Roger Boynes is as full of shit as that Westboro ministry.

I think you can explain this kind of attack by selectively picking and choosing features of almost any culture, with the possible exception of Buddhists… and hippies.
Almost all cultures suffer from stereotypes of some sort of inner angst. For the americans it is economic, for the brits it is social class, for the italians it is the tamperament, for the nordics the winter depression – you can project to a reader whatever you want. I almost want to write to him several versions of his article adapted for other cultures.
However, the fact that he is generalizing does not mean he’s wrong, at least to some degree.

It really is that difficult to go and look for actual reasons behind events, isn’t it? This column brings nothing to the discussion. Instead, it takes a bunch of stereotypes, forms them into a big broom, and then sweeps it all under the rug known as “national mentality”.

There is no real analysis, no real search for causes and effects. Yes, Finland has a high rate of alcoholism and suicides. Yes, we favor shutting up and moving on a little too much for our own health and yes, we’re a pretty taciturn bunch. But to say that the human tragedy that happened in Tuusula happened because the dude had the bad luck of being born in Finland is unprofessional, unresearched bullshit.

The perpetrators at Columbine, Virginia Tech etc. all had the exact same psychological profiles and MOs as Pekka-Eric Auvinen. That’s what we should be looking at. Pekka-Eric was a victim of school bullying. No one helped. His classmates had gone to the principal with their concerns about his strange behavior. She did nothing. This was a seriously disturbed young man who needed psychological help and no one gave it to him. THAT is the source. Not the fact that he had to walk to school in the darkness when he was a kid or whatever.

“National mentality” is an easy scapegoat, just like TV, movies, video games, etc. It’s a broad, distant, abstract concept that can be used to divert attention from the real issues at hand.

This article is something that I can expect from the comments section of this blog. Not a quality newspaper like The Times.

I left this comment at the Times about the article, it looks like their comments section is overflowing, so let’s see if it ever gets posted:

‘While many of the ‘facts’ that Mr. Boyes assembled for this opinion piece (probably via wikipedia) may ring partially true, it is certain that this shooting is far, far from “a very Finnish affair.”

In fact, none of the examples that Boyes gave had anything to do with the shootings, except for the fact that the shooter used the internet – specifically youtube.com to advertise his insanity. I suppose you were aware, Mr. Boyes, that millions upon millions of other people in every other country in the world with internet access also upload videos every minute of every day?

It is not your ‘opinion’ that offends, Mr. Boyes, it is your utter contempt for facts, your assumption that your readership knows less about Finland than you do yourself and finally, the fact that you wrote this half-arsed article from a computer in your cosy office, hundreds of miles away from this terrible event that has shocked a country to its core.’

One could ask why Brits are unable to win any major international football championship? Is it the muddy ground, softened by endless rain? Thick fog rendering football practises useless because it is so easy to lost both the ball and players? Too much beer drinking? Left lane driving?

I don’t think that the dark wintertime is so depressing for everyone, yet it has always been the standard explanation for Finland’s problems. I would much sooner attribute the socialist welfare state with its characteristic high rates of structural unemployment and lack of self-determination, as the true causes of Finland’s depression and alcoholism.

However, I don’t believe these reasons—or even the ones listed in the article—explain this troubled person’s behavior. For example, I don’t think that the author’s mentioned isolation is a big problem among Finland’s youth these days; most young people are VERY socially connected. Even during the wintertime!

Clearly, this particular guy had problems that transcended general social conditions of the country. He was a nutcase; nothing more. .

I have to disagree with you on this matter, not nearly all of us, Finns, are put down by long & dark winter. Some of us really draw our strength from it. Summer is way too overrated, generally its too damn hot and bright. Myself as a guitarist make best songs during winter, all that snow, coldness and dark really bring out your inner most feelings and those feelings are best when crafted to something artistic, like music. Of course it may come out as form of heavy metal but even that doesn’t make us bitter, depressed or anything.

I bet people are pretty much the same across wherever, for instance America, I bet people are as ‘miserable’ behind all that small-talk and fake smiles. For one, I think we Finns just are more prone to show it to everyone, we don’t have to be happy and cheerful if we don’t like it that way.

Of course our drinking habits and such are pretty out there, but so what does that make us less better than the rest of the bunch? We being more silent than say Americans or British? Maybe we got more pressing issues on our minds than to engage in meaningless gossiping and small-talk?

Well anyways I think categorizing these events to be “very Finnish” is just plain wrong and stupid. Every society has these “nut cases” and there’s really not much to do about it. It’s not like we could watch everyone and restrain everything from happening. Life is… and so on.

Anyways good luck to your life in our pseudo-cold Finland.

Here is a collection of comments to the Times Editor..
http://virtual.finland.fi/stt/showarticle.asp?intNWSAID=17249&group=General

This is my favorite:
“This article is well written in terms of style and form, but utter rubbish in terms of content. You might as well read Harry Potter to find out about yesterday’s events in Tuusula,”

This is really weird. I have been monitoring and refreshing the times article page http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/article2828084.ece?Submitted=true

and the number of comments is actually SHRINKING. When I originally posted my comment, there were well over 210 now there are 189.

WTF.

188 now. Mine hasn’t shown up yet.

186!

Finland? They have guns and YouTube there? This devastating news from a great northern latitude will awaken us all to the reality that it’s a small world after all.
Thank you so much for this clear-headed article.Many of us have been way too uninformed about Finland.

If the article was written at another time in a different context, it could actually be funny. But in the context of 8 innocent people being shot dead as they went about their normal daily business, it is simply lacks a lot of taste alongside its lack of facts.

Gee, lets all blame the USA, Youtube, and Al Gore for inventing the internet. And somewhere I saw his Mom traveled to the evil USA, so the connection is real.

Anyone want to see if the Mom and Dad take any responsability? Or do we just flail around for someone to blame. Oh I know, Bush snuck in, planted a water drip device in his bed, making him do it.

