Across the region, known for its liberalism and tolerance, women are for sale, and child abuse, legitimised. Dutch cuisine is terrible. Oh, and cyclists, and Advocaat whilst I am at it.
Well well.. miss Bindel as a Dutchman I admire our custom of not being overly chauvinistic so most of us can take a hit and a hit(piece) this is. Although not all is well in the Netherlands you paint a very exaggerated dark picture. The pedo party you describe is a non entity and your anecdote is very, very dated. A large majority does not condone this at all. I wonder when you visited the Netherlands for the last time, must have been a decade or two ago. In the meantime, contrary to the UK: we have still very decent affordable healthcare, even the areas with a lot of migrants look like Switzerland compared to certain areas in the UK, class disparity is a lot less then in UK, almost free education at a decent level, our rivers are not full of poop, the infrastructure like train stations look like new and have not been stuck in the fifties like certain UK train stations I know. Everybody who comes is generally treated friendly and with respect. You focus on Amsterdam, Amsterdam is not “ the Dutch” same as London is not the “English”. Amsterdam as well as its rather indeed smug political and radical leftist cultural elite is not overly popular in the Netherlands as well. There is more to the Netherlands than that city. Most of all, including some “ smug “ Dutch we usually don’t look down on other countries and feel superior. I wish “ Global Britain” ( what a success) well.
Julie, Much of your politics are not mine, but on trans and sex trade I could barely agree with you more. The quote from the Dutch father says it all. Somethings bear to be repressed and he knows it.
Your criticism is based on speculation (scenario referred to is made up) and so fails the standard you seek to impose on the author. And virtually all social discourse is less science and more story telling - often especially the stuff with source footnotes. I object to the sex trade (and various other things) based entirely on gut feel and all my intellectual justifications are ult. down stream of that. Ex post hoc that it’s “minging”
This answer is odd for a couple of reasons: 1) “being there this June” doesn’t exactly match up to knowing a place well enough to write on it this way (I’d personally be more inclined to hear from someone actually LIVING there) and 2) since you despise it so much, why on earth do you “visit once every year”?! Seems rather counter intuitive
You’ve listed many accomplishments that make you proud of being Dutch. But you have completely ignored the substance of Bindel’s article, which argues that Dutch culture imagines itself to be impressively liberal-minded about sex, but that self-concept as an exceptionally open minded and sophisticated sexual culture in enables the dehumanization of women and children.
It is not Dutch culture as you say, it is a policy being pursued mainly in Amsterdam and is not condoned and implemented elsewhere. In addition there is a strict control on this “ trade” in order to prevent no control “ in the illegal circuit “‘where women are even more endangered.
Amsterdam is in the Netherlands, the capital in fact, no? Own it. Human trafficking, the degradation and abuse of women, rampant open drug use, the normalization of extreme porn; these are not trivial flaws.
Normalization of extreme porn? Well well, if you show me where , I will have a look. The Netherlands have a lot of negative aspects but the positive outnumber the negative in my view . Don’t make a charicature out of a country that’s all the average Dutchman wishes .
In addition, you make a mockery concerning the drugs policy that leaves much to be desired, there is no smugness at all on this here. It was an experiment to control substance abuse which has party failed and that is to be recognized . But Drugs abuse is smaller than it ever was. Concerning heroin users , I don’t know where you have been but that was experienced 30, 20 years ago. Dutch heroin users decreased because methadon policy, then the users came from France and Belgium. Now the problem of heroin users esspecially in the public domain is practically non existant. Except for junkies coming from across the borders who are dealt with. When i read this article it seemed like being transported to the nineties, totally outdated . Yet again don’t mistake Amsterdam for the rest of the Netherlands, meaning the other 17 million people. As we say in Dutch, translated : Every house has its cross but our cross to bear seems somewhat smaller than elsewhere. Lastly, problems there are, but can be readjusted with good well financed programs since the Dutch state is in financial very good shape with 43 procent state debt to gdp , this contrary to a certain kingdom across the North Sea ..
Methadone is a bigger issue that the problem it was trying to to solve and never something to be proud of! Same with tbe liberalisation of prostitution, which is not a career choice for the majority of females involved. Both are abuse. Plain and simple!
I agree that Julie’s article is something of a ‘hit piece’ and fails to make a clear distinction between Amsterdam and the rest of the country. I am a Brit but have family who have lived and worked in the Netherlands for decades. They wouldn’t return to the UK if you paid them.
Everything you mention re the superior health care, a far less divisive class system, better infrastructure, and an excellent education system which successfully teaches its children to embrace other languages - which you yourself demonstrates perfectly here with your grasp of a foreign language.
Your country fascinates me and I visit at every opportunity. And the food is not terrible. Who knew that chips tasted great doused in mayonnaise .
Aart, I get Netherlands is a great country but dismantle the open drug and sex trade in your capital city (and elsewhere)which I don’t doubt the majority feel insults your country.
I can confirm as a hungarian university student that had worked a summer in and near Eindhoven (later i also visited Utrecht and Amsterdam) that the dutch indeed are not much more liberal than the average european. I was going with a prejudice or atleast presumption that i would see a country thats a multicultural lgbt hell. But actually talking with both young people and the older generation most of them sounded just like my countrymen. Actually if anything older people seemed much more right wing funny enough. Ive talked with a few guys from Frisia (my family is calvinist on my fathers side, but me and my mother is catholic) and they seemed much more devout than many hungarian protestants (sadly). I also talked with priests and mass goers in both north brabant and the capital and altough the masses felt a bit more "inclusive" theres also a more traditionalist view especially among younger people.
