The anti-Islam, euroskeptic radical Geert Wilders is projected to be the shock winner of the Dutch election.
In a dramatic result that will stun European politics, his Freedom Party (PVV) is set to win around 35 of the 150 seats in parliament — more than double the number it secured in the 2021 election, according to exit polls.
Frans Timmermans’ Labour-Green alliance is forecast to take second place, winning 25 seats — a big jump from its current 17. Dilan Yeşilgöz, outgoing premier Mark Rutte’s successor as head of the center-right VVD, suffered heavy losses and is on course to take 24 seats, 10 fewer than before, according to the updated exit poll by Ipsos for national broadcaster NOS.
A win for Wilders will put the Netherlands on track — potentially — for a dramatic shift in direction, after Rutte’s four consecutive centrist governments. The question now, though, is whether any other parties are willing to join Wilders to form a coalition. Despite emerging as the largest party, he will lack an overall majority in parliament.
What the fuck is happening to the world?
Far right extremists claim easy solutions to complex problems. With housing etc pricea going through the roof it’s easy to demonize foreigners etc.
Look what happened in Germany with hyper inflation.
If you look at the projections for muslims living throughout Europe over the next 30 years with current levels of immigration you can see there will be a Muslim majority in many parts of Europe. I’m not saying that’s a problem necessarily but it will be a big cultural shift if that takes place. There is some concern that many muslims have followed their holy doctrine in moving towards sharia law. I’m not trying to be islamaphopic it’s just quite difficult to discern between the muslims who want to live in peace and live a western lifestyle and those who want to live under sharia law and those who want to live under some hybrid system and what that might look like. These are the outcomes whether you want to accept it or not. Yes it’s complex and difficult.
This is the first generation with worse prospects than the previous one. Wealth inequality is growing, and robber barons are back. Climate change is making any prospects even worse.
Combine that with a communication revolution (social media, to be exact) which allows anyone to pretty much target anyone else with any message they feel like, means disinformation pushing narratives is everywhere. And not to forget, there people in charge of these platforms are among the aforementioned robber barons.
It’s easy to offer simple solutions to these problems and push disinformation to people who don’t have the knowledge, time or energy to debunk everything and think deeply about things, since they’re busy slaving away to put food on their tables, struggling to build a future, and looking for solutions. And simple answers give people a sense of control or explanation over their difficult situation.
It’s why I have completely removed myself from every social media platform there is, except this one and I’m only on here intermittently.
True, but the generation that tends to vote far right is the boomer generation - it’s the generation that failed to pass on rising prosperity and gave us the climate crisis.
If you look at elections in europe, it’s pretty consistently the 35-45 year old demographic that votes right the most. Every age group votes right and it’s not like it’s only boomers, with the exception of young voters <30 (and women) which do vote significantly more left
E. G. Netherlands https://www.statista.com/chart/8178/pvv-largest-party-but-not-among-youth/
Do we know why? For Americans, I can see the nihilism of the grunge era affecting the latter part of that group, and possibly having a lasting effect towards political compass.
But I can’t think of a reason of the top of my head for European millennials driving so deep into that side of politics.
I think it’s for many different reasons, but a bit the same as everywhere. Some are protest votes due to a distrust in government in general, then 35-45 is the age most get kids and in contrast to their parents generation they live in apartments, not single family homes, as houses aren’t affordable. Then there’s the general widening of the wealth gap and the populists pretending they have a solution and blaming it on immigration (while themselves being a big reason for the problem in the first place…), while left parties often get tricked into reacting to right rhetoric, letting the right dictate the discussion. Old people are less affected by the wealth gap, young people don’t have kids so they don’t notice yet. And in it’s also a question of mobilizing ones base, the right parties get a ton of money for ads and so on, they are good at stirring up fears of existential threats(which is ironic given the real existential threat of climate change), while a lot of people are disillusioned, so middle aged left voters are less likely to actually go vote whereas more right voters do. Of course <30 voters worry more about climate change and are more motivated to go vote, since they’ll be the most affected by its effects.
I’m sure there’s many more reasons but these are the first ones I can think of off the top of my head.
It seems you are more equipped to deal with the disinformation on social media than most of us. Although I understand the desire to step away from the fray, a mind like yours is sorely needed in times like this.
That is not true unfortunately. I tend to be very left wing socially - economically I’m more left of center - and that was reflected on my social media as well - either pushing me towards more radical content or stoking anger with more radical right wing content to get me riled up and coming back for more.
