Here we go again..another school shooting

[Pursuivant]

I am still a bit surprised over what all the frothing over "internet" as the source of copycats is. really, do the people think that the internet is the source of all evil?

The Source of All Evil is Goethe and German Literature. no kidding - there were dozens of men with a bad fashion sense dressed in yellow trousers and purple tailcoat shooting themselves in a spree after the publication of "The Sorrows of Young Werther".

[Paul_D]

Here is how to shut up Starviego.

Everyone click on this link ucp.php?i=zebra&mode=foes&add=starviego

It will remove all Starviego's posts from your view. And honestly, you won't feel tempted to click Display this post when you will see some ignored messages of Starviego. You will just smile and feel good.

(Thanks Ktulu for the original link, intended first for ridgemd... who is a user that has been banned since then !)

/Paul

[TampereOwl]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2 ... orrections

[starviego]

Don’t give up your guns Finland, you’re being taken for a ride!

http://curtmaynardsnewestblog.blogspot. ... do-it.html

[Rosetta]

Yes, it would certainly make a difference (IMO) if kids stayed in school until at least 3.30pm every day. Some days kids finish school at 1pm or 2pm and then of course many of them are home alone until their parents turn up which maybe as much as 4 or 5 hours later.

You can't be serious!?!?

Oh yes, let's just keep the kids at school for 6 and a half hrs every day, from the age of 5 (or 4), which surely makes them become balanced citizens and makes the country stable and peaceful, as in the UK... NOT.
(Honestly, that was so British a view that I have no trouble guessing where you're from, Penelope )

Sorry, but I've just been quite annoyed at the way British media has talked about this - a country where young people stab each others to death almost daily is really the last one to comment anything on the matter!! (No, I'm not exaggerating.) Yes, Finland now has two tragedies we're not proud of, each a product of one deranged individual, but here in the UK the problems go far, far deeper - as I said, frequent stabbings, gangs, huge amount of teenage pregnancies, inequality in everything, to name just a few... And IMO one factor is the stress young children in this society are put through since a very early age (especially at school). I'm witnessing this first-hand daily via my little girl (6)...

On the other hand, the short (and relatively stress-free, especially for younger pupils) school days are probably a contributing factor to Finland's excellent PISA results.

And yes, for that matter, I don't know how this event "makes one see PISA results in a new light" (as you wrote earlier)? I can't see any connection whatsoever...

In regards to the debate about Finns being introverts etc, I'd have to say "loners" are in general much better human beings than those who are in gangs and cliques (for example). Even in this thread, everyone immediately assumed the shooter had been a loner and introvert, although it turned out he had not been... Being "social" is way, way overrated.
(Myself I'm somewhere in between an introvert and extrovert, but I just don't understand how being introvert is often seen as a disease of some kind... People are different, that's all.)

but still it seems we crave more and more "you are the weakest link" sort of reality tv shows, Idols, Big Brother and what have you - shows that are based solely on the perceived worth of publicity as an END, as opposed to publicity as a by-product i.e. something you may (or may not) achieve if e.g. you are good at something. The sort of "publicity at whatever cost" -type of thinking seems to me to be one of the biggest problems facing today's societies. Effectively, I'm afraid that in the minds of many a youngster today, you are NOTHING if you are not somehow "on public display". Combine this with the constant drive towards more productivity, competitiveness... and you'll have something to think about eh?

Yeah, and where have this kind of programmes originated...? Something to think about, eh?

[Pursuivant]

Don’t give up your guns Finland, you’re being taken for a ride!

http://curtmaynardsnewestblog.blogspot. ... do-it.html

The reason for the shooting is your gun-worshipping culture and the media orgasming over the shootings feeding these attention whores. I hope the bank repoes your trailer.

[COBHC]

Sorry, but I've just been quite annoyed at the way British media has talked about this - a country where young people stab each others to death almost daily is really the last one to comment anything on the matter!! (No, I'm not exaggerating.) Yes, Finland now has two tragedies we're not proud of, each a product of one deranged individual, but here in the UK the problems go far, far deeper - as I said, frequent stabbings, gangs, huge amount of teenage pregnancies, inequality in everything, to name just a few... And IMO one factor is the stress young children in this society are put through since a very early age (especially at school). I'm witnessing this first-hand daily via my little girl (6)...

I have to agree wholeheartedly with this, the UK has become so bad on a daily basis that they can't really criticise any other country. Personally i don't know how anybody could raise a child in the UK, you have just listed there most of the reasons i find the UK a disgusting place and would never dream of putting my own kids through the hell that is "Childhood in the UK".

[Pursuivant]

just ask SaxonMan life in the UK is sliced cheese compared with small town Finland

[Rosetta]

Sorry, but I've just been quite annoyed at the way British media has talked about this - a country where young people stab each others to death almost daily is really the last one to comment anything on the matter!! (No, I'm not exaggerating.) Yes, Finland now has two tragedies we're not proud of, each a product of one deranged individual, but here in the UK the problems go far, far deeper - as I said, frequent stabbings, gangs, huge amount of teenage pregnancies, inequality in everything, to name just a few... And IMO one factor is the stress young children in this society are put through since a very early age (especially at school). I'm witnessing this first-hand daily via my little girl (6)...

