Or maybe they were having surströmming for dinner and wanted to spare their guest

As a swede visiting I always got the question "Äter du här/hemma"(Are you eating here/at home?) or "Vill du äta här?"(Do you want to eat here?). I usually responded "Jag äter när jag kommer hem"(I'll eat when I'm home). The whole thing is a bit weird but I do love the jokes and memes that have come from this.

I grew up in New Jersey in the 1960s. Generally, we were expected to be home for dinner. When it was dinner time, I’d head home. I rarely ate anything other than maybe a snack on rare occasions at my friend’s or neighbor’s houses. I never experienced waiting in another room while the family ate though.

As a Brazilian, sometimes forced to eat against my will, I understand now and even agree with some of the reasons. But it's yet, indeed, a cultural clash. I think I would sit in the middle, to offer but not make a big deal of it, if the guest refuses (here, some people can take a refuse as a personal offense, so it can be kinda hard for an introvert person). And, Brazil was discovered by and a part of the Portuguese Empire and later mainly colonized by people form Mediterranean Europe, along with the slave trade from Africa, so you can see where this is coming from. I also have seen another take on this, that the relationship with food is different, regarding waste, from countries with harsh winters and one crop a year to countries with mild winters and two crops a a year. Anyway, that helped a lot to understand. Tack för din videor!

I'm kinda glad I missed this and got to hear it from somebody who researched and thought it all out first. This doesn't seem too strange, I grew up in California and remember similar situations as a kid- usually it was about permission from parents, and not wanting to interfere with plans.

As a child I also went through this to sit and wait for my Swedish friend who was eating in another room. thought it was just as disgusting as now. the sad thing is that how you try to make it sound like stories, they are not stories but something most immigrants have experienced and for some strange reason you try to make it sound like a lie's. I know you yourselves think it's disgusting because otherwise you wouldn't have spent so much time saying it's a lie. Sweden is a racist country, look at the comments on social media and you will see how racist the Swedish people really think. that they have voted racists into the government only strengthens that picture. I, like many other immigrants, am now looking for another place to migrate to because no one wants to live in a society where they charge such high taxes as then this money goes to him who ate food alone with his family in secret.

Man, if only I had Twitter to be able to take part in this rich and fruitful sociocultural discussion. I guess I'll just have to miss out on all these great ideas coming out of there.

3:22 Ladies and Gentlemen, in films you simply call these lame excuses a "Plot Convenience" 🤣🤣🤣

When I was a child, at our home dinner was almost a formal affair. Whereas we ate breakfast and lunch in the kitchen, we ate dinner in the dining room, on the long table, sometimes with candles, and always with our second best china. Our very best China and silverware was saved for when we had guests. One of us would say, "Dinner's ready!", the playmate would leave and the family would have dinner, discussing events of the day, catching up with what everyone was doing, etc. It certainly would never occur to us or to the playmate that he or she should stay for dinner! Never!

I’m wondering… why not tell the child guest to go home and come back after dinner? Or have him call his parents to confirm if he can stay at your house for dinner? Cell phones may not have existed 30 yes ago but land lines yes. When my kids were little and had friends coming to our house to play, I always announced « Time to go home now, we’re having dinner soon. » That was normal for most families. Once in a while I asked the little guest if he/she wanted to stay with us for dinner, in which case, I made him call his parents to ask permission to stay. Just a phone call makes the difference between: he stays home unfed -vs - he stays home and eating with us. I’m from Canada.

In germany this stereotype exists as well. In Fact although you hear it alot, i always invited my guests to stay for dinner and where always invited as well. It is just a myth made up by randoms. For the argument with money, a guests more costs about 3€ when we feed him. That should be affordable in any case (children even less since they dont eat that much).

I just want to say I deeply appreciate this video. People who are not of Northern European or Scandinavian heritage are immensely quick to judge us by THEIR standards and not appreciate that we aren't like them. I have never lived in Sweden, but as a descendant of Swedes this hit home. The concept of "taking care of your own, not being a burden to others, and not taking a debt on to yourself that you can't bear" is not just cultural, it is genetic.

Tack för du gick igenom det sakligt och med olika perspektiv! Så få som är nyanserade angående swedengate hahaha

Explain bajstunnan! Do you make your kid's friend shit in a bag and bring it home with them? The world needs to know.

