From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT
By Paul Homewood
I see the fruitloops are alive and well in Amsterdam!
Amsterdam has become the world’s first capital city to ban public advertisements for both meat and fossil fuel products. Since 1 May, adverts for burgers, petrol cars and airlines have been stripped from billboards, tram shelters, and metro stations.
At one of the city’s busiest tram stops, adjacent to a grassy roundabout bursting with vibrant yellow daffodils and orange tulips, the poster advertising landscape has changed.
They now promote the Rijksmuseum, the national museum of the Netherlands, and a piano concert. Until last week it was chicken nuggets, SUVs and low-budget holidays.
Politicians in the city say the move is about bringing Amsterdam’s streetscape into line with the local government’s own environmental targets.
These aim for the Dutch capital to become carbon neutral by 2050, and for local people to halve their meat consumption over the same period.
“The climate crisis is very urgent,” says Anneke Veenhoff from the GreenLeft Party. “I mean, if you want to be leading in climate policies and you rent out your walls to exactly the opposite, then what are you doing?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c9wejdekpwyo
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Obviously doesn’t mean a damn thing.
It has come to the attention of the Ministry of Truth that some are dissing and need to go missing-
Sweden generates 99% of electricity from clean sources. So why is wind power under attack?
The laughable thing being that the promoters of wind and solar are the ones who pimp the most “misinformation” and “disinformation.”
Only 18.6 % of Sweden’s energy comes from wind and solar
Wind and solar are NOT clean energy, anyway..
They are the most environmentally damaging form of electricity there is.
But it is free if you don’t cont the cost.
And the dead insects, bats, birds ….
Have we ever been concerned about dead insects?
pollinators, yes
This was spearheaded by hydropower (40 per cent) followed by nuclear (27 per cent), wind (23 per cent) and solar (two percen
Imports?
There is no American First Amendment in The Netherlands, unfortunately.
Even if there were, freedom of commercial speech is a little different. Advertising space is a scarce resource rented for money. Advertising is “rented expression” available to the highest bidders, to the exclusion of under-bidders.
I’d be a lot more enthusiastic about public advertising that gave me sight of other options than I am about advertising that exists because it has to occupy the space lest a competitor use it.
It’s all just noise. To the extent I care about public advertising at all, I regard it as an eye-sore.
Advertising the Rijksmuseum, or the national museum of the Netherlands, will need more taxpayers money because these are entities funded by mostly public money. I don’t know about the piano thing. So they need more taxes with less money coming in from advertisers like chicken nuggets, SUVs and low-budget holidays.
So now automobile manufacturers/retailers can’t advertise Petrol Powered Autos or Trucks And Airlines might not be able to advertise at all since they don’t have a non-petrol option. And restaurants can’t advertise meals containing meat, how long before this includes listing them on Menus?. Menus are a form of advertising letting customers know what products are being offered.
To the exclusion of underbidders..
Now excludes FF and Beef regardless. They could offer Triple the asking price and still couldn’t advertise there.
If I’m listening to one speaker, then I am not listening to another.
Everything is a scarce resource.
Give the government the right to regulate scarce resources and you have given the government the right to regulate everything.
That distinction is made-up nonsense and appears nowhere in the First Amendment.
What has the First Amendment to do with The Netherlands? It’s not a law of nature; it doesn’t hold throughout the universe.
I am glad you value it but take care not coin your own made-up nonsense.
Freedom of the press belongs to the person who owns a press. It is not the responsibility of the government to provide a press. Freedom of expression means that a person can use any means available to spread his speech, even commercial speech to anyone who chooses to listen. It is not the responsibility of government to provide billboards. Nor it the responsibility of the government to prevent people from using billboards to express information.
Or in Europe in general.
Not in Amsterdam for sure.
But the Democrats have been trying to sweep away those inconveniences for a long time.
Especially in Amsterdam. Fossil fuels are in most every consumer product in some way. Could these people be any dumber? Of course they can. Maybe it’s the weed there. Hand me my burger please (just not fast food burgers).
The one with the five fingered Leafy Greens on it?
While I agree with the sentiment, Amsterdam (Netherlands) is not covered by the US Constitution.
