dancing_moon: Jadeite / DM / Me (Default)
Ramble-rant ahead. Politics, frustration, media reflections...

Why let facts ruin the story? Norwegian comments on US coverage of the Norway terror

Fox News didn’t let that stop them: “Islamic terrorism is a problem in Scandinavian countries”, we were told, after we knew who the actual perpetrator was, "where they're just sort of turning a blind eye to it." And indeed it seemed we were. The proof? After a UN speech where former president George W. Bush had kept to his favourite subject "the War On Terror", the Norwegian PM was the next speaker and had focused on the threat of (gasp!) Climate Change. Such naïveté.

Except Norway has never been the victim of Islamic terrorism. There have been some examples of political violence in the last decades: hate killings and bombings of a labour day parade, a mosque, immigrant corner shops and a left wing book store. Behind all these were right-wing extremists; loathed, few in number, but willing to use indiscriminate violence.


A Norwegian citizen who was staying in a small US town during the Utøya shooting writes about the news reporting. Now, from what I recall of Swedish news, it began with reporting the terrorist attack against Oslo, with several people voicing suspicions that it was an attack originating with a group with similar sympathies to Al-Quaeda. Iirc, most news sourches I checked were rather clear on the fact that this was only speculation. As the events from Utøya began to be reported, the story turned more to clear WTF-is-happening reporting and the next day when we woke up enough to check the news, the (white) murderer was pictured in the newspapers.

I do however have a very clear memory of checking both BBC and CNN early on, in case they had picked up something that DN or Svt hadn't had time to update yet, and reading at CNN about a "extremist Muslim terror group" that had taken responsibility.

Media musings, private vs. state )

Of course, our (not at all very free and damnded well not politically varied) newspapers all immediately began to dig through the bastards childhood etc as soon as this blue-eyed, blond-haired man was confirmed the cause of the worst political crime in Norwegian history. And, if we stay in modern times at least, the worst in the history of Scandinavia.

Anyway. I don't give much of a fuck if his father was absent (so what? mine too. and, hey, my brother's as well, seeing as how we share one. Yet we do not commit massive terrorism. A-fucking-mazing) but I do wonder at the fact that so much focus was made on psychologizing and medicalizing him - when I can't even recall reading about the men who where on the 9/11 planes in more than cursory detail. Now, this is probably much different if one is actually in the US, but lemme tell you, my local newspapers wrote LOADS about that terror attack too. Only then it was more about Usama bin Laden (whose psychosocial family background I also don't know much about, except that he's from Saudia Arabia and rich. Did he have a good father? Fuck if I know) and about the Muslim organized terror.

Considering that Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland and the European Union all have brown parties in their parliaments (and what is happening in Denmark IDK but it's pretty much all horrible to read about); considering that the fucking xenophobic bastards in SD are spouting the exact same shit that got the "New Democrats" booed out of politics in the nineties, only now the bloody liberals are falling over themselves to agree with their more polished ideas before they've been voiced; considering that we have a rising wave of hateful xenophobic, misogynist, homophobic and white's first parties in all of Europe - I WANT THE NEWS TO TALK ABOUT THIS! I do not care about that man's sad family history, that's what we have court specialists for. I do not care about how comforting the idea of "the lone monstruous killer" is - I would very, VERY much like it if people could open a history and statistics book and realize that the extreme right is currently the most violent organization we have in northern Europe, that they are gaining power and that they are really fucking nasty, fucking scary and by giving in to their ideas step-by-step we are only giving them the ownership of the societal debate and that this is dangerous.

Ugh. So tired of everything sometimes.

In conclusion: There does not need to be a grand conspiracy behind things, for extreme voices advocating violence to influence dangerous people. Sarah Palin did not shoot anyone, but her "target" rethorics did not fly into a vacuum. The ideas of a "white Europe" or the (false) "pre-Muslim invasion" Nordic homogenity and subsequent harmonic history are directly related to the bombing and shooting that directly attack the Norwegian democracy and political youth.

And that the media is still spinning the same old story, helping us repeat the same old mistakes, it's horrifying.
dancing_moon: Wao Youka as Dracula (Creepy)
DN Debatt låter abortmotståndare breda ut sig under rubriken "Dags för samhället att nyansera synen på aborter".

Citat: 1960- och 70-talens kvinnorörelse hade fel när den drev fram en abortlag som bygger på tanken att kvinnans rätt till sin egen kropp nästan alltid är överordnad fostrets. Det är dags för samhället att ifrågasätta det här synsättet och abortlagens konstruktion.

Slutligen har vi en ny, tredje kategori. Denna svarar mot de fall då det finns rimliga skäl att hävda att abort är både rätt och fel till en viss grad. I dessa fall bör det inte vara samhällets skyldighet att aktivt assistera kvinnor som önskar göra abort

Om den gravida kvinnan befinner sig i den tredje kategorin och väljer att avbryta graviditeten är det hennes eget ansvar, inte något som samhället är skyldigt att bistå henne med.

Signerat: Två män - så jävla typiskt.

