This article is outdated. Please update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information. Please see the talk page for more information. (August 2009)

Aftonbladet

200px
Type	daily newspaper
Format	tabloid
Owner	LO (9%) Schibsted (91%)
Founder	Lars Johan Hierta
Editor-in-chief	Jan Helin
Founded	6 December 1830
Language	Swedish
Headquarters	Västra Järnvägsgatan 21, Stockholm
Circulation	310,900 (2010)[1]
ISSN	1103-9000
Official website	www.aftonbladet.se

The first page of the first issue of Aftonbladet

In a hand-written bill from the Stockholm riots during the Revolutions of 1848, support for the then-banned "Aftonbladet" is coupled with a call for overturning the monarchy and instituting a republic

Aftonbladet is a Swedish tabloid founded by Lars Johan Hierta in 1830 during the modernization of Sweden. It is one of the larger daily newspapers in the Nordic countries. Aftonbladet is owned by the Swedish Trade Union Confederation (LO) and Norwegian media group Schibsted, and its editorial page describes it as an "independent social-democratic newspaper". In 2006 the paper had 1,425,000 daily readers (Orvesto research 2005:2), circa 15% of the Swedish population.

History[link]

When it was first published in 1830 by Lars Johan Hierta, it was a tabloid that reported news and also criticised the new Swedish king Charles XIV John. The king stopped Aftonbladet from being printed and banned it. This was answered by starting the new newspaper "Det andra Aftonbladet" (The second Aftonbladet), which was subsequently banned, followed by new versions named in similar fashion until the newspaper had been renamed 26 times, after which it was allowed by the king.^[2]

During its existence, Aftonbladet has leant in different political directions. Initially liberal, it drifted towards conservatism under Harald Sohlman, Editor in Chief from 1890 to 1921. During World War I, a majority holding was sold to the German government in a secret arrangement.

In 1929 the newspaper came under the control of the Kreuger family, when a majority of the shares was bought by Swedish Match, at that time the heart of Ivar Kreuger's corporate empire. Aftonbladet was labeled "neutral". In 1932 it backed Per Albin Hansson's new Social Democratic government. Just a few years later it realigned with the Liberal Party and turned to advocate liberal politics. Heavily influenced by pro-German staff members, the newspaper supported Germany during World War II.^[3]

The Kreuger era came to an end on 8 October 1956. Despite interest from both the Liberal Party and the Centre Party, Torsten Kreuger sold Aftonbladet to the Swedish Trade Union Confederation. The ownership change was first followed by a slight drop in circulation. In the 1960s, however, the newspaper saw its circulation surge rapidly, peaking at 507,000.

By the early 1990s Aftonbladet had run into economic problems, and many had begun to question the competence of the trade union movement as a media owner. On 2 May 1996, the Norwegian media group Schibsted acquired a 49.9 percent stake in the newspaper. The Swedish Trade Union Confederation kept the remaining 50.1 percent of its shares. The same year, its circulation passed that of long-time tabloid rival Expressen. As per 15 June 2009, Schibsted bought another 41% and is now the majority owner with 91%.^[4]

Internet publishing[link]

Aftonbladet adopted Internet publishing early on. It has been published on the world wide web since 25 August 1994, and the main news service is free. Since its inception, aftonbladet.se has consistently been rated as one of the five most visited Swedish websites in various surveys.

Criticism[link]

The journalistic quality of Aftonbladet has sometimes been questioned. In late 2006, the newspaper's own journalist Peter Kadhammar directed criticism at the fact that his own paper appears to treat the love life of Swedish tabloid celebrity Linda Rosing as equally important to the war in Iraq.^[5]

The Swedish film director Ingmar Bergman claimed that Aftonbladet was the main media force behind echoing his alleged financial misdeeds, which finally led to Bergman's self-imposed exile to Munich in the 1970s. In his memoir book Laterna Magica, Bergman called Aftonbladet a rubbish yellow paper which had deliberately aimed to tarnish his reputation.^{[citation needed]}

Controversy surrounding coverage of Israel[link]

This article may be unbalanced towards certain viewpoints. Please improve the article by adding information on neglected viewpoints, or discuss the issue on the talk page. (December 2010)

In recent years, several critics has argued that content published in Aftonbladet often is overly critical towards Israel, sometimes to the extent of - or at least bordering on — antisemitism.^{[6][7][8][9][10][11]} Per Ahlmark, former Deputy Prime Minister of Sweden and founder of the Swedish Committee Against Antisemitism, writes in his 2004 book Det är demokratin, dumbom! ("It's the Democracy, Stupid!"): "Aftonbladet is of course worst among the big newspapers when it comes to both playing on antisemitic strings and then denying that they have done so".^[6]

[edit] 2009 Aftonbladet-Israel controversy

In August 2009, Aftonbladet ran an article^[12] alleging that in 1992 the Israeli Defense Force took organs from Palestinians who died in Israeli custody. The article caused a diplomatic row between Israel and Sweden.