I ended up with a growing hatred and emnity for a growing number of people and “groups”, and black and white thinking. Even though I was aware that I was being manipulated, it was still impossible to sit on a high horse above the fray.
It’s quite easy to manipulate human minds, even ones that are careful and aware. We can all be manipulated. It’s why advertising works, for example.
The only thing to do really is to not play that game. Avoid advertising, avoid other content curators deciding what you get to see and telling you how to reason, etc… realise that most people are empathetic, that most people want what’s best, and those that are radical have been manipulated to be that way, sadly.
Good question. But honestly you just got to look at history for the answer. Far-right extremism often do better when it’s hard times like we have right now.
Amongst other things: Russia.
https://www.amazon.com/Putins-Trolls-Frontlines-Russias-Information/dp/1632461293
And in this specific case, it’s literally Russia: https://nltimes.nl/2023/10/19/leaked-documents-show-connections-pvv-russia – this is often the case for far-right European parties. Russia supports them quite significantly. This is one of the thousand reasons why Russia needs to be stopped and seriously discouraged in Ukraine. I have some hope that now that Putin has played his hand, his influence in European parties will start to diminish. But it’s not looking good yet.
Geert Wilders is a 100% israeli puppet. At 17 years old Geert went to live as an illegal occupier for 2 years in the West-Bank for the israelis. He has visited israel at least 40 times the last 25 years, more than once a year.
A quote from an NOS article about Geert Wilders life as a colonist: (Dutch article)
The later founder of the PVV resides in the West Bank, territory occupied by Israel since 1967. “Although I prefer to call it ‘liberated territory’.”
Look up what Stephen harper is president of right now.
I don’t think this is Russia. Its ex Canadian PM
I’m sure if you look deep enough you’ll even see Russian links there. Harper is a vile weasel.
If you mean IDU, that’s a more moderate center-right coalition. Conservative, sure, but not far-right populist like PPV.
Russia isn’t supporting those center-right parties (to my knowledge), but rather the far-right populists.
We are unfortunately in one of those moments in history where far right authoritarianism is troublingly in vogue.
The right has a cohesive strategy for getting and keeping an animated base, while the libs are focusing on maintaining a status quo that people hate and are creating voter apathy.
Just to be clear liberal doesn’t really make that much sense in Europe as it dose in the US. Liberals are mostly on the right side of politics while in the US it’s on the left. So if you where to talk with European people then they would talk about the left or the right. In my country for instance the only party that is truly liberal is all the way to the right. The left is socialists mostly and while the US have some socialists the democrats in the US is much more to the right than most Europe “left” would be.
Right, you do have some politicians in the US like Bernie Sanders and Alexandra Occasio-Cortes who would be considered Social Democrats in Europe. But yeah, US politics are really opaque due to the two-party system. There are a lot of politicians in the Democratic party who would be considered center-right market liberals in Europe.
From what I see, the center left politicians in Europe are still liberals supporting capitalism. More of a social democracy which is for sure better than the individualistic libertarian ideas being promoted in the states, but capitalist none the less. Still not fully addressing the ethics of the population as a whole.
Also, I do realize that America isn’t the center of the world, but it definitely has serious impact on what the people of the world see as the trajectory of the future. Especially if (and this is pure speculation) if the right is able to create fox style echo chambers in other countries using the narrative of following the American superpower.
In this election, the “libs” are the VVD who, as a socialist (GL/PvdA) I’d hate to say but, are the most right wing reasonable party. You cannot project American political discourse and concepts on Dutch politics.
When I say “libs” I don’t mean 1 party, just any party that express liberal values. Which, based on the Wikipedia page, would include PvdA and everyone to VVD. Bernie and AOC are also libs.
Capitalism makes living harder, populist fascism fools voters, cycle repeats
Everyone thinks that Russia became hostile with war in Ukraine. They were already fighting war with the West for years and it is bringing fruits. It is the war of disinformation and unlike the traditional hot war, they are very good at it and it is now bringing fruits.
It’s going fascist.
Other parties haven’t taken any called for measures when it comes to immigration, now far-right is reaping the benefits.
It’s pretty shit but sorta expected if you just stubbornly avoid addressing the issues people have.
Populism never addresses the issues people have, it preys on their insecurity and creates issues.
Even doing lip service seems to be working better than what the other parties have done
Billionaires control everything and everyone
Social media, mostly.
They’ll probably have 16 parties getting seats and many refuse to work with him. He’s not going to be prime minister or anything.
