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European Parliament Elections 2014 |OT| The Undemocratic EU is Actually Elected

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Arksy

Member
Pretty stoked at the result. Hopefully the tories will fucking finally wake and help get the UK out of the EU.
 
Well, I live in France and there are actually a lot of racists here.
They don't recognize it when talking to non-racists but they are really hateful.

The joke is that they don't really know why exactly.

They're like "strangers steal OUR jobs !" and the minute after they're like "strangers come in France and are payed doing nothing, with OUR money!".

So when the time to vote has come they're like "I say no to Europe!", but they don't even know what Europe is exactly, what it would mean to stop being part of it...
It's just an excuse to vote for a party they believe as racist as them.

There are obviously exceptions, but mentalities are that bad around me.
 
Parties that may get 0.0000000001% of the vote and are guaranteed not get a MEP? That would achieve nothing.

How much did the UKIP get last time? Fact is, people have a choice not to elect racist scumfucks. If they do vote for them, maybe they have other reasons as well.
 
Well, I live in France and there are actually a lot of racists here.
They don't recognize it when talking to non-racists but they are really hateful.

Kinda off topic but does Hollande have any hope anymore of actually turning the economy around? Or is he just holding on for dear life until the next election?
 
The EU needs a rethink. it appears.

It needs to stick to what it does best, stop making blanket laws for everyone and have an economically tiered immigration system so it looks like they are at least trying to enact some control.

I've been against the European Union for a long time because I've understood that it didn't support more openness - it wants to close itself to the rest of the world (so as to 'compete' with the US, Russia and China). The only reason why the borders are open within the EU is that they've erected a huge one around it.

Opening borders can be done with bilateral treaties or, even better, unilaterally. No need for the EU for that.
 

Bold One

Member
Well, I live in France and there are actually a lot of racists here.
They don't recognize it when talking to non-racists but they are really hateful.

The joke is that they don't really know why exactly.

They're like "strangers steal OUR jobs !" and the minute after they're like "strangers come in France and are payed doing nothing, with OUR money!".

So when the time to vote has come they're like "I say no to Europe!", but they don't even know what Europe is exactly, what it would mean to stop being part of it...
It's just an excuse to vote for a party they believe as racist as them.

There are obviously exceptions, but mentalities are that bad around me.

I think that is the core of the problem, A LOT of people don't really understand what Europe is. Ask the regular UKIP voting shcmo on the street how many years EU elections happen, they wouldn't know. Its 5 by the way
 

3Sixty

Member
3sixty, they also ate into SNP, Tories, Labour, and a huge amount of LibDems... so you are saying those parties had a racist element as well that were swayed? How are we consolidating those facts all together?

Could also be that turn out for those sections has decreased due to disillusionment, goes for BNP too. Or you would hope that maybe there are less racists now. :D

I dont think UKIP is a wholey racist party, of course not, but they do have a large Racist/xenophobic base, when you hear their party leader talk about how he doesn't want to live next to Romanians because they're all thieves and criminals. I can't understand how people can defend that.

The EU is far from perfect but UKIP completely ignores any actual solutions and instead pulls on peoples general insecurities about the economy and level of unemployment to push their questionable xenophobic agenda.
 

Spaghetti

Member
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KingSnake

The Birthday Skeleton
It's funny how people anti-EU vote in the European elections thus validating the institutions against they vote. Because there is no other outcome when you vote for a party like UKIP and FN for the European Parliament. You just provided some nice European salaries for some fuckers that won't do anything there, as they don't have any voting power. Because UKIP and FN (and any other right wing party in Europe) won't make anything ever together except for maybe dancing at the inauguration ball on Waterloo by ABBA.
 
Kinda off topic but does Hollande have any hope anymore of actually turning the economy around? Or is he just holding on for dear life until the next election?




Haha he acts like he can still make things better but I think he's just waiting for his life-salary.


