We should all be outraged. At least six women in the Netherlands have been forced to take contraceptives temporarily by court order in the past twelve months. De Volkskrant reported at the beginning of October. Those affected suffered from a serious mental illness - reason enough for the judges to believe that the women would not be able to care for a newborn.
We should all be outraged. At least six women in the Netherlands have been forced to take contraceptives temporarily by court order in the past twelve months. De Volkskrant reported at the beginning of October. Those affected suffered from a serious mental illness - reason enough for the judges to believe that the women would not be able to care for a newborn.
Among the proponents of such coercive measures against the right to physical integrity is today's acting Minister of Health, Hugo de Jonge. As a councilor in Rotterdam, he tried to force drug-addicted parents or those who did not have valid papers (undocumented) or were heavily indebted to use contraceptives.
The Rotterdam court was also the first to order a woman with schizophrenia to take anti-conception medication via injections in September 2020. “The defendant is not able to take care of a child at the moment,” the judge stated at the time. The Mandatory Mental Health Act was implemented at the beginning of 2020.
Five further women were forced to take anticonception medication by the courts in Amsterdam, Noord-Nederland and Zeeland-West-Brabant.
The GGD has been talking to men and women with mental health problems since 2014 about anticonception. Roughly 70 percent of female participants used anticonception, but De Groot is worried about the remaining 30 percent.“We can’t say: just let the rest be. For this group, more encouragement is necessary,” the former juvenile court judge said.
This is a fundamental intervention into the right of self-determination of neurodiverse humans living under the rule of the capitalist bourgeois Dutch state. Further, it is an intersection of sexism, classism, racism as well as abelism. Despite the fact that the numbers remain low, the eugenics program should never be normalised, in order for the Dutch state to produce (in their perception) only useful proletarians that are capable of reproducing the wealth for the few or new white dutch upperclass exploiters.
Enough is Enough!