Tag: liberalism

Pim Fortuyn on 4 May 2002, two days before his assassination

Troubles in the Multicultural Society

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Crossroads of civilisation

In several ways, the Netherlands has been ahead of the rest of the world, such as in liberal reforms like gay marriage and the right to decide about ending one’s own life. It was the result of the political manoeuvring of the left-wing liberal party D66 and, most notably, its leader, Hans van Mierlo, who had schemed to make it happen. The Christian Democrats, who had always been in the government, had long blocked progressive reforms. In 1994, after the Christian Democrats had lost the election, D66 forged the purple coalition with the social democrats of the PvdA and the right-wing liberals of the VVD. These parties set aside their differences and focused on their shared progressive values to implement amendments. A large section of the Christian Democrat electorate supported these changes, including most Roman Catholics, so they remained uncontested afterwards.

The Netherlands is one of the least nationalist countries. In their preparedness to die for their country, the Dutch score particularly low, according to a Reddit survey. It is the most closely tied to both the continental European and the Anglo-Saxon world. Together with Great Britain, the Netherlands is oriented toward the United States. It may explain why the Dutch provided more NATO heads than any other country. If geographical distance indicates cultural distance, it is worth noting that the Netherlands lies between Great Britain, Germany, and France. Being close to Scandinavia, it was also one of the least corrupt countries, with a fiscally prudent government.

The Netherlands long ranked highly in sexual liberty. Prostitution is legal and performed openly in red light districts. It was not all good. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, paedophiles could operate in the open until the focus returned to the damage they do to children. On the work floor, equality is the norm, as the Dutch balance work and private life, which is uncommon in most countries. In many ways, the Netherlands has progressed the furthest. The Netherlands doesn’t lead on all fronts. For example, the country lags in the number of women on boards and in parliament.

On top of that, the border between the Roman Catholic and Protestant worlds runs through the Netherlands. And so, it became the crossroads of Western civilisation, and with more minorities coming in, the crossroads of world civilisation. That wasn’t on my mind at the time, but in hindsight, there is more to it. The Netherlands means ‘the Low Countries’ because half of it lies below sea level. The word ‘Nederland’ almost translates to ‘humble country’. The most unpretentious part of it might be Twente, the region I came from.

The Dutch are known for their tolerance, which is close to indifference. There had long been parallel societies with Protestants, Catholics and socialists living separate lives, so it was mind your own business. For long, Protestantism had been the official religion and Catholicism was illegal, but Catholics could hold masses in secret. That was tolerance. Today, smoking weed is not a problem. The Netherlands was also a haven for Jews until the German occupation during World War II. That same tolerance was the stance towards immigrants for a long time. In that sense, the Netherlands didn’t differ from several other Western European countries.

It was a fairy-tale society, with Van Kooten and De Bie seeking the nuance. Their characters represented the so-called conservative, ignorant and xenophobic undercurrent in the Dutch culture, and of course, hustlers, such as Jacobse and Van Es, infiltrating politics with their corrupt schemes and dubious deals. The undercurrent didn’t go away. Instead, it grew stronger. Immigrants continued to arrive, causing a growing unease. The progressive values many Dutch cherished didn’t agree with the conservative worldview of many immigrants, most notably Muslims. These feelings only needed a catalyst, like the Germans needed Hitler, to give the anger and discontent a voice.

The existing political parties had become complacent and didn’t see what was coming. Nor had I. After the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001, a maverick politician, Pim Fortuyn, rose to prominence with his strong views on immigration and Islam. Fortuyn claimed that leftists were to blame for immigration. He called them the Leftist Church for their moral superiority claims. They would call you a racist if you opposed immigration. Many wanted to contain immigration, most notably of groups that had trouble adapting. Only, no politician said it that plainly as Fortuyn did. The others were more careful not to promote division in society. Most immigrants did okay, and inciting hatred wouldn’t improve things. Keeping a good society is not a simple affair. It is like a juggling act of keeping many balls in the air. Fortuyn didn’t seem to understand or care and sought personal fame.

Balls on the ground

Fortuyn had terminated the fairy tale of the multicultural society. I had believed in it or wanted to believe in it, for if there will ever be world peace, the world must unite and become one multicultural society. Living with people from different cultures isn’t easy. I should have known that, given what happened to me as a student. Culture can be an unbridgeable gap. Some Fortuyn supporters seemed to anticipate civil war and hoped that it would start sooner rather than later, when the authentic white Dutch were still a majority. The atmosphere quickly turned grim. Under the guise of free speech, the sewers opened, and the rivers of hatred flooded freely into the open. Fortuyn’s rise made headlines in the international press because it represented a clear break with the past, occurring in what many believed was the most liberal country in the world.

Fortuyn supporters overran the IEX message board with their vile and racist comments. So when someone created a new account on IEX, started posting, while suggesting he was a Turk to test the mood, others viciously attacked him. Fortuyn was openly gay, and his objection to Islam was that it didn’t agree with Western liberal values. He further pointed out crimes committed by immigrant youth, especially those of Moroccan descent. Racists and bigots jumped on his bandwagon. However, and that was where leftists like me got it wrong, the movement was more than just bigotry and racism. Tribal identities are obstacles to unity, not only internationally, but also within countries. It is as problematic as the existence of nation-states. Fortuyn picked up one ball while dropping several others.