After the last municipal elections he was like "Sooooooo you don't like the direction I'm taking ? I will reinforce it.".
 

StayDead

Member
Maybe I don't want the EU to work? Voting for pro-EU parties to make the EU work means more power to the EU. Which is the exact opposite of what I and a large part of the population want. So who should I have voted for?



You're not even making a point now, you're just repeating insults.

Why wouldn't you want the EU to work?

They fight for net neutrality, consumer rights and many other rights that help us, members of the general populace a hell of a lot moreso than our government has done over the past 20 years.

I mean if you want to be America 2.0 then fine, but I'd rather not.
 
Still more then the rest of the 'out' groups combined. As much as it might annoy the left UKIP are the only realistic choice if your primary concern is in/out the EU.

That's a nice little self fulfilling prophecy you've got there. Especially preposterous while commenting the rise of a party that was considered little more than the power fantasy of a loony a few years ago.
 

TCRS

Banned
It's funny how people anti-EU vote in the European elections thus validating the institutions against they vote. Because there is no other outcome when you vote for a party like UKIP and FN for the European Parliament. You just provided some nice European salaries for some fuckers that won't do anything there, as they don't have any voting power. Because UKIP and FN (and any other right wing party in Europe) won't make anything ever together except for maybe dancing at the inauguration ball on Waterloo by ABBA.

the alternative is giving those seats to pro-EU parties.
 

kharma45

Member
If you throw your lot in with racists, you're not better than actual racists.

Still doesn't make you a racist mind.

I've been thinking where to ask this but it might as well be here now we're on the topic of calling other posters racists without any firm grounding whatsoever.

UKIP are big against immigration, fair enough, but calling them racist isn't correct. Xenophobic no doubt about that, and there are a lot who are proper racists, however I can't help but feel the word racist has lost all meaning after being bandied about incorrectly by everyone who criticises them.
 

Arksy

Member
Why wouldn't you want the EU to work?

They fight for net neutrality, consumer rights and many other rights that help us, members of the general populace a hell of a lot moreso than our government has done over the past 20 years.

I mean if you want to be America 2.0 then fine, but I'd rather not.

To simplify a complicated issue: I'd rather live in a democracy than a benign dictatorship.
 

Tnetennba

Member
If you are making the accusation then quote the relevant parts as presentation, usually how debate works. Not going through a 20 minute video to pick out what you want. But basically you are taking the actions of a few to categorize and entire party and voter base. So all of Labour steal money through fraudulent claims in the expenses system, murder hundreds of thousands of people, warmongers, make secret deals with private companies in turn for jobs after... or can get into convicted criminal offences such as rapes, child sex offences and such. All more serious than talking shit. Do you think we could come up with a higher number of MP's for established parties doing things 'worse' (criminally recognised as) than racism? As for finding new members, seems like they have a whole lot of new voters to pick and choose from... including scots, those little englanders.

That is certainly the painting that has been put together by rival parties and established media, they certainly have those elements. Which they are trying to deal with so why ignore that but take on the negative only? Again, if you wanted to you can label some pretty horrific shit at the main parties. Torture, invasion of privacy on a massive scale, murder, warmongering, rapes, fraud, stealing etc. which are all very serious issues the same as racism. One party has the mud that is sticking, the others are much bigger so it is easier to shake off that mud to some extent.

Again, those trends exist in current MP's. Voting against what the people of their country wanted such as Iraq, Lisbon Treaty etc. so what is that exactly? Ed Miliband involved at the very heart of the country being crippled by debt and abused by banks. Peoples lives are destroyed by those actions. There is so much terrible shit the main parties have done, I find it incredible how you can purposefully blind yourself to it. From my point of view, there is no perfect party, there isn't even a good party available right now. They're all pretty shit to be frank, and a lot have blood on their hands amongst other things. To accuse one over the other is party politics at play and that disappoints me more than most things. You have an MP that steals money from the country, and they all get together to say "Oh, poor dear. Oh well, nevermind." and agreeing to play feck all of it back. They were all perfectly happy to let it go, because they're all at it.