“But above all the Nordic winter isolates the young in the small towns:”

Huh?! I don’t know about the modern youngsters, but we used hang out “by village” (kylällä) every night, no matter what. Preferably without pipo and long underwear. It was exactly like Kauko Röyhkä put it in his song “Paska kaupunki” (Shit Town) in which Pete persuades him to hang out on the street even if it’s raining nails after which they hang out and hang out and go around the same places for the third time. (In reference to another song by another songmaker we also found out how to turn all the streetlights off etc.)

So, what do you think,Phil? You’ve lived here for a few years now. How does that sound to you? Inquiring minds want to know.

Antti, You obviously must be talking nonsense, I mean it was a good 50 km to the nearest neighbour’s house for me, and there was always that lake (always the size of Saimaa) in between and the danger of being eaten by a polar bear.
Then you have to remember, that there is no such thing as either winter clothing or electric lighting in Finland, so we couldn’t of course go outside even if we could make the distance! And anyway, we don’t have any friends to visit in any case.
(Of course, I completely agree with you – the season Winter was the best in some ways; bandy, skating, skiing etc. In any case, the towns are emptiest in the summertime!)

I feel sorry for Mr Boynes, I somehow suspect he suffers from feelings of inadequacy or something like this. At very least, it must be difficult to be so xenophobic when a foreign news correspondent – it must make all the time being in foreign countries amongst all those foreigners next to torture for him. It seems he is the Times’s correspondent in.. Berlin! Can you even imagine what a Briton with such views would write about Germans!

He is at it again.

He is obviously not reporting this from inside Finland, and is getting what few quotes he has from other media.

Well, you’d never guess Finland has a great educational system by reading those comments. Maybe Finland is the 52nd state, right after the UK, the 51st.

The point about children being isolated by the geography, the climate and technology is a valid point and certainly something I noticed in adults. Stats.fi had a statistic a few years back that almost half of the country is single and lives alone. My husband has told me stories about walking home alone from kindergarten! Even in Mayberry I couldn’t imagine allowing such a young child walk alone. He also has scary stories about being bullied at school which is enough of a problem to receive a more than once a year treatment from the HS. It’s a wake up call to parents, to educators and society at large that maybe someone should pay a bit more attention to what’s up with the kids these days as those drunken teens in the park are going to be running your pension funds soon.

Quick, hfb, write #19 in Finnish. I give you 10 minutes.

The latest article by Mr.Boyes,in the Times website is very annoying and presents a distorted picture of Finland….Sturmgeist was a very sick individual,who is classified as a borderline personality with psychotic features.
Also a dysfunctional family situation,and a failure of mental health system in his case,add to his problems.
Stigmatizing the mentally ill,causes society not to properly deal with these individuals and many people who are aware of these individuals problems are afraid to intervene,and are sometimes in denial about the dangerous potential of these disturbed individuals.

So I guess you can’t write Finnish in a forum, unlike the 200+ Finns that you made fun of. If they are 52nd, what state does that put you in, eh?

22 was directed at hfb.

Jahas.

If going around and massacreing people was a Finnish affair, it would be happening a lot more, since Finland has one of the highest gun ownership percentages in the world.

Finns have a teflon-coated resistance to the environment around them, an amazing ability to stay cool under the collar. Some like to call it sisu.

Mr. Boyes, if you want to appreciate how different Finland is from your culture, try giving your hot-headed football hooligans guns and see what happens. You live in a different culture from this one, for sure.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article2841038.ece?Submitted=true
His response to comments, which seems to have little basis on the actual subjects of the negative comments he has got.

Dave – I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make as I wasn’t commenting on their English skills, honey. And I had a baby to get off to a nap so time limits generally get missed by large margins with regularity.

Perhaps the best assessment I’ve seen of the situation was by Toby, an infrequent poster around here. http://lightfromthenorth.blogspot.com/2007/11/pekka-eric-auvinen-not-so-special.html

You need to think the kid was crazy, an anomaly lest you start looking at yourselves. The same thing happened after Columbine. The kids were ‘outcasts’, ‘goth freaks’ and, an eternal favourite, ‘loved violent video games’. They’re still blaming video games. It’ll happen again.

I am so sure, hfb. You got caught out on your own illiteracy. You’re using your baby to hide behind it. Go ahead, I’ll give you another ten minutes or twenty even!

As for the problems here, sure. Yes, there are problems, but these problems have existed for a long time and this is the first time something like this has happened in such a public way. It almost sounds like you are rooting for it to happen again.

It is your child’s other home country, you know. I mean, while we are on the topic of “issues” and “denial” maybe you could take a look in the mirror yourself.

As for Toby’s input on his blog, 26, yeah, OK then there were 5 “big / random” murders in the past 8 or 9 years. WOW. What a revelation!

Try giving the finger to someone who cuts you off on the Mass Pike next time you’re driving with your little one… What? You wouldn’t dare do that? Why? Afraid of being shot?

Random violence is everywhere, but it occurs relatively seldomly here. Domestic violence is also a plague here and elsewhere, where is the news flash there?

These killings in Jokela were a real eye opener for the Finns. Don’t rub their faces in it, hfb. It’s just crass.

PS have you finished your translation yet? Thought not.

Dave – Maybe you haven’t been back for a while. Better brush up on your Spanish before you come back. My written skills in Finnish have always sucked and I don’t believe I ever said I was fluent. The comments in English, regardless of the pitiful state of the Finnglish remain rather juvenile and stupid just like I’d expect from idiots in flyover country. My original comment stands.

And, no, I’m not rooting for children to start killing each other there any more than I do here. But it still happens here….and it will continue there unless educators and parents get their head out of their asses and stop blaming games, technology, etc., everything but themselves.

Dave – I’m sorry, maybe his thesis was too complex for you so I’ll post it for you.

” but that isn’t because overall Finland is safer, but rather because crime has a different profile here. ”

And this changes that profile. Squirm. Bitch. Deny. But Finland won’t be the same anymore no matter how hard you close your eyes.

Who’s denying what? What the heck do you know what the general public here is talking about? All you get is second hand fluff like the crap the london times guy pulled from wiki and internet news sites.

