Holland today is probably the worst country in Europe, a sinkhole of social pathologies that would make Berkeley blush. And yet, at every step, the decisions the Dutch took to liberalize their formerly straitlaced Calvinist society seemed to make sense at the time, at least to some
Today, with crime rampant, social tensions brought on by enormous, apparently unassimilable migration from the Muslim world, and the collapse of its social cohesion and cultural self-confidence, the Netherlands is the Sick Man of Europe.
I originally wrote this story for the now-defunct Mirabella Magazine, to answer the editorial question: why are the Dutch so tolerant. “Tolerant” seemed like the right word at the time; today, nearly 18 years later, “suicidal” might be a better choice.
This is what I found.
The smoke is overpowering as I climb the steep stairs and enter the tiny second-floor room at a neighborhood joint called “Balou.” A group of young men are sitting at a handful of tables, talking, listening to loud rock music, looking out the window at the street below or watching a Detroit Pistons – Cleveland Cavaliers basketball game on the television perched mutely in the corner, each puffing away contentedly. The 25-year-old owner, Jerry, is standing behind the bar and gabbing affably to some of the regulars, displaying upon request a menu of the evening’s offerings. This might be anywhere, in any bar USA. Except it’s not.
Jerry shows me the menu. Compared with competing locals like “The Grasshopper” and “The Bull Dog,” it’s rather small. This is what it says:
Hashish
_____________________________
Moroccan — 6.50
7.50
Ketema –12.50
Grass
______________________________
Sensimillia — 12.50
Skunk — 13.50
I am in a typical Amsterdam “coffeeshop,” where the coffee is sold downstairs, but the real action takes you one floor higher. You pays your money — in Dutch guilders — and you takes your choice: with an expert hand, Jerry measures out precise quantities of the drug of choice into a small scale, right in front of the customer, then bags it. (A gram of powerful “skunk” marijuana would cost about $8.) Whether tobacco or grass, many Dutchmen prefer to roll their own, but fumble-fingered Americans unskilled with cigarette paper can buy Jerry’s ready-made joints for five guilders (about $3) apiece. Just apply a lighted match to the joint’s tip and, voila! It’s the sixties all over again. And all perfectly legal (well, decriminalized, at least) to boot.
Under an informal agreement between police and drug-sellers, shops like Jerry’s are supposed to have no more than 30 grams of marijuana or hash on hand, but no one pays much attention to that. What is strictly enforced, however, is the ban on hard drugs like cocaine; the night before, in a citywide sweep, police raided and closed 18 coffeeshops (out of an estimated 350) where hard drugs and weapons had been found. Jerry rejects any notion that the ultra-mellow, laid-back coffeeshops contribute to street violence: “When you come in here you are safe, and it’s my responsibility to keep it that way. What happens to you once you go out into the street is the responsibility of the police or the government.”
Welcome to the Netherlands, the original laissez-faire capitalist society where doing well by doing good and winking at venial sins has kept the country healthy, wealthy and relatively wise since the 16th century. When the Huguenots fled France, it was the Dutch who took them in and turned a profit by outfitting them for their long sea journey to South Africa. When the Jews were made unwelcome in Spain and Portugal, they found a refuge in the Lowlands, setting up thriving diamond-cutting business in Rotterdam and in Belgium. Although their record of resistance to Hitler was not as exemplary as, say, that of the Danes, the Dutch quickly regained their place as Europe’s most open, broad-minded society, where the principle of live and let live has been raised to a fine art. Indeed, Article One of the Dutch constitution forbids discrimination on the grounds of race, religion, sexual orientation or anything else. Where else would you find unions that represent both heroin-addicted junkies and prostitutes?
By any measure, Dutch society has long been among the most liberal and tolerant in the world. Soft drugs a problem? Then stop the harrassment of pot smokers and concentrate on blocking the influx of hard drugs instead. Prostitution flourishing? Legalize it. Want to block the spread of AIDS and venereal diseases? Put condom vending machines in the high schools and hand out needles and methadone to IV drug users. Unwanted pregnancies unacceptable? Make the Pill free. Want to terminate your pregnancy? State-sponsored insurance will pay for an abortion up to the 20th week.
There’s more. Are you sexually dysfunctional? Insurance will pay for visits to a surrogate, as long as you have a doctor’s prescription. Don’t like the equipment you were born with? Then get the government, after proper psychological evaluation, to pay for your sex-change operation. Resistant to turning over your life’s savings to a doctor so he can keep you alive for a last few miserable years? Make euthanasia possible, under strict but merciful controls. Bored on a business trip? Check into a hotel room and find hard-core porno movies on the pay-TV, or check out the signs for escort agencies with names like “Call Girls” that hang from every streetlamp.
The “family values” crowd in the United States would have a heart attack here.
The Dutch don’t care.
“People always say we Dutch are tolerant,” observes Annemarie Grewel, one of the 45 members of the Amsterdam city council and a prominent leader of the Dutch Labor Party. The truth is we’re simply not interested, and that makes us tolerant.”
Grewel, 57, and a former professor of educational psychology and chairman of the University of Amsterdam, has been active on drug-related issues and is considered the leading Dutch expert on the subject. “We tolerate soft drugs for personal use, as well as the sale of a little bit of soft drugs. But we feel it is very important to draw the line at hard drugs; as soon as hard drugs appear you get concentrations of criminals. So we tolerate, but we have not legalized. With the advent of the European Community, it would be very difficult to legalize marijuana and hashish.”
The biggest problem is with Germany. Dutch towns along the German border are frequented by “drug tourists,” mostly German, who are given stiff prison sentences if they are caught with grass when they return home. The Dutch, however, have successfully lobbied the Germans to show some leniency, and have told the EC that they will not accept any interference with current Dutch soft-drug policy.
It is impossible to win a war against drugs without setting any priorities,” said Amsterdam mayor Eduard van Thijn a few years ago. “We have a pragmatic policy. On the one hand, we reject legalization of hard drugs very strongly, because that is surrender. But we also reject a policy of total war, which is overkill.
