term 'gypsies' here. We don't mean a race of Romanian, Irish or any other type. We mean a scruffy, flea-riddled, thief who takes what he wants from the world and gives zero back. They aren't a race, so our view sure as hell isn't racism, they are a group of robbing, organised, scavengers.QUOTE]


I'm going to be a real pain here & disagree. When I say 'gypsy' I mean someone of romany descent, when I say 'traveller' I'm referring to a scruffy, flea-riddled, thief who takes what he wants from the world and gives zero back (a description I agree with whole heartedly by the way).

I know alot of people don't differentiate but some of us do. But it's a bit like dialect, there's so few genuine gypsies around I know most people are talking about travellers & when I say traveller people still know what I mean.