Proud to be a Swede and a Homo Domesticapiens

Interviewing Myself.......

Is Sweden something to be proud of?
Sweden is a peaceful country with peaceful people.
The landscape is beautiful; from the flat lowlands in the south to the wild mountains in the north. The variation of the landscape in combination with the variation of the four seasons give us an endless variation of sceneries.
This country has little pollution, the air is safe to breath and the water safe to drink almost everywhere you go.
Sweden and the Swedes have been blessed with a country full of natural resources

Sweden has a lot of good entrepreneurs. In the shade of the big, famous, Swedish manufacturers there is a huge group of small manufacturers that survive the international competition with innovativeness, flexibility, stubbornness and a lot of common sense. I admire these entrepreneurs because they live very unglamorous lives and they are still so dedicated. In fact they are the foundation of our economy.
Yes, Sweden is something to be proud of.

Anything I really dislike with Sweden?
We are too self contained and too ignorant about the rest of the world.
But to be honest I was like that myself before I got the privilege to work and live outside of Sweden.

How did I change?
I applied for a job abroad in a big international Swedish company. They offered jobs in China, Taiwan and Malaysia. I was the lucky one to get the job in Malaysia where I stayed for 3,5 years.

I learned a lot about Malaysia and a little about some of the neighbouring countries. But the country I learned most about was Sweden. It was a very interesting and eye opening experience to live outside my home country and look at it from the outside. To look at it with other countrymen's eyes, to listen to other people's views of Sweden and to live in a totally different society to bench mark with.

So what did I learn?
That I was self contained and ignorant.

Can I explain that in more detail?
I grow up in a country ruled for decades by Social Democrate government. Educational system, social security system, political values, tax-system, you name it, everything was shaped by this ideology. Having a father who supported the Social Democrates, I was brainwashed with how excellent and outstanding these systems worked and how the rest of the world suffered.

As a teenager I revolted against my father but it was when I moved to Malaysia at the age of 35 I realized that I was still brainwashed.

I remembered my father's comment to me before I moved to Malaysia: "Oh, watch out for diseases, natural catastrophes and poisonous snakes. How can anybody want to live there?"

My father has never been to Asia. He never visited me during my years in Malaysia.

Can't I be more specific than that?
Ok I'll give some examples:
I realized that many people in Malaysia were working 1o hours a day, 6 days a week and on top of that they could have 2 hours commuting time a day. People had 1-2 weeks of vaccation while Sweden has a minimum of 5 weeks for everybody. They were really focusing on work, had little leisure or spare time but still they were happy! It was all about attitude and expectations.

In Sweden a lot of people see work as a necessary burden. We work our maximum 8 hours a day, 5 days a week. Swedes have more spare time than most people in the world. Spare time is very important and many times what makes life worth living for. Many Swedes work hard but they work even harder during their spare time which they fill up with millions of activities for themselves, the family and their children.
Is it strange that Swedes are the most burnt out people on earth?

In Malaysia people paid around 18% in income tax. In Sweden people paid 30-50% (or more) in income tax. Still the Malaysian society was working well!!!
There were schools, hospitals, public transportation, highways, TV braodcasts you name it. Most things were privately run but it worked, it was not chaos!!!

Back to Sweden, am I proud to be a Swedish man?
Yes I am.

Why?
I grew up in a country with very good post second world war economy. Salaries were high, taxes were high, prices were high, nothing was cheap, everything was expensive.
Due to the high labour cost ordinary people like my family couldn't afford to buy many services. So, we all had to become handy men and learned to do everything ourselves. I can fix the car, I can build a house, I can cook, I can clean, I can repair the dish washer, I can help my wife deliver a baby......

On top of that I grew up during the women's liberation movement in Europe which has shaped my view on equality between the sexes. I would say that many Swedish men in my generation have become very good species of the Homo Sapiens. We could be the most domesticated generation ever... Homo Domesticapiens.
I don't know if I am very Swedish. But I am proud of what I have become.

Warning to women reading this: Beware there are male chauvinistic pigs in Sweden too.

You judge if this is an act of discrimination or not

The following story is put together from different Swedish newspapers. I have tried to fill in the missing parts so every detail may not be exactly correct.

