Thoughts on (lack of) Swedish pride

Defiance

I vårens ljusa kvällar
Great to see the forum's a tad more active again.

I'd like to have a cultural/sociological discussion about the reasons why Swedes don't celebrate their national day, and that it feels that they're not too happy when talking about their own country. What might be some reasons for this?

Cheers!
 
So here's the deal. There's a concept that needs to be understand to kind of wrap your mind around this, and it's controversial (but scientifically sound and should not be questioned as though it is a mere "opinion"). The concept is that of "invisible whiteness." This means that being white is invisible and therefore goes unnamed. "I saw this black guy at the store today, who was..." That same sentence would be "I saw this guy..." if that guy was white.

OK. Now we need to remember that much of what we think of as old fashioned race biology comes from the halls of Swedish academia. This is one of the reasons that the "Swedish type" is on top, even in American eugenics work and stuff. It should be noted that this was partially because of the fact that Sweden wanted to define themselves against "the Norwegian race," actually. This is kind of a funny little fact. ;)

In any case, Swedish neutrality during WWII—while an entirely reasonably defensible position given what happened to Norway and the strength of Germany—means that Swedes never made the "right" choice. And actually, according to a Jewish friend of my girlfriend, Jews were treated quite poorly in Sweden during that period and among the overclass there was a lot of pro-German attitudes (in the Church for example, which I read an entire dissertation about at one point). And the building up of the great state in Sweden was largely done at the behest of the nationalistic conception of the "people's home" (Folkhemmet). Post-WWII, however, the nationalism fell into the background (towards the 60s and 70s).

All of that said, Sweden has largely been a very openly anti-racist society in a lot of ways. Hell, they even have "colorblind" laws that are supposed to encourage people to not think about race, such as that the state can't ask for ethnic information. Sweden is one of the most conscientious about UN regulations and so forth, there has been a strong desire to help people in other countries, to allow those looking for asylum to come to Sweden and so forth. But, a bit like how an alcoholic who quits drinking but never gets help is still an alcoholic, Sweden still has never really overcome these old concepts of "race" and "nation" and the fact that in their history these things have been connected. That means that uncomfortable things happen when Swedes talk about race.

See, according to people in the city there is no racism in Sweden. There is only racism among people who live "in the country" and certainly no self-respecting Stockholmare could be a racist. But what they don't understand is the invisible privilege that comes with being a white Swede. Immigrants: and let's be clear, by immigrants I mean brown ones from Africa or the Middle-East, have tons of problems in Sweden. They have trouble getting jobs. They have trouble assimilating. White women think that men of African or Middle-Eastern descent are dangerous and don't go out with them. Interethnic groups are still pretty rare. And it doesn't matter how many generations you've been in Sweden, if you're brown and have the name Rahim (hell, even if you have the name Andreas), you're going to be asked "where you're from." Because being Swedish is being white.

In fact, I'd argue that this is largely the case in ALL European and "white majority" countries. You don't "become Swedish" when you become a citizen. Ask any Swede. Being Swedish is not civic like being an American is (though, let's be clear, the USA is still a racist, white majority country where white people have invisible privilege). Being Swedish is about being "culturally" Swedish, and how do you do that? You get that by being born in Swedish. Oh, and being white.

I think that this knowledge and the underlying racism in Swedish society are what makes it easy for Swedish racists to grab the Swedish flag and to look back to "folkhemmet", which, mind you is exactly what the racist party (Sverigedemokrater) says. They're just not following the secret societal playbook: i.e., don't talk about it. But so long as Swedes have a definition of Swedish which is inborn and means that you celebrate midsommar and can sing Evert Taube songs and being "ethnically Swedish" is being white, then you have a recipe for nationalists to take the societal subtext and turn it into something very uncomfortable for everyone around them.

And THAT is the reason that I think that metal in Swedish, which sings about liking Sweden or things about Sweden, makes everyone uncomfortable. And so to show that they are definitely NOT RACIST they pan it.

Anyway, that's how I see it. Much of what I said there is founded in literature that I can give citations for. I assume that many people will feel uncomfortable with the topic and not really want to talk about it. I suspect others will disagree with what I have to say about the issue. And I think that this is a difficult issue. I don't want to come off as some sort of "know-it-all" or some shit, that's not my goal. This is simply my working hypothesis (founded on the sociological literature) for why Swedes interact with these issues in the way that they do. The most important thing to remember when thinking about this is that racism can be interpersonal, but often the most important racism is structural. And structural racism is the racism that gets ignored the most in Sweden, while everyone fauns over what a good, non-racist society we have while the suburbs get all the more segregated, schools become all the more segregated and a class of brown immigrants and children of immigrants become more and more marginalized from birth.

TL;DR: I think Swedes feel uncomfortable with metal in Swedish because they think it's nationalistic, regardless of whether it is or not. And they have good reason to be uncomfortable with nationalism because such strains exist in Swedish culture.
 
As a pure, inbred, red-neck country-boy Swede, I would just like to say; "What he said"

Openly, we struggle hard to live up to political correctness on the issue, while behind the scenes, there is still very much a "lika barn leka bäst" attitude in effect. Noone would ever admit to it openly (the general Swede I mean, there are always exceptions), but it is always whispered in the homes when nobody is there to listen and judge. As I mentioned to NovembersDirge on the FB chat, if there is something Swedes love to do, it is to label each other, prefferably in a degrading manner. I had to listen to a lot of "you're a Satanist" bullshit while going to school for the single reason that I was growing my hair long.

