As a European myself, never mention the Romani people to anyone here unless you want to hear the most degenerate, racist diatribe you can conjure up in your mind. (half hyperbole half not)
Over simplified, because Romani are usually nomad, they live in moving settlements and don't typically integrate much wherever they settle in. A lot of the hatred they receive also stems from these settlements being illegally set up in private/public property, as well as how they result in a lot of trash being dumped everywhere. There is also an issue with Romani criminality (stealing, damaging property, and sometimes there are even shootouts between different Romani families which result in casualties).
There is also a perceived notion that governments do not want to deal with these problems, which further fuels the hatred against the Romani as they're seen as criminals who get away with everything.
The truth of course lies somewhere in the middle. Most Romani are not bad people if you take the time to know them, but there is definitely a lot of toxic cultural norms being perpetuated by leaders of many Romani families, which doesn't help with clearing the stereotypes, and with very little to no integration between the Romani and the cultures they are in, it's hard to get rid of the animosity.
There's probably history too, but in many cities in EU there's a lot of assumed roma beggars living in the streets, which means it's a pretty in-your-face practical issue to deal with every day.
As a north american who lives in Europe, agreed. However, the gypsies do not help their own case. They show up in my region every summer, illegally camp wherever they want on private property, and leave huge piles of trash wherever they've been. I've personally seen them getting into all sorts of debauchery, including breaking into people's mail boxes and stealing bikes in plain sight. I have nothing against them and I'm sure their culture is extremely rich and interesting, but no one has the inherent right to just rip off the rest of society without consequences. Also, of course they aren't all stealing and misbehaving, but I understand where people's preconceived notions come from.
Can sadly confirm. European racism is just a different flavor of racism: there are always other European ethinicities to be racist against, especially Romani people, the latest trend seems to be discrimination against Muslims/people from the Middle East, and of course antisemitism is a timeless classic.
This. So many Europeans act with superiority because "at least we don't shoot kill them" when looking at US police brutality, but e.g. we ignore how those cops in US mostly use Glocks made in Austria, making us part of the problem (and making a profit out of it).
Or if we look at the deaths numbers, we ignore the many deaths the "protection" of our borders cause.