Toni Ahvenainen
The Violence
Season of Tilt
Week 20, Wednesday
When I was around twenty, the town where I lived had social issues regarding racism. Finland had just received a minor (but major in our national history) amount of refugees from couple of African countries and it had raised some issues in many smaller towns. There was a certain racist mob in our town too and for some reason I had singled out as a target for their negative attention. In one summer night when I was alone at the streets bunch of them found me and tried to beat me. I escaped from their first attack and run as fast as I could, but there were too many of them and they succeeded exhausting me. I had run through couple of streets and town square when they finally drag me down like a prey at one street corner and gasping my breath I wasn't much of resistance. I can't say I remember much of the actual assault. They had boots with reinforced steel heads and some bars which they used to beat me. Some of the kicks hit me on the head and I lost my consciousness for a while. It felt like a pitch black state and could hear their laughter like it was coming somewhere very far away. I don't know how long they continued or why they stopped. I only remember that once it was done I reached out to nearest car on street and it took me to local hospital. I survived with minor bruises, but from the psychical point of view it was a horrible experience. Afterwards I had, for example, troubles to sleep or go to any open public space. They had broke me from the inside and I had lost my basic social security.
Later on it turned out that one of my friend had actually saw the assault. I asked him to testify it so I could sue the beaters and gain justice for what had happened. He refused and claimed that the assault was actually my own fault because I had been in the streets at night - the truth was he was as afraid of the racist mob as I was and didn't want to be take a stance against them in any way. With this experience I learned something about the nature of violence and why people will always accept and justify some amount of it. It doesn't matter if the violence is physical and happens at the streets, or institutional and is tied into politics of identity, people will accept some of it if it isn't targeted to their own group, because it will make them feel safe to see that it's 'others' who are suffering from it. People will also accept violence if it sustains the social and cultural order and they feel their own group is not targeted. I know, it's an cowardly act, but that's what people do by their nature because everyone is afraid of violence – especially in the war of all against all.
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This is the beginning of my last week of Season of Tilt. Therefore I feel I need to contemplate on my experiences. At the very early stages of this season (actually at second post) I said that the Lensbaby and their products present an approach which is very different from current commercially driven technical approach to photography, which emphasizes the technical qualities like lens sharpness, sensor performance, etc. I asked if this technical discourse of camera manufacturing is obliterating some aspects of photography. I can't say it is a condition that applies to whole photography world, but I can say that in some ways it has applied to me. Before using Lensbaby lenses I was very concentrated on technical matters like pixel perfect editing of my photographs (well, I still am). But by using Lensbaby I have given myself a permission to do other kind of photography what I wouldn't normally do, and it has, finally at the end of this season, led me to more personal photography – which I think is positive development. I've began to use photography to search my inner feelings & memories and tried to find a visual language for them – in this case it's the unscrupulousness of the nature. I see this turning point as a some sort of small victory and I'm happy to finally get there. If someone would ask me what's my experience with Lensbaby, this would be it.
Year of the Alpha – 52 Weeks of Sony Alpha Photography: www.yearofthealpha.com
The Violence
Season of Tilt
Week 20, Wednesday
When I was around twenty, the town where I lived had social issues regarding racism. Finland had just received a minor (but major in our national history) amount of refugees from couple of African countries and it had raised some issues in many smaller towns. There was a certain racist mob in our town too and for some reason I had singled out as a target for their negative attention. In one summer night when I was alone at the streets bunch of them found me and tried to beat me. I escaped from their first attack and run as fast as I could, but there were too many of them and they succeeded exhausting me. I had run through couple of streets and town square when they finally drag me down like a prey at one street corner and gasping my breath I wasn't much of resistance. I can't say I remember much of the actual assault. They had boots with reinforced steel heads and some bars which they used to beat me. Some of the kicks hit me on the head and I lost my consciousness for a while. It felt like a pitch black state and could hear their laughter like it was coming somewhere very far away. I don't know how long they continued or why they stopped. I only remember that once it was done I reached out to nearest car on street and it took me to local hospital. I survived with minor bruises, but from the psychical point of view it was a horrible experience. Afterwards I had, for example, troubles to sleep or go to any open public space. They had broke me from the inside and I had lost my basic social security.
Later on it turned out that one of my friend had actually saw the assault. I asked him to testify it so I could sue the beaters and gain justice for what had happened. He refused and claimed that the assault was actually my own fault because I had been in the streets at night - the truth was he was as afraid of the racist mob as I was and didn't want to be take a stance against them in any way. With this experience I learned something about the nature of violence and why people will always accept and justify some amount of it. It doesn't matter if the violence is physical and happens at the streets, or institutional and is tied into politics of identity, people will accept some of it if it isn't targeted to their own group, because it will make them feel safe to see that it's 'others' who are suffering from it. People will also accept violence if it sustains the social and cultural order and they feel their own group is not targeted. I know, it's an cowardly act, but that's what people do by their nature because everyone is afraid of violence – especially in the war of all against all.
---
This is the beginning of my last week of Season of Tilt. Therefore I feel I need to contemplate on my experiences. At the very early stages of this season (actually at second post) I said that the Lensbaby and their products present an approach which is very different from current commercially driven technical approach to photography, which emphasizes the technical qualities like lens sharpness, sensor performance, etc. I asked if this technical discourse of camera manufacturing is obliterating some aspects of photography. I can't say it is a condition that applies to whole photography world, but I can say that in some ways it has applied to me. Before using Lensbaby lenses I was very concentrated on technical matters like pixel perfect editing of my photographs (well, I still am). But by using Lensbaby I have given myself a permission to do other kind of photography what I wouldn't normally do, and it has, finally at the end of this season, led me to more personal photography – which I think is positive development. I've began to use photography to search my inner feelings & memories and tried to find a visual language for them – in this case it's the unscrupulousness of the nature. I see this turning point as a some sort of small victory and I'm happy to finally get there. If someone would ask me what's my experience with Lensbaby, this would be it.
Year of the Alpha – 52 Weeks of Sony Alpha Photography: www.yearofthealpha.com