A small history note of interest; I was told by a friend, who was reading up on the matter for a school project once, that Sweden not only offered the country up for the Germans during WWII, which is a well known and documented fact, but we even had plans and drawings of having concentration camps made. These were of course dumped faster than the speed of light when the war was turning bad...
 
Nationalism is stupid and countries are dumb. A lack of patriotism is a healthy sign of widespread intelligence and an educated populace. If Swedes are "down" on their wonderful country, then perhaps one of them would like to trade places with me over here in the U.S. I'd be glad to live in Stockholm and have my profession respected, my medical needs not ruin me financially, and to be in close proximity of tons of awesome bands.

Nevermind I just love waving my flag around. AMERICA11!1!1 #1!!!!!!!!

Or I can do the Latin America thing. PUERTO RICO!!!! BOLIVAR!!1!!!!!!!! CHE!!!!!1!!!!
 
A small history note of interest; I was told by a friend, who was reading up on the matter for a school project once, that Sweden not only offered the country up for the Germans during WWII, which is a well known and documented fact, but we even had plans and drawings of having concentration camps made. These were of course dumped faster than the speed of light when the war was turning bad...

This is not true. I don't know where you heard it, but it's not true. At all. Sweden was in a complicated position in WWIIl; they supplied the Germans with a lot of war material. But it was also because they wanted to help Finland out against the Soviets. Sweden also was a sanctuary for anti-fascists and the few Jews who did make it, especially from adjacent countries.

Sweden could not be protected against a German invasion, as England was unable to defend Norway. So they remained in a weird position, actively assisting Finland against Russia and supplying ore to the Nazis, but also serving a sanctuary for targeted groups. They also allowed the Allies to use their bases later on in the war (and had allowed the Nazis the same courtesy to help their Finnish allies).

Sweden never wanted to surrender to the Germans, otherwise they wouldn't have bent their foreign policy like a pretzel during the war!
 
As a pure, inbred, red-neck country-boy Swede, I would just like to say; "What he said"

Openly, we struggle hard to live up to political correctness on the issue, while behind the scenes, there is still very much a "lika barn leka bäst" attitude in effect. Noone would ever admit to it openly (the general Swede I mean, there are always exceptions), but it is always whispered in the homes when nobody is there to listen and judge. As I mentioned to NovembersDirge on the FB chat, if there is something Swedes love to do, it is to label each other, prefferably in a degrading manner. I had to listen to a lot of "you're a Satanist" bullshit while going to school for the single reason that I was growing my hair long.

Yeah, I think that people from the Skåne region are probably more able to speak to this honestly because Skåne is the area that has had the most "open" conflicts with immigrants. Though, there are actually more problems in Stockholm than there are in Malmö, so I think there's a slight cultural difference. But this "lika barn leka bäst" attitude doesn't help at all when it comes to integration. And then if there are problems with schools and access to societal goods, things go south pretty quickly.

What about Sabaton's last album? As an outsider, I view that as a bit of Swedish pride (if just historical).
Well, an example I've given a few times in this discussion was the first line in the Dagens Nyheter (biggest Swedish daily newspaper) review of Sabaton's new record: "The subject of the history one writes is by its very nature taking a position." Then they panned the record. Read my review. I talk a little about this.

Nationalism is stupid and countries are dumb. A lack of patriotism is a healthy sign of widespread intelligence and an educated populace. If Swedes are "down" on their wonderful country, then perhaps one of them would like to trade places with me over here in the U.S. I'd be glad to live in Stockholm and have my profession respected, my medical needs not ruin me financially, and to be in close proximity of tons of awesome bands.

Nationalism has been very useful. We should never forget that. Nationalism, in my opinion, is a neutral thing. It can be used for good or ill. But like most things, it has been used for a lot of the latter in our history.

This is not true. I don't know where you heard it, but it's not true. At all. Sweden was in a complicated position in WWIIl; they supplied the Germans with a lot of war material. But it was also because they wanted to help Finland out against the Soviets. Sweden also was a sanctuary for anti-fascists and the few Jews who did make it, especially from adjacent countries.

Sweden could not be protected against a German invasion, as England was unable to defend Norway. So they remained in a weird position, actively assisting Finland against Russia and supplying ore to the Nazis, but also serving a sanctuary for targeted groups. They also allowed the Allies to use their bases later on in the war (and had allowed the Nazis the same courtesy to help their Finnish allies).

Sweden never wanted to surrender to the Germans, otherwise they wouldn't have bent their foreign policy like a pretzel during the war!

As I understand it, the first part of what he said is true. There were plans a general sense of elite cooperation with Germany. However, the evidence goes in both directions. There are plenty of examples of Swedes helping Norwegians escape, for example. My girlfriends' grandmother worked in a camp helping Norwegian soldiers and refugees. There were Jews who were saved by Sweden during the war as well. The history is generally fairly unclear on this point.
 
So here's the deal. There's a concept that needs to be understand to kind of wrap your mind around this, and it's controversial (but scientifically sound and should not be questioned as though it is a mere "opinion"). The concept is that of "invisible whiteness." This means that being white is invisible and therefore goes unnamed. "I saw this black guy at the store today, who was..." That same sentence would be "I saw this guy..." if that guy was white.

