Let's Get Political!

[BambooToTheFuture]

Already being a geographical European (and not much is going to change that), I'd happily have a European Passport. Seeing as I am European.

[BambooToTheFuture]

I'd happily have a European passport, live in Britain as a state in a United States of Europe, and have absolutely no problem with an EU army, but terms like "empire" aren't great.

It is no different to the Britain of old claiming a "British Empire" except at least a "European Empire" does seem to be a little more democratic and inclusive. Ours was full of land-grabbing, raping and pillaging. More like the "Brutish Empire".

[Sir red ken]

It is no different to the Britain of old claiming a "British Empire" except at least a "European Empire" does seem to be a little more democratic and inclusive. Ours was full of land-grabbing, raping and pillaging. More like the "Brutish Empire".

Right I see it now British empire which stopped Germany and France rulling was bad, even though millions laid down their lives to stopp them. But an eu Empire run by the German's and French is much desired by those who see themselves as neither British or English.
I thank you for you honesty but why not go and live in your beloved eu and let the UK be a free sovereign nation which our forefathers laid down their lives.I don't want to be an eu citizen and that was never offered to the people of the UK at any time by any government.

[Reg Smeeton]

Right I see it now British empire which stopped Germany and France rulling was bad, even though millions laid down their lives to stopp them. But an eu Empire run by the German's and French is much desired by those who see themselves as neither British or English.
I thank you for you honesty but why not go and live in your beloved eu and let the UK be a free sovereign nation which our forefathers laid down their lives.I don't want to be an eu citizen and that was never offered to the people of the UK at any time by any government.

I know several others have tried to explain to you, but let's give it another go.  We're leaving the EU in March. 

One of the consequences is that we no longer have a say in what they choose to do, so if they want a US style confederacy of states, none of our business. 

[RedRag]

Think it would make sense for the grown ups to sort out the Brexit mess and for Empire 2.0 type Brexitists to step aside.

The French Finance Minister's "Empire of Peace" musings are received with a Gallic shrug on the other side of the Channel.

Likewise, when our former Home Secretary warns that the draft Withdrawal Agreement will render the UK a COLONY, normal Brits give a wry smile, raise their eyebrows and wait for Boris' next quip when he returns from playing with his toy soldiers.

[RobertT]

Right I see it now British empire which stopped Germany and France rulling was bad, even though millions laid down their lives to stopp them. But an eu Empire run by the German's and French is much desired by those who see themselves as neither British or English.
I thank you for you honesty but why not go and live in your beloved eu and let the UK be a free sovereign nation which our forefathers laid down their lives.I don't want to be an eu citizen and that was never offered to the people of the UK at any time by any government.

F, must do better!

The UK offered membership to the populace.  It didn't do a very good job of describing the long term objectives, but nobody bothered to do much research either, voting instead for the belief of economic growth, which they got.  The reality is the Treaty of Rome, the origins of what is now the EU, had a clear end game in mind - a unification of Political, Social and Economic policy across member states.  Just because people don't read the small print, doesn't mean they have a right to moan - we had our choice and we took it.  Just as we have now voted to leave and everyone who did so has to accept a Hard Brexit is a possibility, maybe probability.  No backing out.

Next, The British Empire did not resist Germany, an alliance of forces from around the Globe did that, including those aligned to Britain, and our countries themselves.  It did not require them to be part of our Empire, it was the resisting of forced expansion, without democratic involvement of a murderous regime.  As it happens, many of the British Empire then quickly left that Empire - it was somewhat hypocritical to stand against that, given that our Empire was forged in bloodshed.  Not many countries asked to be a part of the Empire, they were held under the force of sword of guns, just like every other Empire in history.  It is very likely they saw us in much the same was as we saw Nazi's.

History moves on, we can;t live in it.  We just voted to leave the EU - you can't get much more to the opposite of the German intent of WW2.  Nobody held us at gun point, we were free to leave whenever we felt like it.  Greece could do so also, they won't though, because for all the bickering about the impacts financial austerity has had on them, they still understand they are better off in than out in the  long term.  Easier to moan about the bad from within than live the with the bad from without.

As Reg says, what the EU do is now down to them, not us.  The concept of Nations is still quite young in the history of mankind, who is to say which way is right.

[Batch]

I used to love the Brittas Empire.

HTH

[BambooToTheFuture]

Right I see it now British empire which stopped Germany and France rulling was bad, even though millions laid down their lives to stopp them. But an eu Empire run by the German's and French is much desired by those who see themselves as neither British or English.
I thank you for you honesty but why not go and live in your beloved eu and let the UK be a free sovereign nation which our forefathers laid down their lives.I don't want to be an eu citizen and that was never offered to the people of the UK at any time by any government.