The Dutch take a similar see-no-evil approach to euthanasia. Passive mercy-killing — the removal of life-support systems to allow for natural death — has long been acceptable. But over the past two decades, active medical euthanasia has become informally allowed under certain conditions: a mentally competent patient must request it; a doctor must confirm that he or she is suffering from terminal illness; a second medical opinion must concur; and the death must be reported to the authorities. The Royal Dutch Pharmacists’ Association has even drawn up a list of the most efficient drugs in order to guide doctors; one preferred method is a shot of barbiturates followed by a second injection of curare. A 1987 movement to legalize the practice fell short of approval, but the Dutch seem content to keep euthanasia, like soft drugs and pornography, in a legal gray area.
If I could sum up the difference,” says Maria Schopman, “it is that the Dutch are pragmatic in their approach to social problems, and the Americans are antagonistic.
Schopman, the director of one of Holland’s leading sex-therapy clinics and for the past seven years the co-host of a Sunday afternoon radio call-in show, Radio Romantica, is sometimes referred to as the Dutch Dr. Ruth.
For example, in Holland it is traditional to leave your shutters open at night and the curtains undrawn. Anyone can look in and see what you are doing, but to us it signifies that we have nothing to hide. And this symbolizes the Dutch attitude toward things like sex and drugs; we don’t hide the problems, we look at them.
Sipping her tea in an Amsterdam private club, Schopman could be in appearance Gertrude Stein’s first cousin, but with a bright twinkle in her eyes; there’s a there there. Like almost everyone in the Netherlands, she speaks nearly perfect English, and on the rare occasions when she fishes for a word, her friend Judith Weingarten, an American-born archaeologist, supplies it for her. She is, in her reserved yet warm way, the archetypal Hollander.
“Our figures shows that 25 percent of the Dutch are dissatisfied with their sex lives, that they’ve become dull, unimaginative and predictable,” says Schopman who, along with co-host Alfred Lagarde, did one weekly broadcast from a bordello. Her quarter-million listeners (the population of the Netherlands is about 14 million) are feel free to discuss nearly every aspect of human sexual response, including male and female homosexuality and sado-masochism; “about the only thing we haven’t discussed on the air yet is necrophilia,” she says, only half-jokingly.
At her Amsterdam clinic, the services offered include birth-control related issues such as prevention and abortion; voluntary sterilization; artificial insemination; and sex therapy. American advocates of unlimited abortion on demand, however, may be surprised to learn that Dutch abortion law more closely resembles Pennsylvania’s: a woman seeking an abortion in the sixth to 18th week of her pregnancy must undergo a five-day waiting period to make sure she really wants to go through with it. (After 18 weeks, procedures are decided on a case-by-case basis.) “From a professional point of view,” says Schopman, who is not an M.D., “I think that the waiting period is a bad idea. By the time a woman comes to our clinic, she’s already made up her mind. But it’s the law.”
It is perhaps indicative of how the Dutch handle their personal freedom that both the abortion and AIDS rates remains low in a country where the age of sexual consent, whether hetero or homo, is 16 — for a time, the Dutch debated lowering it to twelve — and where more than half the women between the ages of 15 and 48 are on the Pill. (Since 1987 it also has been possible for wives to sue their husbands for rape within marriage.) When AIDS first struck, Dutch doctors went into gay bars to hand out information on preventing the deadly disease, and across the country, identity-protected AIDS tests are given for free.
A good example of Dutch pragmatism at work is the current movement to legalize the brothels, which range from cheap cat-houses to elegant, gilded palaces of sin. While Amsterdam’s notorious Red Light District, where the girls set up shop in individual windows from which to entice passers-by with their product lines, has long enjoyed de facto legal protection (much like its sister act along the Reeperbahn in Hamburg), bordellos were technically forbidden on the grounds that the women who worked in them could be exploited. Councilwoman Grewel is voting for legalization — which will allow the government both to regulate the industry and to tax it — but is determined to protect the poor, often drug-addicted streetwalkers as well. “I don’t like them,” says Grewel, speaking of the brothels, “but they exist. They’re a reality.”
Just how real can be gleaned on a visit to Yab Yum, the most luxurious and famous of Amsterdam’s bordellos. Located on one of the inner canals at Singel 295, the five-storied, turtle-doved-logoed, Asian-art-decorated whorehouse — fittingly, built in 1680 as a merchant’s mattress warehouse — is an Amsterdam landmark, an opulent, expensive sexual fantasy whose appeal is less sexual than sybaritic. A 150 guilder (about $88) entrance fee, which also covers the client’s drinks at the bar, discourages casual callers, as does the obligatory 350-550 guilder house champagne charge (of which the girls get about half) and the 400 guilder an hour ($240) charge for sexual services.
No one is more in favor of the legalization of the bordellos that Yab Yum’s proprietor, Theo Hueft, a former cosmetics salesman. “You ask for criminals if you put prostitution under a blanket,” says Hueft, echoing the traditional Dutch rationale. “If it’s legal, you can better control the whole process. It’s better for us, better for the government. Twenty years ago, a place like Yab Yum” — the name comes from the Kama Sutra — “was absolutely illegal. Today, Amsterdam without a club like Yab Yum is unthinkable.”
Hueft, 58 and a fixture on Dutch TV talk shows, has long been active in improving the image of Amsterdam’s brothels. Each of his 60 girls — on any given night, 25 are on duty to service 30 to 35 clients — is medically checked once a week and, with the advent of AIDS, condoms are strictly required for all customers; each one of the eleven rooms at Yab Yum is furnished in Chinese antiques and comes equipped with its own Jacuzzi whirlpool bath, which is also an compulsory part of the foreplay. Except for a short Christmas break, the club is open all year from 8 p.m. to 4 a.m., seven days a week. “We have no real competition,” says the bespectacled Hueft, professorily attired in a dark business suit, polka dot tie. “When you go out to eat, you can have a hamburger or you can go the finest restaurant in town. That is the difference between us and the other houses in Amsterdam.”
