The Black Lives Matter protest of 10 June 2020 was originally planned for the Anton de Komplein in Amsterdam Zuidoost. Because of the enormous turnout expected, the demonstration was moved to the larger Nelson Mandelapark nearby. AT5, the local news channel, reported live. Eleven thousand people came, standing 1.5 corona metres apart and wearing face masks, lending weight by their presence to the demands for equality and against ethnic profiling and police violence. In the distance I saw two RMS flags waving among the crowd. A sign of solidarity, but also a statement that Moluccans are against racism. The flags fitted the picture. Because earlier I had already seen on the wall at the foot of the statue of Anton de Kom the slogan: 'Black is beautiful'.
For me that slogan worked as a missing link. The protests in the Netherlands and in the rest of the world had flared up after the death of George Floyd in America on 25 May 2020. The protests in the Netherlands and elsewhere were inspired by the protests in America. I had seen this before in Dutch history, or rather in Moluccan history. And then, too, it had to do with discrimination.
Black is beautiful
Towards the end of the 1960s, second-generation Moluccan young people came into contact with Dutch society more and more. Partly because they had been moved from the camps to ordinary neighbourhoods. In that Dutch society, Moluccan young people found that they were seen as lesser; they were discriminated against. A kind of collective response followed. Moluccan young people drew inspiration from the 'black is beautiful' and 'black power' movements in America. From those American movements they learned to be proud of themselves and to stand up for themselves.
The effect was confrontation with white Dutch youth. In the late 1960s, confrontations took place in several Dutch cities between Moluccan young people (who travelled around the country en masse on discount tickets; the teenage tour) and Dutch young people. It even reached the point where the Reverend Metiary, then chairman of the largest Moluccan organisation, called on Moluccan young people through pamphlets not to seek confrontation. The link to the American Black movement ran through a few Moluccan young people who had contact with progressive Dutch movements, such as the film club Vrijheidsfilms. It is also the link that contributed to the radicalisation that ultimately led to the actions of the 1970s.
'But there were also movements that exposed racism and protested against it. Moluccans took part in them.'
But back to taking a stand against racism. In the 1980s it became ever clearer that the Netherlands had become a multicultural society and that the government wanted to pursue a so-called 'general minorities policy'; it was also already clear that institutional and everyday racism existed. How subtly that racism worked was put firmly into words at the time in the book 'Alledaags Racisme' that Philomena Essed published in 1984. She was not thanked for it. Then, too, there was a great deal of denial of racism. But there were also movements that exposed racism and protested against it. Moluccans took part in them. They were involved in the annual commemorations of the racist murder in 1983 of the Antillean Kerwin Duinmeyer. They were present at the Princenhof conference against discrimination and racism in January 1984 in Amsterdam. In 1985 Moluccans from Twente organised a bicycle ride to Amsterdam as part of a campaign by 'Ne pas touche mon pote' (don't touch my mate). That was on the occasion of the visit to the Netherlands of the French organisation SOS-Racisme, founded in 1984. And like SOS-Racisme in France, there were anti-racism bureaus in the Netherlands that demonstrated racism through research and recorded racist and discriminatory incidents. And in the second half of the 1980s, 'Anti-Discrimination Consultations' (ADO) emerged at national and regional level. Moluccans were active in those bureaus and consultations as well. At national level this was done, for instance, by the Inspraakorgaan Welzijn Molukkers (IWM).
In the 1990s too, Moluccans were active in anti-racism activities and projects. In 1992/1993 the Working Group on Discrimination against Moluccans came into being, involving Moluccans from various neighbourhoods. And then in 1995 there was a remarkable European project, 'youth trains'. On the initiative of two Irish-Jewish girls, six 'European Youth Trains' travelled from various corners of Europe over the course of a week to the European Parliament in Strasbourg. It was a campaign against racism, xenophobia, antisemitism and intolerance. Each train had its own theme and stopped at 42 stations to pick up young people. The leader on one of the trains was a Moluccan. In the years before that, Moluccan representatives had also taken part in similar European campaigns.
Racism has not disappeared
Somehow things grew quieter on the anti-racism and anti-discrimination front at the beginning of this century. Not that racism or discrimination had disappeared. On the contrary. Fortunately, new initiatives have at least emerged again in recent years. Such as Kick Out Zwarte Piet. There too I saw Moluccan faces. The movement now rising seems stronger than the one from the 1980s and 1990s. Some of the same demands are on the table, but they are being made more widely and by more people. In which the echo of the movements of the 1960s can be heard. That is a good thing and gives cause for hope.
Cover photo: front page of the magazine Tjengkeh from the 1980s.
Read also: Artist Willy Nanlohy's protest against JP Coen in 1987