I assumed you would have already seen it, given that it made the rounds a few days ago and you seem to be pretty in-touch with UKIP. If not then there's a part in the interview where he states that he would be concerned if a group of Romanians moved in next door. When pushed on this point, and the difference between them and for instance Germans, he stated something like "you know the difference". Though to be fair you could jump to almost any point in that interview to watch him squirm as an interviewer actually attempts to hold him to task for the actions of his party members, for a change.

You seem to be attempting to derail the argument and scrutiny of UKIP by trying to paint me as a supporter of the other big parties. I'm not. I'm not a big fan at all, but it so happens that my opposition to any sort of bigotry, xenophobia, racism, sexism or homophobia runs quite a bit deeper. I'd agree there's no perfect party, but there are parties which have significantly less of the aforementioned. If you want to act willfully ignorant of that and claim it's just growing pains then go ahead, though you'll have to accept the scrutiny of the rest of us without trying to divert our attention like you just did. That's usually how debate works, to quote yourself.

And you're seriously going to talk about MPs "stealing money" from the country when literally all UKIP do is claim expenses from the European Parliament and never show up?
 

KingSnake

The Birthday Skeleton
the alternative is giving those seats to pro-EU parties.

So to some people that actually work for the salary they get? The salary paid from European funds.

Edit: to clarify my point, you gave your vote for something that is not solved at the EP level.
 

TCRS

Banned
Why wouldn't you want the EU to work?

They fight for net neutrality, consumer rights and many other rights that help us, members of the general populace a hell of a lot moreso than our government has done over the past 20 years.

I mean if you want to be America 2.0 then fine, but I'd rather not.

Realistically I don't think we'll ever get rid of the EU. So the alternative is to shrink it. Maybe I shouldn't have said not to work but rather I don't want the EU to grow even further. By voting for one of the other three parties that's exactly what would happen. A smaller, more democratic EU whose primary function is to serve as a free-trade zone (that's what we originally voted for) rather than a quasi supra government and ever closer union is something I and most people can certainly live with. Right now it's an undemocratic mess with too much power. And a strong vote for UKIP is hopefully a wake up call.
 

dalin80

Banned
That's a nice little self fulfilling prophecy you've got there. Especially preposterous while commenting the rise of a party that was considered little more than the power fantasy of a loony a few years ago.

If ANY of the main parties had stood up before the elections and declared 'we realise this matter is important to you here is the black and white in/out referendum' Then UKIP would have lost all the wind from it's sails.

They knew that is what they had to do, but instead all they gave was dithering which EVERYONE knew wouldn't be enough. 'oh well, maybe in the future if maybe.. you know we might be able to argue some powers or maybe some details around then we will see. And if that doesn't happen we may consider a vote. Until then we should really give quiche a chance. If that doesn't work then maybe we will consider what the public we represent may actually want.'

There is only one reason for UKIP's rise: The other parties simply got complacent that they could force there will on an increasingly angry public and they have just got bit for it.
 

StayDead

Member
To simplify a complicated issue: I'd rather live in a democracy than a benign dictatorship.

I can't work out if you're pro EU or anti EU by your posts, but if you're anti EU then I think you're incredibly naive to believe we live in a democracy in the UK. Over half of our government are not even voted in.
 

StayDead

Member
Yay greens in the SE. My vote meant something!

I'd say I feel the same, but I can't work out from the BBC map whether where I live counts as South East or East of England which is silly. I've always thought that I live in the South East (I'm on the very southern point of Essex) but the map is weird.
 

cartesian

Member
WTH. Are you guys seriously arguing against democracy?
No, you are misinterpreting the point I'm trying to get at with regards to the democratic quality of complex-issue referenda held in a political culture of low turnout and political engagement, but I admit that I didn't make that point very clearly at all, so I'll clarify it in a second.

