Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2008/01/12

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Subject: [Leica] Resident WAS Belgium (WAS: New topic - what makes "it" newsworthy?)
From: nathan at nathanfoto.com (Nathan Wajsman)
Date: Sat Jan 12 08:14:01 2008
References: <a2f8f4470801120610y7585a08eoc6193b58524f9f2a@mail.gmail.com>

Just to clarify: in order to combat forced marriages which were/are  
prevalent among certain ethnic groups, Denmark has indeed instituted  
a 24-year rule. If a Danish citizen wants to marry a non-resident who  
is under 24 and wants to bring him/her to Denmark, a test is applied  
to determine whether the couple, jointly, have a stronger connection  
to Denmark or to the other country. If the couple has a stronger  
connection to the other country, then the foreign spouse will not get  
a residence permit until s/he is 24. If both parties already have  
legal residence in Denmark, the rule does not apply.

The law is applied equally regardless of nationality. A couple of  
years ago the son of a government minister who had been studying in  
the US for several years was unable to bring his American wife into  
the country because she had no prior connection with Denmark, and he  
had lived in the US for several years, and so they were judged to  
have a stronger connection with the US than with Denmark.

It is hard to say what is reactionary and what is not. The whole  
issue of how to deal with especially Muslim immigrants has been a  
deep dilemma for the Danish left for several years; on one hand, they  
want to be progressive, multicultural and liberal with respect to  
immigrants' rights, but on the other hand they find themselves  
unwittingly supporting truly reactionary practices such as forced  
marriages, the burka, oppression of women etc. In the most recent  
election in November the most extreme left-wing party had a female  
candidate who wore the hijab and supported sharia law, including the  
death penalty (obviously, when speaking to non-Muslims she waffled a  
bit on all that), something that is anathema to most Danes, not just  
left-wing ones. She is widely judged to have cost her party a  
significant number of votes.

Nathan

On 12-jan-2008, at 15:10, Daniel Ridings wrote:

>
> Denmark is different.
>
> A lot of Danes move from Denmark to Malm?, just across the water. It
> only takes them 20 minutes to get to downtown Copenhagen from where
> they live in Sweden. They move there because Denmark (probably the
> most reactionary country in Europe) does not allow its citizens to
> marry with non-Danes until they are of a certain age (24? 25? 26?).
>
> So Danes that fall in love outside the Danish norms move to Sweden
> where their marriages are recognized.
>
> But in doing so, the Danish citizens lose their right to vote. So they
> can work and pay taxes in Denmark, but they can't sleep with whoever
> they want or vote.
>
> Such is life.
>
> Daniel
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Leica Users Group.
> See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information
>

Nathan Wajsman
nathan@nathanfoto.com
General photography:
http://www.nathanfoto.com
http://www.greatpix.eu
http://www.frozenlight.eu
Picture-A-Week: http://www.fotocycle.dk/paws
Blog: http://www.fotocycle.dk/blog



Replies: Reply from dlridings at gmail.com (Daniel Ridings) ([Leica] Resident WAS Belgium (WAS: New topic - what makes "it" newsworthy?))
Reply from jayanand at gmail.com (Jayanand Govindaraj) ([Leica] Resident WAS Belgium (WAS: New topic - what makes "it" newsworthy?))
In reply to: Message from dlridings at gmail.com (Daniel Ridings) ([Leica] Resident WAS Belgium (WAS: New topic - what makes "it" newsworthy?))