I sometimes ate dinner at home and at a friends house as well, when i got older i prefered to eat at home, my friend lived very close. As a swede it feels a bit strange with all criticism of swedish culture in the media lately

Brazil mentioned 🎉

The proper thing to do if there is a guest in your home is to at least offer. If your guest declines, then that is that.

I don’t know about sweden, but in holland when i was a young kids were supposed to finish their plate. And always be home by 18.00. When you came home with a full stomach, your parents would be angry that you accepted someone else’s food, bc the polite thing was to decline… Nowadays it’s a subject you can talk about. I would ask my kid’s friends: do you want to stay for dinner? Then i will call your parents to ask if it’s ok.

how is anyone bringing up #swedengate when they're still walking into my house without taking off their shoes #howdareyou #thisisanasianhousehold #heressomeindoorsandals

Tack ! For the comments. Yes, I think it certainly is a cultural thing, in Latin American countries the fact of not offering to share the lunch or dinner with guests are terrible manners and a mean/ selfish behaviour. Moreover, there is a popular idiom: 'it is better to arrive on time than to be invited' , when someone arrives at dinner time and he/ she was not expected. The guest can say 'no, thank you' but in general, you are expected to join the family at the table if you are there at dinner time.

Det är ganska löjligt att det här trendade i Storbrittanien, ett land som inte är särskilt känt för gästvänlighet och respekt för andra kulturer

The good old days. Family dinner.

According to the video, in Sweden "Everyone provide for themselves", so there is something I don't understand. Why do the Swedes like to pay one of the highest taxes in the world so that unknown people can go to university and have free medicine (which is a good thing and I'm not criticizing), yet they can't give food to the neighbor they have known for years

The internet likes to disregard white majority countries as having cultures, but be quick to say that things from other places are cultural. I'm not white btw, nor from or in Sweden (I wish), so I don't have an agenda to push here. I'm just sad that people don't like realizing western countries aren't all on culture and that they need to viewed from the same lens of respect given to non-western countries. As someone living in the US right now, Sweden is FAR different culturally and it would be incorrect to try and view a situation through American cultural lense.

BUT what is up with inviting people to a party THEN asking them to pay for food?

This concept also lies in india i.e. ऋण/भार - this means you should not be in debt of anybody's favour whether it's money, food or either doing some bad to someone else , we have to repay those debts in next life(reborn) . So in order to attain enlightenment we don't want to be in debt of someone's favour Butttt..... In india we people treat guest as god (अतिथि देवो भवः) so we can not send our guest with empty stomach , we will cook even delicious food and feed them over. So the two ideologies clashes but we live with second one cause not everyone is concerned about afterlife, rebirth and enlightenment.

I am not from Sweden but I prefer your culture. I do not want to cause a burden and I don't want to be expected to be paid back. A lot of hospitable countries expect someone to pay you back in some form, and I hate that. That also feeds into their politics of corruption: I have done this for you, and you must pay me back when I am in power. Italy can brag about how hospitable they are, but their politics have been rampant with corruption because of their hospitable, family oriented culture.

In Philippines, if the child wanna play with their friends/classmates, then they can do that after school time. The child have to inform their parents in advance. When the child get parents approval, then they can play after class but with condition don't eat snacks to their friends house as it is very embarrassing, also come home before dinner (as it gets dark after 6pm) To make it short, the child have to come home before dinner or else nagging will happen from parents

All of these things happened to me as a kid. I am from Canada by the way, 1. Seen as rude to eat with the family. 2. Did not prepare enough for guests. 3. Ruin child’s planned dinner. 4. Assumed already eaten.

In Saudi Arabia we have a common problem of some people having financial troubles for being too generous. Talk about polar opposites

Lol I found this whole thing very funny. My Swedish professor always told us that compared to Americans, Swedes were kinda anti-social. Honestly this makes me feel like I could fit in, in Sweden 😂

swede spotted

Haha this is rediculous. I am disappointed that this could have happened, how this came about that this is questionable and how people can even talk about the culture of a country they have no idea about. But this reminded me of something and it made me laugh, when I was at a friend's house during lunch and I didn't want to eat because I was ashamed and I didn't need to, they persuaded me but to no avail and in the end his grandmother took a "stick" and "whipped" my ass (don't know to express myself differently but it's nothing terrible in my culture, i hope someone will understand me). I come from Croatia and I have to admit that there are many differences between these two cultures, probably because in my country the standard is lower and people are more dependent on each other but this now is really too much.

