| m0ney said: I see that several users are from Sweden. The more I hear news and look into them on net the more questions arise for me that I hope forum swedes could answer: 1) Apparently there is lot of self hatred among swedish people. Where does it originate from? How and when did it begin? 2) What does Sweden's army and generals have to say about the immigration insanity that is going on? Have they expressed opinion and are they involved in processes anyhow? So far I see two theories about this great country's downfall: 1) The muslim world has bought Sweden and/or some of its elite. This would mean that part of elite are traitors of their own country and nation, and I remember in early 2000s there was news that Bin Laden has invested in dairy and other industries in Sweden. 2) Part of Sweden's elite somehow has gotten insane in their liberality due to great life and is unable to see and comprehend reality anymore. |
1) Sweden has a lot of history, which explain much of our society today. We have always had a constantly evolving culture, from the Sami culture (the native population) to viking and nordic mythology, to christianity and later secularism. We also had massive emmigration during 18th and 19th century, mainly to the US. During the economic boom of the 20´s century, Sweden has gotten more and more immigration, especially in the latter half of the century. All this history has formed our society that we live in today. It is a society that has been formed by many different factors, and therefore is quite welcoming to change in different ways. So it´s not about self-hatred, but rather tolerance toward other cultures, and seeing their culture as a contribution to society.
That is not to say we don´t cherish some of the more common swedish traditions (some of which goes a couple of hundred years back in time). Christmas is huge, but not as a christian holiday. New years eve is big aswell. Halloween is big but has traditionally been celebrated in a different way than the US version. Easter is huge aswell, where kids dress up as witches and go around collecting candy. And the big one is Mid summers eve, where se drink schnaps, eat "sill", raise a celebratory pole and sing songs. We also have Cray Fish parties with funny hats and a party where we eat fermented fish.
So tradition is REALLY strong in Sweden, but a big part of that is that we should always welcome people from other countries in. I have a lot of friends from other countries, and they all love swedish traditions. But I also love to experience their traditions, because it doesn´t make my traditions any less important.
2) Sweden has been quite anti-military for the last 200 years. After WWII, our military grew, but has shrunk massively during the 21st century. There is now talks about growing the military again, which would be great. But the military has been more than just a defence force in case we are invaded. It has also helped in snow storms, flooding and such and would have been a great asset during the immigration influx we had. Overall I think the military is positive to immigration since it diversifies society which also makes the military diverse.
I think both your theories are wrong. There is no conspiracy and as a Swede, all the rethoric that we here now, is an echo of what we heard from the right-wing extremists in the 1930´s, 1990´s and now. Sweden is a very liberal country, and that will always create tension. We have a democratic system where we have 8 political parties in the parliament. One of those, the Sweden Democrats, has are very antiliberal and was a right-wing extremist party during the 90´s and has been ignored by the other parties, This upsets them, since they think that gaining 13% of the votes makes it obligatory for other parties to talk to them. Pverall, most parties are in agreement though that immigration is necessary for our economy to grow and for us to live up to our legacy of being tolerant and inclusive.