Sure, but that only works up to a certain point. When they are ignored, voters will get even more annoyed and he might grow towards next election and become impossible to ignore. The same is happening with Vlaams Belang in Vlaanderen.
I like your optimism, but VVD and NSC are probably going to try to work with Wilders.
Won’t get them a majority in the senate, with BBB they have 30 of the required 38 seats there.
They don’t need one. It would be convenient, but it’s not required
Without it, things will get quite difficult. They’d have only 30 out of the 38 needed for a majority which would be very low, particularly without obvious partners who wouldn’t rather watch Wilders fail. It’s not required to become PM sure, but he’s going to have to do something if he wants to get anything actually passed.
Does he actually want things passed though? Can’t have people change their mind on your policy if you do nothing
He’s been in the game quite long, well before the current common brand of right-wing populism. He actually has plans he wants to execute, and he’s definitely going to try and do it.
Bist du faschistisch?
Please don’t confuse The Netherlands with Germany. In NL they speak Dutch (“Netherlandish”), in DE they speak Deutsch (German).
Confusing? Yes. But it is what it is.
(And don’t get me started about Holland vs. The Netherlands :) )
Sorry, it’s from Rick and Morty, when he’s going through different dimensions and every one of them is fascist.
Internet + deliberate misinformation (lies) = broken democracy.
Most people don’t understand politics, and think “guy talking louder than everyone is my favorite guy!”
Remember that one of the notable reasons W won his first presidency is that a lot of people thought he’d be a cool guy to have a beer with.
NWO technology it’s at the head while all of the world still believe representative democracy it’s still possible.
Unpopular take incoming: The Left is principally made up of people who are Agreeable, so they want to help others rather than win resources over others. What happened is the Left are unable to draw lines and limits on certain issues for fear of causing pain. The end result is this alienates a lot of swing voters, often in the working classes.
The Left has always been a haven of the middle classes. They become so preoccupied with calling working class people bigots / stupid, that they forget that the working classes often feel the impact of politics more strongly and are more incentivised to vote.
This is an issue with the left deviating from reason and reality due to an increasing population of younger left wing supporters who have barely spent any time in physical reality, being the most online generation yet. Some of the physical realities that affect the largely natively white working class population in western european countries simply do not occur to these middle class, left wing people.
Migrant workers competing for jobs and class (being told they are better than you and being passed over on jobs by them), eco friendly and green societal initiatives making things often less functional and more expensive, etc etc.
One could blame the ruling classes for some of these elements but truth be told, the bottom half of the middle classes start feeling these effects, they start to see a different perspective too.
Politics has always, and will always follow Economics.
The left isn’t calling working class people bigots. We call people bigots who exhibit xenophobic behavior. If they are working class, they’re being a working class bigot. The working class needs solidarity, not right wing propaganda.
Xenophobia is irrational fear. There is plenty of rational fears, particularly for working class people who see their existence challenged on a daily basis.
What the general narrative suggests (and what you seem to be approaching here too) is disingenuously characterising much of this fear as one of superiority - or in other words predatory, superior views and behaviour. It’s nearly always fear of the unknown, or of threats, whatever those might be.
Well said. You can look at the current situation in Canada, where our government has been driving excessive immigration levels despite the fact that we have a shortage of almost all infrastructure at this point. They have tried to call down any opposition to this policy as racist or xenophobic.
However most Canadians respect the fact that “we are all immigrants” and have no issues with immigrants. And we are tired of being called xenophobic just because we want to slow the rate of immigration until we can rebuild our housing stock, medical system, transportation, and actually create some good paying jobs for people.
So people like myself who are working/middle class and traditionally aligned with the left as it is supposed to support unions and labour solidarity, are now discarding the left as it has discarded us. A continuous push to devalue labour by bringing more people than are needed to the country is anti-worker, it’s “left” but it’s the wrong kind of left! We have no party that represents the working Canadian anymore.
So the issue is that we haven’t given neoliberals enough after giving them everything?
Could you unpack this a bit for discussions sake
When the going gets tough the tough get going… Economic crisis, inflation, unemployment, keep choking people with taxes “for welfare” and this is the result. It was politicians and economists who should have studied history and learned before making all this happen, now we can’t blame lay people.
Right it’s welfare making people poor, not corporations pocketing nearly all economic growth for the last few decades.
Nobody ask how all the wealth has trickled up to a handful of techno-billionaires at the very top!