While the Netherlands Constitution does guarantee freedom of expression, it specifically exempts commercial enterprises (advertising).
The US Constitution certainly IS Meaningless in most all other countries.
And if Socialist Dim-O-Crats had their way it would also be meaningless in the US as well!
“it would also be meaningless in the US as well!”
I think you need more redundancy. 🙂
The government of the city of Amsterdam believes that the people of Amsterdam are so incredibly stupid that the city government has to protect them from their folly. If I lived in Amsterdam, I’d be really offended.
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. They may be more likely to go to Heaven yet at the same time likelier to make a Hell of earth. This very kindness stings with intolerable insult. To be “cured” against one’s will and cured of states which we may not regard as disease is to be put on a level of those who have not yet reached the age of reason or those who never will; to be classed with infants, imbeciles, and domestic animals.
C.S. Lewis, God in the dock.
Is that supposed to be important in Amsterdam?
Is that quote from the Dutch constitution?
No. The quote is from the US Constitution.
The Amsterdam in question is in the Kingdom of the the Netherlands. It is not in the United States of America and is not subject to the US constitution.
Amsterdam was not placed in the US of A in the most recent map I have consulted.
I seriously doubt ads for cars, air travel, or meat encourage the consumption of any of those things. At best they influence which brand you choose when you consume what you were always going to consume.
It’s a performative ban; greens being ostentatious about being green.
(To be honest I’d like to see a lot less advertising of anything in public spaces. It’s tiresome, unattractive visual clutter, on a par with graffiti. Get rid of it all.)
How much are you willing to pay in order to please your eyes?
Do you believe you have the right to force others to pay more in order to please your eyes?
A poster on an Internet site says advertising is a waste of money? How is the Iternet paid for? Companies like Google and facebook must have counterfeit money printing presses in the basement.
“The Netherlands advertising market is experiencing strong growth, with total advertising and market research revenue reaching approximately €10.1 billion in 2026. Digital advertising dominates, with the digital ad spend market alone projected to reach US$4.11 billion in 2026 and growing toward US$5.48 billion by 2029.”
The more astute observation:
“Amsterdam … to ban public advertisements … from billboards, tram shelters, and metro stations.”
Whose revenue is being reduced most directly?
Who is expected to make up for the lost revenue by paying a bit more?
Why?
Anneke Veenhoff : “The climate crisis is very urgent.”
This claim’s lunacy is off the charts.
If something is urgent, putting “very” in front of it doesn’t add anything.
And if something is most definitely NOT a “crisis,” calling ir a crisis doesn’t make it so.
Unfortunately there are people who are easily mislead…
The “climate crisis” is doing very well all by itself. It does not need anyone or anything to accelerate it. /s
Urgent refers to something requiring immediate attention, action, or haste, often described as pressing, critical, or time-sensitive. It implies a situation that cannot wait and must be dealt with immediately. Synonyms include pressing, imperative, crucial, demanding, and vital.
the GreenLeft Party All ‘Green’ parties are Left. It should read the communist party.
OK, the fruit loops are in charge of Amsterdam. However, there is an offset to their nonsense, in our neighbor Canada. The Province of Alberta, Canadas leading oil producer, has gained more than enough signatures to include a vote, in October, to resign from Canada. This is because of Canadas fight, in the name of CAGW, to stop oil production and go “green”. Think of the money they are missing now, with oil at $100 per barrel, due to limiting oil production! Alberta? Come on down!
Under what conditions, if any, can a Canadian province leave Canada?
It might be quite easy. Inter-provincial trade is not huge, and in Alberta’s case they are not a beneficiary of federal transfer payments—quite the opposite.
It might be a bloody nuisance for BC if Alberta flounced off.
It might be a bloody nuisance for the Union if the Confederacy flounced off?
Presumably under the condition that Carney doesn’t send in the Canadian army to crush them.
*snicker* “Canadian Army”
“Secession requires amending the Constitution, which requires the approval of the federal government and likely all other provinces.”
