I hate nationalism. I hate tribalism. Both are poisons. Both divide, distort, and destroy. Nationalism gives us enemies where there were neighbors. Tribalism gives us purity tests instead of solidarity. Together, they gave us trenches, massacres, and gas chambers. They must be abandoned.
But we can still speak of culture. Of history. Of ideas rooted in a shared language, a shared way of thinking. That is not nationalism. That is civilizational context. And when we speak of Freethinkers International, we must say it clearly: this project had to be Dutch.
Not because the Dutch are better. But because Dutch culture makes it possible.
Introduction: A moral ark must have a Western keel
Why the Netherlands? Why not Germany or France? After all, those are powerful nations. Historic nations. But that is not enough. Not here. Not for this. Freethinkers International is not a geopolitical brand. It is a lifeline. And lifelines require more than flags and history books.
It requires deep culture. One that protects doubt, one that tolerates dissent. One that allows someone to leave religion, to love without shame, to think without punishment.
And when we ask who built such a culture—not through theory, but in practice—we find the Dutch. And certainly not the Czechs. I cannot imagine it being a Czech project. The country I live in does not have the deep, centuries-long infrastructure of tolerance, dissent, and protected rebellion. We mimic the West. But we never built its foundations.
Dutch culture: A refuge built over centuries
The Dutch Golden Age was not just about ships and spices. It was about ideas. While Spain was burning heretics, the Netherlands opened presses. While England executed “blasphemers,” Amsterdam welcomed them.
Baruch Spinoza was cast out by his Jewish community. But he did not flee to Rome or Berlin. He stayed in the Netherlands. Because there, he could write. There, he could think. And no one knocked at his door with chains.
Descartes—yes, the French philosopher—did not finish his works in France. He moved to the Netherlands. Not by accident, but by necessity. He needed peace, he needed safety. He needed the Dutch.
Why not Germany or France?
Germany has philosophers—Kant, Nietzsche, Habermas. But it also has bureaucracy. It has cold systems, it has scars from its own authoritarian past. It protects freethought, yes—but with walls. With checkpoints. It is not a natural refuge. Not a sanctuary. It is a legal zone with little warmth.
France invented liberté. But let us be honest—it also invented guillotines. And today, it is tangled in contradictions. It bans religious symbols, but not always in the name of freedom. And it is proud of its Enlightenment, but still polices speech. It speaks of secularism, but often confuses it with nationalism.
France and Germany protect rights. But they do not cultivate sanctuary. The Dutch do.
The Dutch way: Toleration as foundation
From Erasmus to today, the Netherlands chose a different path. It was never a superpower. It had no emperors. No central dogma. It was built as a republic, not a throne. Cities governed themselves. Merchants funded art. Ideas flowed faster than orders.
Multatuli, one of the first anti-colonial authors, came from the Netherlands. He wrote not as a rebel abroad, but as a voice within. The Dutch published him. Debated him. Did not exile him.
The same culture legalized same-sex marriage in 2001—first in the world. It funds secular organizations abroad. It protects blasphemy—even when it offends. The Dutch government may stumble. But the culture still breathes tolerance.
Western Enlightenment, Dutch heart
The Enlightenment had many fathers. But it needed a safe house. A staging ground. A breathing room. And it found that in the Dutch Republic.
It was Dutch presses that printed banned books. Dutch ports that moved banned manuscripts. Dutch cities that let refugees settle and publish. While other nations tightened their grip, the Netherlands loosened theirs.
Spinoza’s lens grinder was not a symbol. It was reality. A philosopher who made his living with his hands, protected not by royalty, but by society’s culture.
Freethinkers International: Not just a project, a legacy
When Stichting id Fix created Freethinkers International, they did not do it for prestige. They did it because they could. Because their country gave them the air to do it. No army guarded them, no oligarch funded them. No priest approved them. It was civil society. Dutch society.
This project is not a coincidence. It is an outcome. An inheritance. A child of Dutch secularism, pragmatism, and resistance to dogma.
Global support, Dutch roots
This is not about borders. The team is global. The people they help come from everywhere. The ideology is universal: protect those who think, who doubt, who dissent.
But every ideology needs a home. A place to incubate. A soil where action can grow. That soil, in this case, is Dutch.
Other countries can help. They should. But they must first learn. Learn what it means to tolerate not just difference—but defiance.
Conclusion: Civilization over nationalism
This is not nationalism. This is civilization. It is not about pride. It is about protection.
And let us not forget the linguistic roots. Dutch is the closest codified language to English—structurally, syntactically, historically. Unlike Slavic languages, Dutch uses articles, definite and indefinite. It separates subject from object with precision. It encodes clarity. That matters. When your mission is to protect thought, to express dissent, and to shelter nuance, language becomes your first tool. Dutch, like English, was built to carry thought clearly.
Freethinkers International is the result of centuries of Dutch resistance to conformity. It is the moral continuation of a society that once gave a home to the hunted.
In a world closing its doors, the Dutch kept theirs slightly ajar.
And through that gap, the freethinkers ran—not to power, but to safety.
That is why this project had to be Dutch.
And why the rest of the world must follow.
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