TV review Just like ‘Urk’, reality series about Sint Willebrord shows a clean version of the village

The residents of the Brabant village of Sint Willebrord are extremely clean. While mother Corrie is bent the sidewalk tiles with a jerry can chlorine, daughter Linda is vacuuming the roof. « Look out, » Corrie calls from the garden to her daughter. Linda: « I do have brain injury, but I am not retarded. »

The reality series St. Willebrord: The Miracle van Brabant Is RTL 5’s answer to Urk from competitor SBS6. Both villages are close, believing communities that the outside world has prejudices (crime, intolerance) which reinforces the we-against feeling. The village is not excessively criminal. On average low educated, hardworking and there are relatively many sick and caregivers. White shutters and tight tiled gardens everywhere. They are « campers without wheels, » says one of the residents.

Just like in Urk stands in St. Willebrord A flamboyant village heater central. The Brabant version of Teun Föhn is called Dante. As Gay and Filipin, he also serves as proof that the villagers are indeed tolerant. Roof vacuum cleaner Linda and her wife Elma – -driven out as a lesbian woman from Zeeland -also say it: « Everyone is accepted, as long as you adapt. »

Dante has a secret weapon: he gives his customers Maria Reals. At the Mary statue in the hair salon he lets his hands go over the needy – he doesn’t touch them, a neat guy – after which the negative energy flies out. The Catholic faith of the village is an extra attraction of the series. Sint Willebrord has its own mariagrot where you can light candles. Next week we will get the first holy communion of the children – the opportunity to unpack with expensive dresses and fairy tale carriages.

Just like Urk shows St. Willebrord A clean version of the village. This is entertainment, so there is no attention for violence or political intolerance. Last year the residents threatened to form a fight team because one refugee family would come and live. The submitter of a petition to the family then said: « I once came to live here because there were only whites. If it is up to me, we will keep it that way. » The village is 97 percent white. Seventy percent votes PVV.

Riots against refugees

After the xenophobic riots in Uden in Brabant against the arrival of refugees, several mayors pointed in Thursday News hour (NPO 1) and Bar late (NPO 2) to The Hague. The ministry, with the Spreading Act in hand, commanded them on the one hand to record refugees. And on the other hand, the responsible minister Faber (asylum, PVV) acted against the shelter. MPs from Forum and the PVV hit their supporters on social media to participate in demonstrations against AZCs.

The mayors found confusing. Mark Boumans, mayor of Doetinchem and chairman of the VNG committee asylum and migration said in Bar late You had to help that he is not against the restriction of admission, but you had to help the refugees that were already there. According to him, the reception crisis could be solved within a few weeks: « Don’t blow it up, stick to the facts. » A Brabant journalist said in Bar late About the rioters: « They feel strengthened by Faber’s policy. »

What the mayors did not see, or at least not said, was that the confusion is no coincidence. It is part of the PVV policy. Stagnating shelter is what Faber and her leader Wilders manage. She want Like an asylum crisis. And throwing cobras is rewarded: the municipalities where riots were quickly withdrew their plans.

VVD mayor Boumans probably kept himself relatively on the plain because his party is in the coalition with the PVV and himself also benefits electorally from refugee anxiety. In de Volkskrant Was he pronounced more: « If we are going to talk about solutions, we have to ask ourselves whether this is a created crisis or a real one. »

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