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During the official pride week in amsterdam, i went for a workshop at the student hotel, which in this week had presumptuously named themselves the ‘pride hotel’. It was rainbows all over, there was even a library with books on queer history, about sex and gender. As they were an official location for pride Amsterdam, they were hosting events for pride week, while at the same time, capitalising on the fact that the city almost doubles in population from the tourists visiting amsterdam for pride week and are in need of accommodation.
22014
22015During the official pride week in amsterdam, i went for a workshop at the student hotel, which in this week had presumptuously named themselves the ‘pride hotel’. It was rainbows all over, there was even a library with books on queer history, about sex and gender. As they were an official location for pride Amsterdam, they were hosting events for pride week, while at the same time, capitalising on the fact that the city almost doubles in population from the tourists visiting amsterdam for pride week and are in need of accommodation. Meanwhile collaborating with the gementee of Amsterdam to be the host of pride TV and other events. When i entered the bathroom, there was a sign saying toilet, and i was pleased to see that they were gender neutral toilets, but inside the space I felt that it definitely was designed as a men's room, so when i was leaving i checked the signs again and saw that the sign toilet was just a sticker pasted over the original sign [see pictures]. I had a feeling that the stickers were put up solely for pride week. But I also didn't want to judge them too early, so I went back one week later. The rainbow carpet still exists. The rainbow flags still exist. Surprisingly the library of queer books even exists, yet the toilets? Back to conforming with the binary. Gender neutral bathrooms respect people's identities specially for those who do not identify with their gender assigned at birth. It also protects them from being attacked or harassed in gender-separated toilets. For trans/ gender non-conforming people, having to enter a gendered bathroom, one that does not correspond with their identity can cause gender dysphoria. Research has even shown that trans/gender-non conforming people even avoid going to bathrooms all together to avoid these negative confrontations which has later led to medical issues. Now we have the Student Hotel, who claims that they “won't stop until everyone feels accepted and respected inside the student hotel”. They make statements about “challenge the binary and heteronormative standards”. [see photo]. Yet when it comes down to actually implementing changes that would make people feel safe, included, accepted this support is non-existent.
They claim to support the emancipation of non- binary people and yet they didn't even manage to keep the gender neutral bathrooms existing for longer than the week it was profitable for them to do it? Because who could imagine (right?), the “pride hotel” having gendered bathrooms. This is not an independent situation, but one of many examples of pinkwashing and co-optation of pride in Amsterdam. If you look at the companies that sponsor the pride, ING, Amazon, Google, and their policies, you realise that they do not care about marginalised communities at all. Yet, during pride, when its fashionable to be queer, when you can make money by being queer friendly, places like The Student Hotel show their support by making gender neutral bathrooms for a week. Or the gementee which gave a spotlight to non-binary and trans people thorughout pride and capitalised on their so-called inclusion due to pride tourism. All the while, they pay no attention to supporting us in our everyday lives, by increasing access to gender-affirming (medical) care, or reducing barriers to finding safe and affordable housing for queer and trans folks.

Queer liberation entails the disruption of all the barriers that prevent queer people from participating
into social activities, and expressing their identity freely. Presently, there are still barriers for queer people, and especially trans, non-binary and gender non-conforming people, for accessing certain jobs and housing opportunities. This results in marginalisation of queer and trans people, who need to seek queer-friendly (meaning, all year round, not only during pride) housing and jobs. Often, this results in economic disadvantage and general marginalisation. For this reason, queer communities come to life, hubs of solidarity around housing, jobs and other economic issues, where people support each other against the harsh cis/heteronormativity of the capitalist system. By so doing, queer liberation becomes an inherently anticapitalist struggle. The tendency of capitalism to flatten out diversity and to integrate everything into profit logic is contrary to the logic of queer solidarity, community, and the distruption of norms.
The Student Hotel is a hyper capitalist enterprise, it thrives on gentrification and the destruction of anticapitalist housing projects like squats. In fact, in Bologna, Turin, Maastricht and other cities, the Student Hotel rises out of the ashes of previously community-managed housing projects and squats. While promoting values like “community, creativity, and diversity”, the Student Hotel participates in the destruction of grassroots projects based on these same values. And worse of all, they have done this actively and consciously, choosing to buy squatted buildings because they would be cheaper, and therefore a better investment, ignoring that in
Bologna for example, 76 families of 26 different nationalities have been evicted for their yuppie heaven to be created.
This lack of solidarity and care, and the explicit participation into gentrification, make the Student Hotel one of the most hypocritical instances of capitalism. Rainbow capitalism appropriates values that it does not really uphold, creating a friendly facade for an actually destructive project.
Capitalising on the portrayal of alternative lifestyle while being a global chain based on profiting off of the housing crisis in student cities makes the Student Hotel a threat to all people who work towards a solidary society, and a world where queer identities are recognised, cared for and protected. Queer liberation is intrinsically based on an economy of care. It cannot happen in a capitalist world where every humanist value is appropriated for profit.
The real “Pride Hotel” is an expropriated building managed by black trans women and non-binary folks who practice a policy of inclusion and provide housing despite people’s economic condition (and not for 1025 euros a month for a single room!). The Pride Hotel is an anticapitalist enterprise. The Student Hotel is just about the opposite of that.
In the end when I inquired about why the toilets changed from being gender neutral, what the manager of the student hotel told me was “ speak to the marketing department, they were responsible for the toilets during pride week”. This should be enough for us to realise that this institution is not a safe space for queers, and it is not in their agenda to make it so.
How dare you even think of naming yourself the pride hotel. Clearly you know nothing about queerness or pride or what it is really about, Clearly you have learned nothing from all the talks and workshops given by the people of the community. They are just another example of institutions rainbow washing their otherwise hyper capitalist enterprise that cares for no one, and regularly takes advantage of marginalised communities to make money.