6 ms·

Racism in Sweden

35 points by LopRabbit 4y ago

pempem 4y ago
Its shit that this person had to deal with continuous racism It's awesome that she recognizes her privilege and was willing/able to post about her experiences, because they are widely shared Its unfortunately unsurprising as the US is not great, and yet better than many alternatives We're going to keep seeing this as previously homogenous - mostly white - countries keep dealing with immigration. The post/tweet Kat shares about 'assumed homogeneity when building a liberal society' is an attitude common throughout the nordic and baltic states Industrialized nations that have relied on continuous GDP growth need immigration and yet socially, look to keep it at arms length. Often they embrace a phenotypical definition of belonging. These countries are just starting to make a journey like the US or the UK which represent two different trajectories and mythologies of state building and identity.
- pannSun 4y ago
  > Industrialized nations that have relied on continuous GDP growth need immigration Correction: the industries, not the nations, need immigration to continue their pace of growth.
  - imbnwa 4y ago
    Er, isn't the birth rate in the West well below replacement rate?
    - throwawayacc2 4y ago
      This would not be an issue if we didn’t live in an absurd system demanding constant growth.
  - refurb 4y ago
    Well, if you want your national pension plans to support seniors so they don't have to eat dogfood, yeah, you need immigration (or new births) to support them.
    - pannSun 4y ago
      So the wealthiest nations need immigration or their elderly will eat dogfood. Then presumably the elderly in other nations simply die upon retirement? Since their nations are both less wealthy and don't benefit from immigration, what other possibility is there?
      - refurb 4y ago
        In other countries? Either the government goes further into debt to support the elderly or they return to elderly moving in with their kids to support them. Singapore is facing this. I can remember the exact numbers but there were 8 working age people for every senior in the 70’s and by 2040 it’ll 2 to 1. So basically either younger folks face higher taxes or the elderly do without.
    - readthenotes1 4y ago
      You mean the pensions are Ponzi schemes, where each cohort requires youngsters to feed it to survive? How evil are we?
      - rsj_hn 4y ago
        That is how all savings work. You understand that when you save for retirement, you are not burying food in the ground so that you can dig it up and eat it when you stop working, right? Instead, you are purchasing claims on future production. It is always the production of the next generation that feeds the current retired generation, as our time transportation technology still lacks the ability to actually save consumer goods for the future.
        readthenotes1 4y ago
        Not exactly. The government pension schemes do not provide anything back to the chumps of the next generation. Savings are put in financial institutions and earn money based upon how much money those financial institutions are able to earn by redeploying that money to help businesses grow. There's quite a bit of difference between investing and extracting donations
  - tetris11 4y ago
    a more diverse workforce is less likely to unionise, so ''want" might be a better word here
  - hackerlight 4y ago
    The "nation" is a vague sociocultural and sociolegal construct. It's not a concrete thing that exists per se and therefore it doesn't have needs in the abstract. In the context that the GP was talking in, it's obvious they were using "nation" to refer to the economic prosperity of a country. This is what industry needs, but it's also what everyday people need.
j7ake 4y ago
Whatever benefits people say Europe has over North America, it is undeniable that Asian expats in North America feel more integrated than Asian expats in Europe.
- Symbiote 4y ago
  I think there's too much variation for this generalisation. Western Asians (Middle Eastern people), South Asians and East Asians all face different problems in different European and American states.
  - oefrha 4y ago
    When the word “Asian” is used colloquially (in the U.S. at least) without qualification to refer to a group of people, it almost always means either East Asian in the narrower sense, or East+South+Southeast Asian in the broader sense. Don’t think West Asians are ever included without clarification.
  - j7ake 4y ago
    Here is a thought experiment: count the number of west, south, East Asian CEOs in top companies or political positions (local to national) and ask whether North America or Europe have more of them. To be Asian and also the face of a very public company or be voted into government is a sign of the publics tolerance of Asians being integrated in their society.
Jamie9912 4y ago
I think this is a massive generalisation and very anecdotal, there's racist assholes everywhere you go.
- olodus 4y ago
  Yeah, for what it is worth as a Swede I've seen the opposite too, where someone who where acting racist towards a person in a store got called out and lectured by a woman who saw it. But I don't deny that the recent seat gains by SD in the general election points towards the country getting increasingly xenophobic, possibly racist.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
dvasdekis 4y ago
Lived in Sweden (Malmo) during the Syrian refugee crisis. Watched in horror as my Swedish friends swung from refugee-welcoming to authoritarian "Nej!" in just 6 months. Why? The rent doubled, the buses were full, taxes increased and crime sky-rocketed as immigrants who didn't have enough to eat crowded on to Sweden's generous social benefits scheme. The swedes, with a proud tradition of construction unions, heritage planning and social consensus didn't have the ability to reach an agreement on how to feed and house so many immigrants so quickly. This led to the migrants literally building a shanty town around the Malmo benefits office, instead of being allowed to build homes for themselves, as the EU refused to support the lone member state that did the right thing. Proportionally, this influx would be like 5 million people arriving and applying for asylum in the US in a single year. [1] As I witnessed these kind and tolerant people transform into the racist bigots this lady encountered, I think things would have very been different if the planet had treated the 2015 refugee crisis as a common problem, and not dumped it all on Sweden. No, there is no excuse for racism, or for the lack of action in this case. But there are forces that provoke it, and every country that didn't take in a proportionate number of refugees during this crisis shares the blame for the social mess that Sweden is in today. [1] https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-rise-of-sweden-democrats-and-the-end-of-swedish-exceptionalism/ https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-rise-of-sweden-democr...
