How tolerant is Holland with its Freedom

The Dutch writer W.F. Hermans was in 1986
declared 'persona non grata' by the city council
of Amsterdam and banned as an artist because
of his literary visit to South Africa three years earlier.

In the beginning of 2000 someone dared to call our queen
on a webforum a Teutoonse Teef (a Teutonic bitch) and was
therefore convicted to a fine for insulting a member of the royal family.

While Japanese emperor Akihito visited our country in May 2000, protesters of the
Foundation for Japanse Debts of Honour (JES) carrying signs like 'Pay your Debts'
were prevented from expressing themselves towards the royal and imperial parade.
And on Liberation Day in 2001 neighbouring people on the Amstel were forced
to remove a banner with the text 'Remember also the deaths of Zorreguieta'
because queen Beatrix and her retinue were visiting there an open-air concert.

After the murder of a Dutch girl an emotional involved person expressed
itself in public in the second half of 1999 and also through a letter
in the local newspaper on a rather violent and unfounded manner
'intentional on an offensive way towards a group of people . . . .
. . especially asylum seekers' of a nearby center, therefore in June
2000 convicted and fined for  f.1500,-. of which  f.1000,-. suspended.
It turned out the offender came from their own autochthon neighbourhood.

The socalled  Black Widow,  mrs Rost van Tonningen, was convicted in 1992
to pay a fine of five thousand guilden for publishing a book containing her memories
because they would 'contain insulting passages for the Jews'. This is not verifiable as the
publication of this book could only hold out for 6 days on the 'Dutch' web in October 1999.

The complaint agaist the writer of the column Een Amsterdamse orgie on August 1998 in the
daily newspaper De Volkskrant was dismissed for he 'was not aware that he spoke about
homosexuals in general in an offensive way': he critizised the vulgar exhibitionism of the
participants during the Gay Games and made a connection with 'the advance of a
decadent, hedonistic culture in which the shameless pursuing of sexual organs
is the highest good' and childporno in the Dutch town of Zandvoort.

Yes, you must be extremely careful expressing your opinion,
for article 137c of the Dutch Criminal Code is, translated:
'A person who publicly, either orally or in writing or by
image, intentionally makes a defamatory statement about a
group of persons on the grounds of their race, religion or personal
beliefs, or their hetero- or homosexual orientation, is liable to a term of
imprisonment of not more than one year or a fine of the third category.'  (max.€458)
Read the (mostly in Dutch written) articles 137d, 137e, 137f, 137g, 261, 266, 429bis, 429quater
and, for our interpretation of the term 'discrimination', 90quater in the Criminal Code of our country.
We may have a great sounding article seven in the Constitution of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, but
that only means that we do not have to ask permission from our government in advance to express ourselves.
With the above mentioned articles of our Criminal Code there can easily be succesful prosecuted and punished.
And there is always the possibility waking up the "sleeping" articles 147 and 147a to tape closed people mouth.  

The description of discrimination (see article 90quater) in our Criminal Code suggests that not only discrimination
itself (like refusal of services because of race etc.) is punishable by Dutch law, but it counts also for the verbal and
written expressions. Because of this last part, this article has an extremely negative effect on our freedom of speech.
Especially considering the strong actions lately to enforce this interpretation of the law. So it may be wise start making
a distinction between the terms executive and abusive (in Dutch: belediging) discrimination. And just call it discrilediging.
 

Pim Fortuyn was killed in mei 2002 just before the elections by an autochtone Dutch milieu-extremist; This is one of the few Dutch political homicides: Floris V in 1296, Willem van Oranje in 1584, Johan van Oldenbarnevelt in 1619 en the brothers De Witt in 1672. And now in 2002 Pim Fortuyn. The historian, former professor of sociology and columnist (weekly magazine Elsevier) was known for his unorthodox statements and his flamboyant character. In 1997 he wrote a controversial book called "Against the Islamicization of Our Culture". In august 2001 he went into politics and became in a short time very successful as politic party leader of 'Leefbaar Nederland' in the city of Rotterdam. After a conflict he started his own national political party 'Lijst Pim Fortuyn'. Media as well as politicians portrayed him as an extreme-rightwing politician, like the Frenchman Le Pen. He was a charismatic populist, a non-conformist and a romanticist. He looked like a dandy and behaved like a hedonist. He made remarkable and controversial statements and openly admitted his homosexuality. He was a strong opponent against the 'paarse kabinet' and the 'poldermodel' and had the ambition to become prime minister and he seemed to be heading towards an electoral victory. However, one month before the national elections he was murdered. The entire nation was shocked. He never got to prove his abilities as political leader. His controversial ideas stay online.

