Finnish study on attitudes to social justice - surprising finding

[RoyalCorgi]

I came across this earlier. It's about a Finnish academic who developed a scale to measure how committed people were to social justice ideas. (He found that the more 'woke' you were, the more likely to be depressed, but leave that for one moment.) The scale for measuring wokeness included asking about attitudes towards race and transgender issues.

The study found that "critical social justice attitudes are not as widespread in Finland as might be inferred from public and media discussions. Overall, the findings suggested a cautious reception towards critical social justice among the general population. This observation was particularly pronounced among male participants, who showed considerably lower agreement with the statements compared to their female counterparts."

While three out of five women view "woke" ideas positively, only one out of seven men do.

I'm not completely surprised that people aren't as woke as you think (we all know about preference falsification) but I am a little surprised at the large difference between men and women.

https://www.psypost.org/study-woke-attitudes-linked-to-anxiety-depression-and-a-lack-of-happiness/

Finland is not like America. I'm shocked.

Ironically, Finland is a vastly more egalitarian society than the US, or even the UK, can ever hope to be, beating the US and UK on virtually every measure of wellbeing. They're not "woke" because their entire society is geared towards inclusion and egalitarianism and the structural inequalities that resulted in the rise of the social justice movement in the US don't really exist.

Oh, and personal pronouns are gender neutral in Finnish (everyone is hän regardless of sex) so that scuppers that one. Although it's always amusing speaking to older Finnish customers (younger ones are always perfectly fluent in English) who absent-mindedly use he/she him/her interchangeably when speaking English.

I'd imagine it would be similar in many countries.
The "woke" are just very loud, but are then shocked when things like Brexit happen. Maybe if they shut up and listened once in a while, instead of screeching racist/transphobe, they might learn something.

There are various studies coming out showing that young men are becoming more conservative and it is young women who are promoting 'woke' policies.
So Finland is in line with that.

It's also not surprising to me that most people don't support illogical immoral divisive policies, and can see the woke agenda as just that.

People are not as stupid as politicians think. But are usually just getting on with their lives and not shouting on social media.

The link between woke type ideology and poor mental health is also well established.

For a long time studies have shown conservatives are happier than left wing people.

The reasons for that are interesting to think about: maybe one is an acceptance of reality instead of a fixation on an unattainable utopia.

Another might be that we also know having a belief in a central locus of control is correlated with good mental health, and is a core concept in conservative thinking.

The belief that systems around you control your outcomes is unsurprisingly a depressing way to think about your life and your role in it.

So I conclude from the study in the OP: Finns are normal humans shock!

This You Tube video puts forward the argument that much modern psychotherapy makes people unhappier and the woke psychology movement is designed to disrupt and break down what I can only describe as the social contract. It's no wonder that so many young people, encouraged by school and social media to focus on identity and happiness and their best life, are depressed:
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"He disliked nearly all women, and especially the young and pretty ones. It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies and nosers−out of unorthodoxy." 1984

I always thought this was just sexist crap written by George Orwell, but maybe it was an observation on how women can be toxic/brainwashed too. (Of course seen from the male view)

Ironically, Finland is a vastly more egalitarian society than the US, or even the UK, can ever hope to be, beating the US and UK on virtually every measure of wellbeing.

My experience of Finland (not very extensive, but I did work there for a while) is that (rather like Denmark) their 'progressive' egalitarian stance is underpinned by conservatism. At one point during my time there there was shock and disapproval about the way the newly-introduced 24 hour free state funded childcare was being exploited by people who were leaving their children in care over the weekends — even when the parents weren't working. Rules were changed and to ensure that anyone wanting to put their child into state care at night or at weekends could prove they were doing shiftwork.

I think it was an astute observation by Orwell.

Women tend to be much more focused on group cohesiveness and in group out group behaviour maintenance and monitoring. Particularly young women.

Women also tend to value the collective good more highly than individual freedom, and value free speech less highly than men.
( All small differences on average obviously but can impact at population levels.)

So if there are clear social rules, particularly ones which are supposedly based on the collective good women are more likely to adhere to, and monitor others adherence to these.

This obviously has good potential outcomes in forming strong safe communities, particularly for women and children, but can be manipulated and get out of control or be misdirected.

Women being more woke than men is then unsurprisingly

I think Malaga may be right, though I'm not sure. I think there is a lot of social pressure on women to be nice and to be kind, and maybe that translates into more progressive attitudes. It may be of course that women feel greater pressure than men to pretend to have progressive attitudes.

I can't find the figures but it seems to be the case that when it comes to mixed marriages, there are far more white women married to black men than black women married to white men, which suggests that women are perhaps less racist than men.

Then again, until recently, women were more likely to vote Conservative than men. What does that tell us? (Not a rhetorical question - I don't know the answer.)

The irony is that they claim their opponents are just very loud, and that overall they are in the majority. Driven in part by mainstream media pushing this while they ignore/discount all other media as right-wing propaganda.

