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7 hours ago, DieselDaisy said:

And then you'll probably be more inclined to the EU as you'd be making use of one of the ''four freedoms'' but if you are on the dole in Greece, and the EU hammered your country with austerity budgets, then there is no conceivable reason why you would support the EU. 

The fact that something isn't conceivable to you doesn't mean it isn't conceivable to others or even hard to understand. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/feb/26/greece-austerity-eu-european-union-uk

As for the EU and Greece. People against the EU often describe what happened as if Greece got in trouble because of EU. That is twisting facts to discredit the EU. Greece got in trouble because they had an unsound economy with weak financial structures, so when recession hit the world some years ago, they couldn't cope with it and were on the brink of state bankruptcy. This was largely their own fault and had been building up for decades. Then the EU offered them loans as a bailout with very harsh austerity measures. Too harsh, apparently. But still. It is not like Greece were doing fine and then the EU came and fucked them up.

And as for the argument that since there are unemployed people in the EU, the EU isn't working. The EU doesn't guarantee low unemployment everywhere. Individual states are still able to have their own unemployment rate depending upon how they handle politics internally. The EU doesn't harmonize everything, as the anti-EU guys like to think, which is why you have social democratic states within the EU, and why Greece could have an economy totally unprepared for a huge recession. So the existence of countries with low unemployment rates isn't necessarily the fault of the EU, but could very well be the fault of those countries. If one wants to argue that the EU causes unemployment then one have to show that the average unemployment rates in the EU is lower than in comparable countries outside of the EU. 

 

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2 hours ago, SoulMonster said:

The fact that something isn't conceivable to you doesn't mean it isn't conceivable to others or even hard to understand. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/feb/26/greece-austerity-eu-european-union-uk

As for the EU and Greece. People against the EU often describe what happened as if Greece got in trouble because of EU. That is twisting facts to discredit the EU. Greece got in trouble because they had an unsound economy with weak financial structures, so when recession hit the world some years ago, they couldn't cope with it and were on the brink of state bankruptcy. This was largely their own fault and had been building up for decades. Then the EU offered them loans as a bailout with very harsh austerity measures. Too harsh, apparently. But still. It is not like Greece were doing fine and then the EU came and fucked them up.

And as for the argument that since there are unemployed people in the EU, the EU isn't working. The EU doesn't guarantee low unemployment everywhere. Individual states are still able to have their own unemployment rate depending upon how they handle politics internally. The EU doesn't harmonize everything, as the anti-EU guys like to think, which is why you have social democratic states within the EU, and why Greece could have an economy totally unprepared for a huge recession. So the existence of countries with low unemployment rates isn't necessarily the fault of the EU, but could very well be the fault of those countries. If one wants to argue that the EU causes unemployment then one have to show that the average unemployment rates in the EU is lower than in comparable countries outside of the EU. 

 

Nope. ''Togetherness, solidarity, cooperation (and all of that abstract waffle)''. There is no ''they'' other than a federalising European Union - NB., that western Germany subsidises economically deprived eastern (Ost-Elbian) Germany.

 

Edited by DieselDaisy
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Pertaining to the media, if overly Eurosceptic countries such as England, Greece and Italy are blaming the EU for this and that - fairly or unfairly - that also raises another point that the EU has an image problem in that it does not engender any degree of loyalty or recognition of sovereign authority in member states. Opinion polls - official ''Eurobarometers'' - rarely produce results demonstrating overwhelming faith/confidence/praise in the European Union, even among seemingly EUphile areas such as Germany, Benelux and France. Generally, percentages in favour of the EU do not greatly exceed 60% which is not exactly a ringing endorsement. This is one of their better showings producing 62% and 66% in favour,

https://www.eud.eu/european-elections-2019/languages/gaeilge/opinion-polls-and-surveys-all-member-states/

That is aggregate. But then when we produce a map of Euroscepticism for individual member states,

Quote

"If a referendum was held tomorrow regarding [our country]'s membership of the EU, how would you vote?"

220px-Poll_about_remaining_or_leaving_EU_%282018%29.svg.png]

  81-90%
  71-80%
  61-70%
  51-60%
  41-50%

"Taking everything into account, would you say that [our country] has on balance benefited or not from being a member of EU?",

220px-Poll_about_perceived_EU_balance_be

  91-100%
  81-90%
  71-80%
  61-70%
  51-60%
  41-50%

Even France isn't that arsed haha. And only the Irish seem to have excessive adoration for the project.