 

Early november 2004 Dutch movie director and columnist Theo van Gogh (great-grandchild of Theo, the brother of thé Vincent van Gogh) was killed by a Moroccan-Dutch moslim-extremist on a gruesome way. Theo van Gogh made his last movie together with Ayaan Hirsi Ali (a Member of the Dutch Parliament) and is titled Submission. It is a short, critical film about the role of the woman being prisoner of the Islam. This film was probably not the known drop in the bucket, but just an excuse to vindicate the death threats and the assassination. Theo van Gogh became known for his blasphering words in discussions and in writing like christenhonden (christian dogs) and geitenneukers (goat-fuckers, referring to moslims). Worshippers experienced these terms as extreme offensive. No mercy for jews or any other worshippers. He did not let himself muzzled, not even when others were obviously felt insulted. Therefore he was a welcome guest om panel discussions. His way of writing however made him an outlaw; the newspapers refused his columns and the only way he could fulminate was through the free daily newspaper Metro and on his website De Gezonde Roker (The Healthy Smoker). An interesting selection from his online archieve: Oranjegevoel (24-01-98); Wie-O-wie? (04-05-98); 't Is hier verschrikkelijk gezellig (23-05-98); Omdat mijn fiets daar stond (04-07-98); Censuur CNN (22-08-98); Vorstinnen & Dictators (26-10-98); Laat duizend champagne kurken knallen (15-02-99); De onderbuik, ter ere van D.C. Lama (23-08-99). And his Proces verbaal (november 1999).   Our Prime minister and the mayor of Amsterdam went both on tour along mosques and islamitic schools to give their support to this group: as a reaction to the murder of Theo van Gogh some arson and death threats towards the islamic community were made. The killer also threatened Hirsi Ali and political party colleague Geert Wilders. Both went in hiding for some time and got heavy security; both their daily and private lives changed drasticly into a permanent status of fear and vigilance. These "threateners of the peace regarding free speach" were as much as possible ignored by our high-minded representatives. The same happened with the little son and the rest of the falily of Theo van Gogh. The darkening Dutch sky shows clearly its it's your own fault.

 

Ayaan Hirsi Ali is born in Somalia and sought in 1992 asylum in the Netherlands. She studied politicology in Leiden and worked after that at the Wiardi Beckman Foundation. For three years she was a member of the House of Representatives where she was occupied with emancipation and integration. She managed to get the oppressed position of women in patriarchal Islamic societies on the political agenda, in particular the (ritual) genital mutilations under female immigrants (which starts to occur in the Netherlands), and she pointed out that the islam is the main culprit. She used the conception the right to offend to indicate that she wanted to criticise the Islam, even when Muslims would experience it as offensive. That was not at all what the Moslim movement as well as the Dutch citizens wanted to hear. Even queen Beatrix Beatrix expressed her horror during her Christmas speech in 2006 at this form of free speech. Hirsi Ali has moved in the mean time to the United Statesd. In a Dutch tv-interview she gave her Christmas wish of 2006 to the Dutch people: that the electoral system in 2007 will be changed on a way that the voter knows before voting to which coalition and which programm his or her vote goes. ("dat het kiesstelsel eindelijk wordt gewijzigd, zodat het electorale systeem in Nederland stabiel kan worden, zodat er vanaf 2007 geregeerd kan worden . . . de kiezer moet weten voordat hij naar de stembus gaat op zijn minst op welke coalitie hij of zij gaat stemmen, op welke programma's.") Nowadays Netherlands' mind is sadly enough too small for her. We will miss her.

 

To protect main members of the Dutch Royal Family against insults and other types of unwanted expressions directed towards them by subjects or protesters, there is more than enough legal provision in our Court of Law, such as the articles 111 and 112 of our Criminal Code. To protect in the same way heads of foreign friendly states, see articles 118 and 119.

And so it goes with our personal freedom in this constitutional monarchy: when the facts are incriminating, it is over with our freedom of speach. Grondwet Nederland the Dutch Constitution de Europese Grondwet het recht om te beledigen the constitutional monarchy overheid.nl: Wet en Regelgeving enkele Nederlands Grond- en Strafrechten vrijheid van meningsuiting vs. discriminatieverboden Legislation in the Netherlands against (sexual orientation) discrimination EVRM: bescherming van de rechten van de mens en de fundamentele vrijheden