I feel relatively safe sending my 8 year old daughter to the corner store in Helsinki (Meilahti), I would not allow her to do that in a similar neighborhood in greater Boston.

What’s that spell?

Safer.

“And this changes that profile. Squirm. Bitch. Deny. But Finland won’t be the same anymore no matter how hard you close your eyes.
” – hfb

I can just see you doing the little dancing party in your living room when this happened, like the Palestinians did on 9/11.

Nice one. Did you bake one of your cakes?

Dave – It means that you perceive it as safer, I don’t know that it means that it’s safer. I wouldn’t be inclined to do the same if I still lived in Helsinki. Too many drunks and weirdos, even during daylight hours.

How does pointing out that this is a watershed event mean that I’m having a party?

But Finland won’t be the same anymore no matter how hard you close your eyes.
In some very small ways that is correct, in many more ways it is understandable.
But Finland will not fundamentally change because of this. It might seem so that it will whilst we are still in the aftermath of this dreadful tragedy. But to change everything would be to put too much emphasis on the actions of a sadly mentally sick murderer, who in many ways is also a victim in this sad event.

Finland is by and large a safe country. It is not a perfect places. There are none of those. There are social issues that need to be addressed, and perhaps also laws on guns that need to be strengthened, but compared to many other places this can’t be considered a dangerous land.

JG – True, but things are changing. For example, how often do you see prams parked out in front of restaurants in the winter with babies in them anymore? By the time I left Finland, I hadn’t seen one in maybe a year.

“But Finland will not fundamentally change because of this. It might seem so that it will whilst we are still in the aftermath of this dreadful tragedy. But to change everything would be to put too much emphasis on the actions of a sadly mentally sick murderer, who in many ways is also a victim in this sad event.” – JG

This I agree with. Not that I have any power to affect it one way or the other, but Finland tends not to overreact in situations like this. The “life sentence” in Finland is all of 20 years – but have murders skyrocketed over the years, no, not really.

What has “mandatory sentencing,” life imprisonment without parole and the death penalty done for the crime and murder rates in the US? Well, they certainly aren’t on the decline.

Not to mention the overwhelming overreaction to the “terr’sts” in the aftermath of 9/11. Just yesterday an entire arrivals hall was emptied somewhere in the US because someone’s sugar cookie mix leaked out of her suitcase at the luggage pickup carousel (they thought it was a chemical attack).

You have Guantanamo, waterboarding, metal detectors, wiretapping and massive breaches of the Constitution and what has improved? Only more people want to join the Jihad and the American public is more frightened than ever.

Post-Jokela, perhaps Finland won’t be the same naïve place concerning school violence – but she won’t either turn all of her children into “suspects” and all of our criminals into “lifers.”

“Random violence is everywhere, but it occurs relatively seldomly here. Domestic violence is also a plague here and elsewhere, where is the news flash there?”

I could swear I’ve seen at least one knifing or beating per day to be reported by either Ilta-Sanomat or Iltalehti. Those are tabloids but I still believe those incidents reported has taken place. And a lot them random. The idea that it doesn’t happen in Finland is getting old.

Maybe it happens a hell of a lot more abroad even to the extent that the above rate can still be described as rare occurrence. Either way I think we’re in denial and these violent nuts benefit from that. I wished everyone stepped out of that denial and be a lot more judgmental about these incidents, vocally.

Take today for example. Helsingin Sanomat has an article about a guy who got into a shouting match with a BMW driver (I don’t know why the BMW part always seems to be pertinent in HS reporting) and the driver knocked him out and his buddies proceed to kick him while he was unconscious. This is just a little snippet from the huge list of random acts of violence going on in this country that no one seems to care about.

Finland is full of these nuts.

I’d be more concerned with BMW drivers running pedestrians over in crosswalks because they’re on the phone talking to their boss, explaining why they’re late.

Who’da thought?! BMW drivers act like assholes?? Tell me it ain’t so!

America and Gun Violence

Every day, more than 80 Americans die from gun violence. (Coalition to Stop Gun Violence)
The rate of firearm deaths among kids under age 15 is almost 12 times higher in the United States than in 25 other industrialized countries combined. (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)
American kids are 16 times more likely to be murdered with a gun, 11 times more likely to commit suicide with a gun, and nine times more likely to die from a firearm accident than children in 25 other industrialized countries combined. (Centers for Disease Control)

Children and Gun Violence
In a single year, 3,012 children and teens were killed by gunfire in the United States, according to the latest national data released in 2002. That is one child every three hours; eight children every day; and more than 50 children every week. And every year, at least 4 to 5 times as many kids and teens suffer from non-fatal firearm injuries. (Children’s Defense Fund and National Center for Health Statistics)

America and Gun Violence
American children are more at risk from firearms than the children of any other industrialized nation. In one year, firearms killed no children in Japan, 19 in Great Britain, 57 in Germany, 109 in France, 153 in Canada, and 5,285 in the United States. (Centers for Disease Control)

Guns in the Wrong Hands
Faulty records enable terrorists, illegal aliens and criminals to purchase guns. Over a two and a half-year period, at least 9,976 convicted felons and other illegal buyers in 46 states obtained guns because of inadequate records. (Broken Records, Americans for Gun Safety Foundation)

Let’s face it. The world IS a violent place. The only difference in Jokela equation was the gun.

“I wished everyone stepped out of that denial and be a lot more judgmental about these incidents, vocally.”

It’ll never happen since you have either the people who want to believe that violence is rare and unusual or those who start quoting the stats of everyplace other than here. Consensus is pounded in from an early age.

That’s 80 Americans killed by gunfire every day. 50 of them are kids and you’re sitting there in Boston, hfb, whining about the violence in Finland.

One more thing about violence in Finland: You never get help from anyone. Not ever. Grown men silently watch as grannies get mugged on the tram. What a sick society.

43. That’s because here you get jailed if you defend yourself or anybody else…

“One more thing about violence in Finland: You never get help from anyone. Not ever. Grown men silently watch as grannies get mugged on the tram. What a sick society.”

