- AMSTERDAM -- The police's
National Diversity Expertise Centre (LECD) wants sex allowed in all public
parks in the Netherlands. The police institute has advised the cities to
follow the example of Amsterdam, De Telegraaf newspaper reported Friday.
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- In Amsterdam's Vondelpark, owners of dogs let off the
leash can be fined, but sex will shortly be permitted. "Why should
we try to maintain something that is actually impossible to maintain, which
also causes little bother for others and for a certain group actually signifies
much pleasure?" says Paul van Grieken, the responsible Alderman in
the Oud-Zuid district of Amsterdam.
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- Van Grieken confirmed that the plan to tolerate public
sex in Vondelpark is part of a draft version of new rules of conduct for
the city's best-known park. The regulations are to come into force after
the summer. "Of course there are strict rules attached. Thus, condoms
must always be cleared away, it must never take place in the neighbourhood
of children's playgrounds and the sex must be restricted to the evening
and night-time."
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- The draft memorandum says that fines will be maintained
for dogs running around off the leash that, for example, cause nuisance
to sunbathing or cycling users of the park. "The research showed that
many people find this disturbing," according to the alderman.
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- LECD is now calling on Rotterdam, The Hague and Utrecht
to tolerate 'cruising' gays in all their parks. In a letter to the administrators
of the three cities, the police institute says that by regulating sex in
public, the safety of homosexuals from 'queer-bashers' can be better guaranteed.
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- Thus, it says in the recommendations that "officers
must not disturb the activities, as long as they do not cause any actual
nuisance" and they would "only have to take corrective action
if there is a question of actual offensive behaviour that is visible from
the public path."
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- Homosexuals' organisation COC is pleased that the Amsterdam
Oud-Zuid district is to be the first to tolerate sex in the Vondelpark.
"Cruising is something belonging to all time and banning it does not
work anyway. They do it surreptitiously and mostly without others being
annoyed by it. But homos at cruising spots are often attacked. By now agreeing
rules of behaviour on this, safety can be increased," according to
COC Amsterdam chairman Dennis Boutkan.
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- http://curtmaynardsblog.blogspot.com/2008/03/police-allow-sex-in-all-dutch-parks.html
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