Day 30. 83,284 words.

I think the past couple of years have just left me (and probably a lot of other people) completely exhausted and generally done with the whole democratic process of elections and society-building.

Case in point, on Sunday Finland held its presidential election. Since I’m not allowed to vote (local elections only, for now), I wasn’t following it particularly closely but from what I hear, there wasn’t much interest in it among my assorted circles of native-Finnish family and friends either.

There were eight main players, each more colourless than the last (somehow, paradoxically, regardless of the order you put them in).

“Now I respect my opponent. I think he’s a good man but, quite frankly, I agree with everything he just said!”

The only real points of interest, sadly, were the True Finns’ isolationist bigot party’s candidate with her apparently non-ironic populist message about closing Finland’s borders, toughening up on immigration, and “taking Finland back”…

Her tagline was “paperit, kiitos”, or “papers, please” – not at all a World-War-II-era Gestapo trope. This is what is actually allowed to happen in politics in 2018.

…and McDonald’s semi-epic trolling of the whole system by announcing an election for their best burger. Just for clarity, each presidential candidate has a number, which is how you vote for them – by writing the number on your ballot paper.

And just to make sure you get all the levels here, their double-cheese candidate corresponds to Merja Kyllönen of the Left Alliance; their double-bacon candidate is Pekka Haavisto of the Green party (he made a splash last election because he’s not only a Green, he’s also gay – and I want to say the “double bacon” is a gay joke, but even if it’s not I love the way “Pekka” and “Pekoni” work as a pun); their Big Mac candidate is Matti Vanhanen of the Centre Party; their El Maco Deluxe candidate is Laura “Papers Please” Huhtasaari of the PerusSuomalaiset (what a fucking stroke of absolute arse-rainbowing genius, McDonalds, I salute you with the intensity of a thousand exploding suns); and their McVegan candidate is Tuula Haatainen of the Social Democrats.

Anyway, to cut a dull story short, the incumbent (or should I say … recumbent?) President Niinistö won[1] and Green candidate Haavisto came in second. This is hardly surprising since Haavisto gathers the majority of the progressive Helsinki votes, while Niinistö gets … well, pretty much all of the not-Helsinki parts of Finland.

[1] And it was a pretty gigantic landslide, which to me really makes sense. First of all, I haven’t even noticed his presidency over the past six years, except for that time he passive-aggressively suggested Trump couldn’t tell two blonde women apart. That means he’s basically done nothing, and that’s a perfect thing for a president to do. As long as he’s not literally a Nazi, that’s how low my standards are now.

Sadly, Less Convincing And Charismatic Elsa Schneider got third place with something like 7% of the vote, which … well, yeah. It’s shit, but even I have to say her campaign was the most (or indeed only) interesting one. I mean, I mainly heard about it because I’m an immigrant and it got a lot of attention among immigrants … but it is what it is. I guess we all knew that about one in ten people was an ignorant fear-driven xenophobic cuntweasel, and here’s our statistical proof.

And yeah, before anyone complains about my attribution of motive to these voters, or my lumping of them into an unfair and unhelpful “racist” category, you’re right. I’m sure it’s more complicated than that and they all have different reasons for their vote.

But they voted for a creationist Trump supporter who wants to close Finland’s borders[2][3], pull us out of the European Union and withdraw us from the Paris Climate Agreement. So fuck them. They’re dumb, and they’re arseholes.

[2] Newsflash: Finland’s borders aren’t open. There’s a case to be made for the EU-internal immigration traffic problem, since immigrants and refugees and assorted troublemakers can enter the EU in some other place and then make their way to Finland quite easily. I’m all for shoring up that whole system and making it work better. I’m all for stopping crime. But the Perssut have no practical answers to this, because withdrawing from the EU and “closing the borders” might get them votes (from idiots) but all it will achieve will be the destruction of Finland. It will achieve nothing else. If there are Islamist Finland-haters out to destroy Finland, this will achieve their goals and they won’t even need to buy winter gear.

[3] Moreover, since I’ve got you here, Finland’s immigration policies are fucking solid and pretty damn strict. I know this because I have been deported. Now, the easy answer to this is “ahh, but the system only punishes the law-abiding good immigrants, the criminals still get in.” First of all, take your crappy argument over to the gun control debate where it belongs, shit-for-brains. Second of all, yes. That could very well be the case. So do you know who’s going to get hurt by a stricter immigration policy? Even more law-abiding good immigrants than previously, that’s who. And you still won’t be erecting a magical goddamn criminal-immigrant-repelling shield. Fucktard.

*clears throat, wipes froth from beard*

Right. I think that’s enough politics for today.