Story in brief:
Nelly 20 and Joakim 21 got married the 14th of October 2006. One week later Nelly was deported to Russia.

Nelly is originally from Tajikistan. During the civil war in Tajikistan (1992-1997), Nelly and her family fled from Tajikistan to Russia. The family didn't get asylum in Russia. Instead Russian authorities decided to deport the family back to Tajikistan.

In 2002 the family fled from Russia to Sweden where they applied several times for refugee asylum. Nelly's sister and parents have already been deported back to Russia from Sweden but Nelly's application was not rejected until a few days after her marriage.

The police always act prompt on rejected asylum applications. The police entered the newlyweds' home and demanded Nelly to get a passport at the nerest Russian embassy. This is to make it possible to deport Nelly according to international rules, back to the country she came from when she entered Sweden.

Nelly and her husband managed to delay the deportation for a few days but finally Nelly was taken into custody and deported to Russia.

In a Swedish newspaper a civil servant at the Swedish migration authority says: -Being married to a Swedish citizen does not stop the enforcement of a deportation.
The police say: -We just execute the law.

The law says that you have to have a legal Visa when you enter Sweden. Nelly came to Sweden without a legal Visa and claimed refugee status. As long as her refugee status was being processed by the immigration she was allowed to stay in Sweden. But at the same instant the immigration authorities made the decision to reject her asylum application, Nelly became illegal in the country and the police should immediately deport her to the country she came from.

How about the marriage then?
Same rule for a foreign citizen who marries a Swedish citizen. You have to enter Sweden with a legal Visa if not you have to leave the country and get one.

I married my Malaysian wife in Malaysia. We also went to the Swedish embassy in Bangkok to register our marriage in Sweden. When we moved to Sweden we flew in and my wife entered Sweden with the 3 months tourist visa she got at the checkpoint in the airport. After a couple of weeks we left Sweden for Denmark, went to the Swedish embassy in Copenhagen and applied for a temporary visa and work permit of 6 months. With the temporary Visa we reentered Sweden. Now everything was fine.

After 6 months we had to go to the local migration authority for individual interviews. This was to assure that our marriage was not a fake marriage. Passing the interviews my wife got another 6 months Visa and workpermit. After another 6 months, another interview and finally she got her permanent Visa and workpermit. This is all according to the book!

Back to Nelly and Joakim.
Their story could have been handled very much better by the Swedish police. The police could have put the rule book aside for a second and used their heads and hearts and adviced Nelly and Joakim to go to Copenhagen to get her Visa. It didn't have to be more brutal than that.
Now Nelly has to do this procedure alone, in the Swedish embassy in Kaliningrad in Russia. I'm sure there is no way the embassy can reject Nelly a Visa there because she is legally married to a Swede.

Worst case scenario is that the Russian authorities take Nelly into custody and deport her to Tajikistan. I can't judge the probabillity of that but let's pray that will not happen.

So, what do you think? Were the civil servants and the police involved performing an act of discrimination or not?

“WOMEN OF THE WORLD UNITE --WE HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE BUT OUR MEN!" Or; why do western men marry Asian women?

Maybe the headline answers the question. Anyway I will dwell on this subject because my wife asked me to do so and I believe it is an interesting subject.

Why do western men marry Asian women?
I believe some answers can be found in the women’s liberation movement that started in the sixties and from where above slogan is taken. This movement was strong in USA and Western Europe.

It is a challenge to try to explain what the woman’s liberation movement was and is, because it was and still is a broad variation of ideas that lead to a broad group of woman’s lib organisations.

One dominant ingredient was socialism that struck against capitalism.
Another ingredient was feminism that struck against the patriarch dominance in western society. On top of that there were also lesbian groups and black women groups fighting for their special interests.
In other words you have:
-Socialist women’s lib
-Socialist feminist women’s lib
-Socialist lesbian feminist women’s lib
-Black socialist woman’s lib
-Black socialist feminist women’s lib
-Black socialist lesbian feminist women’s lib
-Feminists (not socialist)
-Lesbian feminists (not socialist)
Etc.

I’m not listing these groups to make fun of Women’s lib, I do it to describe that this is not a homogeneous group.
There are also groups of women with Christian foundation that fight for the women’s right to be respected as home workers and be entitled to pension and other social benefits while they are home taking care of their children. These groups are not really associated with the women’s lib but they exist and I think they should be considered as a fraction of women’s lib.