Well, it was a week or two ago when HS reported about a guy who saw a man beating a woman and decided to intervene. What did he get in return for that one? The nut’s friends came over and they stuffed the guy in the trunk of their car, drove off somewhere, tied the guy to a chair, and went on a torture spree.

I commented all three of his articles, and none of my comments appeared. For example he says that Tuusula is far from “the vibrant clubs of Helsinki” (= a gloomy place), and I wrote that if 34-42 minutes by train is far, then it is far. And there are at least three trains per hour. I forgot to ask why does he think that a “vibrant club” is a good place for a teenager.

He also mentiones suicides. I checked, and was able to inform him that Finland is now on place #33 in suicide statistics. UK is #37, and sweet and sunny Mauritius, Barbados and Australia are all way ahead of Finland.

I commented on the two that I found, presso, and they didn’t post mine either. Apparently they are only posting the most poorly-written ones in order to keep Finland looking less than ideal?

What happened at the school is most definitely a really sad affair!
What I do not understand is the animosity of some Finns towards the Times reporter.

They are upset that the reporter generalized,and portrayed all Finns as being clinically depressed during the winter etc. Well Finns, how do you think it makes us Black people living here feel when each time you generalize about us??
According to you, all of us are lazy , stupid bums who sit on social welfare.
All of us are from the jungles of Africa. Aren’t there black people from the Caribbean islands, the US, England etc???

All of us are poor and never used the internet , never drove cars, never lived in houses, or ate “good food” before coming to Finland.

All of us are here for a better life. Hasn’t it dawned on you Finns that some of us are here because we got married to Finns who brought us here, and are refusing to let us return home with our Finnish children???

Please stop crying about generalized statements being made about Finns. YOU DO IT EVERY DAY TO US IMMIGRANTS. WELCOME TO OUR WORLD!!! DO YOU LIKE IT???I SINCERELY HOPE THAT YOU DO!!!

By the way, it is true that Finns are a very sad bunch of people who never laugh or smile!!

That thing about watermelon and fried chicken? It isn’t true??!!

For someone not wanting people to generalize, Mr. wonderful, you sure do a good job of doing it yourself.

“That’s 80 Americans killed by gunfire every day. 50 of them are kids and you’re sitting there in Boston, hfb, whining about the violence in Finland.”

That would be in a population of 350+ million. Finland has 5 million. Helsinki has 1 million. If one were running violence per capita, the stats would seem a lot more even.

And I’m not whining, just intrigued that such an event has the power to get people talking about violence….but I’m not optimistic it will happen in Finland where not doing anything at all is the status quo.

wonderfully different, Sorry that you feel that way. Please do point out the article in Helsingin Sanomat or any other Finnish paper of repute that makes such a generalised argument on black people.
It’s sad that you feel the need to lower yourself to the same level as the kind of people you rightly deplore.

I am still waiting for that translation.

While you’re at it, please post the statistics that prove your stance.

At roughly 70 times the population of Finland (with 80 gunshot related deaths per day in the US), that would make about one gunshot related death per day in Finland… Which just is not the case, hfb.

Per capita, there are more gun related deaths in the US. But I didn’t need to tell you that, now did I?

And if what you’re doing isn’t whining, I’d hate to hear your whining.

What are you going on about translations for anyway? I was commenting on the English article with English, well Finnglish, comments. I have no interest in writing Finnish now or anytime soon. Finns sound just like the hicks out in flyover country with little education and less sense. Go figure. My translating my comment probably isn’t going to change that.

And I didn’t make a stance, I merely said that given the tiny population of Finland, the difference probably isn’t that dramatic if you take all the violent crime into consideration.

I hate it when expats go into rabid mode to reassure themselves in some way. I used to do that when I was coming off the honeymoon. The US isn’t as bad as you want to believe nor is Finland as idyllic. They are far, far more alike in many ways than they are different.

#44,45:

Stupid laws are part of the reason but I suspect that more often than not the law is just a convenient excuse. The real reason here is lack of courage and initiative. People here are like sheep going about their daily lives, afraid to stand out from the masses.

#48:
What I do not understand is the animosity of some Finns towards the Times reporter.

Just keep reading the comments here and you’ll start developing a sense of the finnish mentality.

They are upset that the reporter generalized,and portrayed all Finns as being clinically depressed during the winter etc.

Well, he wasn’t so far off as already discussed in this thread.

Aren’t there black people from the Caribbean islands, the US, England etc???

Most aren’t. If you were a (black) person in the US or England, why the heck would you want to come here…

Hasn’t it dawned on you Finns that some of us are here because we got married to Finns who brought us here,

That’s even worse, stealing our women.

“I hate it when expats go into rabid mode to reassure themselves in some way.” – hfb

I hate it when ex-expats go into rabid self-defense mode to reassure themselves it was the right thing to leave. So they take any negative aspects and write endlessly about them.

I remember when you were living here, you were all about cakes and pastries and sunny walks with your camera kit. Now that you left you are all about poop and gunfire. Can’t you see you’re a bit defensive too?

mh , your response pretty much sums up the Finnish mentality. My aim here is not to change your primitive ways!Such a primitive comment” stealing our women.”You sound like an Apache Indian of long time ago!

Get your butt up and do some travelling around the world! Maybe that will get you as civilized as the rest of the world!

Will not waste my time responding to your narrow minded statements!!ONE LOVE MY BROTHER!! ONE LOVE!!

“I mean it was a good 50 km to the nearest neighbour’s house for me, and there was always that lake (always the size of Saimaa)”

Awww, but that’s how it was for those Juntti-Einari’s in the neighbouring village. No problem after turning 15 though. They could buy a pappa-tunturi moped or get a tractor license. Chicks surely appreciate Massey-Ferguson booth over bicycle.

“- the season Winter was the best in some ways; bandy, skating, skiing etc. In any case, the towns are emptiest in the summertime!”

Indeed, everybody was at the summer cottage. Although back home the difference between the house and the summer cottage was that the latter was about 5km further into woods.