We may have freedom to public information,
but that does not mean it is all that easy to get:
a government who has no obligation to publish,
creates no freedom or access to public information.
the right to public information
It is only since some years that the Dutch Telecom
offers the possibility for a specified telephone bill (for
a fee of course!) so that charges for the normal calls
as well as the expensive 06-numbers can be checked.
PTT says there was no equipment before to do so.
important for all the civilians
Looking up  time tables  of public transportation in the
Netherlands is not free (except for trains). Info you want
you may find on the web for two guilden each call (each max
five minutes!) using a modem. For the ones who have no internet
connection or are using a cable modem (chello) there is only one way
to get the information: by phone number 0900-9292 for 75 cents a minute:
"information operators will answer all possible questions regarding public transport "
But not between 24.00h and 07.00h (on weekdays 06.00h). And you start
already paying hearing the words: 'there are eleven people ahead of you'!
There is not only no free information available for national trains and buses,
but also not for buses, trams and metro's to go around in the Dutch cities.
If the reason is the privatising of Public Transportation in the near future,
than it seems to me that this type of privatising is no good for the taxpayer
as well as for the environment. It is not because of unwillingness by the
Dutch but, as I mentioned somewhere else, the Dutch word 'dienst'
has nothing at all to do with the English 'service', but with 'favor'.
comes also with the right of free access
The Amsterdam main Library has a few internet stations where
one can surf for free of charge for half an hour at the time.
In their music department you can relax listen to the
music cd's before you rent them, so you have the
opportunity to "surf-listening"-around to all types
of music like classical, jazz, worldmusic and
music of the Middle Ages. On this part
Amsterdam is more social advanced
than our government-town of The Hague
(Den Haag): in its new library the use of internet
terminals is not free, while at its music department you
can take cd's out, but there is no possibility for listening to them.
and with the duty of unasked publishing
Hopefully the Amsterdam Main Library keeps up these services
in its new planned location, for the sake of a free educational necessity

In september 1998 a market trader on Waterlooplein in Amsterdam is sentenced to pay a fine of 420 guilden and confiscation of the book 'Mein Kampf'. By his appeal on April 2000 the fine is dropped, but the book is still taken from him. He had this book for sale at his market stall and that is not allowed. This book is available in some public libraries around Holland, but just for browsing through and only for scientific reasons. No doubt that this link to Mein Kampf one time will be blocked for the Dutch Internet. In 1992 a book appears in the Netherlands doubting the authenticity of Anne Frank's echtheid diary. This is not allowed according to the Dutch interpretation of the Law and the book was taken off the market. Anne Frank Funds Basel and Anne Frank Amsterdam are relieved. But pornografic images and attributes are allowed to be exposed and shown as long as they are not displayed outside the shops. And even this last one is in Amsterdam tolerated.

How will this be guaranteed in the Netherlands ? • Everyone above the age of 14 is required to carry an I.D, the socalled identificatieplicht. • The banking institutions have their own way to interpret this recently introduced law about compulsory identification. They made it now compulsory to every customer to scan the entire id-card into their banking system, your photograph included. This is ok according to the CBP (Personal Data Protection Board) because the banks promished to "handle this carefully". Since 2001 This CBP monitors the processing of personal data protected by the Personal Data Protection Act. • Phone calls made by a stolen mobile phone are listened in on by the government. • Phone calls between citizens and their lawyers are listened in on by the government. • There are advanced plans to take and store everyones fingerprints centrally. • There are serious thoughts to put the dna of all Dutch citizens into a central database. • Preventive body-searches are held in certain areas like half of the Amsterdam touristic center. See '10 fabels en feiten over verkeersgegevens' of Bits Of Freedom Read article 52 (a rough translation) of the Dutch Criminal Procedure Code (on 12-03-2005): "Every investigator is authorized to ask the suspect for his/her name, middle names, date of birth, place of birth, for the address where the suspect is written in in the central governmental administration as a resident and for the present place of residence. And he is authorized to halt the suspect to do so."

The two recently introduced sections 447d and 447e of the Dutch Penal Code are used for compelling everyone from the age of 14 to show a valid identification card on request, starting at Jamuary first 2005. This is the socalled toonplicht. Article 447e makes a mention of article 2, but this has conveniently been forgotten, therefore simply ignoring the first required criterion: being guilty of any sort of penal act. And so, starting Januari first, 2005, it is required to carry your identification papers always with you when you are above the age of 14, even while jogging and practising nudism. The introduction went rather quietly, unlike in the 1970-ties, when the Dutch protested successfully against the use of specificied telephone bills. The required passport photo must meet certain rules, including a gray background, look straight ahead, do not smile. It is not allowed to wear a headscarf or other headgear, an exception is made for medical, religious or ideological reasons. compulsory identification identificatieplicht.nl/ id-nee.nl

BOF  Bits of Freedom, defends digital civil rights AIVD  Algemene Inlichtingen en VeiligheidsDienst. MIVD  Militaire Inlichtingen en VeiligheidsDienst. CTIVD  Review Committee on the Intelligence and Security Services. NSO  Nationale Sigint Organisatie, de derde veiligheidsdienst in NL. De NSO is in 2003 opgericht als een project-organisatie van AIVD en MIVD voor het afluisteren van satellietverkeer. SIGINT  SIGnals INTelligence: intelligence-gathering by interception of signals, whether by radio interception or other means. CIOT  het Centraal Informatiepunt Onderzoek Telecommunicatie van het ministerie van justitie: klantgegevens telefonie en in 2006 ook internet.