First, I'd like to respond to these remarks -
Like someone else said, do the fascists have to start winning elections before you guys start getting the message?

The very least, it's a worrying behavior. "I don't like what the majority thinks so don't let them vote" is a pretty good summary of the discussion of those two.
This is an insulting misinterpretation of my beliefs. You seem to think that I'm part of some smug anti-democratic pro-EU clique, but you've not read my previous posts. I'm strongly pro-democracy and totally neutral on the EU because I don't feel I understand quite enough about it decide whether it's working in our best interests. Re-read my previous posts:
I have this vague sense that the EU is a very expensive and not very effective bureaucracy. Many of its flagship projects - the CAP, the EAW, the Euro, EU expansion - appear to have been mismanaged or were simply ill-advised from the start. And although the Greek crisis is too complex for me to judge, it's difficult to be confident that the EU has handled it adequately.
If the Conservatives were to hold an in-or-out referendum tomorrow, for the first time in my life I would seriously consider not turning out to vote, purely because I don't feel qualified enough to make that decision. I do worry that the naysayers are right; that it's an expensive, bureaucratic, ineffective muddle of elite-led institutions promoting an agenda agreed behind-closed-doors. When I look at what is going on in southern and eastern Europe, I think, heck, nevermind our own national interest, is this mess even working in the interest of Europe?
And although I find UKIP's far-right politics very regrettable, I respect that they speak for a significant portion of the public and I would rather people turn out and vote for them than sit at home doing nothing. In fact, I actually encourage eurosceptics to vote for eurosceptic parties instead of merely abstaining, because these voters send a clear message to the current political establishment and in so doing they reinforce the representative quality of the democratic process.

But I'm very sceptical about referenda, because I feel they hand far too much influence to the media, to extremists, to fear and doubt, and so on. I honestly believe a referendum can compromise the quality of democratic outcomes, because the process is disproportionately skewed by extreme and external elements. This is precisely what I felt happened in the AV referendum. A single issue was turned into a media circus and informed debate was supplanted by fear, uncertainty, and doubt.

EU membership is an incredibly complex issue. The vast majority of the public, approximately two-thirds, aren't engaged enough to vote in the EU elections. Indeed, not far off half don't even feel engaged enough to turn up in general elections either. I think that's a staggering and alarming statistic. If so many people are that deeply switched off and no longer engage with an issue, it's troublesome to then give precisely these people the deciding say on it. If the people can't be bothered to vote in general elections, how is it democratic to hand the remaining minority the full reins over critical policies?

I'm pro-democracy. I'm pro-elections. I'm hugely pro-democratic reform, including the introduction of full proportional representation and indeed I want to see greater experimentation with e-democracy. I want turnout to rise. I want to see democracy thrive again. But I believe I'm not acting unreasonably to be sceptical about single-issue referenda.
 

Arksy

Member
I can't work out if you're pro EU or anti EU by your posts, but if you're anti EU then I think you're incredibly naive to believe we live in a democracy in the UK. Over half of our government are not even voted in.

There's a serious difference between having an unelected body with little power, and having a similar unelected body with all the power.

The house of lords has no right of initiative. The EU commission has the sole right of initiative.

That's right, the people in the EU parliament have no right to propose legislation. Only the EU commission can propose legislation. How broken is that?

ah, so your right-wing idiocy is not confined to australian politics - check.

lol.
 
I'd say I feel the same, but I can't work out from the BBC map whether where I live counts as South East or East of England which is silly. I've always thought that I live in the South East (I'm on the very southern point of Essex) but the map is weird.

East of England.
 

StayDead

Member
There's a serious difference between having an unelected body with little power, and having a similar unelected body with all the power.

The house of lords has no right of initiative. The EU commission has the sole right of initiative.

That's right, the people in the EU parliament have no right to propose legislation. Only the EU commission can propose legislation. How broken is that?



lol.

Atleast the EU commision seem to care about the general public. The amount of good things they've proposed recently is great.

