Fortuyn, Van Gogh, Hirsi AliDriving out the Unholy Trinity from the Netherlands

COV & RVulnerability and Tolerance

Amersfoort, July 5th 2007

Henri Beunders

I. Tolerance and the Dutch Constitution

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The Dutch Constitution, since 1983

• Article 1:‘In cases alike in the Netherlands everyone will be treated in the same way. Discrimination because of religion, philosophy of life, political orientation, race, gender or on what ground thinkable, is forbidden’.

Article 6 and 7

• Article 6: ‘Everybody has the right to profess freely his religion or philosophy of life, individual or together with others, subject to everyone’s responsibility according to the law’.

• Article 7: ‘Nobody needs beforehand permission to express thoughts or feelings through the press, except everyone’s responsibility according to the law’.

Another part of this article states this is true for any other medium.

II. The forces profondes

• World War I: aloofness led to prolongued moral and religious strictness, and naivety

• World War II:Defeat, Adjustment & Collaborationled to shame and guilt in the post-war era

III. The genesis of the Dutch crisis

• Secularization left people empty handed

• The end of political polarization

• Americanization

• Multicultural Society

• Emancipation of ‘the masses’

Pim Fortuyn enters politics, 2001:‘At your service!’

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Fortuyn cartoons by adversaries

Fortuyn killed May, 6th 2002by a vegetarian fanatic:

reason given: ‘He was a danger for society’

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Theo van Gogh killed November 2, 2004 by a muslim fundamentalist

Ayaan Hirsi AliSomalian refugee, writer and islam critic

Member of Parliament (2003-2006),targeted by Mohammed Bouyeri as well

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IV. ’An Amsterdam Cabinet’

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‘An Amsterdam Cabinet’

• Writer Harry Mulisch on the Purple Cabinet, 1994:

‘Well, it had always been the provinces that were calling the shots, and I count The Hague among them too. This will become an Amsterdam cabinet, a big-city-cabinet. They know a totally different kind of people, move about in other circuits. That gives a cabinet like this a different aura, more worldly’.

The Bourgeois Bohemians

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V. Nihilism-with-a-human-face

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‘Silent marches’ against ‘useless violence’

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VI. Envy in the Media Culture

• newspapers got envious of television

• Public broadcast system got envious of commercial stations

• Everybody started imitating each other

• Irony and cynicism were the order of the day

VII Irony doesn’t like passion

• Fortuyn, Van Gogh, Hirsi Ali all attacked the ironic postmodern era

Theo van Gogh, controversial filmdirector/writer

• In 2004 f.i. he made a tv-movie with young ex-criminal Maroccans • He called imams ‘pygmies’, fundamentalist muslims ‘goat fuckers’• He had to face several libel lawsuits.

Submission, 2004

• A 11 minute tv-film by Theo van Gogh and Ayaan Hirsi Alion the suppression of women in Islam (August 2004)

‘Submission’

• Film fragment: Koran texts painted on flogged female body

Bohemian Rhapsody

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Conclusions

• After a period of neglect, arrogance and rivalry Dutch society was in need of ‘violent’ adjustment to the real world outside

• Fortuyn was called a hype, an incident. The elites thought it was over at the end of 2002

• Van Gogh and especially Hirsi Ali proved that democracy in the multicultural society is not for weak people

• Driving out this Unholy Trinity has made society more alert, stronger, not weaker, including the Muslim community.

• Caution and selfcensorship is the price we pay now for this new peace, maybe at the cost of some old minorities like jews and homosexuals