The slide towards far-right fascism continues…
Don’t worry, the headline is too sensational. (Which is a pet peeve of mine anyway: headlines should be objective. I can make up my own mind please)
He didn’t win a majority. He won’t form a goverment. If he does, he will be powerless in the coalition. If he does get to make laws, they won’t pass the senate (called “1ste kamer” in NL). And if he does, the government will fall anyway (which is a Dutch tradition anyway).
So a lot of ‘outs’ :)
No worries!
Only your last one seems valid. Dutch coalitions aren’t very stable. The only stable factor of the last 12 years has recently left politics.
The question is indeed who is willing to form a coalition government. The most likely option is PVV (far right), VVD (neoliberal), and NSC (Christian democrats), of the latter can convince their voters they can accept the far right.
Not very stable indeed. Since ‘Kok’ (2002!), NL has had 1 cabinet come to full term (Rutte II I believe). In 21 years 8 goverments. 1 full term of 4 years, so 7 in 17 years. Elections every 2,5 years on average :/
But hey, at least NL is not Belgium :D
*Sad Belgian noises
So just any belgian noises then?
I’d wish upon Omtzigt to stick to his morals and tell the PVV to pound sand. Meanwhile, Timmermans has already declared that he’s ready to lead the opposition, and he has a history of zero patience for fascists, so there’s a chance this’ll become a minority coalition.
Yeah…but…FPTP.
deleted by creator
Geert Wilder wins Dutch election
35 of the 150 seats in parliament
Let’s please stop using FPTP language to describe very non-FPTP systems and outcomes.
Also the Dutch political system relies very heavily on coalitions and the “polder model” since no party can ever win a majority of seats in their House of Representatives.
Asking out of ignorance, but why would no party ever be able to win a majority? Are there just too many parties to allow for one to have that much control?
In theory it is possible, in practise it is not. Indeed there are a lot of parties covering the spectrum from left to right.
Its a bit like italy: you have many right and left parties, but each one has some flavors (stance in different issues), so you vote for the right/left party that is more in line with you social and economical policies (or a part leader you like for personality).
Since there are many choices, and each party tries to get a slice if the electorate, its very hard for a single party to cather to the majority if the peoples.
So they form a coalition, and each party in the coalition pass what are the common points, and depending on how well they have done) compromise within the coalition to pass some if their agendas
There is no reason for more unity if folks know they will have to work together. I look at American party’s more as a sort of permanent coalition goverment then political partys really. The real benefit in my view is that this goverment form always stears back to the center, Geert can say what he wants Omzigt and Yeşilgöz wil force him to compromise a lot to form a goverment.
Read the whole wiki, and all I can tell is it’s a label some politician came up with for simply compromising on a common goal to push it through when multiple parties overlap at least partially in agreement of that goal. Nothing beyond that, doesn’t say how, give guidelines or a framework. I guess it’s just a label for being ok with no majority party.
Agreed “win” is too simplistic. Still good shot at forming government though. I’m not familiar with the Dutch system, but, even in systems with proportional representation, the plurality winner usually gets first shot at forming government, and by convention usually does form government. They need 76 seats to govern and are more than halfway there with 37.
This is how we do it. But it might be difficult for him to form an alliance, since all other relevant parties have serious issues with parts of his party program.
Mostly because his program is extremely rightwing but also extremely leftwing at the same time. And financially its all a big foggy mess.
I don’t know how the Dutch system works, but some time ago a pro-Russian party won like 30-40% of seats in Latvia, but every other party joined together against them. And they couldn’t do shit even though they had the biggest number of seats. If it’s not 50%+1 - it doesn’t matter.
I believe no party has ever held an absolute majority in the Netherlands. And there has only ever been one time in the Netherlands when the biggest party did not govern.
Personally, I see two options: the most likely is Geert Wilders will become our prime minister, or (less likely) there will be new elections.
We have had to stand months of the Spanish opposition leader saying he “has won the election” because he leads the most voted party, even though it was impossible for him to form a coalition that would give him the government (the other right wing parties are either centralist, decentralist or independentist, and will veto each other). Even some international media bought this narrative and eagerly presented the idea that there was going to be a change of government.
What does FPTP mean?
First past the post - the party with the most votes ‘wins’. It’s in contrast to a range of other systems that rely on proportionality or preferential voting to ensure that the party or parties with majority support wins.
