If you are a Swedish-speaker then you know, as well as I, that the terms “Neger Niggersson” and “Oskar Neger” are racist in any context. Contemporary usage in Sweden simply does not allow them to be interpreted in any other fashion. Therefore, you may also see the problem of them being written into the training manual of a police force that is already under heavy criticism for racial insensitivity.

If you are not a Swedish-speaker, I’ll try to clarify. For the record, the offensive name in question was “Negar Niggerson” not just “Neger”.

Second, the difference between “neger” and “nigger” is not so heavy as you suggest. Norstedts is Sweden’s most authoritative translation dictionary. Its unabridged edition translates “neger” as follows: “black, Negro, blackie, darkey, nigger” It also lists “nigger” as a Swedish word that translates into English as “nigger, darkie, blackie” There are no other definitions provided. Further, Google Translate says “negar” means “negro, coon” in English.

Those are all racially loaded words and the person who wrote them into the Police training manual knew exactly what they meant. Of course, you would be right to point out the fact that I’m not a native Swedish speaker. But it wasn’t me who first took offense. I read it in the Swedish press. Their editorial teams felt it was crystal clear that these words were racist. Further, the first complaints came from several Swedish police officers themselves.

So while I sincerely appreciate you taking the time to reply, and am always open to setting the facts the straight: I hope you can see that these are not innocent words whose meanings are open to an innocent interpretation. If you are a Swedish-speaker, then I hope you will reflect on your reasons for claiming otherwise.

If you do not believe me try this: Next Saturday night walk into a less affluent neighborhood in Sweden with a large immigrant population and call a few non-caucasian people “neger”. I think they will give you some fairly direct feedback with regard to racial sensativity.

For more on the subject check this clip from a Swedish film:

Thats just not making sense.
Over and out.

You fail.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/8189231.stm

Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: “Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
`My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!’
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away”.

LONDON (Sept. 5) – Trade and oil considerations played a major role in the decision to include the Lockerbie bomber in a prisoner transfer agreement between Britain and Libya, a senior British official said in an interview published Saturday.
Justice Secretary Jack Straw said trade, particularly a deal for oil company BP PLC, was “a very big part” of the 2007 negotiations that led to the prisoner deal. The agreement was part of a wider warming of relations between London and Tripoli.

Sun Aug 30, 10:46 am ET
LONDON (Reuters) – Britain agreed to include Lockerbie bomber Abdel Basset al-Megrahi in a prisoner transfer deal with Libya because of “overwhelming interests” shortly before an oil deal was sealed with Tripoli, a newspaper reported on Sunday.
The Sunday Times said leaked letters from Justice Secretary Jack Straw undermined government denials of a link between the former Libyan agent’s freedom and British trade interests.
Megrahi, 57, was released from jail on August 20 after Scottish authorities said his terminal cancer gave compassionate grounds for him to return home to die.
The British government has distanced itself from the decision, made by Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill, which has angered many relatives of the bombing’s victims and the United States government, which lost 189 citizens.
Megrahi was the only person convicted of the 1988 bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over the Scottish town of Lockerbie that killed 270 people. His rapturous reception in Tripoli has been criticized by the British and U.S. governments.
The Sunday Times said two letters from Straw, dated five months apart, showed he reversed an original plan to exclude Megrahi from a prisoner transfer agreement that was being discussed with Libya.
The paper said the change of heart appeared to be linked to a stalled $900 million oil and gas exploration deal with Libya for British oil giant BP that was ratified a few weeks later.
BP has always denied any link between the deal and the prisoner agreement.
Straw wrote to MacAskill in July 2007 to say he favored excluding Megrahi from the prisoner transfer, an arrangement desired by the Scottish administration which has autonomous powers over most criminal matters.
But by December 2007 he told MacAskill his position had changed.
“The wider negotiations with the Libyans are reaching a critical stage and, in view of the overwhelming interests for the United Kingdom, I have agreed that in this instance the (prisoner transfer agreement) should be in the standard form and not mention any individual,” the Sunday Times quoted Straw as writing.
Straw told BBC radio the alleged link between trade and Megrahi’s release was an “absurd confection.”
“The suggestion that at any stage there was some kind of backdoor deal done over Mr Megrahi’s transfer because of trade is simply untrue,” he said
The negotiations on prisoner transfers were part of a “normalization process” with Libya, he said.
London had made clear to Tripoli that Scotland would retain an absolute right to refuse a prisoner transfer, he added,
Straw said the issue was “academic” given that Scotland eventually released Megrahi on compassionate grounds and not under the transfer agreement.
(Reporting by Tim Castle; editing by Robin Pomeroy)

I never heard the name on NPR. The silence is criminal. I can not support NPR or my local NPR station.

Greg Palast, bless him, is still alive. Shunning him was my first cause to reject NPR, shifting my support to Democracy Now! and the stations that air it.

I will watch NonRhotic TV, and now have this page among my News links.

Thank you so much. I hope your life in Stockholm is good.