Me be the swdish well be bettar aftar what happen

Finnaly someone tells the truth about this.

As an American, like you, this was always my experience. We were expected to be home at dinner time!

Because they always was rich and Need or emjoy the food in another house maybe. They has an introvertit culture of don't disturb the others, be quiet

Gratitude guilt is kinda messed up.

He's a man who's broken his fantasy in Sweden. What if the Swedish people changed their position and left their friends alone in the room at dinner time at a friend's house in another country? I think it is a cultural difference that is beyond the line to be called a cultural difference.

😂 this is insane, Sweden is the least racist place on earth

Thanks! Its a HOAX thing, but I have wood to put on the bonfire! First.. we dont starve our guests, not even small childs that visiting our own child. Then to my memorys of being a young urban child, visiting other homes.. when they started to prepare dinner, I recon that my own family was doing the same and left. It was at this time there was no cellphones, one have to be back at home not later then dinner! And there is more cultural differens betwen north and south europe! We grown up in a protestant tradition, that says, you is always guilty and there is no salvation in heaven, best thing is to be poor and still do the best thing on earth! Soo, it kind of gets to, independens, independens, independens and a fear to get in to and interfere with others independency! One dont realy want to get a call frome other parents to stop feeding there children! I like that this video have named "tacksamhetskuld", its a part of it, and probably a thing that make it difficult to get new swedish friend, its the same betwen swedes! If one get invited to strangers, one supose to invite them back later, if you dont.. your a bad person and there is no salvation for you in the heaven! If one have gotten pass this first stage, and one have get friends, there is not that much limits anymore, its more about how close friends one got. Now to the best part, if one have real good friends one can get invited to some traditional fiestas, then swedes put our traditional "poor farmers" food on the table! A lot of brined herrings and potatoes.. or in worste case, fermented herrings!

One set of great grandparents were Swedish immigrants: they came to the US during WW I. My grandmother, and thus my mother, and thus me and my siblings, grew up with a polite "Your friends will need to go home, it's dinner time." This had two reasons: dinner was usually a more planned meal and there wasn't enough for extra mouths, and after cleaning up was when the kids were expected to do their homework for school. Friends were never sent home for lunch if it was the weekend or the summer, as it was pretty easy to just make another sandwich.

Easily explainable. To 'give food' to guests is like flaunting your wealth, and that goes against jantelagen.

It’s not a matter of culture. It’s all about people : some of them greedy others are not. There are many open hearted and generous Swedes and there some are closed ones.

I pressed like, but 2:53 how are NMR racist? Or do you just repeat what others say about them? I've listened to one of their podcast episodes, and there were no racist things being said, not even bad words or swearing occured, it was a much friendlier listening than Swedish state radio (SR).

Well, if you have a low income, and 3 kids, who all have 3 friends over every day, it gets pretty expensive to make food for everyone.

Sometimes we just have to accept that some cultural things are not good to take it forward to another generation. I hope this inhospitability in the name of culture and individualism ends!

So ridiculous and rude

So tell me how is this okay? I went to a swedish friend's house for the first time. He offered me to visit him and chat together and play some video games. He drank energy drink the whole time we were there and he didn't even offer me a cup of water! How is that okay?

It is just very characteristic of general twitter discussion and painfully ironic to criticise an entire country's agreed upon cultural belief/practice, to the point that it devolves into an argument about bigotry, because it is.................different from what they are used to. Hmm.

I hope whats hapen now to swdish they well behve the gast bettar at there home

This clickbait tho! Unsubscribe immediately 🤮

If your arey guest you are going to enjoy good with me . It's absolutely inhumane and worst kind of hospitality if you don't offer food to your guest

Grow up. Stop whinging....

liked the video but using a blonde woman in a bikini as clickbait ain't it, sir

The parents might not have enough money... bad excuse, here in Latin America people that hardly have any food will share it with a guest. As an adult, I wouldn't even dream of having dinner without inviting a guest, even more if such guest is a child, I would let the kid eat my food gladly.