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Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to you. Cool People did Cool Stuff

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Speaker 1: the podcast I got bored of trying to find clever

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Speaker 1: ways to introduce about a month ago. I'm your host,

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Speaker 1: Margaret Kills, right, and every week I tell you about

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Speaker 1: some cool people who way to think work cool. Today,

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Speaker 1: my guest is Alex Biel's the host of Wonderstrom, radical

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Speaker 1: Dutch podcast. Alex, how are you doing? And how badly

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Speaker 1: did I pronounced the name of your podcast and or

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Speaker 1: your name? Hi? Lovely to be here. I'm great, A

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Speaker 1: little bit sweaty um yep. Pronunciation was it was? Okay? Um?

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Speaker 1: It should be almost strong? Okay strong? Yeah, okay. What

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Speaker 1: is that podcast? It's uh yeah, so like you like

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Speaker 1: you say, it's a radical podcast. It's a monthly and

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Speaker 1: it combines basic radical leftist political concept and a more

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Speaker 1: sort of like practical aspect about how do we organize

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Speaker 1: and like my personal ideas about it. Sometimes I go

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Speaker 1: like into like more philosophy esque stuff, but mostly it's

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Speaker 1: these these two two sides. Okay. We also have Sophie

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Speaker 1: on the call, Sophie as our producer. How are you doing, Sophie?

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Speaker 1: It just reminds me whenever I hear you know something

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Speaker 1: not in the English language, how fucking ugly English is.

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Speaker 1: Dutch words are so much cooler. English words are so

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Speaker 1: basic there, it's like, you know, it's depressing, really but greener,

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Speaker 1: I guess, yeah for sure. I mean, how do you say,

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Speaker 1: how do you say? Cool people did cool stuff? And

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Speaker 1: Dutch cool? Way better, way better, way better. Um, but yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's just my thought at the beginning of this episode.

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Speaker 1: Way better. Alright, So changing the name of the podcast, Um, okay, So,

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Speaker 1: so first of all, I think Sophie is wearing a

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Speaker 1: black hoodie in honor of today's topic. Actually, I don't

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Speaker 1: know if the's a hood might just be a black sweatshirt.

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Speaker 1: There's definitely no hood, but it is and we have

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Speaker 1: alex on because today we are talking about rad Dutch stuff. Specifically,

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Speaker 1: we're going to talk about some people who had a

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Speaker 1: problem and they went out and solved that problem for

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Speaker 1: themselves and for others, which is kind of the basis

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Speaker 1: of being a cool person from my current point of view.

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Speaker 1: And the problem that these particular folks were facing was

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Speaker 1: that people didn't have enough houses to sleep in. The

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Speaker 1: solution was, well, there are some empty houses, so why

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Speaker 1: don't we break into those houses and then sleep there.

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Speaker 1: Because today we're going to talk about the Dutch squatters

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Speaker 1: movement that peaked in the eighties but has gone on

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Speaker 1: for decades. They started out looking for shelter. They wounded

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Speaker 1: up preventing real estate prospectors from kind of destroying half

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Speaker 1: the buildings in the Netherlands, all while building the infrastructure

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Speaker 1: that birthed a lot of the modern anti fascist movement,

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Speaker 1: not just the Dutch anti fascist movement, it a lot

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Speaker 1: of the it's like fascist movement in the West, Alex

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Speaker 1: Have you ever heard of squatting? Yeah, so I have,

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Speaker 1: So I have. It's if you're any kind of radical

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Speaker 1: or activists in the Netherlands, you you really can't get

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Speaker 1: around it. Um all stable social centers that are available

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Speaker 1: to the movement, or most of them have a history

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Speaker 1: in squatting, like they're legalized squads or squads that have remained.

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Speaker 1: And like a lot of like you say, like infrastructure

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Speaker 1: and activist groups are organized around squatted spaces or they

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Speaker 1: meet there, they formed there, and like a lot of

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Speaker 1: the networks of who've been active for a long time

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Speaker 1: or who get active often they come in through squatting.

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Speaker 1: Squatting actions or projects that are related to the squatting movement. Yeah, yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: and it's it's one of those things that I think

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Speaker 1: that when people, especially from the United States, where I

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Speaker 1: can only speak to people from the United States, when

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Speaker 1: they start seeing squatting in Europe in general, but in

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Speaker 1: the Netherlands in particular, it UM is often fairly inspirational,

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Speaker 1: and I try to be a somewhat inspirational podcast. This

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Speaker 1: is why I'm really excited to talk about this topic,

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Speaker 1: which I think actually sometimes annoys the Dutch squatters that

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Speaker 1: Americans are like, you all are doing so great, and

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Speaker 1: they're like, everything's actually really hard. Yeah I've heard this before. Yeah. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Also people who come by, we're like smith and like, oh,

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Speaker 1: there's all these these spaces and these things you can do,

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Speaker 1: and then like even like people like move here, and

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Speaker 1: then they're like, oh wait, it's actually it's actually not

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Speaker 1: that great. It's not you don't actually have that much

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Speaker 1: moon room to maneuver, right, Yeah, yeah, you know. I

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Speaker 1: mean that's why it's not a happy, perfect utopian thing,

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Speaker 1: but it's still a really interesting thing. UM. And I

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Speaker 1: will argue that this episode, this this idea starts where

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Speaker 1: all things start with a bed, a table, and a chair,

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Speaker 1: because in nineteen fourteen the Supreme Court of the Netherlands

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Speaker 1: ruled that in order to prove that you live somewhere,

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Speaker 1: all you need to prove that you are the occupant

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Speaker 1: of a building as you need a bed, a table

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Speaker 1: and a chair. If you live in a space, you

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Speaker 1: know those three things, you are the occupant of that space,

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Speaker 1: not the owner, but the occupant. So in the nineteen thirties,

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Speaker 1: during the Great Depression, tons of people in the Netherlands

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Speaker 1: started moving into empty houses, um but as far as

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Speaker 1: I can tell, didn't conceptualize of themselves as a movement.

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Speaker 1: This wasn't the squatters movement. This was people squatting. In

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Speaker 1: five after the expulsion of the Nazis, more people went

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Speaker 1: and did the same thing. Um. But most squatters in

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Speaker 1: both of these times were kind of just either secretly

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Speaker 1: occupying a place or they were moving in publicly but

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Speaker 1: in order to force the owner's hand into renting to them.

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Speaker 1: And both are super valid things to do, but neither

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Speaker 1: are the sort of politicized squatting that we'll be talking

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Speaker 1: about in a moment Like this is kind of just

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Speaker 1: any squatting, like squatting is of old times. People always

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Speaker 1: squatted to some extent, but like, yeah, having like as

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Speaker 1: this politicized movement quite new, Yeah, totally, and in the

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Speaker 1: nineteen sixties and the Netherlands has started to change. So

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Speaker 1: real estate speculation, or if you're feeling a bit less polite,

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Speaker 1: you can call this house milking. Very simple concept. You

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Speaker 1: buy up houses and then you leave them empty, waiting

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Speaker 1: for them to be worth more. Like when the economy approves,

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Speaker 1: since there's fewer houses on the market, the housing prices

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Speaker 1: go up and the houses you own are now worth more.

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Speaker 1: Even more sinister than leaving these houses intentionally empty. When

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Speaker 1: people need houses, you can leave the buildings to be neglected.

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Speaker 1: And so that all these old historic houses and the

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Speaker 1: Nevolands has beautiful old architecture. Um, all of these old

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Speaker 1: houses they fall into ruin. And as soon as they

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Speaker 1: start falling into ruin, it's easier for the owners to

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Speaker 1: get demolition permits to like knock them over and build

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Speaker 1: cheap modern condos and ship like that. Um, So letting

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Speaker 1: in houses fall into ruin is good business. And I

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Speaker 1: would argue that this is a bad thing. Every part

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Speaker 1: of what I just described, Yeah, it's it's interesting because

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Speaker 1: this this thing, it's still still very current um. Even

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Speaker 1: if it's not for demolition, then it can be like

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Speaker 1: we were going to renovate it, but to renovate it's

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Speaker 1: going to take a while, so the occupants need to

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Speaker 1: go away. Even if like their social rent social housing, um,

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Speaker 1: then this letting things fall into disrepair can still be

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Speaker 1: used now as a tactic to force the people out

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Speaker 1: or to bully them out of the social housing and

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Speaker 1: then renovate the space and then bring in buyers instead

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Speaker 1: or like more expensive rent. Yeah yeah, uh. And that's

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Speaker 1: one of the things that's get kind of sad about

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Speaker 1: like a lot of this stuff, is that this was

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Speaker 1: a thing that did a lot of good um, but continues.

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Speaker 1: All of the problems that the Dutch squatters were facing

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Speaker 1: at this time are old things faced um all over

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Speaker 1: the world. This is probably not gonna be too unfamiliar

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Speaker 1: to two people. In the US. Right now, we're having

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Speaker 1: this huge wave of basically large companies buying up all

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Speaker 1: the available houses um, and the housing market is kind

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Speaker 1: of going wild right now, just as homelessness as starting

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Speaker 1: to pick up again in the U S. And then

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Speaker 1: it's actually interesting the numbers of on housed folks in

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Speaker 1: the US isn't incredibly higher than fifteen years ago. Um,

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Speaker 1: but the it's way more visible in a lot of ways,

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Speaker 1: and a lot of the fights around it are being

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Speaker 1: a lot more politicized. Okay. So in the nineteen sixties

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Speaker 1: in the Netherlands, housing speculation was all the rage of

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Speaker 1: the capitalists and future friends of the pod the Provo movement,

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Speaker 1: who were kind of a and tell me if I'm

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Speaker 1: wrong about this, but I have the Provos is kind

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Speaker 1: of a super political Dutch post hippie movement. Yeah that's

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Speaker 1: sound sounds about right. They're often described as a as anarchists,

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Speaker 1: but they're also closely related to uh to hippie, the

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Speaker 1: hippie movement. Yeah, okay, So they started doing some of

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Speaker 1: the first politicized squatting in the Netherlands that I was

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Speaker 1: able to find. They would start squatting buildings in order

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Speaker 1: to fight against speculation, and squatting got its modern name

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Speaker 1: at the time during that period kraken or cracking. So

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Speaker 1: squatters got the name crackers, which is funny to an

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Speaker 1: American audience. I have to do. Yeah, that's great. Um.

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Speaker 1: So in in so I've been to squats where there's

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Speaker 1: banners like release the Kraken, like release the Kraken. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: because it's you know, it's you have this big, big

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Speaker 1: squid with like crawled and crowbars and bandanas and uh

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Speaker 1: you know, free food and stuff. Yeah. And sometimes they

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Speaker 1: make them out to draw them like really cuddly or

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Speaker 1: really threatening. Yeah. It's also funny, is the word kraken

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Speaker 1: is in a way it's more menacing than squatting. The

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Speaker 1: squatting is this sort of sitting on your on your heels, yeah,

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Speaker 1: whereas kraken is like to crack something like a nutcracker

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Speaker 1: or like a safe cracker. Um, which which connects to

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Speaker 1: this like like the conservatives, liberal conservatives in the Netherlands,

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Speaker 1: they always try to do this thing where they say

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Speaker 1: trying to make squatting into this crime. Right, So there

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Speaker 1: they have the slogans like kara it's in breka, Okay,

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Speaker 1: I'm squatting is burglary. Yeah, but but they say for that,

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Speaker 1: right because it's like like it's on the same page

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Speaker 1: as like safe cracking, house cracking. Yeah. Um, so it

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Speaker 1: has it has some power in the world, but it's

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Speaker 1: also like, yeah, in the crime area, no, and I

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Speaker 1: like it and well, but one of the things I

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Speaker 1: ran across is it claimed that the word is derived

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Speaker 1: from old Dutch thieves can't. And if that's true, I

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Speaker 1: like it because things that make the real world, like

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Speaker 1: dungeons and dragons make me happy. Um and dungeons dragons

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Speaker 1: is going to come up a second time in the script.

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Speaker 1: Just gonna leave that out there for everyone, so go ahead.

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Speaker 1: Oh yeah, no, So the thieves scouts is a fun thing.

