Fact checking facts about "russification" of Finland
1. Hurr durr Nicholas 2 wanted to turn everyone into Russians.
False: He wanted to liberate Finnish people from swedish aristocracy
>Nicholas II said that the core of Finland’s problem was that "the Swedes are striving to regain their former dominant position in Finland, misleading a broad section of the people. Against such gentlemen, decisive action had to be taken."
2. Hurr durr bobrikov was a dictator who suppressed free speech.
Misleading: He targeted swedes and their allies who were advocating for separatism and called Finnish and Russian people mongol barbarians and were closely associated with Germany which posed a security risk
>Of the 116 newspapers published between 1899–1905, 46 (39.7%) were temporarily suspended and 26 (22.4%) permanently shut down. The language distribution of all newspapers published was as follows: 78 Finnish-language (67.2%) and 38 Swedish-language (32.8%). Although most of the suspended papers were Finnish, the relative share of Swedish-language papers was greater. Of all Swedish-language papers during this period, 30% were permanently closed and 52.6% suspended temporarily, whereas the corresponding figures for Finnish-language papers were 19.2% and 33.3%. In the early phase of mass closures, attention was directed especially at Swedish-language papers, six of which were shut down in 1900, while only one Finnish-language paper was closed.
>In Kotka and Käkisalmi, the closures carried out by the governor-general strengthened the position of the Old Finnish press.
>Arbetaren and, outside Helsinki, Länsi-Suomen Työmies, Kansan Lehti, and Itä-Suomen Työmies did not receive a single warning from Bobrikov throughout the entire period, nor were they ever shut down. It appears that political censorship from Russia had little effect on the workers’ press.