Dutch coffeeshops: a thing of the past? Dystopia!!!!!

[alec]

So I've read and heard that Balkenende of the CDA (some political dude who runs the country or whatever) desperately wants to ban coffeeshops from the Netherlands. And I've read and heard that Belgium approves of this. Already both coffeeshops in Terneuzen had to lock their doors and soon the coffeeshops in Roosendaal and Bergen-Op-Zoom have to do the same.

The main argument: drug tourism is a friggin' plague. Belgian and French and German people get into their cars and drive all the way to the border of Belgium/the Nerherlands to buy some weed. They cause problems. What those problems are exactly, I do not know. That they also consume snacks and drinks and sometimes stay the afternoon and go to a local restaurant or check out the city centre does not matter. It's not the same thing as Lourdes where tons of Frenchies, Dutchies, Germans and whatever nationalities gather on a daily basis to get some of the precious water in the vicinity. Those people are good Christians and do not cause problems.

Whatever.

Can some Dutchie explain to me what the bloody, bloody, bloody hell has gotten into the Nerherlands to even mention that they plan on banning their coffeeshops? Do they really think that Amsterdam gets all its tourists because there are hookers there? Duh. I reckon 75% of all tourists there come to get stoned (and have paid sex afterwards). This decision will hurt the Nerherlands more than they can fathom, I'm sure.

Criminality will rise. Drug dealers will make fortunes again. And if my local pusher doesn't have any weed, well heck, I just might buy some speed out of spite.

On another note: what the bloody, bloody, bloody hell is going on with this sad, miserable world? Do politicians really think that I need their advice on how to live my life? On how to be sane and healthy and a productive member of society? I can deal with not smoking in trains and restaurants and whatever shitty public places of any interest, but soon I will not be able to smoke at my pub as well. WTF is up with that? Why the bloody, bloody, bloody hell do I want to pay triple the amount of cash for some sad beer if I can not behave like I'm at home and smoke and cough and fart? I'll just buy beer at the supermarket then and get drunk at home, smokingmy lungs to kingdom come.

There is this new trend in the Western world where all of our freedoms, especially the so-called naughty ones (smoking tobacco/weed) will be banned from existence. What's next? Alcohol? Probably beer (working class) first and then wine (middle-class) and finally spirits (beau monde). There is this tendency that forbids people from being an Einzelgänger (sp?) and almost forces you to "enjoy" social activities, network, befriend the pack of robots and suits out there.

Books have been written about this totalitarian crapola, literary works held in high esteem, and no-one gets it: they weren't just works of fiction, they were goddamn warnings.

This is the way the world ends: everyone wears a suit and gets symbiotic with their electronic devices. Everyone gets born, molded and has to serve a lifetime doing crap for a crappy society.

Come come nuclear bomb, I say. If this trend continues, I am becoming a muslim. Seems like they are the last sensible individuals in the world. I'd rather live by an ancient text that makes no sense, than by the rules and restriction laid upon me by some dumbwitted nincompoops who think they can "change" the world for the better.

Your opinion is of no concern (political credo), but toss it my way, just for laughs.

 

[Loxley]

The reason smoking in pubs is being stopped is that there are people working there that may not smoke but still have to inhale that cancer causing stuff. It keeps your disgusting habits from hurting the people that serve me beer and that is why I agree with it. Very few other jobs where you are expected to walk around in an athmosphere that is that prone to cause cancer.

Thing is though, in Norway atleast, you can smoke in the pub. As long as the pub owner smokes and takes care of the serving. There must ofcourse be no other waitresses there. Besides that, it has come to Norway and I hear few complaints.

As for what goes next? Guns and bird hunting is my guess. Gotta protect nature and make the city folks happy.

 

[Sorrow]

You mean that the flying rats (doves) will get banned and we will gun them down with our guns?

 

[Ah-Teen]

Sorrow: Yes

Alec, stop whining. Your addiction harms others and at that point it's totally valid to keep it outside or gone all together.

Oregon and Utah have passed clean air acts in the time that I've lived in those states. No body is missing their cancer stick and the rest of us can breath freely.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Except now you can smell your fellow human beings instead of just the smoke. And often that's not a good thing.

Hey, BigBrother is just worried about you! He wants to hold your hand, delete all that nasty porn that'll only infect your mind and demeans women around the world.

