Sweden's Twitter Account Subjected to Sexist Abuse

Since 2011, randomly chosen Swedes have taken turns managing Sweden's official twitter account, with a different curator taking charge every week. The project is a joint initiative of the Swedish Institute and VisitSweden, which was launched with the intention of creating confidence in Sweden abroad.

In late summer, Ellen Haglund was entrusted to manage Sweden's public face. When she tweeted that talking about racism and sexism with one's children is important, it was not long before threats and abuse started pouring in. Unknown people wrote to her that she should be raped and that she should die, Swedish Radio reported. By her own admission, Haglund had to block up to 200 users.

"And they were pure trolls who wrote crazy things. Very much racism and sexism. Also, it seemed well organized," Haglund told Swedish Radio.

Furthermore, many used @Sweden as a platform for arguing against immigration.

​"In their racist view, it has become as bad in Sweden as it can only get due to immigration. If I tweeted 'Now, my daughter has come home from the playground' I could get several responses that were 'next time you let her out, she will be raped by Muslims,' 'you have to be glad you still can, soon you will have Sharia Law and you will not go out anymore' and so on," Haglund told Swedish Radio.

​This week's curator is Jenny Nguyen, a Swedish law student who is currently on exchange in Hong Kong. By her own admission, her hobby is "dismantling patriarchy and white supremacy." Throughout the week she has shared the abuse she has received while using the account, Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter reported.

​​According to Henrik Selin, the head of intercultural dialogue at the Swedish Institute, there has been a marked increase in trolls targeting the curators since this summer, which may ultimately lead to the closing down of the account, Swedish news outlet The Local reported. Previously, the agency had repeatedly come under fire for failure to respond to internet hate.

In March, one of the "guest-tweeters" at Sweden's official Twitter account raised a storm with a string of crass, gross and heavily sexualized tweets.

The Twitter account @sweden is run under the motto "new Swede every week," and is rotated between different individuals as part of the Curators of Sweden project.

The Swedish Institute is a state-funded organization, whose goal is promoting Sweden and Swedish values globally, and creating interest and confidence in Sweden and supporting Sweden's image abroad.