A leftist poster with the avatar Kingie started a new website, BeursKings (MarketKings), with the help of. Danger Money. A small group left IEX and joined the new message board. I was among them. I was part of the so-called Leftist Church and had tried to rein in the onslaught of bigotry. One of the IEX posters called me ‘vicar’ for my efforts to moralise. Had BeursKings not started, I would have remained on IEX, so it was not a case of fleeing. BeursKings remained in operation for several years. Kingie once posted several photographs of himself on the website. That was a shock. He looked like my double. In hindsight, that is remarkable because of his avatar name. Others who remained on IEX also joined the BeursKings message board.

Shortly before the elections, a left-wing loner assassinated Fortuyn. Fortuyn had already hinted at it. If something were to happen to him, he claimed, it would be because establishment politicians had demonised him. The socialist-in-name-only Marcel van Dam, who lived in a luxurious mansion far away from multicultural neighbourhoods, and who had always been eager to take the moral high ground, once called Fortuyn an ‘exceptionally inferior human.’ And so, you may ask yourself, who of the two was the most superb Nazi? Fortuyn gave a presentable at-your-service salute that might do well in some fascist circles, but his ‘inferior human’ remark gave Van Dam the edge.

Others called Fortuyn ‘extreme’ or ‘demolishing society’ because he was stirring up public sentiment. Fortuyn was a man of theatre, hyping the wrongs others did to him while being a jerk himself. The Netherlands is not a violent country. It was the first political assassination in 400 years, so no one saw it coming. The civil war didn’t arrive, but death threats to politicians have become common. The attitudes toward immigrants and Islam have also changed. Fifteen years later, the United States saw the rise of a similar leader.

Fortuyn’s assassin, Volkert van der Graaf, was diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome. He was someone like me. To him, Fortuyn may have been a new Hitler on the rise. He feared Fortuyn would tear down Dutch society so that the weak, such as the poor and refugees, would suffer, and also animals, as he had been an animal rights activist. Van der Graaf drew a logical conclusion from the facts, or so he believed. The problem with this kind of thinking is that we don’t know the future. Mass immigration can destabilise a country. Van der Graaf had good intentions, but Fortuyn also believed he was serving the Netherlands. Yet, there was something evil about Fortuyn. I am not a trained psychologist, but Fortuyn was someone who wanted to be the centre of attention and wield power, and didn’t care about the consequences of his actions, much like Donald Trump.

Harry Mens, a Dutch real estate tycoon whom you might call the Dutch Donald Trump, had promoted Fortuyn on his television show, Business Class. So, like Trump, Mens had a television show. Fortuyn’s appearance on his show foreshadowed a new type of politics, common in the United States but not in the Netherlands, in which wealthy money men run puppet politicians. I found Mr Mens to be a questionable character, boasting and flaunting his wealth. At the time, I didn’t think of Trump, but there are parallels. His programme was about investments with people in suits and dresses promoting their investment services. A few advertisers on his show turned out to be frauds, such as Palm Invest.

I think of Pim Fortuyn and Donald Trump as narcissistic psychopaths. These are not official diagnoses, but personal impressions. However, some psychoanalysts concluded that Fortuyn was a narcissist, possibly because of feelings of inferiority that he needed to compensate for with praise. It was all about him, and other people were just utensils. His neurotic disturbances and unresolved personality flaws made Pim Fortuyn such a powerful force. One psychoanalyst said, ‘Imagine if he had to go on a state visit to US President Bush. He would exhibit Sun King-like behaviour.’1 To Fortuyn, the US President would have been a mere extra in the Pim Fortuyn show. Even though the psychoanalysts didn’t raise that particular issue, Pim Fortuyn seemed to enjoy hurting other people’s feelings, so I suppose he was a psychopath as well.

If you consider the characteristics of narcissistic psychopaths, you might discover they are the opposite of Asperger’s syndrome. I name a few: (1) thriving on chaos versus thriving in order, (2) desiring to be the centre of attention versus not wanting attention or praise, (3) manipulative and lying versus honest and forthright and (4) charming versus impolite. At first glance, Fortuyn and Trump seemed impolite rather than charming. That needs further explanation. First, you don’t have to check all the boxes to be autistic or a psychopath. And second, the impoliteness of the autistic person comes from being honest. By being rude, Fortuyn and Trump catered to the fear and anger of their supporters. They told them what they wanted to hear. What can make psychopaths successful as leaders is that they are willing to hurt people, which may be required to do what is necessary. With these words, I conclude my psychoanalysis session.

Life went on

Beurkings attracted a few posters who remained on IEX. One of them, Xzorro, didn’t believe the 9/11 conspiracy theories and thought that the success of the attacks was due to the incompetence of the American authorities. Yet, he believed the allegations that a high-ranking Dutch Prosecution official, Joris Demmink, had had sex with underage male prostitutes and that there was a conspiracy within the Dutch government to cover it up. An investigative journalist and conspiracy theorist, Micha Kat, had pursued the matter relentlessly for many years. In the 1990s, there had been a police investigation into possible child abuse by four high-ranking government officials.

The investigation had collapsed after someone had leaked information. During raids, the police found no evidence on the suspects. Fred Teeven, who had led the investigation, later stated that Demmink had not been a person of interest. The Dutch newspaper AD claimed that Demmink had contact in the 1980s with a pimp of underage boys. Kat was onto something, but he was a nutter. Kat later claimed that children buried in a Bodegraven cemetery were the victims of Satanic child abusers, which was nonsense and easy to disprove. And Kat had a conviction for making death threats to a fellow journalist.

