Politics

Politics are madness

“Whenever there are elections, you simply choose which politician is going to mess up things even more.”, a friend of mine often says. And honestly, I can’t really blame him. Here, in the Netherlands, a lot of politicians haven’t exactly proven themselves trustworthy. Of course, working together on an economic level can be very advantageous. But it goes too far to sacrifice a country’s wellbeing for an economic collaboration zone, which is how politics are currently kind of going in the Netherlands.

And before you call me extreme-right, please allow me to explain why I believe the above. Because in a free society, we not only respect each other’s views; we also listen to each other. I may not agree with a lot of people, but that doesn’t give me the right to ignore them. It’s basically as simple as that, so please continue reading; I will explain myself.

Let’s get a couple of things clear before I start. No, I don’t support political parties such as the NSDAP; I’m not a Nazi. I completely believe in free speech, whether from the left or right part of the political spectrum. As long as respect is present, because if we can’t respect each other, we will always disagree and that’s not going to get any further.

I also do not support Communism. History has taught us enough, I’d like to believe. Confiscating personal property is also a way of taking away someone’s freedom. It goes without saying that not really owning anything is a form of poverty, and I don’t think anyone wants to be poor. Things, and people as well, can never be ‘owned’ by a government. People and the things they own should be sacred; it’s not a possession of anyone but themselves.

With this being clear, I can finally explain my opinion. Because politicians should in the end help the country they were chosen for. Why else would we otherwise allow them to make decisions for us? Dutch politicians, our prime minister included, should do what’s the best for the Netherlands; not for the rest of Europe, except the Netherlands. I’d like to think this is simply common sense about how to rule a country.

And that’s exactly what isn’t happening now. The left-wing politicians, which are dominate in our parliament, often vote in favour of Europe; not in favour of the Netherlands. The right-wing politicians tend to be more conservative, which seems to favour the Netherlands more at the moment.

This doesn’t mean that being ‘left’ is wrong. It’s all about what you think is the best for your country. But that also goes the other way around. It’s not wrong to be ‘right’ either, that, once again, depends on what you think is the right thing to do. And as long as we can respect this, I don’t see any reason as to why a disagreement is a bad thing.

We all disagree about things from time to time. Luckily, we also agree about a lot of things. If the things we agree upon outweigh the things we don’t agree on, then that’s a sign of a healthy society. We don’t have to agree on everything.

But taking things back to the Netherlands, it’d seem that we’re going to support the EU, Ukraine in its war against Russia, trying to fight climate change, and also focus on our ‘nitrogen problem’. The latter, the ‘nitrogen problem’, doesn’t appear to be present in our big neighbour Germany, but that’s stuff for some other time.

The main point I’m trying to make here, is that there’s more money going to projects outside of the Netherlands, rather than the problems that really matter within the country. Despite being a rich country, the Netherlands is also pretty ‘rich’ in poverty. I feel bad for people, especially children, who are living in poverty. A rich country like the Netherlands should be able to fight poverty. Ideally speaking, no one in the Netherlands should have to be poor.

So, it’s about the choices politicians make for the Netherlands. In a way, you could state that the politicians are responsible for the problems we have nowadays. And I agree; I don’t want Russians over here as well. But, and that’s simply the bitter truth, there’s little we can do about the war between Russia and Ukraine. Whoever started the war is a thing of debate. A debate which can be discussed for ages, but which doesn’t help anyone. But war is a shame, in which neither side really ‘wins’. So, why would we support either side? If anything, it’ll bring the whole of Europe in danger.

And regarding climate change; did you know that China is emitting an amount of carbon dioxide every day, which equals to what the Netherlands emits in an entire year? If China doesn’t fight climate change as well, how would the Netherlands have any influence on the climate at all?

The choices described before, are choices made by politicians; not by citizens. But you can say we chose them, and that is true. But then, I’d like to remind you to my friend’s quote: “Which politician do you choose to make things even worse?” Although I don’t entirely agree with him on this, I can understand why he’s saying this. It’s a rather negative view on politics in the Netherlands, but if they’d really care about the wellbeing of the Netherlands, they’d fight poverty first rather than a war in a country we don’t really have anything to do with.