Tag: netherlands

Carbon Neutral, Speech Negative: Amsterdam Bans Ads Featuring Meat & Fossil Fuels

In “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage,” I write about how censorship often becomes an insatiable appetite once countries go down the road of speech regulation. There is no better example than the Dutch and their recent ban on public ads for meat and fossil fuels. Activists have imposed similar limitations on advertising for products in the United States, from alcohol to tobacco. However, the Dutch law reflects how this tendency can metastasize into shielding citizens from unhealthy choices or influences.

It appears that Dutch painters such as Pieter Aertsen (with his work A Meat Stall with the Holy Family Giving Alms, above) were promoting harmful imagery in their work. As for Rembrandt’s “Slaughtered Ox,” the Dutch master is now little more than a climate change denier.

Starting on May 1, the ban on such images became part of Amsterdam’s push to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050. While purportedly neutral on carbon, it is manifestly negative on free speech.

As with other anti-free speech measures in Europe, this push again came from the left. The GreenLeft Party’s Anneke Veenhoff explained “I mean, if you want to be leading in climate policies and you rent out your walls to exactly the opposite, then what are you doing?”

The answer is engaging in free speech.

This is, of course, commercial speech, which is often subject to a lower level of protection. However, this shows the danger of using the differential standard to target products or industries viewed as unhealthy or ill-advised for consumers.

In Amsterdam, the ban will cover industries such as airlines, including KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, one of the largest employers and revenue generators in the country.

Notably, activists compare this to cigarette advertising bans, confirming the very slippery slope danger that those companies raised when they were targeted.

Hannah Prins, a paralegal at Advocates for the Future, is quoted as saying, “I don’t think it’s normal to see murdered animals on billboards. So I think it’s very good that that’s going to change.”

Other Dutch cities are now following suit, including Haarlem, Utrecht, and Nijmegen.

Of course, prostitutes still advertise live in Amsterdam and marijuana is a major industry for tourists.

If you want drugs, there are ample choices.

However, if you want a steak, you will have to rely on word-of-mouth directions.

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Dutch Court Orders Bill Gates to Stand Trial Over COVID-19 Vaccine Allegations

Gates, along with Pfizer CEO and Dutch officials, accused of knowingly promoting unsafe vaccines; attempts to evade trial rejected as November 27th hearing approaches.

Dutch courts have officially ordered Bill Gates to stand trial over allegations related to COVID-19 vaccines. Seven plaintiffs who suffered vaccine-related injuries claim that Gates, along with other high-profile figures, deliberately misled the public into receiving injections that they ‘knew or should have known’ were neither safe nor effective.

The lawsuit also names former Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla, and several key figures from the Dutch COVID response team, accusing them of complicity in the deception.

Gates attempted to evade the lawsuit, arguing that his status as a U.S. citizen should shield him from Dutch legal proceedings. However, the court ruled otherwise, stating that Gates’ close involvement with other defendants who are under Dutch jurisdiction made him subject to trial in the Netherlands.

Now, Gates and his legal team are facing mounting pressure as they prepare to confront these serious accusations in court, with the next hearing scheduled for November 27th.

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Dutch Sex Ed Video SPARKS Fury Over Teaching Kids Masturbation

A disturbing Dutch sex education video has exploded across X, igniting fierce backlash from parents who see it as a blatant attempt to sexualize children under the banner of “comprehensive” education.

The clip, produced by the Rutgers Foundation in the Netherlands, features facilitators in a classroom setting quizzing elementary-age kids about touching their genitals and experiencing pleasure.

Rutgers pulled the original video in 2025 after the initial outcry but the damage—and the questions—keep spreading.

The program is part of Rutgers’ “Spring Fever” (Lentekriebels) initiative, rolled out in Dutch primary schools as early as age 4. In the resurfaced footage, adults ask boys questions like “Do you ever play with your dick?” or “Do you ever touch your willie?” while probing girls on orgasms, clitorises, and vaginas.

Dutch politician Nicki Pouw-Verweij weighed in on the broader Rutgers approach: “Many parents have no problem with sex education, but they do have a problem with sex education at school. We have been teaching teenagers how to prevent STDs for decades, and that has never caused any problems. Teaching children about diversity or masturbation is something completely different.”

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Dutch Nazi Extremist Arrested for Plotting to Kill Princesses Catharina-Amalia and Alexia of the Netherlands

The Princesses have been objects of several nefarious plots.

