author:stefferi quiz
Stefferi
Chief Suomiposter
1yr ago
Just as an aside, I'm not a sports fan, but I go to pub quizzes regularly in a team that consists of sports fans (pretty useful since pub quizzes regularly contain a lots of sports trivia), and while they're primarily soccer fans and know each other as local team supporters, they also follow other sports like hockey, pesäpallo (Finnish baseball variant), track sports etc. Young guys, 30+.
Stefferi
Chief Suomiposter
1yr ago
To hell with David Bowie - we were just at a pub music quiz and despite the fact that all members of the team had extensively listened to Station to Station, we still got the question "What song has this lyric: It's not the side-effects of the cocaine / I'm thinking that it must be love" wrong.
Stefferi
Chief Suomiposter
2yr ago
Ted Kaczynski - the Unabomber - is dead.
I always found it interesting how, when I first learned about this guy, he was mostly portrayed as an ecoterrorist. The spectre of ecoterrorism and animal rights terrorism actually probably loomed larger in the 90s and early 00s than now, which might explain this. There was even a popular quiz with Unabomber and Al Gore quotes, purporting to demonstrate that the former American VP was just as extreme as the Unabomber.
However, if one actually reads the manifesto, or his other work, it soon becomes fairly clear the ecological aspect was not the central point of his critique, and didn't actually feature in it too much at all. He clearly felt some sort of a connection to the anarchoprimitivist and eco-anarchist movements, but mostly in the way of believing they might be allies and converts to his cause, not in the way of actually being one.
No, Ted K.'s true problem with the technological society was that it made people leftist. Since this is immediately obvious when one actually reads the manifesto in even a cursory way, and since during the last decades, parts of the extremely online right seem to have adopted "Uncle Ted" as some sort of a prophet, I don't suppose this actually needs much demonstrating, but to quote it:
Almost everyone will agree that we live in a deeply troubled society. One of the most widespread manifestations of the craziness of our world is leftism, so a discussion of the psychology of leftism can serve as an introduction to the discussion of the problems of modern society in general.
But what is leftism? During the first half of the 20th century leftism could have been practically identified with socialism. Today the movement is fragmented and it is not clear who can properly be called a leftist. When we speak of leftists in this article we have in mind mainly socialists, collectivists, “politically correct” types, feminists, gay and disability activists, animal rights activists and the like. But not everyone who is associated with one of these movements is a leftist. What we are trying to get at in discussing leftism is not so much movement or an ideology as a psychological type, or rather a collection of related types. Thus, what we mean by “leftism” will emerge more clearly in the course of our discussion of leftist psychology. (Also, see paragraphs 227-230.)
Even so, our conception of leftism will remain a good deal less clear than we would wish, but there doesn’t seem to be any remedy for this. All we are trying to do here is indicate in a rough and approximate way the two psychological tendencies that we believe are the main driving force of modern leftism. We by no means claim to be telling the WHOLE truth about leftist psychology. Also, our discussion is meant to apply to modern leftism only. We leave open the question of the extent to which our discussion could be applied to the leftists of the 19th and early 20th centuries.
The two psychological tendencies that underlie modern leftism we call “feelings of inferiority” and “oversocialization.” Feelings of inferiority are characteristic of modern leftism as a whole, while oversocialization is characteristic only of a certain segment of modern leftism; but this segment is highly influential.
Not that this criticism is INVALID, of course, as such - I just always found it interesting how, despite the fact that Ted K. got what he wanted and his manifesto was printed very visibly in newspapers - the actual contents then went pretty much ignored until recently, and even now are acknowledged mainly in small and fringe circles. I don't suppose his death will ameliorate that situation.
Stefferi
Chief Suomiposter
2yr ago
FINNISH MP LEFT OR RIGHT QUIZ - PART 2 AND FURTHER ANALYSIS
(Previous results/analysis post here)
The second part of my quiz for trying to guess whether Finnish MPs are left- or right-wing based on pictures got 70 answers, less than the first one (very expected) but still enough to get some more statistics. This time the average number of correct answers was 11.62 / 20, slightly better than previously but still essentially not that different from random chance.
