On this day in 1918, the Finnish People’s Delegation declared a socialist workers’ republic (known “Red Finland”), at the start of the Finnish Civil War. The burgeoning working class movement was crushed by imperialist German forces.
Prior to 1917, Finland had been ruled as a Grand Duchy, an autonomous part of the Russian Empire. With the collapse of the Tsarist state in the wake of February Revolution and a long-term increase in nationalist sentiment, Finland declared independence on December 4th, 1917, formally recognized by the Russian Bolsheviks on December 31st.
Due to industrialized Finland having a strong revolutionary labor movement, conservative and proletarian forces were immediately thrown into conflict.
Red Guard paramilitary units representing the labor movement found themselves in a cycle of escalation with loyalist “White” Guards, culminating in a mass uprising of Reds in Helsinki on January 27th, 1918, marking the start of revolution. The following day, the Finnish People’s Delegation was formed by members of the Social Democratic Party. Bourgeois forces fled to Vaasa, where they set up their own “White Senate”.
The war saw the Whites, under the leadership of General Mannerheim, receive support from the German Empire, which was more well-established than the Reds’ primary ally, the newly-created Russian Soviet Socialist Republic.
Following an imperialist intervention by Germany on the side of the Whites in March 1918, the war ended in defeat for the Reds in May. Over 12,000 people perished from starvation and hunger while imprisoned in White-operated POW camps, and reparations were not paid to former victims of the White Terror until 1973.
Lessons of the Finnish Revolution of 1917–1918
Megathreads and spaces to hang out:
- 📀 Come listen to music and Watch movies with your fellow Hexbears nerd, in Cy.tube
- 💖 Come talk in the New Weekly Queer thread
- 🔥 Read and talk about a current topics in the News Megathread
- 🐱👤 Come talk in the New Weekly PoC thread
reminders:
- 💚 You nerds can join specific comms to see posts about all sorts of topics
- 💙 Hexbear’s algorithm prioritizes comments over upbears
- 💜 Sorting by new you nerd
- 🌈 If you ever want to make your own megathread, you can reserve a spot here nerd
- 🐶 Join the unofficial Hexbear-adjacent Mastodon instance toots.matapacos.dog
Links To Resources (Aid and Theory):
Aid:
Theory:
I’m gonna adopt the dumbest most pointless contrarian view. Check me out: You all only care about plagiarism talk with regards to AI, youtube videos and academic work because you’re wrapped up in a bourgeois conception of property relations.
yeah i’ll go ahead and add that to my worldview
guy who pretends to not know anything about Japan so people don’t accuse him of being a weeb
Interesting to think about how contingent history can be. If the Finnish Reds had won the civil war, then possibly there wouldn’t have been a Siege of Leningrad. And it would have changed the calculus of the northern/Baltic theater of WW2. Maybe Finland would have been among those countries which joined the USSR as a Soviet republic.
I was in Tampere a while ago and visited the neighborhood of Pispala, where Reds held out for over a week during the White advance. Geographically, Pispala is a high point in the area on top of a hill that oversees a lake. There’s a monument there now in memory of the Reds. When the situation looked bleak, some Reds were able to escape in the middle of the night by skiing across the frozen lake to safety.
On this Pispala Ridge the red guard in Tampere last stood with weapons in hand defending their cause in 1918
I am 100% convinced that if Trotsky et al could have spared ten thousand red army soldiers and a couple of maxim guns finland wouldn’t suck.
I’m told the Finnish government was going to agree to the land swap the Soviets wanted before wwii but some fascist white general left over from the civil war walked in to the room and said “lol nope fuck you commies we’re doing a winter war so the nazis can definitely murder one million civilians at Stalingrad eat shit.”
Not wanting to be tied to a missile and fired at Tel Aviv? Liberalism.
ok what’s up with the weird race posting?
if the site doesn’t have an unfunny bit it can run into the ground every so often we go collectively insane
Tieflings aren’t weird anymore now everyone’s normie dm knows what a tiefling is and normal people play them who aren’t even going to wreck the campaign by making everything about their boring cliched character.
You cant take the redditor out of some people
I’m kinda freaking out over them again. I really really can’t handle thinking about how they’re probably gone forever. I almost want to scream.
