6 ms·

You are harmed by the drug trade. You live in a society where a totally unregulated industry allows bad people to get very rich and exercise illegitimate power

You are harmed by the drug trade. You live in a society where a totally unregulated industry allows bad people to get very rich and exercise illegitimate power through violence and corruption. You live in a society where young people become addicts and rob and harm the people they love and then die prematurely.

the-dude 5y ago
From your description, it does not really affect me.
- vimy 5y ago
  Mocro maffia has already infiltrated the justice and police departement. It’s detrimental to the rule of law and very hard to get rid of once corruption takes root in those departments. A weakened rule of law will affect everyone.
  - jacquesm 5y ago
    Police I will readily believe, justice department would require some pretty hard evidence though, did I miss something important?
    - vimy 5y ago
      > De Antwerpse criminelen hebben zoveel geld dat ze alles en iedereen kunnen kopen. De voorbije jaren zijn een corrupte douanier en verschillende havenarbeiders veroordeeld voor hand- en spandiensten aan drugsbendes. Een groepje top-IT'ers hackte grote rederijen in opdracht van de drugsmaffia. Ook het gerecht en de politie zijn geïnfiltreerd. 'Het is stilaan abnormaal als we in grote drugsdossiers geen lekken vanuit de politie of het parket naar criminelen ontdekken', is de schokkende commentaar in Antwerpse gerechtelijke kringen. Quote from three years ago, after Mocro Maffia set up shop in Belgium. Belgium is a couple years behind The Netherlands. So there's no doubt about it, things are even worse in The Netherlands. Belgium is now in the throw-grenades-at-homes phase but no public executions yet. Matter of time...
- lcrz 5y ago
  Google 'ondermijning'. Crime has a lot of influence on the 'bovenwereld'. If you can't see how this affects you, then that's pretty short sighted.
krageon 5y ago
> You live in a society where young people become addicts and rob and harm the people they love and then die prematurely. Let's not make grand sweeping statements about societies which you clearly don't have a huge practical experience with (or if you do, of which you are grandly exaggerating certain problem spots in order to make your point seem more emotionally critical).
- jacquesm 5y ago
  I actually do have practical experience with that society and it's actually not all that exaggerated, if it is exaggerated at all. NL has a drug problem, and has had a drug problem since the 70's or so. It's been worse than it is today, but even today school age children are approached on a regular basis by pushers, plenty of them end up as addicts and quite a few of them do end up on the wrong side of the law to the point that we have special programs to deal with this. None of our communities is immune from this, whether you live in Northern Groningen, Zeeland, Limburg, Gelderland or the Randstad, the problems are legion and so is the secondary fall out.
  - incrudible 5y ago
    All societies have a drug problem. The only question is, which policy minimizes that problem while considering all related problems (pareto efficiency). There's no "one size fits all" solution.
  - raverbashing 5y ago
    Yes but you're talking about a country with ~ 0.6/100k murders per year The US average seems to be 5, worse cities can get to 20? 40? The problem exists but let's not take it out of proportion
    - jacquesm 5y ago
      That's fair, but we were discussing drugs, not murder per se, even though that is the core subject of the article in the end it is the direct result of the drug trade.
kybernetyk 5y ago
>exercise illegitimate power through violence and corruption. sounds like the description of a government
- mc32 5y ago
  Perhaps, on occasion, but the alternative seems to be warlords which tend to be less predictable and more brutal.
- darthrupert 5y ago
  It's exactly that. It's the primary reason why we need to have strong governments because the only alternative is strong criminals.

the-dude 5y ago

From your description, it does not really affect me.

vimy 5y ago
Mocro maffia has already infiltrated the justice and police departement. It’s detrimental to the rule of law and very hard to get rid of once corruption takes root in those departments. A weakened rule of law will affect everyone.
- jacquesm 5y ago
  Police I will readily believe, justice department would require some pretty hard evidence though, did I miss something important?
  - vimy 5y ago
    > De Antwerpse criminelen hebben zoveel geld dat ze alles en iedereen kunnen kopen. De voorbije jaren zijn een corrupte douanier en verschillende havenarbeiders veroordeeld voor hand- en spandiensten aan drugsbendes. Een groepje top-IT'ers hackte grote rederijen in opdracht van de drugsmaffia. Ook het gerecht en de politie zijn geïnfiltreerd. 'Het is stilaan abnormaal als we in grote drugsdossiers geen lekken vanuit de politie of het parket naar criminelen ontdekken', is de schokkende commentaar in Antwerpse gerechtelijke kringen. Quote from three years ago, after Mocro Maffia set up shop in Belgium. Belgium is a couple years behind The Netherlands. So there's no doubt about it, things are even worse in The Netherlands. Belgium is now in the throw-grenades-at-homes phase but no public executions yet. Matter of time...
lcrz 5y ago
Google 'ondermijning'. Crime has a lot of influence on the 'bovenwereld'. If you can't see how this affects you, then that's pretty short sighted.

krageon 5y ago

> You live in a society where young people become addicts and rob and harm the people they love and then die prematurely. Let's not make grand sweeping statements about societies which you clearly don't have a huge practical experience with (or if you do, of which you are grandly exaggerating certain problem spots in order to make your point seem more emotionally critical).

jacquesm 5y ago
I actually do have practical experience with that society and it's actually not all that exaggerated, if it is exaggerated at all. NL has a drug problem, and has had a drug problem since the 70's or so. It's been worse than it is today, but even today school age children are approached on a regular basis by pushers, plenty of them end up as addicts and quite a few of them do end up on the wrong side of the law to the point that we have special programs to deal with this. None of our communities is immune from this, whether you live in Northern Groningen, Zeeland, Limburg, Gelderland or the Randstad, the problems are legion and so is the secondary fall out.
- incrudible 5y ago
  All societies have a drug problem. The only question is, which policy minimizes that problem while considering all related problems (pareto efficiency). There's no "one size fits all" solution.
- raverbashing 5y ago
  Yes but you're talking about a country with ~ 0.6/100k murders per year The US average seems to be 5, worse cities can get to 20? 40? The problem exists but let's not take it out of proportion
  - jacquesm 5y ago
    That's fair, but we were discussing drugs, not murder per se, even though that is the core subject of the article in the end it is the direct result of the drug trade.

kybernetyk 5y ago

>exercise illegitimate power through violence and corruption. sounds like the description of a government

mc32 5y ago
Perhaps, on occasion, but the alternative seems to be warlords which tend to be less predictable and more brutal.
darthrupert 5y ago
It's exactly that. It's the primary reason why we need to have strong governments because the only alternative is strong criminals.