Ref.: Supreme Court’s Secession Reference (1998) and the Clarity Act (2000)
‘The Court added that if Quebec held a referendum on secession with a clear question and won a clear majority, the rest of Canada would be constitutionally obliged to negotiate the terms of Quebec’s secession.’
https://thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/quebec-secession-reference
The implication is that secession isn’t ‘unconstitutional’. Btw, we’re quickly coming up on the 250th anniversary of declaring our secession from Britain.
Most if not all of the land area of Canada is owned by King Charles III.
Shame on me. I trusted Google AI.
Don’t be hard on yourself. From what I’ve seen, Google AI buys into the entire truck load of climate alarmism, too.
Secession requires having the bigger stick and no fear at all of using it to it’s fullest extent
That, or overcoming over a century’s worth of elementary school civics indoctrination.
Yes. OR having mom be sick of folding your laundry.
Would Alberta join the United States, or become an independent entity?
Yes, Alberta is missing out on a lot of money because of rules made elsewhere.
There is no talk of that at present.
Though once Alberta does become independent, I would be surprised if offers aren’t quickly made.
US in a bidding war with China for Alberta?
Would Alberta join the United States
The new map would take a while to get used to…
It would look like a middle finger.
I would prefer it if Alberta became an independent nation, whose primary economic ties are to the USA.
Oil producer Norway is also ‘green’ thanks to the oil money.
It used to be a fun place – until the thought police took over.
Legal weed and legal prostitution- sounds like fun. 🙂
I cannot claim to be a connoisseur of prostitutes, but as a semi-regular visitor to some cities where they ply their trade openly, the advertising is generally less repulsive than the product.
Now that I think about it, the same goes for burger ads.
Such a Philistine. You don’t dig the art and the culture. Why would you?
I thought Legal Weed and Legal Prostitution WERE part of the culture.
Part of modern culture, but far from the main component overall, right?
When I said Philistine I was making myself quite clear: Lacking in appreciation for art or culture. In a word, shallow.
You don’t know that now do you? Just being an arrogant limey? 🙂
You had a US educashun, mate.
You are so entertaining.
As are you, did you but know it.
But “Where’s the Beef”?
They have some peculiar attitudes to policing in Amsterdam..
The type of advertising on display in Amsterdam is the least of that city’s problems…
The image I always get is that Rob Schneider movie where some body randomly stops and screams “I’m so xxxing stoned” and drops his pants to take a dump on the sidewalk.
Well that settles the science-
Gender emissions gap: Rich white men’s jobs, diets and hobbies found to be bad for the planet
Oh brother.
It’s always something. 🙂
“As humanity edges closer to irreversible climate damage, masculine behaviours have been called out for being “bad for the planet”.”
How does one irreveribly damage a statistical average?
A few million years ago, CO2 levels were 5000ppm and above. The climate wasn’t damaged. Not only that, it eventually because the climate we have today.
There is no such thing as an irreversible climate. (Except perhaps removing all the air. In which case there would be no climate either.)
A week or so ago, the women’s soccer(football for the rest of the world) team from the University of Washington, a team that the year before had won it’s conference championship and made it to the round of 8 in the national tournament, played a game against a local high school team made up of boys 14 years old and under.
The boys won. Something like 5 to 2.
Tell me again how there are no differences, athletically, between men and women.
At the same time you can explain why, in every athletic endeavor where they keep records, the men’s records are always better than the women’s records.
During the 60ies Wilt Chamberlain could break any female world record in 100m,200m,400m,800m,high jump and shot put any time of day.
And he was just a basketball player.
And before they changed the free throw rules he made in single games more dunks than the WNBA in its own existence.
Or too make it easier to understand:
There are many male US Soldiers who can lift an average weight female soldier with thgeir weak arm.
There is no female soldier that can lift an average weight male soldier with their strong arm.
That’s because the male ( punching) power is 140% higher on average.
One gender was obviously built to fight, protect and provide,
the other to get children.
“60ies” – Sixty-ies??
“One gender was obviously built to fight, protect and provide,
the other to get children.”
Sex, not gender.
Space Balls?
“Climate apocalypse marries systemic racism, aka BLM activism.
Next up, CAGW marries Trans Activism.
