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Creator of Lars Løkke Nazi cartoon received death threat in “very bad English”

TheCopenhagenPost
January 31st, 2016


This article is more than 8 years old.

Pia Kjærsgaard, the parliamentary chairman, has called for a retraction of the drawing and an apology

Steve Bell, the cartoonist responsible for a satirical drawing of the Danish PM Lars Løkke Rasmussen dressed as a Nazi, is surprised by the Danish response to his work, which has included a death threat, TV2 News reports.

Unanticipated reactions
“Some of the reactions have been very, very critical, and there has also been a death threat. Even though it was in very bad English, I could understand the sinister intentions,” Bell said.

The cartoon appeared in the British newspaper the Guardian on Wednesday, following the Danish parliament’s vote in favour of the controversial asylum law allowing for the confiscation of asylum seekers’ valuables and a three-year delay on family reunifications.

READ MORE: Danish business community fears new ‘Mohammed Crisis’

According to Bell, the cartoon is intended to show disappointment at developments in Denmark.

“You have done it much better than the UK, and therefore it is disappointing that you take this step. It is more a symbol of disappointment than a charge of Nazism,” he said.

The cartoon has also evoked reactions among Danish politicians. Pia Kjærsgaard, the parliamentary chairman, who in 2006, during the Mohammed cartoon crisis, was an outspoken proponent of freedom of expression and adversary of self-censorship, has called for media to retract the cartoon and apologise for printing it.


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A survey carried out by Megafon for TV2 has found that 71 percent of parents have handed over children to daycare in spite of them being sick.

Moreover, 21 percent of those surveyed admitted to medicating their kids with paracetamol, such as Panodil, before sending them to school.

The FOLA parents’ organisation is shocked by the findings.

“I think it is absolutely crazy. It simply cannot be that a child goes to school sick and plays with lots of other children. Then we are faced with the fact that they will infect the whole institution,” said FOLA chair Signe Nielsen.

Pill pushers
At the Børnehuset daycare institution in Silkeborg a meeting was called where parents were implored not to bring their sick children to school.

At Børnehuset there are fears that parents prefer to pack their kids off with a pill without informing teachers.

“We occasionally have children who that they have had a pill for breakfast,” said headteacher Susanne Bødker. “You might think that it is a Panodil more than a vitamin pill, if it is a child who has just been sick, for example.”

Parents sick and tired
Parents, when confronted, often cite pressure at work as a reason for not being able to stay at home with their children.

Many declare that they simply cannot take another day off, as they are afraid of being fired.

Allan Randrup Thomsen, a professor of virology at KU, has heavily criticised the parents’ actions, describing the current situation as a “vicious circle”.

“It promotes the spread of viruses, and it adds momentum to a cycle where parents are pressured by high levels of sick-leave. If they then choose to send the children to daycare while they are still recovering, they keep the epidemic going in daycares, and this in turn puts a greater burden on the parents.”