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Made in jp
[MOD]
Anti-piracy Officer






Somewhere in south-central England.

Yeah and we've got an opt-out.

What EU navy, covered by what EU air force, is going to deliver what EU army on to British soil to impose non-democracy?

When the non-existent forces aren't kicked back into the Channel, will the EU nuclear force be unleashed as a terrible warning to any other would-be democratic nation?

When the above comes to pass, what will our NATO allies have to say about the matter?

Frankly the article is a load of toss-spank.

I'm writing a load of fiction. My latest story starts here... This is the index of all the stories...

We're not very big on official rules. Rules lead to people looking for loopholes. What's here is about it. 
   
Made in gb
Quick-fingered Warlord Moderatus







 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
An excellent article on the progressive case for BREXIT http://www.spiked-online.com/newsite/article/for-europe-against-the-eu/18102#.VtgwXhPctpw

And if you don't want to click on the link, here's the article:

Spoiler:
On 1 March, Brendan O’Neill spoke to the Brexit Society at Cambridge University. Here’s what he said.

The Brexit camp has asked the BBC to do it one, pretty small favour in the run-up to the EU referendum: to differentiate between ‘Europe’ and ‘the EU’. To encourage its reporters to say ‘Europe’ only when they are referring to the vast continent we live in, and to say ‘the EU’ when they are referring to the Brussels-run union of 28 member states.

And the BBC has refused. Or it has at least failed to clarify when these two very different terms may be used by its staff. This means the BBC has implicitly given a nod of approval to its reporters to say ‘Europe’ when they really mean ‘the EU’.

Some observers think the Brexit lobby is mad for asking for this clarification from the BBC. A writer for the New Statesman said it showed that some people will find bias in the most innocuous of things. In other words: chill out; it is not a problem for the national broadcaster to use the terms ‘Europe’ and ‘the EU’ interchangeably; stop making a fuss about nothing.

But I think the BBC’s unwillingness to maintain a distinction between ‘Europe’ and ‘the EU’ is actually very revealing, and worrying.

It speaks to one of the worst aspects of the debate about the EU: the conflation of the Brussels-based oligarchy with the continent of Europe; the mixing-up of the small, unaccountable cliques who peer down at Europe from their air-conditioned towers in Brussels with Europe itself.

Think about some of the phrases that could potentially be uttered by BBC reporters if they use ‘Europe’ for ‘EU’. They could say that the people of Peterborough, one of the most anti-EU parts of Britain, are ‘against Europe’. They could say that people in Warrington, the seventh most Eurosceptic part of Britain, ‘hate Europe’ or are ‘voting to get out of Europe’.

But of course they’re doing no such thing. Britain isn’t leaving the continent of Europe. That isn’t what we’re voting on. And these people in Peterborough and Warrington might love Europe. They might holiday in Spain, have friends in France, love Swedish TV dramas. Many, if not most, of them won’t be anti-European — they’re just anti-EU.

The Stay campaign’s habit of conflating ‘Europe’ and ‘the EU’ means that those who are anti-EU can be easily depicted as anti-Europe, as xenophobic or nationalistic. These people’s political outlook — their dislike of the way Brussels can impose its writ on nation states — is reduced to a prejudiced outlook, a simple case of being anti-Europe. Their politics is pathologised, turned from opposition to a political system into opposition to a whole continent and its cultures and peoples.

This is why we so often see the term Europhobic. This word explicitly pathologises people’s dislike of the EU. It treats it almost as a mental illness: a phobia is an irrational fear.

The Guardian recently said that ordinary people’s Europhobia has been ‘pandered to and fed by Tory leaders’. So there’s a strange, fearful mob out there and the Tories are recklessly stirring it up. This week, a writer for New Europe magazine listed ‘Europhobia’ alongside ‘xenophobia, nationalism, Islamophobia and racism’, as values that are ‘alien to our postwar European culture’.

See how casually criticism of the EU, opposition to the Brussels oligarchy, is reduced to a phobia, an ism, something which goes against the ideals of Europe itself.

We must challenge the cynical conflation of ‘Europe’ and ‘the EU’, and we must challenge the pathologisation of Brussels’ critics. Because, to my mind, the EU and Europe are not even remotely the same thing. Actually, I’d go further and say that the EU grates against everything that is brilliant about Europe. The EU is an ugly, illiberal, undemocratic blot on the wonderful continent of Europe. The EU is a stain on the best, most inspiring values of Europe and its peoples. It is the EU that is anti-Europe.