For example, imagine a scenario where there are 10 constituencies electing a representative by FPTP. In each of those 10 constituencies, the result is identical as follows:
- Nazi - 40%
- Liberal - 30%
- Socialist - 20%
- Conservative - 10%
Under FPTP, the Nazi would be the top candidate in every constituency, and so win 10 out of 10 seats and have total control of the legislature, even though 60% of people voted anti-Nazi. This is the system in the UK and US.
Under a proportional system, you would allocate the seats in proportion to the votes cast - so 4 for the Nazis, 3 for the Liberals, 2 for the Socialists and 1 for the Conservatives. The non-Nazis would then have a legislative majority (6 out of 10 seats) that reflects how people actually voted, and could form an anti-Nazi coalition government. This is the system in the Netherlands or Germany for example.
Under a preferential system, you still elect seats on a constituency basis, but you make sure that the winning candidate is preferred by a majority of voters in the constituency - either by having multi-round elections or by having voters rank candidates instead of just voting for one. In a simplified system, you could rule out all but the top two candidates (in this case, Nazi and Liberal), and then have a second round of votes two weeks later for voters to decide between those two candidates to represent their seat. This tends to favour more moderate candidates so it’s likely under such a system that the Liberal would generally defeat the Nazi in the second round in most seats. This is the system in France.
There are also hybrid systems like Single Transferrable Vote, which simultaneously achieve proportionality and preferential voting - this is used in Ireland.
THIS IS NOT AT ALL HOW THE US WORKS
Under FPTP, the Nazi would be the top candidate in every constituency, and so win 10 out of 10 seats and have total control of the legislature, even though 60% of people voted anti-Nazi. This is the system in the UK and US.
This description is outrageously wrong regarding the US. Each contest is FPTP but we have many contests centered on geographic regions. Because of this the the breakdown you listed above for the 4 parties ends up with drastically different results based on how these people are distributed geographically. You could see anything from them winning virtual no seats to the majority of seats. You could NEVER win all seat
Our senate is 2 seats per state with some states having as little as around a half a million people and some having tens of millions. Our house is nominally more democratic but its not truly exactly proportional and its subject to gerrymandering.
It’s certainly broken enough to potentially practically provide 51% of the power to a party supported by 45% of the people but its not so bad as to provide 100% of control to someone with 40%
That hypothetical involved an evenly distributed political population, which would work that way under the US system.
There has never been an evenly distributed political population in the history of the US nor is there ever more than 2 major parties in any given contest. This isn’t just happenstance. By definition any third party that grows strong enough to count pulls votes from the party they are most alike ensuring the victory of the major party that is least like the small party.
For instance a normal race looks like 50 Republican 47 Democrat 3% split between 4 different parties. Say one party the libertarians which is aligned with Republicans in many respects gains in that singular race 6% to themselves next go round. This isn’t even enough for anyone to believe you could actually win just respectable enough for people to know you even EXIST. What happens is that you draw your votes mostly from would be Republican voters due the verisimilitude of your positions. You end up with something like
45% Republicans 46% Democrats 6% Libertarians 3% other
Congrats you both caused Republicans to lose ensuring the Democrat would torpedo the very positions you championed and ably demonstrated why no third party can ever get more than minor traction. This is a fundamental feature of the American political system.
That is exactly how the US system works, with a handful of exceptions.
For the election of a Senator or Representative - it’s almost always FPTP. The candidate that gets the most votes wins the seat, regardless of whether or not they got a majority of the vote. The state of Georgia is an example of an exception, as they hold a runoff election for Senator if the leading candidate falls short of 50% - as happened with the elections of Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock, both of which went to runoff.
For the presidential election, this also how it works in the vast majority of cases. 100% of a state’s electoral college vote goes to the candidate that gets the most votes, regardless of whether or not they got a majority of the votes in the state. You have a situations like Texas in 2020 giving 38 electoral college votes to Trump and zero to Biden (versus a proportional allocation of more like 20 Trump, 17 Biden and 1 Jorgensen). That electoral college system results in situations like 1992, when Bill Clinton got a 370 vote electoral college landslide on 43% of the vote because of Ross Perot’s third-party candidacy, as well as situations like 2000 and 2016 where a Republican candidate who came 2nd in the national vote still came 1st in the electoral college by virtue of coming first past the post in enough individual states. (I believe the exceptions are Nebraska and Maine, which split their electoral college votes.)
First past the post
First Past The Post, which is more typically called ‘plurality’ in the US. Each person votes for only one candidate; the candidate with the most votes wins.