Quote

 

Edited by DieselDaisy
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All those graphics don't mean much to me. That the EU has an image problem is obvious. Most people in my country don't even care about national politics, let alone European politics, which doesn't even get a lot of attention in the media. People simply don't know a lot about it. There are two big anti-EU parties in parliament over here that spill a bunch of nonsense about the EU every chance they get and a lot of people aren't smart enough or motivated enough to actually check it, and I can imagine it's like that elsewhere too. The EU isn't to blame for everything that goes wrong with an EU country, but it's easy for Eurosceptics to make it look that way.

Edited by EvanG
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But why would then, assuming you're correct, so much media time be devoted to Eurosceptic falsehoods? There is no smoke without fire. My own belief is that the EU is awful enough that you don't need to conjure up falsehoods. I base my criticism on the EU around an analyse of its institutions, methodologies and personnel (not, immigration, ''£350 extra for the NHS'' or ''the bendy banana'' regulation). 

PS

We have about twelve national newspapers here and only one of them (Guardian) is pro-EU, and about two of them are somewhere in the soft-Eurosceptic/middle position (Times/Independent). One of them loathes the EU with all the passion it can muster (Express); two more are also hard-Eurosceptic (Mail/Telegraph). I cannot speak for the tabloids (Sun/Sport/Mirror) because they are really all about tits and arse. 

Edited by DieselDaisy
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A lot of people don't, they don't know anything about it, then when a populist comes along and uses rhetoric like "'Brussels shouldn't decide for us and we have to take control again'', that sentiment works for a lot of people, especially in the UK which has always been an odd duck in that regard. We had elections last month, when the discussion was about the EU all the parties got the same attention in the media I think, but for a lot of people sentiments on ''we have to stop immigration'' and ''let's get rid of Brussels'' is more appealing than ''we have to work together'' and ''we are stronger with our allies''. Although, most people here would probably vote to remain in the EU, so perhaps I should give people here some more credit.

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The fact that ''people...don't know anything about it'' is a problem with the EU itself. Voter turnout for the EU Parliament is shockingly low, even when compared to national elections: in 2009 voter turnout was 43%. Some countries produce turnouts that are low into the 30s! The fact of the matter is that the EU Parliament have no legislative initiative and the constitution in toto is an utter mess (7 presidents!!) and difficult to comprehend.

PS

42.54% 2014

https://www.politico.eu/article/european-parliament-elections-2014-reveal-lowest-voter-turnout-ever/

Edited by DieselDaisy
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Many Greek people don't share the opinion of the Mayor quoted in the Guardian article.

The Greek crisis has to do with the structure of the Greek capitalism, but also a lot to do with the structure of the EU and the way it operates, and even more so with the Euro zone.  And Greece, although the worst case, hasn't been the only country affected; there's Portugal, Spain...

Greece has been an economy based mostly on services (mainly tourism) and agriculture. It has also, as a small economy, always imported more goods than exported. This passive trade balance worsened since the country entered the EU. Part of it is because its -mostly light- industry, like textile industry, declined in an increasingly globalised economy and many factories were closed. But it's mostly because of the Common Agriculture Policy of the EU, as the biggest percentage of Greek exports consisted of agricultural products. CAP imposed the destruction of the surplus of certain products, which resulted into Greece importing goods that it previously had full supply of and also had surplus to export. A portion of the farmers have benefited individually from the policy - a few of them became even rich - as they have been subsidised according to the quantity of crop they destroyed. Consumers haven't been affected directly either, as a lemon from, say, South America is as much of a lemon as a Greek one. The long-term effect in the economy of the country has been destructive though. The farmers are responsible too, since they could invest the subsidy to cultivate something else that was allowed, but, really, why not take the easy way by continuing to cultivate the same product and then bury it, since they were encouraged to do so?

As for the Euro zone, the common currency, built upon the strongest national currencies, namely the German mark, can't work in different and unequal economies and it benefits the strongest ones. Moreover, the weaker countries are deprived of options to handle the crisis on a local level, e.g. by devaluating the currency.   Of course Greece entered the Euro zone willingly through its then "socialist" government which inflicted austerity measures to make the economy supposedly qualified. Now most people realise that the benefits have been much less than the disadvantages. But the Euro zone is something like Hotel California for countries like Greece: you can enter (although not any time you like) but you can't leave without severe consequences. 