OK. Now we need to remember that much of what we think of as old fashioned race biology comes from the halls of Swedish academia. This is one of the reasons that the "Swedish type" is on top, even in American eugenics work and stuff. It should be noted that this was partially because of the fact that Sweden wanted to define themselves against "the Norwegian race," actually. This is kind of a funny little fact. ;)

In any case, Swedish neutrality during WWII—while an entirely reasonably defensible position given what happened to Norway and the strength of Germany—means that Swedes never made the "right" choice. And actually, according to a Jewish friend of my girlfriend, Jews were treated quite poorly in Sweden during that period and among the overclass there was a lot of pro-German attitudes (in the Church for example, which I read an entire dissertation about at one point). And the building up of the great state in Sweden was largely done at the behest of the nationalistic conception of the "people's home" (Folkhemmet). Post-WWII, however, the nationalism fell into the background (towards the 60s and 70s).

All of that said, Sweden has largely been a very openly anti-racist society in a lot of ways. Hell, they even have "colorblind" laws that are supposed to encourage people to not think about race, such as that the state can't ask for ethnic information. Sweden is one of the most conscientious about UN regulations and so forth, there has been a strong desire to help people in other countries, to allow those looking for asylum to come to Sweden and so forth. But, a bit like how an alcoholic who quits drinking but never gets help is still an alcoholic, Sweden still has never really overcome these old concepts of "race" and "nation" and the fact that in their history these things have been connected. That means that uncomfortable things happen when Swedes talk about race.

See, according to people in the city there is no racism in Sweden. There is only racism among people who live "in the country" and certainly no self-respecting Stockholmare could be a racist. But what they don't understand is the invisible privilege that comes with being a white Swede. Immigrants: and let's be clear, by immigrants I mean brown ones from Africa or the Middle-East, have tons of problems in Sweden. They have trouble getting jobs. They have trouble assimilating. White women think that men of African or Middle-Eastern descent are dangerous and don't go out with them. Interethnic groups are still pretty rare. And it doesn't matter how many generations you've been in Sweden, if you're brown and have the name Rahim (hell, even if you have the name Andreas), you're going to be asked "where you're from." Because being Swedish is being white.

In fact, I'd argue that this is largely the case in ALL European and "white majority" countries. You don't "become Swedish" when you become a citizen. Ask any Swede. Being Swedish is not civic like being an American is (though, let's be clear, the USA is still a racist, white majority country where white people have invisible privilege). Being Swedish is about being "culturally" Swedish, and how do you do that? You get that by being born in Swedish. Oh, and being white.

I think that this knowledge and the underlying racism in Swedish society are what makes it easy for Swedish racists to grab the Swedish flag and to look back to "folkhemmet", which, mind you is exactly what the racist party (Sverigedemokrater) says. They're just not following the secret societal playbook: i.e., don't talk about it. But so long as Swedes have a definition of Swedish which is inborn and means that you celebrate midsommar and can sing Evert Taube songs and being "ethnically Swedish" is being white, then you have a recipe for nationalists to take the societal subtext and turn it into something very uncomfortable for everyone around them.

And THAT is the reason that I think that metal in Swedish, which sings about liking Sweden or things about Sweden, makes everyone uncomfortable. And so to show that they are definitely NOT RACIST they pan it.

Anyway, that's how I see it. Much of what I said there is founded in literature that I can give citations for. I assume that many people will feel uncomfortable with the topic and not really want to talk about it. I suspect others will disagree with what I have to say about the issue. And I think that this is a difficult issue. I don't want to come off as some sort of "know-it-all" or some shit, that's not my goal. This is simply my working hypothesis (founded on the sociological literature) for why Swedes interact with these issues in the way that they do. The most important thing to remember when thinking about this is that racism can be interpersonal, but often the most important racism is structural. And structural racism is the racism that gets ignored the most in Sweden, while everyone fauns over what a good, non-racist society we have while the suburbs get all the more segregated, schools become all the more segregated and a class of brown immigrants and children of immigrants become more and more marginalized from birth.

TL;DR: I think Swedes feel uncomfortable with metal in Swedish because they think it's nationalistic, regardless of whether it is or not. And they have good reason to be uncomfortable with nationalism because such strains exist in Swedish culture.

it's exactly what I was thinking, although I didn't know the name for the concept I always knew, 'invisible whiteness', so true, I try to avoid it as much as I can but it's nearly impossible.

I guess it's similar to Norge, where you can only have the Norwegian passport, if you want to be Norwegian you can only be Norwegian and nothing else. And you've got to be white too, I guess.

As a pure, inbred, red-neck country-boy Swede, I would just like to say; "What he said"

Openly, we struggle hard to live up to political correctness on the issue, while behind the scenes, there is still very much a "lika barn leka bäst" attitude in effect. Noone would ever admit to it openly (the general Swede I mean, there are always exceptions), but it is always whispered in the homes when nobody is there to listen and judge. As I mentioned to NovembersDirge on the FB chat, if there is something Swedes love to do, it is to label each other, prefferably in a degrading manner. I had to listen to a lot of "you're a Satanist" bullshit while going to school for the single reason that I was growing my hair long.