A lot of the Women’s lib was about getting the same rights as men, right to career, right to the same salary for the same job, right to have the same status in society as men, right to the same freedom as men meaning, birth control, divorce, right to financial assets, etc.
And the Women’s lib movement gave the women some of this, but not all of it and it certainly had a price.

In Sweden today it’s nothing strange with women taking up a career. Sweden has many successful women in business and politics. But these women have to do their career on men’s conditions.
The price men pay for their career is; little time for family and children. Many men with careers still have a family because they have a wife supporting their careers. Maybe a staying home wife or a wife who prioritize her husband’s career before her own.

Few career women have husbands that stay home and prioritize their wife’s career. Therefore many career women have fewer kids or no kids or not even their own family.

During the sixties Sweden had a strong growing economy. Sweden lacked labour. The Social Democrat government jumped on the “women’s lib train” and spread propaganda that women should go out and work. A massive production program of government nursery schools where performed. This is to make society take over the responsibillty of rasing and diciplining our children to make it possible for the mothers to work.
The avarage salaries in Sweden gradually decreased in the same speed as the households economy increased due to two incomes instead of just one.

The price women and families paid were:
-Women compete with men on men’s condition.
-Forget to have many children and a big family.
-You leave the responsibillity of raising your children to someone else.
-In the end if you have a family, your houshold's purchase power has not increased as much as the increase of the total hours you and your spouse spend at work!

The whole women’s lib movement was, and still is, a movement with very little men involvement.
What men think about the whole thing is not important for the women’s lib because men are also the enemy. This has become a problem. One sex can not change the world without the other sex contribution.
So, western men are still pretty much like they were before the women’s lib movement started.

What does that really mean?
It means that most men still want to have a wife that focus on family and children. A lot of men want to have many children.

Technology is shrinking the world. Western men are gradually realizing that the women’s lib is a western phenomenon. When western men go to Asia (who didn't have a women's lib movement) they find women who are raised in a more traditional family oriented environment. A lot of these women also identify with the ideal of primary being the wife and mother.

I personally don’t mind women having a career. But I also believe that the best career a woman can have is to bring up her and her husband's children. After all, when we die, our contribution to this world will be our children.
Everything else my wife and I do is to be able to have a big family.

Can you ever say nigger without making an insult?

""Woman is the Nigger of the World" was a 1972 song by John Lennon and Yoko Ono. The phrase was originally coined by Ono during a magazine interview in 1967. Lennon later said it took him until 1970 to 'dig it'.

The song lambasts the traditional role of woman's subservience to man across all cultures. It was banned from radio airplay because of the word 'nigger' although many prominent blacks, including Dick Gregory, spoke out in defense of the song."
Source Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Read the complete lyrics on the following link:
http://www.john-lennon.com/songlyrics/songs/Woman_is_the_Nigger_of_the_World.htm

"How many Niggers are here today?" was the start up phrase the American, Jewish stand up commedian, Lenny Bruce used in some of his shows. Then he started counting; 1 nigger, 2 niggers, 3 niggers, 4 niggers, 5 niggers..... Lenny was, during the fifties, joking and provoking about jazz, moral philosophy, politics, patriotism, religion, law, race, abortion, drugs, the Ku Klux Klan, Jewishness, and the Roman Catholic Church. All the subjects that were taboo to joke about during that time.
You want to know more about Lenny Bruce, see the film Lenny with Dustin Hoffman.

The words Negro and Nigger were introduced and used when slavery started. This is to imply that people with black skin was a lower standing race than people with white skin. This is to justify handling black people as merchandise and treat them as cattle.

I believe that both John Lennon and Lenny Bruce tried to use this insulting word in a creative context. I believe Lenny Bruce tried to neutralize the strong insulting power this word carries by repeating it over and over again. Or maybe he just enjoyed being provocative.

The American history of slavery is full of all kinds of unimaginary abuse against black people. Maybe it will never be possible to neutralize this word. Maybe it is not meant to be neutralized. Maybe it has to be there to remind us about an ugly part of our history.