Another poster on BeursKings, Gung Ho, who lived in the Dutch countryside, favoured traditional US conservatism and posted lengthy pieces copied from American websites, some about US Neoconservatives being Leninist agitators. He enthusiastically promoted a penny stock, Clifton Mining, and believed that colloidal silver was a cure against many diseases. That made him the subject of mockery, most notably by Amoricano, an American of Dutch origin who long had been on IEX. Gung Ho might have been in the military and had friends in the American military, or so his sparse remarks about his personal life suggested.

Gung Ho regularly posted comments about the Neoconservatives being chicken hawks, so cowards who send others to war while having done no military service themselves. His use of language was odd. He didn’t express himself as most people would. That made his lengthy texts amusing. The connection between Neoconservatism and Leninism seemed obscure. Like the Leninists, the Neoconservatives use Hegel’s dialectic to promote social progress via revolutions and wars. The conflict between the West and Islam was their latest project, founded on the clash-of-civilisations ideology, and the Iraq War was one of its consequences. Traditional conservatives like Gung Ho opposed these methods. Fortuyn adhered to the neoconservative clash-of-civilisations ideology as well.

There was also a psychiatrist on BeursKings. He had quit his job and tried to make a living by day trading. He posted under the name Kindval, a soccer player from the 1970s. He didn’t seem to like me. When someone attacked me personally or for my political views, he upvoted these comments. The day trading probably didn’t go well. Once, Gung Ho went loose on him by suggesting he had psychological issues. I upvoted that comment. It was a rare occasion for me to upvote a negative comment. Kindval became agitated about Gung Ho’s comment, but even more about my upvote. It made me think that he was, as Gung Ho implied, on his way to a nervous breakdown.

No gain without pain

Fortuyn’s rise had made me curious about the troubles in the multicultural society. The fallout of my student years of not fitting in had made me interested in cultural differences. My view was that the multicultural society had to work because you can’t go back to nation-states. They are a thing of the past. So, what stands in the way of success? Is there really an unbridgeable gap between Islamic and Western culture? It made me interested in Muslims and what they were thinking. In 2004, I joined the message board Maroc.nl for people with a Moroccan background. They are a disregarded minority and face discrimination. Most notably, young Moroccan men are a source of trouble. There are other minorities with similar issues, but somehow Moroccans get most of the attention. They have a serious likability problem.

So, when the nationalist politician Geert Wilders singled out one particular minority for deportation, he took the Moroccans in his infamous ‘fewer Moroccans’ quote, ‘Fewer Moroccans. Let us take care of that.’ The Dutch dislike Moroccans more than other minorities. As the most-hated child of the entire school, I have been there. It was not entirely my fault, but I was part of the problem. Many Moroccans would probably agree, but they are not the ones who cause trouble. The issues Moroccans in the Netherlands face, and how they see themselves and relate to society, compare to those of blacks in the United States. The message board was open. Everyone could join. It featured discussions about religion and social issues. Various people shared their opinions and discussed them with one another.

People came and went on the message board over the years. Occasionally, there were heated exchanges, with Moroccans complaining about the racism of the Dutch and the Dutch complaining about the misconduct of the Moroccans. There were a few agitators on both sides. But overall, the discussions were meaningful and insightful. That was probably because of the diversity of the posters. I suspect the message board had received a grant and was obliged to keep it open to a variety of opinions. There were Christians, Jews, Muslims, former Fortuyn supporters, and leftists.

There were also a few gays seeking to counter the hatred of LGBTQ people among Muslims because of street violence against LGBTQ people in areas where Moroccans lived. There was a diversity of opinions and an exchange of views. People argue over who is right and who is wrong. I didn’t need to have my own opinion to learn from others. I didn’t have strong views. I was more interested in the problem itself. I could watch others dispute and consider the merits of their opinions.

Traditional Muslims are strict on religion, much like conservative Christians. They have more in common with each other than with liberals. So, why many liberals like Muslims, and conservative Christians dislike them, is quite an enigma if you reason from their perspectives on life. Terrorists usually are young men high on testosterone who seek meaning in life and find it in Islam, and then fall prey to extremist preachers. There aren’t that many of them, but a few hundred can already become a serious threat. During my first year, there was uproar over the Dutch publicist Theo van Gogh, who was indeed kin to the famous Dutch painter. Under the guise of freedom of speech, he called Muslims ‘goat fuckers’ and Muhammad ‘a pimp’. The people on the message board didn’t care much about being called ‘goat fuckers,’ but insulting Muhammad was a red line that genuinely upset them.

Several posters also expressed fury about the Somali lady Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who had left Islam for a liberal lifestyle, and had, together with Van Gogh, made the short film Submission about the suppression and mistreatment of women by Muslims. To Muslims, the film was blasphemous as it showed the bodies of abused women with Quran verses on them that the filmmakers claimed Muslims use to justify mistreating women. Hirsi Ali also had called Muhammad a ‘pervert’ and a ‘paedophile.’ She faced death threats. The anti-immigration and anti-Islam politician Geert Wilders also faced death threats and requires security to this day.

Hirsi Ali had escaped an arranged marriage. The Dutch police prevented her family from abducting her from an asylum seeker centre in Almelo. She later moved to the United States to work for the neoconservative think tank. Van Gogh paid for his Islam-insulting binge with his life. A youngster of Moroccan descent slit his throat, precisely 911 days after the Fortuyn assassination. That was on 2 November, which refers to the European emergency services telephone number 112, the European equivalent of 911. So, in the first year, the atmosphere on the message board was tense, perhaps explosive even.