The future Queen of the Netherlands and her younger sister were targeted by a far-right extremist who developed a ‘Nazi murder plot’ against them before authorities discovered and preempted the attack.

The New York Post reported:

“A 33-year-old man will appear in court next week after he was suspected of planning to harm Princess of Orange Catharina-Amalia, 22, and Princess Alexia, 20, in February.”

Catharina-Amalia is the heir to the throne of the Netherlands, and Alexia is second in line.

“The suspect was captured in The Hague, where he was carrying two axes engraved with the names ‘Alexia’ and ‘Mossad’, Israel’s intelligence agency, as well as ‘Sieg Heil’, the propaganda chant used by Adolf Hitler and his Nazi regime, officials said.”

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Dutch doctors euthanized an autistic teen. Why some say that should be a ‘wake-up call’ for Canada

Four-and-a-half years after he was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder, a Dutch teen was euthanized at his request.

The boy, aged between 16 and 18, had described his life as “joyless.” He’d struggled with anxiety and mood-related problems, and where he fit in, in the world. Oversensitive to stimuli, “every day was an ordeal he had to get through,” according to the latest annual report from the Netherlands’ regional euthanasia death review committees. “In the final weeks before his death, he lay in bed the whole time.”

Despite his young age, his doctor had “no doubts whatsoever” that the youth had the mental capacity to appreciate what he was seeking, and that there was no prospect of improvement, according to the case report.

His death, part of a dramatic increase in psychiatric euthanasia in the Netherlands in recent years, should serve as a warning to Canada as a special parliamentary committee reconvenes to assess the country’s readiness to permit MAID on the sole basis of mental suffering, a prominent Canadian psychiatrist says.

The Dutch experience “should be taken as a wake-up call,” said Dr. Sonu Gaind, a professor of medicine at the University of Toronto and a past president of the Canadian Psychiatric Association.

“The threshold (for assisted death) in Canada is actually lower than the Netherlands,” Gaind said. “If MAID for sole mental illness is opened up in Canada, the numbers would significantly exceed what you see in the Netherlands.”

Proponents of MAID for mental suffering have long held the Netherlands out as a model — “no slippery slope there” — arguing that psychiatric euthanasia in Canada, like the Netherlands, would remain extremely rare.

However, the Dutch situation suggests a more appropriate metaphor for the risks of medically assisted suicide for mental illness “is not a slippery slope but a runaway train,” as Charles Lane reported last week in The Atlantic.

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United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Japan, and Canada Will Now Join US to Keep the Strait of Hormuz Open

The leaders of the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Japan, and Canada have now signaled they will join the United States in a coalition to secure and keep open the critical Strait of Hormuz, the vital oil chokepoint the bloodthirsty Iranian regime has turned into a terrorist kill zone.

As The Gateway Pundit previously reported, the radical Islamic mullahs in Tehran launched a desperate campaign of economic terrorism after U.S. and Israeli strikes hammered their nuclear sites and terror infrastructure.

Iran mined the strait, attacked unarmed commercial vessels, targeted oil facilities, and effectively closed the waterway that carries nearly 20-25% of the world’s oil supply.

President Trump refused to let America shoulder the entire burden alone. He blasted the freeloading “allies,” took to Truth Social, and demanded that nations dependent on Middle Eastern oil step up and send warships.

“Hopefully China, France, Japan, South Korea, the UK, and others, that are affected by this artificial constraint, will send Ships to the area so that the Hormuz Strait will no longer be a threat by a Nation that has been totally decapitated,” Trump said.

He even threatened to “finish off” Iran and let NATO and Asia handle the mess if they wouldn’t get in gear. As we reported, the initial responses from Europe were weak and uninspiring, classic globalist foot-dragging.

Now, with Iran’s attacks growing more brazen and the Strait’s security directly tied to global oil flows, those same allies are signaling that they are prepared to stand with the United States.

That does not yet mean all seven countries have announced warship deployments.

The joint statement so far supports that they have formally backed efforts to keep passage open and are ready to contribute, while some governments are still working through what their exact role will be.

Britain, for example, has been publicly discussing possible deployments, including ships and mine-countermeasure assets, but final national commitments appear to remain in motion.

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Amsterdam: Explosion at Jewish school condemned by mayor as ‘deliberate attack against the Jewish community’

A bomb has gone off in a Jewish school in the capital city of the Netherlands, Amsterdam, in “a deliberate attack against the Jewish community,” according to the city’s mayor.

Mayor Femke Halsema said in a Saturday press release that an overnight explosion in a residential area on the south side of the city, which caused some damage to the school.

