New Zealand and Sweden – different approaches to covid

THE VAST complexity of media – the spin, the funded agendas, the sheer weight of information, the overwhelming choice of platforms and outlets,  suggests that simple messages are not being fed to us  – but they are.

The lesson the public is being fed about Sweden’s approach to coronavirus is clear  – libertarian individualism, laissez-faire economics, social darwinism – however you wish to define or categorise free market ideology – is the answer to our killer virus and Sweden proves it. Sweden isn’t bothering with a semi legally imposed lockdown and it is being that celebrated that a nonsense-free approach is working.

New Zealand’s approach to the coronavirus, on the other hand,  is not being presented with the same emotional pride in our mainstream media. Yet, the statistics available, show that it is more successful in preserving the population and its economy than Sweden. New Zealand isn’t the great example of apparently successful social darwinism, or it can’t be exaggerated to be perceived that way, so it isn’t getting the same media attention.

The populism used to promote the Swedish story provides the same easy attraction as the consumer ideal of pleasure and social irresponsibility.   It provides an alternative to the fuddy duddy, do gooder notion of being the official party pooper of life-saving, lockdown.

In UK culture, the message carried in the Swedish spin, the impression that it makes, its suggestiveness, is that we may as well have carried on going to the pub and getting pissed anyway in spite of coronavirus. This message connects deeply with the mass babyneeds provided by consumer entertainment products – self serving, hedonism and the instant gratification which sells products at a faster rate. It reenforces this view of reality pinned on right wing libertarian ideology.

In turn this also justifies the funds for  the lifestyles and identites of the media owners and their beneficiaries. Why let coronavirus, or climate change, or the truth get in the way of that. Free market wealth creation benefits us all – we are told. Even if most of us will never see it on our lifetimes no matter what we do, say or think.

The truth is that Swedish people are very different culturally to North Americans and the British populations having being brought up with a less intense form of capitalist permissiveness. They have been voluntarily keeping their children off school, more Swedish people live on their own and there is more social cohesion – or put another way Sweden is apparently dominated by a boring sensibleness of the better educated.

I watched this report on BBC’s Newsnight and it’s sensationalist to start with. It uses words like “subversive” and “dangerous” as a juicy and populist introduction of Sweden’s exciting, naughty cornovirus approach before breaking into more depth of analysis providing a further understanding. It was enlightening.

BBC newsnight on Sweden’s covid policy

It’s not a refreshing change from President Trump’s public speculation that Sweden’s crime and rape is caused by immigrants. You can only presume that having been presented with stats on a high amount of rape convictions in Sweden, the president overlooked the fact that the stats were based on Sweden’s highly strict definitions of rape or abuse and efficient prosecution of individuals accused in rape cases. Unusual even in the EU.

It’s not a refreshing change to hear Sweden elevated to a higher status in the UK instead of the consistent news stories on why it is not an ideal place to live. Not as good as you think it is, as if we all thought it was perfect and need to be ridiculed for it.

Suddenly praising Sweden for taking this more libertarian, coronavirus approach, presented as the most “common sense” least fussy approach, is totally predicatable. Now, instead of the normal criticism,  Sweden is praised as champions of libertarian ideals.

I guessed that when I put a Facebook post with a link to the Newsnight report on YouTube with the phrase “the truth is more interesting than the spin” that it was likely that nobody would bother to click on the link and watch the YouTube clip. It came as no suprise when a North American “friend” obssessed with the idea that lockdown is a Stalinist infringement of personal rights – took up the wrong end of the stick to again praise Sweden for saving its economy with an enthusastic comment underneath.

Sweden hasn’t saved its economy from the impact of COVID-19.

sweden’s economy still taking the hit – cnbc

That much was present in the detail of the juicy looking Newsnight report that my “friend” never bothered to watch. It was also present in the phrase – the truth is more interesting than spin. Only obvious to me, apparently, with my fuddy duddy, northern European dry intellectual approach to “fun” issues and love of social democracy.

But the real proof of why the whole spin on Sweden is nothing short of right wing propaganda and the promotion of right wing, political power bases through media ownership and ongoing populist threads of misinformation and lies, is not Taiwan, South Korea, Germany, Hong Kong, or the mass graves in New York. It’s New Zealand. It’s the facts.

New Zealand