Western interventions in the Middle East and Western support for Israel also angered people. Israel illegally occupied Palestinian land, and Palestinians kept on committing acts of terrorism. It has proven to be an unresolvable conflict due to violent extremists on both sides. Several posters on the message board viewed the West, including the Netherlands, as anti-Islamic. As I tried not to offend people with my opinions, I had positive karma on the message board. At first, I was making up my mind anyhow. It is a conflict between two worldviews with their own logic. There is an underlying truth, whatever that may be. In the first years, the American gangster heist called the Iraq War was still in progress. For me, the Iraq War became an unexpected mental dip. The Americans had tricked me into believing that Saddam Hussein had a stash of WMDs.

Once I saw live on CNN how the bombs fell on Baghdad and how gung-ho Americans invaded the country and murdered the defenceless Iraqis, my mood suddenly swung to dim. And then there were no WMDs. They had bombed a country into ruins and killed thousands for no good reason. Mission accomplished. Once again, Americans had confirmed the prejudice of being the trigger-happy cowboys who love their guns and shoot people for minor infringements like trespassing. And Iraq wasn’t even theirs. In the Wild West, it is the law of the gun, not the rule of law, that prevails.

The Netherlands has been a major contributor to the American war effort in Iraq as well as Afghanistan. The Dutch Prime Minister Balkenende had praised the Dutch VOC mentality of the former Dutch colonial enterprise that had invaded and looted the Indies under the guise of trade. The United States had merely copied that proud Dutch tradition of the looting oligarchic merchant republic of the Netherlands. The United States now has the VOC mentality. Shell was a Dutch company, so the Dutch had to be in on the action, or so Mr Balkenende may have reasoned.

Meanwhile, the American government told Americans it was their patriotic duty to purchase more planet-ruining gas-guzzling SUVs to make the scheme profitable. And of course, Americans are very patriotic when it comes to their excessive consumption. You can view the US dollar-based global economy as a scam that primarily benefits wealthy Americans. The whole world is subsidising their lavish lifestyles with their labour and resources. Western countries, including the Netherlands, benefited from this arrangement, as the American military provided peace and stability in Europe. But the world paid the Americans for it by using the US dollar as a reserve currency. The Americans were the leeches on the world’s dime, and they had the military to extort tribute.

That, and the liberal values, are reasons several posters found the West evil and hard to accept Dutch society. They may have used it as an excuse for their misconduct and crimes that they would have committed anyway. Some could easily get angry at you simply for being Dutch. Some Dutch came to the message board only to lecture the Moroccans about the backwardness of Islam or the misconduct of Moroccan youngsters. That didn’t work out so well. You wouldn’t change your mind when someone you have never seen before came out of the blue to tell you how stupid your religion is and that your community is a bunch of criminals. There was also a private messaging system. Over the years, two ladies contacted me as they preferred a Dutch husband and hoped that I was a Muslim.

Several posters wrote that they had been in prison. One of them posted from jail, so there was Internet there, or he had a smartphone. There definitely is a problem. It doesn’t mean that most Moroccans are criminals, but if the crime levels in their community, as the statistics suggest, are three times as high as among native Dutch, their community is a source of trouble. They would argue that you bear no blame for other people’s faults. Only that reasoning is a dead end. If your group’s culture includes values that contribute to these issues, it becomes a problem your community faces. There may be obstacles such as rejection and racism from the Dutch, but positive change begins with you. The West has its own issues to face, most notably the ethics of the merchant, which Balkenende proudly referred to as the ‘VOC mentality,’ so invading countries and robbing them under the guise of trade. We can only move forward if we deal with these issues.

The multicultural troubles weren’t constantly on my mind, but I couldn’t let the issue go. I remained on the Maroc.nl message board for two decades. In 2024, after more than twenty years, shortly after the Gaza War had started, the message board went offline permanently after being filled with anti-Israel messages. That was very suspicious indeed if you believe that the Jews are running this world. Jewish interest groups might have pulled some strings. By then, I had seen too many coincidences to believe that without evidence. And I had arrived at some conclusions. People aren’t willing to change. There will be no gain without pain, which I had already experienced firsthand as a student.

Featured image: Pim Fortuyn on 4 May 2002, two days before his assassination. Roy Beusker (2002). CC BY 3.0. Wikimedia Commons.

1. Een heel vervelend geval. Joris van Casteren (2002). Groene Amsterdammer.

The Twilight That Could Be Dawn

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The sudden collapse of liberalism

In 2016, Trump supporters overran the GodlikeProductions.com message board. The atmosphere turned grim, much as it had fifteen years earlier, when Fortuyn supporters overran the Iex.nl message board. Since then, the new fascism has grown stronger. This time, I didn’t run away as I had missed out on something important. And given the job that may lie ahead, and me supposedly being Adolf Hitler reincarnate, not understanding fascism is no excuse. It is an exaggeration to say that Jews run the United States, but to say that they don’t is naive. And so, I kept visiting the message board and familiarised myself with the MAGA movement, like I previously did with Muslims. But I have never seen this level of bullshit. The first Trump administration was not a clean break with the past, as his cabinet included Republican establishment figures. They kept The Donald in check.

