A video showing a young Dutch man talking about Moroccans, and why he thinks that extreme-right politician Geert Wilders is correct in saying that they should return to what he thinks it their ‘home’, went viral after it was published by a popular Dutch website.
“It is preposterous that, if you have an opinion about foreigners, you’re immediately labelled a racist. I cannot get any benefits, I can’t get a job, and meanwhile, you know how much an asylum seeker costs the state? I don’t know, but it’s a lot. It’s time all those Moroccans return to Istanbul, I’ve had enough.” This man’s ignorance is symbolic of those voting for Freedom Party leader Geert Wilders, whose campaign focuses on popular issues on which he raises empty arguments and makes bold statements, persuading many to think that he is the only politician who is proactive.
But he is not. Even the leader of the Dutch Labour Party, which used to be known for protecting the vulnerable in society like these second generation migrants, attacked by politicians almost every single day, recently said that ‘Moroccans have an ethnic monopoly on nuisance’. The multi-party system in the Netherlands has caused political parties to care more about seats in Parliament rather than representing their citizens. Migration is a popular issue in the Netherlands, like in any Western European country nowadays, and Islamophobia is on the rise as people are increasingly uninformed in their commitments to political issues. They do not know the full picture, yet they draw conclusions about people from Morocco living in the Netherlands.
A woman holds up Moroccan and Netherlands passports as she takes part in a protest against Geert Wilders, leader of the Dutch hard-right Freedom Party in Amsterdam, 2014. Image Source: REUTERS/Cris Toala Olivares http://uk.reuters.com/article/2014/03/23/uk-netherlands-politics-wilders-idUKBREA2M07220140323
Aspects of this ignorance has resulted in Freedom Party member Machiel de Graaf being able to make unchallenged statements about the Labour Party’s suggestion that Palestine should be recognised as a state, on a day in which four Israelis were killed by an attack allegedly executed by Muslims. Because people are generally uninformed about the Israel/Palestine conflict, they allow de Graaf to make statements of this nature without being aware of the thousands of Palestinian Muslims who have died because of the actions of Israel.
Machiel de Graaf bluntly states that the Netherlands can only be a beautiful, functioning country without Islam and without Muslims. He called Islam a ‘collection of retarded, barbaric and extreme ideas from a 77th Century pirate, paedophile and mass murderer’, and said the Netherlands would be without violence and hatred only without Islam. Presenting a very biased collection of examples, he has made it seem like religious and racist attacks have only been executed by Muslims, while many Muslims experience Islamophobia, racism and violence on a regular basis. De Graaf has even suggested that Muslims create Apartheid in the Netherlands, while it was in fact the Dutch who enforced this aristocratic regime in South Africa.
A while back, a post was circulated on Facebook concerning a Muslim man who allegedly had two wives, and in this way, navigated the Belgian benefits system so that he gained an illegitimate and incredibly disproportionate amount of benefits, because of the unusual family structure and all of those involved being unemployed. People condemned this and said the exact same thing would happen if ‘someone like him’ moved to the Netherlands. They ignored (or perhaps were unaware of) the fact that the Dutch benefits system works differently to the Belgian one, and the fact that the Dutch government does not acknowledge polygamy. Besides that, they claimed that Islam was the only explanation for polygamy, while polygamy is originally an Arabic phenomenon.
When Dutch retailer HEMA decided to drop the notorious ‘Black Peter’ symbol, deciding that it was racist, a man wrote a letter to the company, returning his Apple Pie Gift Card and saying that it is ridiculous that HEMA sells head scarves for Muslim women, but refuses to sell Black Peter products. The letter went viral, with many Dutch people agreeing with the man, ignoring the fact that a racist issue is something very different from an expression of faith. “HEMA has moved itself into an impossible position by stopping the sales of Black Peter associated products while continuing the sales of head scarfs to Islamic women. Our innocent patriotic tradition is thus put aside while a sexist, harmful obligation is OK according to HEMA,” the letter read. Using Facebook once again, hundreds of thousands of Dutch people shared an image of the letter.
During his election campaign tour, Wilders prompted an entire room of Freedom Party voters to chant ‘Less! Less! Less!’ after he asked them whether they wanted more or less Moroccans in the Netherlands. Over 100 Muslims from the Netherlands are thought to have joined ISIS. There is no evidence of a direct connection between these two, but the hostile environment that Dutch politicians are creating is harmful and offensive. A country that expanded its power, knowledge and budget through international business and a tolerant environment in its prime is now offending an entire religion and its people, simply because it is a popular topic. A country that has exploited Indonesia, Suriname and South Africa in the most horrible ways, claiming the land as its own, is now complaining about second-generation migrants and their beliefs.
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