The Swedish Model is Evil

The ”Swedish Model” - it is world-renowned. All too many advocates of the welfare state the world over urge us to emulate Sweden. Sweden is lavished with praise for being the one single country which first entered upon that proverbial “golden middle road”. The famous married couple of Social Democrat intellectuals, Gunnar and Alva Myrdal - are the individuals reputed to have coined the term – “The Middle Road”. That road is supposed to be the utopian compromise which is imagined by the Social Democrats to exist in between capitalism and Communism.

Incidentally, it is a testimony to the nature of the child-rearing skills of Social Democrat intellectuals that Gunnar and Alva Myrdal together sired that vicious Communist intellectual, Jan Myrdal. The latter is notorious, in Sweden at least, for singing songs of praise to such moral monsters as Mao Zedong and Josef Stalin. And he is even famous/notorious for lauding praise on - get this - Pol Pot! Right at the very time that this mass-murderer was at the height of his power in Cambodja, and was beginning to come under attack even from Sweden´s  remaining Communists, Jan Myrdal proved his “heroic integrity” by toughing it out and defending Pol Pot to the bitter end (Jan Myrdal lost the support of most of his treasured “groupies” - those naïve “idealists” who remained teenagers-in-spirit even after turning twenty - as his reward for that display of “integrity”.) But I digress.

The Social Democrats themselves have always said that capitalism is evil? Have they not? And nowadays at least, the Social Democrats concede that Communism is evil also? Do they not? Well - if the Swedish Model is a middle of the road between two different forms of evil – according to its own defenders – then what does that say about the moral status of the Swedish Model?

I will proceed to tell you exactly what I think of the Swedish model. It reeks to high heaven! The Swedish Model is the vilest form of radical evil. This idea of mine will, I am sure, give rise to ringing guffaws of laughter on the part of many of the readers of this blog. But I know, nevertheless, that I am in fact right. And that I do stand a fighting chance of showing at least the more honest of my readers that I am right, if I tell the tale of exactly what happened when the Swedish Model came close to destroying my own personal life.

The essence of what happened to me is that the Swedish Model made me so distraught, when I was a teenager, that I went literally insane. Literally insane. I was in fact actually committed to a mental hospital (Ulleraakers outside of Uppsala, to be specific) for the entire summer of 1972, and for the entire entirety of the year 1973. My diagnosis was schizophrenia - which illness is perhaps the gravest form of psychosis. The following is my story:

I was born in Stockholm in 1954. My father was a bank clerk and my mother was a housewife. When I was five years old (i.e. in 1959) my father was offered the opportunity to work in the U.S.A., in order to sell Swedish industrial products (such as, for example, specialty steels and mining products) on the North American market. My father seized the opportunity. For he realized that this was his big chance to move forward in his career, and to “go places”! So in 1959 he moved to America. And he took me, my mother and my sister with him. For eleven, mostly happy, years all of us lived together in the suburbs of New York City. My father worked in an office in a skyscraper on Manhattan.

So I was blessed with the wonderful privilege of getting to grow up in the freest and most rational society in the world at the time – the United States of America. Instead of having to go through the agony of growing up in that cultural cesspool which is modern, egalitarian Sweden – the society which is - “The Royal Swedish Envy´s Beloved Sewer” - in my mind´s eye. That is what I like to call Sweden. I think that verbal shoe fits the country which I have the misfortune to live in nowadays, so to speak.

So you see - I detest my own country of birth, modern Sweden. And I admire the county of my choice, the U.S.A. I did not myself choose to move to the U.S.A. when I was five old, of course. I was just lucky. But my values are now such that I would choose to move to the U.S.A any time, at the very moment that I got the chance. I have in fact tried a few times. But, it turned out, that I was unable to get a Green Card. 

So I am proud to be able to say (I regard this as an honor) that in some ways I am just like my all-time favorite heroine, Ayn Rand – who detested her country of birth, Russia. She, like me, also admired the country of her choice - the U.S.A.! For Ayn Rand used to say that she was “An American who happened to be born in Russia". Well, I can honestly say that I am an American who happened to be born in Sweden (of all rotten places!).

I was happy during my idyllic childhood in the U.S.A. When I think back and dream about my first four magic years “over there”, I like to picture them as “the Golden Age” of my life. For the U.S.A. had that healthy kind of culture which is so rare these days – a culture in which everybody and his brother took it for granted that life was full of wonderful opportunities (they were supposed to be around every corner - and most of us Americans actually believed that), that it was right to value one´s own personal happiness and that (we thought that no one could fail to realize this "obvious" fact) ultimately it was up to you to determine whether or not you made anything of yourself. And that you should have a dream. And that you should, indeed must, “go for” that dream - whatever it was. My own personal dream was to become a scientist when I grew up – but it turned out that I came to suffer heartbreak instead.

For in the year 1970 my luck changed for the worse. I was sent back to Sweden.

To be taken from the relatively healthy American culture, and instead to be immersed in the Swedish welfare state – that was like being thrown into a vat of ice-cold water! It was a shock! It felt awful.

What was it that was so wrong with Sweden? It could be summarized very briefly in Ayn Rand´s observation that Sweden is the society which a fortiori is characterized by “hatred of the good for being the good”. This observation´s meaning is that the majority of the Swedes, due to the influence of their sick culture, are such depraved creatures who hate those very things which they themselves evaluate as being good in some major way. So these subhuman creatures will think along the line “This man´s superlative intelligence is a wonderful thing. It impresses me. Therefore I really hate this guy. I really want to hurt him!”

