It's a tad alarming that people don't recognize that the "my feelings are hurt so do what I say" mentality as an assault on free speech. The Netherlands is not like the US, which does have issues where racism affects the quality of life for its colored people. Zwarte Piet is not affecting anyone's quality of life. Ho hum.

No, but there are still political and economical differences.


Btw, I hate nothing more than when people say you don't have the right to be offended. It's so arrogant. First, one insults another, and then they even have the guts to tell them not to be offended by them. Many people in Europe should listen to what minorities have to say about racism and what gays have to say about homophobia, but instead they use racial slurs and are apalled and consider it an attack on "freedom of speech" when someone calls them out for it.

Europe is so racist smh.

Agree.

I find it quite interesting that Europe automatically seems like a culturally homogenous country to some Americans.
Some of you don't realize that racism has a different history in most European countries and is therefore approached differently. There aren't even close to as much minorities here as they are in the U.S. Most European countries also don't have a history of segregation. Minorities are therefore still often considered immigrants and this perception only starts to change now that some of these former immigrants have lived here for two or three generations. That's why racism didn't really play much of a role here, it is something that has gained public attention with people from other ethnicities being born and having grown up here and realizing that they still face disadvantages due to the color of their skin.
In other areas, Germany has anti-discrimination laws that are much more advanced than those in the U.S. In the U.S. you can use hate speech or wear swastikas. In Germany, you will get a prison sentence or will have to pay a fine for that. So I wouldn't generalize things as quickly as some of you do.

It's their place lol, they were born here or have the dutch nationality.

So you're from the US? What makes you an American? I mean it's not your place either.

I think they can express their shock, that's freedom of speech after all, but asking for it to be banned is pushing it. Most European countries have some cultural things which can be quite shocking for today's standards (paintings, books, characters, hell even food, when I was a child I would often eat 'negro heads') but they are products of their time. Instead of asking for everything offensive to be banned on one 'side' and pretending it isn't offensive and minorites should just zip it on the other, we should acknowledge the offensiveness of some products of that time but explain why it would be foolish to ban them and instead recontextualise them in their proper time period (all the better if it can shed light on these time periods).

This is very true. In many European countries, racial diversity is approached in a different manner, one that from time to time might seem very offensive to Americans, because the countries on this continent are not melting pots. For centuries, European countries have been in touch with non-western ethnicities but for most of that time they've been considered to be foreign. For most of that history, it's been a case of Europeans versus non-Europeans. While America on the other hand has been a mixture of minorities since the very beginning. They have become more sensitive about racism because it offends a greater bunch of people. I personally think neither Americans or Europeans (inhabitants of countries belonging to the European continent) are able to tell each other what is racist because in most cases they see it differently. This case for example clearly offends many Americans (I as a Dutchman/European do NOT claim they have no right to be so) while most Europeans see it as just a joke.

No, Europe isn't.