Blond Bombshell: Girl's story puts spotlight on Roma

Staff Reports
Blond Bombshell: Girl's story puts spotlight on Roma
The girl is lovely, with crescent-shaped eyes and a peaches-and-cream complexion. Oddly, the ends of her long braids are brown, while the roots are blond.

       Anyone who has ever dyed hair knows that roots grow in dark, while the tips normally would be lightened from the sun. At some point, someone dyed the hair of the child known as Maria, found by Greek authorities in a gypsy camp.
       The man and woman who had been caring for her are under arrest on kidnapping charges. Blood tests show they could not possibly be the child's parents, and a lawyer said the couple adopted the child from her biological mother, CNN reported. Quickly, the story shot around the globe.
   The child's photograph appears on websites in multiple countries. In every way, the story plays into racial stereotypes that transcend cultures. Already, the case has brought about heightened scrutiny of Roma populations, reports The New York Times.  
      "Not since Fay Wray found herself in the meaty, black clutches of King Kong has a blonde in the custody of dark beings ignited the global imagination as has Maria," wrote Tunku Varadarajan, a former editor for Newsweek, in The Daily Beast. “…I was struck by the alacrity with which the official mind raced from mere observation to damning conclusion, the alacrity with which an international incident flared up in the space of a few hours—all because a blonde child was found in the custody of dark, Roma parents."
   In France, a 15-year-old Roma girl was taken off her school bus recently and expelled to Kosovo. The girl, her parents and five siblings had lived illegally in France for five years, The Times reported. After protests by student groups, President Francois Hollande said she could return to finish her studies. Her family was not allowed to join her.     
     Discrimination is a longstanding issue for the Roma. Also known as gypsies and travelers, the Roma entered Europe from India a thousand years ago. Since then, they have been targets of discrimination. Countries throughout the world grapple with the same question: What should be done about the band of nomads popularly known as gypsies?
     Tourists encounter them in many places. In Paris, young women approach with handwritten messages that say they are "orphans" in need of money. In Belgrade, Serbia, tiny children dash onto the asphalt, running after cars with their hands out, begging for money.
      They have been tossed out of countries. Their ramshackle homes have been destroyed. In recent years, both Hollande and his predecessor, Nicolas Sarkozy, have come under criticism for dismantling Roma camps, according to a 2012 story in The Christian Science Monitor.  In May 2012, the European Commission concluded that stronger efforts were needed to improve the quality of life for the Roma in four areas: education, housing, employment and health care.            
      But reports about the towheaded child removed from a Roma settlement already are having repercussions across Europe. On Tuesday, the European Roma Rights Centre released a statement of concern after reports that a child had been taken from a Roma settlement in Ireland. And in Serbia, “skinheads tried to take a two-year-old child because he was “not as dark as his parents.”
       Roma children are “much more likely to be put into state care, trapped in segregated education, and forcibly evicted from their homes,” according to the organization. “These are the stories that don’t make it to the front page.”