Disclaimer: There will be a few links to Swedish texts below, as I'm commenting on an event in Swedish media. Google translate should work fine for examining the sources. All translations from Swedish to English are my own and should not be assumed to be completely correct.
Swedish poet, author (I use those terms loosely) and prominent catholic Marcus Birro, columnist for the Swedish tabloid Expressen has chosen to bestow on his readers yet another column. This time, Birro attempts to victimize the religious by writing about the recent World Youth Day in Madrid and how it was criticized by Swedish media.
This would not be the first time Birro nails himself to the cross and moans about how everyone in the evil mainstream media as well as social media is out to get him and his superstitious comrades by way of persecution. In fact, Birro has made it a part of his repertoire to vividly accuse anyone who questions his beliefs of being a modern day witch burner. His recent column, entitled "That which cannot be proven is a big part of my life", is basically a long rant against science and everyone who embrace the scientific method as the best way so far of discovering the world. He argues that all such people are somehow fundamentally disconnected from the rich world of emotions that "his people" consider to be so important, and apparently the rest of us don't. But I won't go deeper into that article. Fellow #sweskep Charmkvark has already done a fantastic job at picking apart that one over at skepchick.se.
This new article of his, entitled "We're not ashamed for believing in God", while not containing quite as many factual errors and misconceptions as the last one I linked, is riddled with the idea of martyrdom. Let's just look at the opening lines (my translation):
When the media hunt is on it is without exception distasteful. It doesn't matter who or what is being hunted down the village slope, with stabs and blows. The hunt in itself is dishonest, vulgar and repulsive. It appeals to our lowest instincts.
So right off the bat, we are to assume that there is in fact, a hunt going on, with Birro and his peers playing the part of fair game. Nowhere to be found is an understanding that the ideas they present will seem odd (to say the least) to the rest of us, who are not convinced by appeals to "thinking with your gut" and similar nonsense, but ask for some sort of reasoning. Instead, as soon as criticism is voiced, it's persecution. Yes, your ideas on the subject of theology are in the minority in this country. But being the minority doesn't give you the right to cry wolf every time someone points out flaws in what you're saying. Sometimes, the minority is just wrong. And sometimes, the minority holds a perfectly valid point of view, with which the majority happens to disagree. None of this should be labeled as persecution, witch hunting or anything remotely similar. You have ideas that differ from the mainstream, Birro. You're not being persecuted for them, you're being questioned and criticized. Ask political dissidents in China about the difference and I'm sure you'll be made to understand.
Birro then goes on to say that Catholics in particular are often held responsible for "hellish perversions". He's not providing any examples here, but I can only assume it's in reference to child molestation and the pedophile priests that are being protected by the church. Tell me, Marcus, who should be held responsible if not the people who chose to remain in an organization where the high-ups protect perpetrators of such vile crimes? Of course, no one is holding the individual devout catholic responsible for the actual rapes committed, but they have a lot of explaining to do about why they chose to stay in their denomination after all of this.
If he instead by "hellish perversions" is referring to when Catholics are being questioned about their actual beliefs (hellfire, vicarious redemption, views on homosexuality etcetera), then I can only wonder why he doesn't understand that this philosophy seems eccentric to the rest of us.
A large part of Birros articles talks about the World Youth Day, and tries to make the point that media should have been reporting about all the wonderful things that the participants got to experience, instead of focusing about how it's irresponsible of the Spanish government to spend large amounts of money on this in a time of economic hardship, and other pieces of valid criticism that has been seen in the media. Would he also like to see more heads of state expressing how impressed they are at the stability in dictatorial regimes, instead of focusing on the bad parts. Is it maybe also a form of persecution that this isn't happening?
I won't bother to comment in detail on the rest of the article, as it can easily be summarized just as an incoherent blabber of fake martyrdom.
It's easy for me to understand why Expressen, a major Swedish tabloid, chooses to have Birro writing for them. It brings in the bucks, and tabloids don't care about ideology, they care about numbers. It is, however, really really hard for me to understand how we became a country where someone expressing views such as his is someone that some people look up to and admire as an intellectual. And then they go switch on the telly, just in time to catch some ghost hunting and seances before they go to bed, safely asleep under their dreamcatcher.