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Speaker 1: There's a uh like the Amsterdam Dutch dialect actually has

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Speaker 1: a lot of influence from this this thieves count, which

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Speaker 1: is called bad Huns, which has like a lot of

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Speaker 1: influence from um, yeah, just words from thievery, but also

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Speaker 1: like Jewish Yiddish influences and stuff all mixed together in

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Speaker 1: a fairly sort of recognizable thing. And you have like

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Speaker 1: Bahun's dictionaries that you can buy and like old books shops,

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Speaker 1: and that's really cool. I want one. Even though I

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Speaker 1: um lived in the Netherlands for a while and cannot

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Speaker 1: pronounce Dutch to save my life. I think I pronounced

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Speaker 1: it perfectly fine. The Dutch people around me don't think

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Speaker 1: I pronounced it perfectly fine. So the laws in the

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Speaker 1: Netherlands were for a long time they were favorable a squatters,

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Speaker 1: at least compared to some other countries like the US.

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Speaker 1: In one they got even better. Some squatters in the

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Speaker 1: Dutch city of Nimegan got run out of the house

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Speaker 1: they were living in and the owner was like, the

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Speaker 1: house wasn't empty, it was for sale. They came into

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Speaker 1: my for sale house. The Supreme Court heard the case

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Speaker 1: an appeal and was like, look, a house in use

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Speaker 1: means a house in use as a house. And this

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Speaker 1: established the concept of domestic peace and Dutch law um,

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Speaker 1: which is basically anyone entering a property needs permission from

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Speaker 1: the current occupant, not the owner, but the occupant. So

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Speaker 1: the person in the house with a bed, table and

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Speaker 1: chair has domestic peace as the one who is allowed

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Speaker 1: to decide who comes and goes. So from this point

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Speaker 1: on for a while, until we'll get to that legally,

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Speaker 1: most squatters could only be evicted by court order, So

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Speaker 1: the cops ostensibly can't just come in and arrestue for

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Speaker 1: trespassing because you're the occupant. And this is all the

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Speaker 1: kind of the groundwork. People who have a problem, like

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Speaker 1: I don't have anywhere to live can address that problem

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Speaker 1: by saying, well, this this building is empty, and squads

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Speaker 1: would still be evicted all the time, as owners would

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Speaker 1: Basically it's not like Okay, you become the document and

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Speaker 1: now it's your house and you get to stay there forever. Right,

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Speaker 1: owners would decide suddenly that they actually wanted to do

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Speaker 1: something with the house. They you know, they were just

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Speaker 1: like leave a house to be empty for ten years,

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Speaker 1: and then squatters move in and they're like, wait, no,

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Speaker 1: I have all these plans you know, and then they

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Speaker 1: go prove that in court, unless they prove it in

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Speaker 1: court then and people would get evicted and wake the

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Speaker 1: sleeping and dragon because they just want to keep it

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Speaker 1: lying around as like they're as they're like, uh, their

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Speaker 1: savings basically and their growth intra invest and then people

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Speaker 1: live in there and it seems like, oh maybe you're

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Speaker 1: losing it. Then it instantly awakes them. Still yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I just rewatched the Hobbit. So this is extra true.

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Speaker 1: And so the first political squatters, the provo movement overall,

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Speaker 1: and the people coming from that, they try to be

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Speaker 1: non violent in terms of how they were building a

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Speaker 1: squat movement. And then on November as a squad was

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Speaker 1: being evicted. Squatters lined up three rows deep. They link

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Speaker 1: their arms together and they shouted no violence, no violence

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Speaker 1: at the police. And you will be shocked to now,

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Speaker 1: this will be absolutely no one has ever heard of

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Speaker 1: this before. But the police didn't listen to them as

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Speaker 1: they were chanting. Founded. Yeah, So the squiders all got

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Speaker 1: the ship beat out of them, and non violence fell

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Speaker 1: out of favor in the squatting movement. And that's when

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Speaker 1: the squatting movement started to get ship done. Was when

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Speaker 1: non violence fell out of favor. I remember an old photo.

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Speaker 1: It's a black and white photo of a of a

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Speaker 1: house squat being defended, and so there's there's people lined

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Speaker 1: up in front of it. They were like motorcycle helmets

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Speaker 1: in there. They have a banner in front of them,

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Speaker 1: or maybe it's hanging on the on the on the building.

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Speaker 1: I don't rightly know. Um. And it says the under

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Speaker 1: conte discussed meat overvelt theveta and food on it out,

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Speaker 1: which means the other side does not discuss about violence.

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Speaker 1: They pour it into law. They poured into law and

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Speaker 1: then they act on it. Right. Yeah. Yeah, some of

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Speaker 1: the slogans that come out of the squad scene are

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Speaker 1: really honestly, really amazing and really poetic. Um. And then

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Speaker 1: so okay, right around this time, in the late seventies,

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Speaker 1: the Dutch economy goes into this tail spin during the

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Speaker 1: worldwide energy crisis. And I haven't fully wrapped my head

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Speaker 1: around the Dutch economic troubles, of I know that domestic

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Speaker 1: natural gas production had been giving the Dutch and economic

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Speaker 1: boom in the seventies, and that this had led to

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Speaker 1: high wages in a strong welfare state. And I also

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Speaker 1: know that neoliberal publications blame this for the crash. They're like,

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Speaker 1: no one wants to work anymore because everyone gets such

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Speaker 1: good welfare or whatever, which is once again not familiar

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Speaker 1: to any Americans listening to this right now. But it

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Speaker 1: seems like the worldwide energy crisis is the reason that

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Speaker 1: the Dutch economy went into a tail spinning. Do you

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Speaker 1: know much about this? No? Not not quite? Okay, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's um. I mean, I couldn't tell you what happened

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Speaker 1: in the late seventies in the U s economy specifically,

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Speaker 1: it is released to this. However, it happened unemployment surged

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Speaker 1: up to seventeen percent by four which for context, for

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Speaker 1: some folks who are listening. This is higher than the

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Speaker 1: huge spike we saw in the US in March and

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Speaker 1: April with COVID, but it's lower than like the Great Depression,

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Speaker 1: right with unemployment, though homelessness surged around nineteen eighty or so,

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Speaker 1: there were fifty three thousand homeless people in a country

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Speaker 1: of only fourteen million people. So that's about point three

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Speaker 1: eight percent people were homeless. And in contrast, the US

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Speaker 1: is dealing with a ton of homelessness right now. It's

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Speaker 1: fifty two thousand people out of three nine million to

293
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Speaker 1: point one seven percent. It's less than half. The current

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Speaker 1: major homelessness crisis that we're facing in the US is

295
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Speaker 1: less than half of what the Dutch were facing in

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Speaker 1: the late seventies early eighties. And while all this is happening,

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Speaker 1: the real estate prospectors are like, well this rules like okay,

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Speaker 1: well you know, let's just hold onto these houses and

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Speaker 1: drive up the prices even more. Um And I remember

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Speaker 1: being told by squatters, and I can't source this. I

301
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Speaker 1: remember being told by squatters that about a third of

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Speaker 1: the houses in Amsterdam were empty for a while in

303
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Speaker 1: the early eighties. Is that you have any idea, Well,

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Speaker 1: very very very many. Definitely, Um, I don't I don't

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Speaker 1: know the exact uh figure, but I know I know,

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Speaker 1: and like currently like now that the squading movement has

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Speaker 1: gone or like it's not gone, like it's diminished. Um,

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Speaker 1: you get like one third of the house being sold

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Speaker 1: now is like to like a big investor. So it's

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Speaker 1: basically trying to do the same thing again. But no,

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Speaker 1: there was like huge emptiness of houses. Yeah, and when

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Speaker 1: you have people who are motivated to do something about it,

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Speaker 1: you have somewhat favorable laws, and you have tons of

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Speaker 1: empty houses, and you have tons of people need houses,

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Speaker 1: you get the squatters movement. Uh. And it it didn't

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Speaker 1: start as a political statement or resistance to anything, at

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Speaker 1: least not as conceived of by most of its participant,

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Speaker 1: but it carried a specific important political ideal, nonetheless, which

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Speaker 1: is that you can just do things right, that you

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Speaker 1: don't need to ask the state for permission, um, that

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Speaker 1: you can solve your problems directly. And and it's because

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Speaker 1: of this that it rejected the political assumptions of this.

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Speaker 1: It kind of rejected a lot of the political assumptions

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Speaker 1: of the left that have been going on before that,

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Speaker 1: and it took on a more anarchist character, and of

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Speaker 1: course the provos that it came from also were you know,

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Speaker 1: part of anarchist movement, and not in that all of

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Speaker 1: the participants were anarchist, but that many of them were,

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Speaker 1: and that the squads were intended as direct action rather

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Speaker 1: than political action. One of the easiest examples to give

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Speaker 1: of direct action. Also, Yeah, you want to explain, like

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Speaker 1: when when is it indirect? Well, if you're trying to

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Speaker 1: influence someone to do something, and we as direct when

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Speaker 1: you solve the problem yourself, like for instance, need a house,

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Speaker 1: you get you use a house. Yeah, it's so simple.

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Speaker 1: It's like one of the things as I was I

337
00:18:57,840 --> 00:18:59,480
Speaker 1: was writing the script is over and over again and

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Speaker 1: just run acros us this Like no, it's just really

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Speaker 1: like it really just comes down to like that billion

340
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Speaker 1: is empty and I'm cold, you know. Yeah yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: and it makes me really happy. But it's it's interesting.

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Speaker 1: So I don't know too much about like the history,

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Speaker 1: like I haven't studied the history specifically, but we get

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Speaker 1: we get like stories from people who are active for

345
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Speaker 1: longer um and for us, like for me, like squatting

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00:19:24,480 --> 00:19:28,520
Speaker 1: is like this ah sort of living tradition or like

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00:19:28,560 --> 00:19:35,240
Speaker 1: long standing movement that's aside all the other movements. Um.

348
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Speaker 1: But you but you can tell like the the origin

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Speaker 1: of certain bits of like squatter culture in this like

350
00:19:40,760 --> 00:19:45,320
Speaker 1: the this very direct like autonomous just solve this thing

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Speaker 1: by yourself. It's very d I y culture way of

352
00:19:49,560 --> 00:19:53,800
Speaker 1: doing things, like you instantly recognize it. Um. Also like

353
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Speaker 1: among squads, like like the direct direct support, like I

354
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Speaker 1: need to move something, I will use your bucke ask them,

355
00:20:00,880 --> 00:20:03,439
Speaker 1: but it's like just assumed of course you're going to

356
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Speaker 1: need it. Um so oh so like sometimes it's like

357
00:20:08,400 --> 00:20:12,440
Speaker 1: so so fast that you're that like they sort of

358
00:20:12,520 --> 00:20:15,400
Speaker 1: assume that you know, you have their permission with some things.

359
00:20:15,400 --> 00:20:18,800
Speaker 1: It's like, um oh, but you're doing this thing, so

360
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Speaker 1: you you want my buck feets right? So I had

361
00:20:21,000 --> 00:20:22,840
Speaker 1: it there, like I cleaned up a little because I

362
00:20:22,840 --> 00:20:25,720
Speaker 1: thought you might want it. Yeah, for anyone who's listening

363
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Speaker 1: to box feeds. Is a pickup a pickup truck bicycle

364
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Speaker 1: where the bed of the pickup is in the front

365
00:20:33,000 --> 00:20:34,879
Speaker 1: and it is entirely based on the fact that the

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Speaker 1: Netherlands is entirely flat. Because these things are gigantic and

367
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Speaker 1: heavy and they rule. But I don't think they would

368
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Speaker 1: work anywhere with hills. Well, I will say the canal

369
00:20:45,600 --> 00:20:49,080
Speaker 1: bridges in Amsterdam are still yeah, a challenge. I've ever

370
00:20:49,119 --> 00:20:51,280
Speaker 1: written a box feeds full of stuff over one of

371
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Speaker 1: those before, Um yeah, I must do, must try, yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: and okay. And And that's actually one of the things

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Speaker 1: that I found so interesting right is as I'm reading

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Speaker 1: about this culture that developed in the early eighties and

375
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Speaker 1: late seventies, my experience, for anyone who's listening, is about

376
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Speaker 1: six months of living in squats in the Netherlands in

377
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Speaker 1: like two and the culture that I'm reading about as

378
00:21:15,200 --> 00:21:19,240
Speaker 1: I'm researching this is just the culture that I experienced

379
00:21:19,240 --> 00:21:21,720
Speaker 1: while I was there, and it's you know, it had

380
00:21:21,720 --> 00:21:23,399
Speaker 1: developed in a lot of ways that had you know,

381
00:21:23,480 --> 00:21:27,520
Speaker 1: certain practices felt more concrete by the time I was there.

