Sorry for the Dutch link; I’m sure you’ll find a decent translation machine device unit to pull it through.

this article in De Telegraaf, one of the bigger newspapers in the Netherlands, got me laughing and mad at the same time. It’s about a guy that was asked to change seats on a KLM flight; it turned out that this was done because the woman who was seated next to him had problems with sitting next to a guy, because of her religious beliefs. Bonus points if you guess the religion of the woman.

What cracks me up, though, is that this guy is a politician with the CDA party, which is a Christian party. One religious bozo causing disruption for another religious bozo; if that’s not irony, I don’t know what is.

Apart from that I’m also appalled. If you have such immense problems with sharing a row with someone of the opposite sex, don’t fly an airplane. If you do, you *know* there’s a chance of you ending up in exactly that position. Don’t complain, or don’t seek out these situations. That’s like joining #italy and complaining about the abuse of colours…

I don’t know why the cabin crew didn’t move the woman — preferably to a guaranteed man-free seat on one of the wings or in the cargo bay — KLM officials said they couldn’t get the story confirmed by the cabin crew.

This is the third instance of religion-induced intolerance in a row in a short time. Just a few days ago, construction workers were “ordered” to wear different pants because the ones they wore exposed too much flesh (hey, they’re construction workers ffs), and in a city hall in another town, paintings were removed because they had some female nudity in them. In both cases, the complaints came from muslims.

I’m all for mutual understanding and respect for each other’s way of life, but only if it really IS mutual. If they want me to respect their beliefs, they’ll have to respect mine too. If you move to a country, whatever country, I expect you to adapt to your new surroundings, instead of requiring your surroundings to be adapted to you.

Bah. I’m starting to sound racist, and I hate that. But this bending-over attitude is just as bad. I’m willing to be tolerant, but not of intolerance.

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