De vs. dem vs. dom

This post is dedicated to Swedish personal pronouns, since so many people (especially native speakers) seem to have a problem with the words de (they) and dem (them). As you can see, we are returning to the eternal issue concerning subjects and objects.

The problem, it seems, is that these two pronouns have an identical pronunciation in standard in Swedish (unlike, for instance, Finland Swedish where the pronunciation is different), which makes writing more difficult. Both words are pronounced dom. Nowadays it’s accepted to use dom in writing, but in my personal opinion, it does not look very educated. 

De is translated into English as they. Dem means them.

• De hittade en katt. They found a cat. De is used when "they" (the third personal plural) do something.
• Katten hittades av dem. The cat was found by them. Couldn’t help myself, and had to throw in a passive.
• Jag talade till dem. I spoke to them. Dem is used when "they" are the object of an action, when something happened to "them". 

Is this clear?