It’s normal language where I live and we’ve always had a multi-party democracy without FPTP
He only got 25% of the vote and it’s a consolidation of other right wing votes, so there is no right wing majority.
So it’s not much different than earlier elections, but now it’s concentrated in his party, making him the largest.
He will not be able to form a government without making concessions. And making concessions will lose him voters.
So yeah, interesting times, but I am not worried.
The headline seems much more sensational than the numbers lead me to believe.
In most countries “winning” the election implies having a majority.
In coalition countries like ours, it only means becoming the biggest party.
Hence why the headline might lead people to a wrong conclusion.
Practically speaking, it’s more important which potential coalition has a majority. And the parties on the right don’t have a clear majority, nor do the left parties.
So it will either be a center-right or center-left coalition.
Center-right will be attempted first, since we customarily let the largest party initiate, but it will be quite difficult since we have two chambers and different parties on the right are big in different chambers.
If he fails, center-left has a clear majority in both chambers with the same parties.
Edit: need to correct a mistake. Center-left also doesn’t have a clear majority in both chambers. Two of the big parties in this election have very few seats in the other chamber.
But not a problem, we often have coalitions that don’t have a majority in the Senate. Our House (this election) is more decisive and the Senate more facilitating.
A GL/PvdA-VVD-NSC-BBB combo has a majority in all chambers. It’s a difficult coalition, but the only one that seemingly commands a majority in both chambers.
If he won the election, why would he not be able to form a government?
Because he doesn’t hold a majority. In the Netherlands parties must form a coalition to govern. It might be difficult to convince other parties to join the coalition given his stances. However, I do think Geert Wilders will become our prime minister. I’m very much hoping he’ll fuck up, the government will fall and a more reasonable person will take over.
I guess netherlands was like, “you know, things have been going too well here”
Things have been going shit here actually, and blaming minorities for a country’s problems is still a surefire way to win votes. As a dutch person I’m sad, embarrassed, and scared.
“Going to shit”, really?
NL is one of the best countries in the world. Yes we have some challenges, e.g. stikstof or crappy goverment (e.g.toeslagenaffaire), but common, don’t be soo fatalistic.
And yes, live is getting very expensive. Which is the result of the late-game capitalistic piramid scheme we live in. That sucks, sure. But that is not solvable any time soon. Especially not by NL :D
- the government doesn’t take climate change seriously
- it is basically impossible for a large group of people (including me) to ever buy a home
- any sort of nature here is dead and over half the country doesn’t seem to care
- inequality has been growing for decades
- the country is incredibly polarized
- after over a decade of neo liberal VVD policy, the majority of people apparently yearn for even more right wing policy
- Ajax are 12th in the eredivisie
Or course I’m being a bit dramatic but considering how things were I do think the Netherlands is going to shit a little bit. Of course it’s a better place to live than many other places, but in my opinion it’s definitely getting worse.
Are there any capitalist countries not like this at the moment? The problems seem the same everywhere, and the response always seems to be a rise in fascism.
NL is one of the best countries in the world.
That can change. Norway is also one of the best countries in the world, but they’ve been doing the same thing I see happening in the UK: not funding health care adequately, police corruption scandals, refusing to decriminalise and legalise drugs, not really using the oil fund money enough (unlike Alaska (US) which pays dividends to its citizens from its oil fund, not exactly a left-wing US state compared to Norway), welfare benefits being reduced, the Norwegian state used to fund housing coop development which led to 20% of our population living in democratic housing but isn’t doing that anymore and now we’re in a housing crisis, inequality has grown over the last 50 years, union density has reduced over the last 50 years, …
When we’re talking about things going to shit we mean relative to where we were before. Don’t get me wrong, there’s a lot I wish we had in the UK that Norway has, but the trajectory looks oddly similar to what happened and is happening in the UK. We’re currently boiling frogs and because things are going to shit so slowly it’s harder to notice. Like, so much counter evidence to what we’re doing exists around the world if we simply look at how other areas are solving problems. For example, Finland is the only country in the EU where homelessness isn’t increasing and housing prices have actually decreased* - wanna guess how they did that? (hint: the state gave people free housing)
* at least until recently, housing markets are weird now because of the inflation, but theirs were falling before that
This is happening because things haven’t been going well. Same can be seen all over Europe. Shit times and whether for a good reason or not, immigration issues have become a big issue in the minds of the people. Established moderate parties have avoided addressing that issue and that’s why far-right parties, who keep banging on about being strict on immigration and immigrants, keep winning a bigger share.