Most Swedes think that money, for example, is a major value. They think that money is something well worth having. For the majority of Swedes sure want to have a lot of money themselves - do they not? Well, the heady sales statistics of the government monopoly on lottery tickets sure argues that they do. But – those very same Swedes despise and spit upon those individuals who succeed at making lots of money! With the exception of the lucky bastards who win a few cool millions on a lottery ticket.

A Swedish businessman who manages to make a fortune by means of working hard to build up a productive business is, virtually without exception, persecuted and harassed by the mass media and by the tax authorities. And the Swedish masses - most of its members that is - cheer whenever the taxman succeeds at “nailing”, and ruining, the life of some unfortunate millionaire. Many times while eating lunch I personally overheard my workmates at the factory I used to work in gloat over the fate of the  latest “wealthy bastard” who “had got his”. It was a routine occurrence. I kid you not. Many Swedish workers are like that. They exhibit schadenfreude.

Well, what is the difference between a wealthy businessman who was burned at the stake, figuratively speaking, in front of a jeering crowd of the envious Swedish equivalents of America´s Joe Sixpacks - and an equally wealthy lottery winner who goes free? The difference is simply that the businessman earned his money - whereas the dude who just happenes to win a few cool millions on a lottery had merely gotten lucky. So you see – all too many of my countrymen hate anyone and everyone who prove themselves to possess moral virtue. That is the issue here. Those vermin in human bodies hate whichever men whom they notice are morally good - or whom, at least, they notice are better human beings in some way than they themselves have cared to make themselves!

Another luminously clear example of this phenomenon (i.e. the phenomenon of “hatred of the good for being the good”) can be found in the Swedish education policies. Sweden´s children are not supposed “to learn at their own pace” as the former Minister of Education – and the idol of Sweden´s Social Democrats - Olof Palme, famously put it. For then some children would learn more, and learn it faster, than others! So the best and brightest of Sweden´s schoolchildren are to be deliberately frustrated and hindered from learning! They are to be dumbed down in order to achieve that "wonderful" value which is called "equality". The brightest minds are to be stunted on purpose! All because the most of the “masses” of Sweden - and most of the intellectuals too - hate and resent any individual who shows signs of possessing unusual intelligence and ambition! (Those intellectuals are, of course, the source of the corruption of those masses.)

Incidentally, Sweden´s Social Democrats hero-worship this moral monster Olof Palme - who wished to torture his own voters´ children (!) and who did little to hide that fact from them - in a similar way that many “modern” Americans hero-worship that power-luster J.F.K. In addition to this parallel, there is also the parallel that both Olof Palme and J.F.K. “benefitted”, as far as their “reputation amongst their posterity” goes, from their otherwise tragic fates as martyrs. Becoming victims (of assassination) boosted their reputation among posterity. 

When I found myself right in the middle of this disgusting filth immediately after my return to Sweden from the U.S.A. I began to feel absolutely miserable! It was the worst period in my life. It was sheer hell. The only reason that I did not attempt to commit suicide was that I lacked the willpower – for I was so egregiously passive and depressed! Just two short years after my return to Sweden I had become almost like a vegetable.

In fact, my sister Sophy has told me many times over the years after I recovered from my psychosis, that she was rather embarrassed to be seen with me at the time - because all her friends would ask her (behind my back, so to speak) “What kind of dope is that brother of yours on?”. For my facial expression and my demeanor were so “wooden” that people who saw me on the tramway with my sister actually thought that I must be high on some kind of narcotic drug! They mistakenly took my psychosis to be a drug habit!

I felt that I was surrounded on all sides by a "vile and pernicious" evil. I could not explain it. I was only sixteen years old. So I could not fathom it. I was a philosophic illiterate when young. For all this happened roughly ten years before I found my rescuer – Ayn Rand and her philosophy of reason.

I felt in my bones that I lived in a hostile, malevolent and threatening universe. I was in such a bad condition that just two short years after my return to Sweden I was committed to the mental hospital just outside Uppsala, called Ulleraakers Hospital, with the diagnosis schizophrenia. The Swedish model had, literally, turned me into a certified psychotic!

And I am not making this up. I still today, 45 long years afterwards, must take anti-psychotic neuroleptika every day. If I ever forgot to take my medicines (which I never do) for a long enough period of time, I might have a relapse. Although I sure as hell make a point of remembering to take my medicines. For I sure as hell so not want to have a relapse! The reason for this being that "I have been there” – i.e. I know what it is like to be psychotic. I would probably prefer to be castrated rather than to lose my mind again. And I mean that. I regard those Swiss drug companies who invented the first anti-psychotic medications way back in the 1950s as wonderful benefactors.  

And there is much, much more which I can say about the depravity of the Swedish model. I can point out that Sweden soon after the end of the Second World War began to aspire to the role of being the world´s “Moral Superpower”.

But – what was the source of the Swedish Model´s seemingly impressive economic success during the 1950s and the 1960s? 

The answer is – the blackleg policies which Sweden pursued during the Second World War. 

