Norwegian local elections, 2015

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Good to see Sentern doing well.

Could any of the Norwegian posters tell me why Os in Hordaland is such an Frp stronghold?

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Interesting, I've never really thought about how the forms of local government differ in the Nordic countries. Really cool that the Norwegian councils can choose between two different systems. I hope this isn't something that is planned to be abolished in the government's terrible municipal merger reform?   

In Sweden of course we have a single form where the city council proportionally elects an executive board (kommunstyrelse) containing both governing and opposition parties, with the chairman of that board being in effect  the mayor of that city, and is mostly translated as mayor in international contexts. However the Swedish word for mayor, borgmästare, is never used for them, instead any full-time politician on the municipal level is called kommunalråd (or borgarråd in Stockholm, because Stockholm is special ). To confuse things though, some places have however recreated an honorary title of borgmästare . So we both have the real mayors (which are not called that) and honorary mayors in a few places, with-out actual power.   

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Thanks Politicus, very interesting.

It should be noted that, in Sweden, the city councils are allowed to create and delegate power to committees as well. In larger municipalities there are always a number of committees, my city has as much as 12 committees for example. In small rural municipalities however committees are rarely used today. 

 

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Why are KrF so strong in the Southern muncipalaties?

Lots of Christians.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Why are there so many conservative Christians down there? Retiree spot?

Nah, SW = Bible Belt.

Quite interestingly, despite the image of the Nordic countries as very secular and non-religious, most of us have a Conservative miniature bible belt. In Sweden it covers mostly Jönköping county (sometimes given the pun nickname Bönköping which means Prayer Town) southern Västergötland and a string of islands on the West coast north and west of Gothenburg. The Norwegian one is in the area you identified,  in Finland it's some of the areas in Österbotten centered around Jakobstad.

There is one on Jutland in Denmark as well, but I think Politicus would tell me I was wrong if I tried to identify where exactly, so I'll leave it to her better knowledge to tell you exactly where it is.

Iceland, as far as I know, doesn't have a bible belt, though I imagine Politicus can correct me on this as well. On the other hand all of the Faroe Islands outside of Torshavn is a bible belt.       

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

everyone outside the big cities is slightly homophobic, but won't display it because that would be making a scene

What?! Now you're just making unjust generalizations. I grew up in a rural area in Sweden and though lots of people certainly held homophobic opinions and it certainly is more socially conservative than most non-Scandinavians think, it's greatly untrue to claim that all, or even most, of people outside of the big cities are homophobes. That isn't the case in Sweden, and I don't think that changes when you cross the Norwegian boarder.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

OK, (slightly) homophobic may be the wrong word (you ignored the word slightly). Would "somewhat uncomfortable when an openly gay person is around" suit you better? By the way, I think you'll find the Norwegian countryside is somewhat more conservative than the Swedish countryside.

I'm not upset if you say some people in rural areas are slightly homophobic and I wouldn't be upset if you said some people are very homophobic as there certainly are those kinds of people. I'm upset you said that everyone is.

My family, and lots of my friends that I had growing up have always been very supportive of my sexuality and has never been uncomfortable with me being open or any of my boyfriends for that matter and they are very clearly rural people. It's quite insensitive to lump such wonderful people with the bigots, who bullied me for being gay when I grew up. You should never generalize in that way. Homophobia is more usual in the countryside, but that doesn't mean all rural people act and think the same.

The Norwegian countryside might very well be more conservative than the Swedish countryside, I have no idea to be honest, but I'm thoroughly convinced that not everyone who lives there are slightly homophobic or even uncomfortable in the presence of openly gay people.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Alright, I can't claim every single person is is. But a large majority are. I made a generalization that people make every single day, that most people understand is a rhetorical generalization and should not be taken literally. Sheesh...

Yes generalizations such as:

- Immigrants are criminals
- Women want children
- Gay people are promiscuous
- Danes are racist
- Urban people are arrogant and know nothing of the rest of the country

Yes people make generalizations, I have too at times. That doesn't make it right.
I'm sure you didn't have any bad intentions, but when you come with incorrect facts (rhetorical or not) I feel it should be pointed out that it is in fact incorrect. Not only does it spread stereo-types about rural people, you also enforce stereo-types about yourself as lots of people on the countryside think that people who've lived their entire lives in Oslo or Stockholm is ignorant about anything that happens in the rest of the country, especially in rural areas.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Is the Finnish Bible Belters Swedish speaking or both communities? I see Jakobstad is 56.4% Swedish-speaking/40.2% Finnish-speaking according to Wiki (would have guessed 2:1, but Swedish keeps shrinking).

Both. The Swedish speaking municipality Larsmo, north of Jakobstad, is the heart of the Finish Bible Belt though. I believe the Christian Democrats got around 40% of the vote there in the Finish General Election. I actually dated a guy (Swedish speaker) from there, who had very conservative and Christian parents.