Dutch Big Brother Watching and LISTENING to you!

I'm neither paranoid or got anything to hide.!
You seem very anti-establishment skip, generally.

 

chill out there man, for sure.

 

I always did dig Candid Camera. In reality I've nothin' to hide while on vacation in our beloved Amsterdam. They'd be wastin' their time listening in on my conversations, unless they're in for a good laugh.

If it keeps the RLD scumbags off my back then more power to the system.

That said, this video is on the disturbing side to say the least.

Policed State Amsterdam

 

I POSTED A MESSAGE HERE BUT DELETED IT.!

What was stopping me.? oh yes fascism through being banned.

 

Well ain't that just great... Nowadays you can't take a dumb without your friendly neighbourhood piggy knowing about it... Damn, there used to a time when I could just tie a bandanna on my shlong go nuts at the streets, and nowbody would write me a ticket... wankers.

 

I Thought They Promote The Red Light District FOR TOURISTS ..... Prostitution And Marijuana Are Both Legal ... This Seems Pretty Hypocritical. Why Do They EVEN Want To Hear What You're Saying?

 

Skip, you have a few facts wrong.

Skip said "BTW, the Dutch have instituted new fascist laws allowing the police to stop and search anyone, anywhere, for any reason now too." The Dutch police are only allowed to search people in areas designated by the local authorities as high crime areas. They cannot stop you for no reason in over 90% of Amsterdam.

Also Skip said " are not only watching you from thousands of cameras installed in Amsterdam and elsewhere, but now they are also LISTENING in to your "private" conversations on the streets." If you read the Times article that Skip linked to, you will notice that Amsterdam does not have the listening devices.

And Skip said "One reason I decided to leave Amsterdam (where I lived for 10 years), was because I couldn't even sit at a coffeeshop and smoke a joint without being recorded by numerous cameras. And now that I know they can pickup my conversation (and you can believe they do, since there are dozens of police watching those cameras who have nothing better to do.) I'd think twice about doing anything unusual in public there." There were many cameras installed inside and on the patios of several coffeeshops in Amsterdam. I don't like this either but there was a serious problem with many stoners getting their bags stolen from inside the coffeeshops. These cameras and their film are not shared with the police unless their was a crime problem. And since their are no sound recording devices in Amsterdam now, they can't pick up your conversation.

And the street cameras do not seem to be monitored very closely in Amsterdam since i recently was witness to a violent fight near the Dam in front of one of the outdoor street cameras and it took the police over 15 minutes to respond.

And Skip ends with "So remember when you're lighting up in Amsterdam, you're on Candid Camera!". For the most part that is incorrect.

Skip, I smoked with you many times while you lived here in Amsterdam. The Netherlands is not a perfect place but I still would rather live here than in the USA any day.

 

I agree .....shit , they gotta be laughing their asses off if their listening in on us.

 

Skip it seems like you are bitter. That is so sad, because the Netherlands are still quite a nice place to live. Yes the people are getting rougher in one way, but more together in other ways. The Netherlands are, at this point, in a time that will determing which way it will go, will things become ugly and violent, or will the normal, real dutch attitude, of compromise win, and I believe the latter will happen. We are a negotiating kind of country

 

Haha, yeah They may listen to my ramblings, no problem.

Well, not about marijuana and the prostitutes. If they have microphones and camera's in places like the RLD they're more for busting things like fights, hard drugs dealers and stuff like that I think.

I'm with you on that. It's not the perfect one, but the dutch regime still seems much nicer for living than the States. Although I can not be entirely sure, cause I haven't been in the US yet.

 

Skip said "Let's see in 1977, the Netherland's murder rate was less than that of the USA (per capita). By 1993, it was THREE times the US rate, and the highest in the western world. In the last few years violent crime has continued to surge, and I can't find accurate figures for it (other crime has declined recently)

Here are some recent statistics that say that the murder rate in the USA is about 4 times higher than the Netherlands.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_murder_rate


And Skip said "things here have swung far to the left in just the last two years". I can't believe you really think this. Maybe a left swing from far right to a more moderate right. As long as Democratic & Republican politicians keep taking all that big money from mostly the same sources, there will never be real change in the USA.

 

Dear Skip,

Get help.

Slowhand

 

Skip, your most recent source (http://www.cbs.nl/en-GB/menu/themas/mens-maatschappij/bevolking/publicaties/artikelen/archief/2005/2005-1666-wm.htm) of the murder rate in the Netherlands has a nice chart that shows the Netherlands murder rate is between 1 to 1.5 murders per 100,000 people. That is about the same as my Wikipedia source that shows about 1.1 murders per 100,000 people.

And your new source also states that there were around 200 murders a year in the Netherlands at the end of the nineties, over 13 times lower than your original source.

Your new source only confirms the Wikipedia rates I quoted.

 

The Netherlands murder rate of 1.1 compares to the USA (2003) rate of 5.7 murders per 100,000. http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0873729.html

Murder rates per 100,000 people for these USA cities for 2003 according to http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0004902.html:

Washington, DC - 44.0
Baltimore, MD - 41.9
Detroit, MI - 39.4
Atlanta, GA - 34.3

Amsterdam's rate of 3.2 means the murder rate in all the above USA cities are more than 10 times Amsterdam's rate.

The USA continues to be a very dangerous place. I feel much safer living in Amsterdam.

 

and from today's SF Gate: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/12/02/MNG10MO6B21.DTL
"The fear is real. Oakland has seen 140 killings so far this year compared with 94 for all of 2005. Half of this year's victims were 25 and younger."

Oakland California has seen almost as many murders as the whole country of the Netherlands so far in 2006. I bet that there will be a much larger % increase of murders in Oakland than Amsterdam this year. I still take the coffeeshops of Amsterdam any day over the medical coffeeshops in Oakland or anywhere else in the USA.