- throwawayacc2 4y ago
  Yeah but those weren’t really “refugees” were they? You can’t call your self a refugee if you cross who knows how many borders from Syria and Afghanistan all the way to Sweden. And then add insult to injury by vacationing in the countries they are “fleeing” from. Sweden wasn’t “the lone member state that did the right thing” and the illegal immigrants were not “dumped on Sweden”. Sweden made a very bad choice opening up to what is very clearly a criminal cohort going out of its way to abuse welfare. And the same goes for Germany. Even more so because their incompetent leadership invited the entire middle east to Europe. If you really wanted to “help out” and “be humanitarian” Sweden and the rest of the EU should have established safe zones in Africa. And end what is essentially a ferry service from Africa to Europe. Migrants go on dingy inflatable boats 5 miles of the coast, issue an SOS and get transported to the EU. If this isn’t incentivising illegal migration, I don’t know what is. You can’t expect to conduct a policy of ethnic replacement which is what Swedens policy has been for the last few decades and don’t get resentment from the native population. You reap what you sow. The only good news is, the tide is turning.
tmikaeld 4y ago
I'd question every tiny twitter account that get this many likes in such short time and where the links are spread by karma-boosted accounts, here and on reddit. The woman also posted a video about some random person, spewing rasist slurs in English towards the woman, somehow know that she only speaks English, in full mask/hoodie so that she cannot be identified.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- tmikaeld 4y ago
  Naturally, pointing out that the accounts are karma-boosted = downvotes.
laserdancepony 4y ago
I wonder how many commenters here have to deal with poor african/middle eastern immigrants on a daily basis. It's easy to say "take them in, no human is illegal" when living in a walled community yourself.
throwaway_4ever 4y ago
Woke activist paints an entire country as racist while singling out a race with things like: "All white dude designers need to read this book. There’s a whole chapter dedicated to you all, and it’s spot on." Not surprised she's been "in a process of unlearning the imperialist + capitalist + racist education I received growing up in the US. Nurturing myself with literature from my people". She's just quite confused on when and what her racist education actually was and doing a bad job unlearning it. https://twitter.com/katherinemzhou/status/1117956130653843456 https://twitter.com/katherinemzhou/status/111795613065384345... https://twitter.com/StandardSolo/status/1583140693362737153/photo/1 https://twitter.com/StandardSolo/status/1583140693362737153/...
TMWNN 4y ago
Sweden is so irredeemably racist that it has no language, income, employment, or skills requirement <http://www.migrationsverket.se/English/Private-individuals/Becoming-a-Swedish-citizen/Citizenship-for-adults/Time-in-Sweden.html http://www.migrationsverket.se/English/Private-individuals/B...> for obtaining citizenship. In completely unrelated news, Arabic is now the second most spoken language in Sweden <https://digitaledition.chicagotribune.com/tribune/article_popover.aspx?guid=7047637a-c5f5-4297-9afa-a273dd443a9a https://digitaledition.chicagotribune.com/tribune/article_po...>.
- mrkeen 4y ago
  1) fix your link 2) This absolutely does not match my experience: I needed an employer to declare that they couldn't find a Swede to employ before I was allowed into the country. 2 years in I needed to renew my residence+work permit (submitting evidence that my income hadn't deceased, etc.). Another 2 years in I needed to renew again - achieving a permanent residence+work visa. Only after that could I apply for citizenship, which is still underway. 3) my experience obviously relates to how the law has worked thus far. The government has only just changed from the leftish incumbent party to a right-wing coalition, so it probably doesn't make sense to judge the current state of the country by laws which will now no doubt be changed.
  - mberglof 4y ago
    1) Agreed, it's broken 2) If you are not a citizen of another EU country (or a country with some special agreement) you will likely have to enter on a holiday/work/student VISA which should prove that you can support yourself whilst in Sweden. After five years you can apply to become a citizen and there's no test in place to judge you Swedish-ish-ness. (Nobody will quiz you about which year our old king skied on one ski from Mora to Salen.. for now) I think the point of the previous comment was that it's too easy to get a citizenship for "immigrants" (refugees), not for economic immigrants that choose to move to Sweden for Fun And Profits/Shits And Giggles. We're all equal under the law, it's just that diffent laws apply to each of us. 3) The law is unlikely to change before 2025 (link below) when you might be tested on which year the Swedish challenger to the headed for refuge (yeah.. ironic) in Norway. P.S. Congrats for sticking with it even if my government forced you to do paperwork TWICE in five years :P https://www.regeringen.se/rattsliga-dokument/statens-offentliga-utredningar/2021/01/sou-20212/ https://www.regeringen.se/rattsliga-dokument/statens-offentl... (Swedish, sorry) https://www.migrationsverket.se/English/Private-individuals/Becoming-a-Swedish-citizen/Apply-for-citizenship/Citizenship-for-adults.html https://www.migrationsverket.se/English/Private-individuals/... (checked as of writing) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasaloppet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasaloppet
shashashasha___ 4y ago
everyone are so embracing and progressive until they see a mass of different people in their country. one day, maybe, all people will accept the fact that we are all the same. regardless of color, religion, origin, sex. we are all the same... racist.
afrcnc 4y ago
The Syrian war was when we should have dealt with Russia in the first place
mberh7 4y ago
[flagged]

