Hello and welcome to the
How to
Live in Denmark podcast.
I'm Kay Xander Mellish.
June is a glorious month
in
Denmark.
The sun has arrived, but
the
mosquitoes haven't.
And it is full of special
days, from
graduations to weddings
to the
midsummer festival of
Sankt Hans,
where Danes meet to sing
traditional songs before
a giant
bonfire.
Danes love a good
bonfire, and kids
are generally introduced
to them in
kindergarten, where
small children
gather around the big
open flame in
their play clothes.
June also includes the
Danish
National Day, Constitution
Day.
The Danes are modest
about this.
There are no parades or
fireworks
or military flybys.
A few politicians make
speeches
about how important the
Constitution is, but most
people
don't even get a day off
work.
And the Constitution has
to share
the day with Father's Day
in
Denmark.
Now, this doesn't mean
that the
Danes aren't patriotic or
don't love
their country.
Anyone who has received
a Danish
flag on their birthday
cake knows
that they do.
In fact, at some level, a
reverse
Jante Law applies when
Danes talk
about their homeland.
Under the original Jante
Law, which
isn't really a law, just a
Danish
cultural code,
individuals aren't
supposed to think that
they're
better than anyone else
or smarter
than anyone else, or that
you have
anything to teach anyone
else.
Under this reverse Jante
Law, as it
applies to the country as
a whole,
there is a subtle belief
that
Denmark is the best of all
possible
countries with the best
of all
possible systems.
In fact, many Danes
quietly believe
that with time and
education,
everyone will want to be
like
Denmark.
In the meantime, Danes
show their
patriotism in subtle ways,
supporting the national
sports
teams, not just soccer or
football,
but handball, badminton,
and both
the men's and the women's
teams.
They display beautiful
Danish
design items in their
homes, like
Georg Jensen silver
pitchers and
bowls.
They try to buy only
Danish meat in
the supermarket, because
they
believe the animals are
treated
better.
Danish vegetables have
fewer or at
least better chemicals,
they believe.
That's why you pick the
cucumber
with the Danish flag on
the
wrapper.
Or now, in June, the
wonderful fresh
Danish strawberries.
Danes show patriotism
with their
passion for
sustainability, the
environmental agenda to
protect
their lovely flat land.
They support the green
transformation with
electric cars,
by carefully recycling
everything
they can, and by using
renewable
energy, preferably Danish
wind
energy. Although there's
always
electricity from Norway
as a
backup.
Norwegian electricity,
cheap goods
from China, a defense
umbrella
from the United States,
all the
things that make Denmark
one of
the happiest countries in
the
world.
This June, however, the
Danes are a
little nervous. Due to a
spat with the
US over Greenland, as
well as the
ongoing war in Ukraine.
Danish politicians talk a
lot about
beefing up the Danish
military,
although there's no clear
idea of
how to pay for that.
Nobody wants higher
taxes and
nobody wants to cut
social services.
in the meantime,
what they have beefed up
is the
amount of time Danish
military
draftees have to spend in
uniform,
from 4 months to 11
months.
And as of the end of this
month,
girls who turn 18 can be
drafted
into the Danish military.
Now, this is new, even
though girls
in Norway and Sweden
have been
eligible for the draft for
some time.
Denmark is proud of its
record on
gender equality, so maybe
it's a
wonder it hasn't
happened sooner.
After all, more than half
of the
medical doctors in
Denmark are
female.
More than half of the
priests in
Denmark are female.
The Prime Minister is
female.
At only about 10% female,
the
military is clearly
lagging behind.
The way the military draft
in
Denmark works is that
boys,
and soon girls, who have
just
turned 18 are invited to
an
obligatory "Defense Day"
where their
physical and cognitive
abilities are
tested.
If these are satisfactory,
you get a
lottery number.
And if the Danish military
does not
get enough volunteers to
meet its
needs, you will be called
up.
In recent years, there
have been
plenty of volunteers, so
getting
enough people hasn't been
much of
a problem.
And getting into the Royal
Life Guards, real-life
soldiers who
also protect the Royal
Family,
remains very high status.
It's where Denmark's
future power
brokers meet each other.
In 2023, there were about
5,000
volunteers and roughly
25% of
them were female. At least
in
peacetime,
the forces have attracted
many
young women who are
athletes,
almost as if it were a very
disciplined form of an
extreme
sports challenge.
But very few stayed in the
forces
after their four months
were up,
moving up the ranks.
Mette Frederiksen,
Denmark's female
prime minister, has said
she wants
more career female
military
officers.
There's also the question
of
diversity.
People of non-Danish
ethnic origin
make up at least 15% of
Denmark's
population under age 25.
But less than 2% of the
military.
Shouldn't they have to
serve too?
Any national day brings
up
questions of "what is a
country"
and "what is *this*
country"?
Many people would say
that
Denmark is about
community,
shared values, cultural
heritage,
and a quiet pride in this
little boat
adrift on the big ocean of
the
world.
The June holiday that
expresses that
is less Constitution Day
than the
other June holiday, Sankt
Hans, the
midsummer festival.
Gathering around the
bonfire
together, singing old
songs
together, enjoying nature
and the
midsummer light.
That's some of the best
Denmark has
to offer.
And at least in June there
aren't too
many mosquitoes.
And that's the How to Live
in
Denmark podcast for this
week.
This is the sixth episode
in the
series the Danish Year.
It's about events that are
simply
expected to happen every
year in
Denmark, and even if they
aren't
formal holidays. This
year I'm going
to try to do a podcast
every month
about aspects of the
Danish year
and how they fit into the
overall
context of where
Denmark is coming
from and where it's going.