On the Times article, if this was particularly Finnish affair, shouldn’t we have had this kind of shootings every now and then since the 19th century or something. If Roger Boynes wants an archaic finnish affair, he could read Kalevala and check out, what happened to Kullervo. Modern version is probably some young punk, secretly listening “Still loving you” by the “Scorpions” and shooting himself with daddy’s moose rifle, not the Jokela rampage.

Or this guy, who went to his workplace to hang himself but cut the rope too long. Monday morning his colleagues find him on the floor alive with a broken leg and the “tie” on.

There isn’t a damn thing wrong with eating watermelon and chicken!! Beats “mammi” any day!! YUM! YUM! YUM!

Bet you are another one of those Finns who spends each vacation in the deep jungles of Finland!! Get out of the jungle! It is clouding your brains!
Have a huge plate of fried chicken waiting for me now!! Better go to eat. BYE , BYE!

Are you sure you aren’t finnish yourself?

Classic

1. Finns cannot cope with foreigners that don’t like Finland. They can’s stand hearing our opinions. It was amazing that the Iltarags gave links the article in the Times, to encourage Finns to express their disapproval. How dare a foreigner criticise Finland. Foreigners can only express opinions about Finland if they’re positive. Gordon Ramsey won’t sell many books in Finland after here dared to express an (honest) opinion about mammi, or whatever that brown shit is called. Finland will not change (improve) until their denial culture changes

2. Wonderfully different’s first comment was spot on. Finns are mostly, and with few exceptions, are racist. Finns now know what it feels like to be stereotyped. The thing is, they won’t learn. Most see themselves, and their society / culture as being superior to anything foreign. A bit like the Nazis really.

3. dAVE REVELATOR, OR WHATEVER, your Finnish wife must be HOT!!! But, don’y foregt, there’s always the take-away option. Those Finnish blondes really shine when exposed to some foreign sunshine!!
Enjoy Finland, you mug!

#61: First statement, spot on! The rest… meh.

“I remember when you were living here, you were all about cakes and pastries and sunny walks with your camera kit. Now that you left you are all about poop and gunfire. Can’t you see you’re a bit defensive too?”

The truth is that I was near suicide and baking cakes and trying desperately to find something positive kept me going. Well, and drinking. After I got preggers and stopped drinking it was hard not to notice things I could previously just drink to forget. I don’t need a school shooting to be certain that escaping was the only option.

“Have a huge plate of fried chicken waiting for me now!! ”

Have you seen the movie “Undercover Brother”? If not, you should rent it immediately.

Finland attracts very few foreigners, and even fewer stay for any lenght of time (apart from losers who are happy to take KELA cheques in return for their TOTAL uncritical support of the Finnish Nazi state. hfb, you did well to get out, I stayed two years. My only regret is that I didn’t leave after a year, like most of the foreigners I knew

61, I couldn’t agree with you more.

Wonderfully different, let me just say that you are not the only one who feels the same way. It goes with other ethnic groups as well.

I don’t know about you guys, but there hasn’t been a winter spent in Finland when I haven’t felt depressed. It takes almost all of your energy just to get out of bed in the morning.

But I don’t believe that it’s the reason behind the Jokela massacre. The guy was a nutcase and they are everywhere.

Timesin artikkelia on editoitu jälkeenpäin

hfb: “1. Finns cannot cope with foreigners that don’t like Finland. They can’s stand hearing our opinions. It was amazing that the Iltarags gave links the article in the Times, to encourage Finns to express their disapproval. How dare a foreigner criticise Finland.”

No one likes if he’s criticised from wrong basis. If I write a novel and critic tells he didn’t like the end because main character killed himself, although no such thing happened in my novel, surely I would not like it.

If you want to criticise (this is not just to you, this is passive), do it. But make sure you got your facts right.

“Gordon Ramsey won’t sell many books in Finland after here dared to express an (honest) opinion about mammi”

This is another thing, common in net. First you tell your opinion about something or someone. Then that someone defends his stands – and hey, suddely he cannot take critic!

First, all opinions are not critics. Not liking mämmi is an opinion, not critic at all.

Second, defending youself against critic does not mean you cannot stand being criticised. It’s simply a part of discussion and every good critic welcomes answers to his critics.

“Wonderfully different’s first comment was spot on. Finns are mostly, and with few exceptions, are racist. Finns now know what it feels like to be stereotyped. ”

If you wish to criticise something, you should avoid doing that mistake yourself. Wonderfully different criticised Finnish way of stereotyping by… stereotyping Finns.

And yes, Finns are racists. According to my opinion, all are and all stereotype, not just Finns, Americans, Swedish or Russians. It’s a one mental tool of human mind.

“The thing is, they won’t learn. Most see themselves, and their society / culture as being superior to anything foreign. A bit like the Nazis really.”

Cool. Nazi-card. Suppose next will be Hitler-card? Or maybe Stalin – after all you should remember that we Finns are communists and not nazis.

“The truth is that I was near suicide and baking cakes and trying desperately to find something positive kept me going. Well, and drinking. After I got preggers and stopped drinking it was hard not to notice things I could previously just drink to forget. I don’t need a school shooting to be certain that escaping was the only option.”

And because you didn’t like it here, this is a utterly horrible place, not suitable for human life at all?

I didn’t enjoy myself in Turkey and yet I don’t go around mocking them on their web pages. Some things are wrong with that country and I personally would not like to live there, but Turks like things I don’t. Why argue.

Proof. Finns can’t cope with a foreigner that dares to express an (honest) view about Finland that happens to be negative. Finns decide what they want to see in their society, and then they see it, regardless of what’s really there. Finns love their self-claimed positive stereotypes (really propaganda) about themselves e.g. we are honest people, Finland is a very safe country etc

arawn: you’re welcome to your imaginary world. Foreigners don’t like it though, and that’s why so few foreigners choose to live in Finland.

The massacre in Dunblaine was a typically Scottish incident.

The Colombine massacre was a typically Colorodoan incident.

The London bombings of 7.7. was a typically British incident.

The Madrid bombings were a typically Spanish incident.

