How an indescribable tweet sparked a huge debate about Swedish hospitality
Normally, an individual tweet from an unverified user would be lucky to get some likes or redirects.
But that was not what happened in Sweden when an indescribable announcement about Swedish hospitality aroused a huge debate and sent the #Swedengate trend.
It revolved around a statement that it is socially acceptable, or even customary, for Swedes not to feed their guests, especially children.
“Not here to judge but I do not understand this. How are you? [sic] you should eat without inviting your friend, ”asked the tweet in question, posted by the Afghan-Canadian user @SamQari.
During it, the attached screenshot showed a comment where a Swedish person told about his childhood experience of not being invited to dinner when he was playing at his friend’s home.
His tweet went viral. Since then, many other tweets and posts have appeared that describe various types of “inhospitable” behaviors that are reported to be common or accepted in Swedish society.
“Went to a friend’s [sic] the house for the first time and playing and their mother calls them for dinner … [she] told me sternly that I had to wait and play with my friends’ toys [sic] room until dinner was ready, ”tweeted Lovette Jallow, a Gambian-born Swedish activist and author.
“When I was growing up in Sweden, I remember not having access to my friends’ dinner tables … I had to put them in the microwave while they played board games in another room,” wrote Signe Krantz, a political scientist.
Viral comments – and subsequent outbursts – tend to generate intense and often violent reactions. Still, #Swedengate has taken the spit to incredible heights and is flowing out of Twitter and social media. The anger it has aroused has even resulted in hostile tweets on Sweden’s official Twitter account.
“Boy, this has ruffled some feathers,” Sam Qari said in his tweets, as his comment snowed into something much bigger than he had imagined.
How has Sweden reacted to the controversy?
Swedish responses to the controversy have varied enormously – from loud defenses of the practice of leaving guests without food to direct denial that such a custom is common.
Even the Swedish pop star Zara Larsson weighed in on the matter via Instagram, and remembered how common it would be not to be invited to the dinner table when she was at her friend’s house.
“Many families would do that [do that], and it would not be strange, ”she claimed. “It’s so rude … but it’s definitely Swedish culture.”
For Stockholm-based law student Mariam, 22, the #Swedengate controversy served as a kind of revelation that shed light on her childhood.
“I have had two experiences with this,” she told Euronews, telling how she was also left to play at her friend’s house at dinner.
“It was by discussing with friends and social media like TikTok that I realized that this was something very normalized that many Swedes experienced, especially as children.”
– I want to add that Swedes are among the nicest people on earth, Mariam said. “It is simply not obvious to them from a cultural point of view that one should share food with guests.”
But other Swedes have taken exception to the claims at the heart of #Swedengate and considered them unusual or lost to the past.
“I have two children and I have never heard it happen when they visit friends,” the Swedish father Anton Myrberg told Euronews. “It’s not a thing and has not been in 30 years or so.”
Professor Richard Tellström, an expert on food and ethnology, also told Euronews that food sharing is an inherent part of the country’s society.
But, he admitted, the country’s hospitality culture is a bit cautious. “You should not offer so much that the other person feels uncomfortable with the offer,” added Prof Tellström.
“You are always offered [coffee and cakes] “When you visit,” he said. “A Swedish journalist who does not drink coffee must learn this, otherwise he or she will not be able to do interviews at home with ordinary people,” he joked.
Also Sweden’s official Twitter account clapped back at a set of angry comments praising the country’s alleged inhospitability.
“The idea that Swedes do not offer refreshments to their guests is not a true reflection of how we go about it,” it said. “Swedes entertain guests of all kinds in their homes.”
Among the examples of customs to share food is coffee, the Swedish tradition which involves sharing coffee and other delicacies. An even older custom is coffee partya kind of small private party where a set of seven types of biscuits would be consumed.
Others include Valborg’s spring celebration, where neighbors gather around bonfires, and midsummer festivities.
Nevertheless, other Swedes have taken a radically different approach and not only claimed that they leave the guests without food. is part of Swedish culture, but that it should also be accepted.
“It’s true that we do not serve food to guests,” read the title of an op-ed for The Independent, written by Gothenburg-born Linda Johansson. “What’s even more confusing to me is why it’s even a problem.”
“Swedish thinking goes like this: the other child (or the other family) may have plans for a different kind of dinner, and you do not want to ruin the routine or the preparations,” she added.
Regardless of any response, the domestic debate in Sweden has been particularly lively.
TV channels such as SVT and TV4 have invited academics and chefs to comment on the roots of Swedish hospitality.
The host of a podcast organized by the major newspaper Svenska Dagbladet even wondered if the Swedish government could stage a PR campaign to alleviate the controversy, even if his comments were at least partly a joke.
“There is so much hysteria and seriousness about this that it is really difficult to determine what is satire and what is real debate,” stated Ian Higham, an American-born lecturer at Stockholm University. “I wish non-Swedish speakers could understand how the absolute most entertaining thing about #Swedengate is the deadly serious debate in domestic media with experts on ‘food security’ and on foreign policy options to save the national brand.”
What does #Swedengate say about the country?
At the heart of the controversy lies a question: how did such a light-hearted comment create such an outcry and debate?
One explanation offered is how central food sharing is in value systems, and how it can be interpreted in deeply different ways across cultures that have different social structures.
“Most of the angry people came from cultures with a more collectivist mindset, and in their own cultures are not considered rude,” Mariam told Euronews. “In an individualistic culture, they may not think it is rude because there is an understanding that no one has the right to belong to others.”
For the Dutch social psychologist Geert Hofstede, Sweden’s cultural model – like that in large parts of Europe – is individualistic. This may explain the contrast in the understanding of specific hospitality customs, especially among people from collectivist cultures.
But for others, there is a much less sophisticated explanation: rather, it has to do with the Swedish answer to the controversy.
“Swedes who were very sensitive to their image abroad, doubled to try to deny or justify the practice,” stated Higham. “Sweden and the Swedish population invest a lot of money in cultivating, promoting and protecting a national brand.”
And the #Swedengate debate has certainly gnawed at the untouched veneer of Sweden’s reputation. But not just over the country’s hospitality – rather, it has opened Pandora’s box by unleashing a broad discussion about supposed skeletons in the nation’s wardrobe.
As a result of #Swedengate, comments and debates have emerged about Sweden’s controversial laissez-faire response to covid-19, the country’s treatment of the Sami minority, its historical colonialist associations and the treatment of people of color and immigrants in Swedish society.
Colored Swedes and especially of immigrant backgrounds have used #Swedengate as an opportunity to share their experiences of feeling unwelcome or discriminated against.
Among these is Jallow, who gave a TEDx talk entitled “Normalizing Silence in Swedish Society”.
“Even though I’m Swedish, it also means that I’m black that I live in an intersection where when I talk about my experiences, the most common answer is to call me an n-word, racist slander and strangers who tell me on the internet to leave my own. land “, she told Euronews and added that she received significant vitriol after her tweets on #Swedengate.”[This shows] which people consider to be strangers and who are entitled to share their lived experiences. “