Post by pieter on Jan 15, 2006 15:49:16 GMT -7
pawian said:
pieter said:
Teachers, pupils and Duch journalists and politicians were offended by the incident,
Yes, I wanted to know if their indignation was real, i.e. did they really feel that DUTCH children, and not some Moroccan or Berberi emigrants` children, were offended.
if it was real, then it means the process od assimilation of these dark-skinned children into a Dutch society has really taken place and they are considered Dutch, not alien.
I don't know what really happened, but I think the Polish and german border guards have treated the youngster inproperly,
The coach was detained at the border for 4 hours, the time needed to check all passports very thoroughly. Especially the passports of coloured children. Besides, Polish custom officers allegedly were rude to one
Filipino girl, and finally they asked the Dutch teacher: "Do you have any normal children here?" (Normal means white Europeans).
The teacher`s comment was that Polish customs officers seemed to have never seen coloured people before.
Their indignation was real, because Moroccan or Berber emigrants` children are considered DUTCH children, because they carry Duch passports, speak Duch and have jobs in Duch supermarkets, horeca and shops.
It is the Duch humanist tradition of sensibility for discrimination, racism,
anti-semitism and xenophobia. There were also news programs who showed items about the bad treatment of Polish (guest) workers who were treated badly by Duch employers. And anger about the refusal of Polish German teachers for Duch highschools, because we have a lack of teachers.
It is ambivallent, because the process of assimilation of these dark-skinned children into a Dutch society has only partly been taking place, and even if t they are practically Dutch, they are stil alien, because of their ethnic accent, integration problems and discrimination on the labourmarket (in daily practice, Duch employers choose for a white Duch compatriot in staid of the
colored -maroccan, Turkish or Antillian- who came before him or her.).
Knowledge of Duch, and being able to read and write, read and understand it propperly is seen as very important. A lot of foreigners are unemployed due to that. You have a lot of Duch unemployed ofcourse, but the percentage under Maroccan, Turkish and Antillian Duch are a lot higher.
That gives tensions in the large, poor neighbourhoods, populated with large
immigrant families and single immigrant housholds (some of them go in an inner immigration. Rejecting the Duch society, and becomming very relgious
Muslims - they call that, becomming "Serious"-, abandoning the streetlife,
drugs, alcohol and sexual promiscuity of their little criminal brothers, and the "normal" working and studying immigrant kids, who work, study and go out -living Duch secular lives, as secular Duch Muslims-. These "Serious" guys, easily get radicalized by internet, the close extremist circles, housemeetings and extremist mosques they attend. Via new fundamentalist
extremist immigrants they get ideas and instructions for the Jihad in Kashmir in India, Iraq and Chechenia, and training in Pakistan.
A minority of them develloped themselves as activists for the Duch and other Western society, the Hofstadgroup, who assasinated the Duch filmmaker Theo van Gogh, wanted to kill Duch politicians, blow up a Gay bar
in Amsterdam, and had plans for an attack on the Duch airport Schiphol
and a Duch Nuclear plant). Unfortunately I have to say that you have a sort of segregation in the Duch society, between Black and white neighbourhoods, schools, clubs and etc.
Ofcourse you have mixed schools and neigbourhoods (I live in one), but the majority of the people live in ethnic area's. In the same time the immigrants
are segregated themselves. Turks live, work and socialize with Turks and Maroccans with Maroccans and etc.
I think that the treatment of the of the coloured children by white Polish custom officers, reminded the Duch of their own colonial past where we treated our black people as less develloped, we were constantly reminded that Apartheid was a Duch word (and that the Afrikaander opressors,
blond, blue eyed farmers looked like Duch farmers from North-Holland,
and had Duch ancesters), our colonial regime in Indonesia, and the bad treatment of our coloured colonial troops in Holland in the fiftees, sixtees and seventees . The Duch are very aware of that and are ashamed
of that past, like many Germans are deeply ashamed of the Holocaust, and therefore very anti-racist, anti-nazi and often pascifist (never an agressive
German army again).
Yes, the case of the Filipino girl shocked the teachers, fellow pupils and the Duch public especially. In Holland we have got used to coloured and immigrant people, because I grew up with coloured kids on school, had immigrant colleages in the jobs I head and when I go out the clubs and pubs are often mixed. But in the same time you have that segregation with the Islamic schools, Islamic neighbourhoods and coffee houses, clubs and shops.
So in fact in Holland we have three sorts of environment, the white Caucasian Duch society, the Mixed society (I live in) and the foreign immigrant society of the Mosque, black school and ethnic getto.