The Netherlands' Awkward Intersection of Drugs, Tourism, and Local Culture

Weed smoking is part of the local culture in the Netherlands. It's also big tourism business. So there's a bit of a conflict facing the Dutch as they head to the polls next week when one of the major issues overshadowing the election centers on whether to limit the country's plentiful weed-and-coffee-shops only to locals. It's being framed as a question of preventing cross-border drug smuggling, but for the vast majority of people concerned, it's really a much broader question of whether a country's cultural pastime and tourist attraction should be both.

For the past few years, a government plan has been hatching to ban the sales of marijuana and other "soft drugs" to foreign tourists. A court ruling in April paved the way for that ban to move ahead, putting a new system in place that would require locals to obtain a "weed pass" that essentially turns the coffee shops into clubs. It's already rolled out in southern sections of the country, and could soon move on to the rest of the Netherlands, including tourist hotspot Amsterdam. Opponents of the ban are calling on voters to support politicians and parties in the September 12 election that would overturn the ban. Unless they're successful, there could be a lot less people visiting the country to enjoy a smoke.