In my opinion, the EU (and the Euro zone), as is, can't be reformed or improved. The "solidarity" and all that is just a nice facade. The EU has been built as a hyper-capitalist entity led by a bureaucracy, through which countries protect and expand their own national interests (the refugee crisis is another example of that) and those of their corporations and banks; and, given the inequality of economical and political power, this can't result into a balance of interests of some sort.

Having said all that, the problem I and other people have is that at this moment the most vocal opposition to the EU comes from a far right and nationalist perspective with a lot of xenophobic rhetoric. The anti-EU voices from a left point of view are marginal. A big portion of the genuine (not the faux socialist) left that has remained is trapped between two evils and chooses the EU as the lesser one (taking into account the past traumas of a divided Europe that led into wars - even though the EU doesn't coincide with Europe which is still divided, as Russia is Europe too) and limits itself into a wishful thinking rhetoric about "reformation." The people who don't like either the EU or nationalism feel that, realistically speaking and apart from a utopia where there will be some sort of revolution and the people of Europe will built a new union from the start based on real solidarity etc., it's a dead end right now.

 

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12 minutes ago, Blackstar said:

Many Greek people don't share the opinion of the Mayor quoted in the Guardian article.

The Greek crisis has to do with the structure of the Greek capitalism, but also a lot to do with the structure of the EU and the way it operates, and even more so with the Euro zone.  And Greece, although the worst case, hasn't been the only country affected; there's Portugal, Spain...

Greece has been an economy based mostly on services (mainly tourism) and agriculture. It has also, as a small economy, always imported more goods than exported. This passive trade balance worsened since the country entered the EU. Part of it is because its -mostly light- industry, like textile industry, declined in an increasingly globalised economy and many factories were closed. But it's mostly because of the Common Agriculture Policy of the EU, as the biggest percentage of Greek exports consisted of agricultural products. CAP imposed the destruction of the surplus of certain products, which resulted into Greece importing goods that it previously had full supply of and also had surplus to export. A portion of the farmers have benefited individually from the policy - a few of them became even rich - as they have been subsidised according to the quantity of crop they destroyed. Consumers haven't been affected directly either, as a lemon from, say, South America is as much of a lemon as a Greek one. The long-term effect in the economy of the country has been destructive though. The farmers are responsible too, since they could invest the subsidy to cultivate something else that was allowed, but, really, why not take the easy way by continuing to cultivate the same product and then bury it, since they were encouraged to do so?

As for the Euro zone, the common currency, built upon the strongest national currencies, namely the German mark, can't work in different and unequal economies and it benefits the strongest ones. Moreover, the weaker countries are deprived of options to handle the crisis on a local level, e.g. by devaluating the currency.   Of course Greece entered the Euro zone willingly through its then "socialist" government which inflicted austerity measures to make the economy supposedly qualified. Now most people realise that the benefits have been much less than the disadvantages. But the Euro zone is something like Hotel California for countries like Greece: you can enter (although not any time you like) but you can't leave without severe consequences. 

In my opinion, the EU (and the Euro zone), as is, can't be reformed or improved. The "solidarity" and all that is just a nice facade. The EU has been built as a hyper-capitalist entity led by a bureaucracy, through which countries protect and expand their own national interests (the refugee crisis is another example of that) and those of their corporations and banks; and, given the inequality of economical and political power, this can't result into a balance of interests of some sort.

Having said all that, the problem I and other people have is that at this moment the most vocal opposition to the EU comes from a far right and nationalist perspective with a lot of xenophobic rhetoric. The anti-EU voices from a left point of view are marginal. A big portion of the genuine (not the faux socialist) left that has remained is trapped between two evils and chooses the EU as the lesser one (taking into account the past traumas of a divided Europe that led into wars - even though the EU doesn't coincide with Europe which is still divided, as Russia is Europe too) and limits itself into a wishful thinking rhetoric about "reformation." The people who don't like either the EU or nationalism feel that, realistically speaking and apart from a utopia where there will be some sort of revolution and the people of Europe will built a new union from the start based on real solidarity etc., it's a dead end right now.

 

One of the best posts I have ever read. The United Kingdom was hammered by the CFP destroying our fishing industries and had to negotiate a rebate in 1985 to counter the CAP (which the French would love to overturn incidentally). This is why the EU and moreover the Eurozone cannot work. It does not regard the eco-geographic and national peculiarities of nation-states. This is why cleverer nations such as Iceland and Norway are wedded to the EFTA which gives them freedom to fish and bilaterally trade, and the Swiss have negotiated (with the EU) bilaterally thus preserving their tradition of neutrality.