The second Trump administration was a different ballgame. Trump had surrounded himself with sycophants and went unhinged. Because there is no limit to Trump’s ego, and his being erratic and spiteful, it became a spectacle, so hilarious that even Monty Python couldn’t have made it up, with Trump naming building after building after himself, making his birthday a public holiday and countless similar self-aggrandising acts. And let’s not forget his self-enrichment and that of his family members by abusing his office, his mass-pardoning of criminals and his divisive Christmas messages. If Hunter Biden should be in prison, much of the Trump family must also be. I have seen lunatics on the left as extreme as MAGA, but they don’t run the United States. Knowing it is a script, I could laugh about it. Otherwise, I might have feared the worst. Others probably did, judging by the surging prices of gold and silver.

We have seen the collapse of liberalism. Things will not return to what they were before. The liberal world has ended, and forever. The liberal fairy tale has long been successful. Liberal states have been the strongest because of capitalism and science. Americans may think their nation is a Christian nation, but its constitution is liberal. Liberalism is as much a part of the Western heritage as Christianity. Science and capitalism thrived most in a liberal environment with freedom of expression and property rights. When the Nazis took over Germany, several Jewish German scientists fled to the United States, including a fellow named Einstein. They helped the United States develop the atomic bomb. And then Adolf Hitler made the error of attacking the Soviet Union. That is how liberalism won the day. When the Soviet Union collapsed, liberalism seemed to have won.

And so, complacency set in. High on delusion and lured by the prospect of profits for the businesses they represented, the neoconservatives, who were a breed of conservatives that had adopted Hegelian dialectic, much to the horror of true conservatives, believed that Western culture is so superior that after toppling the regime in Iraq, a liberal democracy would magically appear. Since then, China has revised its economic model and now outcompetes the West, while mass migration of non-Westerners has eroded the West’s liberal foundations. Most Muslims, Africans, and Eastern Europeans have little interest in LGBTQ rights or women’s rights, in the liberal sense that is. They have had no upbringing in a tradition of progress rooted in the Hegelian dialectic. Westerners can already notice that in inner cities. Liberalism is yet another fairy tale. It has just collapsed in front of us quite suddenly, even to my surprise, but liberals have yet to catch on. It seems that the time is drawing close. It may be the end of Hegel’s ride, so it will either be the collapse of Western civilisation or the completion of our journey to Paradise.

Peak Bullshit

MAGA could be Peak Bullshit, the era where nonsense can’t reach higher levels, as I surmised two decades earlier, after seeing misinformation spread on the Internet. In retrospect, it was a prophetic thought. After peak bullshit, things may collapse, and The Truth may come out. But why did the rise of MAGA nonetheless surprise me? Something similar had already happened in the Netherlands fifteen years earlier with the rise of the populist politician Pim Fortuyn. Only, the level of nonsense was much lower. For over two decades, I believed that the US dollar-based financial system would break down at some point, but when that collapse seemed to start, I had trouble believing it. I could be the messiah, but that is even more unbelievable.

And I am also biased. We all have a model of reality that gives sense to the world. We use it to explain things. Liberalism and fascism are both models of reality with merits and limitations. Christianity is high on bullshit as well, but there is an underlying truth, and Jesus had reasons to believe he was the Son of God. We all cling to our worldviews, but we deal with contradictions differently. Peak Bullshit came with the following symptoms:

  • Outright fabrications: many claims were simply bogus, so untrue. But they riled up people nonetheless. Anti-vaccine posts were usually of that nature.
  • Improper sourcing: a Twitter account claims something has happened, but there is no other evidence. You have to trust the gutter on that one.
  • Hyping incidents: if a black guy molests a white guy or rapes a white woman, the fascists claim it is evidence of white genocide.
  • Distorting the truth: if you get access to the same news from regular sources, you find that the reporting of the alt-right paints a caricature of reality.
  • Finally, there are definitely things that the traditional media do not report on, and are worth knowing. You can think of what preceded the war in Ukraine.

The left uses similar tactics. MAGA is just much better at it. The left hyped violent incidents committed by neo-Nazis. A most excellent example of nonsense from the left is Black Lives Matter, which made an issue out of the police violence against blacks. The incidents that inspired the movement were acts of police brutality with fatal consequences, and some of them might be murder. Racism may have played a role, but there is no proof. Compared to European police forces, American police make a high number of casualties, and not only blacks. And compared to Europeans, Americans accept a high level of lethal violence. You can get away with shooting a cleaning lady who tries to open the wrong door. In the Netherlands, that would be murder. And if you take violent crime levels into account, you get an entirely different picture. Blacks are three times as likely to be killed by the police, but eight times as likely to be a murder suspect.

So, relative to the number of murders they commit, the police killed fewer blacks. It would be fairer to say the opposite was true than what Black Lives Matter told us. And defund the police? Let violent gangs take over? Black Lives Matter was also high on bullshit. They used incidents to paint a caricature of reality. If you want to know why people went MAGA, here is one reason. I don’t doubt that there is widespread racism and that blacks are wronged. But is violent crime among blacks not a far greater problem than police brutality? And is it not that, whatever society does wrong, positive change begins with you? So, do you want to be good at sports, or do you want to become an engineer? Solving these issues requires a different approach than painting caricatures. And that is what MAGA is also about. But MAGA is the end of the line. You can’t go further down that road.

It was hard for me to grasp that people believe things that are easily disproved. But the proof is everywhere around me. And it happens to me as well. I found Black Lives Matter a noble cause until I found out about the violent crime levels among blacks that the liberal media didn’t mention. And there we arrive at the issue of conservatives distrusting the liberal mainstream press. Liberal media may not lie as much as fascist media, but they forget to mention crucial facts, which can be as bad. Often, more is afoot than you can prove, and some conspiracy theories point to these issues. They reflect gut feelings. Your gut feelings, however, are a survival mechanism, not a fact-finding instrument. If you suspect that someone is planning to murder you, waiting for proof can be fatal. So, shoot first and ask questions later. Yet, basing your actions on feelings while ignoring the facts is also dangerous. We live by stories that give meaning to the world. It is our nature to accept the errors and falsehoods in our worldviews.

