<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> A clear example of heartless, cowardly, intolerant liberals.
I might agree with you if I hadn't spent some time
in the Netherlands. I am not convinced that the
Dutch *are* liberal. I found them to be (speaking
of necessity in generalities based on what the
population as a whole seems to do, not what a few
individuals do) among the most conservative people
I've ever encountered on the planet.
It's a surface liberality, a thin veneer for a very
reactive, conservative mindset. Even in Amsterdam,
you get the feeling that the city is very permissive,
but IMO that's just because the boundaries of per-
missiveness are so broad. However, step one meter
beyond those boundaries and the wrath of god descends
upon you, wielded with a brand of sanctimonious
outrage that would have made Calvin feel quite
at home.
The Dutch are a strange lot IMO. You'd like their
attachment to capitalism. One of the keys to under-
standing the Dutch, IMO, is remembering that they
were a company before they were a country. The
Dutch like to make money. And they tend to allow
things that allow them to make money, like prosti-
tution and quasi-legal cannibis. But they come down
hard on anything that threatens the flow of tourism,
and thus the flow of cash.
In this case, I wouldn't be surprised that if you
dug into it you'd find that the authorities wanted
to clamp down on anyone who insisted on making the
problems in the Islamic communities of the Nether-
lands *public*. The immediate response is to do what
is necessary to keep the problem out of the news,
not to attempt to solve the problem.
Just a guess. I wasn't there when this incident took
place, but I have been there when similar events
went down, and I was rather shocked at the arch-
conservative manner in which they were handled.
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