SD: Investigate Hostility Against Swedes

Islamophobia and Afrophobia are concepts that recur regularly in the media, but hostility against Swedes is talked about much less, despite increasing. Now, the Sweden Democrats in Gothenburg want to map the hatred towards Swedes in the city.

Earlier this year, the Forum for Living History released the report Young People’s Views on Others – A Study of Students’ Attitudes, Trust, and Vulnerability, which shows that vulnerability among school students has increased significantly since 2013. Upon closer examination of the figures, it is evident that the largest increase in vulnerability has occurred among students born in Sweden with Swedish-born parents.

In the survey, 53 percent of this group report having been teased, 14 percent threatened, and 17 percent beaten. Overall, this means that students with a Swedish background today both show the largest increase over time and the highest levels of general vulnerability in schools.

A few days after the report was released, SD Gothenburg announced that they were submitting a motion to the city council to map the extent and nature of hostility against Swedes in the city. The need for this effort is referred to repeated reports of humiliating robberies and harassment where young people with Swedish backgrounds have been targeted.

Figures from the Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention show that, statistically, it is more common for youths with an immigrant background to commit robberies against youths with a Swedish background than vice versa. Despite this, there is no municipal report that systematically highlights hate, threats, or discrimination directed at individuals because they are perceived as Swedish.

Values Work

The motion aims at two points: To develop a mapping of the scope and character of hostility against Swedes in Gothenburg in collaboration with researchers from the University of Gothenburg and other relevant actors, and to let the results form the basis for concrete proposals to strengthen safety and counter hostility against Swedes.

The initiative is then intended to be integrated into values-based work in the same way as other efforts against racism and discrimination.

– Safety and equal treatment cannot be selective. If we are serious about combating racism, it must apply to all racism – even that directed at Swedes, says Agneta Kjaerbeck (SD), deputy group leader and member of the city council.

The motion is signed by Agneta Kjaerbeck (SD), Jörgen Fogelklou (SD), Emma Altenhammar (SD), and was addressed by the city council on February 26, where it was rejected: