Another assault at a boarding school has been reported to the police, this time at my old school in Sigtuna. It makes me angry and sad but not surprised. Since the beginning of the 2010s, I have spoken about abuse, peer education and the culture of silence at the Swedish boarding schools about every two years. The incidents are always similar and what they all have in common is that it is young men who exposed younger men to violence.
That more abuses at boarding schools have been reported to the police in recent years may be a sign of a crack in the culture of silence that characterized the schools, an increased openness. Likewise, that the school management at Sigtuna this time is not silent but comments, condemns and takes responsibility. That they take students who raise the alarm seriously.
For some, it is difficult to understand how I, who thrived at a boarding school, can be so critical of outdated structures, a sunken view of humanity and degrading traditions. But at the school that was my home in the mid-1990s, there was so much more. Amazing teachers, inviolable sisterhood and lifelong friendship. Endless conditions for being a safe school for everyone.
One of the scariest things during my years at Sigtuna was the boarding fathers, who came to visit one day a year. Either to ensure that everything was the same at their old student dormitory, or to check that the bed was made in the sons' room. The fathers who sent their sons to boarding school to raise them to be real men and leaders, not to show weakness or give up. Do the same journey as they themselves did.
A telling example is the story from a boarding school mother whose son was severely abused at his student residence in Lundsberg. She called the father of another vulnerable boy, who replied: "It sounds like you've never done anything wrong, leave them alone, they're just boys."
The mother was one of those I interviewed in what in 2013 became the reportage book "To be without being seen". The Latin expression Esse non videri is the motto of both the Wallenberg family and my grandfather's father. You must have power and influence but without it being noticeable or visible. Possibly that explains why it is so difficult to see who actually decides the traditions of the boarding schools.
During my time at Sigtuna, the initiation rite and peer education was a collective action that everyone carried out and everyone was exposed to. To punish someone for that would have been completely absurd. It was also something that the adults who attended the school wanted to keep as much as we did. The most important thing was that nothing came out that could be "misconstrued by the media" or damage the school's reputation. But when it did "go off the rails", it was always at one of the boys' homes.
Given the enormous responsibility placed on parents in other parts of society, who, among other things, risk being evicted from their homes if their children commit crimes, it would be completely unreasonable if society's most resourceful adults were not required to bear the same responsibility.
It was only many years later that I could see my own complicity in maintaining the system. Not only had I accepted the humiliating initiation rite as a newcomer, I had carried it out myself as the oldest in the school. It was with that realization that I finally made the decision to challenge the culture of honor and break the silence.
When three students from Sigtuna have now been detained, high-profile defense lawyers have been hired. One of them believes that everyone is a victim of the school's toxic culture. And that's right. Likewise, we all became perpetrators in the same toxic culture. After the past year's recurring reporting from Lundsberg, it cannot have escaped anyone that that culture exists. And given the enormous responsibility placed on parents in other parts of society, who, among other things, risk being evicted from their homes if their children commit crimes, it would be completely unreasonable if society's most resourceful adults were not required to bear the same responsibility.
Sigtunaskolan has abolished the student title prefect and grade-divided dining tables, in an attempt to get access to student governance and hierarchies. Zeroings and initiation rites have been banned. Both students and parents have protested loudly, but the school management has stood its ground. Perhaps the time has come for the culture of silence to fall. How many reports of abuse does it take for the limit to be reached for even the most dedicated boarding parents?
Basically, all that is required is for a year group to jointly set a new standard and put peer education and pencilism behind them. Assuming they have their parents' support, of course. Is it perhaps time for that now, boarding school dads? I'm happy to help.