We should be opening more borders, not closing them off. Humanity is completely doomed due to the hatred and idiocy of itself.
 

KingSnake

The Birthday Skeleton
Work towards the destruction of nation-state democracy? I'd rather they did nothing.

Look here and tell me how the destruction of nation-state democracy will be stopped?

Because you obviously think that this is the role of the EP.

Edit: Even if all the UK MEP would be from UKIP, it wouldn't make too much of a difference.
 

Arksy

Member
Atleast the EU commision seem to care about the general public. The amount of good things they've proposed recently is great.

We should be opening more borders, not closing them off. Humanity is completely doomed due to the hatred and idiocy of itself.

I hold democracy to be of paramount importance. So if we have a democracy of broken policies, I would prefer it to a non-democratic utopia. (Again in simple terms).

We have different priorities for governance, and that's why we disagree about the EU.
 

Marc

Member
I dont think UKIP is a wholey racist party, of course not, but they do have a large Racist/xenophobic base, when you hear their party leader talk about how he doesn't want to live next to Romanians because they're all thieves and criminals. I can't understand how people can defend that.

The EU is far from perfect but UKIP completely ignores any actual solutions and instead pulls on peoples general insecurities about the economy and level of unemployment to push their questionable xenophobic agenda.

Again I am curious about whether 'large' is an appropriate term, from my experience racists tend to be people who can't shut up about it. They tend not to be too quiet IMO. So people who aren't racist in that party wouldn't get pointed out obviously, which asks the question of what the basis is on that one. I honestly don't know, I can see that appearances wise that party can't survive if it tries to be racist. Most people don't want it, UKIP have addressed that concern as best they can and are progressing to be a more valid party. I hope they are improving themselves and throwing out that element and it is the minority but I don't know for sure, and I don't see people who claim the opposite as fact offering any proof. By that I mean to show a majority or large amount remain in the party thinking along those lines.

Personally I see an elitism and career politician snobbery from Call me Dave/Ed that can be worse in certain aspects. Its clear they both see immigrants as a cheap source of labour, that businesses want them off the books for below minimum wages doing crap jobs with terrible conditions. Creating something akin to a slave workforce. They have been pressed on this before and said hand waving comments on how its illegal and it should be stopped. As if it isn't their responsibility.

Here is a dossier that Labour came up with back when Tories were the challengers:

January 15, 2009: Chester Conservative councillor Richard Lowe apologies after going to a New Year fancy-dress party dressed as Madeleine McCann.

January 28: Nottinghamshire Tory councillor David Taylor is criticised for hanging a topless calendar in his office.

February 25: Cumbria county council leader Tim Stoddard says that helping poor families pay for school uniforms is a waste of money.

February 28: Bolton Conservative councillor Bob Allen apologises after being slammed for posting a picture of a gorilla alongside a comment about an Asian colleague on a blog.

March 9: Leicestershire Tory councillor Robert Fraser claims gypsies would "stick a knife in you as soon as look at you".

March 11: Peterborough Conservative councillor Wayne Fitzgerald calls voters "idiots" and "morons" and tells one to "boil their head" after they disagreed with his plans for a new water park.

April 14: Derbyshire Tory councillor Patrick Clark calls gay people "sexual deviants".

April 30: A Conservative councillor in Essex, Chris Walker, apologises for saying British women should walk nude in the street to make Islamic men commit suicide because their religion forbids them from seeing any naked woman other than their wife.

May 27: Former Conservative Party candidate Ross Coates says "all women should be sterilised" to stop them getting pregnant at work, employment tribunal is told.

May 29: The leader of East Sussex county council, Peter Jones, says he is "good value for money" after receiving £91,000 in allowances and expenses in just one year.

June 12: Tory MP Peter Lilley attacks the help given to pregnant women, saying payments for food and baby equipment are "complete rubbish".

