How did the Dutch see themselves in the twentieth century? Jesper Verhoef examined our identity on the basis of the public debate about new media from America. What seems? The Dutch didn't like those modern frills.
The public debate is still regularly about the Dutch identity. We are afraid that it will be affected by newcomers with different cultures. Or that new technologies such as the smartphone are turning us into individualistic zombies. Historian Jesper Verhoef (Utrecht University) analyzed the public debate about media between 1919 and 1989 and found great parallels with these current fears. Then the arrows were aimed at the Americans with their garish, superficial culture that was miles away from the supposed sobriety and sociability in our own country.
Not tolerant
His research shows that the Dutch had difficulty with new media from modern America. They resist this by consistently portraying 'the other' negatively. Verhoef:“Recent historical research shows that the Netherlands was progressive and tolerant in the twentieth century. However, the papers I've read show the opposite. Most Dutch people expressed themselves very conservatively in the media. The fear of foreigners is therefore not something of the last twenty years, since the rise of Fortuyn and Wilders.”
Although Verhoef thinks that negative sentiment in society was broader, he only examined the public debate about American-associated media. Until the Second World War, Dutch journalists and readers were concerned about the American film world, from the 1950s about transistor radio and TV quizzes. Anti-American sentiment was strongest in the early twentieth century, but it also left its mark after World War II, according to Verhoef. “People think that the Netherlands was pro-American after the liberation by Americans and the Marshall Aid (American food and money in connection with shortages in Europe due to the war, ed.). However, an anti-American undercurrent remained in the coverage, albeit more nuanced.”
Cosiness
Verhoef is not the first to notice this, but he is the first to use so much source material in support. He researched over a hundred thousand articles from different kinds of newspapers. Both national and regional newspapers, local duds, liberal and communist, protestant and catholic newspapers. “The picture in historiography is that pillarization controlled every aspect of daily life. Surprisingly, this is not reflected in the public debate about Hollywood. While Protestants, unlike Roman Catholics, were opposed to film at all, they all wrote about "Yankee folly." Sobriety, modesty and conviviality formed the Dutch core identity. Every pillar could find themselves in this, without their different philosophies getting in the way.”
Although journalists in the last century were more elitist than they are today, they could not express opinions that completely contradicted those of their readers. Certainly in the 1920s and 1930s, the newspaper was the only source of news. On average, every Dutch person read the newspaper, in which the common man also spoke, in letters to the editor and in interviews. Americans were considered superficial, greedy, and primitive, spineless. This was diametrically opposed to the qualities that the Dutch liked to ascribe to themselves.
Double standard
Dutch newspapers are not only opposed to American culture, but also double standards. They wrote condescendingly about hysterical scenes of 'autogram idiots' (signature hunters) around Hollywood stars, but the screams during the arrival of the American actor Tom Mix in Amsterdam were not portrayed as hysterical. “The Dutch had no problem with double standards. American film palaces were dismissed as gaudy, but the new Dutch cinemas after the American example, such as the Tuschinski, were not. The Dutch were very good at seeing splinters in the eyes of the Americans, but had no eye for their own beams," said Verhoef.
In these years, the resistance to the American novelties was greatest, according to the research. It is striking that the Dutch were the most self-satisfied at the same time. “Journalists were definitely afraid of change. But by emphasizing that they saw no danger in American culture, they cast an incantation. Their readers were too sober to indulge in Hollywood and bigoted movie star worship.”
Readers themselves also expressed their annoyance en masse, for example about the emerging body culture in American films. Just because they went to the movies doesn't mean they supported American values. “It turned out okay because it got a, sometimes thin, Dutch sauce. This allowed the negative image of America to remain for a long time.”
Complaining elite
Beginning in the 1950s, journalists began to write more nuanced about American culture and new media. The transistor radio, a fine piece of modern technology that the national pride of Philips could not copy, garnered much admiration. From the 1960s onwards, complaints about this portable radio and the fear of individualization and antisocial behavior mainly came from the elite. She continued to resist the modernization from America the most. Anti-American sentiment still occasionally surfaced in the newspaper, such as with the debate about the Americanization of fun television games. These were increasingly replaced by the American show version with large cash prizes and gloating. So where had that Dutch modesty, sobriety and conviviality gone?
Verhoef:“With historians who wrote that the Dutch were tolerant in the twentieth century, I did not expect that the resistance against the new and the other would continue until 1989. The Dutch were – and are – afraid that their identity would be overgrown by innovations and by a foreign culture. Unnecessary in my opinion, because the Dutch identity does not exist at all. This differs from person to person:a Frisian will probably think differently about this than a Limburger. Moreover, my research shows that identity changes over time.”
Jesper Verhoef about his research into Op Opzit against modernization.