Almere-Digest

October 18, 2019

The Netherlands: Army called out to assist police in the Hague re: farmers protest and demonstrations

October 16, 2019

EU: One in three children don't receive proper nutrition Read more at: https://p.dw.com/p/3RI4f

October 15, 2019

Unicef: One third of children on the globe do not receive proper nutrition

One in three children don't receive proper nutrition

The Netherlands: Europe's number one biking country, becoming unsafe for bikers as higher speed mopeds and scooters are also allowed on bike paths

Scooters and Mopeds,
danger on Dutch bike-paths

There are more bicycles than residents in The Netherlands, and in all the big Dutch cities up to 70% of all journeys are made by bike.

To make cycling safer and even more inviting the Dutch have also built a vast network of cycle paths.

These are clearly marked, have smooth surfaces, separate signs and lights for those on two wheels, and wide enough to allow side-by-side cycling and overtaking.

In many cities the paths are completely segregated from motorised traffic. Sometimes, where space is scant and both must share, you can see signs showing an image of a cyclist with a car behind accompanied by the words 'Bike Street: Cars are guests'.

But there is a major danger now lurking on these beautiful bike paths, Molpeds and scooters,the Dutch call them "snor fietsers", and these also include, what one biker called the "silent killers", electric scooters, who are also racing silently over these serene bike-paths, at high speeds.

Very often Scooters and Mopeds go at speeds of 50 km per hour or even more, specially when the engine is "souped up".

Also Pizza delivering persons on scooters have a reputation of always going too fast. To make matters worse, because these scooters are on the bike-path, they also don't have to wear a helmet.

In December 2017 a majority of the Dutch parliament approved a city of Amsterdam request to move mopeds and scooters from their municipality bike-paths to the open roads and highways.

Unfortunately not many, if not any, of the cities in the Netherlands, have taken any similar action as Amsterdam so far. It is also well known in the Netherlands, that local police is not very agressive, when it comes to writing out "tickets" against moped and scooter riders, who are going too fast on the bike-paths.

As one bike-rider in the city of Almere noted: how many more bikers will need to get serious accidents, before our Municipality takes any action?

EU-Digest

October 14, 2019

Poland: Poland's ruling PiS party wins most votes, according to exit polls

Poland's ruling PiS party wins most votes, according to exit polls

October 13, 2019

MODERN CULTURE: How we came to live in cursed times - by Jia Tolentino

On Twitter, people appear to identify objects and phenomena with “cursed energy” every hour of every day. It’s not just creepy images: the word has acquired new valences, has come to signify increasingly generalized feelings of anxiety and malaise. “The way I use ‘cursed’ has a connotation of being trapped, i.e. a sort of Greek Mythology Ironic Eternal Punishment vibe,” Alex Pareene, a writer for The New Republic, told me.

We must be cursed, one would think, to spend so much of our day walking around with our eyes glued to a device that provokes bad feelings. Ashley Feinberg, a writer at Slate, wrote, in an e-mail, “To me, cursed energy is about any number of bad or dystopian things finding each other and congealing into something that is somehow more stupid than the sum of its parts.” She included a link to an image of an Instagram meltdown queen appearing on a leftist reactionary podcast whose hosts are best known for denigrating #MeToo and valorizing anorexia. Sam Biddle, who writes about tech for the Intercept, told me, “I think so much of the Internet feels like hell now that it just makes sense to blame it on the devil.”

October 12, 2019

NOBEL PEACE PRIZE: Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed wins Nobel Peace Prize

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed wins Nobel Peace Prize