A small history note of interest; I was told by a friend, who was reading up on the matter for a school project once, that Sweden not only offered the country up for the Germans during WWII, which is a well known and documented fact, but we even had plans and drawings of having concentration camps made. These were of course dumped faster than the speed of light when the war was turning bad...

Kind of sad that Swedes label each other so much, but most people do anyhow.

Nationalism is stupid and countries are dumb. A lack of patriotism is a healthy sign of widespread intelligence and an educated populace. If Swedes are "down" on their wonderful country, then perhaps one of them would like to trade places with me over here in the U.S. I'd be glad to live in Stockholm and have my profession respected, my medical needs not ruin me financially, and to be in close proximity of tons of awesome bands.

Nevermind I just love waving my flag around. AMERICA11!1!1 #1!!!!!!!!

Or I can do the Latin America thing. PUERTO RICO!!!! BOLIVAR!!1!!!!!!!! CHE!!!!!1!!!!

I'd love to read more about the Suomi-Russian wars. Poor Suomi, been constantly invaded by Russia.

I think it's good to be proud of your country, I'm a proud Canadian but nothing close to 'nationalistic'. And I don't know what's happening in Canada, we used to be such a diverse, open country (from the 60s at least), but now with this fucking Harper government (illegal and corrupt, with election fraud) Canada is doing things close to WWII; labelling countries as safe or unsafe. Concerning the latter, what this means is that, with the new law that the gvt. passed last month, Canada can label a country as 'safe' or 'unsafe', i.e. if the country is safe, there's no reason for accepting any refugees from said country; so if someone in Hungary (Magyarország) is being persecuted, but the country itself is labelled 'safe', that person cannot ask for refugee status within Canada. Åsome.

And what does everyone think of the recent surge of Nazism in Europe? Especially in Hungary and Greece, where in the latter the Nazi party now actually has 20 seats (or so) in parliament. And no, economic downfall is not an excuse for this. Suomi has become quite strict concerning immigrants, and this, once again, take us to the Breivik shooting in Norge, someone claiming that he wanted to keep the country pure and free of immigrants. All hail white supremacy.

As a Jew (Atheist) I find all this quite offensive and worrying to be honest; the general feeling that I'm getting is that people are forgetting what happened in WWII or are simplifying the matter a lot; like a 'Yeah more than 5+- million Jews were killed, get over it' kind of thing.

As I understand it, the first part of what he said is true. There were plans a general sense of elite cooperation with Germany. However, the evidence goes in both directions. There are plenty of examples of Swedes helping Norwegians escape, for example. My girlfriends' grandmother worked in a camp helping Norwegian soldiers and refugees. There were Jews who were saved by Sweden during the war as well. The history is generally fairly unclear on this point.

I guess that with Sweden it's really hard to tell whether it was pro, against or neutral with the Nazis; I guess it varied from region to region, or even city to city.
 
This is not true. I don't know where you heard it, but it's not true. At all.

Which part do you disagree with, or is it the whole thing in general?
I know Sweden also let non- and anti-nazi's into the country, among other things they took in jewish and Danish refugees after Denmark became occupied, but that's no the sam as they were treated well when they got here. As far as I have been informed, they were of course free from the sort of persecution that the nazis were doing, but they were still, in parts at least, treated with mistrust and sometimes hostility. Of course there are sunshine examples as well, but all of them were certainly not like that.
Also, why give up our ore-mines to the nazis for weapons and ammo production? That in itself doesn't sound very neutral to me. Sounds more like we were ready to roll over for anyone who seemed to be the winner at the time...

Sweden is a great country, with a lot natural splendour still intact, but I can't say that I give much for a lot of the inbred mentality we have going on. Then again, I'm sure a lot of countries are like that.
 
Nationalism has just a bad rep because of the nazis. I love my country, the land, flora and fauna, our history, our cultural heritage (My older ascendant was a well known warrior who fought against the spanish invasion in the XVI century and I proudly have his -last- name), the people (in general terms) and I think it's pretty fine to feel like that. It's not like I positively hate other people (like Peruvians for example) it's about to love what you are, where you come from, what your sons will be and what your country will.

It's kinda sad to read that people in Sweden repress themselves of loving themselves as a nation to stand for a politically correct perspective. No one will love more than you what you are, have been and will be.

I go further: The whole anti-racist thing has been going so far, that now anti.racism IT'S racist itself. Here in Chile, if you have a flag, you're a nazi. If you say something like : 'you know? I love my country' you're a nazi. If you have a defensive stand against the aggression of a foreign country (like Bolivian and Peruvian provocations), you're a nazi. Seriously, I prefer to be called 'nazi' (and I don't share their vision btw) that being one of those people who doesn't value a shit about us and themselves.
 
Hi, Djöfull/Bessi here with a new name.. since the old one wouldn't work.

Much of what I said there is founded in literature that I can give citations for
Would be informative.

Anyway, interesting topic and I sometimes think about it. I always come to the conclusion that everything is sensible in moderation partly because you can find examples that support arguments on both sides of the issue.

How can one decide what is to be a swede? The basic necessity is language.

Cultural knowledge as well. However well assimilated immigrants can appear to be better than some locals at some of these things...
 
Nationalism has just a bad rep because of the nazis. I love my country, the land, flora and fauna, our history, our cultural heritage (My older ascendant was a well known warrior who fought against the spanish invasion in the XVI century and I proudly have his -last- name), the people (in general terms) and I think it's pretty fine to feel like that. It's not like I positively hate other people (like Peruvians for example) it's about to love what you are, where you come from, what your sons will be and what your country will.