I don’t think there’s any hope for me. I’ve been on a downward spiral for almost a year now.
New Megathread Nerds!!!
-
🐶 Join the unofficial Hexbear-adjacent Mastodon instance toots.matapacos.dog
-
🌈 If you ever want to make your own megathread, you can go here nerd
@aaaaaaadjsf@hexbear.net @Abraxiel@hexbear.net@Acute_Engles@hexbear.net @AntiOutsideAktion@hexbear.net @Alaskaball@hexbear.net @AlicePraxis@hexbear.net @Aliveelectricwire@hexbear.net @artificialset@hexbear.net @asa_red_heathen@hexbear.net @autismdragon@hexbear.net @Awoo@hexbear.net @bbnh69420@hexbear.net @buh@hexbear.net @CDommunist@hexbear.net @Cherufe@hexbear.net @ClimateChangeAnxiety@hexbear.net @Comp4@hexbear.net @ComradeCmdrPiggy@hexbear.net @ComradeEchidna@hexbear.net @context@hexbear.net @corgiwithalaptop@hexbear.net @CrispyFern@hexbear.net @CriticalOtaku@hexbear.net @Cromalin@hexbear.net @CyborgMarx@hexbear.net @Dirt_Owl@hexbear.net @Dolores@hexbear.net @drinkinglakewater@hexbear.net @ElChapoDeChapo@hexbear.net @ElectronNumberSeven@hexbear.net @ElGosso@hexbear.net @EmmaGoldman@hexbear.net @FALGSConaut@hexbear.net @Flinch@hexbear.net @Frank@hexbear.net @Frogmanfromlake@hexbear.net @FuckyWucky@hexbear.net @GalaxyBrain@hexbear.net @Goadstool@hexbear.net @Grownbravy@hexbear.net @GVAGUY3@hexbear.net @HarryLime@hexbear.net @hexaflexagonbear@hexbear.net @Ho_Chi_Chungus@hexbear.net @HornyOnMain@hexbear.net @InevitableSwing@hexbear.net @iridaniotter@hexbear.net @jabrd@hexbear.net @JamesConeZone@hexbear.net @Kaputnik@hexbear.net @kristina@hexbear.net @LesbianLiberty@hexbear.net @Magician@hexbear.net @MaxOS@hexbear.net @Melina@hexbear.net @Mindfury@hexbear.net @mkultrawide@hexbear.net @Nagarjuna@hexbear.net @Nakoichi@hexbear.net @PaulSmackage@hexbear.net @PaX@hexbear.net @plinky@hexbear.net @Pluto@hexbear.net @PorkrollPosadist@hexbear.net @President_Obama@hexbear.net @Ram_The_Manparts@hexbear.net @Redcuban1959@hexbear.net @RION@hexbear.net @RNAi@hexbear.net @Rojo27@hexbear.net @SeventyTwoTrillion@hexbear.net @SorosFootSoldier@hexbear.net @Sickos@hexbear.net @silent_water@hexbear.net @Sphere@hexbear.net @take_five_seconds@hexbear.net @Teekeeus@hexbear.net @Tervell@hexbear.net @UlyssesT@hexbear.net @VHS@hexbear.net @viva_la_juche@hexbear.net @WhatDoYouMeanPodcast@hexbear.net @Wheaties@hexbear.net @WhyEssEff@hexbear.net @WIIHAPPYFEW@hexbear.net @wtypstanaccount04@hexbear.net @wombat@hexbear.net @Zoift@hexbear.net
@thelastaxolotl@hexbear.net @WhoaSlowDownMaurice@hexbear.net @Quimby@hexbear.net
@CARCOSA@hexbear.net @liberal@hexbear.net @ella@hexbear.net @all_or_nothing@hexbear.net @KenBonesWildRide@hexbear.net @KiraNerys@hexbear.net @TomboyShulk@hexbear.net @DuckNuckem@hexbear.net @SapGreen@hexbear.net @Zangief@hexbear.net @scumlord@hexbear.net @COMMENT@hexbear.net @Antisocial_Socialist@hexbear.net @DOPESMOKERDENG@hexbear.net @BoarAvoir@hexbear.net
No current struggle session discussion here on the new general megathread, i will ban you from the comm and remove your comment, have a good day/night :meow-coffee:
Aki Kaurismäki reading this mega and a single tear rolls down his cheek
ayyup
HELLO
First.