The women who apply to work at Yab Yum, most of whom have never before been prostitutes — an international collection of university students, secretaries and housewives — are screened by Hueft’s Swiss girlfriend, Monica, to whom they apply. They must be at least 18 years old, and the determining factor is less their physical beauty (taken for granted) than their language skills (about half of them are Dutch, and nearly all speak English), their ability to carry on a conversation and their general comportment; Miss Congeniality does well here.
If the Netherlands seems the land of enlightenment to long-suffering American liberals, it has not become so without paying a price. Even today, American visitors who arrive in Holland expecting the neat, orderly Dutch landscapes of Cuyp and van Ruisdael are in for a disappointment; the area around the city’s Centraal Station is notorious for its drug addicts and cheap prostitutes, and dirt and graffiti adorn many public streets and buildings. In fact, for a time conditions got to be too much even for the Dutch, who realized their hard-won social freedoms were being threatened; in 1988, under van Thijn, the Dutch started to clean up their act and today Amsterdam is notably more salubrious, if not as squeaky-clean as the German cities across the Rhine.
Further, it would be wrong to think that Amsterdam is Holland, just as New York City is not the United States. Parts of the Netherlands remain almost preternaturally neat, and are as politically conservative as anything in the American heartland. The Protestant farming village of Staphorst, 80 miles northeast of Amsterdam is synonymous with Dutch reactionary conservatism, representing the views of about 300,000 members of the Dutch Reformed Church scattered across the country; this “Staphorst factor” rejects most of the Dutch welfare-state trappings and consistently polls about five percent of the vote in national elections.
But it is not just the Dutch equivalent of the Amish who are starting to react against some of the social extremes. Martha Hawley, an American expatriate who works at Radio Netherlands and whose 14-year-old daughter was born in Holland, is beginning to have second thoughts. Hardly a Pat Robertson type, the unmarried Hawley is nevertheless concerned — concerned about her personal safety in Amsterdam and concerned about the effects of Dutch license on her teenager. “By the time kids reach puberty here,” she says as we stroll to a restaurant on the fringes of the Red Light District, “they’ve seen everything.”
It’s true. Walk into, or even past, any Amsterdam pornography shop and you will see, openly displayed, images of almost every conceivable sexual situation and perversion, including water sports and animal acts (but no child pornography, which lies beyond the pale even here). Despite the government’s ban on hard drugs, dealers walk the streets, chanting their list of wares, New York City-style: cocaine, ecstasy, cocaine, ecstasy. If the atmosphere is not as threatening as, say, the South Bronx, it is inimical enough to keep even an experienced journalist like Hawley out of the area.
Later that night, boarding a tram at the Centraal Station, I am accosted by a fellow passenger holding a bouquet of Christmas-tree cuttings and humming to himself. He seems friendly enough, but there is something unusual about him.
“A girl gave me these at the station,” he says in a British working-class accent, although he is clearly Dutch. “I told her I just got out of jail today.”
I remark on the quality of the arrangement, but he is intent on telling me his story. “I was in jail for 16 years. I sure hope I still have a place to live. I’ve got the key, but who knows what I’ll find when I get home.” He laughs loudly, bringing stares from the other passengers.
“I shot a policeman,” he explains without being asked. “I shot him in the head.” Again, the laugh and a shake of the head, as if he can’t quite believe it himself.
As I step to the door to get off at my stop, he calls out to me: “Good luck mister, and be careful on the streets. The crime has really gone up around here.”
As I make my way back to my hotel, I think of something Martha Hawley had told me, a famous Dutch aphorism that every first-year student of the language learns, and which admirably sums up the whole social ethos here: Doe maar gewoon, dan doe je al gek genoeg.
Which, translated, means: “Just be normal, that’s crazy enough.” It seems an apt, pragmatic symbol.
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305 Comments
Michael,
You wrote an excellent article, and nailed it. I have traveled to Amsterdam, and seen the elephant. Doing what every red blooded American male needs to do wearing a cowboy hat, clean jeans and carrying a camera,no trip abroad would not becomplete with out a tour of the red light district. The phenomenon you described in the article was not limited to Amsterdam either. Copenhagen had a similar version, albeit a bit toned down.
I was never so glad to get back to Texas, where things were more normal, safe, and sane.
"Which, translated, means: “Just be normal, that’s crazy enough.” It seems an apt, pragmatic symbol."
I remember telling myself at the time, that the liberalism affecting them then, would make its way here. It has.
The way the libs are destroying this country – I say go for it here – at least people can tune their shrill rhetoric out and get some lovin and a good buzz – hopefully long enough to wake up from the nightmare that Barry & his band of socialist mo-rons are putting us through now. No wonder booze sales are doing so well.
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Is this where libertarianism leads? Because if it does, I want no part of it.
"but to us it signifies that we have nothing to hide."
When I was there, they had rear-view mirrors just outside the houses so you could see who was coming and going. Yup. Now that's open, at least for spying on the passers by.
I should also mention that Amsterdam was the first place where I had to protect a young lady (an American) from street thugs. I didn't have to do this in Italy or Denmark or Greece. But in Holland? Yes I did.
Couldn't we just send Hillary, Bill, Obama and his wife, Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, and all the card carrying members of the ACLU, Robert Gibbs and the entire Obama administrative staff , and most of the members of the Supreme Court over to Amersterdam, ONE WAY, first class, with some money to set up their lives? It would cost SO much less than what they are trying to do here as they try to bring Amersterdam liberalism and cram it down our throats.
This article makes it all sound like a bad thing.
