http://www.newmajority.com/ShowScroll.aspx?ID=8a80f624-92a7-...
The NYT article doesn't make any mention of the fact that emigration from the Netherlands in 2004 was the highest since 1954. This makes me wonder if things are really as wonderful there as the article claims, although it does a pretty good job of pointing out the pros and cons.
The author conflates many issues here. Most people disagreed with Fortuyn because he was a right-wing populist who managed to form a fringe party that consisted of sorry losers. The guy himself was intelligent, witty and utterly narcissistic. He was like a character in Oscar Wilde's plays who had a bon mot for everything and solutions for nothing. Not the kind of person who should have political power.
That is up to the voters to decide, no?
Have you repented for the murder of JFK, Lincoln and some school personnel in San Diego (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brenda_Ann_Spencer) yet?
But I do think the analogy holds. Theo van Gogh was indeed killed for his anti-Islam statements, but by a disturbed individual who had hoped to solve the situation that way. It only made it worse, of course.
The murder of Pim Fortuyn follows more or less the same pattern. Killed by a disturbed individual that figured that was the only way to stop him.
Fortuyn especially had a relatively large following among the Dutch. I don't think "punished" is the right word for it, since it implies that there is any legitimacy to their murders, or even sanctioned by the populace, which is simply not the case.
http://www.expatica.com/nl/news/local_news/why-are-they-all-...
"In 2004 almost 50,000 people born in the Netherlands decided to leave and live in a foreign country. Since 1954, the number of emigrants has never been so high. The Dutch economy, with the exception of the early 1980s, has never been so poor since 1954.
The Netherlands is undergoing the longest period of stagnation in two generations, according to the latest statistics from the CPB Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis."
I thought it was a widely held "fact" that the NL is overcrowded and that dutchmen should try to find their lebensraum elsewhere.
It's a pity though, cause the metaphorical meaning of living "room" is precisely what I meant.
Sometimes bordering on (self-) censorship. So that caution is not necessarily a good thing.
I agree that one should be careful when using emotionally charged words, but I also think that playful usage might be a way out of the self-censorship that surrounds a great many dreadful historical events. Not just in Germany.
It's easy to imagine the Netherlands having the same problem. Of course, emigrating to a less dense country is an easier solution.
Modern Germany is dense, yes. But guess what: People are migrating en masse from states like Saxony-Anhalt (118 inhabitants/km²) to Baden-Württemberg (301 inhabitants/km²).
[1] In quotation marks, because there was no state called Germany back then.
Anyway, what I think the most important issue is that the people in positions of power (1) actually try to do the right thing and (2) that their views on what is right are not too skewed. Both of which are generally true in the Netherlands I believe.
Lastly, on conformity as mentioned in the original article: I would not even know what is meant with conformity. True, you will have to conform to store closing-times which is a silly rule that needs to be changed. But there are hardly any social norms, you may be openly gay, atheist or deeply religious and wear whatever you want. Just don't expect to be viewed as sympathetic when you dress ostentatiously (where would you be?).
'lack of inidividual initiative': Why should people be individually be burdened with taking care of social problems, when we have a government in place just for that task?
From what I see on the TV and read in newspapers this is changing.
> they are forced to emigrate, as in the case of Somali-born politician Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who violated the Dutch norms of “consensus” by insisting on publicly discussing female genital mutilation; honor violence; honor killings; and forced marriages.
She was forced to emigrate because she lied about her past. If she hadn't she wouldn't have been allowed in in the first place.
> I would argue that the economic consensus model in the Netherlands is quite recent in historical terms, and that even today, it contains a fair amount of conflict.
> In 1982 the Dutch state...
And the 4 paragraphs later he ends with:
> These changes are worth noting, but they came about only after extremely difficult struggles that took decades.
Some of the social issues he raises are interesting, but overall I feel that this is a poor response.