PS

The tradition of supranationalism has more longevity in France, Germany and Benelux who all share borders. The antecedents of the EU involving those countries can be traced back to 1951-2. 

Edited by DieselDaisy
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As I have already said in this thread, for me there have been a lot more advantages than disadvantages, in fact I can't think of any disadvantages for me personally, but I realize that I live in a relatively rich country compared to other EU countries, that is why I have also said that when it is the other way around for someone, I understand that they are anti-EU and I can't argue that. Everyone who is pro-EU knows that it needs to be improved and reformed. Whether that is possible or not, to be honest, I can't even answer that because I don't think I know enough to make such a statement. I like to think it can, though.

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1 hour ago, DieselDaisy said:

I was going to post that for your perusal myself - more for Robinson's pugilism.

You can see the guy not really listening and summering up the courage to chuck his milkshake.

 

29 secs, cracking shot there by Tommy :lol:  Say what you will about him he’s got decent technique!

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1 hour ago, soon said:

 

Dang, racists really dont like having eggs or milkshakes splashed on them. Really showcases their feeble nature.

Time for a new slogan

tVCvRfbh.png

:lol:

Tommy is very pro Israel/Jews, identifies as a zionist (i'm not entirely sure what that means but as I say, I don't really keep up with politics/sociological wotsits etc.  I think it means something to do with Israel is the rightful land of Jewish people, am I right?)  Anyway,  a lot of Jewish organisations have basically come out and told him to fuck off, feeling that he is using them as some sort of pawn in his on-going battle against Islam. 

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1 hour ago, DieselDaisy said:

I was going to post that for your perusal myself - more for Robinson's pugilism.

You can see the guy not really listening and summering up the courage to chuck his milkshake.

59422809_465644437514361_650700268755117

:lol: 

Edited by Dazey
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17 minutes ago, Len Cnut said:

Tommy is very pro Israel/Jews, identifies as a zionist (i'm not entirely sure what that means but as I say, I don't really keep up with politics/sociological wotsits etc.  I think it means something to do with Israel is the rightful land of Jewish people, am I right?)  Anyway,  a lot of Jewish organisations have basically come out and told him to fuck off, feeling that he is using them as some sort of pawn in his on-going battle against Islam. 

I was just playing with the chant from Charlottesville "Jews will not replace us". Because the fash keep getting so upset about such a nebulous act like throwing a milkshake. See how I cleverly took that famous charlottelesvile pic that the racist has desperately tried to have removed from the internet and did some word play with their chant? Hehe. Maybe it has more context over here :) 

An Israeli cabinet minister, one of those folks running the apartheid state against arabs, has stated that Israel is a "white state." Its not at all uncommon for white nationalists to tap into that reality of Israel, but mostly its a way to get the so called christian right wingers on side. So I would say those orgs are spot on to reject him.

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Quote

1. What the fuck is he doing in my neck of the woods anyway?

Dunno, never much been up Manchester way, at least not in recent years, cept the Roses gig and I must admit I did get a bit of stick for being a paki there :lol:  Is it like a mostly white area or...?

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21 minutes ago, Len Cnut said:

Dunno, never much been up Manchester way, at least not in recent years, cept the Roses gig and I must admit I did get a bit of stick for being a paki there :lol:  Is it like a mostly white area or...?

To be honest I'd never given it much thought. I think that North Manchester is pretty multi-cultural but not so sure about the rest. Funnily enough Altrincham where I live is proper honky central but the apartment complex I live in is full of Indians. :lol: Like loads of the fuckers. Place proper fucking honks of curry! :lol: 

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23 minutes ago, Len Cnut said:

That was a chant?!  Fuck those guys...

Yep, but thankfully so far most fash seem more motivated to act when a milkshake or egg is thrown. Such a pathetic ideology as it is, the milkshake enrages them :lol:. Sadly, my reference was poorly chosen given Robinson's public position on Israel. Dang that transatlantic divide, always messing with the comedic flow :lol:

Yeah, they chanted this and the next day they murdered a women named Heather Heyer. And then Trump and a bunch of posters on here talked about "the good people on both sides" of the tragic events. 

PS: Tommy sucker punched that guy and then you can see his wrist buckle. Not enough force for any follow through either. Thought you were a boxing fan, this man gets no props for his bent wrist sucker punch!!! :lol:

 

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