One of Finland's Darker Moments

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harryc
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One of Finland's Darker Moments

Post by harryc » Mon May 29, 2017 1:06 pm

Last edited by harryc on Sat Jun 03, 2017 12:42 pm, edited 1 time in total.



One of Finland's Darker Moments

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harryc
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Re: One of Finland's Darkest Moments

Post by harryc » Tue May 30, 2017 9:40 pm

Perhaps some think my subject-title is an exaggeration. For those that think headlines should be world-shaking events, it surely is. But having lived in Finland for MANY years, this kind of behavior and attitude, to me, would have been unthinkable not too many years ago. And would have received far more attention.

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ilikepeanutbutter
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Re: One of Finland's Darkest Moments

Post by ilikepeanutbutter » Wed May 31, 2017 9:52 pm

harryc wrote:Perhaps some think my subject-title is an exaggeration. For those that think headlines should be world-shaking events, it surely is. But having lived in Finland for MANY years, this kind of behavior and attitude, to me, would have been unthinkable not too many years ago. And would have received far more attention.
I know. I mean I've been here going on 15 years and Finland is totally different from that time. People are more full of hate and anger on a whole compared to the good ole relaxed days. I don't know what's changed. :shock:

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Re: One of Finland's Darkest Moments

Post by Jukka Aho » Thu Jun 01, 2017 2:00 am

If it helps any, quick googling reveals the unnamed “discussion forum” was apparently Ylilauta, the closest Finnish-language equivalent to 4chan. (“Overboard” is one possible translation for the name. That should tell you something, I guess.) I’m not sure why Yle wanted to hide the fact.

You can post whatever comes to your mind anonymously and the comments range from, er, random to sensible to chaotic. Some threads exhibit similar mob mentality as that which can be experienced on 4chan.

I’d be more worried if it had been an actual discussion forum in the normal sense...
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Re: One of Finland's Darkest Moments

Post by harryc » Thu Jun 01, 2017 8:40 am

That still doesn't avoid the realization that nothing of that sort would be out in Finland 'back in the day' - anonymous or not.

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rinso
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Re: One of Finland's Darkest Moments

Post by rinso » Thu Jun 01, 2017 8:59 am

"Back in the day" internet was in its infancy. Extreme opinions were not as easily noticed as nowadays but they did exist.

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Re: One of Finland's Darkest Moments

Post by tavastia » Thu Jun 01, 2017 9:38 am

I will never agree with any kind of form of harassment discussed on that forum, but some people talk where this has actually started. Someone has said she was living on the public lavvu and uses "public" wood, YLE article also mention things about hunting, which is heavily regulated, etc. YLE shall have said originally she stayed on somebody's property, uses their wood, etc and probably will be no issues. So is easy to get some people mad even more they can do it anonymously...


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Re: One of Finland's Darkest Moments

Post by harryc » Thu Jun 01, 2017 10:41 am

"
Back in the day" internet was in its infancy. Extreme opinions were not as easily noticed as nowadays but they did exist.
All true enough (doesn't say much for the SM aspect of the net) - but Finland has become a much crasser society - I don't think anyone will deny that.

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Re: One of Finland's Darkest Moments

Post by Oombongo » Thu Jun 01, 2017 10:47 am

tavastia wrote:I will never agree with any kind of form of harassment discussed on that forum, but some people talk where this has actually started. Someone has said she was living on the public lavvu and uses "public" wood, YLE article also mention things about hunting, which is heavily regulated, etc. YLE shall have said originally she stayed on somebody's property, uses their wood, etc and probably will be no issues. So is easy to get some people mad even more they can do it anonymously...


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Yep. YLE has played the role in this too, and obviously your average Joe doesn't do much reading before going full emotional.
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Re: One of Finland's Darkest Moments

Post by Jukka Aho » Thu Jun 01, 2017 9:26 pm

Oombongo wrote:Yep. YLE has played the role in this too, and obviously your average Joe doesn't do much reading before going full emotional.
My point with the comparison to 4chan was that it is not your average Matti commenting in Iltalehti, having accidentally dropped his moral compass and manners somewhere along the route to the nearest K supermarket while doing some grocery shopping last Tuesday, but (probably) a flock of (mostly) young-ish, Internet meme-savvy guys (?) who are quite knowingly “emulating” 4chan and similar online communities. In that context, it’s crassness for the explicit purpose of being crass, and trolling for the purpose of being a troll, and making over-the-top, rude (or as-non-PC-as-possible) comments or image postings just because, well, people frequenting those kind of imageboards find that entertaining (in that context), and they like to make crass, off-color “fun” of everything from paedophilia to cannibalism and from rape to domestic violence, among the more ordinary and less off-limits things.