35 points by LopRabbit 4y ago

Its shit that this person had to deal with continuous racism It's awesome that she recognizes her privilege and was willing/able to post about her experiences, because they are widely shared Its unfortunately unsurprising as the US is not great, and yet better than many alternatives We're going to keep seeing this as previously homogenous - mostly white - countries keep dealing with immigration. The post/tweet Kat shares about 'assumed homogeneity when building a liberal society' is an attitude common throughout the nordic and baltic states Industrialized nations that have relied on continuous GDP growth need immigration and yet socially, look to keep it at arms length. Often they embrace a phenotypical definition of belonging. These countries are just starting to make a journey like the US or the UK which represent two different trajectories and mythologies of state building and identity.

pannSun 4y ago
> Industrialized nations that have relied on continuous GDP growth need immigration Correction: the industries, not the nations, need immigration to continue their pace of growth.
- imbnwa 4y ago
  Er, isn't the birth rate in the West well below replacement rate?
  - throwawayacc2 4y ago
    This would not be an issue if we didn’t live in an absurd system demanding constant growth.
- refurb 4y ago
  Well, if you want your national pension plans to support seniors so they don't have to eat dogfood, yeah, you need immigration (or new births) to support them.
  - pannSun 4y ago
    So the wealthiest nations need immigration or their elderly will eat dogfood. Then presumably the elderly in other nations simply die upon retirement? Since their nations are both less wealthy and don't benefit from immigration, what other possibility is there?
    - refurb 4y ago
      In other countries? Either the government goes further into debt to support the elderly or they return to elderly moving in with their kids to support them. Singapore is facing this. I can remember the exact numbers but there were 8 working age people for every senior in the 70’s and by 2040 it’ll 2 to 1. So basically either younger folks face higher taxes or the elderly do without.
  - readthenotes1 4y ago
    You mean the pensions are Ponzi schemes, where each cohort requires youngsters to feed it to survive? How evil are we?
    - rsj_hn 4y ago
      That is how all savings work. You understand that when you save for retirement, you are not burying food in the ground so that you can dig it up and eat it when you stop working, right? Instead, you are purchasing claims on future production. It is always the production of the next generation that feeds the current retired generation, as our time transportation technology still lacks the ability to actually save consumer goods for the future.
      - readthenotes1 4y ago
        Not exactly. The government pension schemes do not provide anything back to the chumps of the next generation. Savings are put in financial institutions and earn money based upon how much money those financial institutions are able to earn by redeploying that money to help businesses grow. There's quite a bit of difference between investing and extracting donations
- tetris11 4y ago
  a more diverse workforce is less likely to unionise, so ''want" might be a better word here
- hackerlight 4y ago
  The "nation" is a vague sociocultural and sociolegal construct. It's not a concrete thing that exists per se and therefore it doesn't have needs in the abstract. In the context that the GP was talking in, it's obvious they were using "nation" to refer to the economic prosperity of a country. This is what industry needs, but it's also what everyday people need.

