Dan Minette schreef: > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Sonja van Baardwijk-Holten" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > To: "Brin-L" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Sent: Monday, December 03, 2001 3:51 PM > Subject: What do you mean Dutch intolerance? > > OK, let me ask a couple of questions then. Maybe there are aspects of the > Dutch culture that I don't understand. > > The Neatherlands is about 8% ethnic Turks by population. > > What fraction of them are citizens?
Most. Or at least their children are. Most of the immigrants' children that are born here got the Dutch nationality by default at birth. (which btw doesn't give them *all* that much more rights.) They also have the choice to keep the nationality of their parents as well. So nearly all Turkish, Moroccan, German, Indian (or whatever other nationality) people's children, born in the Netherlands have a double nationality. Even my son has a double nationality. But nobody really cares about what nationality you have. It's not a subject or an issue for most Dutch. That terrible distinction you keep making again and again between hispanic - not hispanic or black - not black doesn't exist here. Here you are either good at what you do or you are not. You are likable or you are not. That's it. That seems to be a concept that is really hard to grasp for you Dan. You are saying that America is better because such and such a percentage of another group than white American males is in office. You have no idea how terrible that kind of argument sounds for people used to the amount of tolerance we have in the Netherlands. > What governmental leadership offices have they held? For example, even > though there is still racism in the US, most of the largest cities in the US > have had black mayors. Although blacks are a minority in Houston (about 35% > IIRC), the present mayor is black, and just beat a Hispanic to win a third > term in office. I wouldn't know. Because in the Netherlands it really doesn't matter. It is not important wether your origins are Afro American, Russian, Asian, Moroccan, Turkish or whatever. It does however seem to matter a *lot* to you that you can _specifically_ mention one Hispanic and one black citizen that are succesfull in office. Now that _does_ show something about difference in mentality I'd say. > >Being f.i. Jewish won't get you into deadly trouble but it won't get you > any special > > treatment either. The average Dutch citizen doesn't care all that much. > > How do Jewish people get special treatment in the United States. Yet, if > you look, the US has more Jewish people than does Israel. Why do you have that insatiable need to push me into an antisemitic corner? I don't think I implied any such thing. But to answer your question, I don't know and I really don't care. I mentioned 'special treatment' here as the opposite to 'deadly trouble'. For me that is stylisticly correct use of language to make the point that under normal circumstances Dutch don't really care about background. Please correct me if I'm wrong on this. Oh and btw since you claimed that Jewish people have to be afraid in the Netherlands I think it is your turn now to prove it. Or do you retract? > BTW, let me use this post to clear up a point. My Jewish friends have told > me that for many/most being Jewish is more ethnic than religeous. I am told > that most Jewish people in Israel are athiests. Indeed, I had one friend > (an American) that was pulled off the street to read kaddish (sp) becaue the > people who asked him desparied of finding an Israelie who could read Hebrew. Sounds about right. I think that most religions are losing flock. I think that especially in the more wealthy countries the young ones aren't all that much into religion. Anybody got any figures on that? Sonja