It’s an “Internet subculture” of sorts, based on (mock/attempted) shock value and (supposed) lack of moral restraint and filter. It needs a certain kind of virtual community to support and fuel it, and to act as participants and spectators. Much of it is just hot air “for the lulz”; a collective performance act.

Sometimes this mob mentality is not “just for the lulz”, though, and somehow manifests itself in “the real world”. Internationally, the most famous example of this is probably Anonymous (which is, again, associated with 4chan — but probably something much less organized and more of a random, ever-changing, collective mob act than the media sometimes makes it out to be.)

In any case, according to the papers, the young German lady apparently did not have any knowledge of the Internet comments concerning her — at least not originally — and left the country simply because she had got bored at her experiment at about the same time the original story was published — the allure of living in the woods and eating frogspawn had run its course.

I think they have removed (?) the original thread on Ylilauta, but I found another one discussing the aftermath of the media coverage. Some people there seemed to be a bit miffed (or entertained, depending on the writer) that out of 2000 (?) comments, the 30 (or so) over-the-top ones got so much media attention. Apparently the entire thing was picked up by the media because the German girl’s host family first found out about the discussion thread (commenting on Yle’s article) on Ylilauta and then quoted some of those crasser comments in a Facebook post of theirs.
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Re: One of Finland's Darkest Moments

Post by harryc » Thu Jun 01, 2017 11:59 pm

JA:

Let's really hope your analysis/supposition is correct and this was an exceptional case. Unfortunately, it does match the changing behavior that I and a number of friends - young and old - have noticed in the last 15-20 years.

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Re: One of Finland's Darkest Moments

Post by Jukka Aho » Sat Jun 03, 2017 2:07 am

harryc wrote:JA:

Let's really hope your analysis/supposition is correct and this was an exceptional case. Unfortunately, it does match the changing behavior that I and a number of friends - young and old - have noticed in the last 15-20 years.
I don’t think it’s exceptional — I think crass, over-the-top, absurdly rude or mocking anonymous commentary on the posted topics/links/matters/people/images (“for the lulz”) is business as usual on the so-called “imageboards” — and those usually like to make a point of being very permissive and light-handed in terms of any kind of moderation.

The only semi-exceptional thing is that this one case got widely reported in mainstream media. Usually people either look the other way, ignoring the hornet’s nests of anonymous verbal anarchy on the Internet, or... participate in them themselves. But these things don’t usually leak into real life. (Except when they do, as in this case.)

That said, not all the comments are nasty on those sites. It’s just that the site administration does not do anything to curb the nastier kind of commentary or posts unless it is something that would very likely subject them to legal action (it’s sort of a free-for-all environment), and for some commenters, making nasty or perpetually cynical remarks about the posted pictures or news stories is some sort of performance art in its own right.

When cornered, these people typically call “free speech” in their defence, or explain there being a need for a platform where people can “speak their true mind” but I think it is highly debatable whether this kind of behavior actually is “speaking your true mind”. My theory is it is more like just venting off and writing all kinds of bullshit to relieve stress or to pass time by creating a fantasy/performance art version of what it would supposedly be like, in some fantasy world, if you could “speak your true mind”, being this rough fantasy person who “always tells it straight” — often in a bit formulaic way, and without actually bothering to even analyze what you’re really thinking about the matter, if anything. Even the nastier comments, I think, are mostly just some supposed-to-be-entertaining off-color quips for the like-minded spectators, intended to be understood in the context of the board and its usual routine banter rather than be quoted by some major news outlet, all serious, and taking everything at face value.

Those kind of commentary threads as reported about this incident may not be very nice, or advance the society or the human experience much but the practical question is, even if someone’s offended, just what can you do about the “4chans” of this world? Not much, I guess — otherwise they would have ceased to exist already. You can file a request for investigation with the police on menacing or libelous speech targeting yourself, hoping that they would find the person behind a particular anonymous comment and prosecute him, but that’s probably a long and uncertain process. There’s no swift silver bullet that would resolve this once and for all.
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Re: One of Finland's Darkest Moments

Post by harryc » Sat Jun 03, 2017 9:13 am

A strong dynamic going on in Finland for many decades is urbanization - we might have reached a tipping point in the last 20-30 years with respect to 'behavior.'.

A well-done program from BBC bringing out a number of factors --

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p04gsyn5


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