It's kinda sad to read that people in Sweden repress themselves of loving themselves as a nation to stand for a politically correct perspective. No one will love more than you what you are, have been and will be.

I go further: The whole anti-racist thing has been going so far, that now anti.racism IT'S racist itself. Here in Chile, if you have a flag, you're a nazi. If you say something like : 'you know? I love my country' you're a nazi. If you have a defensive stand against the aggression of a foreign country (like Bolivian and Peruvian provocations), you're a nazi. Seriously, I prefer to be called 'nazi' (and I don't share their vision btw) that being one of those people who doesn't value a shit about us and themselves.

I know it was all a union of several difficult situations in DEU (my great-grandfather blowing his head off because of said situations), but I just can't help but say 'fucking Nazis'; it's a really sensitive topic to me because I'm German Jewish, so a lot of the Josephy family was killed during the Holocaust. My Opa (Walter) managed to survived by running to (on a motor bike, which he loved; got away just in time, Nazis knocking at the front door whilst he escaped through the back one) Czechoslovakia, then getting to London and on a boat to Canada, where he was kindly treated as an enemy alien (little known chapter in Canadian history, we haven't always been the open country everyone knows and loves, we pretty much rejected all immigrants until the 50s, but now it's going back to before that).

And, just minutes ago, I find out that my grandmothers family, Jewish from Lithuanian origin, was almost completely killed in the Holocaust, only 7 survived from a rather large family (my Oma included).

What I find very sad nowadays, is not only that people are forgetting this, but also that, for example, you've Nazi Latinos, almost black, speaking about the Aryan race and all that; saying that Hitler didn't mean it that way. So not only are people forgetting it, but they're stupid enough to not really understand what Nazism means, to the point that, through their ignorance, they permeate Nazi culture.

Concerning Nico's post, I know it's sad; I may not have been born in Germany but I consider myself a proud German, and 99% of people look weird at me when I say that I'm a proud German and that I love Germany. It's always associated with Nazism.

And yes, Neoracism, giving black people a better service just because they're black, not because they need a better one.

That's really cool, do you know the name of the Warrior who fought against the Spanish? Kudos to you, I applaud.

And yes, a bit sad that Swedes don't recognise the beautiful country they live in.
 
Nationalism is a vile and recent phenomenon. Its primary use is to mobilize citizens to fight the citizens of other states (though after two World Wars we fight mostly in the soccer field, at least in the developed world). Fuck you, Napoleon. It's never neutral; it defines "us" and "them." You go back 500 years and you don't have the common person identifying with the state. Every modern country has to build its own national myth. The stuff of whatever is your culture may go back thousands of years, but wherever you live in the world, your "country" is not more than 200 or so years old. Random note, for this reason the two oldest "countries" in the world are arguably Britain and the United States. Ho ho ho bust out the pitchforks and wrap your head around that one...

I guess it's more complicated than that, loving home and whatever culture you define as yours is not nationalism. Countries are communities we imagine to be real things that are defined by borders, but we all know the world isn't nice and neat like that.

I don't say that to be like, YOU'RE ALL WRONG!!!!! But nationalism is pretty vile and disgusting stuff. Doesn't mean I think it's wrong to love wherever you come from, just doesn't mean you gotta love your imagined, socially constructed ahistorical people unit cuz life is simpler that way. ;)

As for the Sweden thing, it's not that I disagree with the statement, it's that it's factually wrong. I'm sure there were Swedes who wanted to immediately surrender if the Nazis made a real move to invade the country, but it didn't happen. That's a whole other story that I don't really know the details to (I bet there a bajillion books in Swedish about it, though). Were there pro-Nazi Swedes like in Norway? I would think there would be. But the government's policy was pretty complicated. I'm drunk and I forgot what the original statement was that I thought was wrong but if I could read it over without throwing up because the words are all squiggly, I bet I could wrap this paragraph up with an actual example that demonstrates why it's wrong rather than just assert that it is (I know I'm right but I'm just some dude off the internet so why would you take my word for it? I wouldn't either, fuck dudes off the internet).

FYI "countries are dumb" is a Propagandhi song. I don't like that band but that song title is cool.
 
^ haha nice one, Naglfar :) gotta love drunk posting, I miss my college years...

OT: not much to contribute to the discussion, the only Swede I ever knew loved his country and didn't seem unhappy when people asked him what it's like in Sweden. He was only here temporarily as an exchange student and would definitely go back.
 
I know it was all a union of several difficult situations in DEU (my great-grandfather blowing his head off because of said situations), but I just can't help but say 'fucking Nazis'; it's a really sensitive topic to me because I'm German Jewish, so a lot of the Josephy family was killed during the Holocaust. My Opa (Walter) managed to survived by running to (on a motor bike, which he loved; got away just in time, Nazis knocking at the front door whilst he escaped through the back one) Czechoslovakia, then getting to London and on a boat to Canada, where he was kindly treated as an enemy alien (little known chapter in Canadian history, we haven't always been the open country everyone knows and loves, we pretty much rejected all immigrants until the 50s, but now it's going back to before that).

And, just minutes ago, I find out that my grandmothers family, Jewish from Lithuanian origin, was almost completely killed in the Holocaust, only 7 survived from a rather large family (my Oma included).