I love Europe, but I hate the EU. I consider myself a European. I don’t have any special emotional attachment to Great Britain. I love London, but I’m kind of Irish, and if I could afford it I would live in Paris.

My argument for getting out of the EU is not a Little Englander one. It’s not because I think Britain is the best country in this continent. It’s not because I love the pound or the Queen. It’s because the EU is detrimental to the whole of Europe, and particularly to two incredibly important values that European peoples have in various ways been fighting for for hundreds of years: democracy and liberty. The EU is anti-democratic and illiberal.

Supporters of the EU tell us it is an inspiring union of the European peoples. Nonsense. It is a union of European elites who want to avoid their peoples. The EU is the mechanism through which national governments outsource various powers and decision-making processes to distant, aloof, mostly unaccountable bodies like the European Commission and the European Court of Justice.

The true instinct behind the Brussels machine is not to bring Europe together. It is to absolve national governments of the burden of having to consult us, the plebs, about important political and social matters, in favour of allowing various experts and cliques in Brussels to discuss and shape such matters on our behalf. The EU’s fuel is not cosmopolitanism — it’s democracy-dodging.

From the outset, the EU has not been the embodiment of people’s will — it has been a struggle against people’s will. The 1992 Maastricht Treaty that founded the EU as we know it was only just approved by France and was rejected by Denmark. And of course, John Major’s Tory government refused to put it to a referendum. British people were co-opted into the EU without our explicit say-so.

Almost every time they have been asked about the EU, people in Europe have said ‘We don’t want it’. In Ireland in 2001, voters said No to the Nice Treaty. In 2005, the new EU Constitution was rejected by voters in France and Holland. EU bureaucrats then denounced the French and Dutch as ‘ignorant’ and ‘xenophobic’. One MEP said it was mad to subject something as important as the EU Constitution to the ‘lottery’ of public opinion.

The European Commission responded to this French and Dutch disobedience by renaming the EU Constitution the ‘Lisbon Treaty’, which EC vice-president Margot Wallstrom admitted was ‘essentially the same proposal as the old constitution’. Only this time people wouldn’t be asked to vote on it, because, in the words of Nicolas Sarkozy, ‘a referendum now would bring Europe into danger’. So democracy is dangerous; the people’s will is a threat to the EU project.

In 2008, the Irish were permitted to vote on the Lisbon Treaty. And they said No. They were slammed and defamed by Brussels bureaucrats and forced to vote again. Under the pressure of the EU’s economic blackmail, they said Yes second time round.

The EU is not an expression of European people’s will. On the contrary, it has been constituted time and again in direct opposition to people’s will.

The hostility of the EU to national sentiment and democratically elected governments can also be seen in its constant hectoring of the governments of Eastern Europe.

In 2006, the elected prime minister of Slovakia was instructed by Brussels to challenge political extremism in his country and repress certain political ways of thinking or risk being found in breach of EU regulations. In 2006, the prime minister of Poland was forced by Brussels to declare that his government was not homophobic or anti-Semitic and that it would not bring back the death penalty. In 2011, the EU pressured the Hungarian government to rethink its new constitution.

In 2000, when the far-right Freedom Party won 27 per cent of votes in Austria, enough to enter into a coalition government, Brussels imposed diplomatic sanctions on Austria. There would be no ‘business as usual’, the EU decreed, so long as the Freedom Party remained in government. The Freedom Party that had just been elected by huge numbers of Austrian people.

Brussels’ lecturing of Eastern governments doesn’t only expose the anti-democratic instincts of the EU — it also gives the lie to the idea that the EU has united the nations of Europe. Actually the EU has nurtured divisions, primarily between the apparently civilised west of Europe and the allegedly dark, twisted east of Europe which must constantly be corrected, but also between the supposedly industrious north and the apparently lazy, financially reckless south. The Iron Curtain is back, and the north-south divide is back, in a new, insidious way.

The Brussels oligarchy’s view of democracy as dangerous became most apparent in 2011. In that year it worked to impose technocratic governments in Greece and Italy and to import a gang of bankers and bureaucrats to Dublin to keep a watchful eye on the Irish government and its austerity measures. It rode roughshod over democracy, and effectively installed benign tyrannies.

Mario Monti, the unelected technocrat charged with running Italy on behalf of Brussels, actually boasted about the aloofness of his regime. He said: ‘The absence of political personalities removes any ground for disagreement.’ This is what the EU and its lackeys really hate: politics, personality, debate, disagreement — the lifeblood of democracy. They far prefer the rule of experts, the coolness of technocrats.

And their fanboys in the media agree. In 2011, the Guardian published an article headlined ‘In defence of Europe’s technocrats’. It argued that ‘temporary technocrat rule may well be… acceptable — perhaps necessary — at a time of crisis’. Here we have an explicit defence of the destruction of democracy; an open, unabashed argument for the rule of the unelected. And it comes, not from the far right or neo-fascists or other extremist groups that we’re constantly told pose a threat to European values, but from so-called liberals, from supposed EU cosmopolitans.

Some people argue that the EU is our best guard against the kind of tyranny Europe experienced in the 1930s and 40s. Yet as they say this, Brussels installs unelected leaders, blackmails elected prime ministers, describes democratic referendums as a ‘danger’. Under the cover of keeping at bay the tyrannies of the past, the EU constructs a new kind of tyranny.

The vile attacks on the voters of France and Holland and Ireland, the dictating to the elected governments of Eastern Europe, the enforcement of technocratic oversight in Greece and Italy…. none of this is accidental or merely a response to particularly tense, crisis-ridden moments in recent years. Rather, it is in the very nature of the EU to be suspicious of or outright hostile towards the views and attitudes and will of European peoples.

Indeed, the EU has shaped itself precisely around European elites’ feeling of exhaustion with the democratic process. The EU is the means through which politics can be done in a distant and post-democratic way. And to this end, at the very top of Brussels, there is the EC, a body that is emblematic of the EU’s agitation with democracy. This executive body, responsible for proposing EU legislation, is unelected. It has 28 members, one for each member state, who are nominated by the member states. You have no more power to get rid of this clique of commissioners than you have of walking on the Moon this evening. They are beyond your reach, yet they make laws that impact on your life. That is fundamentally contrary to democracy. It cuts against the basic democratic principle that we should consent to the institutions that rule us.

The EU doesn’t only trash democracy. It restricts liberty, too. This vast oligarchical entity is, unsurprisingly, hostile to the idea that people should be free to think and say what they please and to live their lives as they see fit so long as they don’t harm anyone else.

The EU does not trust you plebs. It continually passes rules or laws that seek to govern your minds and lives. It tells all national governments to restrict speech that incites hatred ‘based on race, sex, religion or nationality’, an explicit attack on freedom of speech. It has seriously discussed outlawing the denial not only of the Holocaust — which would be illiberal enough — but also of various other crimes against humanity. This would massively dent academic freedom and historical debate.

Its illiberalism is often mad and petty. It has banned chocolate candy cigarettes on the basis that they ‘appeal to minors’ and could be a gateway to real smoking. It has passed regulations designed to protect ‘vulnerable consumers’ — that is, stupid ordinary people — including by restricting the advertising of formula milk to new mums, who, in the EU’s eyes, should be breastfeeding and not arrogantly making their own parenting choices. It wants to ban diabetics from driving. It enforces controls on products that use a certain amount of wattage, in an attempt to make us uncaring idiots more eco-friendly, whether we want to be or not.

The EU thinks our nationally expressed political will is dangerous, and it thinks it is dangerous to leave us to our own devices, to let us say what we want, buy what we want, behave as we want. This is an institution designed to circumscribe your democratic rights and your everyday ability to run your life.

It goes against what it means to be European. For hundreds of years, through democratic upheavals, revolutions, struggles against arbitrary power and struggles for enlightenment, the peoples of Europe have sought to gain greater control over both their nations’ political affairs and their own lives. The EU undermines both of these things, both democracy and individual liberty. It is against the gains of history. It is against Europe. It is against us.

As someone who considers himself left-wing, I’m horrified that lefties are often at the forefront of defending this elitist institution. It is an historic black mark against the reputation of the left that it has been the chief cheerleader of an institution that undoes so many of the great gains of past radicals and progressives.