In Finland it was recently suggested that fat people should pay more taxes or that slim, fit people should get tax-cuts. On the logic that fat people are more prone to get heartattacks and other diseases that the government ends up treating out of taxmoney. It was shot down, this time...

 

[alec]

Alec, stop whining. Your addiction harms others and at that point it's totally valid to keep it outside or gone all together.

My addiction harms others? How the fuck does my addiction harm others? You think you get cancer from a passer-by blowing some thin smoke in the air, close to you? My cigarette smoke is less harmful to my fellow human beings than any car out there on the streets - and no: I don't drive a car. How about all the crap smoke that you inhale by simply walking the streets, eh? Why don't they put large stickers on the front windows of cars saying: "Drving a car can cause lung cancer" or "Driving a car is harmful to others" or "Every time you drive a car, you become more stupid" (which is obviously true)?

Also: this thread is about weed, mang. And about our little vices being banned because the so-called healthy normies out there can't cope with them. This is a thread about restriction, mang. About Nineteen Eighty-Four.

In Finland it was recently suggested that fat people should pay more taxes or that slim, fit people should get tax-cuts. On the logic that fat people are more prone to get heartattacks and other diseases that the government ends up treating out of taxmoney. It was shot down, this time...

Eggs-ackley! You care about my health so much that you want me to stop smoking? You accuse me for not wanting to stop? Well, how about I start telling all the fat people out there that they need to lose weight pronto because they're fat and it is endangering their lives? How about I walk true the park and I see a fat kid and I tell him: "Hey fatty, lose weight or die?" How about them politicians start demanding of McDonalds to put messages on their burger packages, in bold letters, saying: "If you eat this shit, you will die a slow and horrible fat death"? And next to that, let's tax them for being fat and refuse them full healthcare as long as they're fat because if they get sick it's their own bloody fault, because they're fat?

Gimme break.

This new pre-occupation with health is like a goddamn woodworm eating away at our personal freedom. And others telling me, ordering me to conform to some Vault City philosophy is close to some form of twisted totalitarian madness.

 

[Dragula]

Seriously, stop overinterpritating 1984.

 

[alec]

Seriously, stop overinterpritating 1984.

How exactly does one overinterpritate something?

Does one have to interpritate it first? And then keep interpritating it until it is, finally, overinterpritated?

Please elaboritate on this.

 

[Pablosdog]

he has a point, maybe not to the extent of dystopia, but to the extent of of rights being taken just because of some pressure from foreign countries.

 

[syllogz]

You should wait until the bloody politicians make mandatory to take soma.

After that, everything will be fine.
You will WANT to do sports, go shopping and buy stuff no matter what, work 12 hours a day and feel happy about it, have barbecue on the weekend, watch idiotic shows/games on the TV, go shoot some Bambi, maw your 6-by-2-sq.yard lawn, drive your SUV.

 

[Loxley]

Alec, stop whining. Your addiction harms others and at that point it's totally valid to keep it outside or gone all together.

My addiction harms others? How the fuck does my addiction harm others? You think you get cancer from a passer-by blowing some thin smoke in the air, close to you? My cigarette smoke is less harmful to my fellow human beings than any car out there on the streets - and no: I don't drive a car. How about all the crap smoke that you inhale by simply walking the streets, eh? Why don't they put large stickers on the front windows of cars saying: "Drving a car can cause lung cancer" or "Driving a car is harmful to others" or "Every time you drive a car, you become more stupid" (which is obviously true)?

/sigh. It is because in free air the concentration of smoke is much less dangerous since it has (depending on weather conditions)near unlimited amounts of air to disperse into while inside a house that amount of air is dependant on ventilation and the size of the room, both of which is limited.

Sure if you stick your face into an exhaust pipe the concentration will be dangerous, but you only need to pull your face one and a half meter away to be relativly safe. While if you take a tube from the exhaust in through the side of a car window, close all the windows and then start the car it will be fataly dangerous since it is a much more closed space.

And as you said cars pollutes and are bad for air quality, however cars in many places are a neccesity and very often they do something for the community(getting people to reach work faster, makes thing go faster and more efficient ), smoking is a luxury. And luxuries are fine, that is until they start hurting other people, such as passive smoking does.

