A letter for my bullies

Uhriutuja päästänyt sormensa tanssimaan näppiksellä. En yhtään ihmettele, että opinnot vähän viivästyivät.

Chapter 2: Racism unmasked
The tone in our studies and the group dynamics in our class were never ideal, and it was set early on — during the very first few week of our studies — against me.
I am half Romany, and I have a well-known Romani last name, which is also shared by a famous Romany person in Finland. As I learned at the beginning of our studies, this person had been convicted of financial crimes.
This issue came up during a class taught by the senior journalism teacher at our school, Pertti Sillanpää. It was clear that Sillanpää did not like Roma people.
The topic of the class was how journalism can smear someone’s reputation simply by reporting that they have been suspected of a crime.
His way of illustrating this was by showing us pictures and names of people who had been publicly accused of crimes and asking whether they had been found guilty or acquitted in court.
He went through every name and face moderately fast, only giving the correct answer after our guesses — except when he came to this Romany person who shared my last name.
With him, he took his time, repeating the last name several times, looking at me with a look I unfortunately know all too well. He also made sure everyone knew this person was Roma.
As if this blatant racism wasn’t enough, the entire class was silent. No one spoke up about the obvious racism happening right in front of them. In fact, one student, Santtu, even laughed at me. 
This entire episode was a clear example of racism and prejudice in action. By singling out a Romany individual—who shared my last name—and lingering on that name with an unmistakably hostile stare, the teacher deliberately reinforced harmful stereotypes about Roma people. Using a real person’s name linked to crime to “teach” a class not only perpetuated stigma but also unfairly associated me with negative assumptions, despite my own innocence and individuality.
The teacher’s behavior was not only unprofessional but morally wrong. Instead of fostering an inclusive, respectful learning environment, he weaponized his position of authority to otherize me and my heritage. The fact that the rest of the class stayed silent, with some even laughing at my discomfort, further exposed a toxic dynamic. Their silence was a tacit acceptance of this racial targeting, creating an environment where I felt isolated, vulnerable, and dehumanized.
This moment set the tone for the entire class’s attitude toward me. It signaled that discrimination was tolerated, even normalized. It established a social hierarchy in which I was seen as an outsider, someone to be mocked or excluded rather than supported.
Emotionally, it was devastating. I felt exposed, humiliated, and powerless. The experience planted a seed of fear and mistrust toward my classmates and teachers alike. It reinforced a painful internal narrative that I didn’t belong and that my identity made me a target rather than a valued individual.
This kind of systemic, everyday racism is a form of violence that leaves deep scars — scars that affected not just my studies, but my sense of self and my ability to feel safe and accepted in the spaces I was supposed to grow and learn.

And oh, how that tone was set — because this was far from the last time I had to endure racist comments during my time in OUAS.
One day, right in the middle of class, that same senior teacher turned to me and, in front of everyone, said something along the lines of: “What are you even doing here? Shouldn’t you be home with your husband and kids?” After class, my classmate Senni asked me about the incident and what the teacher meant by his words. I just shrugged and told her I didn’t know. But sadly, I did know all too well. Senni seemed to understand early on that something was off about the dynamics in the class, which is one of the reasons I grew so close to her later on.
Now, someone might think I’m being paranoid or reading too much into the teacher’s comment. But a remark like that, coming from a person in power, in front of my peers, wasn’t innocent — it was loaded with stereotypes. Taking into account the teacher’s already clear negative attitudes toward Roma people (and toward me personally), it takes on a much heavier meaning.

That comment wasn’t random. It wasn’t just an offhand remark or a slip of the tongue. It was both racist and sexist. He was sending a broader, more poisonous message: that Roma people — and especially Roma women — don’t belong in higher education at all. On the surface, it might have sounded like a casual comment or a strange joke. But beneath that surface was something much darker.

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