382
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Speaker 1: But it, like you're saying, it's this living practice that continues,

383
00:21:31,359 --> 00:21:33,960
Speaker 1: and it's so interesting to me because it's, I don't know, whatever,

384
00:21:34,000 --> 00:21:36,720
Speaker 1: it's interesting me for a lot of reasons. Uh So,

385
00:21:36,760 --> 00:21:39,760
Speaker 1: the early movement quickly found the organizational structure that it

386
00:21:40,119 --> 00:21:43,160
Speaker 1: um that it continued to have for a very long time.

387
00:21:43,480 --> 00:21:45,480
Speaker 1: And it's an organizational structure kind of like what you're

388
00:21:45,480 --> 00:21:48,280
Speaker 1: talking about. It's built on autonomy at every level, but

389
00:21:48,320 --> 00:21:51,680
Speaker 1: also organization at every level. Individual squatters are autonomous within

390
00:21:51,720 --> 00:21:54,719
Speaker 1: their squad by and large, they live their individual lives

391
00:21:55,200 --> 00:21:58,160
Speaker 1: autonomous but in coordination with their squad mates. The squats

392
00:21:58,160 --> 00:22:01,919
Speaker 1: themselves are autonomous from, but in court nation with their neighborhood.

393
00:22:02,320 --> 00:22:05,920
Speaker 1: And then most of the organization happens at the neighborhood level.

394
00:22:06,960 --> 00:22:09,960
Speaker 1: Each neighborhood has its own like a squatters council essentially

395
00:22:10,000 --> 00:22:13,119
Speaker 1: that meets to coordinate opening new squads and defending squads.

396
00:22:13,280 --> 00:22:15,639
Speaker 1: And they acted autonomously from anything that's happening in on

397
00:22:15,640 --> 00:22:19,159
Speaker 1: a citywide or nationwide level. Yet individual cities and the

398
00:22:19,280 --> 00:22:22,399
Speaker 1: entire country are capable of coordinating certain actions as necessary.

399
00:22:23,320 --> 00:22:26,040
Speaker 1: And I think this rules. I think this is a

400
00:22:26,119 --> 00:22:30,440
Speaker 1: really good model, um. And it the beauty and strength

401
00:22:30,440 --> 00:22:35,280
Speaker 1: of the style made itself clear, UM that this worked

402
00:22:35,640 --> 00:22:39,000
Speaker 1: really well. Obviously, there's all kinds of things that went

403
00:22:39,040 --> 00:22:41,919
Speaker 1: wrong with it, and you know, we'll talk about some

404
00:22:42,000 --> 00:22:45,080
Speaker 1: of them later. But and it's it's it depends like

405
00:22:45,840 --> 00:22:48,639
Speaker 1: once it's got going, like the fact of its of

406
00:22:48,680 --> 00:22:52,359
Speaker 1: its density, that so many people were squatting meant that

407
00:22:52,440 --> 00:22:56,399
Speaker 1: it it ah, it was able to get to a

408
00:22:56,480 --> 00:22:59,760
Speaker 1: kind of critical mass that allows this thing to work

409
00:22:59,800 --> 00:23:05,600
Speaker 1: where um like the neighborhood social centers and the neighborhood

410
00:23:05,600 --> 00:23:09,520
Speaker 1: meetings they make sense once enough people in the neighborhood

411
00:23:09,560 --> 00:23:13,520
Speaker 1: are involved. So um, right, this is more you like,

412
00:23:13,760 --> 00:23:16,159
Speaker 1: if there's if there's if squad is much thinner on

413
00:23:16,200 --> 00:23:20,080
Speaker 1: the ground, then it's harder to coordinate in this very

414
00:23:20,119 --> 00:23:23,240
Speaker 1: direct local way. Yeah. No, that that makes sense, and

415
00:23:23,240 --> 00:23:25,879
Speaker 1: you probably have to work with larger groups depending on

416
00:23:25,920 --> 00:23:28,920
Speaker 1: the the critical mass of it or whether you've reached

417
00:23:28,960 --> 00:23:32,200
Speaker 1: the critical mass. Um And so you have so the

418
00:23:32,200 --> 00:23:34,040
Speaker 1: way it would work. So you have these neighborhood focused

419
00:23:34,040 --> 00:23:36,359
Speaker 1: squad groups and they start breaking into empty buildings and

420
00:23:36,400 --> 00:23:40,320
Speaker 1: helping people move in. And how this would happen. A

421
00:23:40,320 --> 00:23:43,000
Speaker 1: group of people want a house, so that you're living group,

422
00:23:43,040 --> 00:23:45,119
Speaker 1: they want a house. So either find a house on

423
00:23:45,160 --> 00:23:47,760
Speaker 1: your own, or you go to the neighborhood squad assembly

424
00:23:47,760 --> 00:23:50,400
Speaker 1: and you ask for leads. They case the house, whether

425
00:23:50,440 --> 00:23:52,760
Speaker 1: it's the living group or other people. You case the

426
00:23:52,760 --> 00:23:56,320
Speaker 1: house to prove it's truly unoccupied. You look up city records,

427
00:23:56,359 --> 00:23:59,320
Speaker 1: you may be carefully asked neighbors. You stick a toothpick

428
00:23:59,400 --> 00:24:01,359
Speaker 1: or a match dick in the door and then like

429
00:24:01,440 --> 00:24:03,520
Speaker 1: see if that falls, because if they opened the door,

430
00:24:03,600 --> 00:24:05,919
Speaker 1: the match stick would fall to the ground. Um, you

431
00:24:06,040 --> 00:24:07,719
Speaker 1: check on it every few days to see if it's

432
00:24:07,760 --> 00:24:11,600
Speaker 1: still there. And if the building was empty, then they

433
00:24:11,600 --> 00:24:15,679
Speaker 1: planned to move in. And in the laws were updated

434
00:24:15,680 --> 00:24:17,400
Speaker 1: to say a building had to be empty for a year.

435
00:24:17,720 --> 00:24:19,200
Speaker 1: So this part got a bit harder because you have

436
00:24:19,280 --> 00:24:21,919
Speaker 1: to it became harder to prove that building has been

437
00:24:21,920 --> 00:24:23,840
Speaker 1: empty for a year. I know at least in one

438
00:24:23,840 --> 00:24:26,359
Speaker 1: case that I was around four people have been tracking

439
00:24:26,560 --> 00:24:28,520
Speaker 1: that building for a year, and as soon as it

440
00:24:28,560 --> 00:24:30,080
Speaker 1: was empty for a year, it was like the day

441
00:24:30,119 --> 00:24:32,719
Speaker 1: it was empty for a year, they moved in, actually

442
00:24:32,760 --> 00:24:36,480
Speaker 1: breaking down the door. It's illegal, right, it's destruction of

443
00:24:36,520 --> 00:24:39,520
Speaker 1: property unless you're the occupant of the house. This part

444
00:24:39,520 --> 00:24:42,280
Speaker 1: always seemed very confusing to me. So it's like if

445
00:24:42,280 --> 00:24:44,280
Speaker 1: you break in, you're in trouble if they catch you

446
00:24:44,320 --> 00:24:46,200
Speaker 1: breaking in. But if you break in and you get

447
00:24:46,200 --> 00:24:49,480
Speaker 1: a bed, table and chair in there, then it's okay.

448
00:24:49,760 --> 00:24:52,920
Speaker 1: It's it's very it's it's not unlike, um, what's it called,

449
00:24:52,960 --> 00:24:57,720
Speaker 1: like green light? Green light? Red light? Totally yeah, as

450
00:24:57,760 --> 00:24:59,320
Speaker 1: I've been standing here all the time. I don't know

451
00:24:59,320 --> 00:25:06,359
Speaker 1: what you're talking. Yeah, it's moving me. Um. And so

452
00:25:07,119 --> 00:25:09,639
Speaker 1: so breaking down entering, the breaking and entering stage has

453
00:25:09,680 --> 00:25:13,400
Speaker 1: to be done very carefully, right because it's it's illegal. Um.

454
00:25:13,400 --> 00:25:15,679
Speaker 1: But you know what else is illegal are the amazing

455
00:25:15,760 --> 00:25:20,720
Speaker 1: prices of our advertisers. Uh, with prices so low that

456
00:25:20,800 --> 00:25:22,719
Speaker 1: they have to be criminal. I have to do an

457
00:25:22,720 --> 00:25:27,119
Speaker 1: ad transition. Um. They pay a fine for every product

458
00:25:27,200 --> 00:25:30,040
Speaker 1: you bye, yeah, they want you to get it so cheap,

459
00:25:30,080 --> 00:25:32,879
Speaker 1: they'll just pay the cops off. Yeah, exactly. You the

460
00:25:33,160 --> 00:25:36,520
Speaker 1: all of these advertisers have bribed the police. Here's a

461
00:25:36,560 --> 00:25:43,800
Speaker 1: anths and we are back from those advertisers, and we're

462
00:25:43,800 --> 00:25:47,040
Speaker 1: telling you how to break into buildings. So the way

463
00:25:47,080 --> 00:25:51,360
Speaker 1: to break into a building than it looks I know. Um,

464
00:25:51,400 --> 00:25:55,119
Speaker 1: So you set up the neighborhood assembly, sets up the

465
00:25:55,160 --> 00:25:57,480
Speaker 1: squad action. Kind of approves the squad action because it

466
00:25:57,480 --> 00:26:00,680
Speaker 1: takes a lot of people to do this safely. And

467
00:26:00,720 --> 00:26:05,359
Speaker 1: then dozens to hundreds of squatters congregate into some nearby location.

468
00:26:05,440 --> 00:26:08,080
Speaker 1: Usually it's another squad or an apartment something like that.

469
00:26:08,560 --> 00:26:10,879
Speaker 1: Once you get the crowd together, you go out to

470
00:26:10,920 --> 00:26:13,960
Speaker 1: the building and the neighborhood's breakers group, which is a

471
00:26:13,960 --> 00:26:16,960
Speaker 1: specialized task usually not done by the living group, but

472
00:26:17,040 --> 00:26:21,359
Speaker 1: like basically by professional locksmiths and ship Um. They'll have

473
00:26:21,359 --> 00:26:23,280
Speaker 1: already cased the place, figure out how to break out,

474
00:26:23,320 --> 00:26:25,760
Speaker 1: break down the door. They show up with crowbars, get

475
00:26:25,800 --> 00:26:30,600
Speaker 1: into these buildings incredibly fast. Um. Meanwhile, if the cops

476
00:26:30,600 --> 00:26:32,680
Speaker 1: show up, which they often do because there's a large

477
00:26:32,680 --> 00:26:36,800
Speaker 1: crowd congregated and the cops kind of know what's going on,

478
00:26:36,880 --> 00:26:41,200
Speaker 1: sometimes the crowd keeps the cops at bay through various means,

479
00:26:42,040 --> 00:26:44,280
Speaker 1: and I'm sure at various points this has been more

480
00:26:44,359 --> 00:26:46,720
Speaker 1: and less militant, but a lot of it just literally

481
00:26:46,720 --> 00:26:48,679
Speaker 1: means standing there so the cops can't get through you

482
00:26:50,000 --> 00:26:52,879
Speaker 1: blocking the side of the breakers yeah ah, yes, so

483
00:26:52,920 --> 00:26:57,439
Speaker 1: they can't see who's doing the actual yeah. Um. So

484
00:26:57,480 --> 00:26:59,960
Speaker 1: then the door is open and immediately rush in. A bed,

485
00:27:00,119 --> 00:27:02,280
Speaker 1: table and chair usually shows up on one of the

486
00:27:02,359 --> 00:27:05,520
Speaker 1: box feeds and as well as barricading materials. The door

487
00:27:05,560 --> 00:27:07,720
Speaker 1: gets repaired or at least barricade in such a way

488
00:27:07,720 --> 00:27:11,879
Speaker 1: that can be held shut. Um, and now the building

489
00:27:11,960 --> 00:27:16,800
Speaker 1: is occupied. Note about the door. So I recently heard