Sweden was, as everyone knows, never invaded by Nazi Germany. Of course not! Why would Hitler go to the trouble of invading Sweden? Those “practical-minded” Swedes collaborated with the Nazis willingly anyway! Almost exactly 52% of all the iron ore which the Nazi war machine consumed during the war came from Sweden. Hitler´s tanks, cannons, battleships, etc – they all were manufactured largely from Swedish iron ore! So – as a result of its economic cooperation with the Nazis - Sweden had an economy which was in much better shape at the end of the war than that of any of its major competitors - with the single important exception of course, of the U.S.A.

For many of Sweden´s industries had been favored with packed order books during the entire war. And not a single one of Sweden´s factories had been laid in ruins by the fighting. For none of the fighting had taken place in Sweden! Great Britain, France, Germany - their industries lay in ruins at the end of the war. But Sweden´s factories were intact. So Sweden´s private industry had an enormous competitive advantage when the reconstruction began after the end of the war. 

Now, this relatively robust private sector proved able to carry on its back the burden of the parasitical welfare state, which became hearier and heavier as it was being built up by the Social Democrats during the first two decades which followed the end of the war. It was not until the late 1960s that this sham of a pretense and self-deception began to self-destruct.

It should be noted that Sweden´s Social Democrat Party had a majority of the seats, all by itself, in both chambers of the Swedish Parliament during the war years 1940-1944. You can look that up in the history books. I have. So it was the Social Democrats alone who bore the primary responsibility for the shameful blackleg policy which had kept Sweden out of the war! 

But.

After the end of the war the Social Democrats began to demonize the U.S.A.! In other words, the Social Democrats had the temerity to demonize that very nation which had saved Sweden from both Nazism and Communism. Those Yankees sure as hell received no gratitude from the Swedish Social Democrats for their heroism, and for their foolish generosity! All they received was a figurative slap in the face. Nay - a knee in the crotch! 

Of course, if it had not been for the U.S.A´s willingness to fight the Nazis during the war - and to at least block the otherwise unprotected road into Western Europe beckoning the Soviet Communists after the war - Sweden would today probably be a vassal state. Either a vassal of Nazi Germany or of the Nazis´ partner-in-crime, the Soviet Union. Which - say I - would merely have served them, i.e. the majority of my countrymen, right!

So the Swedish Social Democrats – the creators of the Swedish Model – sure knew how to go about turning themselves into a pack of ungrateful swine! And how to go about turning themselves into world champion hypocrites!

So you see – the source of the good reputation of the Swedish Model is actually a disgraceful chapter in Sweden´s history.

And what about that famous, much talked-about “solidarity with the weak”? 

Well – if we are to speak of the “weak” - what about all those unfortunate victims of lobotomies? During the 1940s and the 1950s, many, many hundreds of mentally ill Swedes were lobotomized – without their own consent, of course! And many of those unfortunates were crippled, literally, as a result of this “beneficial medical procedure”. JFK´s sister, Rose (who, to be sure, was not lobotomized in Sweden - but still), was never even able to go to the bathroom again without assistance after her lobotomy in the early 1940s. Between 2% and 18% of those who were lobotomized, died as a direct consequence of that operation (often from heavy bleeding in the brain). Today, many textbooks use the lobotomy procedure as a concrete example of bad science and bad medicine! 

So - how in the world could all this hurting of innocent people happen in that “civilized” country, which modern Sweden is widely believed to be an example of?

A likely explanation is that the reason so many Swedes were lobotomized without their consent was precisely the Swedish Model! Specifically, it was the fact that the mental hospitals were all financed by a means which was based on “solidarity”. For the mental hospitals in Sweden were financed with tax money. It was the government which paid the enormous bill for keeping alive all those many thousands of psychotics who were kept in the mental hospitals of the time. 

Before the lobotomy procedure came onto the scene, there were no effective treatments for psychoses which were deemed to be effective and reliable. So, any unfortunate individual who developed a psychosis in those days would often have to live the rest of his life in an institution! And it goes without saying that this must have caused the “public treasury” tons and tons of tax money. The vast army of psychotics vegetating in the mental hospitals at the time, constituted a major economic drain on “the public”.

But towards the end of the 1930s, a new method for treating psychoses appeared – the lobotomy! This treatment seemed to work on many psychotics. To be sure – many patients died as a result of the procedure. And to be sure – many more were crippled for life as a result of it. But some patients, at least, seemed to benefit from this new treatment! 

So the lobotomy procedure seemed to be a promising means of emptying the mental hospitals of the economically burdensome army of psychotics. There was, obviously, an opportunity to save tons upon tons of tax money here! And you know how politicians typically behave when they feel that they are hard-pressed to save tax money? They will do some of the craziest things imaginable to save a buck! You know they will, don´t you? 

So it stands to reason that the widespread and rapid adoption of the morally questionable lobotomy procedure in Sweden (as well as over the entire rest of the world) was a political decision, not a medical one. Saving tax money was more important than looking after the interests of the patients. That is how socialized medicine works. You can read more about the lobotomies here - http://henrik-unne.blogspot.com/lysenkoism-i-den-socialistiska.html .