I recall not too many years ago, training materials made a clear and unambiguous statement that “If you are white, especially if you are white and male, you are racist.”
Of course that falls squarely into the unacceptable racial profiling.
The same people who proclaim that all whites are racist, also proclaim that it is impossible for a minority to be a racist.
Apparently they haven’t been to a lot of third world countries.
However, the city of Amsterdam did not budget any money to enforce the ban, so the whole thing is dead in the water, at least until January. According to Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf: “Although advertising for meat, air travel holidays, and petrol cars is officially banned in Amsterdam as of May 1, the municipality will not immediately enforce this newest taboo…If citizens do submit enforcement requests after seeing advertisements for cheese containing rennet, the municipality will only take them up starting January 1, 2027.”
See the newspaper article here (in Dutch. Site block Google translate directly, but copying and pasting the text works).
….so the whole thing is dead in the water, at least until January.
That soon!!
Blackout blame game: Spain targets energy firms as Portugal’s EDP pushes back
You don’t want to rush these things in the public circus.
“from billboards, tram shelters, and metro stations.”
Is the government (owner of the tram shelters, and metro stations) asking for additional funding for inspectors needed to make sure itself doesn’t collect additional funding for advertising space?
Wow, banning something people already don’t like (for other reasons though). Bold move.
It the majority of people didn’t like it, there wouldn’t be much advertising in the first place.
You really think people like being advertised to?
Why is there advertising?
“Egyptians used papyrus to make sales messages and wall posters. Commercial messages and political campaign displays have been found in the ruins of Pompeii and Arabia. Lost and found advertising on papyrus was common in Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome. Wall or rock painting for commercial advertising is another manifestation of an ancient advertising form, which is present to this day in many parts of Asia, Africa, and South America. The tradition of wall painting can be traced back to Indian rock art paintings that date back to 4000 BCE.”
People have supposedly “not liked” advertising for about 6000 years.
Every ad, Super Bowl or media ad clicks, increases the prices of things we buy.
We are paying to be faced with that nonsense. Most people do not realize they have been had.
Well, when most people think of Amsterdam, they think of pot and whores.
Do they do anything else?
A spot of painting. A few sketch artists etc
Digging canals
Architecture – in an amazingly compressed space
Museums
Palaces
War history
Overthrowing feudalism – centuries before its big next door neighbour, Germany
Wasn’t New York originally called New Amsterdam?
Amazingly good ham and cheese sandwiches. They’re a major exporter of premium ham and cheese, or maybe used to be with the current lunes running the show.
Not sure how they will export those without shipping…powered by…diesel!!!
Or Airlines powered by AvGas (petrol)!!!
A little mouse with clogs on, and Hendrika.
Oh come on! Who down-voted me for that?
Amsterdam is ruled by out of control leftists led by an ignorant mayor who live in their own little bubble. A bit like New York which, appropriately, was once called Nieuw Amsterdam.
Plus ca change plus la meme chose.
Haarlem… sorry, Harlem.
Let amsterdam survive 1 week without any product that needs fossil fuel and than we can have a talk if people really want that. remember wind and solar also need fossil fuel.
Yep, Wind requires strong structural steel which needs Coal for its refinement. Wind also needs lightweight composite materials for the blades which requires petrochemicals to manufacture. And Solar needs Coal to refine Silica into Silicon for PV cell wafers. As well as composites for a clear covering over the cells. Coal, Oil and Gas will always be needed until something better comes along. And Wind/Solar/Battery ain’t better.
The blades also require balsa wood, which is often illegally (and unsustainably) harvested.
Just ban all public advertising. Get rid of all environmental eyesores (yes, WTGs ad SVs, too.)
We don’t need ads, the government will tell us what we want.
This decision does not surprise me in the slightest. It is obviously idiotic.
And yesterday, I learned with astonishment that in England, the sale of cigarettes had been banned for life for people born after 2008. Being a non-smoker myself (and not drinking alcohol either, for that matter), hating when someone smokes next to me, and unable to stand the smell of stale tobacco, I still have to say that this decision leaves me dumbfounded.