490
00:27:16,800 --> 00:27:19,720
Speaker 1: this that in in French squatting there's like a small

491
00:27:19,840 --> 00:27:24,800
Speaker 1: variation where um, the breaking in part is of course

492
00:27:24,840 --> 00:27:27,919
Speaker 1: also illegal. Um, but so what they do there is

493
00:27:27,920 --> 00:27:30,320
Speaker 1: they often they will just bring a new door and

494
00:27:30,359 --> 00:27:32,479
Speaker 1: just that this has always been the real door, So

495
00:27:32,520 --> 00:27:34,960
Speaker 1: this is being a replacement door. Show like, oh, it's

496
00:27:34,960 --> 00:27:38,960
Speaker 1: all fine, it's nothing going on here, and yeah, it's

497
00:27:39,000 --> 00:27:42,520
Speaker 1: the surreal nous. For me, I'm used to police being, um,

498
00:27:43,280 --> 00:27:47,280
Speaker 1: particularly aggressive people. Uh, the surreal nous is sometimes intense,

499
00:27:47,280 --> 00:27:51,119
Speaker 1: where you know, it's the scuffle outside and then the

500
00:27:51,160 --> 00:27:53,760
Speaker 1: door is broken open and then everything is inside, and

501
00:27:53,760 --> 00:27:57,040
Speaker 1: then it's almost like someone's like time out, we're in

502
00:27:57,640 --> 00:28:00,000
Speaker 1: and everyone's like oh okay, and then like everyone lets

503
00:28:00,040 --> 00:28:03,600
Speaker 1: go of everyone else. And then um, you specifically invite

504
00:28:03,840 --> 00:28:07,200
Speaker 1: two police officers to come inside the squad to come

505
00:28:07,280 --> 00:28:10,280
Speaker 1: look and see that it was in fact empty. And

506
00:28:10,560 --> 00:28:12,480
Speaker 1: the part that makes the least sense from an American

507
00:28:12,520 --> 00:28:14,520
Speaker 1: perspective is that there's a belief that the cops will

508
00:28:14,560 --> 00:28:17,080
Speaker 1: tell the truth in court about what they saw when

509
00:28:17,119 --> 00:28:21,840
Speaker 1: they went inside the squad. Um. Yeah, but like and

510
00:28:21,920 --> 00:28:25,720
Speaker 1: to establish this kind of trust also is very strange

511
00:28:25,720 --> 00:28:29,600
Speaker 1: because the movement has just gone from like okay, we

512
00:28:29,600 --> 00:28:35,119
Speaker 1: will do peaceful tactics, no confrontation, peace, peace, peace, and

513
00:28:35,160 --> 00:28:37,359
Speaker 1: then you have like more more militant struggle. And this

514
00:28:37,440 --> 00:28:41,760
Speaker 1: is like something that happens a lot. And then the

515
00:28:42,240 --> 00:28:45,280
Speaker 1: next moment, okay, so we were settled, come have a look.

516
00:28:45,360 --> 00:28:48,760
Speaker 1: See we fixed it all, um, and not only the

517
00:28:49,000 --> 00:28:51,520
Speaker 1: trust between them, but also then like the attitude switch

518
00:28:51,600 --> 00:28:55,200
Speaker 1: shift from like the police. It was like okay, like

519
00:28:55,240 --> 00:28:57,840
Speaker 1: you said, like the time out and now we're doing

520
00:28:57,880 --> 00:29:00,720
Speaker 1: this other thing. Now we're just seeing whether the right

521
00:29:00,720 --> 00:29:03,520
Speaker 1: procedure has been followed. It's like the boys in blue

522
00:29:03,640 --> 00:29:09,880
Speaker 1: also enjoy hop scotch. And yeah, I gotta admit this

523
00:29:09,920 --> 00:29:13,440
Speaker 1: is the part that I if anyone in the US

524
00:29:13,520 --> 00:29:15,920
Speaker 1: feels like they want to start squatting, more power to you.

525
00:29:16,000 --> 00:29:20,200
Speaker 1: But don't use the specific tactics necessarily. Um. They look

526
00:29:20,240 --> 00:29:23,560
Speaker 1: different in different places for different reasons and including different times. Right,

527
00:29:23,600 --> 00:29:25,520
Speaker 1: Like we'll talk about a little bit later. This is

528
00:29:25,560 --> 00:29:29,040
Speaker 1: no longer how you can do Dutch squatting. But okay,

529
00:29:29,080 --> 00:29:33,320
Speaker 1: so now you have a house, um, and kind of

530
00:29:33,560 --> 00:29:36,960
Speaker 1: in this simple mechanism of basically now you you move in,

531
00:29:37,040 --> 00:29:39,520
Speaker 1: and now the real estate prospectors have to shift what

532
00:29:39,560 --> 00:29:42,280
Speaker 1: they're doing and they as you're saying, wake the sleeping dragon.

533
00:29:42,800 --> 00:29:47,400
Speaker 1: Um it. The squatters kind of in the early eighties

534
00:29:47,560 --> 00:29:51,400
Speaker 1: started destroying the real estate speculation market and started forcing

535
00:29:51,440 --> 00:29:53,920
Speaker 1: property owners to keep buildings in use. And so is

536
00:29:53,920 --> 00:29:55,720
Speaker 1: this social good for the squatters because they get to

537
00:29:55,800 --> 00:29:57,280
Speaker 1: keep a house for a while, But it was also

538
00:29:57,400 --> 00:29:59,800
Speaker 1: social good for Dutch society more broadly because it keeps

539
00:30:00,000 --> 00:30:03,040
Speaker 1: borhoods from going derelict. And there's this tension where some

540
00:30:03,080 --> 00:30:04,640
Speaker 1: of the squads like, we don't give a ship about

541
00:30:04,680 --> 00:30:09,560
Speaker 1: what's good for touch society more broadly. Um, but still

542
00:30:09,600 --> 00:30:13,440
Speaker 1: fucking interesting. Um. So this again, like this is all

543
00:30:13,480 --> 00:30:16,920
Speaker 1: sort of like like a reformist branch of it, where

544
00:30:16,920 --> 00:30:19,200
Speaker 1: you say like, well, actually it's good. It's healthy for

545
00:30:19,280 --> 00:30:22,520
Speaker 1: the for the housing market, and you can value that

546
00:30:22,600 --> 00:30:24,200
Speaker 1: or not, but like, at least you can see that

547
00:30:24,280 --> 00:30:27,760
Speaker 1: it's um at the very least, and you can use

548
00:30:27,760 --> 00:30:29,840
Speaker 1: this also as an argument against people who are like

549
00:30:29,840 --> 00:30:32,239
Speaker 1: saying like, oh, that's not okay. Um, you know, at

550
00:30:32,320 --> 00:30:34,400
Speaker 1: least that can bring them in maybe that it is

551
00:30:34,520 --> 00:30:38,160
Speaker 1: it is functional for that for that market. Um. Have

552
00:30:38,200 --> 00:30:41,760
Speaker 1: you ever seen that video how wolves change rivers? You

553
00:30:41,760 --> 00:30:44,760
Speaker 1: ever seen that? So this story about like okay, you

554
00:30:44,760 --> 00:30:48,720
Speaker 1: have your Semite park right, and there's uh and there's

555
00:30:49,120 --> 00:30:52,200
Speaker 1: or like I think it's your Semiti park or some

556
00:30:52,200 --> 00:30:56,200
Speaker 1: some big area and there's way too much like ah

557
00:30:56,480 --> 00:31:00,760
Speaker 1: pis and they're some kind of heard some kind of

558
00:31:00,800 --> 00:31:04,640
Speaker 1: herd animal um and there's no predator, so they go

559
00:31:04,760 --> 00:31:08,719
Speaker 1: everywhere and they eat all the grass and they trample

560
00:31:08,760 --> 00:31:10,920
Speaker 1: the ground, so the riverbeds get soft and the whole

561
00:31:10,920 --> 00:31:15,880
Speaker 1: thing becomes like this big um swampy bog where not

562
00:31:15,960 --> 00:31:19,240
Speaker 1: much else can live or at least like specific other stuff.

563
00:31:19,240 --> 00:31:22,760
Speaker 1: But it's not that biologically diverse. And they introduced wolves

564
00:31:23,600 --> 00:31:26,120
Speaker 1: and the wolves I think, so it's not it's not bison,

565
00:31:26,200 --> 00:31:29,320
Speaker 1: like it's deer. There's this big these herds of deer

566
00:31:29,880 --> 00:31:31,960
Speaker 1: and the wolves. There's only a few of them. But

567
00:31:32,000 --> 00:31:36,120
Speaker 1: what they do is they forced the deer ah to

568
00:31:36,320 --> 00:31:39,200
Speaker 1: be careful about certain spaces because they know, like, oh,

569
00:31:39,240 --> 00:31:41,440
Speaker 1: this is a this is an ambush spot. So if

570
00:31:41,440 --> 00:31:44,160
Speaker 1: I stay there, they're gonna they're gonna get me. If

571
00:31:44,160 --> 00:31:46,760
Speaker 1: I stay here too long, they're gonna get me. So

572
00:31:46,800 --> 00:31:49,840
Speaker 1: they get more picky, they get quick on their feet,

573
00:31:49,840 --> 00:31:53,480
Speaker 1: They avoid certain areas, and those areas trees come back

574
00:31:53,680 --> 00:31:56,800
Speaker 1: because the young trees they can grow up without being

575
00:31:56,800 --> 00:31:59,760
Speaker 1: graced to death. Yeah, and then in the trees different

576
00:32:00,160 --> 00:32:05,280
Speaker 1: new animals, species get reintroduced, birds and stuff. Um. And

577
00:32:05,320 --> 00:32:09,160
Speaker 1: it was find this a nice, nice metaphor for it

578
00:32:09,240 --> 00:32:13,360
Speaker 1: because it shows like, um, if you if you prod them,

579
00:32:13,360 --> 00:32:15,880
Speaker 1: if you say like you can't just get everything you want,

580
00:32:15,960 --> 00:32:20,920
Speaker 1: then other things can blossom. Yeah, which is inating, but

581
00:32:20,920 --> 00:32:23,120
Speaker 1: it also has this problematic side when you see like

582
00:32:23,160 --> 00:32:28,760
Speaker 1: this reformist attitude towards squatting where people pretend like the

583
00:32:30,440 --> 00:32:33,640
Speaker 1: I don't know, the helping to grow an art scene,

584
00:32:34,320 --> 00:32:36,400
Speaker 1: like this is something that can be helped in this

585
00:32:36,440 --> 00:32:38,440
Speaker 1: way through squatting, but it was never the point. And

586
00:32:38,440 --> 00:32:40,200
Speaker 1: if you make that into the point, then it can

587
00:32:40,240 --> 00:32:42,360
Speaker 1: be used against you as saying, but that's what it's about.

588
00:32:42,400 --> 00:32:45,840
Speaker 1: We've made a new art program. So yeah, yeah, now

589
00:32:45,840 --> 00:32:47,920
Speaker 1: that we don't care that you still can't find housing

590
00:32:48,000 --> 00:32:51,320
Speaker 1: if you're poor or whatever, and like, um yeah, because

591
00:32:51,360 --> 00:32:53,320
Speaker 1: like the point of it is the direct action. If

592
00:32:53,320 --> 00:32:57,160
Speaker 1: it has symbolic benefits or other benefits that come out

593
00:32:57,160 --> 00:33:00,960
Speaker 1: of it, that's not the Now that's interesting. And then

594
00:33:02,160 --> 00:33:05,360
Speaker 1: so to start making this more concrete in the history

595
00:33:05,400 --> 00:33:10,920
Speaker 1: of it on November one, in six adjacent seventeenth and

596
00:33:10,920 --> 00:33:14,360
Speaker 1: eighteenth century buildings on a canal called Kaiser Rock got squatted,

597
00:33:14,960 --> 00:33:18,840
Speaker 1: and the whole complex was called Groot Kaiser or Great

598
00:33:18,920 --> 00:33:24,920
Speaker 1: Kaiser to distinguish it from Yeah, that one Kaiser. Uh,

599
00:33:25,600 --> 00:33:29,200
Speaker 1: I'm gonna call it Great Kaiser throughout to distinguish it.