Moderates are handing far-right votes by ignoring what people are concerned about. I know it’s a dilemma to parties who don’t consider it an issue (do you really want to go in on an issue you don’t believe is an issue), but people think it’s an issue and feel like they aren’t being heard.
the Netherlands has been on a steady decline, and housing especially has been a massive issue
the netherlands is a good country because we are still benefitting off of our past, but we are not improving
People need to understand that in a democracy, winning the plurality of the votes is not the same as winning the election. If no-one will work with him, he will not be in government.
In a republic*, ftfy. Republics and majority rule in general are not at all so democratic. The vast majority of the population has entirely no input in government.
Republic, you say? *King Willem-Alexander has entered the chat*
Does he have any effective political power?
not until he forms a coalition
Wait what? In the Netherlands the king forms a coalition? Or is it like in Belgium where the king appoints someone to try make a coalition and if he can’t then appoints someone else. Usually party heads of the parties in decreasing order of number of votes 😅 I guess the only real power the Belgian king has is censoring a party from initiating coalition talks.
oh i misread the comment you were replying to
no, the king has no real political power and constitutionally cannot have any
in fact, in practice he barely has a job in general and only exists to (?)
The Netherlands isn’t a republic and republic basically just means “not a monarchy”. Whether it’s democratic or not is an entirely different matter.
Hell, North Korea is a republic. So is Finland. You can be a democracy without being a republic and a republic without being a democracy.
The Netherlands isn’t a republic and republic basically just means “not a monarchy”.
A republic means a state with representative democracy. (Not strictly necessarily representative, but it’s hard to even imagine a State system with full democracy.)
You can be a democracy without being a republic and a republic without being a democracy.
Exactly, because a republic isn’t very democratic. What I’m saying is that representative democracy is barely democratic at all. Especially when using systems like majority rule. In most representative democracies today, the general public is barely if at all participating in the government of public affairs. I’m purposefully using the original meaning of the word democracy: government by the people or the people governing themselves. If the only way we can govern is by checking a box on a ballot twice a decade and that resulting in anywhere between 1 and 250 people having full authority over an entire country, I would not call that governing at all. And it shows that in most republics, policy enacted by their governments rarely represent what people actually want and care about.
There’s a few definitions but this is the first one in quite a few dictionaries and on Wiki
A political order whose head of state is not a monarch and in modern times is usually a president.
While Wikipedia mentions that power rests with the public (hence the name) instead of a monarch:
Representation in a republic may or may not be freely elected by the general citizenry. In many historical republics, representation has been based on personal status and the role of elections has been limited. This remains true today; among the 159 states that use the word “republic” in their official names as of 2017, and other states formally constituted as republics, are states that narrowly constrain both the right of representation and the process of election.
Exactly, because a republic isn’t very democratic. What I’m saying is that representative democracy is barely democratic at all.
Those are two different things.
Would you argue that the head of the state of the Netherlands is the king? It being written to be so doesn’t mean it is so in practice.
Would I argue that the king is the head of the state of the Kingdom of the Netherlands? Obviously?
The Kingdom of the Netherlands (Dutch: Koninkrijk der Nederlanden, pronounced [ˈkoːnɪŋkrɛik dɛr ˈneːdərlɑndə(n)] ⓘ),[g] commonly known simply as the Netherlands,[h] is a sovereign state consisting of a collection of autonomous territories united under the monarch of the Netherlands who functions as head of state.
Sure that’s in paper. But does he head the state? North Korea is also a democratic republic if you go by the official definition…
I’m from Belgium, which is also a kingdom, but our king has absolutely no power. The state is headed by the federal government, not by the king, in practice. I would imagine that to be the case in the Netherlands too.
Yeah but they’re still democratic systems.
It’s terminology. I guess they’d be called so today, yes. They wouldn’t be called like that a few hundred years ago when the term democracy first became public. The word democracy actually has a very interesting history. At the time of the founding of the United States of America, the founding fathers were actually motivated in crafting the constitution of the republic by fears of democracy breaking out. The resulting constitution also never mentioned the word democracy in it.
If you’re gonna ban Islam, at least ban every other religion at the same time so you don’t look like a racist.
That would make him a leftist though
Yeah, it would.
I didn’t think you’d make the argument of “if you’re going to be a far right politician then at least be left”
It’s a circle, not a line. Far left and far right end up meeting in the middle.