j7ake 4y ago

Whatever benefits people say Europe has over North America, it is undeniable that Asian expats in North America feel more integrated than Asian expats in Europe.

Symbiote 4y ago
I think there's too much variation for this generalisation. Western Asians (Middle Eastern people), South Asians and East Asians all face different problems in different European and American states.
- oefrha 4y ago
  When the word “Asian” is used colloquially (in the U.S. at least) without qualification to refer to a group of people, it almost always means either East Asian in the narrower sense, or East+South+Southeast Asian in the broader sense. Don’t think West Asians are ever included without clarification.
- j7ake 4y ago
  Here is a thought experiment: count the number of west, south, East Asian CEOs in top companies or political positions (local to national) and ask whether North America or Europe have more of them. To be Asian and also the face of a very public company or be voted into government is a sign of the publics tolerance of Asians being integrated in their society.

Jamie9912 4y ago

I think this is a massive generalisation and very anecdotal, there's racist assholes everywhere you go.

olodus 4y ago
Yeah, for what it is worth as a Swede I've seen the opposite too, where someone who where acting racist towards a person in a store got called out and lectured by a woman who saw it. But I don't deny that the recent seat gains by SD in the general election points towards the country getting increasingly xenophobic, possibly racist.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

dvasdekis 4y ago

Lived in Sweden (Malmo) during the Syrian refugee crisis. Watched in horror as my Swedish friends swung from refugee-welcoming to authoritarian "Nej!" in just 6 months. Why? The rent doubled, the buses were full, taxes increased and crime sky-rocketed as immigrants who didn't have enough to eat crowded on to Sweden's generous social benefits scheme. The swedes, with a proud tradition of construction unions, heritage planning and social consensus didn't have the ability to reach an agreement on how to feed and house so many immigrants so quickly. This led to the migrants literally building a shanty town around the Malmo benefits office, instead of being allowed to build homes for themselves, as the EU refused to support the lone member state that did the right thing. Proportionally, this influx would be like 5 million people arriving and applying for asylum in the US in a single year. [1] As I witnessed these kind and tolerant people transform into the racist bigots this lady encountered, I think things would have very been different if the planet had treated the 2015 refugee crisis as a common problem, and not dumped it all on Sweden. No, there is no excuse for racism, or for the lack of action in this case. But there are forces that provoke it, and every country that didn't take in a proportionate number of refugees during this crisis shares the blame for the social mess that Sweden is in today. [1] https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-rise-of-sweden-democrats-and-the-end-of-swedish-exceptionalism/ https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-rise-of-sweden-democr...

throwawayacc2 4y ago
Yeah but those weren’t really “refugees” were they? You can’t call your self a refugee if you cross who knows how many borders from Syria and Afghanistan all the way to Sweden. And then add insult to injury by vacationing in the countries they are “fleeing” from. Sweden wasn’t “the lone member state that did the right thing” and the illegal immigrants were not “dumped on Sweden”. Sweden made a very bad choice opening up to what is very clearly a criminal cohort going out of its way to abuse welfare. And the same goes for Germany. Even more so because their incompetent leadership invited the entire middle east to Europe. If you really wanted to “help out” and “be humanitarian” Sweden and the rest of the EU should have established safe zones in Africa. And end what is essentially a ferry service from Africa to Europe. Migrants go on dingy inflatable boats 5 miles of the coast, issue an SOS and get transported to the EU. If this isn’t incentivising illegal migration, I don’t know what is. You can’t expect to conduct a policy of ethnic replacement which is what Swedens policy has been for the last few decades and don’t get resentment from the native population. You reap what you sow. The only good news is, the tide is turning.

