In a social media post, Dagens Nyheter’s foreign correspondent Anna-Lena Laurén complains that Minister for Civil Defence, Carl-Oskar Bohlin (M), uses language that is far too complicated for her. Others argue that it is actually Laurén herself who unwittingly admits she is not very sharp.
In a column in DN on Monday, Alex Schulman rails against the minister’s language use:
He speaks authoritatively and naturally about “outcome spaces” and “discretion” and “accrued debt” and “maximizing capability-creation” and “capacity-enhancing measures.”
About the world, he says that it sometimes changes “disruptively and epoch-definingly fast.” Why not just say that it sometimes changes very fast? That is why he is an enigma, Carl-Oskar Bohlin.
Schulman is backed up by Anna-Lena Laurén, who says she is “very tired” of such difficult language:
Social Democrat Jan Eliasson agrees:
Others believe Laurén’s comment says more about her and DN than about Bohlin:
Going by the comments on Laurén’s attack on Bohlin, it seems that far more people — if not all — agree with Julia Caesar rather than Laurén herself.
A few more comments:
“Isn’t it a bit embarrassing to flaunt one’s stupidity?”
“Or maybe we finally have a politician who speaks to us like adults. Wonderful to have a politician who masters the Swedish language. You in the media can keep talking with Noshi who sounds like a child but the rest of us are happy to keep COB.”
“This article says more about Alex than about COB. One can have opinions about certain banal clichés, but overall, adult language is better than using the 500 words a five-year-old has.”
“Also very tired of journalists who think people are stupid and can’t understand what he’s saying. It suggests a very condescending view of people.”
“I am very tired of Alex Schulman.”
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