Helsingin Sanomat reports on a study published Tuesday which suggests that one in five men in Finland believe that women may deserve violence perpetrated against them.

Among men under 35, the proportion rises to one in four who at least partially agree with the statement “a woman can deserve violence because of certain ways of dressing, her behavior or appearance.

The study did not define the term violence in the questions asked of men, so respondents could be referring to emotional, psychological, physical or economic violence.

“The situation is serious,” said Silla Kakkolawho chairs both the Finnish Violence Observatory and Nytkis, the coalition of women’s organizations in Finland.

“Not all men idealize violence, but far too many do.”

The survey found that about 78 percent of all-male respondents thought men should intervene more often when they hear insulting or objectifying comments about women.

Around 60 percent believe that gender equality has already been achieved in Finland.

Researchers received 1,058 responses to an online survey from men aged 18 to 79. The margin of error was 3.2 percentage points either way.

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NATO spending

Aamulehti wears a opinion article examining the implications of the new Trump presidency on Finland’s defense spending.

The president-elect has repeatedly demanded that NATO countries spend more money on defense, criticizing those that do not currently meet the alliance’s target of spending at least 2% of their GDP on their armies.

Finland is currently above the 2% threshold, but this figure could fall after 2027.

AL examines recent statements from Finnish politicians, most of whom seem to agree that a new target of 2.5 percent will likely be adopted soon.

There is some discord over how this could be financed, with the SDP MP Tytti Tuppurainen suggesting that a new common EU debt could finance the spending and that European states could potentially agree a new “social contract” to consolidate their consent to defense spending.

The reaction has not been positive from parties traditionally opposed to debt, with the Finnish party lawmaker Mika Bergbom calling such comments “irresponsible”.

The document seems quite clear, however: defense spending will increase once Trump enters the White House – in Finland and elsewhere.

Lapland tarmac

Iltalehti follows recent comments by a senior Defense Ministry official about the poor state of Finland’s road network in the north.

Janne Kuusela had said that Highway 21, from Tornio to Kilpisjärvi in ​​western Lapland, was narrow and risked supply bottlenecks in an emergency.

In the worst-case scenario, he said, troops defending Finland would instead arrive via the Norwegian and Swedish borders.

Tuesday IT request a defense expert to sketch out a scenario in which an attack could materialize in the north. Jaakko Puuperäeditor of the Nordic Defense Review, said the most likely scenario involved invaders crossing the border at Raja-Jooseppi with 10,000 to 20,000 troops.

They would move quickly from Salla to Kemijärvi, but would then quickly face supply problems as they attempted to push west.

Puuperä says the oft-repeated maxim that poor roads benefit defenders is not entirely true, as defense forces also need infrastructure.

He concedes, however, that poor roads are generally better for defenders than attackers.

He suggests that the consolidation and perhaps widening of the north-south connection in western Lapland is an important measure to ensure that any possible invasion can be stopped in the east, near the border, rather than to progress westwards towards Norway and the Atlantic.

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