600
00:33:29,680 --> 00:33:31,720
Speaker 1: So there's another. I think there's another squad called the

601
00:33:31,760 --> 00:33:33,480
Speaker 1: canal called the Little Kaiser. That's the best I could

602
00:33:33,480 --> 00:33:36,760
Speaker 1: figure out, but I'm not entirely sure. Um, this is right,

603
00:33:36,840 --> 00:33:40,320
Speaker 1: must must have been there so many. Yeah, this is

604
00:33:40,400 --> 00:33:44,160
Speaker 1: right in the center of Amsterdam, and about fifty people

605
00:33:44,160 --> 00:33:46,920
Speaker 1: were living in Great Kaiser. All of the squads were

606
00:33:46,960 --> 00:33:48,960
Speaker 1: first and foremost living places, right, because that was the

607
00:33:49,000 --> 00:33:51,240
Speaker 1: whole point, And this one in particular was more of

608
00:33:51,240 --> 00:33:54,040
Speaker 1: a flophouse for squatters and travelers. People coming through would

609
00:33:54,080 --> 00:33:58,080
Speaker 1: would come stay here. Less than a year into the occupation,

610
00:33:58,200 --> 00:34:02,520
Speaker 1: on October, the courts ordered the residents to leave, and

611
00:34:02,520 --> 00:34:05,560
Speaker 1: they were given a month to get out. Most of

612
00:34:05,560 --> 00:34:07,760
Speaker 1: them do most of them like all right, you got us,

613
00:34:08,040 --> 00:34:10,120
Speaker 1: you know, time to go find another place to squad.

614
00:34:10,680 --> 00:34:13,239
Speaker 1: But then the squatter movement of the city as a

615
00:34:13,280 --> 00:34:15,600
Speaker 1: whole was like no, fuck it, We're going to move in.

616
00:34:15,880 --> 00:34:18,160
Speaker 1: It's time to take a stand, it's time to fight eviction,

617
00:34:18,440 --> 00:34:20,120
Speaker 1: and we're gonna make a symbol out of this place.

618
00:34:20,640 --> 00:34:22,640
Speaker 1: So squatters from around the city move in and they

619
00:34:22,680 --> 00:34:25,680
Speaker 1: barricade the compound and they decided to actively defend it.

620
00:34:26,239 --> 00:34:29,400
Speaker 1: And this was a bit contentious because some squatters were like, no,

621
00:34:29,520 --> 00:34:32,000
Speaker 1: staying mobile and flexible as our strength, we shouldn't defend

622
00:34:32,000 --> 00:34:34,759
Speaker 1: a single place. This isn't about symbols whatever, and other

623
00:34:34,760 --> 00:34:36,800
Speaker 1: people are like, no, we need to show that we're strong,

624
00:34:37,000 --> 00:34:40,920
Speaker 1: right um. And some people, of course are like I

625
00:34:40,960 --> 00:34:43,160
Speaker 1: will die to defend the Kaiser, which is really funny

626
00:34:43,200 --> 00:34:46,479
Speaker 1: to type out, because um, you know, they mean something

627
00:34:46,560 --> 00:34:48,800
Speaker 1: very different than most people say they will die to

628
00:34:48,840 --> 00:34:53,640
Speaker 1: defend the Kaiser. So water beds were all the rage

629
00:34:53,880 --> 00:34:57,439
Speaker 1: right in the Netherlands the early eighties. So people were

630
00:34:57,440 --> 00:35:00,239
Speaker 1: throwing out their old mattresses and box springs left and right.

631
00:35:00,760 --> 00:35:03,080
Speaker 1: The squatters started grabbing all the box springs off the

632
00:35:03,120 --> 00:35:06,400
Speaker 1: street and then weld them over the windows of the squads.

633
00:35:07,040 --> 00:35:10,279
Speaker 1: And I have never seen more ingenuity and fortifications than

634
00:35:10,320 --> 00:35:14,680
Speaker 1: I have seen from Dutch squatters. Um. And and I

635
00:35:14,680 --> 00:35:16,920
Speaker 1: want to be clear when I say Dutch squatters, I'm

636
00:35:16,960 --> 00:35:19,440
Speaker 1: I mean squatters in the Netherlands rather than people who

637
00:35:19,440 --> 00:35:23,160
Speaker 1: are necessarily like Dutch. Right, it was an international movement

638
00:35:23,640 --> 00:35:27,759
Speaker 1: even at that time, and later, like there's this whole

639
00:35:27,800 --> 00:35:30,440
Speaker 1: thing that's happened where there's like whitewashing of Dutch squatting

640
00:35:30,440 --> 00:35:32,640
Speaker 1: culture because I think people realize that it like saved

641
00:35:32,680 --> 00:35:34,640
Speaker 1: the city and is the reason there's art scenes and

642
00:35:34,640 --> 00:35:38,560
Speaker 1: ship um, and so there's all of these like articles

643
00:35:38,560 --> 00:35:40,840
Speaker 1: that are complete lives that are like in the beginning,

644
00:35:40,960 --> 00:35:44,240
Speaker 1: all the squatters were good social minded Dutch who wanted

645
00:35:44,239 --> 00:35:48,960
Speaker 1: rental properties. But then the evil internationalist anarchists showed up

646
00:35:49,000 --> 00:35:52,040
Speaker 1: from all of the other countries and they were made

647
00:35:52,239 --> 00:35:57,400
Speaker 1: violent and destructive and it's sorry it was violent, destructive

648
00:35:57,400 --> 00:36:02,040
Speaker 1: international anarchists who saved your art scene. Like yeah, well,

649
00:36:02,120 --> 00:36:03,880
Speaker 1: so there's a few things like a lot of a

650
00:36:03,880 --> 00:36:07,839
Speaker 1: lot of the radicals were not necessarily anarchists, like there

651
00:36:07,840 --> 00:36:13,080
Speaker 1: were a lot of autonomous Marxists, etcetera. And more of

652
00:36:13,120 --> 00:36:17,080
Speaker 1: the anarchists have remained, I think. Um, but it was

653
00:36:17,080 --> 00:36:20,239
Speaker 1: was very mixed, but also not super white at all. Well,

654
00:36:20,480 --> 00:36:24,080
Speaker 1: so the area that had like the most squads in

655
00:36:24,160 --> 00:36:28,680
Speaker 1: Amsterdam during around this time was the southeast southeast the

656
00:36:28,719 --> 00:36:33,920
Speaker 1: bellmot Um and this was squaded by mostly people from

657
00:36:33,920 --> 00:36:38,600
Speaker 1: from Surinam. When after like the uh in Surinam gained independence,

658
00:36:38,640 --> 00:36:41,040
Speaker 1: a lot of people were given the choice. People were

659
00:36:41,040 --> 00:36:42,759
Speaker 1: giving the choice like where do you want to live

660
00:36:43,000 --> 00:36:44,719
Speaker 1: in the Kingdom of the Netherlands, and a lot of

661
00:36:44,719 --> 00:36:49,319
Speaker 1: people from Surinam came here um h and a lot

662
00:36:49,320 --> 00:36:53,200
Speaker 1: of them were denied social housing on the basis of

663
00:36:53,560 --> 00:36:56,840
Speaker 1: racism um and so a lot of them started squatting

664
00:36:57,760 --> 00:37:02,240
Speaker 1: in the bellmot which is like almost like a separate

665
00:37:03,000 --> 00:37:05,520
Speaker 1: chapter of the squading movement that it gets rarely gets

666
00:37:05,560 --> 00:37:10,040
Speaker 1: talked about. Okay, no, yeah, that that is super interesting

667
00:37:10,040 --> 00:37:12,319
Speaker 1: because yeah, everything I was reading at first would just

668
00:37:12,360 --> 00:37:14,759
Speaker 1: be like and then the squatters did this, or even

669
00:37:14,800 --> 00:37:16,759
Speaker 1: then then the Dutch squatters did this, and then it'll

670
00:37:16,800 --> 00:37:19,359
Speaker 1: like kind of like as a throwaway line talk about

671
00:37:19,360 --> 00:37:24,160
Speaker 1: people who weren't Dutch at all, you know. Um, so, yeah,

672
00:37:24,200 --> 00:37:29,600
Speaker 1: it's histories are not always written, but the best way

673
00:37:30,080 --> 00:37:33,520
Speaker 1: while the while the still concert arguments often remain the same. Oh,

674
00:37:33,600 --> 00:37:37,120
Speaker 1: it's the people who aren't really Dutch who come here

675
00:37:37,160 --> 00:37:40,200
Speaker 1: and make the trouble while everyone who's really Dutch would

676
00:37:40,280 --> 00:37:43,960
Speaker 1: never do this, would never yeah, because you're supposed to

677
00:37:44,000 --> 00:37:47,760
Speaker 1: love your country and your Yeah, whereas there are plenty

678
00:37:47,800 --> 00:37:49,839
Speaker 1: of Dutch people who hated their country who are doing

679
00:37:49,880 --> 00:37:54,520
Speaker 1: this too, you know. Yeah. So a month goes by,

680
00:37:54,719 --> 00:37:58,439
Speaker 1: the month that the people at Great Kaiser are are there,

681
00:37:58,440 --> 00:38:01,400
Speaker 1: and that the city doesn't fucking air move on the place.

682
00:38:01,480 --> 00:38:04,640
Speaker 1: It is too well defended, and rumors start spreading about

683
00:38:04,640 --> 00:38:08,000
Speaker 1: a huge police mobilization building up to evict it. Another

684
00:38:08,040 --> 00:38:11,840
Speaker 1: month goes by and nothing. So the squatters are tired

685
00:38:11,840 --> 00:38:14,080
Speaker 1: of waiting and they decided to go on the offensive.

686
00:38:14,200 --> 00:38:17,160
Speaker 1: And what they declared d Day, a declaration of war

687
00:38:17,239 --> 00:38:20,359
Speaker 1: on the city's politics. A hundred demonstrators from all over

688
00:38:20,360 --> 00:38:25,280
Speaker 1: the city attack city council with fireworks and smoke bombs. Um.

689
00:38:25,320 --> 00:38:28,040
Speaker 1: The whole attack only takes fifteen minutes, and I think

690
00:38:28,120 --> 00:38:30,919
Speaker 1: maybe everyone got away. I couldn't find anything about anyone

691
00:38:30,960 --> 00:38:35,840
Speaker 1: getting arrested at this action. Um. But you know what

692
00:38:35,960 --> 00:38:42,839
Speaker 1: else will get you arrested buying goods and service. Okay, Well,

693
00:38:42,840 --> 00:38:45,000
Speaker 1: now let's do it different. Um. Okay, So we try

694
00:38:45,040 --> 00:38:46,720
Speaker 1: to be on this show. We try to be sponsored

695
00:38:46,760 --> 00:38:50,320
Speaker 1: only by very positive things. Um the our our longest

696
00:38:50,320 --> 00:38:54,480
Speaker 1: standing sponsors, the concept of the potato on any individual brand. Okay,

697
00:38:54,560 --> 00:38:57,759
Speaker 1: so I'm wondering if you have any um specific positive

698
00:38:57,840 --> 00:39:00,200
Speaker 1: thing that you would like to be sponsored by this

699
00:39:00,239 --> 00:39:04,040
Speaker 1: show being being Dutch, I already love the potato, but

700
00:39:04,120 --> 00:39:07,480
Speaker 1: I would like to tack on this this the concept

701
00:39:07,520 --> 00:39:13,000
Speaker 1: of deep frying things. Okay, okay, oh, yes, that is

702
00:39:13,120 --> 00:39:17,319
Speaker 1: a that is a great sponsor. So so so our

703
00:39:17,360 --> 00:39:22,400
Speaker 1: podcast is sponsored by the concept of frying things food

704
00:39:22,520 --> 00:39:31,840
Speaker 1: specifically um and and and every everything else is wrong. Yeah, yeah,

705
00:39:31,880 --> 00:39:34,959
Speaker 1: deep fry. Also, there's your your appliances like my deep

706
00:39:34,960 --> 00:39:39,000
Speaker 1: fryar so good and deep fried bits of deep fryer. Ah. No,

707
00:39:39,160 --> 00:39:45,319
Speaker 1: that that makes a lot of sense. Okay, we are

708
00:39:45,360 --> 00:39:48,040
Speaker 1: back from those ads all about the different things that

709
00:39:48,080 --> 00:39:50,600
Speaker 1: you can deep fry. Every service or ad that you

710
00:39:50,719 --> 00:39:55,359
Speaker 1: just heard you could deep frying. Yeah, including the podcasters.

