Etikettarkiv: Swedish Democrats

Podcast 15/52 – Similarities between UKIP and the Swedish Democrats?

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Was working in the garden yesterday, listening to a podcast from the RSA on something or other. Don’t quite remember actually. Anyway, as I was cutting up branches for the garden bin, sweeping up old leaves from the outside seating area and other typical ”it’s spring and there’s stuff to get done in the garden”-stuff, when one show from the RSA ended, a new one automatically began. That’s how I ended up listening to a pod on UKIP and the left behind: what a new party tells us about modern Britain. This is not an episode I would have put on from reading the heading, but I’m very glad that I got to listen to it. So I decided to make it the 15th podcast recommendation from me this year. (By the way, you can watch it as well if you prefer that. I don’t.)

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I don’t know much about the Swedish Democrats, honestly, and I certainly know even less about the UKIP in the UK, but as I listened I wondered if there are more similarities between the two parties, and the trends in the respective countries, or if what’s happening is totally different in Sweden and the UK?

Are the same demographic groups being attracted to the Swedish Democrats as to UKIP? Are the reasons for voting Swedish Democrats the same as those for voting UKIP? Has anybody done such a thorough analysis of the voters and rationales for voting Swedish Democrats as the analysis made by Matthew Goodwin in the UK?

I don’t know. Still. I haven’t gotten any answers to my pondering. But perhaps you know, and can help me learn more about this? Articles to read? Pods to listen to?

What am I afraid of and who’s to blame?

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What am I afraid of and who’s to blame? We center our lives around this question – according to Brene Brown – to the detriment of us all. Just started to listen to the RSA Talk that Brene Brown gave a while ago, and even though I’ve listened to it at least five times, I’ve never latched onto this question.

But today. Wham!! It hit me like a hammer on a nail that this is what is happening in Sweden today. And yesterday. And on election day. And the months leading up to Election Day… and so on. We have all fallen prey to the question of what I’m afraid of and who’s fault it is.

There are those that voted for the Swedish Democrats. This very question somehow seems to be at the very center of what that party is all about. A fear of/for a country (and a world) that is changing by the second, and being afraid of that change. Not wanting it. Not feeling safe with that change. Or whatever the rationale is… And the blame is put on immigrants.

Then there are those who didn’t vote for the Swedish Democrats. The people terrified or pissed off or personally offended by the racist dogma that somehow seems to have been the main focus during this general election in Sweden. And here the blame is placed on the people who sympathise with the Swedish Democrats.

And you know what?

It won’t work. Neither way.

We can’t create a good society if we base it on fear and blame. So regardless if you voted on the Swedish Democrats or you voted for something else, if you based that vote on fear (and blame), you will not get what it is you desire. You will not get a release of that fear. On the contrary, because of what you focus on, you will get more of that. So if you base your life on fear, fear you will have.

And I don’t wish living a life based on fear on my worst enemy. And I speak from a point of having done just that. So much of my life has been centered on fear. Knowingly sometimes, unknowingly the other times. But always this fear lurching beneath the surface. Menacing. Even making me fear fear.

But it’s not where I come from now. Today I am centered in love, and I know fear is a mind construct that I do not have to believe!

What would it take for you to start to look at your fears? Would it help if I told you fear is a figment of our imagination? It is not a Truth. It only lives in your mind.

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Do you know what you are afraid of? Do you know why you voted on what you voted for this general election? Can you honestly tell me fear didn’t have anything to do with your choice?