If this is even *half* accurate… no wonder my ancestors left that country for brighter shores.
The YouTuber here repeatedly repeats the error of calling Sweden “socialist,” an error popular among those who want to laud the Scandinavian system. But Sweden isn’t socialistic; like the other Nordic countries, Sweden is a capitalistic country… but one with an overpowered nanny state.Sweden tried socialism, decades ago; and as socialism always does, it failed. Sweden bucked the trend in getting rid of socialism without mass bloodshed… but it kept a lot of the trappings of socialist brutalism.
As well, it is culturally burdened with the dismal “Law of Jante,” a set of rules that have helped to normalize the “ghastly egalitarian” nature of Scandinavian culture.
The ten rules state:
- You’re not to think you are anything special.
- You’re not to think you are as good as we are.
- You’re not to think you are smarter than we are.
- You’re not to imagine yourself better than we are.
- You’re not to think you know more than we do.
- You’re not to think you are more important than we are.
- You’re not to think you are good at anything.
- You’re not to laugh at us.
- You’re not to think anyone cares about you.
- You’re not to think you can teach us anything.
These not only stand in stark contrast to American norms, they stand in stark contrast to Viking-era norms. These rules are touted as reasons why the Nordic countries are so “happy,” but the metrics used to determine that happiness seem at best dubious… more “acceptance” than “actually happy.” The result of Jante culture and government policies is a gray middle where nobody is too poor and nobody is too rich. Basically, this chops off both ends of the cultural bell curve. Sure, it gets rid of a lot of awfulness… but it also gets rid of a lot of greatness. And in actual fact, the existence of exceptional greatness, even when paired with equivalent awfulness, promotes actual forward progress. Look at Elon Musk: had he not been allowed to become stinkin’ rich, and not been allowed to flaunt that cash, we wouldn’t have SpaceX. And I’m more than happy to accept unhappy Amazon delivery guys if it means humanity becomes a multiplanetary species. We’re not going to see an exuberant Swedish space colonization effort anytime soon.
Of course, this culture won’t last. Sweden is replacing both the Swedish people and their culture. Shrug.
