Rixstep
 About | ACP | Buy | Industry Watch | Learning Curve | News | Products | Search | Substack
Home » Heroes Banquet

Swedish Sex

The new book by Oscar Swartz is one of the most important books of the new millennium.


Get It

Try It

BERLIN/STOCKHOLM (Rixstep) — Julian Assange dropped into Sweden on 11 August 2010 and planned to stay not quite a fortnight. Over five hundred days later and he's still wearing an ankle bracelet under house arrest. The 'crime' is having 'consensual but unprotected sex'. And they call it 'rape' in Sweden.

What happened? More importantly: what happened to Sweden? Oscar Swartz may not have all the answers, but he's come closer than anyone to assembling the necessary background data. And now for a meagre £5 you can partake of it.

Broadband in 1995

Oscar Swartz founded Sweden's first commercial ISP in 1994 and was offering 5 Mbit pipes a year later, only two years after sir Tim's invention went mainstream and the very same year the 'web revolution' unofficially began. (Most surfers would still be on dial-up for years to come.) He has a monthly column in Computer Sweden, is a special correspondent for Wired, and has always been a supporter of Sweden's Pirate Party. He has a degree from the Stockholm School of Economics and was a Fulbright Fellow as a PhD student at Columbia University in New York.

One Year's Work

Oscar devoted the past year to researching what's happened to his native Sweden the past 50 years - how the country went from the envy of everyone to the pariah of the planet. The result is the Kindle book released 1 June 2012 through Amazon, the full title of which is:

'A Brief History of Swedish Sex: How the Nation that Gave Us Free Love Redefined Rape and Declared War on Julian Assange'



Oscar spent some time thinking about the ideal format for his book and finally settled on the 'timeline'. And a good choice it was too. The book comprises thousands of short sections in chronological order. The four main divisions are:

  1. The Rise of Swedish Sin
  2. The Fall of Swedish Sin
  3. The War on Sex
  4. The War on Men

There's been a lot written at this site about the Assange case and there's been a recurring ambition to write a similar book, but now Oscar's done it.

You'll meet luminaries such as Lars Ullerstam. And you'll wonder how Lars could articulate exactly what you're thinking today. Then you'll meet people you wish you didn't meet such as Maria Pia Boëthius, Claes Borgström, and Anna Ardin. And by the time Julian Assange enters the picture on 11 August 2010, it'll be more than obvious what's going to happen simply by virtue of his setting foot in the country.

See Also
Amazon: A Brief History of Swedish Sex

About | ACP | Buy | Industry Watch | Learning Curve | News | Products | Search | Substack
Copyright © Rixstep. All rights reserved.