And in Amsterdam out of all places i met probably the most rw and "politically incorrect" priest :DDD I wont be naming names but even for me his views were a bit spicy
In addition , I have always been been a bit of an Anglophile with great respect for British culture, sacrifice, mindset ( without the UK we would be speaking German, in reference to WW2). So I DO wish the UK well but as I said before every house has its cross to bear.
And as nobody knows better than you, there’s also the “Dutch Protocol” which “pioneered” the use of puberty blockers and sex hormones for children. Awful.
Yes, that was very bad but I have heard that they have backtracked on that in recent years. It was partly from a Dutch study that people realised their dangers.
The protocol originally had good outcomes in the restricted population they used it on. They have since retreated from it, as more evidence accumulated from a wider population. It is how interventions are developed on desperate populations/ groups.
I don’t think they’ve backpedaled. On the recent NYT podcast The Protocol, the Dutch doctors who pioneered child sex reassignment vigorously defended their work and said they were proud of it.
The question is what population is the protocol used on ? The initial research was on genuinely extreme cases of gender dysmorphia. As more people were categorised as gender dysmorphic the treatment population grew. The age treatment interaction was controlled in the initial study, not in the expanded protocol. I can see why the studys authors still support the protocol and also why it was not on balance less harmful when generalised to a wider population.
That is certainly true. However even the two initial subjects who were interviewed struck me as not very happy. One was pretty clearly a tomboy/nascent Lesbian who needn’t have transitioned, while the other spoke wistfully about not really understanding the sacrifice of his ability to have children at 16. DeVries and Peggy (forgetting her last name) still treated them as success stories. Meanwhile their model was exported around the Western world to disastrous results.
Even though I am a psychologist, I do not possess the arrogance to judge from an interview. All I do know is that 1) gender dysphoria has severe psychological consequences. 2) for many it is not transient 3) the originators are not responsible for the generalisation. 4) As a stick to beat the Dutch with, it is flimsy. How many of the experimental surgical procedures published each year have we heard of ? How many are adopted ? I would question the adopters who were desperate for a cure or to buy time rather than wait for the data to firm up.
Appalling offensive typical British chauvinistic dismissal of Holland and people..have you any idea Julie of how much the British are hated worldwide and why. I'd venture to say your track record colonial and current would make the Dutch look like Enid Blyton .shame on you!
Nice way to ellide over what she described of the current and continuing abuse of women in Holland. Every nation engages in some objectionable practices, but prostitution and abuse of women in Holland is a feature, not a bug.
‘I think you’re shit!’ Well, I think you’re even shittier!. A little infantile, Eilis, don’t you think? It’s Ms Bindel, she’s also being funny, so some of the criticisms are clearly tongue-in-cheek*. You’ve also sidestepped her key assertions about prostitution and female exploitation. (*a British colloquialism for humour and nothing to do with the Dutch practice of ‘backdoor rimming’ - as publicly depicted in the aforementioned, family newsagents Julie visited in your fine capital). 🤣
"The vagina of Europe" how disgusting. Difficult to disagree with your analysis of the legalised sex trade Julie. Isn't there a saying about not being so open minded your brain falls out? And wine in thimbles? That really is the last straw!
And yet here you are open mindedly falling for a click bait article that doesn’t bear any resemblance to the country that most Dutch people or visitors of 40 years like myself, married to a Dutch lady that whole time, actually experience. The irony of your comment is mind blowing.
A humorous example of amateur-mistake journalism from usually an interesting writer, this article is worth the read to understand how a burlesque impulse works. It’s not reality, it’s the drama.
You’ll get the eye-rolling impulse to equate Amsterdam with Holland (asking any adult Dutch person will clarify quickly, seriously), fact-checking legal statements is usually a smart move (I don’t need to do, the author should, cite the code), and having lived on Warmoesstraat, in a Red light district (there are several in Amsterdam) the rest of the hyperbolic statements are unrecognizable.
We are to believe junkies are routinely shooting up in public in a city which aggressively polices pissing in a canal in public. Sure! The last visit 50 years ago must have been a doozy.
A final hint: many “women” in windows are men.
Naturally what is left out is a tradition of female shelters and ‘strong women’. Het Begijnhof is one of the oldest woman-only living areas in the world - 600 years.
The Dutch are tolerant, but not participatory - the author states it directly: few or no Dutch women are prostitutes.
The philosopher Spinoza in Holland after the Inquisition is a good example of tolerance but distance. Do read.
What points the author makes which are true are just a reflection of this ethos - tolerance, distance - (“libertarian” : no. Strong government creates the peace and stability required for freedom.)
The sadness of organized crime in Holland is due in no small part to transnational money-laundering, which the Dutch are quite good at since the launch of the Euro. Drugs, at least when I lived there were more a feature of Belgian trade systems. Again, check facts.
The Dutch know what side of the bread butter goes on, and major drug trade would make the country unworkable for business, and the Dutch are all business.
I did love the “slave trade” comment - mind-blowing comparison of centuries of atrocity economy to 21st century sex trade economy.
Global state-sanctioned mass-kidnapping and elimination of all attributes as a human over mutiple generations to facilitate commerce is, well, qualitatively and quantitatively different from sex trade.
Sex trade is deeply exploitative but it doesn’t strip people and their descendants of legal status as humans on the basis of race.
The implication is that slave trade could include the “poor choice” to be stripped of personhood - the status of being a human - on the basis of race.
Wow! We’ve gone there…!
Factually in error, unbalanced, hyperbolic and exaggerated, ahistoric and frankly one of the more offensive false equivalencies I’ve read in quite some time.
So your defense of the sex trade in the Netherlands is that it traffics not in Dutch women but in foreign women--whew!--and it doesn't strip the women's descendants of legal personhood on the basis of race?
I wrote in plain English, but the defense of sex trade seems top of mind for you.