Jonathan Leman (a member of the editorial board of the Swedish anti-racist magazine Expo) and columnist Charlotte Wiberg wrote an article on Newsmill in August 2009 where they criticised what they described as "Aftonbladet's problematic attitude towards the Jews, both when it comes to purported criticism of Israel as well as in other contexts".^[9] In the article, they wrote: "Is Aftonbladet an antisemitic newspaper? No, but it seems that since the 1980s they [Aftonbladet] sometimes appear both blind and deaf in front of the expressions of antisemitism, which sometimes makes the newspaper "skid" [Swedish: slirar] in a way that few other newspapers do. The publishing of Boström's article [see the section below] unfortunately don't appears to be an accident at work, but rather seems to be in line of a larger pattern".^[9] Leman and Wiberg noted an instance in the 1982 Lebanon War where the Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin was portrayed as a Jewish Angel of Death, followed by the caption: "And on that night I want to cross the land of the Palestinians and beat all first-born of both humans and creatures and perform my punishment on all of the Palestinans' Gods, I the lord".^[13] Leman and Wiberg also noted instances in 2002 and 2006 where the paper used religious themes to criticize Israel.^{[6][8][14][15][16]}

See also[link]

• Expressen
• List of Swedish newspapers

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website
• Company history

Janne Josefsson
Janne Josefsson at a Bok- & Biblioteksmässan in Gothenburg 2008
Born	(1957-06-27) June 27, 1957 (age 55) Gothenburg, Sweden
Occupation	Journalist, Television host

Janne Josefsson (b. June 27, 1957 in Gothenburg) is a Swedish investigative journalist who has had numerous shows on Sveriges Television such as Fittja Paradiso, Uppdrag Granskning and Debatt.^[1] Uppdrag Granskning has uncovered some of Swedens most noted scandals such as the ICA meat repackaging controversy, and have both received journalistic prizes and attracted criticism for e.g. biased reporting.

Bibliography[link]

• Behöver vänstern gå i terapi? (also with Mats Zetterberg), 1976
• Kriget & sanningen [Editor: Jan Josefsson], 2002

Referenser[link]

1. ^ http://www.expressen.se/noje/1.1318656/janne-josefsson-brot-samman-hos-luuk

This Swedish biographical article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

Björn Olof Söder^[1] (born 3 January 1976) is a Swedish politician of the nationalist Sweden Democrats. He is the current party secretary of the Sweden Democrats and a member of the Swedish parliament following the 2010 general election.^[2]

Background and education[link]

Söder was born in Väsby, Höganäs Municipality, Skåne County, Sweden, where he also grew up.^[1] After he had completed upper secondary education (gymnasium) in 1995 he began engineering studies at the Lund Institute of Technology.^[1] Between 1997 and 1998 he made his compulsory military service at the K 3 regiment in Karlsborg.^[1] After finishing his military service he started to study again but took a break between 2000 and 2002 to work as an information technology consultant.^[1] He finished his studies in 2004 when he earned a Master of Engineering degree in chemical engineering from the Lund Institute of Technology.^[1]

Political career[link]

Söder first joined the Swedish Progress Party in 1991 but left the party in 1994 after internal struggles and instead joined the Sweden Democrats.^[1] He was elected as a substitute member of the party board in 1997 but left the board to serve as secretary of the Sweden Democrat Youth between 1998 and 2000.^[1] Between 1998 and 2002 he was a member of the municipal council in Höör Municipality for the Sweden Democrats.^[1] In 2001 he was again elected as a member of the party board and later the same year of the party executive committee.^[1] In the same year he was also elected as a member of the church assembly of the Diocese of Lund and as a substitute member of the church assembly of the Church of Sweden.^[1]

At the Sweden Democrats' national meeting in 2003 Söder was elected as deputy party chairman.^[1] He left this post at the national meeting in 2005 when he was elected as party secretary.^[1] In 2005 he was once again elected as a member of the church assembly of the Diocese of Lund and as a full member of the church assembly of the Church of Sweden.^[1] Between 2006 and 2010 Söder was a member and party group leader of the Sweden Democrats in the Scania Regional Council as well as a member of the municipal council in Helsingborg Municipality.^[1]

In the 2010 general election the Sweden Democrats for the first time entered the Swedish parliament with 5.70% of the votes and Söder, placed second on the party's national ballot, was elected as a Member of Parliament along with 19 other Sweden Democratic politicians.^[2] On 24 September 2010 he was elected as group leader of the Sweden Democrats in the Swedish parliament.^[3]

After Sweden's victory in the 2012 Eurovision Song Contest, he expressed disappointment and shame that the song was performed in English and not Swedish, thereby sinking even further into regional zeal and narrow-mindedness. After a massive backlash, he deleted the comment from his social media pages, and said that he now realizes that the Eurovision song contest "appearently is a holy cow that must not be critiziced in any way, just like multiculturalism."

References[link]

Jan Helin

Jan Gustav Helin, born Jan Gustav Karlsson 12 January 1967 in Nynäshamn, is a Swedish journalist who since January 2008 is the editor-in-chief of the newspaper Aftonbladet, replacing Anders Gerdin. Helin previously worked as reporter, propagandist and editor at Aftonbladet, which he first joined 1992-1993 as an intern.^[1] Helin started his career in journalism at Sundsvalls Tidning.