Hence, dismissing the MAGA people as stupid or evil is a mistake. The Netherlands had once experienced a large-scale benefits fraud, with most culprits coming from a particular ethnic group. The United States also had one. Only, you can’t trust the reporting in the US because the issue is heavily politicised, while that was less so in the Netherlands. Giving in to popular sentiment created a greater disaster later on. The Netherlands is still dealing with the fallout from a fraud-prevention campaign gone wild, and paying reparations to people treated as fraudsters without proof. A conservative politician’s relentless efforts helped uncover the latter scandal. At the same time, the government tried everything to cover it up, including blacking out pages that it was required to hand over. Moral integrity mattered more to him than political gain. Such politicians are a rare breed, also in the Netherlands. Other politicians schemed to get rid of him by giving a ‘position elsewhere’ a note accidentally photographed by a journalist revealed. He came from the region I came from and lived at striking distance of my birthplace.

In a world ruled by money, fraud and corruption are everywhere, but if immigrants do it, we are more alarmed because ‘they’ are robbing ‘us’. It is only natural to feel this way. We are group animals. And so you have to be serious about fascism. Otherwise, things only get worse. The truth is often disagreeable. You hope that it isn’t so, unless you are a jerk. Those who abuse a system may feel no connection to the society they live in. They may have their reasons, but a society has its reasons to expel them. We can only address these issues if we are candid, and if needed, politically incorrect and as sharp as a knife, but that also means fairness and painting a truthful picture.

For the job that may await me, I needed answers. So, let’s start with a warning. It is the truth as I see it. I try to have a fair and balanced view, but above all, an insightful one. And it is my personal view, so definitely not neutral. But if I am the messiah, it might be the truth you should accept. The truth has many sides. Different views highlight different aspects of it. If you are a liberal, taking the perspective of a conservative opens up a different world with things you weren’t aware of, but are nonetheless true. The same is true if you are a conservative and adopt a liberal perspective. But I fear it is impossible to become good at it if you haven’t been both, and don’t consider your former views a folly.

That happened to me. I adopted the Hegelian dialectic to deal with the contradictions. There is an underlying truth. There are fundamental disagreements about direction, leading to an authority crisis and a moral crisis that divide societies. Think of it. An Antifa activist is as concerned about the future as a neo-Nazi. Authority and morality come from the stories we believe in. The United States has a moral corruption issue that gave rise to MAGA. Most Americans are normal people who have jobs, obey the law and pay taxes. They think what they do is right. Yet, Americans live in a tradition of pragmatism while Europe has a tradition of idealism, and that is a profound difference.

As Judgement Day seems to be approaching. The International Court of Justice is in The Hague, the Netherlands, where I live. The Hegelian dialectic has progressed the furthest here on issues like dealing with the planetary boundaries, LGBTQ rights, animal rights, and the right to decide to terminate one’s own life. That is no coincidence, either. The Netherlands has its own issues. There is a crisis of authority with rioters attacking police, firefighters, and ambulance crews with fireworks during the New Year’s celebrations. They are people who shit on authority. Some are immigrant youngsters, some are soccer hooligans, but most are neither. Liberalism is at the end of the line as well. If I sound judgmental, that is because I must, not because I like to. Try to view it as a problem description rather than a moral judgment. If it seems otherwise, remember that I am a systems engineer appointed to fix the biggest clusterfuck in the history of humankind.

For most ordinary people, the most brutal truth may be that if you work hard to get ahead, you may live at the expense of the planet, other people and future generations by taking more than you need. So, there you are: hard-working, obeying the law, paying taxes, raising your children properly, giving money to charities, perhaps even being faithful to your spouse, only to find out that your hard work and consumption ruin the planet. And that affects both liberals and conservatives. It is hard to stomach. But if we intend to march towards God’s Paradise, we must accept the whole truth and spare no one. Coming from a family of farmers, I am not afraid of shit. If necessary, I grab it with both hands. These are shitty issues, and you can’t fix them unless you get your hands dirty. Some of the most profound truths are hidden at the bottom of a manure pit.

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Latest revision: 5 January 2026

Liberal democracy

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A definition

Democracies are often called liberal democracies. So what is a liberal democracy and why might it be the best way of government? There are no easy answers to these questions nor is there agreement on these matters. Liberalism emphasises the value of individuals while democracy is rule by majority. These two principles can be at odds.

Liberal democracies have elections between multiple political parties, a separation of powers into different branches of government, the rule of law in everyday life, an open society, a market economy with private property, the protection of human rights, civil rights, civil liberties and political freedoms for everyone.1

Liberals believe that individuals and social groups have conflicts of interest. The social order must deal with these conflicts and resolve them in a peaceful manner. To achieve such a feat, all parties must be reasonable and there should be a balance of powers. No party should be able to force its will upon others.2 It is an important reason why liberals stress the importance of individual rights.

Democracy means that government decisions require the consent of the majority of the citizens. In most cases the citizens elect a parliament that does the decision making for them. Sometimes citizens can vote for individual proposals in referendums. In reality many democratic countries aren’t fully democratic because not all government decisions are supported by a majority of the citizens.