What more can I say about the Swedish Model´s depravity? Well, I can easily demonstrate that those many Swedes who support it are beyond the moral pale. I worked for roughly 34 years, up until the end of 2009, as a factory worker in order to make a living. And I heard with my own ears what one of the favorite discussion topics was, whenever my fellow factory workers discussed politics during the lunch and the coffee breaks. The favorite subject of discussion was – “distribution politics”. That is the name, in Sweden, for the combination of tax and handout policies which directly affect how much money the wallets of the citizens come to contain. Distribution politics is a filthy business – sort of like emptying bedpans or cleaning latrines!

And most Swedes adore it! My workmates´ litanies over the injustices they perceived in the current “distribution politics” of the society they lived in was never-ending. Those “rich people” never paid enough taxes according to my workmates. And my former workmates never stopped complaining about how unfair it was that the foreman at their own workplace, or the doctor at the nearest hospital, or the neighbor across the street, made more money than they themselves did. It was always unfair when somebody else made more money than they did. But on the other hand - it was never a problem worth mentioning when the apprentice or the janitor at their own workplace made less money than they did!

And my workmates never grumbled even a teensy-weensy bit about the Swedish education policies. The well-known fact which was that Sweden´s children were not learning even to read and write properly in the public schools – that did not seem to bother my workmates at all. For they never even mentioned the subject! And this despite the fact that many of them were themselves parents at the time, with kids of their own in school!

And get this - I literally cannot recall a single occasion on which the subject of the deplorable state of education was even brought up at my workplace during all the 34 years during which I worked in Swedish factories! I kid you not. Their own kids´ abyssmal (lack of) education did not even seem to be an issue in the minds´ eyes of my fellow Swedish factory workers. For they did not seem to think the subject was worth mentioning! 

So you see – these swine in human bodies were tormented by the thought that somebody - anybody – somewhere was making more money than they were. But the fact that their own kids were failing to get a decent education in the public schools – that did not bother them the least!

Such were my workmates´ priorities! Such were the mentalities, and the moral stature, of those “heroes of production” - the Swedish workers! The situation in the land of the Swedish Model is that bad. The Swedish Model´s enthusiastic supporters (and they are enthusiastic in a desperate, contrived sort of way) are moral lice.

So, I say – the Swedish Model belongs in the dustbin of history! Along with those other two “darlings” of socialism which the 20^th century gave birth to - Nazism and Communism. We should all value justice instead of equality. And we should all value freedom instead of security. For it is a false and illusory equality, which consists of people making equal money for unequal production. And it is an equally false and illusory security, which one attempts to found on the quicksand of the policy of handing over one´s life to the state.

So wake up, you pathetic fools who constitute the clear majority of those semi-humans who populate modern Sweden! Otherwise you will one day wind up finally realizing that something is really, really wrong with the society you are stuck in – but that it is now too late to do anything about it!

Summa Contra Xenophobia

I have strong views on the question of free immigration. I hold two strong views in particular. I believe, firstly, that all opponents of free immigration - with the single exception of the very young (whose age constitutes an excuse for their eventual gross ignorance) - are morally depraved. And I believe, secondly, that all opposition to free immigration - with the possible exception of the very young - presupposes an element of xenophobia.

Now these are two sweeping generalizations. And they are unqualified (apart from the bit about the “very young”) judgments. So I had better work d-n hard to back those assertions up. Here goes.

This essay will consist of four parts. First I will show that all opponents of free immigration (except for the very young) are morally depraved. Then I will show that all opponents of free immigration (again, except perhaps for the very young) display an element of xenophobia. Thirdly, I will discuss the fact that all restrictions on immigration are, by their nature, a violation of individual rights. And last of all, I will deal with the issue of Objectivists, specifically, who oppose free immigration.

WHY ALL OPPONENTS OF FREE IMMIGRATION ARE MORALLY DEPRAVED

I feel very strongly about the free immigration issue. I am enraged by each and every man who argues for restrictions on immigration. Now - by “restrictions on immigration”, I mean restrictions other than those which protect individual rights. I do not take freedom to mean anarchy. So I do not take “free immigration” to mean that the government should do nothing whatsoever to prevent convicted criminals, known members of terrorist organizations and individuals carrying contagious diseases from entering one´s own country. I am only condemning restrictions on the immigration of men who are innocent of crime and who are not carrying contagious diseases. And Lord knows there are so many such controls in this rotten world which we live in today!

Now - why am I so incensed by “mere” restrictions on immigration? Well, have you read about the consequences of the restrictions on immigration in the newspapers?

Desperate men, women and children – who are merely trying to improve their own lot by means of escaping from some pesthole in the Third World – frequently drown at sea while trying to travel to free countries by boat. Sometimes it happens that unscrupulous smugglers of immigrants literally throw their “customers” off a boat, way out in the middle of the ocean, and let them drown in order to “get rid of them”. And sometimes the police, or its equivalent, in the prosperous country which the prospective immigrants are trying to reach will actually drive boats filled with putative immigrants back out into the ocean - where they are certain to perish from thirst or from drowning. 

And then there are all the prospective immigrants who have been slowly suffocated to death in containers and truck trailers. 

And then there is the fact that the border police of the U.S.A. every now and then run across the mummified remains of Mexicans in the middle of the deserts of Southwestern America. Those Mexicans had died of thirst while desperately trying to enter the U.S.A. by land. 

And then there are the prospective immigrants (admittedly there have not been many of these cases) who have died of cold or asphyxiation, because they hid themselves just before take-off in the landing gear of some jet-liner which was going to fly to some prosperous nation.