List of MPs based on how many got them correct (ie. guessed correctly that left-wing MPs are leftwing and contrariwise)
LEFT MPs
99 %: Satu Hassi (Greens)
83 %: Eveliina Heinäluoma (Social Democrats)
81 %: Mirka Soinikoski (Greens)
70 %: Eeva-Johanna Eloranta (Social Democrats)
47 %: Tuula Väätäinen (Social Democrats)
43 %: Jari Myllykoski (Left Alliance)
29 %: Johannes Koskinen (Social Democrats)
Right MPs:
73 %: Veikko Vallin (The Finns)
73 %: Markus Lohi (Centre)
73 %: Kalle Jokinen (National Coalition)
71 %: Tuomas Kettunen (Centre)
61 %: Sari Multala (National Coalition)
61 %: Mika Lintilä (Centre)
57 %: Paula Risikko (National Coalition)
54 %: Terhi Koulumies (National Coalition)
53 %: Marko Kilpi (National Coalition)
54 %: Pekka Aittakumpu (Centre)
41 %: Jaana Pelkonen (National Coalition)
21 %: Sari Essayah (Christian Democrats)
17 %: Ruut Sjöblom (National Coalition)
General comments:
Physiognomy isn't really scoring points, as a theory. There are certainly indicators in dressing styles etc. (ie. red glasses and huge jewelry signifies left-wing allegiances, clean conservative dressing implies the right camp) that allow people to assign people to left/right camps, even across a modest cultural barrier, and some people were indeed succesful using those indicators, but faces alone don't seem to suffice for this purpose. Like someone said, when people talk about physiognomy, it probably usually just means "I can pick my political opponents from my political supporters because my opponents are ugly and my supporters are not).
The trend of people generally getting left-wing women and right-wing men correct continues. There's probably a strong association, particularly, with young women being left-wing and older men being right-wing, and indeed similar there is currently a developing tendency in Finland for this direction - but the traditional left parties (Left Alliance, Social Democrats) continue have a large amount of traditional working-class older male politicians still drawing a lot of votes, while the National Coalition has made a huge (and succesful) effort to draw in young women and offer them important roles in the party.
The American association of right with red tribe and left with blue tribe also creates a certain difference to Finland, where there are still significant (though contracting) pockets of rural left-wing support and, contrariwise, a right-wing party (National Coalition) that is both urban and urbane, getting some of their largest support from the capital region of Finland and also having worked hard to create an image of a right-wing party than educated, cultured urbanites can very well support, at least if they are wealthy enough.
This might be one of the things where MPs are less-than-optimal for making such guesses, as political parties will know their "type" and also know they have to sometimes actively work to privilege potential applicants outside of this type to expand their appeal. On the other hand, I'm not sure there are optimal constituencies for an experiment like this.
Cultural signifiers continue to play a role. For instance, while one might argue about the definitions of left and right here - many of the right-camp MPs here would probably be the sort of social liberal pro-market types who would make absolutely no bones about that in US they'd be Democrats - there are also some strong social conservatives here that were difficult for many. Sari Essayah represents Christian Democrats, probably the only party in Finland that really represents Christian conservatism (The Finns also sort of do but mostly concentrate on anti-immigration, anti-EU and anti-environmentalist agendas) and which still campaigns against permissive abortion laws or same-sex marriage.
Pekka Aittakumpu, who was put on the right by 54 %, is also a Christian conservative, one of the few ones in parties outside of Christian Democrats or The Finns. So many people putting Aittakumpu on the left was a surprise to me, he's a conservative Lutheran pastor from Northern Finland and to me he also very much looks like one.
If one wants to run such an experiment in the future, it might be interesting to use American state-level politicians - I would not expect Americans to know state-level politicians from outside their state, or inside their state, as well. And could Europeans pick Democrats from Republicans by face alone? Of course there would be the factor that most ethnic minority politicians would be Democrats, but it would also be interesting if there are different looks between, for instance, Democratic and Republican Hispanic pols.
Finnish MP Quiz: Initial results
(note: I've created a second equivalent quiz, you may click here to take it if you want to test yourself more without reading analysis)
The quiz has been taken 237 times (at the moment of writing). The best results has been 19/20 (this may have been just me testing the quiz, though). The worst result is 3/20. The average result is 10.8 - while this looks like only a little better than random change, it should be mentioned that evidently not all answered every question.
