EntForgotHisPassword

Also very random to see the name in Finnish! Took me a few seconds to process that he was talking about Mariehamn på Åland.

English yes, Finnish maybe. Depends on what region you're in. I didn't speak Finnish properly until I had to for my work when I was like 21. I still don't speak it that well... Way easier to switch to English to get the conversation flowing when you're a group of people!

Also it has become socially more acceptable to do your service as a civil service instead of the army. Many men choose to just take the easy path out (army isnt't fun all times), instead of staying here for 6-12 months

As a proud civari I have to tell you to get off your high horse. I have many friends that were in the military and what they've told me sounds just plain ridiculous - running around in the forests playing "war" while smoking cigarettes/weed and bullshitting all day. Sure it was heavy, but it's not as if you needed to do anything psychologically heavy. You just had to do what you were told to do... No demands to think for yourself and figure out the best way to deal with situations.

I did my civil service for an elderly home where I took care of our veterans. That sure as fuck wasn't a psychologically easy job... They also seemed to dislike the image that's being portrayed of the army. They hate anything with war and they felt no pride in what they'd done. I remember one chilling time when a very quite patient suddenly started talking about how he was defending a hill and had to mow down 10's of russians advancing. At that time all he wanted was to go home, he was crying at the horrors, crying that good men were being forced to kill each other.

Hi I'm one of these "snobby" swedishspeaking finns. I don't speak Finnish. I just don't. I can try when I'm a bit drunk, but usually people won't understand me and I don't understand them. The people from the Western part of Finland have incredible difficulty with Finnish, since we're not surrounded with it. I've had people accuse me of being rude and snobby before, simply because I did not understand what was being said!

Public opinion in Finland is that nuclear weapons would only mean misery. No serious politician would ever even suggest it in jest. Even like the right wing pro-military anti-foreigner party wouldn't suggest it.

Though there is animosity and the future enemy is always assumed to be Russia, we are still neighbours. We trade with each other (when I was in school 40% if our export went to Russia, that has decreased now with EU and Russia sanctioning each other). We don't want to antagonize Russia for no good reason. Getting nukes would certainly be antagonizing them.