Jag visste det. Jag visste det, för flera år sedan, när jag läste en debattartikel i Aftonbladet med ungefär samma frågor (men signerat några religiösa pappskallar i stället för filosofiprofessorer) att vi var illa ute. Det blåser riktigt, riktigt otäcka högervindar över hela Europa och sånt här hänger ihop. Ut med invandrare, ner med kvinnors rättigheter, mindre ansvar från samhällets håll och en råare, mer egoistisk verklighet där de starkaste och priviligierade är vinnarna. Och nu står de, med fina titlar (filosofer) och ges utrymme åt debatt i DN. Missförstå mig rätt, jag talar inte om att det bör vara statlig censur, men... för några årtionden sedan hade en sån här artikel klassats ungefär som i samma kategori som en diskussion på temat "Vi tror jorden är platt och ni bör lyssna på vår åsikt". Skräpkorgen, direkt, irrelevant. Nu? Nu tror man det säljer tidningar, nu tror man det finns folk som faktiskt håller med

Lagen bör inte göra det svårt eller dyrt för kvinnor att få abort. Vill samhället ha färre aborter, är ökad sexualundervisning och billiga preventionsmedel vägen att gå. Men att försvåra aborten slår bara mot de svagaste och leder till ett ökat antal illegala, farliga aborter.

Från DN's lilla faktaruta, förresten: Den lag som antogs 1975 ger en gravid kvinna rätt att ensam besluta om abort till och med graviditetsvecka 18. Hon behöver inte uppge skäl och kan inte nekas abort, inom lagens tidsgränser. En effekt är att allt fler aborter utförs tidigt i graviditeten - Jamen det är ju JÄTTEBRA, för tidiga aborter är säkrare, mindre psykologiskt besvärande och kostnadseffektivare för samhället. Vari ligger problemet?

Jag kan knappt diskutera det här, för jag vill bara skrika NEJ NEJ NEJ NEJ!!! Ett embryo/fosters rätt att utvecklas och eventuellt bli en människa måste alltid prioriteras lägre än den människan som faktiskt finns här och vars kropp och liv berörs. Alltid, på alla villkor.
dancing_moon: [APH] Austria getting his hair teased (Stress)
So.

The racists got into the parliament in Sweden. I am angry, disappointed and goddamn afraid. The US is already too far right for comfort, Europe is having an incredibly worrying upswing in the far right fringe taking place in parliament after parliament. I worry about my family - I don't want my grandmother to have to imagine a repeat of the 1930-ies for us kids, I don't want to have to consider changing my name if I ever want to attempt the open job market again, I DON'T WANT TO LIVE IN A COUNTRY WITH A PARTY OF FUCKING NEO-NAZIS, XENOPHOBES, HOMOPHOBES AND WOMEN BATTERERS IN THE PARLIAMENT.

I do actually hope the blue and green parties can come to an agreement. The reds and blues can't, of course, but (speaking as someone who voted green with a hope of a left-green victory) I would be deeply disappointed in the politicians if they couldn't work something out.

Now I shall work, pack my shit and re-read the Harry Potter books. Excuse me, world, but I don't want to communicate with you right now because you stink.
dancing_moon: Jadeite / DM / Me (Default)
I just finished Johan Hilton's No tears for queers, with the subtitle "A report about men, gays and hate crimes". It is a deeply unsettling and horribly shaking book about three cases of violence against homosexual men. It is published by Bokförlaget Atlas and I bought it at Textmässan, a book fair for independent publishers.

Hilton writes in a detached, clinical style. Lots of recaps based on police materials, many many quotes and interviews. It's chilling, perhaps even worse because it's so clinical. He uses words like a scalpel and what he shows is awful, there are values of manliness that are rotten through and stink of hate and violence.

Matthew Shepard in the US. Johan Petterson in Katrineholm. Josef Ben Meddour in Göteborg.

It hurts, to read this report of three senseless, brutal murders. It hurts and it makes me so angry, so angry with the world and this country. I hope it is a good anger, I hope I'll be able to channel it into something doing more than just writing this little blog post as some kind of futile protest.

There's a long quote on the publishers page - here's part of it.

Först 1997, året då Josef sköts i rygg och nacke, började Säpo föra statistik över brott med homofobiska motiv. Sedan dess har antalet anmälda brott ökat med 76 procent utslaget över hela landet. Det beror inte bara på att HBT-människor numera känner större tilltro till polisen och vågar anmäla brotten. Det beror på en reell ökning. Bögar knackas som aldrig förr. 140 anmälda hatbrott i Västra Götaland bara det första kalenderhalvåret 2003. Att jämföra med 150 under hela 1997. Vad värre är: endast några få av dem klaras upp.

Short in English : Since 1997, when the security police began to track them, crimes with homophobic motives have increased with 76% in Sweden. The book was written in 2005, as far as I can understand.
76% more hate crimes against queer persons in eight years. WHAT THE FUCKING HELL IS THE MATTER WITH THIS COUNTRY. WHAT THE FUCKING HELL IS WRONG WITH THIS WORLD!
150 reported crimes during all of 1997 to 140 crimes the first half of 2003 in one area.

So. Yeah. If you can speak the language, read this book.

There's a whole heap of important books in my "to read soon" list. I attack them when I have the time and energy. Here, I only began to flip through some pages and then I was sucked in. It's like a nightmare. I don't want it to be true. But I know it is, I recognize the words and values and the unspoken pressure. From my memories of school, from hearing drunk people on the bus, from friends of friends - straight from a few former friends, in fact - from the assumptions behind things that everyone says and thinks. Probably me too, if I could look at my mirror image with objectivity.

Have another quote. It's telling:
Den kritik och agg som deras föräldrar och det vuxna närsamhället har mot invandrare och homosexuella omvandlar de i handling. De utför de handlingar som vuxna säger sig vilja utföra, men inte vågar.
Basically, young aggressive men put into violent reality the anger, dislike and fear that the society as a whole feels towards homosexuals and immigrants, but only dares to express through words.
The above from Hans Knutagårds "...det var bara en bögjävel", quoted in the book.

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