Review: Gypsy Child Thieves
Posted Under: Eastern Europe,Minorities,Racism/Fascism,Reviews,Society,Television
It never fails to annoy me when it’s claimed that some group or other is the ‘last’ group that it’s acceptable to be prejudiced about. Sure, there’s no denying we live in relatively enlightened times, but there are any number of marginalised sections of society that you can get away with offending without any fear of backlash. Don’t believe me? Well, off the top of my head, how about people who are mentally ill, or transsexual, or poor and white (yes, the whole chav thing – it’s just sneering at people who are worse off than you; stop trying to justify it)? Or how about gypsies? If you doubt that they face prejudice, try taking a look at definition 6 (or definitions 1,4 and 7, to a lesser extent) on urbandictionary’s entry for the word. (Yes, I’m well aware that part of the point of urban dictionary is to try to be shocking, but there‘s a difference between pushing the boundaries of what’s acceptable for comedic purposes and simple bigotry. That’s clearly an example of the latter.)
Anyway, while I was vaguely aware that gypsies were marginalised and suffered prejudice, I knew very little about the context and origins of that prejudice, or indeed about gypsy culture at all, so a documentary on iPlayer that claimed to be about precisely that, I was pretty keen to watch it seemed a good chance to learn more. Admittedly it might have been a bit optimistic of me to expect so much from a documentary that had a title like Gypsy Child Thieves, but the blurb for the programme claimed it would show “the racism and discrimination suffered by the Romani people”. In fact there was far less background information than I’d have liked, and unfortunately – while I’m sure this wasn’t what filmmaker Liviu Tipurita intended – a worrying amount of ammunition for the bigots.
The film certainly delivered on the promise of the title; there was plenty of grainy footage of attempted robberies by young Roma children in Spain and Italy, as well as interviews with the same children back at the camps where they lived. And there was some genuinely shocking material as well: the way that the titular child thieves are beaten and coerced into a life of crime by their handlers (or their own parents), and the disturbing revelation that Romani girls are traditionally married off (and the marriages consummated) when they’re just 12 or 13 years old. There was also some footage of a street party held by the Lega Nord (a populist right-wing political party in Italy) to celebrate the destruction of a Romani camp, at which one man openly spoke of his desire to kill Gypsies. But if this film is all you’ve got to go on, antipathy towards Gypsies is almost made to seem understandable, as so much is left unexplained. Why do so many Romani people steal for a living? Why do they live in squalid camps on the outskirts of cities? Why do they so often refuse help from the Social Services? Why is it that they’re so marginalised all over Europe?
Even when Tipurita travelled to Romania (where many Roma who emigrate to Western Europe arrive from) with the supposed aim of finding answers to some of these questions, he didn’t really seem to get anywhere. The best we were given was an extended interview with Breliante, a Romani organised criminal who provided the illuminating insight that “the thieving is no longer a national problem. It’s happening on an international scale.” Liviu Tipurita is clearly a talented documentary-maker, but this felt like a serious missed opportunity.
You can watch Gypsy Child Thieves on iPlayer before 8pm on Wednesday the 9th September, as long as you’re in the UK.
Reader Comments
I must say, though I can see what your saying, I think the film adequately allowed for the opinion that those who enforce child exploitation are the ones to blame, and then not least the community who do little but villify them. But I think the film has forced far tougher questions for us, questions that sit uneasy with our more wooly instincts. Its not a false statement to say that those children are thieves, but what is even more difficult to juggle is the idea that that is a generational trait in those communities. The good ideas are coming from people who are finding solutions for those kids and the next generation, like the Italian community worker.
If I’m not making myself clear then I hope I have in my entry about the documentary here. I digress on the further questions, but my conclusion is that, tough though the road may be, the case of the girl at the end who achieves a good education is the way forward, and the decidedly progressive angle with which we should read this film.
I really like your post, and I didn’t mean to imply that I think the Gypsies in the film were in any way misrepresented. The documentary did, as you say, make a convincing case that a life of crime is pretty much the norm for Romani people, and that it’s a problem that needs to be addressed, and that’s something I should really have acknowledged more clearly in my post. I still think my point about a lack of contextualisation remains valid, though – some kind of explanation as to how the present state of affairs came about was sorely lacking.
Well yes, I guess if you were being sold a film about its history, the Roma plight etc, you were sold short. But for what it’s worth, the film did reinforce the notion that blame extends further than just the community itself. I mean, if it achieved anything it was that many forces are at play, and it is too simple to blame the child him/herself. The rich criminal leader for example, and the lifestyle he introduced us to, that was truly appalling. A historical document may have been too far reaching for the filmmaker, but certainly something more in this direction should be considered, and would be well due.
I enjoyed reading the history of Gypsys, through studying the history of flamenco.