The Copenhagen Report

The Danish daily newspaper Politiken is currently running an outstanding - and much needed - campaign entitled 'Jeg er dansker' ('I am Danish'). It features daily photos of 'typical' and 'less-typical' Danes. These less-typical Danes have all to often, in recent years, been cast as something - anything - but truly Danish by a minority of Danish politicians (and their supporters). Sadly, these politicians at this point have all but managed to hijack not only the issues and agenda, but also much of the language of the ongoing 'discussion'.

Nowadays, when one hears talk in the Danish media of what (and who) is traditionally Danish and so forth, it is almost left assumed and unsaid that what this means is precisely as it has been defined - in a frustratingly monopolistic way - by this small xenophobic minority.

Of course, it didn't help that the one political party that tried to stand up against this issue with their heart and soul quickly fell flat and rather hard on their faces owing to their own inept clumsiness when put to the electoral test - and have since remained laying on the ground with heavily bleeding noses.

Anyway, well done Politiken. This is an issue which the volume needs to be turned up higher and higher in the coming months and years. Of course, if Politiken was really clever they should probably take out these same ads elsewhere, as readers of very liberal Politiken are probably the least likely to be the ones espousing the problematic viewpoints, or voting for the most troublemaking of the political parties in this area.