#Finns have such a massive main character syndrome sometimes and it's exhausting

[lehdenlaulu]

Okay, I get being mad at the Eurovision results, but I personally draw the line at two things:

Personal attacks towards Loreen's character, appearance, etc., not to even mention misogynistic, transphobic, and racist slurs.

Dragging Sweden's colonization of Finland into it. Because while what is now modern-day Finland was gradually and sporadically under Swedish rule from roughly 1266 to 1809, and there were obviously some skirmishes related to the crusades and colonies, and your typical oppression of peasants here and there... we, by every possible European/international standard, have been fucking lucky. We've been largely left to our own devices: no serfdom, no violent and systematic erasure of language and culture, no unfair treatment compared to the rest of the population (generally speaking, of course). Hell, even the Russians treated us much better than many of the other peoples under imperial rule, even granting us autonomy. But my point is: I'm not trying to tell anyone how to feel about Finland's history with Sweden or what could have been if they hadn't colonized us (hint: it would have been Novgorod and/or the Germans instead), but I feel dragging something that happened centuries ago into it as if it’s relevant especially when Israel, who might well have won instead, is violently colonizing and oppressing Palestine as we speak is... kinda crass. So, in that respect, I say: get the fuck over yourselves, Finns. We are not special.

[these-are-the-first-steps]

Firstly, I’d like to say thank you, @srgnts, for giving me a very thoughtful reply and for giving my post a chance, I appreciate it. I hear what you’re saying here, and I understand where you’re coming from. If it’s alright, I’d like to add a little more info and a little more context, especially since the post in question is around a year old now and is missing both those things. It might help, it might not, but I’d like to make sure you have all the information at your disposal. This got long, so I’ve sectioned it off- I hope that’s ok. It might make it easier, I'm not sure.

NOTE TO MY FOLLOWERS: Please do not add your own reply to this. Please. You can reach me via chat if you want to talk about it.

Some Admissions: To begin, I admit that the tone of the post, standing alone like that, is far from the best it could have and perhaps should have been. It was also written late at night, which you might recall being mentioned right at the beginning, and I was a bit exhausted with little filter left after a frankly awful day at work. But it is one of a series of short posts that were made as I was combing through the “Before the Awakening” novel looking for information- there are many of them about Rey and Poe as well. I’ve got a pretty good collection of TFA-related books going for this very purpose- I like knowing as much as I can as I try to form theories and work on material.

Finn and Kylo are actually stellar mirror images of each other: This post was also made during a stretch of time where the ‘good guy’ characters were being a bit coddled in the fandom, and as I’m personally someone who believes everybody’s got some sort of skeleton in their closet (frankly it’s more interesting when they do), especially when the villains were being so blindly thrashed, I really latched on to the thought that I had finally found Finn’s- Rey’s previously being that she’s killed many times before and that the area around her home was rigged with fatal booby traps (source: Rey’s Survival Guide). But when I found Finn’s, my mind went into over-drive- why was this his main sin? Did he always do it? (according to ‘Before the Awakening’, he did not- and I also made a post about that the next day) So why did he feel compelled now? As some time has passed, I’ve begun to realize that Kylo and Finn are actually mirror opposites of each other both in path AND in characterization. Parents vs. no parents. Didn’t choose the order vs. chose the order, brainwashed (Finn) vs. Stockholm Syndrome (Ben), chose to leave vs. chose to stay, chose not to kill vs. chose to kill, chose to lie vs. chose not to lie, wants to go WITH Rey vs. wants Rey to go with THEM. Literally in every respect, mirror opposites. Thus why the emphasis on how the only real positive thing Kylo has going for him is that he’s openly honest with Rey- it becomes another opposing piece of the Kylo-Finn puzzle. But at the time I’d made that post, I hadn’t quite figured that out yet. What you see there is me skirting along the edges of this realization before I had it. I hope that makes sense. On the topic of Kylo’s interactions with Rey: I’d also like to share some information from the TFA novel as it has deleted scenes that didn’t make it to the film. Pablo Hidalgo, canon keeper for the new trilogy, has said that the books count as canon unless disproven by future films, so I’m going with that assumption. To begin, I will have to insist that two people battling on opposite sides of a war who are in no discernible relationship whatsoever cannot possibly be abuse. I really do have to insist on that. It was made clear in the TFA novel that Kylo had no intention of hurting Rey during the interrogation- he explicitly says, “Despite what you may believe, it gives me no pleasure. I will go as easily as possible- but I will take what I need.” (source: TFA novel, p. 199). His line about “You know I can take whatever I want” is, according to the film script, the second half of an unspoken conversation, essentially, that the audience never hears. To quote:  “KYLO REN: ...You. A scavenger-- Rey reacts -- afraid -- how does he know? KYLO REN (CON’T): You know I can take whatever I want. (TFA oscars submission script, p. 79)”

