Purpose: The Anti-Rumours Cafés, now called Stop The Rumour (Stop Ryktet) and are carried out for the municipality of Botkyrka by the environmental and social impact agency The Good Tribe that set up cafés in libraries as a public platform to discuss and explore rumours and prejudices among young people aged 18-25 years.
Stimulus/Rationale: The motivation for Stop The Rumour cafés is the everyday overload of information, in private life, work life and social media, which makes it difficult to distinguish between facts and rumours, and consequently may produce damaging rumours and prejudice about others. The cafés encourage the participants to critical thinking and discussion as a way to confront rumours and prejudice.
Process: Libraries were chosen as they are well attended by young people aged 18-25 years old. 4 anti-rumour cafés were set up and each one focused on a particular rumour. The initial theme was “Criminality” (the most prominent theme of rumours in Botkyrka), followed by “incompatibility of the Swedish and migrant cultures”, “Unequal distribution of public resources” and “Swedish culture is under threat”. The rumour-theme, “Swedish culture is under threat”, was among the most visited café. This can be explained by the political situation in Sweden IN 2014. The populist party, Swedish democrats, had recently achieved their best election result to date, raising questions for citizens all over Sweden, not least those in Botkyrka. This notion of a threatened ‘Swedishness’ is often illustrated by the feeling that Swedish traditions are no longer being celebrated or performed as they used to be and that “the good old days” are dying out.
However, irrespective of the level of interest in a rumour theme, it was noticed that in the early stages of the project attendance by majority Swedes was poor in certain locations. Part of the explanation may relate to the effect of the rumours themselves: When cafés were organized in Alby, Fittja and Norsborg/Hallunda (areas of high migrant populations), the level of interest among majority Swedes was lower. Statistically, majority Swedes preferred to attend the cafés in Tumba and Tullinge, with lower concentrations of migrants. This challenge was addressed by organising “extra invitations” addressed to target groups from different demographic areas (Tullinge and Tumba). In addition, invitations and information about all the events were disseminated through social media (facebook, internal web etc).
The main goal of each café was to encourage people to talk about rumours that they usually feel uncomfortable discussing, and the survey of the participants indicate that this goal was accomplished. The participants reflected on how “true” the rumours all over Botkyrka were and gave examples from their own lives. One general outcome was a widespread belief that rumours lead to depression and that the need of dialogue is huge!
Impact: The expected impact is to question and combat rumours and prejudice.
Key reference documents: https://www.thegoodtribe.com/blogg-sverige/2017/5/valkommen-till-antiryktes-cafe-i-hallunda