We must leave the EU, in order to start the process of recovering our democratic clout. But we must do more than that: we must also encourage and offer solidarity to other European peoples who want to leave. Too much of the current debate is focused around, ‘What will happen to Britain if we leave?’ My concern is what will happen to the other European peoples who will remain stuck in this awful institution. We must fight with them, alongside them, and create a new and real unity across Europe: a union not of elites who distrust the people, but of peoples who have had more than they can take of the elites.

Brendan O’Neill is editor of spiked.




Wow, thats quite a good read, nice find!

I may actually bother voting on it now.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-px27tzAtVwZpZ4ljopV2w "ashtrays and teacups do not count as cover"
"jack of all trades, master of none; certainly better than a master of one"
The Ordo Reductor - the guy's who make wonderful things like the Landraider Achillies, but can't use them in battle..  
   
Made in us
Stubborn Hammerer





 Kilkrazy wrote:
Yeah and we've got an opt-out.

What EU navy, covered by what EU air force, is going to deliver what EU army on to British soil to impose non-democracy?

When the non-existent forces aren't kicked back into the Channel, will the EU nuclear force be unleashed as a terrible warning to any other would-be democratic nation?

When the above comes to pass, what will our NATO allies have to say about the matter?

Frankly the article is a load of toss-spank.



Another undecided joined the out vote based on the in crowd's dismissive nonsense. Pity I'm not British.
   
Made in gb
Courageous Grand Master




-

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Yeah and we've got an opt-out.

What EU navy, covered by what EU air force, is going to deliver what EU army on to British soil to impose non-democracy?

When the non-existent forces aren't kicked back into the Channel, will the EU nuclear force be unleashed as a terrible warning to any other would-be democratic nation?

When the above comes to pass, what will our NATO allies have to say about the matter?

Frankly the article is a load of toss-spank.


There was no mention of an EU military in that article, or did I miss something?


"Our crops will wither, our children will die piteous
deaths and the sun will be swept from the sky. But is it true?" - Tom Kirby, CEO, Games Workshop Ltd 
   
Made in gb
Rampaging Reaver Titan Princeps






 Kilkrazy wrote:
Yeah and we've got an opt-out.

What EU navy, covered by what EU air force, is going to deliver what EU army on to British soil to impose non-democracy?

When the non-existent forces aren't kicked back into the Channel, will the EU nuclear force be unleashed as a terrible warning to any other would-be democratic nation?

When the above comes to pass, what will our NATO allies have to say about the matter?

Frankly the article is a load of toss-spank.


Lovely hyperbole. Nowhere in the article did it mention anything about armed force or anything of the like. It did some very persuasive points on economic blackmail (Ireland) or diplomatic sanctions (Austria) that the EU has carried out as well as plenty of lovely quotes from EU apparatchiks on the outcomes of various referendums and votes over the years.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2016/03/03 15:25:18


 
   
Made in gb
Bryan Ansell





Birmingham, UK

I pretty much agree with the top half of the article in that I have found myself having disagreements where Europe is the catch all term for the continent we are part of and the entity that is the EU.
Dislike of the EU is seen as horrible jingoistic racism.




   
Made in jp
[MOD]
Anti-piracy Officer






Somewhere in south-central England.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
 Kilkrazy wrote:
Yeah and we've got an opt-out.

What EU navy, covered by what EU air force, is going to deliver what EU army on to British soil to impose non-democracy?

When the non-existent forces aren't kicked back into the Channel, will the EU nuclear force be unleashed as a terrible warning to any other would-be democratic nation?

When the above comes to pass, what will our NATO allies have to say about the matter?

Frankly the article is a load of toss-spank.


There was no mention of an EU military in that article, or did I miss something?



There was mention of the insidious Fu Manchu programme of de-democratisation. How does the writer think the EU is going to enforce this?

I'm writing a load of fiction. My latest story starts here... This is the index of all the stories...

We're not very big on official rules. Rules lead to people looking for loopholes. What's here is about it. 
   
Made in gb
Courageous Grand Master




-

 Mr. Burning wrote:
I pretty much agree with the top half of the article in that I have found myself having disagreements where Europe is the catch all term for the continent we are part of and the entity that is the EU.
Dislike of the EU is seen as horrible jingoistic racism.






Like most people, I've travelled all over Europe. Lovely nations, lovely people, great culture, history, and institutions.

The EU on the other hand sends a shiver down my spine. It is the exact opposite of every European value IMO.

Love Europe, hate the EU. Bit of a cliché, but that's how I feel.

