A hizzy-fit is brewing between Sweden and China. And now we have people eager to sell their souls to appease the angered dragon.
A few weeks ago, three Chinese tourists were forcefully evicted from a Stockholm hotel. The tourists had arrived a day early, and refused to take a ”you’re room was booked for tomorrow” for an answer. A video from the event shows one of the tourists falsify distress as if it was insurance-fraud caught on a dashboard-cam, shouting ”this is killing!” as he’s being carried away by Swedish police.
No killing occurred. Not even a smidgen of it. One might understand that a person raised in the Chinese autocracy might reasonably fear that being carried off by police might end in a bullet to the head. But ,#newsflash, that’s just not how Swedish authorities operate.
But the Chinese government considered this culture-clash to be police brutality against Chinese citizens. So, they demanded an apology and recompense from the Swedish government. A government, which could only shake its head and blankly state that the forceful eviction was a police matter. Neither the Swedish parliament, nor the Foreign Ministry for that matter, directly inserts its will into ongoing police investigations. Which, again, is understandable that the Chinese autocracy has trouble comprehending.
And then someone decided to throw gasoline on the embers.
A Swedish satire program sent a droll little informative video into the Chinese side of the internet, kindly cautioning Chinese tourists to behave when on foreign soil. Or get their asses kicked.
China is now threatening to close down travel to Sweden. To boycott Swedish products and companies. They even activated their youth propaganda-agents, Pissy, to tell Sweden off. All because Swedish media labours under the (supposedly faulty) impression that the Freedom of the Press also protects satire and comedy levied against the Great Chinese State.
Worse yet, Swedish companies and businessmen lambaste the media production, calling for discontinuation of one of Sweden’s most informative news shows.
Which is exactly how you sell your soul and freedoms.
What we have here is a global superpower, trying to impose their red dominion on a relatively free people. They do it by way of the wallet. The Chinese government seems to consider the Swedish nation as a puppet state. A vassal. In their eyes, they own us. To the point where it’s their right to dictate the behaviour of Swedish citizens, business’, and media. And they are not a friendly giant. Not a blank-cheque investor. They are a scary, scary empire, and a menace to any effort of free thought attempted within their domain.
Which is fine! An oppressive regime is gonna oppress. We all know that the scorpion is going to sting the frog in the back, no matter how many times we tell the story. But, and here’s the kicker, we have Swedish business’ and corporations that are going along with it. So frightened that they will lose the Chinese money in their pockets that they are willing to give up their democratic privileges to retain it. And many people here, vast swathes of the Swedish economy, has allowed itself to become so dependent on Chinese money to function, that they are willing to give anything up to keep themselves afloat. To appease their eastern overlords. And it’s those people that are the real problem here.
For if you depend on evil, you are a part of evil.
To me, there will never be enough Chinese-, or American-, or Russian money to warrant me selling my privilege to express myself freely. And if you try to take that privilege away from someone, then you are an opponent and enemy to a free society. No way ’round it.
/Sebastian Lindberg 2/10-2018
WastedWords 