711
00:39:55,400 --> 00:39:57,960
Speaker 1: If it was ads for podcasters, you could deep fry

712
00:39:58,000 --> 00:40:04,000
Speaker 1: the podcasters. H So at Great Kaiser they start stockpiling

713
00:40:04,040 --> 00:40:08,239
Speaker 1: other things to deep fry, including rocks for throwing gas masks, fireworks,

714
00:40:08,239 --> 00:40:11,680
Speaker 1: smoke bombs, and paint bombs. And if you're wondering how

715
00:40:11,719 --> 00:40:14,719
Speaker 1: to make a paint bomb. In this style, you take

716
00:40:14,760 --> 00:40:17,640
Speaker 1: a fist sized balloon, you dip it into wax, then

717
00:40:17,680 --> 00:40:19,600
Speaker 1: you pull out the balloon. Then you fill the wax

718
00:40:19,640 --> 00:40:22,080
Speaker 1: ball with paint, and you cap it off with more wax,

719
00:40:22,600 --> 00:40:25,120
Speaker 1: and then you have a paint bomb. The squatters set

720
00:40:25,160 --> 00:40:27,879
Speaker 1: up a pirate radio station called the Free Kaiser, the

721
00:40:28,000 --> 00:40:31,640
Speaker 1: voice of the Squatters movement, and eventually the bed springs

722
00:40:31,640 --> 00:40:34,440
Speaker 1: over the windows get replaced with welded together steel planks

723
00:40:34,520 --> 00:40:38,080
Speaker 1: all held together by construction poles um, which is like this.

724
00:40:38,880 --> 00:40:41,839
Speaker 1: The construction poles were everywhere. I I love them. They're

725
00:40:41,840 --> 00:40:45,760
Speaker 1: just extendable poles. That the Bows Temple. Yeah, the Bows

726
00:40:45,800 --> 00:40:50,120
Speaker 1: Temple and uh. One of the more ingenious things that

727
00:40:50,160 --> 00:40:52,120
Speaker 1: the Great Kaiser Squatters did as they set up counter

728
00:40:52,160 --> 00:40:55,640
Speaker 1: intelligence programs all over the city. They tracked the police

729
00:40:55,760 --> 00:40:58,520
Speaker 1: people post themselves at police stations and at riot police

730
00:40:58,560 --> 00:41:01,040
Speaker 1: training grounds, waiting to see if there was any sign

731
00:41:01,040 --> 00:41:03,920
Speaker 1: of a raid on the squat. Hundreds of people waited

732
00:41:03,920 --> 00:41:07,960
Speaker 1: on standby. Um. Every squatter and squat supporter in the

733
00:41:07,960 --> 00:41:10,719
Speaker 1: city was part of the Squat Alarm Phone Tree, which

734
00:41:10,760 --> 00:41:13,279
Speaker 1: was basically like, if you are a squatter, you care

735
00:41:13,280 --> 00:41:15,840
Speaker 1: about squats you're on this phone tree, and if something happens,

736
00:41:15,840 --> 00:41:18,360
Speaker 1: if the alarm goes out, everyone who can be fucked

737
00:41:18,440 --> 00:41:21,120
Speaker 1: to get out of bed, gets their shipped together, gets

738
00:41:21,120 --> 00:41:23,160
Speaker 1: on a bike and goes over to where the alarm is.

739
00:41:24,400 --> 00:41:26,279
Speaker 1: I've seen that. I've seen a poster of that in

740
00:41:26,320 --> 00:41:29,080
Speaker 1: a in a squad recently, well not in a legalized

741
00:41:29,120 --> 00:41:32,040
Speaker 1: squad house, but um yes. So they had like the

742
00:41:32,640 --> 00:41:35,959
Speaker 1: map of like going from like wherever is the main

743
00:41:36,000 --> 00:41:38,160
Speaker 1: place you call to spread it, and then going into

744
00:41:38,200 --> 00:41:42,279
Speaker 1: like the different areas, different branches, different groups. Yeah, yeah, yeah,

745
00:41:42,280 --> 00:41:46,720
Speaker 1: I was, Yeah, I was really impressed by the squat

746
00:41:46,760 --> 00:41:48,879
Speaker 1: phone tree, which was still in place and in use

747
00:41:48,960 --> 00:41:51,680
Speaker 1: twenty five years later after after this. Yeah, and the

748
00:41:51,800 --> 00:41:54,920
Speaker 1: was are all like house house phones like the landline. Um.

749
00:41:55,000 --> 00:41:57,680
Speaker 1: So nowadays you will have like alarm signal groups or whatever,

750
00:41:58,040 --> 00:42:02,800
Speaker 1: but back then it was like house of landless. Yeah.

751
00:42:03,040 --> 00:42:05,080
Speaker 1: And so since Amsterdam, I don't know if you knew this,

752
00:42:05,160 --> 00:42:07,920
Speaker 1: but Amsterdam has a lot of canals in it, um

753
00:42:08,760 --> 00:42:11,560
Speaker 1: Venice of the North. Yeah, yeah, there's almost as many

754
00:42:11,560 --> 00:42:14,640
Speaker 1: canals as Venice. And it's like mostly known outside of

755
00:42:14,800 --> 00:42:17,880
Speaker 1: Amsterdam first, like you know weed or whatever, but um,

756
00:42:17,960 --> 00:42:23,000
Speaker 1: it canals very defining feature, and the center of the

757
00:42:23,000 --> 00:42:25,520
Speaker 1: city is sort of a ring of canals, and so

758
00:42:25,560 --> 00:42:28,600
Speaker 1: there's there's only so many bridges over the canals to

759
00:42:28,640 --> 00:42:32,400
Speaker 1: get to the Great Kaiser. So what each neighborhood council

760
00:42:32,440 --> 00:42:35,560
Speaker 1: did is take responsibility to block or barricade one of

761
00:42:35,600 --> 00:42:39,200
Speaker 1: those bridges in whatever autonomous way that they saw fit

762
00:42:40,680 --> 00:42:42,359
Speaker 1: good system as long as you don't have a bunch

763
00:42:42,360 --> 00:42:44,400
Speaker 1: of people you're expecting to flake. If you have a

764
00:42:44,400 --> 00:42:46,080
Speaker 1: bunch of people you're expecting to flake, this is not

765
00:42:46,160 --> 00:42:49,839
Speaker 1: a good system. But the eviction kept not coming. Later

766
00:42:49,960 --> 00:42:51,759
Speaker 1: it was learned that the mayor kept calling it off

767
00:42:51,800 --> 00:42:54,160
Speaker 1: because it was too risky, which makes sense. It was

768
00:42:54,200 --> 00:42:56,719
Speaker 1: too risky. They would have gone really badly if they

769
00:42:56,719 --> 00:43:00,160
Speaker 1: tried to evict the Great Kaiser. In Jay, you were

770
00:43:00,160 --> 00:43:04,040
Speaker 1: in a demonstration of three thousand people marched past all

771
00:43:04,080 --> 00:43:08,920
Speaker 1: while people on the roof waves squatter flags and Sophie,

772
00:43:09,120 --> 00:43:11,719
Speaker 1: do you know what the squatter flag looks like? I

773
00:43:11,800 --> 00:43:14,480
Speaker 1: do not? Should I look it up? I mean like

774
00:43:14,520 --> 00:43:16,400
Speaker 1: it's a flag with the squatter symbol on it. Do

775
00:43:16,440 --> 00:43:18,800
Speaker 1: you know? The not to just put you on the spot,

776
00:43:18,840 --> 00:43:21,920
Speaker 1: but have you seen the squatter symbol before. I've looked

777
00:43:22,000 --> 00:43:25,560
Speaker 1: up what this looks like and uh is it? Is

778
00:43:25,600 --> 00:43:28,919
Speaker 1: it like a lightning bolt end with an arrow on it?

779
00:43:30,320 --> 00:43:36,520
Speaker 1: I like it? Yeah? Yeah, circle? Yeah? Um, so that's

780
00:43:36,520 --> 00:43:40,319
Speaker 1: the squatter symbol. I was always really curious about where

781
00:43:40,320 --> 00:43:41,960
Speaker 1: it came from, and this is where it comes Yeah,

782
00:43:42,040 --> 00:43:48,120
Speaker 1: what's the origin of that? Like it's so interesting, Okay,

783
00:43:48,120 --> 00:43:50,600
Speaker 1: but it looks like it would be like a superhero's

784
00:43:50,719 --> 00:43:55,440
Speaker 1: like every right on there. It's great. Nobody knows the

785
00:43:55,480 --> 00:43:58,120
Speaker 1: origin of it, so there's getting embarrassed, like fun, I

786
00:43:58,120 --> 00:44:00,920
Speaker 1: don't even know, but nobody knows. Yeah, he asked me.

787
00:44:01,000 --> 00:44:05,400
Speaker 1: I was like, no, It's like, I'm just really excited

788
00:44:05,400 --> 00:44:08,880
Speaker 1: about this part um because because I've I've wanted to

789
00:44:08,880 --> 00:44:11,680
Speaker 1: know forever. I know so many people with the tattoo, like, right,

790
00:44:12,400 --> 00:44:16,120
Speaker 1: and what it is is that? Um? Okay? So yeah,

791
00:44:16,160 --> 00:44:17,840
Speaker 1: it's a It's a circle with a sort of lightning

792
00:44:17,880 --> 00:44:20,360
Speaker 1: boll tour end cutting through it that sticks out of

793
00:44:20,360 --> 00:44:22,600
Speaker 1: the upper right with an arrow on the end on

794
00:44:22,640 --> 00:44:26,799
Speaker 1: the extension out the arrow. Yeah. And I always got

795
00:44:26,840 --> 00:44:29,359
Speaker 1: told it was nazis out, which is cool, but that's

796
00:44:29,360 --> 00:44:32,080
Speaker 1: not what it originally was. And I'm like, that's cool

797
00:44:32,120 --> 00:44:36,680
Speaker 1: but okay, yeah. Um, so in nine at the defense

798
00:44:36,680 --> 00:44:40,000
Speaker 1: of the Great Kaiser Squad. Uh, it first got used

799
00:44:40,040 --> 00:44:41,960
Speaker 1: and then it got quickly spread to Berlin and then

800
00:44:41,960 --> 00:44:44,560
Speaker 1: the rest of the world. And the first incarnation was

801
00:44:44,640 --> 00:44:46,480
Speaker 1: on a support poster and it was a straight arrow

802
00:44:46,560 --> 00:44:49,040
Speaker 1: through a circle. Um. And there are only guesses as

803
00:44:49,040 --> 00:44:51,279
Speaker 1: to what it means, which is really frustrating because there's

804
00:44:51,320 --> 00:44:54,320
Speaker 1: a decent chance that whoever designed this is alive. This

805
00:44:54,440 --> 00:44:58,719
Speaker 1: is only forty years ago, but it possibly the most

806
00:44:58,760 --> 00:45:01,040
Speaker 1: common guess is that it comes from the American hobo

807
00:45:01,040 --> 00:45:05,279
Speaker 1: symbol for keep going, which is but it could also

808
00:45:05,320 --> 00:45:07,920
Speaker 1: have been derived from an older European rogue symbol, kind

809
00:45:07,920 --> 00:45:09,520
Speaker 1: of from that like kind of thieves can't stuff we

810
00:45:09,520 --> 00:45:13,239
Speaker 1: were talking about. Um, there's an illustrated language that goes

811
00:45:13,280 --> 00:45:16,800
Speaker 1: back to the medieval era, and those symbols had started

812
00:45:16,840 --> 00:45:18,720
Speaker 1: to die out by the beginning of the twentieth century,

813
00:45:18,719 --> 00:45:21,040
Speaker 1: but that they had a resurgence in the nineties because

814
00:45:21,040 --> 00:45:24,040
Speaker 1: everyone was fucking poor and hobo symbols are cool and

815
00:45:24,160 --> 00:45:29,320
Speaker 1: crime is cool sometimes. Um. Later it became a lightning bolt.

