Some 300 protest against erotic center plans for Amsterdam-Zuid
Around 300 people gathered at the RAI in Amsterdam-Zuid on Wednesday evening to protest against the possible arrival of an erotic center ahead of the district council’s meeting on the matter. Among the protesters were remarkably many children holding up signs amid the noise protest, Parool reports.
Annalu, an 11-year-old from Buitenveldert, held up a sign saying, “I don’t want to live next to a mega brothel” at the protest. She’s afraid of the men who’d visit the erotic center, she told Parool. “I have to pass it on my way to school. Every day. And then, if you are alone and you come across a man who has just been rejected..”
Finne, 13, has similar concerns. “There are children playing here. What should we do if we suddenly get slapped on the ass?”
Ten-year-old Livine: “I have to pass by when I go to hockey. Then those men will ask if I want drugs. If it is no longer safe here, we will have to move.”
After Amsterdam-Noord officially rejected the NDSM wharf as the location of the erotic center in its advice to Mayor Femke Halsema, it seems Amsterdam-Zuid locals are stepping up their protest. With children as the new shock troops, Parool described it. The locals also handed their district council a petition with 7,639 signatures to not bring the erotic center to Amsterdam-Zuid.
Amsterdam announced its plans to open an erotic center to relieve some pressure from the Red Light District in February. Two of the possible locations are in Amsterdam Zuid, and the third is at the NDSM Wharf in Noord. Locals in both districts are vehemently against the plans and have shown up in scores at previous meetings in Zuid and Noord to express their discontent. Sex workers also protested against the plans.
The proposed locations in Zuid are opposite the entrance to the Amstelpark playground, local resident Marlies Booijink said at the protest. They’re 200 meters from the paddling pool in the Beatrixpark and 120 meters from the ROC. “Thousands of school pupils cycle past to their sports club or school every week. Why should Amsterdam want to build Europe’s largest brothel with a sex amusement park in a place with so many vulnerable people.”
Jacques Bettelheim (PvdA), chairman of the district council, called the petition and protests impressive evidence that locals have concerns. “A signal that everyone has heard,” and to which he will carefully listen, he said.
Last week, Mayor Halsema told AT5 that she asked for the planning process around the erotic center to be delayed by five weeks so that she could carefully answer locals’ questions and address their concerns. She said she hoped the Noord and Zuid district councils would also give her that time before issuing their advice. Noord did not heed that plea.
