Evil Politicians! Film at 11!

[hankhank at ccwf.cc.utexas.edu]

Here's an example from someone who comes from one of the lagers in that
Village called Scandinavia, an example that might shed light to the issue.

I once audited a lecture by an American guy who teaches English at one 
of Finland's universities. His students include American exchange students. 
I don't know how it happened, and I don't really want to know, but once he
decided to show _Kramer vs. Kramer_ to a multinational class of his as a
part of a course on American culture or something. Reading the students'
analyses on the film was something of a shock to him, and he decided to
repeat the course including the film on a yearly basis. What is more,
he decided to concentrate on the episode where Meryl Streep analyses
the reasons which made her leave her family. ("I had to leave everything
to find myself", or something.)

It was the strongly differing attitudes between Finnish and American
female students toward Mrs. Kramer that attracted his attention. Nearly
all Finnish fem students - also those who regarded themselves as feminists
or quite sympathetic to feminism - thought that it was wrong of her to do
what she did. Whereas vast majority of American fem students thought that
what she did was just what she had to do, and their sympathies were
clearly on her side. (Most American males were, not unexpectedly, *not* on
Mrs. Kramer's side. I don't know how many avant-gardists the teacher
has confronted, who have declined to say anything about the film.)

In Northern Europe women seem to think that if they wanted to improve
their situation, they should carry it out in their own environment,
through their Caressing Social Democratic Community. (Or, in other words,
they cannot flee the community.) And to some extent they have succeeded.
But on the basis of my experiences (and I know many women who think the
same), this 'community' (it's not only the State) feels often quite
suppressing. American  masculinism is one thing (I stumble on it everywhere), 
as is the American brand of "individualism", but is there something to be
learned from Americans? Do Americans know better what it is to live in the
Zone? Because the world economy is getting so tough that Our Lovely
Social Democracy will not last long.
  
Heikki