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BY MATTHEW PICHT
ANCHOR NEVILLE MILLER
Free speech is getting a test in Sweden this week.
As part of their “Curators of Sweden” initiative, the Swedish Institute tourism
board is lending out its official @sweden twitter account to a different citizen every
seven days. But the democratic experiment took a turn for the bizarre when 27-year-old
Sonja Abrahamsson stepped up to the keyboard.
The self-described “single and low-educated mother” surprised @sweden followers with
a string of strange anti-Semitic tweets revolving around her question: “What’s the fuzz
with Jews”? Outraged tweeters demanded an apology from Sonja, who later tweeted she
didn’t mean to cause offense, but was just curious “why some people hate jews so much.”
Most commentators attribute the rant to ignorance rather than hate-speech, but Sonja’s tweets
could still pose a serious problem for Sweden’s national image. The Slate’s Jeremy Stahl
points out Sweden has struggled with xenophobia and anti-Semitism in recent decades.
“That’s not to say at all that Sonja is an anti-Semite. But her questions are clearly
asked from a place of profound ignorance, which is obviously what hate groups rely on
in order to flourish...”
Despite this, the official response to Sonja’s tweets has been very laissez-faire. Swedish
spokesman Tommy Sollén told the Wall Street Journal, the Swedish Institute wasn’t planning
to remove or edit any of the offending tweets.
“Swedes frown on censorship, Mr. Sollén said... ‘How else are you going to show
the multi-faceted people that Sweden is composed of?’”
Sweden’s refusal to censor @sweden is drawing praise from some people. A Forbes analyst
says, Sonja’s tweets are an opportunity for Sweden to prove its commitment to free
speech.
“Sweden wanted to dramatically show how committed it is to freedom of speech and the
power of the unfettered Internet...”
The initiative has certainly impressed at least one American man. “Enthralled” by
Sweden’s twitter campaign, Comedy Central’s Stephen Colbert has announced, he wants to
be next in line for ownership of @sweden. Colbert asked his viewers...
“...to pressure Sweden’s Ministry of Tourism into giving me the controls. I solemnly swear,
that I, Stephen Colbert, know what the fuzz is with Jews.”