Read the words “offensive false equivalences” a couple of times.
Once that’s understood, consider global legal support for stripping a human and all descendants from the status of being a person on the basis of race.
Now try to equate that to sex trade and you may understand the point.
Why do you keep making slavery about race? Are you one of those people who think that American enslavement of blacks is the only slavery? The only historical or current condition of unfreedom or human trafficking? Have you read a book about the global sex trade? Which one? Name it, so I can read it and get schooled about what a false equivalence it is to speak of slavery in the sex trade.
Clue me in, the transatlantic slave trade up to the early 19th century included boatloads of Russians, Polynesians, Greeks and Laotians? Did I miss a class in elementary school?
You’ve got sex trade on the mind, shake it off and follow the thread.
But then Julie does take the sex trade seriously. Is the Netherlands especially big in this? Again I see people mostly just flinging insults and sarcasm at each other.
Still the sex trade along with the miniscule conviction rate here in Blighty itself is very aggravating. Ian
Immigrant women and sex trafficking is badly managed in Holland particularly Amsterdam, as the same in Brussels and as I remember in Cologne and Antwerp.
That was 25 years ago. I have not assessed the situation recently, it will have changed dramatically because of internet, cellphone and bitcoin.
Loved living in Zwolle, got metaphorically slapped by someone taller than me - every time I referred to the country as Holland though, bam slap - Nederlands!
Puzzled where Julie visited! If you go to the backstreets of any large city you will find grime and crime. Perhaps some fact checking? Age of consent for marriage in the Netherlands is 18 years for both partners.
Age of consent for sex is indeed 16 years old.
As another person said, “shooting up heroin in the street” is a fantasy. H is out and has been for 20 years.
The pedophile party may not have been forbidden, but its promotors all ended in jail for their actions, and not their words.
Yes, prostitution was legalized as an attempt to destigmatise the women. As in many Nordic countries. And yes, sex trafficking has become a big problem, but not only in the Netherlands. It is a criminal activity worldwide.
Amsterdam is not the Netherlands. It is run by a Green Left mayor and party who make impenetrable policies and decisions. Gaza fanatics run the place nowadays.
Euthanasia is still a crime and only condoned after a strict and lengthy procedure. Each euthanasia death is investigated by the police. And it is not easy to convince the doctors you are eligible. Less than 30% of the human beings who request it, are accepted.
The story is a mish mash of century old biases and lies, mainly invented by the English. I think Julie is partly envious and partly greatly misinformed.
Yes, it is worldwide. Doesn't make the Netherlands a relative working class paradise. No one should ever need to engage in sex work, no one should be so miserable they need drugs to feel wonderful.
Exactly, it is worldwide, and the more gutted out a community often the worse the tear in the social fabric. It's worth also noting it is far worse than "Scotland" in a small town here in New Zealand. One can almost always find a proverbial "ghetto" somewhere where it's worse than the other place.
Hi Julie, thanks for this fascinating post. I'd love to know what they think a 16 year old age of consent means if it includes 12 year olds who "consent." The whole point of having an age of consent is to say that below that age kids are too young to give consent!
Another thing: these negative phrases about the Dutch come from the 17th and 18th centuries when Britain and Holland were at war. They're just projections on to the enemy of common human traits. Often they imply something isn't real but a substitute: Dutch courage comes out of a bottle, a Dutch wife isn't a real woman, "going Dutch" isn't a real date, "double Dutch" is gobbledook. On the other hand a Dutch baby is a delicious apple pancake!
That's because it's grossly misrepresenting the facts.
"Dutch law is more restrictive than that statement suggests.
Article 245 of the Dutch Criminal Code makes it a criminal offense for an adult to engage in sexual acts with someone between 12 and 16 years old. (AMBT Advocaten) Consent from the minor is not relevant - the law explicitly protects minors against seduction that may come from themselves. (De Strafpleiters)
However, there's an important procedural detail: prosecution requires a complaint to be filed by the parents or by the minor themselves. (AMBT Advocaten) Without a complaint, the Public Prosecutor typically won't pursue the case (though they retain the authority to do so).
Additionally, if there's no coercion or abuse of power and the age difference is small, the Public Prosecutor may decide not to prosecute, depending on the circumstances. (AMBT Advocaten) The law also includes provisions that exempt "normal sexual experimentation between age peers" from criminal liability when there's a small age gap and the situation is equal."
This is a deeply misguided article. I can understand why Ms. Bindel feels this way, but the analysis is superficial. It reminds me of Latin American Marxist complaints about how America if terrible and has too much poverty, while they remain silent to the fact that the poorest people in their country flock to the US to escape poverty.
By any reasonable measure the Netherlands is a better place to live in than most of Europe, and certainly a better place to live in compared to the UK. Furthermore, I do not recall any news of Muslim gangs systematically raping Dutch children. Furthermore, people there have homes to live in, even in cities. They also refrained from throwing their poorer citizens out of their cities to make room from criminals pretending to be refugees (although they clearly have taken in too many of such people, they have done a better job of it than most of Europe).
Most of all, the Dutch have created a livable society. Contrary to this article, THC is not a problem anywhere in the world, save for the artificial problems of its legality. The Dutch are involved in more drug trafficking because Rotterdam is the largest port in Europe. Similarly, as much as Ms. Bindel hates prostitution, even the strictest laws in the US have never been able to make a dent in the trade. Hating something does not make it go away. Much like drugs, there is simply no way to stop prostitution. It has always been with us, and it always will be. Throwing people in jail does not help anyone. It is better to regulate vices such as drugs and prostitution as to keep out real evils (such as underage prostitution or fatal drug substitutes). This does not feel good to the activist class, but it is the least bad option. It is far from perfect, but much like democracy, it is the best thing we have got.
