Originally Posted by dwsnc
This is a bit off topic, yet still relavent. I live in North Carolina and have experienced quite a bit of prejudice. A few close friends are Dutch and they are extremely racist even in my book. Granted we don't have the influx of muslims in my community as I see in Amsterdam, but we certinally have a large latino community and the city I live in is over 50% African American (I'm obviously white) but I find the intolerence of "brown people" in the NL amazingly out there < ie. burning community centers etc.
Certinally the dynamics of the situations are different, but the image of a liberal, tolerant Dutch culture is a facade when it comes to "brown people"
"Pseudo-liberal" is a term that is too rarely used.
On a related note, the Flemish/Dutch-speakers in Belgian security forces (including immigration/customs) comprise a majority of those Belgian "officials" who have been or are being investigated for affiliation with far right-wing parties/groups in the past two decades. [The majority political party of the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium just got shut down and had to reconstitute itself for promoting communal hate.]
Even in "liberal" Sweden, let's just say it's more than a rare judge who holds racist/xenophobic views... views that impact determinations of guilt and sentencing. If you are a Russian-/Slavic-/Muslim-/African-immigrant to Sweden and get pulled over by the Swedish police for speeding, the consequence are more serious than if you are an ethnic Swede.
Racist singling out of people seems to correlate with the depth of hate group members and their "sympathizers" penetrating the security forces .... at least in Europe.
I'd be curious if AMS flight delays correspond or don't correspond to the number of people "selected" for more thorough grilling.