The English have clearly learned nothing from the era of Prohibition. What a boon for local gangs and mafias, who will be able to diversify their activities! Good grief, what an ode to capitalism, what encouragement to self-enterprise!
Not to mention how this decision infantilizes citizens who are nevertheless adults. But if you don’t know what’s good for you, the government does, doesn’t it?
“In 2024, the United Kingdom exported approximately $83.8M in tobacco and substitutes, primarily to Israel, France, and Germany, while experiencing a sharp decline in overall export volume. Key exports include processed tobacco, cigarettes, and specialized smoking products, with a heavy reliance on imports from Poland and the Netherlands”
“The UK imports significant amounts of tobacco, with top suppliers including China, Poland, and Lithuania, valued at over $400 million annually.”
Money?
More concisely:
“Tobacco was introduced to England in the late 16th century, sparking a niche agricultural industry alongside widespread consumption. While briefly popular in the 17th century, cultivation was heavily restricted to protect colonial imports. Today, it is not a major commercial crop, with the UK primarily relying on imports for its tobacco products.”
It may well be the reason for this law, but in that case I regret that the infantilization of the population prevails over the economic argument being presented clearly and honestly.
Yes.
Quote is America-centric because Internet:
“Tobacco use is heavily concentrated in lower-income communities, with individuals often spending a significant portion of their income (e.g., over $1,200 annually) on tobacco”
‘They’ want the local version that revenue to be local, not Americanized.
Would telling that truth change behavior in lower-income communities?
Moribund is the word…
Ah, look at them go, Bunderschaft, you are going daft?
Better seal off the castle grounds
“This is Moribund, the Burgermeister, I’m gonna keep this monster down
Somebody sent the subversive element, going to chase it out of town”
Sounds to me like it’s time to stop selling Petrol in Amsterdam…period! This means nothing for the Airport either. And All restaurants should immediately switch to vegan menus and stop selling meat. See how long it lasts when the Yahoo’s get what they think they want!
Minor correction….
when the Yahoo’s get what they
think theyhave been told to want!Another minor correction.
No apostrophe for plurals. “Yahoos”.
it’s an interesting concept, but clearly they don’t go far enough. Since nearly all modern products depend on fossil fuels, whether directly or indirectly (through the manufacturing process, processing the raw materials, or the electricity generated), Amsterdam needs to ban all public advertising, period. That will be a tremendous relief to the citizens and improve the cityscape markedly, Tourism will boom… uh oh. More fossil fuel use to get there! Have to ban tourism as well.
Do they still have the streets lined with large windows and a bedroom scene with a hooker selling her wares in Amsterdam? Is that gone now or still there? And marijuana clubs? They can advertise sex and drugs but not meat products and cars?
There’s an awful lot of meat being advertised in the shop windows in the red light district.
Does the ban mean the ladies can’t display their wares anymore?
I’d hazard a guess that going “carbon neutral” will not involve replacing the extensive installed base of diesel and electric pumps with wind-driven ones like they used from the 15th through 18th centuries. Without continuous pumping the North Sea will reclaim more than half the country at high tide.
Who needs meat? Let them eat tulips!
The Netherlands is well on their way to destroying domestic agriculture, so perhaps even tulips will become unavailable.
So does anyone out there still think socialists/marxist’s don’t become totally autocratic.
If Amsterdam want to be a climate justice warrior why ignore the elephant in the room? Require all jet refueling at Schiphol to be bio-based and really make a difference!
Amsterdam Airport Schiphol Main international airport in the Netherlands (near Amsterdam – been there a dozen times). All other EU airports would see a substantive utilization increase.
The rest of The Netherlands considers Amsterdam to be an open-air asylum for the chronically green insane.
Do not pay to much attention to them or they might get violent.
Young male Dutch entrepreneurs are encouraged to get into the horse and donkey breeding business. All internal combustion is to be banned and so transport of people and goods will necessitate return to the natural world for energy.
New jobs will be created, it is not quite clean energy and the manure will need collecting to be used in the generation of bio-gas and fertilizer.
Young female Dutch people will be too tired to do much work, their iron-deficiency anaemia rendering them partially disabled.