I have to agree wholeheartedly with this, the UK has become so bad on a daily basis that they can't really criticise any other country. Personally i don't know how anybody could raise a child in the UK, you have just listed there most of the reasons i find the UK a disgusting place and would never dream of putting my own kids through the hell that is "Childhood in the UK".

Yes, that's the main reason why we are planning to leave soon...

Thank you for understanding (I know I was a bit blunt in what I wrote, being a Finn and all )

[COBHC]

Sorry, but I've just been quite annoyed at the way British media has talked about this - a country where young people stab each others to death almost daily is really the last one to comment anything on the matter!! (No, I'm not exaggerating.) Yes, Finland now has two tragedies we're not proud of, each a product of one deranged individual, but here in the UK the problems go far, far deeper - as I said, frequent stabbings, gangs, huge amount of teenage pregnancies, inequality in everything, to name just a few... And IMO one factor is the stress young children in this society are put through since a very early age (especially at school). I'm witnessing this first-hand daily via my little girl (6)...

I have to agree wholeheartedly with this, the UK has become so bad on a daily basis that they can't really criticise any other country. Personally i don't know how anybody could raise a child in the UK, you have just listed there most of the reasons i find the UK a disgusting place and would never dream of putting my own kids through the hell that is "Childhood in the UK".

Yes, that's the main reason why we are planning to leave soon...

Thank you for understanding (I know I was a bit blunt in what I wrote, being a Finn and all )

Blunt is good, why beat around the bush when you can say what you think?

[Pursuivant]

question is Rosetta when did you leave Finland? with the economy as it is life hasn't gotten any easier.

[otyikondo]

but still it seems we crave more and more "you are the weakest link" sort of reality tv shows, Idols, Big Brother and what have you - shows that are based solely on the perceived worth of publicity as an END, as opposed to publicity as a by-product i.e. something you may (or may not) achieve if e.g. you are good at something. The sort of "publicity at whatever cost" -type of thinking seems to me to be one of the biggest problems facing today's societies. Effectively, I'm afraid that in the minds of many a youngster today, you are NOTHING if you are not somehow "on public display". Combine this with the constant drive towards more productivity, competitiveness... and you'll have something to think about eh?

Yeah, and where have this kind of programmes originated...? Something to think about, eh?

Lots and lots of sound points in Rosetta's post, but as a practicing pedant I'd have to suggest that the Japanese* are as responsible as any for the Z-list fame-at-all-costs, even-if-it-involves-shame-and-humiliation brand of television reality, as lampooned regularly by slightly xenophobic British audiences watching clips of these shows in the 1980s and 1990s. Who'd have thought they - and we - would end up in the same precarious boat? Laughing ourselves to death, as Neal Postman once put it.

* A nation with its own educational issues to work out and its own disaffected youth problems, who are themselves not above aberrant and suicidal behaviour leading to death of innocents on a large scale. (He said, generalising madly.)


Good point, Pursuivant, BTW. Finland ain't quite what it once was. The talkkari would have had that .22 off him and given him a good whacking before he could say Columbine.

[TampereOwl]

Good points by rosetta about Britain, but I don't really see any direct comparisons. As I think pretty much everyone will agree, it's better to bring your kids up in Finland because life is generally much less stressful here. But media comment on anything and everything, and it is possible to simultaneously think Finland could do something differently and that Britain has a lot of problems to deal with. I think you probably get a lot of your gangknifenastypeople hysteria from that very same British media you don't think has any right to talk about Finland's problems, so I'm struggling to see your point really....

[ScubaGirl]

As I think pretty much everyone will agree, it's better to bring your kids up in Finland because life is generally much less stressful here.

I don't agree with this at all. I was okay with life in Finland UNTIL I had my daughter. I was afraid to move back to the states though for a million and one different reasons, however I finally got the courage to go there last spring and spent most of the summer there with my daughter. I came back to Finland 6 weeks ago with the intention to resume life here, but decided after one week that life HERE was too stressful (among other things I won't mention because the list is too long ). Not only that, but if your child isn't in daycare here, there is almost NOTHING for kids to do if you live in central Helsinki (unless of course the weather is good, then you can go to a park). Unfortunately, the scales tip way more in favor for cold/wet/rainy & overall bad weather here, which wouldn't be a complaint of mine if there were enough good indoor activities for kids to partake in. Anyway, we're moving back to the states permanently in a few days and I couldn't be happier about it

This isn't an anti-Finland post, it's just my experience. There is no perfect place on earth to raise children, you just have to bring them up to the best of your ability with the cards that life dealt you. The grass will always be greener on the other side no matter where you are. I can just hear myself now complaining in weeks to come about how things in America aren't done the Finnish way

[Pursuivant]

remember to take toothpaste with you