Maybe not SRK but it doesn't matter how you dress it up - you will always be a European Citizen. Because you (I assume) were born in Europe. There is nothing geographically you can do about it. It must make you sick to the back teeth that as long as you remain a citizen of the United Kingdom/England/Blighty/The British Isles/Great Britain & N.I - you will still always be a European.

I'm English, I'm British, I'm European and I'm fucking proud!

[Reg Smeeton]

Maybe not SRK but it doesn't matter how you dress it up - you will always be a European Citizen. Because you (I assume) were born in Europe. There is nothing geographically you can do about it. It must make you sick to the back teeth that as long as you remain a citizen of the United Kingdom/England/Blighty/The British Isles/Great Britain & N.I - you will still always be a European.

I'm English, I'm British, I'm European and I'm fucking proud!

I'm not sure SRK is of this planet.....

[BambooToTheFuture]

I used to love the Brittas Empire.

HTH

Same, wasn't bad at all. You can't beat Red Dwarf and Arnold Rimmer from that era though.

[pauld]

Maybe not SRK but it doesn't matter how you dress it up - you will always be a European Citizen. Because you (I assume) were born in Europe. There is nothing geographically you can do about it. It must make you sick to the back teeth that as long as you remain a citizen of the United Kingdom/England/Blighty/The British Isles/Great Britain & N.I - you will still always be a European.

I'm English, I'm British, I'm European and I'm fucking proud!

Not sure  SRK is though - reading his posts, I don't think English is his first language

[pauld]

I used to love the Brittas Empire.

HTH

Yes everyone is entitled to their opinion and all that but this is a step too far. The Brittas Empire, like everything else that whossisface was in, was fucking terrible

[RobertT]

I'm a Swindonian.  I have affiliations to sporting teams at varying levels - England for Rugby, and Football, England and Wales (and probably Ireland and Scotland) for Cricket, the area known as Great Britain for Olympic sports, The British Isles for Rugby again, Europe for Golf.  These are more because I like sport and tend to support teams with the closest affiliation to me.  They are more fun than any great sense of "patriotism".  That is until the 4th of July, where I now boast my undying love of the Nation and Royal Family when asked what I am doing to celebrate :-)

[horlock07]

Not sure  SRK is though - reading his posts, I don't think English is his first language

It always tickles me that so many who are the first to argue that immigrants don't integrate and thus should not stay seem barely able to communicate in English and would probably fail any language qualification were it imposed on those immigrating to our country.

[horlock07]

Right I see it now British empire which stopped Germany and France rulling was bad, even though millions laid down their lives to stopp them. But an eu Empire run by the German's and French is much desired by those who see themselves as neither British or English.

Jesus read a bloody history book rather than the Daily Express and you never know you might learn something.....

even though millions laid down their lives to stopp them. But an eu Empire run by the German's and French is much desired by those who see themselves as neither British or English.
I thank you for you honesty but why not go and live in your beloved eu and let the UK be a free sovereign nation which our forefathers laid down their lives.I don't want to be an eu citizen and that was never offered to the people of the UK at any time by any government.

What is this bloody obsession that right wingers have with the war, trying to conceal nationalism (which our forefathers fought to prevent) with a skewed bastardisation of patriotism.

I suspect you have no experience of the war, my old man lived through the war in Swindon, cowering under the table in a shelter during raids, making friends with German PoW's (I suspect that in your mind that probably makes 7 year old Horlock07 senior a traitor), mixing with all the Polish incomers and RAF members and not seeing his dad (that he can remember) until he was about 9.

Everyone who fought during these conflicts vowed to never forget and never again at the end, yet there are those who seek to galmorise the conflict and still use it to justify their world view suggesting that its some manner of high point in history (and blithely forgetting that in each case we didn't win on our own, in both cases France and Russia took an absolute shoeing!

Subsequently my old man moved to France and used to attend remembrance Sunday every year in the small town in southern France they moved to (I imagine that makes his a traitor as well), the first year they just turned up with a wreath to lay, after that it got to the stage that he and his wife were approached each year by the Mayor to ask if they still wanted to lay a wreath to remember the British dead and they were invited to the event after the formal ceremony with the veterans of the town (despite my old man only being a kid during the war) so that all nationalities could remember together - go and visit a French War memorial, they make ours look sparsely populated!

Whether you like it or not, you are European (assuming you are British, its not clear) and that isn't going to change, we are stronger together and I remain a proud European, British and English (although probably less proud to be English in recent years for reasons that you so beautifully articulate!)