Even today this word is on the agenda in Sweden. Recently I saw people, both young and middle age, wearing t-shirts with a slogan, something like; "what's wrong with nigger-ball when Finnish fingers are OK?".

In Sweden we have a round chocolate ball that was commonly called nigger ball (Negerboll in Swedish) until during the seventies (when the Swedes got better educated) it was officially changed to chocolate ball. Finnish fingers (Finska pinnar in Swedish) is a snack you can eat as an appeatizer or eat like peanuts to a beer.

The question on the T-shirt shows a huge ignorance about the different meanings of the word Nigger and Finnish. An ignorance that makes me feel very uncomfortable.

Or, maybe less likely, the people making these T-shirts look down on people from Finland too? This assumption is not impossible since the Finnish immigrants in Sweden have been treated and looked upon as second class citizens.

Or, even more unlikely, the T-shirt maker wants to say that it is as bad to say Finnish Fingers as Nigger-ball?

Two questions:
-Why do you think people print a T-shirt like that?

-Do you believe the word Nigger ever will be neutralized and not be taken as an insult if used on somebody?

"If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at Maria Borelius"

In a way Man hasn't changed very much the last 2000 years.

The new Swedish government has its first minister resignation after only a week in power.The minister is a woman named Maria Borelius, she was meant to be the Trade Minister but now she has been "stoned" out in the cold by media and bloggers.

The last week a lot of academic discussions have been going on about moral, civil disobedience, upper class arrogance etc. This is because Maria Borelius during different occasions in her life has ran away from paying tax.
Once she employed a nanny without paying employer's tax. She didn't pay her Television licence and she owns a house via a company based in the tax escaper’s paradise Jersey.

Maria Borelius lied about the reasons why she hired the nanny illegally. She claimed she and her husband couldn't afford to pay employer's tax. But nobody believed that, this was nothing but a lousy, lousy lie. Maria Borelius and her husband had at the time of the offence, a common income sky high above the average Swede.
Maybe this lie was Maria’s biggest mistake. To be honest, who doesn't want to escape tax? But lying to the people is really bad.

So, stoned she was.

Sweden’s new Prime minister; Fredrik Reinfeldt, tried at first to be forgiving but the pressure got too strong and finally he had to advice Maria to resign.

So, what would Jesus have done if he was in Fredrik Reinfeldt's situation?

In the Bible, John 8: 1-11, we can read the famous words Jesus said to the crowd, wanting to stone a woman caught in adultery: "If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her."

When the crowd had left, without throwing one single stone, Jesus told the woman: "Go now and leave your life of sin."

"Do not commit adultery" is the 7th of God's 10th commandments. If the woman had been caught during the time before Jesus, the time of the Old Testament, she would most likely have been stoned. She was very lucky to be brought before Jesus whose mission on earth, among others was to teach Man to be forgiving.

How about Maria Borelius:
8th Commandment: Do not steal.
9th Commandment: Do not lie.
If Maria had lived during the time of the Old Testament she may have had her hand chopped off for stealing and her tongue cut out for lying.

Luckily Maria lives in Sweden 2006. Sweden is a country with an interesting mix of Old Testament and New Testament Christian values.

This is why we first stone Maria with words and after that tell her to "Go now and leave your life of sin."

Finally the most difficult part; to repent and to forgive.

To be forgiven you have to repent. I haven’t read or heard any statement from Maria Borelius showing any kind of remorse. Her reason to resign was, according to media that the pressure on family and friends became to strong and the resignation was handed over to release that pressure.

Maria, I can’t forgive you if you can’t repent.
If you repent I will forgive you.

Proud to be a Malaysian

Sue Ling (fictitious name) was born 1967 in Malaysia as a third generation Chinese immigrant. She went through the Malaysian government school system, in a catholic convent school, where she learned Bahasa Malay and English. At home Sue Ling spoke the Chinese dialect Teo Chew with her family. Living in a Chinese community Sue Ling also learned to speak Mandarin and some Cantonese.
Sue passed college in Kuala Lumpur and took a university degree in Oklahoma USA.
After 5 years in the states Sue Ling moved to Singapore, worked and lived there as a PR for 8 years. During that time she met her becoming husband whom she married and followed to settle down in Sweden.
After been living in Sweden for 8 years and having 4 children in Sweden, I ask her the following questions about being an immigrant in Sweden.

