Wednesday, September 20, 2006

Oranjestan

A couple of weeks ago, I speculated what life would have been like had the Brits not kicked the Dutch out of New Amsterdam? If the U.S.A. had never happened? Instead, if by some grotesque quirk of history, the Dutch had remained and become the world's dominant cultural power? How different would things be?

It's relatively easy to piece this parallel universe together by looking at other countries' experience of Dutch colonial rule, and other communities where the Dutch and their ancestors have flourished.

Two examples stand out above all others: the Boers and the Amish. The Boers settled South Africa and quickly set about implementing State-sponsored segregation of people along colour lines: white or Zwarte Piet. This became known as 'apartheid', which is the Dutch word for 'separateness', and the English word for 'racism'.

On the other side of the world, the Amish community represents the product of almost 350 years of uninterrupted Dutch social development on American soil. Their guiding principles are to shun all modern forms of technology and to live a simple life, plodding and untainted by modern artifices, like medicine and telecommunications.

Imagine if these 2 unique Dutch contributions to world culture had been allowed to develop unchecked? Would we still be tilling soil by hand? Or, more likely, would slaves be doing this? Would medical science be laughably underdeveloped? Modern services and conveniences would still be the stuff of science fiction. If there was any science. Or fiction.

It's sobering to think what Oranjestan could have been like. Backward and insular, mean to minorities, resistant to change, with an acute hostility to progress and development. Basically, exactly like modern Holland. Only bigger.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

In fact, the Amish are not Dutch at all. The "Dutch" part of the moniker "Pennsylvania Dutch" is a corruption of "Deutsch," so they should properly be referred to as "Pennsylvania Germans."

A truer picture of what the U.S. would be like under Dutch rule is provided by the area in and around Holland, Michigan, which is one of the most wretchedly conservative and reactionary parts of the U.S. People from Holland are absolutely mortified at some of the goings-on here in the "real" Holland.

Unknown said...

one substantial flaw in your theory... the Amish are not of dutch ancestry. they are of Swiss-German ancestry.

Anonymous said...

Dutch - Swiss - German: they're all the same...

Anonymous said...

Q: Anonymous said...
Dutch - Swiss - German: they're all the same...

_________________________

Let me quess: a American view of the world...

Anonymous said...

Having lived in Amsterdam and in Switzerland and not being American, I can verify that the Dutch and Swiss-German are indeed actually quite similiar. Just as closed, racist, calvanistic and pessimistic as each other and both speaking with a very LOUD and ugly lower German dialect.

However, it's much cleaner in Switzerland, almost obsessional. When you walk into a shop, they do not leave you alone for wanting to assist you, which is just annoying as being ignored. You can buy warm bread at 9pm and they have change!!!!

Anonymous said...

It can be disputed if the Amish are Dutch or other. Keep in mind that in the time period when the frontier was conquered and pilgrims traveled going west in the United States the educational and literacy level was very low. As an example think of the role of a barbershop, he applied first aid.

I was in Penn. Dutch and the home cooking created is very Dutch. They even had poffertjes and pannekoeken.

Dutch rule? More like Dutch immigrants. The United States was already an independent nation when during the period that the pilgrims and pioneers moved out west.
The first nation in the world to recognize the USA was The Netherlands as when a naval ship of the USA with the new US flag entered a Dutch port in the Dutch Caribbean it received an official port salute as recognition of the independent state.
American’s of Dutch descent include President Van Buren. At that time the Amish already existed and if the president can acknowledge Pennsylvania Dutch it must be so.

What would life be if the Dutch had not existed well the business enterprise as we know it would not exist. The VOC was the first international trading company in the world.
That slaves and spices were traded is something that needs to be added to the historical books. Of the slave trading and the results of it, there were and still are good Dutchmen.
In the Dutch East Indies in the region of Depok a landlord with governor status Cornelis Chasltelein gave all his land to his then slaves and set them free at his death in his dying will. Seven families were entrusted to this land and all there descendants there after, forever.