Now – whose fault are these human tragedies? When I have argued this issue with opponents of free immigration they have most often answered “Well, those prospective immigrants chose to try to enter our country by boat or by crossing the desert or by hiding in a container. So, obviously, it is those prospective immigrants´ own frigging fault!” This line, which I have actually heard, enrages me. For these swine, who are making that argument in order to defend the policies which bring about those tragedies - they are blaming the victims!

For, the reason that prospective immigrants take the enormous risks that they take is the fact that they are desperate. Which is due to the fact that the governments of the western countries try to prevent them from doing what they need to do - which they moreover have a right to do – namely, to improve their own lives by means of moving to a country which is more pro-life than the pesthole which they had the misfortune to be born in. The putative immigrants are not doing anything wrong when they merely exercise their individual rights in order to improve their lives.

And the prospective immigrants often meet with tragic fates even when they succeed at reaching their goal. For the western countries often “send the immigrants back”. And that breaks the immigrants´ hearts! These prospective immigrants have often “bet the farm” on a desperate attempt to reach a free country. They often use up their life´s savings in order to reach a free country in which they will be able to enjoy a human existence. But – just when they thought that they have made it – they are sent back to the very pesthole which they had paid such a high price to escape from.

Now – those prospective immigrants who have been “sent back” or who have died in the attempt to reach a better place to live - are total strangers to me. I have, for obvious reasons, not had any opportunity to befriend any of them. So why should I care about their fate? Well, for one thing: I value justice. That is one excellent reason for me to care.

And another reason is that I detest the disgusting phenomenon of indifference to the suffering of innocent human beings. Those human swine who oppose the free immigration of innocent men, despite all the tragedies which I related above, are callous and inhumane. They are indifferent to the suffering of innocent men. They are, in my opinion, moral monsters. They are on the same moral level as those semi-humans which can stand by and watch while an innocent man is physically tortured, without seeming to feel anything.

Also, there is the fact that the advocates of “sending them back” are picking on the weak. Almost no man is weaker, and is with fewer friends, than the prospective immigrant. Those brave individuals are alone against the entire police force plus the entire military apparatus of hostile alien governments. And the opponents of free immigration sit in the safety of their own homes and workplaces - where they are well-fed, comfortable and warm – and smugly urge their governments to see to it that those innocent weaklings be persecuted and victimized!

MY PERSONAL MOTIVE

And I also have a personal reason for being p-d off by the opponents of free immigration. This additional reason for my feeling so strongly about the issue of free immigration is the hardship which my own wife has gone through due to Sweden´s restrictions on immigration. My own wife, Thi, is an immigrant to Sweden from Vietnam. And she has suffered due to the Swedish government´s restrictions on immigration. And since I love my wife deeply, I am personally p-d off by those restrictions. My wife is such a kind, gentle woman and is such a good, morally upright person. But she had to go through hell before she met me.

My wife came to Sweden a few years ago. A man from Sweden had visited Vietnam, looking for a wife to bring home. Some relatives of my wife recommended her to marry him. She trusted her relatives´ judgment and did so. But when she came to Sweden, after marrying that man in Saigon, she soon discovered that this man was an alcoholic - and that he beat her whenever he was drunk. Which was almost every day. My wife went through a year of hell. For - she was afraid to leave this man, since she knew that she might then be sent back to Vietnam. And in that case she would face an uncertain future. But after an incident in which her husband seemed to threaten her with a kitchen knife, she just had to leave him and divorce him. For Thi feared for her life after that incident.

Well, after the divorce, it turned out that Thi´s fears were not unfounded. For the Swedish Immigration Authority decided that since Thi now was not married to a Swedish man any longer, there was no reason that she should be permitted to continue to stay in Sweden! But my wife appealed the Immigration Authority´s decision to a Swedish court. The court deliberated for an entire year. During that whole year Thi waited, with the Damocles Sword of being “sent back” hanging over her. And during that entire year Thi was not permitted to work. For she did not have a “work permit”! (Imagine, the very idea that anyone should need the government´s permission to carry out honest work! That is absurd!). Thi herself wanted to work - but she was not permitted to. So for a whole year Thi had to live on welfare payments. And guess what? There are reams of Swedish swine who oppose free immigration and who are in the habit of complaining about “Those rotten parasites from abroad who come here in order to live off of our oh-so-generous welfare system because they are too lazy to work”!

Thi met me, and then married me, while she was waiting for the law court´s decision in regard to whether she would be permitted to stay in Sweden. The County Court heard Thi´s case exactly six days after our wedding. I attended the hearing - although I was not given a chance to testify. The representative for the Immigration Authority - a tired old woman of around 50 with deep lines in her face (I bet that she had been a radical Communist when she was young back in the 1960s. You know – she was probably a survivor of that proverbial “Long March Through the Institutions”. Although she had, in that case, permitted herself to be corrupted by the system which she had set out to conquer. Big surprise!) - argued, with a straight face, that Thi should be sent back despite the fact that she was now married to me, a Swedish citizen. For the oh-so-brilliant reason that our marriage "might be a fake one". I.e. - it just might be a fake marriage intended merely to enable Thi to stay in Sweden. So the onus of proof was on Thi and I to prove that we had not done anything wrong! Well, what were Thi and I supposed to do? Should we have installed video cameras in our bedroom, made recordings of our nights together and sent the tapes to the Immigration Authority - to function as objective evidence?

