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474 Anssi Halmesvirta among them— certainly knew whom he meant. In Finland the caricature was published only in 1985 in a collection of over one thousand caricatures titled MaxiKari (Maxi-Kari 1985: 87). Evidently Kekkonen’s demise in the early 1980s had paved the way. Thereafter Kari’s caricatures were published in pictorial albums almost yearly so that others besides the readers of the Helsingin Sanomat could acquaint themselves with his humour of revelation—humour that ridiculed the Finnish authorities themselves. It is possible that it did not arouse so much laughter but rather suspicion and anger in Finnish society toward the Others (Blacks and Soviets) and the officials dealing with them. To conclude, Kari’s view of politics could be described as a distorted mirror of Finnish political culture. From a distance, opened for him by the Helsingin Sanomat, the softly dictatorial rule of Kekkonen appeared circus like, the president being the ringmaster and others acting as clowns and conjurers (see the analogy by Kari: Czechoslovakia = Kekkoslovakia). To Kari, the Soviet leader Khrushchev was the friendly but devious Other, a political player who knew how to monitor the public arena from outside Finland, sending warning messages—do not approach the West (the EEC, Nordic co-operation) —that alarmed the Finnish political elite. And its representatives had to bow down quite deep and, occasionally, make Canossa trips to Moscow (i.e. to explain and apologize for their unfriendly political line in order to restore trust between the countries), the lowest humiliation of Finnish pride to Kari. It is hard to imagine any other way the Finns would have been informed of the other side of coin of friendly pretensions of Finnish-Soviet relations. Regarding Kari’s depiction of Blacks as culturally distant and devious Others, one cannot imagine that any caricaturist would dare today, when there is again a flow of asylum seekers into Finland (approximately 35,000 in winter 2016), to use the same kind of poison brush as he did. Any art that might arouse so-called hate speech or prejudice against asylum seekers or other foreigners is now forbidden by law, and the Media Council and police monitor social media for any cases of slander or hate speech. Softening the hot issue somewhat, quite recently the president of Finland, Sauli Niinistô, used a low-key TV interview to teach asylum seekers proper behaviour: “In Finland, do as the Finns do!”—reminding us of the classic Roman model (“When in Rome, do as the Romans do”). Sources The Archives of the Finnish Media Council. National Archives of Finland, Helsinki. Decision no. 1702/ SL/90 with attachments. Helsingin Sanomat (Helsinki News). Lapin Kansa (Lapland People’), June 17, 1991.
