An advertisement text: ‘With a dog whistle you immediately attract attention, even from a great distance.’ I wasn’t thinking about dogs, I was thinking about radical farmers who revolt with large equipment. They are now getting that attention from all over the country, from city dwellers and country people.
By the way, the entire text of the advertisement reads: ‘With a dog whistle you immediately attract the attention of your dog, even from a great distance.’
But such a whistle can also be used for political purposes. The banners of angry farmers bear unmistakable texts: ‘THE WAR HAS BEGAN WE WIN’, but what I read between all those hefty lines is something else. That this revolt by angry farmers is the only righteous Dutch revolt, because something like the birthright applies here. That’s too long for a banner, but it’s the implicit message I hear.
Raised in Twente, and not in Enschede, there were children of farmers at my primary school; I was friends with some, I came to their house. Jumping a ditch, catching tadpoles in a glass jar, helping out on the farm… No, I’d rather not, because as a child I was afraid of most animals. Everyone thought that was perfectly understandable, because I spoke High Dutch, and moreover I belonged to an exceptional category with my appearance. Not from here, but from there. The city, the west, or even further away.
Viewed from the countryside, the relationship with the city is ambiguous: feelings of superiority and inferiority constantly alternate. Urban people know nothing about real life, but also: beware of urban people, because they are always too smart for you. Those folks from the west shouldn’t think they’re more than us. The people don’t do that either, the sad thing is that most city dwellers hardly think back about the countryside.
In any case, the actions of farmers have put an end to this abuse: the country is wallowing in peasant fury.
Underneath lurks the idea that farmers are the backbone of the country, and belong to the category of the real, indisputable Dutch. I have often thought about the at first sight incomprehensible alliance between Baudet and farmers, but in any case they share the aggravation. He who grants himself the birthright must become white-hot when those privileges are tampered with.
The bad thing is that there is no primogeniture to be forgiven in the Netherlands: it is not a family, but a constitutional state, and the Dutch passport can expire, but does not become worth more the longer it is in the family.
This misunderstanding must also be eradicated – just like the nitrogen.
Stephan Sanders writes a column here every Monday.
A version of this article also appeared in the newspaper of 11 July 2022