Well, to my and to Thi´s great relief, the County Court decided to let Thi stay in Sweden for reasons unrelated to the fact that she now was married to a Swedish man. If Thi had been sent back to Saigon then she would have had to re-apply for permission to move to Sweden. She would certainly eventually have been granted that permission – since she was now married to a Swedish citizen again - namely me. But it would have taken perhaps a year for the bureaucracy to do its "work". During that time Thi and I would have been kept apart from each other. And Thi would have been obliged to pay substantial bribes to the corrupt government employees in Vietnam who would process her application to emigrate to Sweden – which would not have been easy, since neither Thi nor I had much money.

So, you see, I have good reasons to feel a personal animosity towards restrictions on immigration and towards those human swine which defend such restrictions.

And I have not even begun to tell you anything at all about the hell which Minh, a good friend of my wife, went through. Minh was a boat refugee from Vietnam who came to Sweden back in the 1990s, and who also had major problems.

THE QUESTION OF SCIENTER

I have shown that restrictions on immigration have vicious consequences. But in order to prove, conclusively, that all opponents of free immigration also are morally vicious, I have to deal with the question of scienter. In other words – do those bastards know what they are doing/saying when they oppose free immigration? Or are they merely making an innocent error of knowledge?

Well, I know for a fact that anyone and everyone in my own country, Sweden, if he reads the newspapers at all, must be aware of the vicious consequences of the restrictions on immigration. For I have seen with my own eyes that the newspapers frequently carry reports on those vicious consequences. After all, the reason that I know all about the many drownings and the many suffocations and so forth of prospective immigrants, is the fact that I have seen detailed reports of concrete instances of these types of events in the papers. And my fellow Swedes - they read pretty much the same mainstream newspapers that I do.

But - if I am to be able to say that all opponents of free immigration are morally vicious, then I must demonstrate that those of them who live in other countries also must know about the consequences of the restrictions on immigration. In other words - how can I be sure that the mass media in other countries report on the consequences of restrictions on immigration to the same extent that the Swedish mass media do?

 Well, I have read many issues of such American periodicals Time and Newsweek Magazine over the years. And I have seen many individual reports on the tragedies which have afflicted prospective immigrants in those two periodicals while doing so. And any other American or European who reads those magazines must have seen those reports as well. And then there is the Internet. I have seen reports about prospective immigrants who met tragic deaths on numerous news sites on the net. And those sites are accessible to people all over the globe. And then there is the fact that I know that one reason for the fact that the Swedish mass media is so keen on reporting the tragedies which afflict prospective immigrants is the fact that they are controlled mostly by leftists – and those leftists love to point to the tragic fate of immigrants and refugees as a means of blackening the reputation of the allegedly “capitalistic” societies of the West. Well, I know for sure that the mass media in the USA, and also in the rest of Western Europe, are controlled mostly by leftists as well. So it would be very surprising if the mass media in those regions didn´t also give the tragic fate of the immigrants and refugees a lot of attention in order to tarnish the reputation of their own allegedly "capitalistic/racist" societies. 

So I know beyond a reasonable doubt that the mass media all over the western world give major coverage to the tragedies connected with "illegal" immigration. So – I know beyond a reasonable doubt that all men - in the Western countries at least - who oppose free immigration have such a context of knowledge that they do have scienter and that they therefore are moral scum.

And what does it really matter anyway if I am wrong on this point (not that I harbor any non-arbitrary suspicions that I am wrong)? The opponents of free immigration are advocating for the use of physical force by the government – against men and women who have not themselves used force. For the prospective immigrants certainly did not do anything involving force when they merely fled for their lives from poverty and oppression. And – since the reports about the tragedies afflicting these putative immigrants are reported in the mass media of all the countries of the West to some significant degree at least – these opponents of free immigration could not have tried hard at all to find out the facts - if they are blithely unaware of them. 

And that means, in such case, that they are advocating for the use of physical force against non-criminals with a cognitive recklessness. For they are so presumptuous that they claim to know that their own governments have a legitimate right to dispose of the fate of other men – even while they have not taken much trouble to find out what the relevant facts are. And that means that they, in such case, are moral scum - even though they do not have scienter. For ignoramuses who cavalierly presume to have a right to dispose of the very lives of other men - by means of governmental physical force - are morally contemptible also!

WHY ALL OF THEM HAVE ELEMENTS OF XENOPHOBIA

What makes the opponents of free immigration tick? What are their motives? 

I say that all of them are motivated to some significant degree by a fear of “outsiders” or “aliens”. In other words, all opponents of free immigration are to some significant degree xenophobes. Now, this statement of mine is of an incendiary nature. For - xenophobia is a form of ethnic collectivism and it is therefore closely related to racism. 

Now, I do not equate xenophobia with racism. There is a difference. To be sure, both racists and xenophobes feel a fear of the members of “alien” collectives. But xenophobes are not on the premise that the members of those alien collectives, whom they fear, are morally or intellectually inferior to the members of their own collective. Racists are on that premise. So racists are, morally, still worse than xenophobes. 