This is on point about Amsterdam. I made my first trip to Amsterdam during Thanksgiving in the late '90s. Big Mistake. It was Cannabis Cup in Amsterdam, which I was unaware of. I knew about the soft drugs laws but didn't give it a thought as to why my flight over was full of hippies, '60's rejects and the like. Not being a marijuana smoker I ignored it. Even when the check points into Schipol were pulling people deemed questiomable, i.e. the hippies, etc… over and denying some of them entry. Once in Amsterdam I became concerned about my safety. As I walked around Dam Square, I was constantly accosted by Moroccan or Turks whispering "do you want any cocaine? heroin?" I ignored them. At night the streets had prostitutes advertising their trade everywhere one turned. Plus every Dutch I talked to thought San Fran was the city they would most want to visit in the US. Thinking it was just my being a first time tourist, I went back a couple of years later and it was worse. I have not, nor nor do I plan, to go back.
Pretty soon there will be no crime in Holland..
When isomething gets out of control, they simplly leagilize it, or overlook it.
Then justify their lenient attitude with, "people will just do it anyway", plus we can tax it.
That makes it OK…A Gov'ment Seal of Approval on anything out of control, topped off with the obligatory EU tax…
You can have my weed when you come get my guns.
there is a way that seemeth right unto man but the end thereof is the way of death
The Dutch will be gone in a few generations, driven into burqas by their soon to be Muslim overlords demographically. It couldn't happen to a more pathetic specimen of what's left of western culture in Europe – pathetic sniveling self-loathing lefty toadies that they are.
The Geert Wilders' trial with the Dutch nuking of the most important western political concept, free speech, pretty much sums up their degradation.
Tolerance of intolerance isn't a virture and in the Dutch case it's cultural suicide. They won't be missed.
I too, an intrepid Texan – have wandered around Amsterdam slightly agog at the antics of the "natives" , whom are generally more "international" looking than local.
I passed by a "coffee shop" with a Jamacian theme, and low and behold some very "Jamacian" looking black guys with dreads and the whole Rastifarian look were imbibing on herbal delights. This place was at street level and not being discreet in anyway.
Interesting, if it hadn't been near daylight but midnight and very cool, I would have thought I was in Jamaica.
Now, I'm no prude but man, the whole place "reeks" (pardon the pun) of an under lying criminality. I was only there for a few days on my tour around that part of Europe but dang, I went to museums by day and stayed out of sight both nights after about 11:00 pm or so. No drug/sex "tourism" for me!
Hysterical. I bet everyone on here keeps shouting "small government." I concept I agree with completely.
Yet, you want the government to tell you what you can put into your body. And if you don't agree, put you in jail.
More hypocrisy. Time to move on…
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First job I took when I got my undergraduate degree was as a roadie for a rock act that toured Europe. We spent a lot of time in Amsterdam. And hey, we were musicians, so we spent a lot of time in the coffee houses, but not drinking coffee. I have to admit, that even the uber-libertarin that I am found the openness of the prostitution jarring – seems to me most societal laws ought to be designed to protect the innocence of children – but the hash houses were GREAT.
Succinctly put, the Dutch on their present course are doomed culturally.
[...] from: » Sex, Drugs and Cultural Euthanasia: Amsterdam, 1992 – Big Journalism Post a [...]
The one merit of legalizing marijuana would be depriving the criminal gangs of what is thought to be ~50% of their profits.
Two merits to legalizing prostitution:
The "ladies" would be safer.
More people would understand their elected officials.
Uh, okay, legalizing (not decriminalizing) weed may be an alright idea if done right, but I am joking about the ho's… 'case anyone was wonderin'… And NO, I don't use ANY drugs, just beer…
Ironic that theft and petty crime is a major problem in Amsterdam. An example is that most people use TWO locks on their bicycle. If you leave it unlocked it WILL be stolen, often within a few minutes. Why do these uber-"tolerant" European states have these problems ? Doesn't leftist theory declare that the welfare state will end crime (by ending poverty)?
That blonde in the "showcase" window looked like your type, Jb
[...] ik het goed begrijp is dit artikel geschreven in 1992 door de Amerikaan Michael Walsh en is de introductie van nu. We krijgen er flink van langs in dit stuk. Of juist niet? JdeW komt er [...]
GF
Here on the Plains of L.A. where pot is ostenstively legal, with 800 outlets, just bring your prescription !, you can buy it for $300-$400 an oz..plus tax……
Of course, most buy a gram for approx $30.00 plus tax…… do the math*, just cause it's legal does not mean the price is down…Kind of surprising….
*28 G= oz
hee hee…after enough fine German beer it wouldn't matter! …add in a Svedka shots and I might break out the window and "climb in".
This article is nonsense. The sick man of Europe claim is blatantly false.
Rampant crime? Really? Let's try the murder rate: countries in Europe with higher murder rates include France, Italy, Germany, Spain, Hungary, Portugal, Finland, the Czech Republic and the United Kingdom. Only Norway, Ireland and Switzerland do better than the Netherlands.
How about rape? Here the claim is a little better but still wrong. Rates are higher in the UK, Spain, France, Norway and Finland.
Freedom of Speech: We tend to forget that the US is the ONLY country in the world that has an absolute protection of speech in its constitution. It isn't always observed, but in practice the US is far, far freer than any country in Europe where "hate speech" laws have stripped most European citizens of the ability to speak freely.
The Dutch have come under fire lately (and rightfully so) for their utterly craven behavior involving the murderer of Theo Van Gogh and their refusal to provide protection for Ayaan Hirsi Ali but on the whole their actions are no worse than any other European country.
Red light districts are nothing new in Europe, Germany has had them for years. They may not be centers of cultural excellence but the rape rate in the Netherlands is 1/3 of that in the US and 1/7 of that in Canada (yes, our brothers to the North are far more violent with women than Americans are, something that is rarely mentioned). I think it is safe to say that open prostitution has not made the Netherlands into some kind of violent porno land.
I don't particularly like the Dutch culture, nor any other Old Europe culture. They are doomed, not because of drugs and hookers, but because the welfare states have drained whatever initiative the Dutch still had that wasn't already destroyed by centuries of despotism.
However, stupid and obviously false arguments about Europe have to be challenged especially when they are used to justify government policies in the US.
