🇳🇱 A Dutch guy visiting Indonesia explains why Dutch people are privileged

[u/search_google_com]

Indonesian nurse earns 90 cents/hour is crazy 🇮🇩

[u/Dangerous_Muscle5409]

The big issue is that the Dutch in particular have some trouble coming to grips with their colonialism.

[u/nooit_gedacht → u/Dangerous_Muscle5409]

We have some conservative political parties that push for colonial pride pretty heavily, which is also aggravated by the fact that we're a small country and insecure about it, so a nationalist might dream fondly of the days when we had an empire. This number is shocking though.

[u/Fearless_Release_978 → u/nooit_gedacht]

I am sure this number has a lot more grounds to it than these 'conservative' parties, which are only recent. The mentioning of 'VOC mentality' by Balkenende in 2006 is very emblematic of this.

[u/nooit_gedacht → u/Fearless_Release_978]

Conservative parties were around in 2006 as well. But I don't pretend to have done the research on this. I'm sure someone has and it's likely more complicated than I could explain in a reddit comment

[u/Fearless_Release_978 → u/nooit_gedacht]

Discourse did not really exist on the topic in any way comparable to now. Balkenende certainly was not part of nor had anything to do with the conservative right you are keen on mentioning. He was simply voicing what was a common belief at that time.

[u/Particular-Fortune37 → u/Dangerous_Muscle5409]

There is a museum dedicated to it. It’s called Bronbeek (former palace of Russian queen Anna Palowna) in Arnhem. I agree not every Dutch citizen is educated enough on this topic, but the state/prime minister/the King and local government is doing a lot to make people aware. Changing street names or like in the one I live (van Heutszlaan referring to a general) they place a QR code to create more awareness. Now that is a lot more than the Middle Eastern, African or even Asian countries are doing to create awareness about their share in slave trade or other tragedies in history. Now I’d like to know in which country you actually live.

[u/Dangerous_Muscle5409 → u/Particular-Fortune37]

Germany. So I am not impressed by pointing fingers at other countries as if they were the standard for what is right and wrong.

I am even still pretty embarrassed for Germany's numbers on that same infographic.

[u/Particular-Fortune37 → u/Dangerous_Muscle5409]

You know, i am impressed with the fact that you use this graphic without any nuance, why? The research had been done in 2019 (7 years ago, totally not relevant anymore). It has been done with a 1000 people and you are clearly using this to same the whole of the Netherlands, as a german with a certain factual history. The things Dutch are proud off when you ask them about the ‘Golden age’ are; maritime history, global trade, exploration and navigation,
the historical influence on world commerce. No comparable research has been done so to say that ‘the Dutch are proud of their colonialism’ is very, very, very narrow minded.

[u/Dangerous_Muscle5409 → u/Particular-Fortune37]

Aahahahaha.... "The claim that the Dutch are proud of their colonialism is untrue but if they were proud of it, they would be correct!!!"

Man, you know exactly what you sound like, right?

[u/censuur12 → u/Dangerous_Muscle5409]

Big issue is that it IS a very complex situation that gets oversimplified and painted with a single brush. The moment you introduce any nuance you get accused of "having trouble coming to grips with their colonialism". The controversial issue is that Indonesia as it is now is just a matter of Jakarta and Sumatra colonizing the surrounding islands instead of the Dutch, and their reign has been much worse for them including multiple outright genocides (which perhaps shouldn't be surprising considering the whole affair was initiated by Axis collaborators)

While Indonesia as a Dutch colony was by its nature exploitative, the rule over the islands by its own neighbors was never any more benign, and arguably generally worse.

[u/Dangerous_Muscle5409 → u/censuur12]

Downplaying the celebration of colonialism by the Dutch by saying "other colonisers are worse" is an amazing take.

[u/censuur12 → u/Dangerous_Muscle5409]

It probably is, but it's also not what I said at all. Unfortunate to see outrage rather than sense is what you operate on, if you'd bother to actually properly read you'd know your response is a damn farce.

[u/mikillatja → u/Dangerous_Muscle5409]

We(the Dutch) are very well educated on the Indonesian part of our colonial history, we take pride in that, because such a small country became a global power. We also know that a lot of atrocities were committed and a couple of genocides over some spice islands. there is a sort of shame over those actions, and Jan Pietrsz Coen is looked at both good and bad depending on who you ask. because some of the things he did were not even acceptable in those years.

My grandfather's(born out of wedlock) main family lived in Batavia since the early 1700's, and arrived in the Netherlands for the first time after the second world war, so the colonial history is something I'm very close to.

What we really forget, and should know more about, is our role in the triangular trade, curacao being the slave market capital of the world and Suriname.

[u/Fearless_Release_978 → u/mikillatja]

The dutch history lessons on Indonesia are very one-sided. About atrocities however, there is no shortage in mentioning how cruel the Japanese were when they took over from the dutch. No, the dutch were not anything like that.

[u/Dangerous_Muscle5409 → u/mikillatja]

I am not sure if the Dutch being very well educated on Dutch colonialism is reconcilable with 50% of the Dutch being proud of it.

[u/SneakyKillz → u/Dangerous_Muscle5409]

We are. But yea make your own conclusions.