Also seems 1984 is alecs new wolf cry now.

 

[Phil the Nuka-Cola Dude]

And as you said cars pollutes and are bad for air quality, however cars in many places are a neccesity and very often they do something for the community(getting people to reach work faster, makes thing go faster and more efficient ), smoking is a luxury.

Cars are as much of a luxury as smoking. They are not a necessity. Take the fucking bus.

And luxuries are fine, that is until they start hurting other people, such as passive smoking does.

Cars cause infinitely more damage to the environment than lighting up. I'll wager you've never been to any major US city if you think standing a few meters away from motor vehicles is going to prevent you from inhaling a few cigs worth of cancer-causing exhaust.

As for some prick trying to ban the coffee shops... If they're that much of a tourist magnet, I doubt the ban'll pass.

 

[Sorrow]

The last thing I want when I'm in work or on a bus stop is smoking someone else's cigarette.

 

[Starseeker]

LOL, car pollution isn't dangerous?

Someone has obviously never been to any Chinese cities.

 

[Dragula]

Seriously, stop overinterpritating 1984.

How exactly does one overinterpritate something?

Does one have to interpritate it first? And then keep interpritating it until it is, finally, overinterpritated?

Please elaboritate on this.

Elaborate*, and picking on a foreigners english is kind of low, don't you agree? What I meant was that you are putting more meaning into the book, and similiar book, than there is. It' like finding something deep in a Donald Duck cartoon.

 

[horse]

actually, smikers and fat people are good for the economy. they die earlier; what costs most is keeping gomers alive who need 24/7 care and treatment.

 

[alec]

Elaborate*, and picking on a foreigners english is kind of low, don't you agree?

Yes, it is. It's also funny.

What I meant was that you are putting more meaning into the book, and similiar book, than there is. It' like finding something deep in a Donald Duck cartoon.

Wow... more meaning than there is? Have you read Nineteen Eighty-Four? It does deal with the tricks played on us by governments, you know?

"It is intolerable to us that an erroneous thought should exist anywhere in the world, however secret and powerless it may be," says O'Brien somewhere in the book. Why? Because erroneous thoughts and erroneous actions are the stuff of freedom.

The same thing, i.e. banning all erroneous thoughts and actions, is happening all over the world as we speak. You can't make fun of religion, for instance, unless it's in the safety of your own home. You can't use soft drugs and the few places where you can will disappear sooner or later. And so on. You think it'll stop there? Whom are you kidding?

As for finding something deep in Donald Duck cartoons: dude, it happens. You think the guys who draw and write those comics/cartoons just say whatever they feel like, whatever they think of at the moment itself? Give me a break, kid. That stuff is orchestrated, think tanks lose sleep over it and yes: it does convey a deeper meaning, a moral, a pondering, a depiction of reality, a meaningful story.

Go back to school, kid, and talk to me again when you've graduated.

 

[Dragula]

War is peace
Freedom is slavery
Ignorance is strength

Yeah, I have read it. Your points seem more fitted to Animal farm though.

Fun thing is, I have graduated school and I'm currently at university. And of course some Donald Duck convey deeper moral meanings, it's wrong to steal and so on. But that doesnt mean one has to overdo it, trying to find the meaning of life in the way they portrait a certain element. Same goes for 1984, yes it's about a control society. But it's nowhere near the governments we see today.

 

[Starseeker]

How come all of the sudden that I am reminded of the Cultural Revolution?

The irony is that you can smoke as much as you want and drink as hard as you want in China.

Anthony Bourdain would be proud.

 

[Sander]

I can confirm that drug tourism is getting completely out of hand.
I can't cross the street without some Belgian/French/German/English/Polish/whatever dude asking me where the nearest coffeeshop is.

Bloody annoying that.

In more serious news: there's no way that this is going to go very far, weed and hash are too ingrained in our society for that to happen.

Interestingly, though, it is getting more regulated. Moreover, recently two of the biggest coffeeshops in Eindhoven were closed (one of them probably permanently) for having about $2 million worth of weed in stock (which is way, way over what is allowed). They claimed this was due to a scarcity and them thus accepting anything they're offered.

There's also talks of implementing a city-wide card which would be required to visit a coffeshop, and only issued to people living in Eindhoven.