The Iraq war is a typically Iraqi experience.

And on and on the crap is spun.

(ps., thanks for your revelation, hfb. At least we now know you’re human. )

Ano: “arawn: you’re welcome to your imaginary world. Foreigners don’t like it though, and that’s why so few foreigners choose to live in Finland.”

Considering what troubles great numbers of foreigners tend to cause, that’s maybe not a bad thing to us Finns… We were lucky to choose a place where no one else wishes to come.

“Proof. Finns can’t cope with a foreigner that dares to express an (honest) view about Finland that happens to be negative. ”

1. How could we express our coping? Agree with every negative opinion about us and Finland?

2. Could you point my a nation who calmly swallows all negative comments that are expressed about it?

69. “Finns can’t cope with a foreigner that dares to express an (honest) view about Finland that happens to be negative.”

This is unfortunate, but do you really think that this is primarily a Finnish characteristic?

Can you name any place in the world where a foreigner would not get a hostile response by saying in a loud voice in a bar or restaurant, “boy, this country of yours is really a crappy place”?

#71:
Considering what troubles great numbers of foreigners tend to cause, that’s maybe not a bad thing to us Finns…

I think you got it the wrong way around. The problems caused by the increasing number of foreigners in Finland are due to 1) racism, and 2) the fact that most of the immigrants are actually refugees who don’t have a choice. Have you noticed how the finnish word for immigrant has turned into an euphemism for an African refugee?
The presence of foreigners in Finland wouldn’t cause such problems if somebody actually wanted to live here.

This whole conversation is one of the most futile ones you can ever have. Everybody seems to be ignoring the obvious fact that finns are just as stupid and volatile as are any other nationality when they respond to criticism against their country. The only exception to that might be the Americans because they’re so used to it and receive it a lot – as they should.

And the hypocrisy is astounding. Suddenly we’re offended when someone makes broad generalizations and depicts a group of people in unfavorable way? WTF, this is like the finns’ favorite passtime activity. Serves us right.

mh: “The presence of foreigners in Finland wouldn’t cause such problems if somebody actually wanted to live here.”

That would be more plausible if France, Sweden, Netherlands and Britain wouldn’t be facing problems with their immigrants…

“The problems caused by the increasing number of foreigners in Finland are due to 1) racism, and 2) the fact that most of the immigrants are actually refugees who don’t have a choice.”

1) With racism is always that problem, which was first, egg or the chicken – do we have problems because Finns are racists or are Finns racists because we have problems.

I have no answer to that question, but it seems to me that if it’s only racism that causes troubles, there are quite a lot of racists in other countries too…

2) Ministry of the interior has a somewhat different view: there are around 120 000 foreigners in Finland and most of them are students or came here to work or with their family. If children are excluded, these people had choice.

Finland is ready to have 750 refugeer per year, but every year there’s less than maximum amount. 2000-06 little less than 5000 refugees were permitted to Finland. So they are a quite small part of the foreigners in Finland although I agree with you in that they are causing more trouble than you could suspect by their numbers.

Then there are immigrants who seek for asylym. They have arrived here willingly, they could seek it anywhere else in Europe.

Biff (74), for me anyways, it is not the depressing depiction of the author of the london times article had of Finland per se… It is the groundless connection that the shooting itself was “very, very Finnish” and that just doesn’t ring true.

He completely ignored the fact that shootings like this have been occurring for the past 40+ years all over the world and all of them have resembled each other in many, many ways.

Dave,

I’m fully with you on that one.

Anon – “My only regret is that I didn’t leave after a year, like most of the foreigners I knew.”

Mine was, how shall I say, believing my näive husband who claimed that finding a job would be easy. I was eager to leave and try someplace else and found myself jobless for two years in a place that wasn’t friendly to its own people much less foreigners. I should have kept my paid-for house and my six figure job and told him to get stuffed. It was an adventure that had its fun moments but I’m glad the escape pod arrived when it did.

#68 – That wasn’t my comment – Only the suicidal baking was mine. Besides, I actually liked mämmi and salmiakki. Who says I’m ‘mocking’ anyone. I still have a Finnish husband, a half-Finnish daughter and Finnish in-laws. I only escaped the geography. I’m still stuck with Finland in many other ways. I made an attempt in earnest to stay and like it there but there just wasn’t enough of any one thing to make me believe that I would ever be welcome or that I would ever stop feeling like one of those damned furriners.

hfb, welcome to the club. I struggled my whole life to be accepted as being a part of the Finnish society but still feel like a freaking tourist spot every time I enter a local k-market. I have finally come to acceptance that some things will never change.

The thing I don’t get is that why every time a foreigner expresses his/her feelings about Finland, people get so defensive. Don’t you see that this is our only way to let out our frustration after what we have experienced.

[Hey Arawn, it doesn't really matter if it's 'critique' or 'opinion']

Only people who have experienced it understand what it means. Finns (or Finnish mind-like) will never fathom how is to be like a {{colored}} foreigner in Finland.

Ano II: “[Hey Arawn, it doesn’t really matter if it’s ‘critique’ or ‘opinion’]”

it does, if answer to one’s defence is “you just can’t take critic.”

“The thing I don’t get is that why every time a foreigner expresses his/her feelings about Finland, people get so defensive. Don’t you see that this is our only way to let out our frustration after what we have experienced.”

I admid that I don’t get why you don’t get this thing. Well, atleast I’ve encountered it so much in so many places that I started to think it’s actually a part of human nature. When I tried to even moderately criticise Soviet Unions actions durin and after WW2, response was outrageous. Didn’t do any better with Swedish, French, Americans or Brits.

Also this applies to smaller things too; if you are from Turku and start to tell how hideous place Helsinki is, make sure, there’s no people from Helsinki around you.

“Only people who have experienced it understand what it means. Finns (or Finnish mind-like) will never fathom how is to be like a {{colored}} foreigner in Finland.”

That’s probably true. But how could we since we’re not coloured? :/

I simply can not get it why people think “not being able to take critique” would be an especially Finnish characteristic. Every nationality will respond badly, if critisized heavily and, in their view, unfairly.