Going through the individual MP's, here's how they rank on the basis of how correctly they were guessed (in other words, the number shows how many people correctly guessed a left MP as leftist or a right MP as rightist):
LEFT MPs
97 % Pia Lohikoski (Left Alliance)
77 % Tiina Elo (Greens)
68 % Anneli Kiljunen (Social Democrats)
65 % Seppo Eskelinen (Social Democrats)
64 % Pirkka-Pekka Petelius (Greens)
50 % Kimmo Kiljunen (Social Democrats)
47 % Ville Skinnari (Social Democrats)
14 % Markus Mustajärvi (Left Alliance)
RIGHT MPs
73 % Vilhelm Junnila (The Finns)
71 % Janne Heikkinen (National Coalition)
68 % Mauri Peltokangas (The Finns)
64 % Ville Vähämäki (The Finns)
58 % Wille Rydman (National Coalition, currently independent pending review)
52 % Jouni Kotiaho (The Finns)
51 % Kai Mykkänen (National Coalition)
42 % Kaisa Juuso (The Finns)
41 % Hannakaisa Heikkinen (Centre)
32 % Ville Valkonen (National Coalition)
30 % Hanna Kosonen (Centre)
25 % Riikka Slunga-Poutsalo (The Finns)
QUICK THOUGHTS:
The fact that there is one MP who was correctly guessed by 97 % shows people have tried to answer the quiz seriously, for the most part. It's not surprising that Pia Lohikoski would be guessed correctly by the most, as there are several cultural signals (red hair, glasses, jewelry) that probably are more associated with left-wingness than right-wingness interculturally.
On the other hand, her party comrade Markus Mustajärvi was the most wrongly guessed person in the quiz; it probably should be mentioned that while both indeed belong to the leftmost party in the Finnish parliament, Mustajärvi is probably the most "red-tribe-equivalent" leftist politician in the country, representing the deepest reaches of Lapland, being very much a "trad leftist" type, opposing for instance gun control bills when they have occasionally been proposed, once causing a scandal by drunkenly addressing a far-right rally etc.
Generally speaking, I suspect many simply associated women with left wing and men with right wing. Finnish political dress codes for women are typically looser than in countries like US and "normie dresses" and such are pretty normal female politician-wear; the sort of a "power pantsuit" you'd associate with Hillary Clinton, Kamala Harris, Nancy Pelosi etc. would be reserved to a very distinct class of right-wing female politicians.
The two female politicians from the Centre were guessed more incorrectly than correctly, and Centre, indeed, would probably be the party whose members would most likely resent me placing them in the "Right" category; this party, stereotypically representing rural interests, identifies as centrist (as the name says) and is in government with the three left-wing parties, but it also constantly fights with those parties in all manner of policy issues, recently almost bringing down the government, and at least at this point I would guess most Finns would place the party on the Right.
Some people said that 20 pols is too little and they want to test again if they are now better at a particular form of cultural pattern-matching, so I've created a second quiz with 20 more MPs. My subjective appraisal is that this might be a little bit easier?
Stefferi
Chief Suomiposter
2yr ago
I was planning on sharing them tomorrow. However, my current thinking is that I'll make another quiz with 20 other pols after that, to see if getting a grip on certain ways Finnish pols of left or right look might help people answer better. After that a more comprehensive post on analysis on Monday.
CAN YOU RECOGNIZE LEFT-WINGERS FROM RIGHT-WINGERS FROM FACE ALONE?
I've seen numerous people on Twitter etc. claim that they can indeed do this, so I've created a quiz to test this claim. This quiz has 20 Finnish MP's essentially selected randomly (I took their photos from the Parliament's webpage, organized them alphabetically using medium icons and then just removed the middle part of this collage, leaving a bit over 20 photos: after removing the Swedish People's Party members for not fitting the ideological scale that well and taking one out for wearing a party pin, I was left with exactly 20 photos). Note: pics are displayed in randomized order.
The MP's represent six parties, but all you have to do here is select: Left or Right? Those representing the parties Social Democrats, Greens and Left Alliance are Left, those representing the parties Centre, National Coalition and The Finns are Right.
I will offer one hint: you cannot use tie color/dress color (ie. politicians wearing party-color dresses and ties) to make consistently correct guesses.
Stefferi
Chief Suomiposter
2yr ago
Pub quizzes are good fun, and often a good fit for the kind of a person who obsessively and constantly scours the Internet for all sorts of information, as I suspect many here are.
I'm lucky to be in a team full of people with excellent sports and light entertainment knowledge, since those are often-present topics that I'm not particularly good with.
Of course finding a team might be an issue, I kind of stumbled to mine through a friend.
I went to a sport game for the first time in my life, a soccer match at my hometown's brand new soccer stadium. I happen to know a fair amount of the main local team's supporters (I've participated in their pub quiz team for some years), and I now for the first time followed them to the supporter stands of the team itself. I was surprised how much I got into it - definitely different live than when watching from TV/stream and getting distracted by a million little things. A 2-2 draw but some exciting gameplay nevertheless.
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