"Our crops will wither, our children will die piteous
deaths and the sun will be swept from the sky. But is it true?" - Tom Kirby, CEO, Games Workshop Ltd 
   
Made in jp
[MOD]
Anti-piracy Officer






Somewhere in south-central England.

 Mr. Burning wrote:
I pretty much agree with the top half of the article in that I have found myself having disagreements where Europe is the catch all term for the continent we are part of and the entity that is the EU.
Dislike of the EU is seen as horrible jingoistic racism.






There is a problem there but it's ridiculous to blame the BBC. Firstly, there's no way to enforce its hundreds of reporters and presenters to stick to such a rule in live TV, etc. Secondly, it's largely people like the Daily Mail that have built up this image of everything bad and Europe being from the EU (ref. Human Rights Act, Straight Bananas Act, etc.)

I'm writing a load of fiction. My latest story starts here... This is the index of all the stories...

We're not very big on official rules. Rules lead to people looking for loopholes. What's here is about it. 
   
Made in gb
Courageous Grand Master




-

 Kilkrazy wrote:
 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
 Kilkrazy wrote:
Yeah and we've got an opt-out.

What EU navy, covered by what EU air force, is going to deliver what EU army on to British soil to impose non-democracy?

When the non-existent forces aren't kicked back into the Channel, will the EU nuclear force be unleashed as a terrible warning to any other would-be democratic nation?

When the above comes to pass, what will our NATO allies have to say about the matter?

Frankly the article is a load of toss-spank.


There was no mention of an EU military in that article, or did I miss something?



There was mention of the insidious Fu Manchu programme of de-democratisation. How does the writer think the EU is going to enforce this?


They don't have to enforce it - they just have to keep doing what they've been doing for years - the slow drip drip drip of eating away at the sovereignty of Europe's nation states.

Look at the UK. We joined the EEC in the 1970s, and now 40 years later, we have a behemoth of a European Union with thousands of workers, various departments, and its fingers on every aspect of democratic control.

It's a slippery slope, Kilkrazy.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 Kilkrazy wrote:
 Mr. Burning wrote:
I pretty much agree with the top half of the article in that I have found myself having disagreements where Europe is the catch all term for the continent we are part of and the entity that is the EU.
Dislike of the EU is seen as horrible jingoistic racism.






There is a problem there but it's ridiculous to blame the BBC. Firstly, there's no way to enforce its hundreds of reporters and presenters to stick to such a rule in live TV, etc. Secondly, it's largely people like the Daily Mail that have built up this image of everything bad and Europe being from the EU (ref. Human Rights Act, Straight Bananas Act, etc.)


I 100% agree with you that the Daily Mail has gone over the top over the years when it comes to Europe, but newspapers like the Guardian, who unashamedly bash the pro-EU drum, and dismiss anybody who doesn't like the EU as Little Englanders, has not helped either.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2016/03/03 15:37:58


"Our crops will wither, our children will die piteous
deaths and the sun will be swept from the sky. But is it true?" - Tom Kirby, CEO, Games Workshop Ltd 
   
Made in gb
Ultramarine Librarian with Freaky Familiar





 Kilkrazy wrote:
Yeah and we've got an opt-out.

What EU navy, covered by what EU air force, is going to deliver what EU army on to British soil to impose non-democracy?

When the non-existent forces aren't kicked back into the Channel, will the EU nuclear force be unleashed as a terrible warning to any other would-be democratic nation?

When the above comes to pass, what will our NATO allies have to say about the matter?

Frankly the article is a load of toss-spank.


You're being deliberately disingenuous if you think there won't ever be a combined EU military force in future. It may not exist right now, but it most certainly IS on the political agenda.

Besides, as other posters have said, the article made no mention of a military. Your comment is a straw man.

This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2016/03/03 15:54:35


 
   
Made in jp
[MOD]
Anti-piracy Officer






Somewhere in south-central England.

So what if there's an EU armed forces?

Is the EU going to invade the UK because we stayed in the EU and refused to bow down to anti-democracy, or because we refused to bow down to anti-democracy and got out?

In either case, most of the EU are our NATO allies, so how does that fit in with their cunning plans?

The UK would be a major component of any combined EU armed forces anyway. Are we going to invade ourselves?

I'm writing a load of fiction. My latest story starts here... This is the index of all the stories...