I do find the absence of criticism for countries such as China and Russia, which also have sex tourism, or Cambodia, Madagascar, Cuba,..., and many other countries that are notorious sex tourism hot spots only without any of the protections provided by the Dutch, well I find it intellectually dishonest. When i was in university years ago American students would go to Cuba because of inexpensive, beautiful prostitutes. It was not easy to get there from the US, but many went because a $20 Cuban professional was more beautiful than a $300 American one. China probably has the largest prostitution system that is both illegal and openly available in pretty much every hotel in the country. Even in the US we have prostitution everywhere despite vice squads in most police departments large enough to have departments.
The Dutch are not perfect, but they are doing a far better job than anyone in the Western hemisphere when it comes to protecting the poor souls suffering from addiction, or those who have chosen the skin trade for whatever reason.
Some good points but smothered in a thick sauce of John Bull jingoism which is about as appealing as everything else that passes for food in the UK. The Netherlands cannot be reduced to prostitution policies that you disagree with or the paedo party which was crazy but also totally anecdotal. More importantly, you seem totally oblivious to what happened during the last 20 years and the equally spectacular backlash and populist wave in the Netherlands. The potent streak of Puritanism in Dutch culture (the original sin that the Dutch share with the Anglo world) which expresses itself in attitudes towards smoking for instance, totally escaped you as well. I know Brits love to express contempt for everybody else (it helps them forget the empire is over) but if you have a beef with legalising prostitution, address the topic instead of penning a xenophobic screed.
Agree emphatically. It was a proud dutchman ( loved Hitler and was a uni tutor) who stalked me and broke into my home, who raped me and sadistically burned my small dog with a cigarette. Who terrorised me till I sold my house ( at a loss) and moved islands. He also had euthanised his father and proudly told peoole. His wife an American ( a geologist)had esxaoed back to the States with her American ( clinical psychologist) sister's help. He fantasised going to the U.S.A. to kill her with one of his guns. It took me 8 months to get a judge to put him (Tony Haver)under a restraining order...which is still in force. I remain on the unlisted roll.
Sean, your comment is totally unacceptable, trivialising a woman’ trauma—your arrogant behaviour is comparable to the rhetoric of the rapist who traumatised her.
Seamus Ariat, your comment is totally unacceptable, trivialising a woman’s trauma—your arrogant behaviour is comparable to the rhetoric of the rapist who traumatised her.
"Despite the government’s propaganda, there is no evidence that legalisation has benefited the prostituted women." This is a stunningly bold statement and it is so obviously inaccurate that it's inclusion is clearly a deliberate choice to lie. This, in turn, strongly implies that the author knows she has to lie in order to 'prove' her point. Which would also explain the constant attempts to push guilt through proximity of wording. E.g. There are paedophiles in Britain. Julie Bindel is British. There are also women who are violent abusers of children. Julie Bindel is a self-confessed woman. Etc, etc. It's just so weak. Referring to The Netherlands as Holland is like referring to Britain as Somerset. And if you don't want to get hit by a bike, try not walking in the clearly marked cycle lanes. It honestly comes across like the author has never set foot in the country as all this is pretty basic. Finally, it's "bane" not "bain".
Working in Amsterdam for six months in 2000 I’d agree - I found the central area to be pretty sleazy, lots of drug dealers, lots of sex shops, sex shows, prostitutes, hard-core porn in newsagents as you mention. Visited in 2024 and found a radical change - a much smaller red light district, didn’t notice any street walking prostitutes, no in-your-face drug dealers, one or two sex shops but no porn in the windows. And the restaurants were pretty good, especially the Asian ones. Yes, you can smoke a joint in a cafe (but as I found out, not a cigar) and the weed boat does a thriving business in the canals. I don’t know how long it’s been since you last visited, but I think the Dutch understood that things had got out of hand (particularly with cheap flights bringing in stag parties from the U.K.) and they’ve sought to address the problem. I’ll certainly be back.
Well well.. miss Bindel as a Dutchman I admire our custom of not being overly chauvinistic so most of us can take a hit and a hit(piece) this is. Although not all is well in the Netherlands you paint a very exaggerated dark picture. The pedo party you describe is a non entity and your anecdote is very, very dated. A large majority does not condone this at all. I wonder when you visited the Netherlands for the last time, must have been a decade or two ago. In the meantime, contrary to the UK: we have still very decent affordable healthcare, even the areas with a lot of migrants look like Switzerland compared to certain areas in the UK, class disparity is a lot less then in UK, almost free education at a decent level, our rivers are not full of poop, the infrastructure like train stations look like new and have not been stuck in the fifties like certain UK train stations I know. Everybody who comes is generally treated friendly and with respect. You focus on Amsterdam, Amsterdam is not “ the Dutch” same as London is not the “English”. Amsterdam as well as its rather indeed smug political and radical leftist cultural elite is not overly popular in the Netherlands as well. There is more to the Netherlands than that city. Most of all, including some “ smug “ Dutch we usually don’t look down on other countries and feel superior. I wish “ Global Britain” ( what a success) well.
I was there in June this year - I visit at least once a year
Julie, Much of your politics are not mine, but on trans and sex trade I could barely agree with you more. The quote from the Dutch father says it all. Somethings bear to be repressed and he knows it.
That never happened, she 100% made that up to add some colour to her story
What did Im 'make up'?
Even were that true, it wouldn’t alter that the open sex trade in Amsterdam is a disgrace - a view l hope is shared by the vast majority the Dutch
Yes but why do we have to use made up scenarios instead of writing actually researched articles, backed by reputable sources?
I think I know why: it would be too much work, Julie is just ragebaiting and she couldn’t use her fake feminism as a shield.