What I find very sad nowadays, is not only that people are forgetting this, but also that, for example, you've Nazi Latinos, almost black, speaking about the Aryan race and all that; saying that Hitler didn't mean it that way. So not only are people forgetting it, but they're stupid enough to not really understand what Nazism means, to the point that, through their ignorance, they permeate Nazi culture.

Concerning Nico's post, I know it's sad; I may not have been born in Germany but I consider myself a proud German, and 99% of people look weird at me when I say that I'm a proud German and that I love Germany. It's always associated with Nazism.

And yes, Neoracism, giving black people a better service just because they're black, not because they need a better one.

That's really cool, do you know the name of the Warrior who fought against the Spanish? Kudos to you, I applaud.

And yes, a bit sad that Swedes don't recognise the beautiful country they live in.

I kinda understand your point and well... no one here supports the acts of the Nazis. I know it was a terrible thing, it's terrible the existence of neo nazi groups supporting the 'aryan' shit and stuff, but it's also terrible the lack of identity that the anti racism brought with it, cause in rational doses, I think it's healthy to have some love for your land, the people and the culture.

A different perspective: the oldest member of my family was called Tucapel (in native mapudungun language: 'the one who seizes with might') as he was known for being the most ferocious of the warrior chiefs (Loncos). fought against the spanish invasion for centuries and while the spanish took over the whole north and center, our tribe stopped them to get further south. With time, spanish soldiers mixed with the natives and gave birth to 'Chileans'. Chile was still a spanish cologne and some rich Chileans wanted to get more lands, so they helped the spanish to took over the Mapuches (the tribe) betraying them, so the spanish could sell and give them the lands and make the Mapuches to work it. With the help of a Lonco, peace was achieved but with a cost: Mapuches would never be the same again: our lands were taken for the newborn Chilean state and we were enslaved, converted by force to christian religion (and killed if you didn't submit), our culture was almost completely lost and some minor but culturally rich tribes disappeared forever.

Now, with a huge loss of cultural background, most of Chileans, dislike/discriminate natives, don't value our nature and have a too way hollywoodized vision of 'how things should be'. There's no identity, everything foreign is by default better than our own creations...I live in a country where no one have pride, no one gives a shit about our history but they might know better the US history or the spanish one; also the 20 years of left wing government made nothing but get our education worse, our life standard worse, sold the country in its entirety (electricity, water, public transport, etc) and all that wrong left propaganda which made the loss of identity even worse.

Anyway, Orkan is kicking my ass and Andreas sounds way better in swedish.
 
I'm drunk and I forgot what the original statement was that I thought was wrong but if I could read it over without throwing up because the words are all squiggly, I bet I could wrap this paragraph up with an actual example that demonstrates why it's wrong rather than just assert that it is (I know I'm right but I'm just some dude off the internet so why would you take my word for it? I wouldn't either, fuck dudes off the internet).

:lol: The simple awesomeness of this post has convinced me!
 
So first, let me just say: Wow, this post got huge.

it's exactly what I was thinking, although I didn't know the name for the concept I always knew, 'invisible whiteness', so true, I try to avoid it as much as I can but it's nearly impossible.

I guess it's similar to Norge, where you can only have the Norwegian passport, if you want to be Norwegian you can only be Norwegian and nothing else. And you've got to be white too, I guess.
Yeah, this appears to be the same in most of the European countries, in my opinion. Everyone says that "language" is the big issue, but that's not true: kids who are born in Sweden, speak perfect Swedish and have the misfortune of being brown still have trouble coming into society.

I'd love to read more about the Suomi-Russian wars. Poor Suomi, been constantly invaded by Russia.
It's funny how Sweden gets no credit for having occupied Finland for a long ass time. The best protected minority in the world are Swedish speaking Finns. So, Russia wasn't the only baddy.

I think it's good to be proud of your country, I'm a proud Canadian but nothing close to 'nationalistic'. And I don't know what's happening in Canada, we used to be such a diverse, open country (from the 60s at least), but now with this fucking Harper government (illegal and corrupt, with election fraud) Canada is doing things close to WWII; labelling countries as safe or unsafe. Concerning the latter, what this means is that, with the new law that the gvt. passed last month, Canada can label a country as 'safe' or 'unsafe', i.e. if the country is safe, there's no reason for accepting any refugees from said country; so if someone in Hungary (Magyarország) is being persecuted, but the country itself is labelled 'safe', that person cannot ask for refugee status within Canada. Åsome.
Wow, that's totally crazy. Canada used to have the most open and highly effective immigration politics in the world! I wasn't aware that was happening, especially since the Canadian integration policy is world class. WTF?

And what does everyone think of the recent surge of Nazism in Europe? Especially in Hungary and Greece, where in the latter the Nazi party now actually has 20 seats (or so) in parliament. And no, economic downfall is not an excuse for this. Suomi has become quite strict concerning immigrants, and this, once again, take us to the Breivik shooting in Norge, someone claiming that he wanted to keep the country pure and free of immigrants. All hail white supremacy.
This comes back to what I was saying, though, about how nationality and RACE have become linked, which makes it very easy for nationalists to take these things and be racists. Technically American racists can't ever really do what a Swedish racist or Norwegian racist can do: point to some kind of deep racial purity that should be upheld. While White Americans can do that, they have a much more difficult time of it because of the immigrant background that essentially is the basis of our modern nation.