Question: Is there a difference being an immigrant in Sweden compared to Malaysia?
I don't feel like an immigrant in Malaysia, even if my fore fathers came from China. I'm a Malaysian, I grew up there. I'm sure my children don’t feel like immigrants in Sweden either.

Question: Is Sweden easy or hard to be an immigrant in?
If I would fantasize of being a Swede moving to Malaysia, I would say the transition would be easier in Malaysia as an immigrant due to the language barrier. When you move to Malaysia you have very little language barrier. It's a multi lingual country and almost everybody speaks English there. Swedish children learn English in school but Malaysian children do not learn Swedish in school. With less language barrier, the transition into the society is much easier. Other sets of problem will come in of course. Like the cultural difference, the culture shock, finding employment and so forth.

Question: Are you a Swedish citizen?
No

Question: Why not?
Because I am proud to be a Malaysian, I want to die as a Malaysian. I have no need to become a Swede. I don't see a need to convert to be a Swede because I don't think Sweden has so much to offer me. The only advantage I will get to become a Swedish citizen is the right to vote and since politics is not my favourite subject I can skip that.

Question: Doesn’t that make you feel that you are outside the democratic process in Sweden?
Maybe it's a very selfish attitude I have. Maybe I should care more about who is governing the country because it will affect the coming generations. If it was possible for me to have dual citizenship I wouldn't mind applying for a Swedish citizenship. But in Malaysia it's not allowed to have two citizenships. I wouldn't risk loosing my Malaysian citizenship to get a Swedish one.

Question: Do you feel a pressure to convert into a Swede to become a Swedish citizen?
I think there is a general assumption from society and from friends that the ultimate goal for me is to become a Swede. It's an unasked question in the air. I don't take it as a pressure but I believe other people may do if they are in my position.

Question: What do you appreciate most in Sweden?
I appreciate the nature and the fact that everybody is entitled to the nature. It’s everybody’s responsibility to preserve the nature and what it has to offer. This awareness is impressive. That's the mentality we need to cultivate for the generations to come.

Question: What do you miss most in Sweden?
I miss the competitiveness. Swedes tend to be self contented because they believe 'they have it so good' and there can't be a better place on earth than where they are. That bugs me because there are a lot more we can learn from outside of Sweden. If only people would stop being so self-contained and self centered they can start to strive to make it a better world.

Question: What do you appreciate most in the Swedish mentality?
The Swedish mentality, hmm, what is the Swedish mentality, give me some examples? After eight years I still don't know what the true Swedish mentality is.
One famous Swedish mentality is equal rights for females. I'm not a feminist so I can't fully appreciate that.
But I do appreciate that in Sweden girls have different status, almost the same status as boys. Therefore girls are encouraged to do anything they wish to do. You don't curb the creativity and potential of a certain gender in this society.

Another widely spread Swedish mentality is equality for all people. Sweden has an open policy towards immigrants from all nations. But what they are not saying, the fine print in this mentality, is as long as you come in and become a Swede you are welcome, but you should not come in and stand out as an individual. Standing out is not appreciated because everybody should be equal. But that's not correct since everybody is unique. How can everybody be the same and be expected to do the same things? People should not suppress their full potential just because there is a mentality that no one is better than the next.

Question: What do you dislike most in the Swedish mentality?
Sweden is supposed to be a Christian country but you can't see that in the Swedish lifestyle. There is a lot of "I need more"(material comfort) mentality in this country instead of I need God !

Question: How do you feel about seeing your children growing up in Sweden?
In this country, you don't teach children to respect their parents. You put the children in child care at the age of one year old because everybody wants to work. They work because they are sold into the thinking that this is the right way to lead a successful life. Family relationships are not stressed enough since everybody is so self-contained. We are moulding the society into a selfish society.
Parents have the tendancy to treat the children as equals rather then establishing the parental authority. Hence, many children grow up lacking of no discipline. This is against everything I have learned and I would never raise my children the Swedish way, no way.

The government is sending mixed signals to the families. World famous maternity leave with guaranteed job when you return, and you are also entitled to work part-time upon the return. This is all good but the mixed signals come when mothers choose to stay home with their children after maternity leave is over. Then suddenly they are worth nothing to the society.
I'm happy to see my children being proud of being Swedes but at the same time I will not be happy if they adopt all the Swedish mentalities along with the national pride.