Your criticism is based on speculation (scenario referred to is made up) and so fails the standard you seek to impose on the author. And virtually all social discourse is less science and more story telling - often especially the stuff with source footnotes. I object to the sex trade (and various other things) based entirely on gut feel and all my intellectual justifications are ult. down stream of that. Ex post hoc that it’s “minging”
There is more consensus than not on this. Let’s focus on that
This answer is odd for a couple of reasons: 1) “being there this June” doesn’t exactly match up to knowing a place well enough to write on it this way (I’d personally be more inclined to hear from someone actually LIVING there) and 2) since you despise it so much, why on earth do you “visit once every year”?! Seems rather counter intuitive
Hi Julia, to research the sex trade, and to visit those women that campaign to repeal legalisation
As I said before, I'd like to hear from Dutch feminists on all this. Ian
Why? To torture yourself? Do you also do that under the guise of feminism?
You’ve listed many accomplishments that make you proud of being Dutch. But you have completely ignored the substance of Bindel’s article, which argues that Dutch culture imagines itself to be impressively liberal-minded about sex, but that self-concept as an exceptionally open minded and sophisticated sexual culture in enables the dehumanization of women and children.
It is not Dutch culture as you say, it is a policy being pursued mainly in Amsterdam and is not condoned and implemented elsewhere. In addition there is a strict control on this “ trade” in order to prevent no control “ in the illegal circuit “‘where women are even more endangered.
Amsterdam is in the Netherlands, the capital in fact, no? Own it. Human trafficking, the degradation and abuse of women, rampant open drug use, the normalization of extreme porn; these are not trivial flaws.
Normalization of extreme porn? Well well, if you show me where , I will have a look. The Netherlands have a lot of negative aspects but the positive outnumber the negative in my view . Don’t make a charicature out of a country that’s all the average Dutchman wishes .
As I said, own it. It's right in front of your nose.
Fair
Yes, I was also going to say that.
In addition, you make a mockery concerning the drugs policy that leaves much to be desired, there is no smugness at all on this here. It was an experiment to control substance abuse which has party failed and that is to be recognized . But Drugs abuse is smaller than it ever was. Concerning heroin users , I don’t know where you have been but that was experienced 30, 20 years ago. Dutch heroin users decreased because methadon policy, then the users came from France and Belgium. Now the problem of heroin users esspecially in the public domain is practically non existant. Except for junkies coming from across the borders who are dealt with. When i read this article it seemed like being transported to the nineties, totally outdated . Yet again don’t mistake Amsterdam for the rest of the Netherlands, meaning the other 17 million people. As we say in Dutch, translated : Every house has its cross but our cross to bear seems somewhat smaller than elsewhere. Lastly, problems there are, but can be readjusted with good well financed programs since the Dutch state is in financial very good shape with 43 procent state debt to gdp , this contrary to a certain kingdom across the North Sea ..
Methadone is a bigger issue that the problem it was trying to to solve and never something to be proud of! Same with tbe liberalisation of prostitution, which is not a career choice for the majority of females involved. Both are abuse. Plain and simple!
I read articles all the time about where I live that I dont recognise, but doesnt mean they are not factual...
I’m just here for the comments 🍿
I’m not understanding why you visit every year if you don’t like the place, can you please explain?
research
Thanks for your reply. Substack is showing me random articles and I had yet to read your bio. It all makes sense now! Very interesting!
I agree that Julie’s article is something of a ‘hit piece’ and fails to make a clear distinction between Amsterdam and the rest of the country. I am a Brit but have family who have lived and worked in the Netherlands for decades. They wouldn’t return to the UK if you paid them.
Everything you mention re the superior health care, a far less divisive class system, better infrastructure, and an excellent education system which successfully teaches its children to embrace other languages - which you yourself demonstrates perfectly here with your grasp of a foreign language.
Your country fascinates me and I visit at every opportunity. And the food is not terrible. Who knew that chips tasted great doused in mayonnaise .
Aart, I get Netherlands is a great country but dismantle the open drug and sex trade in your capital city (and elsewhere)which I don’t doubt the majority feel insults your country.
I can confirm as a hungarian university student that had worked a summer in and near Eindhoven (later i also visited Utrecht and Amsterdam) that the dutch indeed are not much more liberal than the average european. I was going with a prejudice or atleast presumption that i would see a country thats a multicultural lgbt hell. But actually talking with both young people and the older generation most of them sounded just like my countrymen. Actually if anything older people seemed much more right wing funny enough. Ive talked with a few guys from Frisia (my family is calvinist on my fathers side, but me and my mother is catholic) and they seemed much more devout than many hungarian protestants (sadly). I also talked with priests and mass goers in both north brabant and the capital and altough the masses felt a bit more "inclusive" theres also a more traditionalist view especially among younger people.
And in Amsterdam out of all places i met probably the most rw and "politically incorrect" priest :DDD I wont be naming names but even for me his views were a bit spicy
In addition , I have always been been a bit of an Anglophile with great respect for British culture, sacrifice, mindset ( without the UK we would be speaking German, in reference to WW2). So I DO wish the UK well but as I said before every house has its cross to bear.
i think it was Belgians he hated in austin powers.
No, Julie is correct. Here is the scene; it's very easy to find:
https://youtu.be/Zgp-0UxeBK0?si=6CDlMbmTv2qoeY-P
I don't understand why people who try to correct things don't check their facts first.
I guess they just assume the other person is wrong and run with a comment. Weird.
And as nobody knows better than you, there’s also the “Dutch Protocol” which “pioneered” the use of puberty blockers and sex hormones for children. Awful.
The doctor who led in the institution of the Dutch Protocol has recently “backpedalled” on it!
