A responce to Grev Per's article

Day 292, 11:39 • Published in Sweden Sweden • by josefstark

If you haven't red it, please do.
Here is Grev Per's article " [a url=http://www.erepublik.com/article-615331.html]A Sign of Dissatisfaction[/a]!"

A well written article! It reminds me of a good book I red when I was younger by Jens Toldstrup, "Ockuperat Land" was the title in Swedish. It was about Jens himself when he was young, under the Nazi occupation of Denmark. His father worked down at the dock at a big silo, loading ships with grain. Jens speaks of a man called Adolf Hitler who is rounding up the people in Germany and saying that the Jews are the ones to blame for all bad that had happened to Germany lately, them loosing the First World War. He seizes power and some years go by, and Jens becomes a young man working at a local automobile shop. One day he and his family hears a loud roaring sound in the sky, it turns out to be German airplanes, after a while it starts to rain paper flyers, and on them it's written to the people of Denmark not to put up with resistance, because it will be futile.

Later the German army swarms across Denmark. The fights last only for a short while before it's all over. Denmark is now German.
Jens father is not pleased and after coming home late one night after work he is arrested by the Gestapo for sabotage, the whole silo at the docks was destroyed by Danish partisans. Later in the book Jens is sucked into the Danish resistance and he grows up and becomes a man with the true spirit of never giving up. He finds love in the resistance force, he is betrayed by old friends... It is a really good book and a true story too.

I have always been in this sticky situation of not knowing what to think, believe or do, regarding this issue. I am half Dane half Swede. I used to spend the summers down in Korsør with my family, oh how I loved it. The smell of Store Belt, going through your nostrils. I even remember how the first breath after I got out of the car always made me a bit dizzy.
But I also love this country, Sweden. The winters may be cold, not as cold as they used to be, not as much snow as when I was younger. Some say it's the global pollution that is taking it all away, and I think it's true, sad... but true.

I have always wanted Denmark to be free. My thoughts have not always been met with very much sympathy. Sometimes not met at all, even ignored. I have sometimes just been seen as one of those Swedish scum who took Denmark. That hurts me a lot. Now more and more people are realizing that you cannot oppress people in Erepublik like you can in the real world, you have to make friends instead of enemies, because that is the only way to last all the way through this game, it's all built on one simple, basic principle... and that is coexistence, and that does not function correctly without cooperation, and cooperation does nut function without mutual understanding, and there we have it! Mutual understanding.

We can all be misunderstood but there is always forgiveness, and that is worth remembering, no matter who you are, be it Dane, Swede, German or Pole, we all have to forgive each other because there is no other way if we don't want to live in agony and constant mistakes due to our lack of understanding.

Now, I do agree that Christian the 10th did some truly heroic acts. He was a brave man and an icon. But I cannot agree to change my avatar only to show of my dissatisfaction. However, I understand that Danes may want to.
Maybe I was wrong but I did kind of getting the feeling that Grev Per was comparing Sweden with Nazi Germany, I can understand the thoughts behind that and the symbolism he is after, you could say it's justified, but not to everybody, not to me. But I can live with that if it serves a higher purpose. We all need to make sacrifices if this aught to work.
I know it sucks not to have a country of your own, half of mine is gone. But it may surprise you that there are more people in Sweden wanting peace between us than you think and I am one of them.

Now, you may ask, why would Sweden want to give Denmark back to the people it belongs with?
We can simply keep it in order to suck out the resources it will gain when V1 opens. Why couldn’t we just do that? Well I guess we could but where is the fun in that? We would be so despised across the world, and that mark, the mark of evil, is so hard to wash away you whish you had a time-machine to go back and set everything in its right place. But that isn’t the case. We ripe tomorrow what we sow today, so let us TODAY sow a seed of peace and understanding so that we all can enjoy it TOMORROW. Because tomorrow will come, and if you have but a tiny, tiny chance of doing something better, I believe it’s worth doing. So get out there and be understanding and kind to each other and you’ll know that we humans have come this far, not by fighting, but by hard work and cooperation!

- Josef Stark

EDIT: I almost forgot. Here are some words of wisdom:
Per aspera, ad astra! / Through hardship, to the stars!