My last chronicle – frustrated young men who are angry because they must not have sex – I finished with that call for sensible male role models. Alternative to preachers that avhumaniserar women, or scares the boys with tales of women is chaos. ”Where are you?” skew I in a mixture of despair and desperation.
I got a lot of reactions. I had expected the usual angry comments that I’m stupid and manshatare. I had expected the ”helpful” suggestions to solve the incel problem via state prostitutes. But I did not expect to be heard. My call happened namely coincide with the tremors in the Swedish cultural life caused by Anna-Carin Stenholm Pihls documentary about Josefin Nilsson.
the painful the film thrown I back in time. I reminds me that in the afternoon when I am shopping in one of the inner city’s more well-stocked supermarkets and suddenly see Josefin Nilsson and the man, an actor, who is mentioned in the documentary. It must be the weekend because I remember standing at the delikatessdisken when she comes up with the man in tow. She beams at his obvious, natural way.
”Oh, she is together with him”, I think to myself while I cast a glance in their general direction. ”They certainly have a fun and creative relationship.”
Little did I know then. Especially if this things are not always as they appear to be.
Myself, I found myself in a relationship that outwardly seemed completely normal, but that soon would evolve into something ljusskyggt, violently. I would change my behavior, to become ever more attentive to the reactions, swerve for the abrupt movements. I would start doing everything to avoid derailments of friends or warding off the visits completely. I would start baiting me as a full-fledged co-dependent before I even knew the word. And so the toughest thing of all, I would get to experience how it is to finally take the plunge and tell someone, pull up your sleeve and show the hidden brands and be met by silence.
where the afternoon would later be sentenced for the assault that Josefin Nilsson was subjected to. And that, according to the documentary, caused her great damage and lifelong pain.
But none of that I knew then when my paths crossed with the beautiful gotländskan at a deli counter with helgglada locals.
Josefin Nilsson was never to know that so many would rise up in fury after the documentary shown on 22 march 2019. Ljusmanifestationen at the royal dramatic theatre. The cancelled performances, meetings, and rockaderna at the royal dramatic theatre, which became the consequence. But also to all the brave men who now breaks the silence and steps forward. Among others, Alexander Karim is behind the initiative #tackanej, (”I say ‘ no ‘ to the project with all the gubbslem and assholes”), Morgan Alling, who started the #krokaarm-the movement on instagram (”Now hooks we arm! How many of my male followers are tired of seeing our sisters to fight alone against abuse of all forms”), and Alán Ali and Svante Tidholm, who together with the organization MEN picked up Morgan Allings securely link their arms, and called to the general meeting at the Southern theater, ”to take advantage of the anger, the desire for change and commitment against men’s violence”.
It is now it happens, I think when I go shopping Saturday dinner in a completely different town, in a completely different time, grateful to experience all of this.