I smoked a boatload of cannabis in my day, and quit twenty years ago. I had no legal issues, no health problems — I just decided to quit, and I did.____Even though it's not for me (any longer), I wonder if our federal, state or local governments actually have a valid constitutional right to criminalize pot-smoking among adult citizens.
An old girlfriend of mine was a long time member of Willie Nelson's entourage. She had pictures of a stop in Amsterdam…let's just say they indulged mightily.
I went to a show Willie played in Austin (actually just outside of Austin) and after the show we spent some time afrter the show in the second tour bus, not Willie's and whew, those boys know how to party, holy guacamole`.
Stiffy
Where did you say you lived??
The Dutch legalizing (or legal protection) of nearly all forms of sex and most drugs, with brothels that employ housewives and secretaries, coffee houses that sell hash, and TV shows where sex is debated like a serious subject, all of this accompanied by government regulation and involvement in these aspects of life … rather than being titillating, it all sounds rather boring and tired. I can imagine that some tourists would get sick of this pretty quickly and rush headlong over to Germany and France where what is still forbidden and illegal is probably much more exciting.
HiPD
Good to see the familiar avatar is back.
My point is not price, but profitability. If American farmers are allowed to openly cultivate (and yeah, I know, a lot of other people too) and sell the crap, it would massively undercut the profitability of the drug gangs. Plus, much as it pains me, it could be regulated and taxed. Penalties could still exist for any number of "offenses" related to cultivation, distribution and consumption. Add in real immigration/border control, along with more serious enforcement against hard drugs and we might make a dent after all.
Another benefit would be to threaten deadbeat hippies with a special tax increase for their "sin". But only to help "the children". Might make 'em think twice about taxation (assuming they CAN think). And who could oppose that?
Special exemption for Spliff Menendez though…
$300-$400 an oz..plus tax..
Geez remember when a Lid was 10 bucks. Did I say that LOL. Yes back in the day I had some fun. But then I grew up. But $400;00 an Oz damn…..
Even though it's not for me (any longer), I wonder if our federal, state or local governments actually have a valid constitutional right to criminalize pot-smoking among adult citizens.
What has the Constitution have to do with it. The current people in power don't even think it exists. Just saying….Sad
Never mind guys I won't post anymore. Obviously i must have done something wrong. I guess the first amendment does not exist here either Bye….
GF
I have it on good authority that the pot outlets here grow some 6-10 lbs a year themselves and parcel it out to the "sick" for the above stated gram price..
.Beats real work when you can make $50-100K clean before you have to invest in more "Product"…It's a good racket without the violence…Just pay the sales tax..
.I'm sure they'll all do that esp "for the children"…
After about 11:00 pm or so the TV cable channels are down right almost XXX rated. They sell commercials for phone sex stuff and what not, it's all in Dutch (or German). After a while I guess it makes it all as seem routine and "normal"
How do the Islamists influence Holland since your report?
I can vouch for Italy as well. Suffering from jet lag and reverse sleep scheduling, I found myself walking through Venice and Florence at about 2 am when I was in Italy. It was awesome and I was never bothered by anyone.
It might sound surprising, but Holland and Greece are odd twins with similar destinies, and their decadence shows how destructive socialism is. While the last few centuries' history of the two nations is very different (Holland, a prosperous and enterprising sea kingdom with solid democratic sinews, and Greece a backward, somnolent, sometimes violent Turkish province), both have entered in the second half of the XX century under the protective umbrella of the US, situation which has removed from their daily concerns the conservation instinct, and has unleashed the sense of entitlement and lack of responsibility.
Holland – laid back, take it easy, tommorrow is another day, why're so uptight, the City Hall will handle this, it's vacation time, tommorrow will be another fine day, you Americans don't know how to live your lives, take things so seriously –
Greece – more tense, yet everything that I said about Holland applies to them, too –
It's over baby – someone's got to pick up the tab -
Their open-mindedness and tolerance has been slipping in favor of political correctness as of late. Their prosecution of Geert Wilders is a travesty of justice and a threat to freedom of speech. And recently, they outlawed smoking tobacco products in bars and restaurants. I guess you can smoke weed and hash, but not tobacco in these "coffee houses". Couple that with the growing Muslim influence/threat, and you have bizarro-land.
And I imagine there are no thugs in Italy, Norway, Greece or Ireland? Come now, I am sure that criminals come in all nationalities (even American).
I hopped on his old bus, the Honey Suckle Rose
The party was Vegas it was after the show.
Alone in the front lounge with just me and him,
With one parting puff grim creeper set in.
I'll never smoke weed with Willie again
My parties all over before it begins
You can pour me some old whiskey river my friend
But I'll never smoke weed with Willie again
Now we're passing the guitar and telling good jokes
I know ones a-comin' cause I'm smelling smoke
No I do not partake, I just let it pass by
With a smile on my face and a great contact high
I'll never smoke weed with Willie again
My parties all over before it begins
You can pour me some old whiskey river my friend
But I'll never smoke weed with Willie again
In the fetal position with drool on my chin
I messed up and smoked weed with Willie again
LOL
Galtfan, on this point I tend to differ sharply from many of my conservative friends. A look at at the history of the Drug War shows, it is a waste of time, lives, and treasure. Other countries who legalize drugs avoid much of the down side.
I don't need a nanny sate mentality period…
Michael,
It would be interesting to do a Redux on Amsterdam as it is now. From what I'm told, the rising influx of Islamists is in the process of replacing the Dutch Laissez Faire with Sharia. Gay bars are being conveted to mosques, and the pimps are all Muslim.
No GACE, they only got half the equation right-the legalization of drugs and prositution part. Libertarian philosophy is that the govt should not subsidize their screw ups. Amsterdam is just a childish liberal "I wanna do whatever I want and not have to worry about any consequences" utopia that subsidizes stupidty and pnishes common sense.
wldbil,
This is one reason I went from Conservative to Objectivist. Objectivist is pretty black-and-white, and actually is fairly similar to what most "conservatives" I know believe anyway (anecdotal).