(Just riffing off all the bicycles in Holland!)
I presume you wrote this article tongue in cheek, rather than be so prejudiced as to bin an entire nation of people
Yes, that was very bad but I have heard that they have backtracked on that in recent years. It was partly from a Dutch study that people realised their dangers.
The protocol originally had good outcomes in the restricted population they used it on. They have since retreated from it, as more evidence accumulated from a wider population. It is how interventions are developed on desperate populations/ groups.
I don’t think they’ve backpedaled. On the recent NYT podcast The Protocol, the Dutch doctors who pioneered child sex reassignment vigorously defended their work and said they were proud of it.
The question is what population is the protocol used on ? The initial research was on genuinely extreme cases of gender dysmorphia. As more people were categorised as gender dysmorphic the treatment population grew. The age treatment interaction was controlled in the initial study, not in the expanded protocol. I can see why the studys authors still support the protocol and also why it was not on balance less harmful when generalised to a wider population.
That is certainly true. However even the two initial subjects who were interviewed struck me as not very happy. One was pretty clearly a tomboy/nascent Lesbian who needn’t have transitioned, while the other spoke wistfully about not really understanding the sacrifice of his ability to have children at 16. DeVries and Peggy (forgetting her last name) still treated them as success stories. Meanwhile their model was exported around the Western world to disastrous results.
Even though I am a psychologist, I do not possess the arrogance to judge from an interview. All I do know is that 1) gender dysphoria has severe psychological consequences. 2) for many it is not transient 3) the originators are not responsible for the generalisation. 4) As a stick to beat the Dutch with, it is flimsy. How many of the experimental surgical procedures published each year have we heard of ? How many are adopted ? I would question the adopters who were desperate for a cure or to buy time rather than wait for the data to firm up.
Appalling offensive typical British chauvinistic dismissal of Holland and people..have you any idea Julie of how much the British are hated worldwide and why. I'd venture to say your track record colonial and current would make the Dutch look like Enid Blyton .shame on you!
Nice way to ellide over what she described of the current and continuing abuse of women in Holland. Every nation engages in some objectionable practices, but prostitution and abuse of women in Holland is a feature, not a bug.
Whilst Dutch colonialism is beloved across the world, I presume?
And your defence of widespread abuse of women is…?
‘I think you’re shit!’ Well, I think you’re even shittier!. A little infantile, Eilis, don’t you think? It’s Ms Bindel, she’s also being funny, so some of the criticisms are clearly tongue-in-cheek*. You’ve also sidestepped her key assertions about prostitution and female exploitation. (*a British colloquialism for humour and nothing to do with the Dutch practice of ‘backdoor rimming’ - as publicly depicted in the aforementioned, family newsagents Julie visited in your fine capital). 🤣
Can we make that English rather than British? (As JB might have referred to the Netherlands rather than Holland…)
Actually the British get a great welcome across the world. We do tend to be hated by tin pot dictatorships, which is a plus.
Classic deflection of objectively reasonable criticisms.
Is there something specific that Ms. Bindel is wrong about?
Stereotypes exist for a reason.
Because Julie likes them.
Do they? For what reason?
Heuristics.
"The vagina of Europe" how disgusting. Difficult to disagree with your analysis of the legalised sex trade Julie. Isn't there a saying about not being so open minded your brain falls out? And wine in thimbles? That really is the last straw!
And yet here you are open mindedly falling for a click bait article that doesn’t bear any resemblance to the country that most Dutch people or visitors of 40 years like myself, married to a Dutch lady that whole time, actually experience. The irony of your comment is mind blowing.
A humorous example of amateur-mistake journalism from usually an interesting writer, this article is worth the read to understand how a burlesque impulse works. It’s not reality, it’s the drama.
You’ll get the eye-rolling impulse to equate Amsterdam with Holland (asking any adult Dutch person will clarify quickly, seriously), fact-checking legal statements is usually a smart move (I don’t need to do, the author should, cite the code), and having lived on Warmoesstraat, in a Red light district (there are several in Amsterdam) the rest of the hyperbolic statements are unrecognizable.
We are to believe junkies are routinely shooting up in public in a city which aggressively polices pissing in a canal in public. Sure! The last visit 50 years ago must have been a doozy.
A final hint: many “women” in windows are men.
Naturally what is left out is a tradition of female shelters and ‘strong women’. Het Begijnhof is one of the oldest woman-only living areas in the world - 600 years.
To this day. No men allowed. Unexceptional.
https://hetbegijnhof.nl/sterke-vrouwen/strong-women/?lang=en
The Dutch are tolerant, but not participatory - the author states it directly: few or no Dutch women are prostitutes.
The philosopher Spinoza in Holland after the Inquisition is a good example of tolerance but distance. Do read.
What points the author makes which are true are just a reflection of this ethos - tolerance, distance - (“libertarian” : no. Strong government creates the peace and stability required for freedom.)
The sadness of organized crime in Holland is due in no small part to transnational money-laundering, which the Dutch are quite good at since the launch of the Euro. Drugs, at least when I lived there were more a feature of Belgian trade systems. Again, check facts.
The Dutch know what side of the bread butter goes on, and major drug trade would make the country unworkable for business, and the Dutch are all business.
I did love the “slave trade” comment - mind-blowing comparison of centuries of atrocity economy to 21st century sex trade economy.
Global state-sanctioned mass-kidnapping and elimination of all attributes as a human over mutiple generations to facilitate commerce is, well, qualitatively and quantitatively different from sex trade.
Sex trade is deeply exploitative but it doesn’t strip people and their descendants of legal status as humans on the basis of race.
The implication is that slave trade could include the “poor choice” to be stripped of personhood - the status of being a human - on the basis of race.
