Sweden Bashing since WWII

[dongregg]

If this URL works, you'll read a thoughtful essay from the New York Review on Sweden bashing in the US and within Sweden as well.

http://www.nybooks.com/daily/2018/02/08 ... a%20Symbol

[dongregg]

Okay, the URL works. I've been inundated by pronouncements from both sides of the crime issue because I've spent so much time finding online stuff about Malmö while writing Set Me As a Seal upon Your Heart.

[PeteMork]

Okay, the URL works. I've been inundated by pronouncements from both sides of the crime issue because I've spent so much time finding online stuff about Malmö while writing Set Me As a Seal upon Your Heart.

Great post, Don. I immediately linked it on my Facebook page. Damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead!

[SpartanAltego]

I find any claims of gang violence, rape, or gun violence being disproportionately high in other nations to be painfully tone-deaf coming from the United States of "More Mass Shootings Than Days In The Year" America. I'm not a religious man, but the phrase that comes to mind right now is "remove the plank from your eye before pointing out the speck in your neighbor's."

[ltroifanatic]

Okay, the URL works. I've been inundated by pronouncements from both sides of the crime issue because I've spent so much time finding online stuff about Malmö while writing Set Me As a Seal upon Your Heart.

I remember when Don was researching Malmo and in turn I started to as well.To be frank I'd never even heard of it before As luck would have it I watched a video that used all the usual phrases."No-go areas"."Rape capital".."Immigrants rule the streets at night"..Of coarse it was crap but I wrote back to Don saying how wild Malmo seemed to be.I'd fallen for it hook,line and sinker.

[sauvin]

I find any claims of gang violence, rape, or gun violence being disproportionately high in other nations to be painfully tone-deaf coming from the United States of "More Mass Shootings Than Days In The Year" America. I'm not a religious man, but the phrase that comes to mind right now is "remove the plank from your eye before pointing out the speck in your neighbor's."

Tell me, this "disproportionately high" incidence of crime, is it just simple totals, or are you quoting statistics presented on a per capita basis? According to Wikipedia, the US outweighs Sweden in terms of population to the tune of 326 to 10.

[dongregg]

Okay, the URL works. I've been inundated by pronouncements from both sides of the crime issue because I've spent so much time finding online stuff about Malmö while writing Set Me As a Seal upon Your Heart.

I remember when Don was researching Malmo and in turn I started to as well.To be frank I'd never even heard of it before As luck would have it I watched a video that used all the usual phrases."No-go areas"."Rape capital".."Immigrants rule the streets at night"..Of coarse it was crap but I wrote back to Don saying how wild Malmo seemed to be.I'd fallen for it hook,line and sinker.

Yep. As the article states, "Today, when social media dominates the distribution of news, the Bad Sweden narrative is potent. It is shocking because it is the opposite of the utopia story. It is visually arresting in its contrast with the stereotypical aesthetics of Sweden. It is scary, and therefore effective, because if it could happen in Sweden, imagine what could happen here (wherever your “here” is). Add in a dash of schadenfreude and you have a resilient and fecund meme."

[SpartanAltego]

I find any claims of gang violence, rape, or gun violence being disproportionately high in other nations to be painfully tone-deaf coming from the United States of "More Mass Shootings Than Days In The Year" America. I'm not a religious man, but the phrase that comes to mind right now is "remove the plank from your eye before pointing out the speck in your neighbor's."

Tell me, this "disproportionately high" incidence of crime, is it just simple totals, or are you quoting statistics presented on a per capita basis? According to Wikipedia, the US outweighs Sweden in terms of population to the tune of 326 to 10.

I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here. Are you arguing that even among first-world nations the U.S. is not a startlingly violent nation with immense gun violence every year and record-breaking levels in recent times? Or are you saying Sweden 'does' have a high crime rate relative to its size?

Fairly confused, here.

[sauvin]

I find any claims of gang violence, rape, or gun violence being disproportionately high in other nations to be painfully tone-deaf coming from the United States of "More Mass Shootings Than Days In The Year" America. I'm not a religious man, but the phrase that comes to mind right now is "remove the plank from your eye before pointing out the speck in your neighbor's."

Tell me, this "disproportionately high" incidence of crime, is it just simple totals, or are you quoting statistics presented on a per capita basis? According to Wikipedia, the US outweighs Sweden in terms of population to the tune of 326 to 10.

I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here. Are you arguing that even among first-world nations the U.S. is not a startlingly violent nation with immense gun violence every year and record-breaking levels in recent times? Or are you saying Sweden 'does' have a high crime rate relative to its size?

Fairly confused, here.

You're confused because I was, and because I did a stupid thing. I read something that irritated me, fired off some idiotic comment and then read the referenced article. My knee-jerk response to people citing statistics to prove some point or other is to treat them initially with a unhealthily large grain of salt because of how "statistics" are often collected, derived and/or reported, and because people in general don't really understand legitimate statistics.

As an example: if you eat this kind of food, scientists say, you're five times more likely to die of some horrible disease than if you don't. This may even true, but I'm nearly always annoyed by those scientists never giving out the base odds in the six o'clock news. If the base odds are one in a hundred, your chances of dying from this food are one in twenty, and that would be a scary prospect. If the base odds are one in five million, your elevated level of risk is one in a million, and it would leave me wondering what the hell the six o'clock news show folks have against said food and why the [HONK] they're trying to scare us with it.

As it turns out, the referenced article does a nice job of suggesting what I'm saying.

[Wolfchild]

In what way does this discussion of Swedish politics and its peripheral comparison to that of The United States enhance our understanding of this story?