Say, if I, as a foreigner, wrote on this blog a heavily controversial statement about Americans, I would quite probably see a lot of very pointed (even to the point of being abusive) replies. But if such a thing would happen, no way would I go about claiming that Americans “can not take critique” or have a low self-esteem or are brainwashed. In every country people tend to think that by virtue of living in that country they know more about the conditions than those, who in their view, have only summary information about living there.

In Finland, as in other small nations, people have a certain “small country mentality” about international media handling local issues. It can be compared to, say, rock bands: a small band releasing their debut album internationally will read every foreign review they can get their hands on, and quite probably, frame the one from the Rolling Stone on a wall. Those reviews will make or break their reputation as a real rock group. Metallica, however, will not care about most of the reviews they get: they already have a solid reputation as a great band.

Small country issues get only a little coverage internationally. If that coverage seems to mispresent the country or society, through poor research, sloppy stereotyping or loose generalisations, it is understandable that Finns (or Estonians, or Icelanders, or Hungarians etc.) should seek to remedy those shortcomings more than, say, the Germans or the French. Those bigger countries are well known, covered in greater depth and by more numerous experts. Small countries and small peoples will try to voice their opinions out loud, lest their voices be drowned out by those in a stronger position in the global media community.

This thing about “small country mentality” is absolute nonesense!! I am from a country a lot smaller than Finland, and we really couldn’t care less about what the world thinks of us . We are who we are ,and you either like us or you don’t.I live by that same motto in Finland : I am not a Finn, will never be one . I am who I am , you either like me or you don’t.Ok Finns??

By the way, though smaller than Finland, we have greater world presence than Finland, because we do not suffer from that Finnish sense of low self esteem.It is a crime in Finland to be proud of yourself or your acheivements!!!

If something is printed in the interntional media that you deem unfair coverage of your country, then the onus is on you, to correct the wrong by creating a good impression on tourists and foreign diplomats to the country. No amount of whining here will change anything!
But Finns can’t do that since they are always cold to everyone, and really paranoid.
More energy should go into treating tourists well here, then maybe the image of Finland as a nation of cold, xenophobic, suicidal people will be no more!!

We do not have the time or the energy to wallow in self pity and anger each time we get negative foreign press!! Grow up!!

Wonderfully Different, for someone who decries negativity and anger, you seem extraordinarily negative and angry.

Drakon – But small countries like Finland are only going to get press in one of two ways; news of the weird, e.g. Conan and Tarja, air guitar, wife carrying or Something dramatic and violent like Russia invading or an angsty teen gunning for humanity. Enjoy your brief and infrequent noteriety.

“Say, if I, as a foreigner, wrote on this blog a heavily controversial statement about Americans, I would quite probably see a lot of very pointed (even to the point of being abusive) replies. But if such a thing would happen, no way would I go about claiming that Americans “can not take critique” or have a low self-esteem or are brainwashed.”

America is so big that you could claim any or all of those things and they’d likely be true to some degree. Some people have a gigantic stick up their ass, too. Go figure. But, that being said, there is something so incredibly fragile about the Finnish inability to take even the slightest of criticism. I mean, even when you stick to known facts like, “Hey, you eat fish you catch in the Baltic? Isn’t it dead because of pollution and aren’t the fish full of PCBs?” “HEY, WE DIDN”T POLLUTE THE BALTIC! IT WAS THE RUSSIANS!”, etc. ad infinitum. There’s something so kneejerk about it, especially since I’ve seen people react similarly even when it doesn’t involve Finland, that I suspect it starts early in school. I always felt like I was walking on eggshells in even the most benign of conversations.

“Only people who have experienced it understand what it means. Finns (or Finnish mind-like) will never fathom how is to be like a {{colored}} foreigner in Finland.”

Very true. I feel for you as being white, I could simply shut my mouth and wear my Burberry scarf and at least disappear. One of my favourite colleagues at work was a black guy who had been here since university. He knew the language and was one of the best workers in the crew. While sitting down to lunch one afternoon, I watched a woman at the end of the table near where he was sitting down, stop eating, pick up her tray and move two tables over for no other reason than to avoid sitting next to the dark spot in the room. I think my jaw may have dropped since I only expected that kind of blatant behaviour from uneducated hicks from the sticks. I just couldn’t imagine how much more miserable life might have been had I been obviously a foreigner.

Oh yes, the overt racism here astounds me even to this day! I have never experienced it anywhere else, except in Finland, and I have spent time in some countries regarded as highly racist!

Finns do not sit next to “foreigners” on the public transportation system. They would rather stand than sit next to you!

At the cashier counters, has anyone ever noticed how some cashiers are experts at avoiding to touch your hand when giving out the change??

If you go to the beach and start bathing, have you noticed how suddenly some people leave the water or wade lower down??

This land reminds me of how the US was in the 60′s , with all the segregation going on there at that time.

It does hurt when people treat you badly simply because they do not like your colour!!

Finns claim to hate foreigners. How did you guys feel when not so long ago, you were treated as second class citizens by the swedes, since they did not consider you to be ” fully white “??
How did you guys feel, when upon migrating to the US, not so long ago, you were treated diffrently because you were seen as the poorly dressed, alcoholic, violent, babaric, knife weilding Finns.

YOU DO KNOW HOW IT FEELS TO BE TREATED DIFFERENTLY!! All the more reason you should treat foreigners better!

Wonderfully different: Finns claim to hate foreigners
All 5 million plus of us? Interesting. Sorry to ruin your argument, but I happen to be Finnish and free of hatred for foreigners.

Racism is deplorable whomsoever it is aimed at, and I am sorry if you have experienced that from some Finnish people during your time in Finland – that is truly sad news. But to react by stereotyping all Finns as racist says more about yourself than Finnish people. Is is not equally as discriminatory to infer all Finnish people are racist?

“Hey, you eat fish you catch in the Baltic? Isn’t it dead because of pollution and aren’t the fish full of PCBs?” “HEY, WE DIDN”T POLLUTE THE BALTIC! IT WAS THE RUSSIANS!”

