Via my dad, I came across Alex Beam's latest in The Boston Globe.
Beam tackles what he calls a "wool-gathering essay" he came across in Utne magazine, an essay by Leif Utne, who is from Minneapolis, an essay where Leif debates with himself, ad nauseum, about whether or not he and his Swedish wife should move to Sweden.
Let me just give you a taste of how Alex Beam basically crucifies Mr. Leif, by making fun of him (and Sweden, and a bunch of other things) mercilessly:
Utne lauds the beguiling one-size-fits-all-ness of Sweden. There are only two car manufacturers, and only two low-flow toilet makers. Because in Sweden, it's not about consumerism; ''Sweden is a far more relationship-oriented society than the United States,'' he writes. ''Although a Swedish grocery store may only carry four brands of soap, Swedes have far more political choices than we do,'' e.g. seven political parties for 9 million people.You would think that Sweden's liquor monopoly, known as ''The System,'' and the fact that it is the world's single largest wine buyer, and that waiting in line there ''on a Friday afternoon is a shared national ritual'' might alert Mr. Utne that all is not copacetic in the land of sex, suicide, and socialism. But no matter; he plans to move -- ''I am certain of it.''
You should read the whole thing.
Posted by sheilaI've never read Beam but this op-ed is not only funny, it's spot on.
I think the whole "safety first" meme we are witnessing in the country is an off-shoot of the polictal correctness crap mixed in with the frivolous lawsuit tendencies of, well, lawyers.
For example, my wife and I recently purchased a home with a pool that had a slide. I say "had" a slide because in order to get the loan to buy, I had to get insurance for the house and the insurance company would not insure unless the pool slide was removed. Thus, now i have a pool without a slide and a pool deck with holes in it.
Posted by: Val Prieto at July 8, 2003 02:59 PM