I guess if you consider “we got rid of our differences” and “we got rid of the different people” to be the same it is
But if you’re talking about right wing governments pretending to be left for PR then I would discount them as just being right wing
Why do you think they give a shit about looking like a racist?
I’m ok with that
Even atheism. And agnosticism. If you have a single opinion at all on theism you’re out.
Not elect fascists worldwide (challenge impossible )
What we really need now is a nice World War one.
A nice large draft to cull the world’s population and make sure the working class appreciates how good they have it to not be in a muddy trench.
Odd war to pick given it led to a rise in fascism
WW1 lead to fascism, fascism lead to WW2. What did WW2 lead to? And what leads to WW3?
Cold War > Capitalism > WW3
The cold war was a result of capitalism, not the other way around. Part of the reason the rest of Europe allowed fascism to rise was because it was more aligned with capitalism than some of the competing ideologies on the left, like socialism, communism, and anarchy.
I’d also say that capitalism lead to WW1. Capitalism is imperialism for the masses, and the war was directly an imperialist war. Plus, the emerging arms industry was playing off rivalries to make maximum money, which lead to that being the time where both sides thought that they had a temporary weaponry advantage over their rivals. Some thought “either fight and win a war we can win now or they’ll invade and win after their next upgrade cycle in 5 years”.
If Russia had won the Cold War then I would have wrote communism in that spot
The flaws of capitalism aren’t new or unique to capitalism, even the bible lists them as sins
There is no perfect system - humanity just needs to self-regulate when it goes to shit. When are we finall gonna eat the rich?
For effing sake, that is a stupid idea that is so widespread.
Beware of the broken window fallacy.
Wilders wants to ban mosques
That’s cool, as long as we ban churches, cathedrals, synagogues, and temples at the same time.
I really didnt know this guy was still around, he hasn’t been making the world headlines so much in recent years.
Don’t forget gurdwaras, stupas, and wats.
Oppressing people’s religious beliefs is not “cool.”
People will still practice those beliefs while they are being oppressed. It won’t create an atheist utopia. It’ll just create more terrorism, crime, and discrimination.
Ban religion it will be religious groups throwing down the governement.
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Took the convertion of one emperor
Limiting what structures can be built/open and where isn’t oppression, it’s standard government policy everywhere on earth. People can still believe whatever they want.
Only discriminatory if it favors one group over another, so ban them all.
I am not discussing structures.
Also the government restricting building at the whims of a local populace is what caused our current housing crisis so not exactly the argument I’d make about how efficient that system can be.
Why do they all have weird fucking hair?
At this point, it’s not even weird. I’m just glad they aren’t tarnishing any look I would miss. I mean, in an alternate universe, I could see myself rocking a Chaplin moustache. But they can have the thinning, wiry, bizarrely-styled blond look all to themselves.
“Politics of me” beats “politics of we” once again.
More like “politics of being to dumb to see further than the tip of if my own nose”.
Aww…the rest of the world is going through their own Trump phase now.
Shit’s contagious, like covid
You mean the Berlusconi phase, maybe.
It’s really weird to see Republicans doing poorly in the US while the far right makes gains in Europe
I don’t think it’s a phase in the short term unfortunately. The world shifted too far into PC culture, ‘acceptance’ to the point of segregating anyone with a differing opinion, cancelling anyone with an accusation against them prior to any sort of conviction etc and I really think it just pushed all the people who were quietly racist/sexist/whateverist to a point they are loud and standing up for what they think is right. It’s created a shift of what you can and can’t say backwards and suddenly a lot of people who still hold these opinions albeit very frowned upon felt empowered by seeing their opinions on TV, internet etc and began to speak up.
Just seems like the world is doomed to run in a cycle. I think it’s going to get a lot worse before it gets better.
the world is falling to fascism. Fuck this goddamn planet just smite us already jesus fucking christ
If the conservatives want for Jesus to come down himself to smite us, THIS is how they will get them to come down himself to smite us. I hate how this happens
The left just has to stop taking in muslims first
Fuck.
Don’t worry. He didn’t win the majority. Headline is too sensational.
The Netherlands has always been a centrist, or even socialist, country. That won’t change.
In fact, this could be a blessing in disguise: let him try to form a goverment. He won’t. And if he does, he will fail making policies/laws that are too far right anyway. And then after a few years, the coalition will fall apart. And we will vote again. And then he will lose this temporary win again.
I am 0% worried.
I’m quite sure he will fail. Still worried.
The worlds sick of liberalism, so their solution is…fascism.
🫣