Xenophobes and racists have a common psychology – a visceral fear of “aliens”. But they do not have a common philosophy. They do not both regard “aliens” as being intellectually or morally inferior. Except in those cases where a xenophobe is at the same time also a racist, of course. 

I suspect that all racists are xenophobes. But I also know that not all xenophobes are racists.

Now – how do I know that all opponents of free immigration have an element of xenophobia in them? Well, the best place to start is with the empirical evidence. I have argued against advocates of restrictions on immigration many times over the years. And I have seen that all of them fall under one of three categories. 

Some opponents of free immigration, namely the leftists and the socialists, are afraid that an influx of immigrants will lead to a more intense competition on the labor market, with “wage dumping” as a consequence. They are therefore especially afraid of immigrants from the Third World. 

Other opponents of free immigration, namely the ones who lean towards conservatism, are afraid that an influx of immigrants will lead to their own culture being “polluted” by the cultures of alien societies. They are therefore especially afraid of immigrants from non-Western areas of the world. 

The third kind of opponents of free immigration consists, to a large extent, of Objectivists. These opponents of free immigration are afraid that some of the prospective immigrants will turn out to be terrorists or violent criminals, or will prove to be enemies of capitalism. They are afraid that if we permit Arabs and Muslims to immigrate freely into our Western societies, then our societies will become infested with Islamistic terrorists. And that if we permit the free immigration of Mexicans into the USA, then America will become plagued by violent drug gangs. And that if we permit free immigration from leftist societies, such as those of Latin America, then we will risk being voted into socialism once those immigrants come to constitute a large fraction of the electorate.

Well, all the opponents of free immigration which I have run into have been afraid of the prospective immigrants. They have shown clear signs that they feel a visceral fear of hordes of aliens “invading” us, - and subsequently either “dumping” our wages or “polluting” our culture or blowing us up or voting us into socialism. And that fear of theirs is a fear of an entire collective. Those enemies of free immigration are not afraid of merely individual foreigners. They generalize and say that any member of at least some particular alien group(s) constitutes a possible threat - by dint of his being a member of that alien group(s). And is that not on the face of it a fear of the aliens per se? I.e. a visceral fear of any and all members of a collective?

Well, it is obvious that the fear of “wage dumping” and of “cultural pollution” are instances of irrational collectivism (socialism and ethnic collectivism, respectively).

But - what are we to make of the fear felt by some Objectivists that some immigrants will turn out to be terrorists or socialists?  Well - some individual Arabs/Muslims are in fact Islamists who sympathize with the terrorists. That is true. And some Latinos are socialists. That is also true. 

Well - this means that the restrictions on immigration advocated by some Objectivists constitute preventative law. For putative immigrants are to have their right to live and work where they want violated on the grounds that they might turn out to be terrorists or socialists, according to these Objectivists.

Do you remember Ayn Rand´s analysis of racism, in her essay "Racism", from way back when? She explained the phenomenon of the racism-flavor of collectivism in that essay - Ms. Rand stated that the white racists of the Deep South observed that some individual blacks had raped white women or had proven themselves to be lazy or whatever - and that those racists then proceeded to decide that they could permit themselves to use (the initiation of) physical force on all blacks on the grounds that they (the racists) knew for a fact that there were some individual blacks who had done bad things. Well - what is the difference between those racists (whom Ms. Rand despised) and the Objectivist opponents of free immigration? Both decide that they have a right to subject all the members of a certain group to (the initiation of) physical force, on the grounds that they know for a fact that some members of that group are “bad” in some way.

And there is still another reason to view all opponents of free immigration as being xenophobes. Even if their motives are individualistic – for example, even if they are motivated by a genuine desire to protect themselves against Islamistic terrorism – they are in fact advocating patently collectivist means to achieve that individualistic goal! For they are advocating that all members of a certain group – foreigners – be discriminated against. For what does it mean to restrict immigration - if not to treat all foreigners in a less favorable way, where individual rights are involved, than the way that the citizens of one´s own country are treated? Well, individualist goals do not justify collectivist means - do they? Moral ends do not justify immoral means - do they? And if it walks like a xenophobe, and it talks like a xenophobe - then it is a xenophobe! Actions speak louder than words - The Primacy of Existence!

Enough said. There can now be no reasonable doubt that all opponents of free immigration have an element of fear of the members of a certain type of collective - namely aliens. So they are all of them, to some extent, xenophobes. Even if they somehow also are Objectivists.

WHY ALL RESTRICTIONS ON IMMIGRATION ARE VIOLATIONS OF INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS

Unfortunately, the question I posed in the caption above is necessary to answer. For, there is so much ignorance about this issue in our collectivistic modern world.

Let us begin by concretizing. Say that a man is born in New York. He lives and works there for many years. Then, one day, he decides that he wants to move to Chicago and work there, in order to improve his lot. Does the American government have any right whatsoever to demand that he gets permission from itself (the government) in order to get to move to Chicago, and to work there? No way, man!

Now, let us say that another man is born in, say, Mumbai or Sao Paolo or Jakarta. And he decides one day that he wants to move to Chicago, and work there, in order to improve his lot. Does the American government have any right whatsoever to demand that he gets permission from itself (the government)  in order to get to move to Chicago, and to work there? Again – no way, man!

