Question 1

How does the passive work here if there is no object being fought?

Accepted Answer

In Finnish, the passive isn't just for actions done to a direct object. It is often used with intransitive verbs (verbs without an object) to imply a generic, unspecified human actor. Here, ei taistella simply means that people generally do not fight, or one does not fight.

Question 2

Why is the verb taistella in its basic dictionary form after ei enää?

Accepted Answer

It is actually the passive connegative form, which happens to look exactly like the dictionary form (the first infinitive) for Type 3 verbs like taistella. When you negate a passive verb, you use ei plus this connegative form. If it were affirmative, it would be taistellaan.

Question 3

Why is the word for greed, ahneus, in the partitive case (ahneutta)?

Accepted Answer

It is driven by the postposition vastaan (against). This postposition requires the word it modifies to be in the partitive case. The noun ahneus follows the rule where words ending in -us turn into -utta in the partitive, giving us ahneutta vastaan.

Question 4

Why is ahneutta vastaan placed before the verb ei enää taistella?

Accepted Answer

While standard word order might put the verb first in the subordinate clause, moving ahneutta vastaan to the front places emphasis on the phrase against greed. It highlights the target of the struggle before stating that the struggle is no longer happening.

Tarkoittaako perustulo, että ahneutta vastaan ei enää taistella?

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