Dagens Nyheter, Sweden's largest daily, has landed in hot water over a Christmastide carol it published in December.
A verse about a teenager shot in the city of Malmö sparked strong reactions as many found it extremely unethical.
The carol initially posted on Instagram goes as follows: “A child was born in the city of Malmö // so was God's will // He would become just sixteen years old // and was shot with a pistol yesterday”.
To the readers, the verse instantly reminded them of a 15-year-old teenager who was killed in a street shootout on 9 November. The incident triggered massive press coverage and triggered a police crackdown on violent crime called “Operation Hoarfrost”. This was, however, not the only coincidence. In January 2017, 16-year-old Ahmed Obaid was murdered in Malmö. On New Year's Eve 2011, 15-year-old Ardiwan Diaa Samir was murdered in Malmö. Neither of the murders has been solved.
Given this background, many slammed the verse as tasteless and crass.
“I do not think you need to live in Malmö to find this carol utterly tasteless. Apparently DN regrets the publication, but it would be much more interesting to know how the publication could have happened at all”, the senior judge at Malmö court Lennart Strinäs suggested.
Jag tror inte man behöver bo i Malmö för att tycka att detta grötrim är riktigt smaklöst. Ser nu att DN beklagar publiceringen - betydligt mer intressant vore att få veta hur publiceringen överhuvudtaget kunde ske. pic.twitter.com/el5rRpKHm1
— Lennart Strinäs (@LennartStrinaes) 26 декабря 2019 г.
Jan Ericson of the Moderate Party found the carol “extremely distasteful” and stressed the irony of Dagen Nyheter devoting much of its time criticising the harsh satire and irony on social media.
Samtidigt som DN emellanåt riktar hård kritik mot grov satir och ironi i sociala medier.
Detta var faktiskt ytterst osmakligt...hur tänkte man där? pic.twitter.com/j6Tq3US9jp
— Jan Ericson (@Ericson_ubbhult) 25 декабря 2019 г.
Fellow Moderate party profile Hanif Bali, called the verse “really obnoxious”.
“Inner-city kids get named and pictured when someone addresses them with the wrong pronoun, while wog children who are murdered on open streets become Christmas carol material. Socialist Liberal Utopia”, he tweeted.
Detta är väldigt magstarkt, vidrigt faktiskt.
— Hanif Bali (@hanifbali) 25 декабря 2019 г.
Innerstadsbarnen får namn och bild när någon benämner dem med fel pronomen, medan svartskallarnas barn som mördas blodigt på öppna gator blir julklappsrim.
Socialliberal utopi. https://t.co/skV9Q11b5z
“Something must have burned in that head of yours, what were you thinking when you approved the carol?” an indignant user asked Dagens Nyheter and its perennial editor-in-chief Peter Wolodarski.
@dagensnyheter @pwolodarski här måste det väl ha brunnit i huvudet hos någon av er, vad tänkte du när du godkände rimmet? 😨
— Mikael Nensén (@mikaelne) 25 декабря 2019 г.
“Makes you feel like cancelling your subscription, or at least watch a clip where Wolodarski explains a thing or two for the editor”, another one explained.
Man får lust att säga upp prenumerationen, eller i var fall se ett klipp där @pwolodarski talar om för redigeraren ett och annat.
— Gunnar Frenning (@GunnarFrenning) 26 декабря 2019 г.
Others suggested that Wolodarski and the rest of Dagens Nyheter's editorial board had drunk “too much mulled wine”.
Dagens Nyheter's Christmas carol even caught the eye of fellow journalists. Svenska Dagbladet's social media editor Hanna Östberg wrote: “So incredibly tasteless”, to which Aftonbladet's editorial director Michael Poromaa responded that “DN has become so weird nowadays”, after writing “WTF”.
DN är så märkliga nuförtiden
— Vargen från Lautakoski (@MPoromaa) 25 декабря 2019 г.
“Now the post is gone (three days and 400 comments later) and DN regrets it. Well, better late than never, and I hope we of the major media can agree that we have a responsibility and should have a presence on social media”, Östberg mused.
Nu är inlägget borta (tre dagar och 400 kommentarer senare) och DN beklagar. Nåväl, bättre sent än aldrig och jag hoppas på att vi på de större medierna kan enas om att vi har ett ansvar och bör ha närvaro på sociala medier. https://t.co/mEOPSBADv1
— Hanna Österberg (@HannaOsterberg) 25 декабря 2019 г.
Malmö, Sweden's third-largest city, has seen no fewer than 32 deadly shootings this year, several with a fatal outcome. Still, it is surpassed by Uppsala in shootings per 100,000 inhabitants, if only by a slim margin.
Dagens Nyheter is a major Swedish daily with extensive domestic and international coverage. It is owned by the Bonnier family, which runs over a hundred media companies in a dozen countries, and is self-described as “independently liberal”.
