In the interest of full disclosure, I do not nor have I ever had any interest in visiting Aruba. It is, from all accounts, essentially a party resort island, given over almost exclusively to tourism, and aside from a museum or two, that could occupy at best an afternoon, the only things there are “to do” on the island have to do with riding various watercraft and scuba diving, and dancing the night away in party bars.
I wish that were not so, because now that the governor of Alabama is urging a boycott, I would like to see everybody who has the resources to do so visit Aruba.
In case you have been lucky enough to miss the story of Natalee Holloway, she is a teenaged girl from Alabama who went on a graduation trip to Aruba and disappeared. That was last May, and during that time, the combined efforts of law enforcement from the Aruba, the US and the Netherlands, in addition to a gaggle of private investigators have been unsuccessful in finding any evidence of any crime, or evidence that Natalee is either alive or dead.
Her family has recently demanded that Aruba assign to the case new investigators and a new prosecutor, and Aruba has failed to do that, thus the boycott.
That is the story in a nutshell, if you wish to immerse yourself in the minutiae of theories, allegations, etc. just google Natalee Holloway and you will drown in the stuff.