References[link]

1. ^ Svenska Dagbladet, 2007-12-12: Tuff match väntar ny chefredaktör ('Tough game ahead for new editor-in-chief') (Swedish)

This article about a Swedish writer or poet is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

This article about a European journalist is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

Magnus Betnér
Birth name	Magnus Lennarth Betnér
Born	(1974-08-16) 16 August 1974 (age 37) Stockholm, Sweden
Medium	Stand-up
Nationality	Swedish
Years active	1998–present
Subject(s)	Religion, politics, current events, pop culture, human sexuality, libertarianism
Influences	Doug Stanhope, Bill Hicks
Website	MagnusBetner.com

Magnus Lennarth Betnér (born August 16, 1974 in Stockholm) is a Swedish stand-up comedian, social critic and television host. His material largely consist of discussing society, religion and politics such as feminism and liberalism.

He has been acting in Swedish comedy shows such as Parlamentet, 100%, Veckans nyheter, Extra! Extra!, Stockholm live and in 2008 he made his own show called I ditt ansikte (In your Face). He has focused on his own 90-minute stand-up shows since then, with his 4th big tour playing over the winter 2011/2012. He is the only swedish comedian to be awarded with the "Swedish comedian of the year" award twice, in 2005 and 2010. With the 2010 award he was recognized to be "on the right road to be great in the United Kingdom".^[1]

Betnér has been performing increasingly in English, in the US, UK and Ireland. In August 2010 Betnér performed a complete run of hour-length shows in English at The Stand Comedy Club during the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, receiving praise in mostly four star reviews.^[2][3][4]

In 2012, Betnér now hosts his own show on Kanal 5 called Betnér direkt, which is inspired by shows like Real Time with Bill Maher and The Daily Show with Jon Stewart where Betnér discuss current events with a panel and a guest.

Early life[link]

Betnér was born in Stockholm, son of Lennarth Betnér, then pastor in the Swedish Mission Church and mother, name unknown, then a housewife, now works at HSB. Because of his fathers work Betnér moved around lot when he grew up. He lived in Idre, Sala and Vingåker before they moved back to Stockholm at age 14.

Comic style[link]

Betnér uses dark comedy, often offensively, against Swedish celebrities such as Linda Rosing, Ebba von Sydow, Mikael Persbrandt, Per Gessle and many more. His stand-up comedy has garnered him much criticism and even death threats from Swedish neo-Nazis and rappers, but he finds it humorous that people can get so angry about jokes.

Betnér often has to answer questions on why he is so offensive. He often replies that people should accept the jokes, since they are only jokes.

Betnér was awarded the "Swedish comedian of the year" award in 2005 and again in 2010 in connection with the Swedish stand-up gala. Betnér's characteristic humour is often political and provocative; for example, in one show, he ironically proposed to give his daughter a "pussy piercing" as a present for her second birthday, but ultimately opted against it, citing "why would you buy a pussy piercing for your two-year-old daughter? It would grow shut in a couple of weeks!" as the reason.

Betnér has also released four DVD movies: Live från Norra Brunn (Live from Norra Brunn), Magnus Betnér UnCut, Inget är heligt (Nothing is sacred) and Tal till nationen (Speech to the nation). He later chose to discontinue appearing in the program Extra! Extra!, as he considered himself censored when they would not allow him to joke about Runar Søgaard.^[5] He has been visiting the TV programs Robins, Förkväll and Belinda. In the autumn of 2008, Betnér's own TV program I ditt ansikte (In your face) was broadcast on Channel 5 in Sweden.^[6] After that Betnér went on to make a permanent contribution to SVT's Debatt (Debate).

Personal life[link]

Betnér is living together with Helena Sandklef and has a daughter, Lina (born in 2006) from a previous marriage. Because of Betnér's dislike for tabloid newspapers, he almost never exposes himself in the media, but in some of his old acts he talked about his daughter. Sometimes when it comes to Christianity he refers to his father who is a pastor. Betnér however is an outspoken atheist and considers the world to be better off without religion. He believes that everybody is bisexual.^[2][7][8]

Discography[link]

• Live från Norra Brunn (Live from Norra Brunn) (2006) (DVD)
• Magnus Betnér Uncut (2007) (DVD)
• Inget är heligt (Nothing is sacred) (2007) (DVD)
• Tal till Nationen (Speech to the nation) (2009) (DVD)
• Livets ord (Words of life) (2010) (DVD)
• Magnus Betnér IV (2012) (Digital Download)

Television[link]

• I ditt ansikte (2008)
• Betnér direkt (2012)

Appearances in other shows[link]

• Parlamentet (1999–present)
• Stockholm live (2005–2007, 2 episodes)
• Extra! Extra! (2006)
• 100% (2006)
• Veckans nyheter (2006)
• Sverige dansar och ler (2007, 3 episodes)
• Debatt (2008)

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Magnus Betnér

• Official website
• Magnus Betnér's channel on YouTube (channel for videos in English)
• Magnus Betnér on Myspace
• Magnus Betnér at the Internet Movie Database