Empty Bus Seats Mistaken for Burqas by Anti-immigrant Group

A Norwegian man who posted on Facebook a picture of six empty bus seats causes a shock at the anti-immigrant group who mistakenly identified this seats a group of Muslim women wearing burqas.

“Terrifying” and “Tragic” were among the comments posted by the ‘Fatherland first’ group members, the Norwegian news website Nettavisen reported.

The thelocal.no website is citing some observations: “Get them out of our country – frightening times we are living in.”; “Ghastly. This should never happen.” ; “I thought it would be like this in the year 2050, but it is happening now.”

Others in the group wondered whether those “women” might be carrying bombs or weapons beneath their clothes. “This looks scary. Should be banned,” one comment says, “You can’t tell who’s underneath. Could be terrorists.”

The man who posted the picture “for a joke” is a journalist Johan Slåttavik. He told Nettavisen he was “interested to see how people’s perceptions of an image are influenced by how others around them react. I ended up having a good laugh.”

“There are three things I wanted to achieve,” he explained Nettavisen.no.” First, I think a lot of difference on legitimate immigration criticism and blind racism and xenophobia. I was going to check these differences. Second, I would get a closer look at how people in groups may respond differently to something than separately. Third, I needed some entertainment, he explains. Slåttavik says that there were some harsh comments afterward, but not something he takes very seriously. – I think it’s great that people value humor. But hoping at the same time it was possible for everyone to learn from the event,” he said.