4 ms·
> On the contrary: we welcome it it open doors. Well good for you, but as someone who lives in the centre of Amsterdam I can understand the motivation to disco
by lawlorino 7y ago
> On the contrary: we welcome it it open doors.
Well good for you, but as someone who lives in the centre of Amsterdam I can understand the motivation to discourage drug tourism.
Edit: to clarify it's not the reams of tourists getting high in coffee shops that I have a problem with, but the knock-on effects of it. Tourists treat the city like an adult themepark and recently the city council have been taking steps to address these problems.
- bartvanH 7y agoI am personally more annoyed by the drunk people than i am by the high/stoned people.
- ed_balls 7y agoIf people were just smoking weed that wouldn't be a problem.
- EForEndeavour 7y agoIn other words, heavy tourism is a problem, no matter what drives it.
- emsy 7y agoAmsterdam is still clean and quiet compared to other major cities. To be honest, I suspect the main factor to be the red light district. Just visit the Reeperbahn in Hamburg. I'd argue it's much worse and they don't offer legal weed. To be clear, I'm not arguing for or against prostitution, but against prostitution as a tourist attraction.
- BurningFrog 7y agoIt's hard to see how you can have prostitution and it not be a tourist attraction.
- davvolun 7y agoIf prostitution was legal, or decriminalized (I believe sex workers and advocates prefer decriminalization over legalization), everywhere, it wouldn't be much of a tourist attraction.
- Ididntdothis 7y agoIn Germany prostitution is legal and with the exception of st Pauli the red light districts are the opposite of tourist attractions.
- delecti 7y agoI think the relatively small size (land area and population) of the Netherlands and the length of time that things have been going on have both contributed to that. A country newly legalizing pot probably has a lot less to worry about WRT rambunctious tourists.
- nothrabannosir 7y ago> recently the city council have been taking steps to address these problems I was in Amsterdam this morning and everyone I talked to explicitly mentioned it being done against drunk Englishmen on stag dos. I remember myself hating fractious drunk English stag parties, and have fond memories of pointing polite and hapless stoned Italians to the street we were already on. Tourists from the UK are reviled by Amsterdam and they’ve ruined it so much the entire city centre now has an alcohol ban. It has nothing to do with weed.
- dep_b 7y agoWell the UK is near and there are cheap flights so yeah that combined with Amsterdam's reputation and the way certain people like to "represent" the UK abroad is a pretty bad mix. But there's just tons of people from all countries all over the world that are smoking weed under your window, pissing on the street, don't watch out for cyclists and so on. You don't fix Amsterdam by banning the Brits. Also, Dutch stag parties seem not to be that far off what happens in the UK.