“This is a cowardly act of aggression toward the Jewish community,” Halsema said. “I understand the fear and anger of Jewish Amsterdammers. They are increasingly confronted with antisemitism, and that is unacceptable.

No injuries were reported in the incident.

Halsema reported that police obtained Closed-Circuit Television (CCTV) surveillance footage of an individual planting the explosive near Cheider, a Jewish school.

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New Government of the Netherlands Is a Poster Boy for Europe’s Thirst for War

Warfare seems to be top of mind not only for the Trump administration, but also for the new government of the Netherlands. The coalition agreement of the Jetten I cabinet, installed in late February, presents an unprecedented push towards militarism that includes a doubling of the defense budget, a tax on freedom, royals in fullcamo gear and clear steps towards the reintroduction of forced conscription.

Cabinet Jetten I
“Aan de slag,” which roughly translates to “Let’s get to work,” is the title of the coalition agreement of the new Jetten I government, comprised of the progressive liberals of D66, led by Prime Minister Rob Jetten, the conservative liberals of VVD and the Christian Democrats, CDA. As a rare minority government – the second in the country’s history – it has only 66 out of 150 mandates in Parliament and a mere 22 out of 75 in the Senate and will therefore be completely reliant on opposition support for its various proposals. Nonetheless, it did not shy away from presenting far-reaching objectives in nearly all policy areas, first and foremost defense.

Never mind that “getting to work” might be a bit late for a cabinet comprised of three parties of which at least one or more were part of every single cabinet since 1971 (not counting various predecessors of current parties, which would bring the count back to 1918). Indeed, although D66 is currently the largest party in Parliament with 26 mandates, it was the VVD under current NATO Secretary General, then Prime Minister, Mark Rutte, that led the Netherlands from 2010 until 2024, when he left to take on his current role at NATO.

Hawks lead the way
The echo of Mark Rutte is clearly heard through the new cabinet’s choice of Minister of Defense: none other than his own successor, VVD party leader Dilan Yeşilgöz, now holds the post. Other remarkable choices include the new Minister for Foreign Affairs, CDA-member Tom Berendsen, who was previously an MP in the European Parliament and, with a background in industrial policy, ran his own election campaign (in the 2024 European elections) mainly on stressing the importance of the European defense industry in relation to the war in Ukraine. Moreover, he is known for his hawkish stance on China. This pair is completed by the new Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation, D66-member Sjoerd Sjoerdsma, who will have to navigate promoting Dutch trade whilst being on both Russian and Chinese sanctions lists simultaneously. Notably, in 2022, Sjoerdsma was also the initiator of an adopted parliamentary motion to increase the Netherlands’ defense spending to NATO’s then 2% of GDP standard (a goal that the country had thus far failed to meet), underlining his forward leaning position in terms of defense.

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Dutch farmers protest across the country in response to proposed environmental laws

Farmers all across the Netherlands have banded together in recent weeks to protest newly proposed emission cuts that would devastate the livestock industry, with farmers shutting down major city centers, distribution centers, airports, and more across the small European country.

On Tuesday evening, police fired upon farmers in their tractors.

Police said that they were responding to a “threatening situation” in which farmers were attempting to drive their tractors into officers and service vehicles at just before 11 pm.

According to Friesland police, officers issued warning shots as well as more targeted shots.

One tractor was shot, with the tractor being stopped shortly after. Three people were arrested, and no injuries were reported.

Due to shots being fired, The Rijksrecherche, the Dutch government’s internal investigator, has been requested to conduct an investigation into the matter.

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AI FLOP: Dutch Court Annules Couple’s Marriage Over ChatGPT Speech

It may have been artificial, but in this case, it was not intelligent.

We live in a world where the power of Artificial Intelligence is starting to impact many aspects of our lives – and not always for the best.

Case in point: a Dutch couple had their marriage annulled after the person officiating used a ChatGPT-generated speech.

Yes, you read it right.

The AI speech that was intended to be ‘playful’ but authorities decided that ‘it failed to meet legal requirements.’

This was announced in a court ruling published this week.

Reuters reported:

“The pair from the city of Zwolle, whose names were redacted from the January 5 decision under Dutch privacy rules, argued that they had intended to marry regardless of whether the right wording was used when they took their vows.

According to the decision, the person officiating their ceremony last April 19 asked whether they would ‘continue supporting each other, teasing each other and embracing each other, even when life gets difficult’.”

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