I think if this is an example of a conservative mindset then I've lost track of what the word means. I would have thought that conservatives would be against state-funded childcare full stop?

When did this study take place? Because Finland's in a recession with a crashing CoL crisis and has been since Russia invaded Ukraine. So they might have other things on their mind right now.

That could also be the reason for Finnish men not having much time for progressive ideas? Bit difficult to hold progressive ideas on gender fluidity when you're aware that you share a border with Russia and could realistically be conscripted in the not too distant future.

I took it as a social conservatism perspective rather than a political one. As in, it’s okay to fund childcare for those who are working and contributing to the economy. Whilst objections were based on more of a social or moral conservatism i.e. a tsk tsk at parents putting their children into state funded care at the weekend to go enjoy themselves when they ought to be looking after their own children if they’re not at work.

Anyhow many run of the mill ‘liberal’ policies in the Nordic countries are seen as out and out socialism if not communist in the UK.

Not surprising. I live in Finland, most Finnish men I know aren't that interested in "woke" ideas though I expect its somewhat different inside of the capital region - everything is different there

I work with an Estonian and a Dane (so both quite close to Finland) - they were both absolutely incensed when I said that I always interviewed women, no matter their CV, vs. men who I filtered a bit more, even though I said that obviously I would only employ either if they met the requirements for the position, and I get 10:1 men to women applying. Because in my experience, women under-sold themselves on CVs, and tended to be more loyal once employed, plus clearly had some drive to be a minority in IT in the first place (and gave the example of how intimidating it is as the solitary 18year-old girl on a course to walk into a lecture filled with 100 18 year old boys)

I work in IT. I've heard the attitudes from blokes which are genuinely prejudiced and I've experienced first-hand the borderline (and over-the-line) harassment we have to put up with day to day in many companies, but they couldn't even agree with the slight attempt at adding balance.

So I think it's very dangerous to assume what we think of as 'woke' or 'conservative' blanket applies to other cultures.

I know Scandinavian culture reasonably well and would say they are definitely less woke because they focus on policies which actually support women and a more equal society rather than the nonsense we see in the UK.

Added for clarity: the nonsense that is woke

Here's another fun vid from Youtube, with regard to difference in the sexes for "Be Kind" type sympathies and the like. Thank Nefoedd that it's two women discussing it. Are Scandi counties currently more resistant to Feminisation?

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@CleftChin I also work in tech, and having worked with companies in the four main Nordic countries I would say that the systematic imbalances that are present in the sector in the UK are largely absent there - it is absolutely unremarkable to work with other women in roles from the deeply technical, to senior management. In the UK by contrast, I have customers without a single woman in the IT department, or if there are a couple they will be in non-technical roles. Perhaps this is where their mindset was?

Also, can we stop calling Finland a Scandi country please? 😂

Nothing to do with Finland, but can I say, I think 'woke' gets a bad rap? I reckon I support most of the things categorised as 'woke' these days. Except the gender nonsense. The phrase is a follow-on from the awful American term, 'social justice warrior'. Yeah, sure, people who campaign for a better world should be mocked. Well, the Trumpists think so. The problem is, the TRAs have been so successful in intertwining gender into the 'woke' lexicon.

@duc748 agreed - it's meaningless now, particularly in the UK where it's just the modern version of "political correctness gone mad." In the US, it originally had a very specific meaning in African-American English: to be awake to the effects of racial injustice. However it has been appropriated by white people and its meaning bastardised. Unsurprisingly, this upsets a lot of black people, however they tend to get denounced as "woke" if they dare to object. It's no different to using "gay" as an insult.

Finland has the biggest gap in school literacy between the sexes - the high ranking in international testing is down to the girls. Also despite being held up as an educational nirvana, they are gradually falling down the rankings.

I don't think it's probably all that helpful to decide that certain countries are "progressive" or not. It depends on some kind of agreed upon list of what things count as progress, which doesn't exist, for one thing.

Ultimately, many types of policy are trade-offs. And strong socialist policies often need to be accompanied by strong social cohesion and a sense of sacrifice to the group. Not just when people want, either. Very strong group norms, like the example with people not abusing free childcare, is deeply necessary.

All that being said - woke ideologies are essentially identity politics, and the imposition of simple hierarchical power structures on to certain categories. It's not surprising that most people anywhere are not enthralled by it, because it's so simplistic that it doesn't account for observable reality, and often directly opposed to more traditional liberal democratic values.

I'm not surprised that women are more likely to buy into it, and I would bet money that is true generally.

Also, can we stop calling Finland a Scandi country please?

Isn't it? You learn something new every day!

Yes, thank you. Like lovely easygoing, green, egalitarian Denmark where conformity is very important and social conservatism is wielded through quiet disapproval and chopping down of tall poppies, as well as rampant racism.