About integration - or why we will never be united

Yesterday I was on a meeting of the Swedish Socialdemocrats immigrationsboard and followed it with a sense of surprise. So often I hear immigrants talking about the Swedish people's unwillingness to integrate foreigners to the Swedish society. So often I hear voices rising that the Swedish people are xenophobic and do not like foreigners. So often I hear that we immigrants are not welcomed to this country.

Well, yesterday I experienced a second of enlightenment: how can we immigrants expect the Swedish people to accept us and allow us integration into their society if we cannot even find agreement inbetween ourselfes?

The whole meeting can be described as a show off between different immigrant groups and when our assignment was to plead for a new chairman, all kind of objectives were put on the board. We should vote for a European citizen, we should have someone from outside the EU. We should vote for someone blond, we should vote for a black person. We should vote for a christian, we should vote for someone who knows arabic to please muslims. The only real suprise for me was that the choice was between two (fantastic bright and professional) women. Otherwise I was chocked and disappointed.

If we immigrants cannot find some kind of serious possibility to agree, to find the middle-path and to find some consensus, how can we then become members of the Swedish society? I do not mean that everyone always has to be of the same opinion. No! There has to be some scope that gives people the opportunity to disagree. BUT: sometimes you have to agree to disagree. You have to find a consensus and to split the note. This seems to be impossible for us. Everyone who stood up yesterday had their very own interest in mind, despite the risk that it will harm the board and even the party. A party that is just on its way to recover from disasterous internal problems.

If we cannot jump over our own shadows to prevail this kind of troubles and to give in for a greater cause, if we cannot become one minority, instead we become 28 different groups who are all concerned about their own benefits, how can we become integrated into Swedish society? I would like to see us stand united to demand our place in society, to demand our place in politics and in the government. For us, for the country and for our future.