Principles

Liberal democracy is based on a social contract, which is an agreement amongst the members of society to cooperate for mutual benefits. For instance, labourers may accept capitalism if they get a share of prosperity. That deal turned out to be more attractive than state ownership of the means of production.

Liberalism has two principles that can be at odds, namely non-interference with people’s lives and realising everyone’s potential. In this vein there are two branches of liberalism:

  • Economic liberalism promotes freedom of the markets as well as free trade and claims that the state should be of minimal size and not interfere with people’s lives.
  • Social liberalism claims that the state should help to realise the potential of people by promoting their freedom to make choices, which includes ending poverty.

Each liberal democracy more or less embraces these values. Liberal democracies come with a market economy and respect for the rights of individual citizens. Governments interfere with the lives of people and try to promote their happiness and to realise their potential. The conflicting nature of both principles makes liberal democracies differ with regard to freedom of markets and government interference.

In the United States liberalism has a different meaning. There it is another word for social liberalism or democratic socialism. In Europe the definition of liberalism is broader and this is also the definition used here. In the 17th century liberal ideas began to emerge in what is called the European Enlightenment. Around the year 1700 the philosopher John Locke came up with the following basic principles for a liberal state:

  • a social contract in which citizens accept the authority of the state in exchange for the protection of their rights and property and maintaining the social order;
  • consent of the governed, which means that state power is only justified when the people agree;
  • separation of church and state, which means that the state doesn’t favour a specific religion and does not require a religious justification.3

Is it the best form of government?

Liberal democracy is part of the European cultural heritage. Proponents claim that it is the best form of government. These universalist claims are sometimes contested on the ground that they are a form of western cultural imperialism. Another argument is that there is no guarantee that liberal democracy leads to better decisions. From a religious perspective people argue that our Creator may prefer a different kind of social order and government, possibly even a theocracy.

The argument in favour of the universalist claims is that liberal democracy emerged out of a historical process that took centuries in which rational arguments played a decisive role. The European Enlightenment challenged existing practices in government on the basis of reason. Ideas that emerged out of the European Enlightenment were tried out in different ways and refined further. Europeans also invested heavily in educating their citizens. This produced a culture of reason and compromise as well as a massive body of practical experience and best practises.

There is also no guarantee that other forms of government lead to better decisions. In an open society better information can be available so well-educated citizens in a culture of reason and compromise may make better decisions. There are a few democracies that live up to these expectations so it can work out that way. And we may not be able to determine what kind of order God desires. If our Creator is all-powerful then the emergence and spread of liberal democracy may not be God’s plan.

One of the biggest problems facing liberal democracy is high expectations. Liberal democracy itself does not guarantee a reliable government that is both efficient and effective nor does it ensure a flourishing economy. This has led to disappointments. A failed and corrupt government can’t simply be turned into a success by allowing elections. Liberal democracy works best with a well-educated population in a culture of reason and compromise that doesn’t allow for corruption and abuse of power.

On the moral front there are a few issues too. Liberal democracy promises equal treatment for all people. In reality people aren’t treated equal nor do they have equal opportunities. There is discrimination based on ethnicity, gender or sexual preferences. And poor people have fewer opportunities than rich people. Still, the goal of equal treatment and equal opportunities can be something to strive for. It may be better to aim for such goals and fail from time to time than not having these goals at all.

If liberalism promotes tolerance then how to deal to intolerant people? Should their intolerance be tolerated? If people do not accept liberal values, should they be educated or should these values be imposed? And are free markets the best way of organising the economy or is government involvement advised? If the economy is served by stability, should dissent that causes instability be suppressed? An excessive or unnecessary use of force can undermine the foundation of liberal democracy as liberal democracy is based on reason and convincing people by argument. And indeed it is possible that liberal democracy can be overturned.

History

The preconditions for liberalism had already emerged in Western Europe during the Middle Ages. There was a larger degree of individualism than elsewhere. Liberalism itself emerged during the sixteenth century. At the time Europe was ravaged by devastating religious wars. After several decades of warfare Europeans grew tired of the conflict and began to tolerate religious differences. Some catholic countries accepted protestant minorities while many protestant countries accepted catholic minorities. Germany was almost equally divided. At the time Germany consisted of small states that had either protestant or catholic rulers.

This religious tolerance was at first more or less an uneasy truce. No party had been able to gain the upper hand. Religious minorities at first didn’t receive equal rights. They were only tolerated. Over time the case for religious tolerance became more widely accepted. It was based on two major arguments.

  • The argument of ignorance which states that only God knows who is on the right path and who is doomed so humans shouldn’t judge others.
  • The argument of perversity which states that cruelty is at odds with Christian values and that religious persecution strengthens the resolve of the persecuted.1

The concept of tolerance expanded into a general concern for the rights of individual citizens. In the 17th century liberal ideas were spreading. The Glorious Revolution of 1688 in England limited the power of the king. The rights of individuals were written down in the Bill of Rights. Parliament became the most powerful political institution based on the principle of consent of the governed. The 1776 Declaration of Independence of the United States was based on liberal principles too. It states that all men are created equal and have certain unalienable rights like life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.2

The founding fathers of the United States were also early liberals. The United States Constitution reflects this view. The aim of the United States Constitution is, amongst others, to safeguard the rights of individuals against the state. A large group of Americans believe that individual rights should prevail against democratically elected governments. The widespread support for gun ownership in the United States comes from a distrust of the state as a protector of life, liberty and possessions.