We're not very big on official rules. Rules lead to people looking for loopholes. What's here is about it. 
   
Made in gb
Ultramarine Librarian with Freaky Familiar





As other posters have said, the article does not mention an EU military, so you're making a straw man argument.
   
Made in jp
[MOD]
Anti-piracy Officer






Somewhere in south-central England.

The need for an EU military can be inferred from the fact that the EU wants to enforce an anti-democratic agenda. Ultimately this depends on the use of force.

I'm writing a load of fiction. My latest story starts here... This is the index of all the stories...

We're not very big on official rules. Rules lead to people looking for loopholes. What's here is about it. 
   
Made in gb
Ultramarine Librarian with Freaky Familiar





 Kilkrazy wrote:
The need for an EU military can be inferred from the fact that the EU wants to enforce an anti-democratic agenda. Ultimately this depends on the use of force.


No it does not. The EU has the full cooperation of national governments. When it does not, it resorts to blackmail, with threats of economic consequences and diplomatic sanctions. It does not need the hard power of a military, when its soft power is more than adequate. And nobody here is saying that the EU will declare war and invade if Britain does leave, thats ridiculous hyperbole.

You're going off on a tangent and mocking us all based on something you incorrectly inferred.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2016/03/03 16:03:17


 
   
Made in jp
[MOD]
Anti-piracy Officer






Somewhere in south-central England.

Why do think the EU's soft power won't work on the UK if we leave?

I'm writing a load of fiction. My latest story starts here... This is the index of all the stories...

We're not very big on official rules. Rules lead to people looking for loopholes. What's here is about it. 
   
Made in fi
Courageous Space Marine Captain






That article was ridiculous. Boo-hoo, evil EU won't let Poland to oppress gays or bring back the death penalty! Quelle horreur!

   
Made in gb
Ultramarine Librarian with Freaky Familiar





 Kilkrazy wrote:
Why do think the EU's soft power won't work on the UK if we leave?


Why are you presuming my opinion and asking me a leading question?


It probably will work. I have no doubt that the EU will try to blackmail Britain, and I have no faith in the ability of British leaders to stand up to it. I'm voting No regardless.
   
Made in gb
Courageous Grand Master




-

 Crimson wrote:
That article was ridiculous. Boo-hoo, evil EU won't let Poland to oppress gays or bring back the death penalty! Quelle horreur!


But the EU is more than happy to turn a blind eye to wide-spread human rights abuses in Belarus.

By an amazing coincidence, the main oil pipeline from Russia flows through Belarus before it hits Europe...

"Our crops will wither, our children will die piteous
deaths and the sun will be swept from the sky. But is it true?" - Tom Kirby, CEO, Games Workshop Ltd 
   
Made in gb
Ultramarine Librarian with Freaky Familiar





 Crimson wrote:
That article was ridiculous. Boo-hoo, evil EU won't let Poland to oppress gays or bring back the death penalty! Quelle horreur!


If you can't refute an argument, pick out one single line in a long article and mock it.
   
Made in de
Joined the Military for Authentic Experience






Nuremberg

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
 Crimson wrote:
That article was ridiculous. Boo-hoo, evil EU won't let Poland to oppress gays or bring back the death penalty! Quelle horreur!


But the EU is more than happy to turn a blind eye to wide-spread human rights abuses in Belarus.

By an amazing coincidence, the main oil pipeline from Russia flows through Belarus before it hits Europe...


To be fair, Poland is in the EU and has agreed to abide by EU standards. Belarus is not a member. It's not exactly a fair comparison.

   
Made in gb
Ultramarine Librarian with Freaky Familiar





 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
 Crimson wrote:
That article was ridiculous. Boo-hoo, evil EU won't let Poland to oppress gays or bring back the death penalty! Quelle horreur!


But the EU is more than happy to turn a blind eye to wide-spread human rights abuses in Belarus.

By an amazing coincidence, the main oil pipeline from Russia flows through Belarus before it hits Europe...


Human Rights is highly selective and always subject to the whims of governments who ignore it when convenient.
   
Made in de
Joined the Military for Authentic Experience






Nuremberg

The EU had sanctions on Belarus til October 2015. I don't call that "turning a blind eye". That pipeline has been there the entire time.

   
Made in fi
Courageous Space Marine Captain






 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

But the EU is more than happy to turn a blind eye to wide-spread human rights abuses in Belarus.

