Cake In the Face

The temperature in the upcoming national election in Sweden in September, was raised several degrees yesterday when Göran Hägglund, Minister for Health and Social Affairs and leader of the Christian Democrats of Sweden, got a cake shoved into his face when he was in Gothenburg, Sweden, to give a campaign speech.

Photo: Pontus Lundahl/TT

The cake-attacker was a 20 y.o. spectator who was apprehended by the police immediately after the incident.

The Fag Army insignia

Today a group called Fag Army (who have a presence on F*c*book) accepted responsibility for the cake-attack, saying they are a group of men who identify as LGBTQ and that they are tired of homophobia and the liberal mass-hysteria "that too often hijacks our struggle against it".

In it's statement on F*c*book, the group also stated that the group "caked" Mr. Hägglund as he represents a homophobic and transphobic party which over the years has done everything it could to thwart  the rights of LGBTQ people and that the Christian Democrats is the party in the present government that represent and normalize "the oppression that stalks, abuses and kills (LGBTQ people)" 

The statement ends with a laconic postscript that says, "Given what religious extremists have done to us LGBTQ people throughout history, isn't a cake in the face quite innocent?"
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Although I do agree with Fag Army that a cake in the face is quite innocent and that the Christian Democrats of Sweden is a party for organized homophobia and transphobia, I believe that there are better ways to handle our opponents. This, however, doesn't mean that I don't think this was a hilarious action and that it probably helped to put focus on the Christian Democratic parties deplorable stance on LGBTQ issues.

A Welcome Change of Heart

In two previous posts (Stop Forced Sterilization and A Message from Love) I have informed you about the deadlock among the four parties that form the Swedish government on the issue of forced sterilization of transsexuals before being granted permission for new legal gender identity and gender corrective surgery. 

Although three of the four parties in the governing so called "Alliance for Sweden" and 90 % of the members of parliament as a whole were for a change of the law and abolish the requirement for sterilization the fourth party in the Alliance, the Swedish Christian Democrats, blocked any change of the present law.

The Christian Democrats is a socially conservative ("family values", i.e. anti-abortion, anti-gay rights, anti stem-cell research etc etc.) party heavily influenced by the "Word of Faith" movement and other fundamentalist Christian movements. 

Recently internal strife broke out where the party chairman Göran Hägglund was challenged for the leadership of the party by a candidate for the hardcore fundamentalists. The rebellion was successfully quenched by a humiliating defeat after which the party leadership - finally - grew a pair of brand new "cojones" and on Saturday declared that the party would no longer oppose abolishing the requirement of forced sterilization.

We can now look forward to a change of the anachronistic and discriminatory law.

Göran Hägglund och KD väljer bort Stockholm Pride

Göran Hägglund (kd) är den enda partiledare som tackar nej till att delta i Stockholm Prides partiledardebatt. Enligt Hägglunds pressekreterare Petra Kjellarson kan han inte komma eftersom han håller sitt traditionella sommartal på Öland påföljande dag.

I Svenska Dagbladet beklagar RFSLs förbundsordförande Ulrika Westerlund Hägglunds beslut och hon säger att ”det är svårt för mig att se hur statsministern kan göra en lucka i kalendern men inte Hägglund”.

Kristdemokraterna kommer som enda parti inte heller att ha ett eget tält på festivalsområdet.

Stockholm Pride äger rum den 26 juli-1 augusti 2010. Debatten arrangeras av RFSL på temat HBT-frågor, det vill säga homosexuella, bisexuella och transpersoner.

Genom sina prioriteringar avslöjar man var man står, skulle man kunna säga om detta.