Democracy had not been a seriously considered since classical antiquity. It was believed that democracies are inherently unstable and chaotic due to the changing whims of the people.1 The violence during the French Revolution supported these views. It began as a popular uprising incited by liberal ideas but it soon turned into chaos and bloodshed. Order was restored by a despot ruler named Napoleon Bonaparte who did much to spread liberal reforms throughout Europe by ending the feudal system, emancipating religious minorities and imposing a liberal code of law. The spread of liberal ideas proved to be lasting and democracy was to follow a century later.

The Industrial Revolution started a period of accelerated and constant change that was disastrous for many who found themselves on the losing side. The ruling class changed. Nobility was replaced by a new elite of business people. The position of craftsmen was undermined by factories. And workers in factories laboured under miserable conditions for low wages. There were three major ways of confronting these changes:

  • Conservatives tried to hold on the old order of community, religion and nobility.
  • Socialists tried to overturn the elite of business people by giving power to workers.
  • Liberals tried to manage the change, thereby implicitly supporting the order in which business people were the ruling class.

Liberalism often coincides with the interests of business people. They have possessions and some are rich. They feared that the poor might vote for handing over their possessions to the poor. Socialism became the embodiment of this fear. Liberals were at first inclined to limit the right to vote to people who pay taxes because this excluded poor people from voting. When the threat of socialism became subdued and socialists were willing to compromise, liberals came to accept democracy based on the principle of one person one vote.

In the 19th century European countries held vast colonial empires. These colonies were kept for profit. It was generally believed that the people in these colonies had to be educated before they would be able to govern themselves. The colonial era helped to modernise these countries and most Europeans at the time believed that the oppression and the economic exploitation were justified on these grounds. There were only a few dissenters, for instance the Dutch writer Multatuli.

Liberal democracy faced a few major crises like World War I, the Great Depression and World War II. World War I demonstrated that liberal democracy and free trade weren’t a guarantee for peace and stability. The Great Depression once again challenged liberal democracy as the Soviet Union remained unaffected while Nazi Germany was able to recover and achieve full employment while other countries were still struggling. And during World War II Nazi Germany overran most democratic countries in Europe.

After World War II the European colonies became independent. The Soviet Union came to dominate Eastern Europe and China became a communist country. The United States became the protector of liberal democracy but also a number of dictatorships. This era is called the Cold War and it lasted until the Soviet Union dismantled itself after allowing the peoples of Eastern Europe to make their own choices. Major challengers of liberal democracy nowadays are the one-party system in China and political Islam.

The citizens of Hong Kong and Taiwan don’t like to lose their freedoms. Chinese too probably prefer freedom if they have a choice. And the Islamic State has shown Muslims all around the globe that political Islam can easily turn into a reign of terror. The foundations of liberal democracy may be strong, but a collapse of the global economy may turn be a more serious threat to liberal democracy than the alternatives. Reason can easily disappear once people become fearful of the future.

Reasons for success and limitations

The success of liberal democracy is therefore not a historical necessity. Liberal democracy might never have been invented or dictatorships could have gained the upper hand. That didn’t happen. Communist and fascist dictatorships came and went. Perhaps liberal democracy is a temporary phenomenon but we can’t know that now. Only the future can tell. There are a number of causes that might explain the strength of liberal democracy.

  • Liberal democracy is based on the consent of the governed so it is has the consent of the governed by default while other forms of government do not.
  • Science greatly contributes to the success of states and science is best served with an open debate that liberal democracy provides.
  • The economy greatly contributes to the success of states and the economy is best served with individual rights that liberal democracy provides.

A despot ruler or a ruling party in a one-party system might have the consent of its subjects, but if not, only force remains for the ruler or the party to maintain power. Liberal democracies usually resolve such issues peacefully through elections, making liberal democracy more stable by default. Intellectual freedom is helpful to science while economic freedom is helpful for the economy, so liberal democracy can be a potent force. Only when leadership is required, liberal democracy might not always be adequate.

Liberalism has no higher moral value than the individual, which is peculiar because the individual human is an insignificant part of this universe. And individualism may be at odds with human nature as humans are social animals. Humans are not atomic beings that choose to cooperate for mutual benefit like liberalism supposes. Cooperation is part of human nature and not a choice individuals deliberately make.

It is the success in cooperation that makes a society win out. Liberalism gives a framework for living together in peace as long as all major parties are reasonable and willing to compromise. This makes larger scale cooperation possible and that can make a society successful. For instance, the United States integrated people from different cultural backgrounds, which contributed to the success of the United States as a nation.

It is said that history is written by the victors. Strength may be the reason why liberal democracy prevailed. Liberal philosophers have tried to provide a moral justification for liberal democracy or they may have opposed it or they may have tried to improve it. Liberal democracy emerged out of thought and action, experiment and failure, and it was a process that took centuries. Philosophers like Locke contributed to its success as they set out the goals people could strife for.

Apart from individualism, liberal societies lack a higher purpose. From a scientific viewpoint there is no higher purpose to this universe. The moral codes humans live by are not more than an agreement. Only when this universe is created for a purpose there is a reason for our existence. But moral individualism can be dangerous. The challenges humanity is currently facing, most notably living within the limits of this planet, most likely requires making individuals subject to a higher causes like the survival of humanity and caring for the planet.

1. Liberal democracy. Wikipedia.
2. Liberalism: The Life of an Idea. Edmund Fawcett (2015). Princeton University Press.
3. History of liberalism. Wikipedia.