#uni will be the death of me actually thats the only thing preventing me from peaking

[latejulys]

[norsesuggestions]

what is your opinion on gustav iii?

Hmmm well

With the disclaimer that this is just a personal opnion build on growing up in sweden, were we often talk about him, not like historian based opnion (although i a mix i opnions from being a gender studies student and undergrad ethnology student. But I have not read much about gustav iii at uni level is what I am trying to say)

Well I would say this:

First of all he was a tyrannt. He shut down the parliement, and took all the power himself (which was illegal. Like, he really did such a state coup, that would today be called a diktator overtake of the state).

Now the parliement of sweden during the 18th were in many ways corrupt, but it was still allowed a proto-demcracy rule, were elected represantives from the 4 stånden cooperated to rule sweden (nobility, priests, borgious, and peasants were the 4 stånden).

Because the parliement actually DID include peasants in sweden, and peasants of a certain status could vote in their represantives into the parliement, shutting it down is a massive step-back for the political influence majority of swedens population, who were peasants.

Gustav III talked about giving “the people the power” but with doing that, he actually takes away power from the people, from my non-historian understanding.

Anyway! I just can’t agree with shutting down the swedish parliement, which is the very parliement we still have in sweden (even if it ofcourse gone through 200 years of reform by now. The parliement of then was not identical etc etc. But it just… feels wrong haha)

Also! Gustav III had alot of ideas for sweden as a nation. But several of those ideas were totally dumb. Sweden was super much in debt when he ruled. But still he insisted on starting wars forexample.

In particular he started a war with russia that went VERY badly, and he is in the historical narrative of sweden, often blamed for sweden losing finland to russia (which happened after his death,so I am not sure how correct that is as a blame game, but he is often blamed for this in sweden. Although I think his son is the one that actually lost finland to russia. I don’t remember).

He ALSO wanted to be treated more like a living God, like the kings of France. Which we often ridicouly him for, both today in sweden and historically.

(Sweden royalty were you know, treated like very powerful people, not like worshipped. He wanted the court to compete to dress him in the morning etc. The population of sweden just laughed and laughed about this silly ideas. Competing about wiping the bottom of the king? Ridicolous!)

Gustav III also wanted sweden in general to became a great power of europe, which in 18th century europe is just… the worst idea. You know importing colonial methods etc etc (which he was not the first swedish monarch to do, but just think about what importing ideas from the other european nations means in the 18th century actually entails).

He also, as many swedens monarchs have, desperatly tried to create a regional swedish fine culture “market”. Like supporting the arts, and trying to make it possible for sweden to compete in the arts with other countries of the world. Thid helped sweden to be able to build up educations of art and academia, not always under his life time, and not all thanks to him. But it helped with injecting some life into the academia.

On the other hand lots of swedens academia has also been BAD, so thats not all positive *pointed look at the eugenics and race biology of which swedens academia was a breeding ground for, ever sense the 18th century*

But well. Gustav III tried to do something with sweden. Something different than what it was, which most of swedens population considered to be total shite.

He did forexample greatly help end the beastility panic i have spoken so much about. He declared that he refused signing papers for death punishment beastility. And lo, and behold, the problem of executing large parts if the healthy male population because of beastility charges, disappear if you do not execute them!

He also refuse to execute people for homosexuality, which I find a very good thing of him.

Now about gustav iii and homosexuality. Gustav iii is often described as some kind of mindless “sissy” tyrannt, because of homophobia. These describtions often, from what I learned in gender studies, actually steam from homophobic slander campaings against him during his life time, and also quickly after his death.

These views, where homosexuality, and just a general non-conformity to our gender norms, is potrayed as “evil” i am HEAVILY against.

Like make fun for Gustav III for all the awful things, and dumb decisions he did in life (like being a tyrannt, claiming that being a dictator was how to be “enlighted monarch”, starting point less wars in a country already in massive debt because of war etc) but I disapprove of making fun of him for his sexuality and gender expressions.

ALSO

With that being said, I also disapprove of all these cishet swedes who will go “he was not gay, that was just slander. He was totalt straight, soooo straight. And he was totally a paragorn of masculinity. And that was totally how all irl in the 18th century considered him”. Like…. He was gay. Pleaaaase. (And i know the difficulty with calling historical people gay. But ALSO. He was gay). And more important, the urgency among historian indicates a homophobic viewpoint among all the modern historians rushing to do so (and this i learned in some feminist articles somewhere haha).

Same with his gender expression. Its says more about the historian rushing to declare his gender expression the paragorn of 18th century manliness, and their modern anxiety about our gender binary, than it tells anything about how his gender expressions was percieved during his life time (I know I just lighty thouched this topics. There is lots intersting things to say about 18th century masculinity among swedish nobility, but I digress)

Anyway. He was gay. He also disliked his wife personally. And she disliked him. And he appeared to have a legit medical issuie with his penis, that prevented him from ejeculating enough sperm during intercourse with the queen. THAT, the inability to create a heir, is therefore not only a case of him being “too gay” (which is often how the homophobic take on him describe him. Like he brought “the end” of swedish rule over finland, by being too gay to create a proper heir….. yes its sound ridicolous, but this is often how gustav iii have been spoken about).

Tldr. I find him intersting. And enjoy joking about him. Gustav iii as a politican though i HEAVILY disaprove of, and I am glad the parliement killed him and reinstated the rule of the parliement.

I just can’t approve of his political actions, but as a historical phenomena he is intersting

(Also WHEN are we getting a proper show about him, which is not tainted by homophobia? LIKE. So sick about swedish historical docs, were all they talk about is about how he had problems to have sex with his wife, and spend all time speculating of thay is what brought the fall of some kind off imagned great epoch. Or something)

PS. All said here is from memory, i did not look anything up. Feel free to correct me if I got something totally wrong. I am no expert in monarchs of sweden and their history. I read ethnology for two terms, and they are not very interested in the history of 1 particular monarch. Much more entire social classes and stuff. And kinda same with the history focus when we have history at gender studies)

Apperntly i had much more opnions about gustav iii than i thought when I first started to type this answer. Ah well haha.