Ahem…the correct finnish reply would have been: “Yea, but those fishermen living on their small rocks in the archipelago and practically eating only baltic herring live almost 10 years longer than people on the mainland, because benefits of the seafood diet exceed the effects of their higher dioxin intake.”

Antti – Well, you should tell the guy who said that. Perhaps it is simply not living in Helsinki that prolongs their life…not the fish.

Woderfully different said: “At the cashier counters, has anyone ever noticed how some cashiers are experts at avoiding to touch your hand when giving out the change??”

As a finn I agree that Finland is quite racist country. However, some of the things you describe as racist are not necessarily so. For example, your statement above. Finnish people in general do not like to touch each other too much. If you take a closer look, maybe this cashier is avoiding touching other people too.

I don’t like it if somebody touches me without my approval. It is like a boundary violation. You might think I’m weird or stupid because of it, but that’s what I am. And many finns are like me in that sense. If you come, as I assume you do, from a culture where people like to touch each other, and notice that nobody wants to touch you in Finland, you might think it is because of your looks. In some cases it is true, but mostly, I think, it is because we just don’t touch each other that much.

Wonderfully different: You claim to come from a country even smaller than Finland and you then claim that they are in no way affected by the image other people have of it. Yet you didn’t tell us which country, exactly, that might be.

Why didn’t you if your claim is true? I just love the smell of burning bullshit in the morning. Hypocrite, much?

#85 As JT seems to be pointing out, characteristics that foreigners easily interpret as racism or xenophobia (and far too much of both really do exist here) is just part of the general awkwardness of human interaction in Finnish culture.

Finns on public transport tend to go for the window seats, and when they are all taken up, many do indeed stand rather than sitting next to anybody – regardless of nationality.

So for all of you foreigners who think that Finns hate them because they won’t talk to them – more often than not, it’s not about you or your race or nationality. They often don’t like to talk to other Finns either.

What Kimmo said. Remember everybody, the Finns are equal opportunity haters, so don’t take it personally.

“What Kimmo said. Remember everybody, the Finns are equal opportunity haters, so don’t take it personally.”

Small comfort, really. It’s true though as even family gatherings are excrutiating and often (mostly) silent affairs.

Hfb, you must chosen the wrong family I think! Our family gatherings are certainly far from that.

“Hfb, you must chosen the wrong family I think! Our family gatherings are certainly far from that.”

Well, we had a most pleasant Father’s Day yesterday visiting my dad, with good food, good wine and lively conversation. Then again, I am not looking forward to the awkward and chilling experience of visiting my mother on the next weekend. Your mileage may vary.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article2841038.ece

Its official, Finns cannot cope if a foreigner dares to say anything that is not positive about Finland

Pathetic!

“One more thing about violence in Finland: You never get help from anyone. Not ever. Grown men silently watch as grannies get mugged on the tram. What a sick society.”

Sounds more like the New York Subway than Finland. I don’t know who u are but claiming no one helps you in Finland is just rubbish. Just, pure, rubbish.

“Its official, Finns cannot cope if a foreigner dares to say anything that is not positive about Finland Pathetic!”

I don’t know what to say about a writer who tries to hit the spot when the nation is still crying. It’s not pathetic it’s an act of a lowlife scum. A jab on the jaw would be justice for this writer.

Get real and stop being melodramatic

99., stop being a cunt and fuck yourself.

Do at take-away Dave, you know it makes sense!

gone:
“I don’t know what to say about a writer who tries to hit the spot when the nation is still crying. It’s not pathetic it’s an act of a lowlife scum.”

I do think that he has a point, although it is debatable whether good old fashioned trolling is an acceptable journalistic method in a quality newspaper. However isolated the incident was, Pekka-Eric Auvinen was a product of the society and community he lived in. It is worth considering how easy it is to fall through the cracks in Finnish society. The reference to the “vibrant clubs” of Helsinki was pretty pathetic, though. Having visited them quite a lot, I’d say they offer plenty of motivation to go on a shooting spree. It is more important to have social alternatives to school, which may be lacking in a suburban hellhole like Jokela. Screw the “sexiest man in Finland” and his praise of building your dream house in the middle of the forest 50km from anywhere.

91 – Kimmo

> Finns on public transport tend to go for the window seats, and when they are all taken up, many do indeed stand rather than sitting next to anybody – regardless of nationality.

This is true, I prefer not to sit by anyone if possible (miserable git etc.) but it doesn’t mean people won’t avoid the black person. I wrote this on my old blog in 2004: “On IESAF last week much discussion was provoked by this campaign poster from the Red Cross. The text simply says: ‘Of course there is no racism in Finland’. (2007 update the poster showed a black woman sitting on their own on a otherwise crowded tram – link is no longer working) So I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry when I fought my way on to the already crowded 08.11 K train from Puistola to Helsinki this morning. There were people standing in the door area and people standing in aisles of the carriages. I looked – and really checked carefully as I could hardly believe it – but every seat was taken in the carriage except for one. It was next to the one black person in the carriage. Of course, it could have been coincidence – but you would have to be very generous of spirit to believe so.”

I’ve seen the same shit again and again, and heard people say worse. A neighbour who doesn’t know us from Adam, told us the other day that she would never go to Itakeskus to shop anymore because there are too many “ragheads” (rättipää – if that’s how you spell it) there. As you don’t see to many Arab Sheiks hanging out there or buying new trainers in Stadium, I presume she finds the presence of Somali women somehow offensive or threatening? You have openly racist MPs in parliament (the ugly Kokkomus guy) – so it leaves plenty of space for the average bloke or woman to air their “views” as well.

There are plenty of racists in the UK where I’m from as well, but say what you want about ‘PC-ness’ – they learned they had to shut the fuck up some decades ago to get accepted in decent society. Same thing hasn’t happened here yet.

In Finnish schools all over, even nowheremaki, there’s no sports teams, theatre, music etc etc People just get bored. All they have is just Nationalism and clostophobia

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