Never ask a Finnish wolf which side its great-great-great-great-grandparents were on in WWII

This is a country with a long and dark history of farmer wolf hate

👏 let wolves farm👏

Farmers just hate wolves so much. They put up propaganda billboards along the roadways near me basically advocating for exterminating the tiny locally endangered population, trying to get hunters to shoot them or getting tourists to complain to the government.

Every time I see that shit I just think maybe it isn't the wolves that need to be culled.

Also the mythical finnish forests have indeed been a myth for a long ass time. When you go anywhere here today the nature you are most likely to see is clear cut lumber monoculture. The stuff in the tourist brochures really doesn't relate to reality.

The practices of the forestry industry have been so destructive and there really isn't much old forest left. The oldest and most diverse small patches of forest are often near cities where it gets preserved as an area for the urban dwellers by the city. Or carefully selected in tourist heavy areas like Saamenmaa, but the areas are tiny compared to how big the country is. In more rural areas there hasn't been much diverse forest present in a long long time now, Finnish Karelia for example is pretty depressing. It's mostly wood farming monoculture practices that render the forests vulnerable to pests and destroy the environment.

All the land has been dried for maximum lumber output. Trout used to migrate through the forests here a hundred years ago, there is nothing to migrate through now. The wolves and other big predators are hated by the hunting kulaks who both poach and "legally" kill as many as they can. The legality comes from the bougie state that is very much an arm of these same interests. They get to do whatever they want. Same as in mining. The Sami have been driven off their land and the latest bougies to enter the picture in Saamenmaa are israeli business people who are in bed with the local bougies.

None of it is environmental, it's always been like this since the country became "european". Back when there was a slash and burn culture here the relationship to land was complelety different, no land ownership existed. The only positive that is still left over from this is the fairly strong right to roam law, but the bougies hate it. I am sure it will go next.

The history of Finnish lumber capitalism is dark af and one big reason for local bougies going full nazi was the "green gold" of Karelia. The industry was heavily tied to the British empire and later nazi germany. This is just a continuation of that.

I bet that could be extrapolated to just "lumber capitalism."

The Finnish bourgeoisie has shown itself to be both willing and able to disregard any aspect of preserving local nature if given the promise of profits. In fact, the same bougies have been fucking over the Sámi minorities' rights for at least as long as modern Finland has existed. The absolute hypocrisy of the Finnish elite is frankly disgusting.