I believe in God, but have no use for religion. You do what you want, don't impose on me, and I will respect/tolerate your beliefs. (Freedom of conscience, 1st amendment).
I own far too few guns, but I am working on it. Who the hell has any right to tell me whether I can own some inanimate object or not? Guns are neutral, it is the user and application that defines their morality. (somewhere else in the Constitution, I think…).
The right to privacy is just that, a right. If I am not infringing on the rights of others, if I am am not causing harm to anybody but myself, if what I am doing is within the realm of my own being, bugger off pest! MY business! Alcohol, tobacco, trans-fats, salt… NOT DUI/DWI or any other public endangerment… AND, since I am self-reliant/responsible for my own well being, there is NO need for the government to worry what my impact on the budget will be… I don't expect any stranger to be responsible for my well being. I don't accept being imposed upon. Charity and coerced obligation are a world apart…
"Liberals", Leftists, Commies, Religious Right wing-nuts can all go to hell. In our poor economy, and with my gross under-employment I am CERTAIN I qualify for more than one form of "government" aid/welfare. I refuse. I know that that money comes from the pocket of another productive citizen, or from the future earnings of a child I may know. It's MY problem and I will solve it or suffer the consequences. I will not put my hand out. If I get desperate I will lean on family. Those who can't can turn to charity. How much better off would private charity be if we were taxed far less?
Jesus Christ had it just about right:
"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you"
He just needed to be more explicit in the "leave me the hell alone" aspect of it.
Wilson and both Roosevelt's were Progressives. Teddy did some major land grabs out West and set a precedent that haunts us to this day. I won't insult you by reviewing the record of the other one…
Rambling rant over, thank you for your time…
Yep, and there are places in America that most of these "delights" can be had now.
Why am I always moderated on this site but none of the other "Big" sites?
well, looks like I'm not gonna be around at Bigjournalism.com any more, haven't had a post go through in days so I must be banned
Give me back the Berlin wall
Give me Stalin and St Paul
Give me Christ
or give me Hiroshima
Destroy another fetus now
We don't like children anyhow
I've seen the future, baby:
it is murder.
Things are going to slide, slide in all directions
Won't be nothing
Nothing you can measure anymore
The blizzard, the blizzard of the world
has crossed the threshold
and it has overturned
the order of the soul
When they said REPENT REPENT
I wonder what they meant
When they said REPENT REPENT
I wonder what they meant
When they said REPENT REPENT
I wonder what they meant.
~~ Leonard Cohen (The Future)
'Is this where libertarianism leads?'
Let's see:
1) condom vending machines in high schools? NO. Libertarians oppose taxpayer-financed schools. One of the reasons why is because it's a lot harder to enforce moral standards in a public institution.
2) taxpayer-financed: abortions, contraceptive devices, sex-change operations and euthanasia? NO. Libertarians oppose socialized medicine in all forms. We support your right to purchase these services or products, but you have to find a way to pay for them yourself.
3) legalized prostitution: YES. At least with legalized prostitution people are checked for diseases. Also, it's a lot more difficult to exploit someone engaging in a legal activity. Not many people want to admit to a crime, even if they're in danger because of their participation in the crime.
[...] » Sex, Drugs and Cultural Euthanasia: Amsterdam, 1992 – Big Journalism [...]
Point 3 is the real issue, and depending on your interpretation of libertarianism, you're simply wrong. The fact that something is legal doesn't mean those engaging in it will be 'checked for diseases' or that it will be 'more difficult to exploit someone'. That assumes some regulatory authority, which is abolished with pure libertarianism. In a completely free and unregulated system there will most definitely be a race to the bottom.
Again, this is why I am not a libertarian. In its pure form it fatally ignores externalities. This isn't too surprising given that most of libertarianism's biggest fans are frightfully ignorant of economic theory (one of the reasons libertarianism irritates me is that this is the same flaw that blights progressivism: adherence to an impractical idea).
You need some external regulatory authority. This makes Government is a necessity. It should be as small as possible, but it will need to have some control, And, as it is the product of the individuals in a society, it will reflect that society's majority moral code. The acceptance of that is the definition of Conservatism, as I know it.
It should come as no surprise that the Dutch are being consumed by Islam. Cultural impotence invites conversion, be it forced or voluntary.
The way the libs are destroying this country – I say go for it here – at least people can tune their shrill rhetoric out and get some lovin and a good buzz – hopefully long enough to wake up from the nightmare that Barry & his band of socialist mo-rons are putting us through now.
Is death in nursing hone good choice?
Hollan is a beautiful country, i especially like the architecture in Amsterdam. Tolerance is one of the countries virtues. They let their citizens choose how to live their lives and this is Freedom! If you don't like it dont visit.
According to WIki, Yab Yum is no longer in business. It seems it was owned by either the mafia or Hells Angels, depending on whom you wish be believe. Note the article refers to its "proprietor" not its owner. This, plus Sharia law is where Dutch tolerance leads.
don't ya just love people who moralize how others live their lives then claim to be lovers of freedom, they get on my damn nerves
In my opinion alcohol is a hard drug compared to the soft drug, as they call it in Amsterdam, weed. Radio host Dr. Dean Adel considers Alcohol a more harmful drug than heroin.
Pretty much scares the hell out of you…..doesn't it. Wonder if this is a blueprint for America……….
Save the airfare. Visit a rehab facility…….
When Government highly regulated your vices this is called Serfdom, not Freedom.
Personally speaking I find flaccid dicks addicted to porn and pot to be an intolerable experince because all they ever do is sweat like pigs as they hump like jellied porkers.
Common in many countries, they're for safety- both for drivers and pedestrians- for cming around blind corners or out of driveways. C'mon, there's enough substantive areas for discussion here without total ignorance getting in the way.
Libertarians don't believe in PAYING for your sins, vices, or perversions, and fully believe in you suffering the consequences of them.
It's only freedom if it doesn't infringe on the freedom of others, otherwise it's just a perverse sort of anarchy.