816
00:45:30,000 --> 00:45:32,040
Speaker 1: And again there's like all of these like I've read

817
00:45:32,040 --> 00:45:34,799
Speaker 1: academic papers about people trying to figure out how it

818
00:45:34,840 --> 00:45:38,720
Speaker 1: became a lightning bolt, and all this ship um my theory,

819
00:45:38,800 --> 00:45:41,160
Speaker 1: which is not supported by anything but me saying it

820
00:45:41,239 --> 00:45:44,760
Speaker 1: is my theory. Around this time, and this part is true.

821
00:45:44,960 --> 00:45:47,120
Speaker 1: Around this time, the theory of action and the squater

822
00:45:47,160 --> 00:45:51,080
Speaker 1: symbol embrace. The lightning strike is what they called it.

823
00:45:51,760 --> 00:45:54,160
Speaker 1: Instead of riots that would stick around and wait for

824
00:45:54,160 --> 00:45:56,280
Speaker 1: the cops to come beat you up, all the squatters

825
00:45:56,280 --> 00:45:58,840
Speaker 1: would target some specific building or whatever, show up in

826
00:45:58,920 --> 00:46:02,440
Speaker 1: huge numbers, trash the place, and then funk off. And

827
00:46:02,520 --> 00:46:05,040
Speaker 1: not all the lightning strikes were directly physical. Some of

828
00:46:05,080 --> 00:46:08,440
Speaker 1: the targeted attacks that they would call lightning strikes were like, um,

829
00:46:08,640 --> 00:46:11,560
Speaker 1: pissing the real estate prospector's mail slot at his house,

830
00:46:12,200 --> 00:46:15,479
Speaker 1: or send him bed bugs in the mail, or order

831
00:46:15,520 --> 00:46:17,799
Speaker 1: expensive things in his name delivered to his house, like

832
00:46:17,840 --> 00:46:23,080
Speaker 1: send him a funeral wreath I think for himself. Um.

833
00:46:23,200 --> 00:46:27,200
Speaker 1: The other most likely origin is that probably some designer

834
00:46:27,280 --> 00:46:30,759
Speaker 1: was like, this looks cool and then went with it.

835
00:46:30,760 --> 00:46:36,280
Speaker 1: It reminds me a bit of how like the anarchist cinema,

836
00:46:36,320 --> 00:46:41,400
Speaker 1: like the circle A for anarchy is order, there's there's this,

837
00:46:41,760 --> 00:46:47,080
Speaker 1: there's any like who who designed it? What? Some people said, Uh,

838
00:46:47,120 --> 00:46:50,719
Speaker 1: Thomas Ibany is designed it UM and he recently wrote

839
00:46:50,760 --> 00:46:54,160
Speaker 1: a book like anarchisms movement was quite nice UM. But

840
00:46:54,280 --> 00:46:57,720
Speaker 1: he's known for denying that he did not that he

841
00:46:57,400 --> 00:47:04,439
Speaker 1: UH in Paris during UH the uprising of May sixty eight. Yeah,

842
00:47:04,920 --> 00:47:08,000
Speaker 1: so's he's famous for saying he didn't design it, while

843
00:47:08,040 --> 00:47:13,080
Speaker 1: other people disagree. I want I want the squatter symbol

844
00:47:13,160 --> 00:47:14,759
Speaker 1: version of that. I want the guy to come out

845
00:47:14,800 --> 00:47:20,640
Speaker 1: and say I didn't do it, but did you? So anyway,

846
00:47:21,040 --> 00:47:25,640
Speaker 1: that's the squatters symbol. It's Great Kaiser too well defended

847
00:47:25,680 --> 00:47:28,520
Speaker 1: for the police to attack. So in February eight the

848
00:47:28,520 --> 00:47:31,600
Speaker 1: police start attacking the squatter movement, but not at the

849
00:47:31,600 --> 00:47:35,400
Speaker 1: Great Kaiser. There's all these small skirmishes all over the country.

850
00:47:35,560 --> 00:47:39,640
Speaker 1: There's arrest there's evictions of smaller squats. One such squad

851
00:47:39,680 --> 00:47:43,400
Speaker 1: was the Bondlestrat. Also in the center of Amsterdam. On

852
00:47:43,400 --> 00:47:48,160
Speaker 1: on Leap Day February, the police evicted some squatters from

853
00:47:48,200 --> 00:47:52,279
Speaker 1: their home. The squatters didn't want to be evicted, so

854
00:47:52,520 --> 00:47:55,279
Speaker 1: a head on clash between protesters and police ensued, and

855
00:47:55,320 --> 00:47:58,640
Speaker 1: there's like rocks versus batons and tear gas and it's

856
00:47:58,680 --> 00:48:01,360
Speaker 1: the first really intense use of violence by the squatters.

857
00:48:01,680 --> 00:48:04,200
Speaker 1: I read later mainstream reports that claimed that the squatters

858
00:48:04,280 --> 00:48:06,480
Speaker 1: used molotovs at this time, but I don't believe this

859
00:48:06,520 --> 00:48:08,319
Speaker 1: is true because I have all of these I've read

860
00:48:08,320 --> 00:48:10,759
Speaker 1: all these reports from squatters at the time about when

861
00:48:10,800 --> 00:48:13,319
Speaker 1: they did decide to use molotovs about five years later,

862
00:48:13,880 --> 00:48:16,960
Speaker 1: um as because of the violence against them had escalated.

863
00:48:17,000 --> 00:48:19,920
Speaker 1: It was a very conscious decision. The violence that the

864
00:48:19,920 --> 00:48:23,120
Speaker 1: squatters were using was always measured in a kind of

865
00:48:23,120 --> 00:48:30,520
Speaker 1: impressive way. Um And they won. They drove back the police,

866
00:48:30,520 --> 00:48:33,759
Speaker 1: and they retook their house. They took the entire intersection,

867
00:48:33,920 --> 00:48:36,759
Speaker 1: and they held it over the entire weekend. The military

868
00:48:36,800 --> 00:48:38,920
Speaker 1: came in. It took a thousand cops and soldiers with

869
00:48:38,960 --> 00:48:41,800
Speaker 1: a literal tank and like helicopters of snipers and ship

870
00:48:42,080 --> 00:48:47,240
Speaker 1: screaming stopper will fucking shoot you. Before they lost on Monday.

871
00:48:47,840 --> 00:48:50,200
Speaker 1: Fifty cops were injured at that riot. I haven't found

872
00:48:50,320 --> 00:48:52,160
Speaker 1: a record of the number of squatters who were injured

873
00:48:52,200 --> 00:48:55,600
Speaker 1: because the report I found was from a mainstream perspective.

874
00:48:56,160 --> 00:48:58,399
Speaker 1: I'm just I'm just want to make a UM, maybe

875
00:48:58,400 --> 00:49:00,480
Speaker 1: it's gonna come up. There's at some point there's there's

876
00:49:00,520 --> 00:49:05,680
Speaker 1: a building with like refrigerators on top and stuff getting

877
00:49:05,719 --> 00:49:08,000
Speaker 1: to that, aren't you Huh Yeah, there's gonna be some

878
00:49:08,000 --> 00:49:12,879
Speaker 1: refrigerators on top of some buildings at some point. Um. Yeah.

879
00:49:12,920 --> 00:49:17,799
Speaker 1: The Dutch squiders are like some home alone and genius ship, um,

880
00:49:17,920 --> 00:49:21,719
Speaker 1: but like just just underlying. So they drove off uh

881
00:49:22,600 --> 00:49:27,439
Speaker 1: a thousand police and military who arrived with armored vehicles,

882
00:49:27,480 --> 00:49:31,000
Speaker 1: so that they lost. Once a thousand police came, they

883
00:49:31,440 --> 00:49:35,799
Speaker 1: won all weekend and so the state had to go

884
00:49:35,920 --> 00:49:40,160
Speaker 1: gather their forces and show up several days later, um,

885
00:49:40,200 --> 00:49:43,480
Speaker 1: in order to drive them off. And during all of this,

886
00:49:43,600 --> 00:49:47,080
Speaker 1: the Great Kaiser still being defended. It's no longer a house,

887
00:49:47,120 --> 00:49:49,880
Speaker 1: it's a fortress. The ground floor was barricaded so much

888
00:49:49,960 --> 00:49:52,800
Speaker 1: that no natural light came in people. I think people

889
00:49:52,880 --> 00:49:55,080
Speaker 1: defending this just like lost their goddamn minds and we're

890
00:49:55,120 --> 00:49:57,319
Speaker 1: like this is it. I mean I would too write

891
00:49:57,320 --> 00:49:58,640
Speaker 1: if I was in there, I'd be like, this is

892
00:49:58,680 --> 00:50:02,759
Speaker 1: sucking it right. Um. People worked on the house all day.

893
00:50:02,920 --> 00:50:05,680
Speaker 1: I think all night. People kept watch on the roof.

894
00:50:07,320 --> 00:50:09,600
Speaker 1: But at their six months under threat mark, they threw

895
00:50:09,640 --> 00:50:11,800
Speaker 1: a party in the street and they had like bands

896
00:50:11,840 --> 00:50:14,880
Speaker 1: play on boats and the canals outside or the canal outside.

897
00:50:15,400 --> 00:50:18,080
Speaker 1: They drew up multiple lines of defense, one behind the

898
00:50:18,120 --> 00:50:20,000
Speaker 1: other in case of attack, like all of this ship

899
00:50:20,040 --> 00:50:22,360
Speaker 1: that like is like straight out of like How to

900
00:50:22,400 --> 00:50:26,680
Speaker 1: Defend a Fortress books from Sucking eighteenth century writers and ship.

901
00:50:27,120 --> 00:50:30,960
Speaker 1: And at this point their counterintelligence extends outside the city.

902
00:50:31,000 --> 00:50:36,080
Speaker 1: They have like centuries sucking everywhere looking for large movements

903
00:50:36,120 --> 00:50:38,600
Speaker 1: of police. And in the midst of all of this,

904
00:50:39,400 --> 00:50:43,879
Speaker 1: the Netherlands decides to crown a new queen. You might

905
00:50:43,880 --> 00:50:45,719
Speaker 1: have heard of this, this woman. Have you heard of

906
00:50:45,800 --> 00:50:51,680
Speaker 1: Queen Beatrix? Oh yes, yes, I have, actually surprising yeah

907
00:50:51,760 --> 00:50:55,520
Speaker 1: yeah yeah, I'm such a loyalist. I still uh refused

908
00:50:55,560 --> 00:51:00,440
Speaker 1: to acknowledge that the royal holiday it used to be

909
00:51:00,560 --> 00:51:03,080
Speaker 1: Queen's Day has now become King's Day because her son

910
00:51:03,160 --> 00:51:08,120
Speaker 1: take took the place. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah yeah Queen's Day.

911
00:51:11,080 --> 00:51:15,279
Speaker 1: Yeah I know. Wow. So, um so that was still

912
00:51:15,320 --> 00:51:21,799
Speaker 1: before yeah, while the Kaiser was still being being like

913
00:51:21,960 --> 00:51:25,160
Speaker 1: under threat in the siege. Yeah yeah, because she, um,

914
00:51:25,239 --> 00:51:30,040
Speaker 1: she gets core. She gets crowned on April thirt and

915
00:51:30,080 --> 00:51:32,359
Speaker 1: so that's like six months more more than six months

916
00:51:32,400 --> 00:51:36,759
Speaker 1: into the Great Kaiser Defense. Queen Beatrix, I learned was

917
00:51:36,880 --> 00:51:40,400
Speaker 1: married to a literal Nazi named Prince Coys served in

918
00:51:40,400 --> 00:51:45,319
Speaker 1: the Nazi army. It was like, as officer, Yeah, like

919
00:51:45,480 --> 00:51:49,080
Speaker 1: no big deal. It's not like no, no, no, marry

920
00:51:49,160 --> 00:51:52,160
Speaker 1: the literal occupier of your country. Um, but that that's

921
00:51:52,440 --> 00:51:55,400
Speaker 1: that's so, so, so terrible, Like the Netherlands says this

922
00:51:56,719 --> 00:52:00,560
Speaker 1: weird sort of like progressive aura that it really doesn't deserve.