tmikaeld 4y ago

I'd question every tiny twitter account that get this many likes in such short time and where the links are spread by karma-boosted accounts, here and on reddit. The woman also posted a video about some random person, spewing rasist slurs in English towards the woman, somehow know that she only speaks English, in full mask/hoodie so that she cannot be identified.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
tmikaeld 4y ago
Naturally, pointing out that the accounts are karma-boosted = downvotes.

laserdancepony 4y ago

I wonder how many commenters here have to deal with poor african/middle eastern immigrants on a daily basis. It's easy to say "take them in, no human is illegal" when living in a walled community yourself.

throwaway_4ever 4y ago

Woke activist paints an entire country as racist while singling out a race with things like: "All white dude designers need to read this book. There’s a whole chapter dedicated to you all, and it’s spot on." Not surprised she's been "in a process of unlearning the imperialist + capitalist + racist education I received growing up in the US. Nurturing myself with literature from my people". She's just quite confused on when and what her racist education actually was and doing a bad job unlearning it. https://twitter.com/katherinemzhou/status/1117956130653843456 https://twitter.com/katherinemzhou/status/111795613065384345... https://twitter.com/StandardSolo/status/1583140693362737153/photo/1 https://twitter.com/StandardSolo/status/1583140693362737153/...

TMWNN 4y ago

Sweden is so irredeemably racist that it has no language, income, employment, or skills requirement <http://www.migrationsverket.se/English/Private-individuals/Becoming-a-Swedish-citizen/Citizenship-for-adults/Time-in-Sweden.html http://www.migrationsverket.se/English/Private-individuals/B...> for obtaining citizenship. In completely unrelated news, Arabic is now the second most spoken language in Sweden <https://digitaledition.chicagotribune.com/tribune/article_popover.aspx?guid=7047637a-c5f5-4297-9afa-a273dd443a9a https://digitaledition.chicagotribune.com/tribune/article_po...>.

mrkeen 4y ago
1) fix your link 2) This absolutely does not match my experience: I needed an employer to declare that they couldn't find a Swede to employ before I was allowed into the country. 2 years in I needed to renew my residence+work permit (submitting evidence that my income hadn't deceased, etc.). Another 2 years in I needed to renew again - achieving a permanent residence+work visa. Only after that could I apply for citizenship, which is still underway. 3) my experience obviously relates to how the law has worked thus far. The government has only just changed from the leftish incumbent party to a right-wing coalition, so it probably doesn't make sense to judge the current state of the country by laws which will now no doubt be changed.
- mberglof 4y ago
  1) Agreed, it's broken 2) If you are not a citizen of another EU country (or a country with some special agreement) you will likely have to enter on a holiday/work/student VISA which should prove that you can support yourself whilst in Sweden. After five years you can apply to become a citizen and there's no test in place to judge you Swedish-ish-ness. (Nobody will quiz you about which year our old king skied on one ski from Mora to Salen.. for now) I think the point of the previous comment was that it's too easy to get a citizenship for "immigrants" (refugees), not for economic immigrants that choose to move to Sweden for Fun And Profits/Shits And Giggles. We're all equal under the law, it's just that diffent laws apply to each of us. 3) The law is unlikely to change before 2025 (link below) when you might be tested on which year the Swedish challenger to the headed for refuge (yeah.. ironic) in Norway. P.S. Congrats for sticking with it even if my government forced you to do paperwork TWICE in five years :P https://www.regeringen.se/rattsliga-dokument/statens-offentliga-utredningar/2021/01/sou-20212/ https://www.regeringen.se/rattsliga-dokument/statens-offentl... (Swedish, sorry) https://www.migrationsverket.se/English/Private-individuals/Becoming-a-Swedish-citizen/Apply-for-citizenship/Citizenship-for-adults.html https://www.migrationsverket.se/English/Private-individuals/... (checked as of writing) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasaloppet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasaloppet

shashashasha___ 4y ago

everyone are so embracing and progressive until they see a mass of different people in their country. one day, maybe, all people will accept the fact that we are all the same. regardless of color, religion, origin, sex. we are all the same... racist.

afrcnc 4y ago

The Syrian war was when we should have dealt with Russia in the first place

mberh7 4y ago

[flagged]