He’s referencing her thoughts, which he’s casually reading, but the Audience isn’t aware of this. It’s actually a really brilliant storytelling ploy that I’ve come to love a lot. I use it in lots of places now. Second is that Kylo actually argued *against* the destruction of the Hosnian system. He argued against it so insistently that Snoke yelled at and threatened him and this is where Snoke accuses him of having compassion for Rey, and if Rey had essentially become his ‘weakness’, then he needed to bring the girl to him. (Source: TFA Novelization, p.207-208) Snoke attempted to blackmail Kylo for his compassion. This is why he refuses to be on Starkiller when the weapon is used- it’s his admittedly weak rebellion against what happens. Thirdly, I have to protest the new over-use of the word ‘Nazi’ on the basis that my grandmother survived 5 years under Nazi, REAL Nazi, occupation and I take a firm stance against her experiences being belittled by seeing that word applied to fiction. The First Order is reprehensible, but they do not, as of this moment, have goals of genocide, and worlds under their control such as Jakku are clearly left to be free societies because the FO only seems concerned with how big their territory is, not with running it. We have no knowledge of whether or not they seize all possessions of everyone on every planet they capture, like the nazis did to my grandmother and her entire island. We have no knowledge whether or not they subject every single person under their rule to a strict and paltry rations regimen. If we go by Jakku, and that’s really all we have to go by, Extreme Capitalism runs free and laissez-faire governance is the order of the day- that is the exact opposite of nazism. So please, as someone who grew up constantly hearing stories about the Occupation, please refrain from tossing that word around so much. I was at the AAAS meeting last weekend which is a massive gathering of scientists, and one very old scientist from Vienna recounted the day the nazis took over his schoolyard and regimented them all, how the planes flew over (my grandmother’s experience as well- she was forced to learn german for a time), etc. and he has also said that the current state of affairs in the US is nothing like those times- a court in Washington state would never have been able to stop an order from Hitler in the 1930s. He says we are far from that reality at the moment and should also refrain from constantly making that comparison, and as much as I’m personally afraid of nuclear war breaking out, I have to agree- what’s going on today and back then are two separate situations.

Analyzing characters from TFA vs. trying to contextualize them against the real world: I understand what you’re saying about the perception you’re picking up on. The world is in a shameful state, and as someone who has the rather terrible task of combing through US news for a living, I understand this so intimately that I have nightmares about what goes on. This is why sometimes my posts come out with a bit more edge than is meant from time to time, but how could anyone know that? It’s no one’s job to know that. And again, I do understand that my tone wasn’t the best in that post- I’ve been working over the past year since it was made to try and correct that. Tone has admittedly always been my biggest enemy online.

You feel that Kylo is excused because of his actor’s skin color, and that Finn gets nit-picked because of his actor’s skin color. I hear you, and I admit that I cannot weigh in on that. I’m simply not equipped with the experiences you have had in order to do so. All I can do is share with you why I’ve spent so much time analyzing Kylo/Ben and Rey in depth, and I will try to do so without getting too personal. Essentially, I grew up in a situation not dissimilar to Kylo’s current state in the story. Imagine a close family member in the place of Snoke and there you have it. I mostly managed to escape. Mostly. But the damage has been done and recently they have begun to actively stalk me again. I spent a lot of last fall calling the police and filling out reports. But I’m still damaged goods. Kids used to fight me in school but I always bent the rules so not only did I win but I only ever got sort-of in trouble once. I have on very, very rare occasions been in terrible rages that luckily either no one was around or I still had enough sense of self to leave. I’ve survived murder attempts. I had to twist my future around just to keep a roof over my head in high school and I’m only now, so, so late, starting to get things back on track. Nothing will ever be what it should have been- all because of that one person from the moment I was born. So I see a lot of myself in Kylo. I can understand his perspective better than the rest of the characters and this makes him not only enjoyable for me to write in fics but also analyze from a literary perspective. I’m interested in seeing Ben succeed because it means if he can do it- space maniac that he is- then maybe I can, too. This is why I find him fascinating. This is also why I’d like to see him get some self-fulfillment along with Rey, who is also a different kind of damaged goods with her own dark streak, but that’s admittedly a purely selfish hope on my part. So somewhere in the middle of all of these things, all of these points above times about ten or so, my mind was nowhere near current events. It was nowhere near current events at all. In fact, everything I do here is my one tiny corner to try and get away from current events, at least for a moment or two, while my main blog is filled with more news headlines, unreported crimes, and rally information. I realize the tiny escape is a luxury that many don’t have. I want you to know, though, that I understand your perspective, and I hope, somehow, in this now way, way too long post that I’ve been able to more clearly describe my own. There was never any intention for a racist perception to come across in my post, and I hope that’s something at least a little more clear now. I’d also like to take this opportunity to say that I, for the confusion, apologize. For my part, I’ll continue to be much more mindful of tone, but will also take your words to heart and consider wider perspectives outside of the immediate story as well when constructing posts. Honestly, I’d like to write more about Finn on a whole assortment of topics, but we get so crucified for even liking him that many of us in this corner of the fandom are too nervous to. I feel like there would be much more Finn content if not for things like that. This post has gotten too long- I’m sorry. But thank you again for taking the time out to write, and I hope you maybe read at least a little of this. Please let me know if I’ve missed anything. I feel like this is such a big topic that I probably have in trying to connect all the dots. Please also feel free to start a chat with me if you like- you are very much welcome to.