What I think is the most shocking is how militant the racism and fascism is getting in Eastern Europe. The next genocide or racist fascism that arises will be over there, IMO.

As a Jew (Atheist) I find all this quite offensive and worrying to be honest; the general feeling that I'm getting is that people are forgetting what happened in WWII or are simplifying the matter a lot; like a 'Yeah more than 5+- million Jews were killed, get over it' kind of thing.
Yeah, it's very worrying.


Which part do you disagree with, or is it the whole thing in general?
I know Sweden also let non- and anti-nazi's into the country, among other things they took in jewish and Danish refugees after Denmark became occupied, but that's no the sam as they were treated well when they got here. As far as I have been informed, they were of course free from the sort of persecution that the nazis were doing, but they were still, in parts at least, treated with mistrust and sometimes hostility. Of course there are sunshine examples as well, but all of them were certainly not like that.
Also, why give up our ore-mines to the nazis for weapons and ammo production? That in itself doesn't sound very neutral to me. Sounds more like we were ready to roll over for anyone who seemed to be the winner at the time...

Sweden is a great country, with a lot natural splendour still intact, but I can't say that I give much for a lot of the inbred mentality we have going on. Then again, I'm sure a lot of countries are like that.
I would argue that it was very neutral if Sweden was playing both sides. But certainly the threat of invasion was immense and Per Albin-Hansson straight up lied about Sweden's ability to counter German military might.

Nationalism has just a bad rep because of the nazis. I love my country, the land, flora and fauna, our history, our cultural heritage (My older ascendant was a well known warrior who fought against the spanish invasion in the XVI century and I proudly have his -last- name), the people (in general terms) and I think it's pretty fine to feel like that. It's not like I positively hate other people (like Peruvians for example) it's about to love what you are, where you come from, what your sons will be and what your country will.

It's kinda sad to read that people in Sweden repress themselves of loving themselves as a nation to stand for a politically correct perspective. No one will love more than you what you are, have been and will be.

I go further: The whole anti-racist thing has been going so far, that now anti.racism IT'S racist itself. Here in Chile, if you have a flag, you're a nazi. If you say something like : 'you know? I love my country' you're a nazi. If you have a defensive stand against the aggression of a foreign country (like Bolivian and Peruvian provocations), you're a nazi. Seriously, I prefer to be called 'nazi' (and I don't share their vision btw) that being one of those people who doesn't value a shit about us and themselves.
Anti-racism is not racism. Racism is very different. While racism can be interpersonal—which, btw, having a flag and being treated poorly is prejudice not racism—the most damaging is structural racism. How Indians are treated in South America as a whole is structurally racist. That anyone with Quechua as a mother-tongue is systematically kept out of jobs, for example, is far more akin to racism and leads to long term problems.

Anti-racism might break against the current societal structures in an attempt to promote an agenda of equal rights for everyone, regardless of origin, but that is not the same as the repression of people based on their origin. I think it's important to remember that nations did not always exist, and your forefathers were no more Chiléen than they were "American." They had their own groups and methods of separating the world, and the process of nationalization was often opposed because it destroyed freedoms that groups previously had. The nation is ultimately an imagined community.

Would be informative.
Well, when it comes to the sociology of race and ethnicity I can recommend the book that I helped research by Desmond & Emirbayer - Racial Domination, Racial Progress: A Sociology of Race in America.
RE: Swedish nationalism's undercurrents of race and a discussion of whiteness, see "(Social) Democracy in the Blood? Civic and Ethnic Idioms of Nation and the Consolidation of Swedish Social Democratic Power, 1928–1932" by Carly Elizabeth Schall [http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-6443.2012.01428.x/abstract

The majority of other literature that I have at home is elsewhere and I can get back to you with more comprehensive lists later, but those are both great places to start.

Anyway, interesting topic and I sometimes think about it. I always come to the conclusion that everything is sensible in moderation partly because you can find examples that support arguments on both sides of the issue.

How can one decide what is to be a swede? The basic necessity is language.

Cultural knowledge as well. However well assimilated immigrants can appear to be better than some locals at some of these things...
I disagree that language is the basic necessity. Brown kids born in Sweden with perfect language are not considered Swedish and do not consider themselves Swedish. That is anecdotal, but from all my experience around this topic, I'm fairly certain that's the case.

And yes, Neoracism, giving black people a better service just because they're black, not because they need a better one.
I would encourage you to read about the theory on this stuff. This concept is laughable given the structural constraints that black people deal with throughout the world.

I guess it's more complicated than that, loving home and whatever culture you define as yours is not nationalism. Countries are communities we imagine to be real things that are defined by borders, but we all know the world isn't nice and neat like that.

I don't say that to be like, YOU'RE ALL WRONG!!!!! But nationalism is pretty vile and disgusting stuff. Doesn't mean I think it's wrong to love wherever you come from, just doesn't mean you gotta love your imagined, socially constructed ahistorical people unit cuz life is simpler that way. ;)
Even drunk, this is a good point. The one thing I would say is that nationalism, again, has been a particularly effective way of reaching the point we're at now. So, love it or hate it, nationalism is the reason for excellent welfare states in Scandinavia, for example. And yes, hundreds of millions have died in the name of nationalism, but hundreds of millions have had their lives improved as well. Ascribing evil or good qualities to it because of those things does it a disservice, IMHO.