Wow! We’ve gone there…!
Factually in error, unbalanced, hyperbolic and exaggerated, ahistoric and frankly one of the more offensive false equivalencies I’ve read in quite some time.
Superb journalism
So your defense of the sex trade in the Netherlands is that it traffics not in Dutch women but in foreign women--whew!--and it doesn't strip the women's descendants of legal personhood on the basis of race?
I wrote in plain English, but the defense of sex trade seems top of mind for you.
Read the words “offensive false equivalences” a couple of times.
Once that’s understood, consider global legal support for stripping a human and all descendants from the status of being a person on the basis of race.
Now try to equate that to sex trade and you may understand the point.
Why do you keep making slavery about race? Are you one of those people who think that American enslavement of blacks is the only slavery? The only historical or current condition of unfreedom or human trafficking? Have you read a book about the global sex trade? Which one? Name it, so I can read it and get schooled about what a false equivalence it is to speak of slavery in the sex trade.
Oh goodness.
Clue me in, the transatlantic slave trade up to the early 19th century included boatloads of Russians, Polynesians, Greeks and Laotians? Did I miss a class in elementary school?
You’ve got sex trade on the mind, shake it off and follow the thread.
But then Julie does take the sex trade seriously. Is the Netherlands especially big in this? Again I see people mostly just flinging insults and sarcasm at each other.
Still the sex trade along with the miniscule conviction rate here in Blighty itself is very aggravating. Ian
The statistics on women from Eastern European countries are poor in most of Western Europe, but particularly in Germany, Belgium and The Netherlands
The statistics are poor -nobody cares about the women - or they are poor, or both. Have I understood you? Ian
Immigrant women and sex trafficking is badly managed in Holland particularly Amsterdam, as the same in Brussels and as I remember in Cologne and Antwerp.
That was 25 years ago. I have not assessed the situation recently, it will have changed dramatically because of internet, cellphone and bitcoin.
Loved living in Zwolle, got metaphorically slapped by someone taller than me - every time I referred to the country as Holland though, bam slap - Nederlands!
I love your writing.
Puzzled where Julie visited! If you go to the backstreets of any large city you will find grime and crime. Perhaps some fact checking? Age of consent for marriage in the Netherlands is 18 years for both partners.
Age of consent for sex is indeed 16 years old.
As another person said, “shooting up heroin in the street” is a fantasy. H is out and has been for 20 years.
The pedophile party may not have been forbidden, but its promotors all ended in jail for their actions, and not their words.
Yes, prostitution was legalized as an attempt to destigmatise the women. As in many Nordic countries. And yes, sex trafficking has become a big problem, but not only in the Netherlands. It is a criminal activity worldwide.
Amsterdam is not the Netherlands. It is run by a Green Left mayor and party who make impenetrable policies and decisions. Gaza fanatics run the place nowadays.
Euthanasia is still a crime and only condoned after a strict and lengthy procedure. Each euthanasia death is investigated by the police. And it is not easy to convince the doctors you are eligible. Less than 30% of the human beings who request it, are accepted.
The story is a mish mash of century old biases and lies, mainly invented by the English. I think Julie is partly envious and partly greatly misinformed.
Yes, it is worldwide. Doesn't make the Netherlands a relative working class paradise. No one should ever need to engage in sex work, no one should be so miserable they need drugs to feel wonderful.
There are probably more hard drugs around in Edinburgh where I lived.
Exactly, it is worldwide, and the more gutted out a community often the worse the tear in the social fabric. It's worth also noting it is far worse than "Scotland" in a small town here in New Zealand. One can almost always find a proverbial "ghetto" somewhere where it's worse than the other place.
Hi Julie, thanks for this fascinating post. I'd love to know what they think a 16 year old age of consent means if it includes 12 year olds who "consent." The whole point of having an age of consent is to say that below that age kids are too young to give consent!
Another thing: these negative phrases about the Dutch come from the 17th and 18th centuries when Britain and Holland were at war. They're just projections on to the enemy of common human traits. Often they imply something isn't real but a substitute: Dutch courage comes out of a bottle, a Dutch wife isn't a real woman, "going Dutch" isn't a real date, "double Dutch" is gobbledook. On the other hand a Dutch baby is a delicious apple pancake!
That's because it's grossly misrepresenting the facts.
"Dutch law is more restrictive than that statement suggests.
Article 245 of the Dutch Criminal Code makes it a criminal offense for an adult to engage in sexual acts with someone between 12 and 16 years old. (AMBT Advocaten) Consent from the minor is not relevant - the law explicitly protects minors against seduction that may come from themselves. (De Strafpleiters)
However, there's an important procedural detail: prosecution requires a complaint to be filed by the parents or by the minor themselves. (AMBT Advocaten) Without a complaint, the Public Prosecutor typically won't pursue the case (though they retain the authority to do so).
Additionally, if there's no coercion or abuse of power and the age difference is small, the Public Prosecutor may decide not to prosecute, depending on the circumstances. (AMBT Advocaten) The law also includes provisions that exempt "normal sexual experimentation between age peers" from criminal liability when there's a small age gap and the situation is equal."
- Claude
don't forget the Dutch oven
exactly! It's not a real oven.
This is a deeply misguided article. I can understand why Ms. Bindel feels this way, but the analysis is superficial. It reminds me of Latin American Marxist complaints about how America if terrible and has too much poverty, while they remain silent to the fact that the poorest people in their country flock to the US to escape poverty.
By any reasonable measure the Netherlands is a better place to live in than most of Europe, and certainly a better place to live in compared to the UK. Furthermore, I do not recall any news of Muslim gangs systematically raping Dutch children. Furthermore, people there have homes to live in, even in cities. They also refrained from throwing their poorer citizens out of their cities to make room from criminals pretending to be refugees (although they clearly have taken in too many of such people, they have done a better job of it than most of Europe).