And the mere fact that, in the latter example, the man is not a born American makes no difference whatsoever. For rights are not gifts from the government. All men - by their nature as rational beings - have the same rights. Regardless of nationality, race, religion, gender, sexual orientation and so forth. The mere fact that a man is not an American, or is not a Swede, does not mean that he lacks the same right as an American or a Swede to live and work anywhere in the U.S.A. or in Sweden that he wants to (provided, of course, that he can find a place to live and a job to accept - by his own efforts).

Restrictions on immigration are a violation of individual rights for another reason also. They are instances of preventative law. For prospective immigrants are prevented from exercising their right to live and work wherever they wish before they have committed any crime. When leftist governments restrict immigration, they assume that the prospective immigrants might not be “sufficiently beneficial” to the labor market of the host country (which is, obviously, a collectivist premise - this is the idea that one must be “beneficial to the community” in order to be permitted to live in it) until proven otherwise. For they do not permit the alien to exercise his right to move into the country unless and until it is proven that he is beneficial. And when governments restrict immigration on the grounds that a prospective immigrant might be a terrorist or a violent criminal, they treat the prospective immigrant as “guilty until proven innocent”.

Of course, preventative laws are necessarily non-objective laws. Take the case of the Swedish immigration laws. These laws say that a foreigner does not have a right to enter Sweden, with the exception of persons who risk “political persecution” in their home country. But - how will the Swedish government possibly be able to apply that law consistently? All countries of the world violate individual rights (which is what political persecution is all about)  to some degree – even the Western ones. So the Swedish government would have to let every alien who so wishes, move to Sweden in order to apply that law with full consistency. Since it does not want to do that, the Swedish government has put into practice the policy that only a “sufficiently substantial” risk of political persecution will give an alien the right to flee to Sweden.

Well, what constitutes a “sufficient” risk? A 50% risk of being murdered by one´s own government? A 20% risk? A 5% risk? A 1% risk? And how will the Swedish government determine the magnitude of the risk?

And how major a form of political persecution will qualify a foreigner for asylum in Sweden? Will not being able to get a job be enough? Will being beaten up while serving in the military be enough? Will having racial slurs or the like sprayed on the walls of one´s house be enough? Will having difficulty in finding a place to live be enough? Will being harassed, or insulted, by government bureaucrats be enough? Will being subjected to a hostile tax audit be enough?

So you see, any laws which restrict immigration, so long as they stop short of banning all immigration – i.e. which stop short of banning immigration as such - will necessarily institutionalize a rule of caprice (a rule of terror, actually). There is no way to regulate immigration objectively – just as there is no way to regulate prices or wages objectively.

And restrictions on immigration violate the rights of the citizens of one´s own country also, to boot! For, if my employer decided that he wished to fetch somebody from, say, Bangladesh or Ethiopia and let that fellow work for him here in Sweden instead of me, then I would be violating my employer´s rights as well as the putative immigrant´s rights if I blocked that Bengali´s or Ethiopian´s attempt to immigrate to Sweden and take "my" job. And likewise, if my landlord decided to invite a foreigner to come to Sweden and rent an apartment which the landlord owned, I would be violating that landlord´s rights if I blocked that foreigner´s attempt to immigrate to Sweden and rent that apartment.

THE ISSUE OF MORAL RESPONSIBILITY

Well, most men today do not understand the issue of individual rights. So I would not be justified if I condemned all enemies of free immigration on the grounds that they were contributing to the violations of individual rights. Many enemies of free immigration just don´t know better. So they do not have scienter.

But the reason I condemn all enemies of free immigration is not their advocacy of violations of individual rights per se. The reason that I condemn all enemies of free immigration is, as I have explained, that they are, firstly, callous individuals who are indifferent to the suffering of innocent fellow men - and, secondly, that they are bullies who pick on the weak. 

So the issue of individual rights per se is not really the root source of my contempt for the opponents of free immigration.

THE ISSUE OF TOLERATION

Now, should I and you the reader, alienate ourselves from Objectivists who disagree with us over the narrow, political issue of free immigration? When they agree with us on so many other, more fundamental questions of philosophical principle? 

Yes, yes, yes! Any man who is willing to victimize the weak and innocent is not a good Objectivist. I do not think that such a man is a valuable ally. And I do not think that he is suitable as a friend. That is why I am now taking the risk that I may wind up alienating me from an awful lot of Objectivists. I say “an awful lot of Objectivists” not because I think that many Objectivists are themselves opposed to free immigration. I believe that most Objectivists understand that they must support the principle of free immigration in order to be consistently in favor of individual rights.

But, in my experience, many Objectivists refuse to ostracize those fellow Objectivists who support restrictions on immigration. In my experience, many Objectivists are willing to “sanction the sanctioners of evil" in this issue. 

It would be a grave error to refuse to “exclude” otherwise good Objectivists who were willing to tolerate the victimization of innocent Jews in the Nazi concentration camps. This would be a grave error despite the fact that the victimization of those Jews would be a very narrow concrete. 

And for the same kinds of reasons it would also be a grave error to refuse to “exclude” otherwise good Objectivists who were willing to tolerate the victimization of innocent prospective immigrants. This would be a grave error despite the fact that the victimization of those prospective immigrants would be a very narrow concrete. 

For - the victimization of the innocent is always a major moral issue. And as Milton Friedman said in another context: When individual rights and justice are at stake, one is not permitted to count noses!