Last thing I heard, this Muslim thing is not going well at all. The Dutch are very tolerant, the Muslims, well they kill the dutch critics they don't like (VanGogh). Then there is the Geert Wilders affair, where he really takes Islam to task for its Koranic scriptural sanctioning of violence. It seems that Dutch tolerance has finally met its outer limits. Because of this, there has a definite shift in the Dutch politic. Ironically, Mr. Wilders is speaking against what he bevlieves to be a very real threat Islamic threat, while Paris burns with Ismlac rage, while most other European leaders dare not speak at all concerning this volitile subject. Mr. Wilders is the only one who has the courage to speak out.
One need not travel to China to find indigenous cultures lacking human rights. America leads the world in percentile behind bars, thanks to the ongoing open season on hippies, commies, and non-whites in the war on drugs. Cops get good performance reviews for shooting fish in a barrel. If we’re all about spreading liberty abroad, then why mix the message at home? Peace on the home front would enhance global credibility.
The drug czar’s Rx for prison fodder costs dearly, as lives are flushed down expensive tubes. My shaman’s second opinion is that psychoactive plants are God’s gift. Behold, it’s all good. When Eve ate the apple, she knew a good apple, and an evil prohibition. Canadian Marc Emery is being extradited to prison for helping American farmers reduce U. S. demand for Mexican pot.
The CSA (Controlled Substances Act of 1970) reincarnates Al Capone, endangers homeland security, and throws good money after bad. Fiscal policy burns tax dollars to root out the number-one cash crop in the land, instead of taxing sales. Society rejected the plague of prohibition, but it mutated. Apparently, SWAT teams don’t need no stinking amendment.
Nixon passed the CSA on the false assurance that the Schafer Commission would later justify criminalizing his enemies, but he underestimated Schafer’s integrity. No amendments can assure due process under an anti-science law without due process itself. Psychology hailed the breakthrough potential of LSD, until the CSA shut down research, and pronounced that marijuana has no medical use. Former U.K. chief drugs advisor Prof. Nutt was sacked for revealing that non-smoked cannabis intake is scientifically healthy.
The RFRA (Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993) allows Native American Church members to eat peyote, which functions like LSD. Americans shouldn’t need a specific church membership or an act of Congress to obtain their birthright freedom of religion. God’s children’s free exercise of religious liberty may include entheogen sacraments to mediate communion with their maker.
Freedom of speech presupposes freedom of thought. The Constitution doesn’t enumerate any governmental power to embargo diverse states of mind. How and when did government usurp this power to coerce conformity? The Mayflower sailed to escape coerced conformity. Legislators who would limit cognitive liberty lack jurisdiction.
Common-law holds that adults are the legal owners of their own bodies. The Founding Fathers undersigned that the right to the pursuit of happiness is inalienable. Socrates said to know your self. Mortal lawmakers should not presume to thwart the intelligent design that molecular keys unlock spiritual doors. Persons who appreciate their own free choice of path in life should tolerate seekers’ self-exploration. Liberty is prerequisite for tracking drug-use intentions and outcomes.
Freedom is just another word for nothing else to lose (credit Janis Joplin) Society sets norms condusive to social order. When a society abandons all sense of restriction, anarchy prevails. Nature abhors a void. The net result for the abandonment in Holland is a influx of Islamists(seperate from Muslim) who see what they percieve as pure evil and therefor justifiably to be destroyed. Hence, when the uber-liberal artists depict their Prophet Mohammed as an insame bomber or a dog, they feel it is their personal duty to kill the infidel. And what is the societal response to such threats, debate sex, smoke cannabis, pot and just tune out. Well, the Dutch have nothing else to lose, so I guess they are free. Sad.
Bingo. But I just wanted to float the question and stir the hornets nest.
As I see it, libertarianism in its purest form, leads to anarchy. And anarchy leads to tyranny.
From what I have seen from many who espouse libertarianism is that they are really the same as liberals/progressives, except for their economic theory.
At the root, as you said, our government will be a reflection of the people. And right now, looking in the mirror isn't too pretty.
Do you really want me making your pathetic monkey life a living hell around here? I have the time to dog you to till you unplug your junk pile and toss that 1999 computer out the window.
You really want me exposing your ignorance? The asshole Rasta's were STONED OUTTA of there minds. They looked like skinny f-ed up morons like you.
Get the truck fired and get to scouring the dump.
Not for nothing, but… that chick is HOT.
When's the last time you were in Amsterdam moron? Paroled felons can't travel out of the county. TravelChannel doesn't count. You couldn't get out of sight of Maw anyway, she might do the whole town. Clown.
You're a stoner on top of being natural born loser? Anarchy isn't freedom, fool – lines need to be drawn here and there. What little you know about Amsterdam is that problems with their brand of "freedom" are getting worse and the people are calling for things to tighten up a bit.
You can still take my bong out of my cold dead hands.
Amsterdam is not my problem.
But regardless, Amersterdam's problem isn't drugs, it's immigration and political correctness.
Hey, cool. Stay stoned, I could care less, and yes drugs are a problem in Amsterdam. Add in Muslim youth gangs and the apparent inability of the Dutch to face their problems and we have – a mess.
Please bear with us. We have been having problems with the Intense Debate filters.
Apologize for the troubles we have been having with our filters. Correcting them now.
Totally disgusting!
The rear view mirrors were for the canal area hookers posing in the windows, so that they could see when/if a potential client was approaching and adjust their position accordingly – sit up straight/no slouching/smile, etc.
Looking at the Dutch is a front row seat to the fall of the Roman Empire, and America isn't far behind with their own brand of pseudo intellectualism…just read the posts here for legalization. More seems like a good idea at the time thinking, which is what the Dutch themselves suffer from.
The reason the drug wars in this country are not won is due to political power. Who wants to win that war when it means expansion of government, political appointments, etc. Don't forget moral relativism, as well as moral equivalence are two things people fall for the easiest. The 'it's your body' argument always seems to rule the day, right up until someone wants to commit suicide, and yet the effects of drugs are suicide, so it won't be long before we turn a blind eye to that.