Question: Do you regret moving to Sweden on a permanent basis?
No I don't regret moving to Sweden because I still believe that wherever my husband go I would follow him and as long as he is here I will be able to put up with anything, even being a nobody in this system.

Question: What do you think about the famous Swedish social insurance system?
I think it has good and bad sides. Good is that you are allowed to stay home the first year when you have a baby and come back to your old job, that is very good for a working mother.
Bad is when you have to queue up to get in contact with a clinic and then you have to queue up to get to see a doctor. In Malaysia, there are lots of private clinics which are open 24 hours and you can always run there and get an appointment very quickly. In Malaysia there is always fast access to a doctor, it’s not subsidized as here but you get access to it much faster. And you may need that if you are sick.

Question: What do you think about the Swedish school system?
I don't know enough to make a fair statement. Ask me again in a few years when my children have been there and I have more experience.

Question: Do you feel you are treated equally to a Swede?
In a way yes. I haven't been employed in Sweden, but due to the fact I am married to a Swede, I got into the system and am entitled to the same benefits as the next Swede.
I look different, have a different colour tone and yet people often assume I'm a Swede rather than I'm a foreigner, meaning people start talking to me in Swedish. I think there are so many immigrants in this country so people are used to see immigrants from all races.

Welcome Nyamko Sabuni

Let me present; Mrs. Nyamko Sabuni, Sweden's new minister of Integration and Equality.

As you may know the Social Democrates lost the election for the Swedish parliament to the "Alliance". The Alliance is; the Liberal Party, the Moderate Party, the Christian Democrates and the Center Party.
Sweden's new Prime minister is Mr. Fredrik Reinfeldt and he had the courage to give Nyamko a post in his new goverment. Congratulations to both of them.

Nyamko is a direct and straight forward person. This is not very Swedish. She is not afraid to demonstrate her self esteem, which is not very Swedish. And on top of that she is black, which is not very Swedish. It is sad but you should be aware there are lots of Swedes who are provoked by these facts already.

Nyamko became famous because of her fight for the many young women in cultures and religions who are; circumsised, put in fanatic religious schools, repressed by the so called culture of honour, are forced to wear a veil and forced to marry against their will.
You may wonder what all this has to do with Sweden? But according to Nyamko there are hundreds of thousands of women, in multi ethnic Sweden who are at risk of these assaults.

Nyamko has also become known by explaining, to us Swedes the history behind; why it is insulting to call a black person a negro.

Nyamko also wants to inspire women to take more political power and she explains that doing that has a price and require sacrifices. It is definately a men's world in politics.

I may not agree with everything Nyamko stand for in politics. But I'm very encouraged to see this colorful person among all these white men in Swedish politics.

Nyamko, I will stand by you "when the going gets rough".

The quiet, non spoken, mutual agreement

There is a common conception among a lot of Swedes that immigrants are more criminal than Swedes

In Sweden there is no statistics clarifying how many immigrants there are in Swedish prisons. The only statistics there is, is how many prisoners we have with foreign citizenship.
Prisoners with foreign citizenship are 27% of the total member of prisoners (2002-2003).

There is no statistics clarifying how many immigrants are performing legal offence in Sweden.

Research from 2005, including 4,4 million people between 15-51 years old, living in Sweden during 1997-2001, shows that 12% of people born outside Sweden were suspects in crime investigations, while only 5 % of people born in Sweden were suspects in crime investigations during the same period.
This research is done by The Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention. http://www.bra.se/

The reasons that people born outside Sweden, living in Sweden, are suspects twice as often as people born in Sweden can, according to The Swedish National Council for crime Prevention, be that they:
1. Are reported to the police more often.
2. Are looking and behaving differently.
3. Have difficulties to adapt to Swedish customs.
4. Belong to the lower class’ of society.
5. Are living in segregated residential areas.

Be aware that none of these 5 points are criminal offence.

If any comfort; it is 3,5 times more common that men are suspects than women. 6 times more common that people living on social welfare are suspects than people not living on social welfare.
Or, how about the combination; being a man, born outside Sweden and living on welfare. Does that make it 2 x 3,5 x 6 = 42 times more common to be a suspect than being a woman, born in Sweden and not living on social welfare? The research doesn’t answer that question.

The Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention has interviewed 10 000 Swedish students regarding their attitudes towards minorities and foreigners. The study shows that there is a small group of students that are strongly intolerant and hostile towards immigrants.
This group is mainly working class boys, with problems in school, with criminal friends, with a male chauvinistic attitude and they feel like outsiders in the society.

My own conclusion is that these young men carry a need to take revenge. And they do it by declaring war towards people they feel are below than them in society. People like, homosexuals, immigrants, women, Jews, Muslims etc.. They declare war towards these groups because they are cowards but also because they believe there is a quiet, non spoken, mutual agreement, among the majority of the Swedes, that minorities are threats and therefore it is OK to attack them.

We must always be aware of what we say and how we act to avoid reinforcing this dangerous, “quiet, non spoken, mutual agreement”.

Think about that my friend !

A Love story across borders

Bill had been married to his Swedish wife for 15 years when he came to South East Asia for the first time in his life. They had 2 children a boy 6 and girl 8 years old.
Bill travelled in business for a Swedish company. Soon Bill got impressed by the hospitality and flattered by the kindness he met from the Asian people and the Asian woman in particular. He was not attracted by the prostitutes he met in hotels and night clubs, since he couldn’t understand the thrill of having sex with a total stranger.
But he was really amazed by the way women treated him as a guest at the suppliers he visited.
Bill started to compare with what he was used to from Sweden. Women in Asia were really different, there was no competition with the men; there was no fight for equality. Women seemed to enjoy if they could make him comfortable and if they could please him. What they wanted back was appreciation and respect.
Bill did appreciate and respect these women and he demonstrated this to them.

Bill's marriage was not happy. He and his wife didn’t share the same ideas about how to raise children and build a family. This subject was fuelling their continuous fighting. Bill was a family man and had been determined to overcome the differences but it always ended with him compromising and his wife did not.
Their marriage had come into a situation where Bill slowly realised that he might have started a family with the wrong woman. They were too different and his wife totally lacked competence in compromising at all.
They were never talking nicely to each other, always reminding each other what they disliked with one another. Since the children were born sex was more or less dead. The few attempts, when the need was too strong to ignore, always ended with disappointment for both parties.

After Bill had been travelling in Asia for a couple of years Bill's wife was fed up and wanted to get a divorce. Bill agreed and they started to plan the separation. They told the children about the divorce and of course they were devastated.
After 15 years with the wrong choice of woman Bill felt relieved and at the same time he felt like a big failure. When his own parents divorced, he had promised himself to not get there himself but now he had; freedom and failure in a mess.

During a casual dinner Bill told a female business associate about his divorce. She told him about her recent separation from the man she had been engaged with for some years. She had met the man after an auntie’s intense match making. This woman was of Chinese origin and a third generation immigrant in South East Asia. Bill and the woman, whose name was Ling, had been working together for two years and they knew each other pretty well as colleagues. Now they started to know each other as friends.

Bill liked this woman and the more they got to know each other the more he liked her. It was pretty obvious that she liked him too. Ling made him feel comfortable, relaxed and appreciated. He realized that she was not putting up an act. She was genuine, natural, caring, warm, understanding, funny, intelligent and beautiful.
Finally they ended up in bed. Bill realized that after the years with his wife he was totally confused and had no self esteem left in the bed room. What could he say? How could he explain? They talked about it without making a big thing out of it and let it rest.

Bill and Ling got along very well. They found out that they really were soul mates. Despite the difference in how they grew up, culture, religion, upbringing, education system etc. they realized they shared a lot of values. They shared the same ideas about how to raise children. And they shared the same God.

Bill fell in Love. He fell so hard, but he didn’t mind because he knew this was the right thing. He could feel it so strongly in his heart.
After having spent 15 years with a woman that he thought he loved but soon the love had been replaced with reasoning and common sense, he had learned to listen to his heart and trust it. The lesson had been too expensive but here was the reward.

And the best of it all Ling was in Love too and she fell for him.
And they are still falling.

(So, what about the sex?
Now they have six children, do I have to say more?)