By an amazing coincidence, the main oil pipeline from Russia flows through Belarus before it hits Europe...

Belarus is not an EU member.

Yes, I'd like EU to take a tougher stance on Belarus, but this is not a comparable situation.

   
Made in gb
Courageous Grand Master




-

 Crimson wrote:
 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

But the EU is more than happy to turn a blind eye to wide-spread human rights abuses in Belarus.

By an amazing coincidence, the main oil pipeline from Russia flows through Belarus before it hits Europe...

Belarus is not an EU member.

Yes, I'd like EU to take a tougher stance on Belarus, but this is not a comparable situation.


Ukraine is not a member of the EU, but the EU was happy to get involved in Ukrainian politics.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 Da Boss wrote:
The EU had sanctions on Belarus til October 2015. I don't call that "turning a blind eye". That pipeline has been there the entire time.


You call them sanctions, I call it soft soap.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2016/03/03 16:41:49


"Our crops will wither, our children will die piteous
deaths and the sun will be swept from the sky. But is it true?" - Tom Kirby, CEO, Games Workshop Ltd 
   
Made in gb
Ultramarine Librarian with Freaky Familiar





 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
 Crimson wrote:
 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

But the EU is more than happy to turn a blind eye to wide-spread human rights abuses in Belarus.

By an amazing coincidence, the main oil pipeline from Russia flows through Belarus before it hits Europe...

Belarus is not an EU member.

Yes, I'd like EU to take a tougher stance on Belarus, but this is not a comparable situation.


Ukraine is not a member of the EU, but the EU was happy to get involved in Ukrainian politics.


Even going so far as to send senior EU bureaucrats to Kiev at the height of the Maiden protests to express official approval and support for the revolution. That was a gross violation of national sovereignty and diplomacy.
   
Made in gb
Lord Commander in a Plush Chair





Beijing

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-35712463

France now threatening that border controls in Calais will go if we leave, despite them not being reliant on EU membership. The situation in Calais has no business coming to british shores, if the French don't like it they should not be allowing illegal immigrants to enter their country and instead deport them. Somehow they get all the way across France and pile up in Calais and start trying to force their way through.
   
Made in gb
Ultramarine Librarian with Freaky Familiar





 Howard A Treesong wrote:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-35712463

France now threatening that border controls in Calais will go if we leave, despite them not being reliant on EU membership. The situation in Calais has no business coming to british shores, if the French don't like it they should not be allowing illegal immigrants to enter their country and instead deport them. Somehow they get all the way across France and pile up in Calais and start trying to force their way through.


Like I said, blackmail. Our government will cave in g cause they're spineless cowards.

I'm still voting No.
   
Made in gb
Courageous Grand Master




-

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:
 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
 Crimson wrote:
 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

But the EU is more than happy to turn a blind eye to wide-spread human rights abuses in Belarus.

By an amazing coincidence, the main oil pipeline from Russia flows through Belarus before it hits Europe...

Belarus is not an EU member.

Yes, I'd like EU to take a tougher stance on Belarus, but this is not a comparable situation.


Ukraine is not a member of the EU, but the EU was happy to get involved in Ukrainian politics.


Even going so far as to send senior EU bureaucrats to Kiev at the height of the Maiden protests to express official approval and support for the revolution. That was a gross violation of national sovereignty and diplomacy.


I remember when this happened, lots of people pointed that out, but were shouted down as being Putin puppets.

"Our crops will wither, our children will die piteous
deaths and the sun will be swept from the sky. But is it true?" - Tom Kirby, CEO, Games Workshop Ltd 
   
Made in gb
Bryan Ansell





Birmingham, UK

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:
 Howard A Treesong wrote:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-35712463

France now threatening that border controls in Calais will go if we leave, despite them not being reliant on EU membership. The situation in Calais has no business coming to british shores, if the French don't like it they should not be allowing illegal immigrants to enter their country and instead deport them. Somehow they get all the way across France and pile up in Calais and start trying to force their way through.


Like I said, blackmail. Our government will cave in g cause they're spineless cowards.

I'm still voting No.


My vote is steadily heading towards no. And propaganda and crass blackmail from nation states nudges me further into that camp.

I notice Junkers has said migrants shouldn't come to Europe. That'll stop em.
   
 
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