Actually I wasn't, compass wise from me, it's south!

That depends on how you phrase them - and the SVP is quite notorious for that part.

The current posters don't have as strong pictures as before, but the details are important: "Stop the mass immigration" means that the SVP is convinced that there is a mass imm igration going on right now. The Swiss society is actually growing and yes, this is due to immigration. But when is it "mass" immgration? - a very negative word typically connected to starving refugees on boats.

The choice of words is as always important - you will have a hard time finding anyone who would say "yes, i want mass immigration", but how many will you find to support you if you ask "do you believe we are having a mass immigration into Switzerland right now?"... or "do you think immigration is too strong?".

Last but not least have they never ever answered where they are willing to cut the costs if they actually successfully throw out the foreigners and killed the jobs here.
"Are you willing to pay X% more taxes in order to not have to see foreigners here anymore?" would be a fair question. I doubt you'll ever see it on posters.

I would beg to disagree. It's not as offensive maybe, but the image of black boots marching over a Swiss flag is quite clear. There is a clear implication of the Swiss being the underdogs. There is even something vaguely military about those black boots. An invasion is being suggested. This is stronger than it has been in any campaign than I can remember.

See this:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/0..._n_922354.html

It is shameful pandering to hateful people.

Even if the hateful is on the other foot, it's still a business' choice to support/promote/extoll an advertiser or observance.

Why should a business cave in just because people don't like something?

I totally agree 100 % with you.

But I believe it is a difference to open your business on minorities like the exemple you give and standing up for it and promoting racism and discriminations.

The SBB exemple and the Whole Food store are opposite to each other. One is promoting hateful feeling while the other one is refusing to give in those feelings.

AS a non SVP-Swiss, I can understand your points. On the other hand, I believe in freedom of speech and this should also be applied to political posters. Forbidding these is a breach of democracy IMHO.

As for me, the posters have an opposite effect. I really don't wanna vote SVP. They polarize people into left and right and I really think sometimes the SVP is doing themselfes more harm than good. A more diplomatic approach may be better.

Is there any democracy on earth where, when elections are coming up, the parties will not try to spread fear with their propaganda? I doubt it, but will be open for any examples...

Best regards

Michael

As it seems is the picture then stronger for a Swiss having a black boot walking over your flag. I can tell you that from all posters the one with the different colored hands grabbing Swiss passports was the strongest for the non-white people I know. I personally found the the "Ivan" style ones stigmatizing certain nationalities as criminals of the worst kind (rapists, pedophiles...) the worst.

But then your response assumes that everybody reading is at the same latitude as you surely.
If you really are in central CH I would think La Chaux de Fonds would be west.

Sorry I'm having one of my pedantic days again

No, the Whole Food example shows that managment believe there is more money to be made in opening their doors to Muslims than in railing against them. That's a business decison. Money has spoken. I see no evidence of any deeper ethics in their decision. No more than a shop selling Christmas stuff is promting Christianity. It's just plain business.

The SBB example shows that if somebody puts money on the table he gets what he wants. Again, money has spoken. In the bigger picture of things, there is no difference. If a brown sugar company had put that same money on the table those posters would now be advertising brown sugar.

Youu can only talk about standing up against the current when you're rejecting money or business opportunties because your ethical standards are higher.

I am just trying to see a store in Saudi Arabia have a Christmas or Hanukkah specials.

Yes it is stupid but no, it is not exclusive to Christian rednecks.

You don't know that. They may find your presumption quite insulting.
Clearly the word "ethics" means nothing to you.

AYB

Have you been reading Ayn Rand or something?
There is nothing ethical in maximising your income.

maybe if you can prove that this decison lost that store more custom than it gained them, you could say there was an ethical decison. But I see no evidence for that.

The SVP will shout whatever their voters want to hear. Looks like the average low educated, low income, over average male Swiss voter likes his car.

With top level SVP politicians actually making their money by building trains (http://www.peter-spuhler.ch/), I would not expect them to act as radical as they talk here... all double decker Zurich S-trains, many sbb ones, Bernese ones... all from an SVP politician owned and run company: http://www.stadlerrail.com/en/

Nevetheless, Spuhler is a minority in his own party, If you remember the Avanti initiative you will recall how SVP was pulling all the tricks it could to build the image of cars and roads being hopelessly disadvanatged against public transport. But this is not just Switzerland. In the USA, the Republicans are railing against Obama's plans for high speed trains because cars are supposed to be freedom. In Germany, the car lobby is one of the best organised lobbies on the planet and the politicians of all parties (except maybe the Greens) kiss their ars* on a daily basis, with a speed limit on motorways being considered on par with nuclear war. In Britain, the BNP has been railing against speed cameras and even the big parties have been caving to that. So car drivers everywhere believe they are being hard done by and milked and right-wing parties are especially sympathetic to that whining.

Exaggerating, much?

The election turn-out for the parliamentary election was 48%. So this means,
14% of the Swiss population voted the SVP into the 'Nationalrat' (chamber of CH parliament, similar to US house of representatives), and 6% of the Swiss population voted the SVP into the 'Staenderat' (chamber of CH parliament, similar to the US senate).

What leads you to the conclusion that the 48% turn-out was not representative for the remaining 52%? Are you seriously suggesting that nobody from the non-voters support the strongest party in Switzerland?

You could also extrapolate those 30 percent onto the world population and say that the SVP has more than 2 billion supporters. Do you smell the BS?

Normally when people don't vote its because they don't care one way or the other.

Seven out of ten points for trying though

Not nobody, but I would make a fair presumption that SVP supporters, probably being more "reactionary" than your average Swiss, are more likely to vote. Therefore, I think the SVP are probably over-represented in parliament.

I'm already getting on a train, how far do they want me to go !?!

You have some strange views on retailing. One minute you are waxing lyrical about everyone-is-an-owner joy of Migros then you are casting (sic) assertions on the motives of a small retailer for not discriminating.

Maybe you should read a bit more, and post a bit less.

AYB