Howdy
-
me when my coworkers are talking about what streaming services they pay for while i watch everything off of dodgy websites i found on the r/piracy megathread hosted in the global south somewhere
European medieval movies: Everyone is wearing brown and covered in shit, everything is awful and miserable and ignorant, everything sucks
Chinese, Japanese, Korean medieval movies: people spend tons of time hanging out in clean, well appointed inns. Anyone who isn’t poor is wearing nice clothes. There’s rule of law and cops and stuff. There are civil police, doctors (who can fly because reasons), cities and towns are clean and organized, people routinely travel long distances if relative comfort.
I’m in Mexico.
There used to be a sort of socialist movement and commune in a rather obscure place called Munsala in Ostrobothnia, about 80 or so kilometers north of Vaasa. The Munsala socialism, or Munsala radicalism, they called it. It was started by people from the region who returned after having emigrated to the US in the late 1800’s. Many of them had found that US labour rights were absolutely fucked, and had began to work with various labour movements, and eventually discovered Marxism. A few dudes that returned home to Munsala in the early 1900’s started spreading the good word of Karl Marx in the region, and it was very popular among the almost entirely agrarian proletariat. It was a also rather religious movement. The local preachers took to incorporating the teachings of Marx in their sermons. They emphasised pacifism, sobriety, education, and parliamentarianism.
That is, until the civil war broke out. The Munsala socialists mostly tried to stay out of it, but since the whites had decided to base themselves in Vaasa (80km away) and Pietarsaari/Jakobstad (30km away), they found themselves pretty much at the heart of enemy territory. They were often harassed by whites and cops, and used guerrilla style hidey holes in the local forests to hide. Many who didn’t hide were captured and executed or fled to Sweden. During the second world war, many Munsala socialists refused to fight, because of the finnish state’s alliance with Hitler and therefore its support for fascism. The able bodied men went back into hiding in their old forest hidey holes, while the rest of the village kept watch for cops and whites. In the 1930’s, a Munsala socialist and teacher named Walter Blomqvist fled to the US. He eventually ended up in Cuba, where he supposedly hung out with Castro and Che and took part in the revolution (here is an interview with the guy, in swedish)
Machine translated summary
Munsala idealist Walter Blomqvist moved to Cuba in the early 1930s. He experienced many stages of Cuba’s modern and bloody history and became friends with Fidel Castro and Che Guevara. Listen to him recount his fascinating memories.
It was something of the Viking blood in the Munsala people that made elementary school teacher Walter Blomqvist leave the safety of Ostrobothnia and head out into the world. Via Sweden, Norway and Denmark, he acquired a taste for the big world. But he became increasingly anxious. He liked Munsala, but wanted to develop himself and the Munsala ideas.
Walter Blomqvist travelled in 1929 with a small suitcase to study in Birmingham. There he applied for and received a scholarship to Columbia University in New York.
Blomqvist had only fourteen dollars in his pocket when he arrived in New York. The first time in New York was therefore very difficult. But Blomqvist made contact with the Finnish-Swedish emigrant community.
During his studies, Blomqvist met a Cuban girl, fell in love and got married. They couldn’t stay in the US because Blomqvist only had a student visa, so they travelled down to Havana, Cuba.
As soon as Blomqvist arrived in Cuba, he fell in love with the country, the nature and the Cubans. There was a strange bright light over nature. But he was also upset by the huge gaps between rich and poor. For example, the plight of sugar cane workers.
The country was held in a strong dictatorship by Fudgenico Batista, after a coup in 1952. But with the coup came an uprising against the dictatorship. Being the Munsala idealist that Blomqvist was, he became interested in the situation there and in the youth trying to resist the dictatorship. Walter Blomqvist believed that Cuba was in need of a great revolution, which came in 1959.
Blomqvist had several personal contacts with Fidel Castro and Che Guevara. We hear anecdotes about Fidel and Che.
Walter met Che Guevara for the first time when he came down from the mountains. He was bearded and big, almost as tall as Fidel. But when Blomqvist and a Finnish journalist, Eva Aminoff, met Che as Minister of Industry in a luxury palace, it was strange to see the bearded, unshaven man among the luxury items.