923
00:52:01,280 --> 00:52:06,320
Speaker 1: And when you look at like the royal propaganda around

924
00:52:06,360 --> 00:52:08,560
Speaker 1: around this stuff, it's it's just it's just crazy. Like

925
00:52:09,400 --> 00:52:13,160
Speaker 1: people pretend like Dutch resistance in Second World War was

926
00:52:13,200 --> 00:52:17,440
Speaker 1: like uh, mostly like patriots and people who thought like, oh,

927
00:52:17,480 --> 00:52:19,840
Speaker 1: these Nazis, they're being so weird and modern and we

928
00:52:19,920 --> 00:52:22,879
Speaker 1: just want our regular Dutch values, which is of course

929
00:52:22,960 --> 00:52:26,080
Speaker 1: not not true. Like these these were all radicals. There

930
00:52:26,120 --> 00:52:29,960
Speaker 1: were communists and anarchists, etcetera, mhm um, and there were

931
00:52:30,000 --> 00:52:32,680
Speaker 1: like a few others. And then so like the longest

932
00:52:33,160 --> 00:52:37,120
Speaker 1: running musical theater show in in the Netherlands is so

933
00:52:37,280 --> 00:52:42,680
Speaker 1: that's for an Orangio Soldier of Orange, which is about this. Ah,

934
00:52:42,840 --> 00:52:49,400
Speaker 1: it's like a royalist resistance fighter. Like if you look historically,

935
00:52:49,760 --> 00:52:51,960
Speaker 1: he was someone who won once the war was over.

936
00:52:52,400 --> 00:52:58,520
Speaker 1: Wanted to help Queen Beatrix's predecessor reinstate like an actual powerful,

937
00:52:58,640 --> 00:53:02,400
Speaker 1: like near absolute monarch. Key, um, so new with all

938
00:53:02,440 --> 00:53:07,239
Speaker 1: someone like defending democracy against Nazism or something. No, no,

939
00:53:07,320 --> 00:53:10,120
Speaker 1: but they they just wanted to pick a name of

940
00:53:10,160 --> 00:53:14,120
Speaker 1: like an important resistance figure to celebrate that wasn't a radical, right,

941
00:53:15,640 --> 00:53:21,600
Speaker 1: Yeah that I wish that's no, go ahead, Yeah that's

942
00:53:21,800 --> 00:53:24,759
Speaker 1: just today. You also see all these these photos circulating

943
00:53:24,840 --> 00:53:31,000
Speaker 1: of Queen Elizabeth doing like the the Nazi salute. So yeah,

944
00:53:31,040 --> 00:53:34,160
Speaker 1: it's it really does run in the family, I suppose. Yeah.

945
00:53:34,280 --> 00:53:37,800
Speaker 1: Wait were they related? All the queens and yeah this

946
00:53:37,960 --> 00:53:40,920
Speaker 1: all incest on it? Yeah? Um, I was gonna say

947
00:53:40,920 --> 00:53:45,719
Speaker 1: it's incest everywhere. Yeah yeah. And I ran across all

948
00:53:45,760 --> 00:53:49,279
Speaker 1: this like girl boss ship about Beatrix, you know, like

949
00:53:49,520 --> 00:53:52,040
Speaker 1: well she managed to become queen despite the laws that

950
00:53:52,120 --> 00:53:54,799
Speaker 1: say eldest sons get priority in secession. So it's just

951
00:53:54,840 --> 00:53:57,120
Speaker 1: the fucking and he was watching House of the Dragon

952
00:53:57,440 --> 00:54:01,600
Speaker 1: Game of Thrones. It's just that some fucking girl boss

953
00:54:01,600 --> 00:54:04,840
Speaker 1: ship where like now I get to be queen, um

954
00:54:04,960 --> 00:54:09,040
Speaker 1: but without the dragons. Yeah yeah it sucks really kind

955
00:54:09,040 --> 00:54:13,719
Speaker 1: of wigs. I know, I wouldn't put the wigs past,

956
00:54:13,760 --> 00:54:17,600
Speaker 1: but not the silver down to your waist wigs, right, totally.

957
00:54:17,680 --> 00:54:20,120
Speaker 1: Beatrix would totally rock rock like a wig if it

958
00:54:20,160 --> 00:54:22,680
Speaker 1: was more like socially acceptable to change that and stuff,

959
00:54:22,680 --> 00:54:26,799
Speaker 1: because she's like in this like conservative base. But like

960
00:54:26,880 --> 00:54:31,080
Speaker 1: she she has like so many different hats all the

961
00:54:31,120 --> 00:54:34,400
Speaker 1: time that like so many full time working like developing

962
00:54:34,440 --> 00:54:39,120
Speaker 1: new hat technology just for clean Beatrix, like like I

963
00:54:39,160 --> 00:54:41,839
Speaker 1: cannot imagine that she would not love to have like

964
00:54:42,040 --> 00:54:47,279
Speaker 1: wigs everywhere, and like it's fascinators and boches and yeah

965
00:54:47,320 --> 00:54:52,560
Speaker 1: yeah yeah. So the squatters are like, all right, we

966
00:54:52,560 --> 00:54:55,160
Speaker 1: have a new campaign which I'm gonna ask you to

967
00:54:55,160 --> 00:54:56,920
Speaker 1: say the name of it because it rhymes in Dutch.

968
00:54:56,960 --> 00:55:01,440
Speaker 1: But the campaign is no house, no coronation. Yeah's famous

969
00:55:01,480 --> 00:55:07,080
Speaker 1: slogan can voting came crowning, Um so English, come on,

970
00:55:07,520 --> 00:55:12,279
Speaker 1: get it. Yeah. So no coronations, no crowning. Okay, no

971
00:55:12,400 --> 00:55:16,440
Speaker 1: no living, no crowning. Yeah okay. And so it's like, look,

972
00:55:16,480 --> 00:55:17,880
Speaker 1: if we don't have houses, you don't get to be

973
00:55:17,960 --> 00:55:20,480
Speaker 1: fucking queen. You don't know housing, no crowsing from housing,

974
00:55:20,520 --> 00:55:24,000
Speaker 1: no crowning. It's like almost rhymes yeah, okay, no housing,

975
00:55:24,040 --> 00:55:27,960
Speaker 1: the crown okay, okay, And so they declared the whole

976
00:55:28,040 --> 00:55:31,200
Speaker 1: month to be a month of action. They're like an April,

977
00:55:31,680 --> 00:55:34,600
Speaker 1: we're going to disrupt the monarchist spectacle and open as

978
00:55:34,680 --> 00:55:41,000
Speaker 1: many houses as possible. Um, And what's gonna happen with

979
00:55:41,239 --> 00:55:43,920
Speaker 1: it is where we're gonna leave it today, because we're

980
00:55:43,920 --> 00:55:47,719
Speaker 1: gonna leave it on the eve of the coronation where probably, uh,

981
00:55:48,080 --> 00:55:51,080
Speaker 1: I think nothing bad happened. I think that Queen Beatrix

982
00:55:51,280 --> 00:55:56,360
Speaker 1: was like a truly kind and beneficent benefit, like a

983
00:55:56,480 --> 00:56:00,640
Speaker 1: Disney queen. Um, that's how it went right, Alex. Kind hearted, yeah,

984
00:56:01,160 --> 00:56:07,800
Speaker 1: merciful sort of yeah. Yeah, she saved that Nazi. Yeah yeah, yeah, No,

985
00:56:07,880 --> 00:56:17,200
Speaker 1: it's she's forgiving, so forgiving. It's great. Yeah, we love her. Well,

986
00:56:17,239 --> 00:56:19,600
Speaker 1: you can find out what happens if you listen to

987
00:56:19,760 --> 00:56:24,360
Speaker 1: part two on Wednesday, Alex, do you have anything you

988
00:56:24,800 --> 00:56:29,600
Speaker 1: want to plug? I do? I do um so you

989
00:56:29,640 --> 00:56:32,960
Speaker 1: can you can find you can find me on the

990
00:56:33,280 --> 00:56:37,279
Speaker 1: website on the stronge dot red um. So if you

991
00:56:37,360 --> 00:56:40,839
Speaker 1: know anybody who's Dutch or knows Dutch and can listen

992
00:56:40,920 --> 00:56:43,800
Speaker 1: to it Dutch language radical stuff. If you know, like

993
00:56:43,880 --> 00:56:46,120
Speaker 1: a Dutch person who said, oh, there's only liberal stuff

994
00:56:46,160 --> 00:56:49,960
Speaker 1: here or no, but Audion Lubach is really really radical

995
00:56:50,040 --> 00:56:54,040
Speaker 1: organ is really really important. Now send them to on

996
00:56:54,200 --> 00:56:58,880
Speaker 1: the stone into death. Also on Instagram. Um. But the

997
00:56:58,960 --> 00:57:01,480
Speaker 1: real thing I would like to uh plug more importantly

998
00:57:01,960 --> 00:57:07,600
Speaker 1: is the soon upcoming Anarchist Book Fair of Amsterdam, which

999
00:57:08,880 --> 00:57:11,040
Speaker 1: will feature this year for the sixth year in a row.

1000
00:57:11,440 --> 00:57:14,720
Speaker 1: And it's like grown to be like the biggest radical

1001
00:57:14,800 --> 00:57:18,760
Speaker 1: event of the year in the Netherlands despite the pandemic.

1002
00:57:19,240 --> 00:57:22,640
Speaker 1: And it's it's uh in the last weekend of October

1003
00:57:24,480 --> 00:57:27,480
Speaker 1: of October, so if you can make it there, if

1004
00:57:27,520 --> 00:57:30,680
Speaker 1: you're in the area, drop by. Its two days Saturday

1005
00:57:30,720 --> 00:57:35,480
Speaker 1: and Sunday. UM find information on Anarchist Book Fair Amsterdam

1006
00:57:35,600 --> 00:57:40,800
Speaker 1: dot black blogs dot org, or find them on Facebook

1007
00:57:40,840 --> 00:57:45,600
Speaker 1: and Insta with the same name you recommend. Yeah. I

1008
00:57:46,480 --> 00:57:48,840
Speaker 1: was gonna go and then I um got a dog.

1009
00:57:49,880 --> 00:57:54,360
Speaker 1: Um yeah, but someday I we'll go and Margaret you

1010
00:57:54,400 --> 00:57:58,440
Speaker 1: have a book coming out, correct I do? Yeah? Direct?

1011
00:57:59,200 --> 00:58:00,680
Speaker 1: Did you is this the one that you ghost wrote

1012
00:58:00,720 --> 00:58:03,840
Speaker 1: for me? This is the one that my dog Anderson

1013
00:58:03,880 --> 00:58:07,920
Speaker 1: ghost right, you can find um the book we Won't

1014
00:58:07,920 --> 00:58:12,960
Speaker 1: be Here Tomorrow written by Anderson the Dog or me. Um,

1015
00:58:13,320 --> 00:58:15,200
Speaker 1: you can. I don't know I'm going with this joke.

1016
00:58:15,880 --> 00:58:21,000
Speaker 1: It's coming out from a k Press September, which is soon. Wow,

1017
00:58:21,040 --> 00:58:22,800
Speaker 1: it's really soon. It might even be in the past. No,

1018
00:58:22,880 --> 00:58:24,040
Speaker 1: I think it will be in the future. If you

1019
00:58:24,120 --> 00:58:27,040
Speaker 1: listen to this one it first comes out, um, and

1020
00:58:27,720 --> 00:58:30,240
Speaker 1: then you can read all kinds of weird stories and

1021
00:58:30,320 --> 00:58:32,160
Speaker 1: if you you have to pre order it in order

1022
00:58:32,240 --> 00:58:35,400
Speaker 1: to get the little cool art piece that as Sandra,

1023
00:58:35,520 --> 00:58:38,400
Speaker 1: the cover artist drew for it. So that's a reason

1024
00:58:38,440 --> 00:58:44,880
Speaker 1: to pre order it. And we will talk to you all. Yeah,

1025
00:58:44,960 --> 00:58:49,840
Speaker 1: talks to you next time. Cool People Who Did Cool

1026
00:58:49,880 --> 00:58:52,640
Speaker 1: Stuff is a production of cool Zone Media, but more

1027
00:58:52,720 --> 00:58:55,760
Speaker 1: podcasts and cool Zone Media. Visit our website cool zone

1028
00:58:55,800 --> 00:58:58,120
Speaker 1: media dot com, or check us out on the I

1029
00:58:58,240 --> 00:59:01,800
Speaker 1: Heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.

1030
00:59:08,920 --> 00:59:09,320
Speaker 1: M HM