I'm always amazed that people insist on repeating the failures of other people.
Isn't that what I just said? Thanks for clarifying since I'm so stoned I can't even understand the very words I just wrote.
Not exactly Spliffo. Benign immigration and roving Muslim youth gangs bashing non-Muslims aren't exactly the same thing. Context and syntax. Soooo, ya – Hit it again Spliffo, hit it again.
She's a sex slave, moron. You think she's standing in a glass booth holding a dildo because she wants to?
Go see "Taken". Then apologize.
Whenever I see a sex slave like that poor girl in the window, I have an almost overwhelming desire to go to the gun range.
Libertarians want to legalize prostitution, which will remove the last legal barriers against sex slavery. We already have a huge sex trafficking problem in every country as well as America. It is rampant in Holland. Oh, I hear the libertarians squeal (behind a cloud of pot smoke) that sex slavery isn't legal and legalizing prostitution will help stop it. Of course not, morons. Girls who are trafficked are usually drugged out of their minds (oh, there's that drug legalization problem again) and once they're raped sufficiently and hooked on enough drugs, they don't know how to free themselves.
I just sat through a sex trafficking seminar given by a Denver vice cop. He doesn't want drugs or prostitution legalized because that will deny him the only tools he has to get pimps off the street, and get girls out of this horror.
Oh, and any man who says prostitution is just fine and/or admits they visited a prostitute better not do it within ball crushing range of me. That is all.
Seem there are far more intrusive Government regulations when vices such as drugs and prostitution are legalized than when not.
Go ahead legalize the vices however at the end of the day all that will occur is an ever expanding Big Government; plus these vices will become the new tobacco TAX, TAX, TAX and more TAX along side regulation,regulation regulation.
Another funny note is that these vices will treated like gasoline; after pot and prostitution are legalized the Government will TAX to encourage the users to reduce their usage.
Like the moron Dr Krauthammer's premise 'high tax on gasoline to force consumers into reduce their consumption".
If you want your vices then keeping them illegal reduces opportunity for Big Government to seize your new found 'freedoms'.
Yes Joe Leftists ARE hypocrites. Maroons like you try to smear others while New York liberals try to ban salt ! Pot meet kettle. Why are the Red-trolls always the lowest in IQ and lacking even the most basic knowledge ? Sigh…
This guy is a great example of the idea that Liberalism is a mental disorder isn't he ?
I know, they even let an ever-growing Muslim population enact Sharia Law within communities!
That freedom will be going down the pisshole soon.
how strange that a peaceful lib would advocate violence.
You have it spot on Bob. Mr. Walsh should have written the article about the drug problems of the U.S. and Mexico. Violent crime in the U.S. is higher than that of the Netherlands. While I don't doubt crime in Holland, I visted quite often, it's far less of a problem than the drug cartels of Mexico & the U.S. Besides, we have a much larger problem here in the States; perscription drugs and methamphetamine abuse.
too bad they didnt whip your a$$
*claps* BRAVA!! Im joining you at the gun range…
I smoke marijuana. Why that gets under your skin I will never know. Must be the socialist inside you, you know, you have got to make people do what YOU believe is right. Screw liberty. You are just going to have to live with the fact that someone who is stoned all day long can be just as knowledgable as you are on whatever topic, and flatten you in a debate.
You sould like a fool while trying to talk down to me. I'm right. You know I'm right. I'm saying the same things you are, but you can't admit it. You have to spin words and such while throwing around terms like "context" and "syntax" because you believe I should be stupid and not understand reality and must bow down to the all knowing non-weed smoker. Get over yourself.
Robert Gibbs? Is that you?
P.S. How do you think those roving Muslim youth gangs got there?
Well said. I do not believe the government has a right to tell me what I can do with my body, as long as I'm not harming another in the process. Seems to me that is the essence of what it means to be free. Smoking pot may not be the best thing someone can do, but neither is having a beer or smoking a cigarette or eating a Big Mac… it goes on and on. As long as you don't harm another or violate someone's rights, I just don't believe the government has any right telling me how I can live my life.
The left claims to believe in this, being pro-choice means the government keeps their hands off your body. Yet they have no problem with the government running every OTHER aspect of your life. The right is of course against the concept of the government coddling you from cradle to grave, yet when it comes to the simple personal rights of body and bedroom, the social conservatives have plenty to say and can't wait to cast aspersions on your lifestyle and create a "War" on drugs that has done nothing other than guarantee that there will always be a good living to be made by selling drugs (because if they were legal, there would be no drug dealers.)
Just think back to Al Capone. Do you see anyone like him now? When's the last time you heard of a shootout between the police and someone trying to smuggle a case of Corona?
As a college kid, Amsterdam was…oh, sweet Amsterdam. Ah, but I digress.
Being for consensual sex between two adults is not the same thing as endorsing sex slavery.
Very good. Moralists want us to straighten up and do right. We would all cease to decline if we would just stop sinnin'. What BS.
The moral decline in this country has it's roots in the policies of our rulers in Washington. You can challenge morality but until an unjust Federal Government stops making unjust laws and stealing from it's citizens you are laughing in the wind.
Give me liberty or give me death. But now the cry is to give me more rules to moralize others with. My rules are good, yours are bad. I drink a legal drug that kills me and others, your drug is bad. People have given so much power to unjust laws and then have been educated for two generations by the government that they believe in and just have no clue.
Only a reaction to "make things right," by more rules of course…
Yes it is hypocritical. But not everyone here that is for small government believes it is a "case by case" basis. I believe in small government, across the board. That includes the legalization of drugs, the privatization of the school system, and getting rid of the income tax, among other things.
You may differ from your conservative friends on this issue, but you are in tune with your Libertarian friends.
The War on Drugs does nothing more than overprice a commodity that is not particularly valuable, and make people who might otherwise not be, unbelievably rich and powerful. Everytime you try to legislate morality, it backfires.
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