The Munsala Socialism is said to have been eradicated in the 70’s, after fur farming became a thing. It brought in vast amounts of money and resources to the thus far poor agrarian community, which “did away with any need for socialism”.
This whole thing is of great personal meaning to me, because I grew up quite close to Munsala. I’ve driven through Munsala a fair few times. My grandma and grandpa both have roots in Munsala. Me and many in my family speak the same (or a similar) swedish dialect spoken in Munsala. So by all accounts, this should be common knowledge, or at least something I would have been taught, but no. I never ever once, not even a litte, heard of this before. Not a word about it in school or anything. Unbelievable. First time I heard of this was in maybe 2015, when a random woman at an anarchist café in Turku (southwest finland) overheard me saying something in swedish. She could tell I was from Ostrobothnia by the dialect, I guess. She asked if I’m from there, and I said that yeah, but I didn’t really like it because of its still very prevalent white (both as in mayo and as in wrong side of the civil war) mindset and culture. She told me to not feel bad about it, because there is a vast and colourful history of labour movements and class struggle there, “for example the Munsala Socialists”.
Finnish natopedia article: https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munsalan_radikalismi
Here is one article and videos about it in swedish: https://svenska.yle.fi/a/7-883429
full documentary, also in swedish: https://areena.yle.fi/1-4261007
Doesn’t seem to be available with subtitles either. It’s unfortunately very hard to find any more information about this in English. Erased history, I suppose.
This is really cool to hear, as I was also never taught about socialist movements besides the civil war.
The local preachers took to incorporating the teachings of Marx in their sermons. They emphasised pacifism, sobriety, education, and parliamentarianism
Notoriously sober peace guy who likes paliarments, Charles Marks.
Some day you will pass this information on to the next generation the same way it was passed to you and that kid you tell will go on to ignite the revolution in Finland from their secret base in the woods outside Munsala.
I actually fucking hate JPEGMAFIA. As if what he did wasn’t bad enough, his response to the criticism makes this all so much worse. The gall for this piece of shit to call anyone mad at him a redditor. Don’t worry guys it’s fine for him to pose, collab with, sing the praises of Nazis, it’s all non-political and he can’t agree with their politics because they hate black people…?
Stupid prick made his entire brand political and is surprised when people are disappointed with him palling around the same fascistic losers he used to talk shit about in his songs. Fuck him and fuck Kanye. And fuck every veteran who doesn’t feel deep deep shame over being a veteran, that was always a red flag with him, he never had enough shame over his time in the air force
ngl I hate the term “redditor”, especially since redditors started calling each other that as an insult. I don’t listen to a lot of music (I am the ‘everything has to be serious all the time’ copypasta person) so I never listened to his stuff
The everything has to be serious all the time music genre is listening to carmina burana all the time really loud. Oh fortuna is the most serious. Orff orff orff orff orff
too emotional and dramatic
His music was never good and i dont even know whats going on with him right now
His music was never good
says who? I enjoy his music
Me, Mokey.
It’s so funny that steamboat willie mickey mouse is quite literally a legally distinct ripoff of an earlier character design that Walt Disney did when under contract somewhere else. Something beautiful about constantly rewriting copyright law to extend protections of a character that was used to circumvent copyright law to begin with.
It’s all bullshit. People are big mad palworld ripped off pokmans and it’s like sthfu it’s its a cartoon fox. It’s a fox. It’s a fox with big eyes. Fuck you who cares?
>looking for a new hyperfixation
>ask the fandom if their niche media is homestuck or touhou
they dont understand
>pull out illustrated diagram explaining what is homestuck and what is touhou
>they laugh and say "it's a good work maam"
>delve into the work
its homestuckSpeaking of Finns it is amazing to follow my fellow Finns, the progressive lib edition, discover yet again that those with most electroral funding are those who end up getting most votes.
Gee, I wonder what could explain this?
This is rediscovered every time, then there is a 2 second long outrage. Then back to enjoying privileges for a few years again.
I openly stated today that I did not vote at all. Why would I vote for “a left option” that opted for Nato? I have to go visit the Pispala memorial soon, to remind myself that there used to be class conscious and anti-imperialist folks here too.
