It's been very interesting to read everyone's posts. smile

Being me, however, I think I should refrain, from now at least, from commenting on things in the United States. Let me say something about how the media has portrayed politicians and important public persons here in Sweden, and how that has influenced voters and our country in general.

This is Per Albin Hansson:

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He was Prime Minister in Sweden from 1932 up to 1946, when he died. He was a highly successful Prime Minister, who during his long political career (which had started as early as 1901) not only fought to give all Swedes the same right to vote, but who also presided over Sweden's rise from a poor agricultural society to a well-to-do industrialized nation with a remarkable degree of general welfare. He also encouraged and fortified his nation, both the mood of the people and the country's military strength, during the Second World War.

But would you believe that this guy had two families? That he was - I'm not kidding you - actually married to two different women? At the same time? Okay, he had married one in a civil ceremony and the other one in church. And back then, there were still some vestiges left of a centuries-old pre-Christian marriage form, so maybe he had that kind of marriage with one of his wives, and a church-sanctioned marriage with the other.

Was bigamy allowed in Sweden in the first half of the twentieth century? Oh no no no!!! It wasn't. I don't think that it has ever been allowed here for as long as we have had written documents to describe our history, which would be going down to about 600 AD.

But, you know, Per Albin Hansson. Everybody's Per Albin. Our nation's strength and pride. Would the media of his time inform the general public of the Prime Minister's unusual marriage arrangements? No! That would have scandalized him, wouldn't it? It would just cause a lot of anger and upheaval. And Sweden as a country might have been weakened, and it may have looked bad in the eyes of other countries. Better leave the Prime Minister and his wives alone, no?

My point is that back then, the media were soooo polite. Another little scandal that they didn't write about, but which has been acknowledged afterwards, is that the person who was King of Sweden while Per Albin was our Prime Minister, Gustaf V, was gay.

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Gustaf V was a moderately good King, and probably an even better Crown Prince. In 1905, when Norway refused to be united with Sweden any longer, there was a good chance that Sweden might declare war on Norway. Gustaf, then Crown Prince, showed a lot of diplomatic skill when he helped avert that war between two Scandinavian nations.

My point is that these two men could so easily have been undone if the media had published sordid details about their private lives. Thanks to the fact that the media kept mum, Sweden could have this Prime Minister and this King, and was probably strenghtened because of it.

Ann