Most of all, the Dutch have created a livable society. Contrary to this article, THC is not a problem anywhere in the world, save for the artificial problems of its legality. The Dutch are involved in more drug trafficking because Rotterdam is the largest port in Europe. Similarly, as much as Ms. Bindel hates prostitution, even the strictest laws in the US have never been able to make a dent in the trade. Hating something does not make it go away. Much like drugs, there is simply no way to stop prostitution. It has always been with us, and it always will be. Throwing people in jail does not help anyone. It is better to regulate vices such as drugs and prostitution as to keep out real evils (such as underage prostitution or fatal drug substitutes). This does not feel good to the activist class, but it is the least bad option. It is far from perfect, but much like democracy, it is the best thing we have got.
I do find the absence of criticism for countries such as China and Russia, which also have sex tourism, or Cambodia, Madagascar, Cuba,..., and many other countries that are notorious sex tourism hot spots only without any of the protections provided by the Dutch, well I find it intellectually dishonest. When i was in university years ago American students would go to Cuba because of inexpensive, beautiful prostitutes. It was not easy to get there from the US, but many went because a $20 Cuban professional was more beautiful than a $300 American one. China probably has the largest prostitution system that is both illegal and openly available in pretty much every hotel in the country. Even in the US we have prostitution everywhere despite vice squads in most police departments large enough to have departments.
The Dutch are not perfect, but they are doing a far better job than anyone in the Western hemisphere when it comes to protecting the poor souls suffering from addiction, or those who have chosen the skin trade for whatever reason.
I'm from Amsterdam,I live in NZ now. I do love the city and the country, but i will never go back there to live.
The corruption is staggering, the major of Amsterdam is a criminal.
Everything in this country has changed over the 60 years I'm alive and not for the better.
I do like the pea soup though.
Some good points but smothered in a thick sauce of John Bull jingoism which is about as appealing as everything else that passes for food in the UK. The Netherlands cannot be reduced to prostitution policies that you disagree with or the paedo party which was crazy but also totally anecdotal. More importantly, you seem totally oblivious to what happened during the last 20 years and the equally spectacular backlash and populist wave in the Netherlands. The potent streak of Puritanism in Dutch culture (the original sin that the Dutch share with the Anglo world) which expresses itself in attitudes towards smoking for instance, totally escaped you as well. I know Brits love to express contempt for everybody else (it helps them forget the empire is over) but if you have a beef with legalising prostitution, address the topic instead of penning a xenophobic screed.
I'm not sure where you have eaten in the UK. But we have really good food. You don't have to eat shite!
You can find decent food. In foreign restaurants…
I heard they have very good indian restaurants!
Agree emphatically. It was a proud dutchman ( loved Hitler and was a uni tutor) who stalked me and broke into my home, who raped me and sadistically burned my small dog with a cigarette. Who terrorised me till I sold my house ( at a loss) and moved islands. He also had euthanised his father and proudly told peoole. His wife an American ( a geologist)had esxaoed back to the States with her American ( clinical psychologist) sister's help. He fantasised going to the U.S.A. to kill her with one of his guns. It took me 8 months to get a judge to put him (Tony Haver)under a restraining order...which is still in force. I remain on the unlisted roll.
Sounds like a bad boy.
Sean, your comment is totally unacceptable, trivialising a woman’ trauma—your arrogant behaviour is comparable to the rhetoric of the rapist who traumatised her.
Seamus Ariat, your comment is totally unacceptable, trivialising a woman’s trauma—your arrogant behaviour is comparable to the rhetoric of the rapist who traumatised her.
brilliant. i will skip them when i get to Europe.
Go to Belgium instead. Just as boring, smug, sanctimonious beer sodden pervert population. And a sketchy colonial history, like the Dutch.
Like England then.
But the chocolate...
‘They only invented the chocolate to get to the children’🤣
yeah definitely don’t verify anything for yourself, you might learn something
its not like there's a shortage of other places to visit
Finally someone who hates my country for the right reasons.
You forgot child euthanasia though.
"Despite the government’s propaganda, there is no evidence that legalisation has benefited the prostituted women." This is a stunningly bold statement and it is so obviously inaccurate that it's inclusion is clearly a deliberate choice to lie. This, in turn, strongly implies that the author knows she has to lie in order to 'prove' her point. Which would also explain the constant attempts to push guilt through proximity of wording. E.g. There are paedophiles in Britain. Julie Bindel is British. There are also women who are violent abusers of children. Julie Bindel is a self-confessed woman. Etc, etc. It's just so weak. Referring to The Netherlands as Holland is like referring to Britain as Somerset. And if you don't want to get hit by a bike, try not walking in the clearly marked cycle lanes. It honestly comes across like the author has never set foot in the country as all this is pretty basic. Finally, it's "bane" not "bain".
Working in Amsterdam for six months in 2000 I’d agree - I found the central area to be pretty sleazy, lots of drug dealers, lots of sex shops, sex shows, prostitutes, hard-core porn in newsagents as you mention. Visited in 2024 and found a radical change - a much smaller red light district, didn’t notice any street walking prostitutes, no in-your-face drug dealers, one or two sex shops but no porn in the windows. And the restaurants were pretty good, especially the Asian ones. Yes, you can smoke a joint in a cafe (but as I found out, not a cigar) and the weed boat does a thriving business in the canals. I don’t know how long it’s been since you last visited, but I think the Dutch understood that things had got out of hand (particularly with cheap flights bringing in stag parties from the U.K.) and they’ve sought to address the problem. I’ll certainly be back.