I kinda understand your point and well... no one here supports the acts of the Nazis. I know it was a terrible thing, it's terrible the existence of neo nazi groups supporting the 'aryan' shit and stuff, but it's also terrible the lack of identity that the anti racism brought with it, cause in rational doses, I think it's healthy to have some love for your land, the people and the culture.

A different perspective: the oldest member of my family was called Tucapel (in native mapudungun language: 'the one who seizes with might') as he was known for being the most ferocious of the warrior chiefs (Loncos). fought against the spanish invasion for centuries and while the spanish took over the whole north and center, our tribe stopped them to get further south. With time, spanish soldiers mixed with the natives and gave birth to 'Chileans'. Chile was still a spanish cologne and some rich Chileans wanted to get more lands, so they helped the spanish to took over the Mapuches (the tribe) betraying them, so the spanish could sell and give them the lands and make the Mapuches to work it. With the help of a Lonco, peace was achieved but with a cost: Mapuches would never be the same again: our lands were taken for the newborn Chilean state and we were enslaved, converted by force to christian religion (and killed if you didn't submit), our culture was almost completely lost and some minor but culturally rich tribes disappeared forever.

Now, with a huge loss of cultural background, most of Chileans, dislike/discriminate natives, don't value our nature and have a too way hollywoodized vision of 'how things should be'. There's no identity, everything foreign is by default better than our own creations...I live in a country where no one have pride, no one gives a shit about our history but they might know better the US history or the spanish one; also the 20 years of left wing government made nothing but get our education worse, our life standard worse, sold the country in its entirety (electricity, water, public transport, etc) and all that wrong left propaganda which made the loss of identity even worse
So leaving aside the politics bit at the end, you just made an excellent argument for while nationalism is bad. Building the nation of Chile came at the cost of the "actual" culture, for an imagined culture instead. So why should you be proud of being Chilean at the cost of identity of your forefathers? What is "genuine" culture? Why is imported culture not "genuine" culture? Does not imported culture get appropriated into Chilean culture and changed from what it is in other countries?

It seems to me like you're making culture, first, "eternal" and something almost sacred. And then you're also making it something contradictory: that is, my culture and your culture cannot coexist and become nearer, instead one destroys the other and everything is lost and this is _bad_ because it destroys something "eternal and sacred." I would counter, however, that culture is not binary. It is not on or off, yes or no. Culture is literally everything we do based on generations of building and norm construction; including huge invasions from Europe into the Americas and that means Chile is just a construction (you speak Spanish as your first language, right?). Just like the United States is a construction and France is a construction and certainly Germany is a construction. Read what Nietzsche has to say about the unification of the German nation—this was a project that had nothing to do with the "unified nature" of Germans. Why were the boundaries drawn where they were? Was that any more logical than drawing them somewhere else? The Middle East illustrates this as well, "countries" like Iraq that have all these tribes and groups that were just thrown together by the British empire. Why should there be "Iraqi" nationalism? Who feels like an Iraqi?

The point I'm making here is that your arguments contradict: On the one hand you're pointing out that the creation of Chile came at the cost of the indigenous cultures of the region; and on the other hand you're appropriating those cultures into Chile and arguing that anything that changes that from the outside is "false" and that people are losing their "true identities." I see these points as contradictory.

I'm not in college, why would you stop just because you're not in college anymore!?!?

I don't have a hangover. /fist pump

:headbang:
 
So leaving aside the politics bit at the end, you just made an excellent argument for while nationalism is bad. Building the nation of Chile came at the cost of the "actual" culture, for an imagined culture instead. So why should you be proud of being Chilean at the cost of identity of your forefathers? What is "genuine" culture? Why is imported culture not "genuine" culture? Does not imported culture get appropriated into Chilean culture and changed from what it is in other countries?

It seems to me like you're making culture, first, "eternal" and something almost sacred. And then you're also making it something contradictory: that is, my culture and your culture cannot coexist and become nearer, instead one destroys the other and everything is lost and this is _bad_ because it destroys something "eternal and sacred." I would counter, however, that culture is not binary. It is not on or off, yes or no. Culture is literally everything we do based on generations of building and norm construction; including huge invasions from Europe into the Americas and that means Chile is just a construction (you speak Spanish as your first language, right?). Just like the United States is a construction and France is a construction and certainly Germany is a construction.

Said it much better than I could ever express it. We literally decide, as individuals / groups / communities / mosh pits, the norms we live in, the things we remember, by how we build our societies. War, metal, sex, literature... think about heavy metal. GUYS PLAYING MUSIC INVENTED BY POOR BLACK AMERICANS TRANSFORMED BY AMERICAN HIPPIES WHO THEN ADOPTED GAY BIKER ATTIRE. Bam. You get Sepultura and Immortal. It couldn't be any stranger, be it Brazil or Sweden.

I don't want to make the world sound malleable, because subjectively it matters to all of us how our lives, music, love lives, careers, environments are built and sustained. I'm critical of the nation building project because, well, it's a useful farce... but in a lot of places it's treated as something primordial. In the U.S., people loooooooove to throw down the patriotism card in ways you just scratch your head and wonder if people have forgotten it is a farce (or if they ever knew it was in the first place).