Eight police officers will be prosecuted in connection with the arrest of a 32-year-old man who died after Taser electroshock weapon was deployed, the Dutch Public Prosecution Service (OM) announced on Thursday. The officers are suspected of violating guidelines dictating when the use of police force is warranted.
Has your country ever had a problem with police brutality? I'm from America, so it's no surprise that my answer is yes. I don't know why I've not thought
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“The Dutch have perfected their facade. They are the definition of ‘facade!’” Sylvana Simons tells me, laughing, on a video call from her home in the Netherlands. “Things look great from the outside. We have told ourselves that we’re tolerant and we’re understanding and we’re progressive, and the rest of the world is so backwards.”
But you don’t have to look far to find plenty of examples to the contrary. Most famously, there’s Zwarte Piet (Black Pete), a Sinterklaas tradition involving blackface; in recent years, anti-Black Pete protesters have experienced violence at the hands of both police and civilians. There’s a Christian youth group lobbying to criminalise sex work. There are the deaths of Mitch Henriquez and Tomy Holten in police custody in 2015 and 2020, respectively. In May, providing a clear example of institutional racism, the Dutch tax authority, the Belastingdienst, was found to have systematically flagged people wit