June 24: Kidderminster Conservative councillor Mumshad Ahmed, who twice drove while disqualified, apologises after a court bans him from driving for two years.

July 2: An investigation blames Stretford Conservative councillor Ian Mullins for a vicious internet campaign against a female colleague that compared her to Hitler.

July 7: London Assembly member Brian Coleman refuses to publicise expenses saying "only the mad, bad and the sad" wanted to see. He adds: "I'm not pandering to mob rule."

August 21: Gosport Conservative chairman Alan Scard says he would only pick a woman to stand in one of the party's safest seats if she was good looking. Asked if he was happy to support David Cameron's call to put more women in Parliament, he says: "If they are attractive, yeah, I would go for it."

August 26: Conservative MEP Daniel Hannan describes the NHS as a "60-year-old mistake" and hails Enoch Powell as his political hero.

September 1: Oxford University Conservative Association is condemned after students hold a sick competition to see who could tell the most offensive racist joke.

September 9: Tooting councillor Susan John-Richards quits the Conservative Party after claiming she endured three years of sexual discrimination from the Tory group.

October 15: A former Mayor of Brent, councillor Bertha Joseph, is suspended after taking money intended for a charity ball and spending it on clothes.

October 22: Former adviser to Margaret Thatcher and vicechairman of Goldman Sachs Lord Griffiths defends bankers' bonuses and says taxpayers should "tolerate the inequality".

November 2: Disgraced Tory MP David Wilshire compares the treatment of politicians over their expenses claims to the plight of Jews in Nazi Germany.

November 20: An Orpington councillor, Peter Hobbins, is suspended from the Conservative Party after sending emails ranting that Asian prospective parliamentary candidates do not have "normal sounding" English names.

December 7: Tory candidate for Dorset South changes his quadrupled-barrelled name, Richard Grosvenor Plunkett-Ernle-Erle-Drax, to Richard Drax on posters.

December 31: MEP Daniel Hannan says that no "sane" person would support the NHS.


You could do one with Labour for other issues, probably some racists/sexists amongst them too. Stupidity exists without borders, political ideals or colour.



So a guy almost dies, you are using that as the opportunity to make those kind of remarks... shame you couldn't get a hospital picture instead. Maybe a grave if you were lucky.

You are so much better than a racist person.
 

TCRS

Banned
Atleast the EU commision seem to care about the general public. The amount of good things they've proposed recently is great.

We should be opening more borders, not closing them off. Humanity is completely doomed due to the hatred and idiocy of itself.

Controlling borders and immigration is not hatred of humanity...
 

3Sixty

Member
Again I am curious about whether 'large' is an appropriate term, from my experience racists tend to be people who can't shut up about it. They tend not to be too quiet IMO. So people who aren't racist in that party wouldn't get pointed out obviously, which asks the question of what the basis is on that one. I honestly don't know, I can see that appearances wise that party can't survive if it tries to be racist. Most people don't want it, UKIP have addressed that concern as best they can and are progressing to be a more valid party. I hope they are improving themselves and throwing out that element and it is the minority but I don't know for sure, and I don't see people who claim the opposite as fact offering any proof. By that I mean to show a majority or large amount remain in the party thinking along those lines.

The main difference is Farage.

He is the party leader and regally comes out with these sort of comments.
 
People voting for UKIP because they feel sorry for them, seriously. Farage goes on show on any channel and they're asking him if he's racist, if his members are racist and nothig about his policies.
Cameron, Clegg and Millibands spin doctors have caused this.
 

Marc

Member
EU membership is an incredibly complex issue. The vast majority of the public, approximately two-thirds, aren't engaged enough to vote in the EU elections. Indeed, not far off half don't even feel engaged enough to turn up in general elections either. I think that's a staggering and alarming statistic. If so many people are that deeply switched off and no longer engage with an issue, it's troublesome to then give precisely these people the deciding say on it. If the people can't be bothered to vote in general elections, how is it democratic to hand the remaining minority the full reins over critical policies?

I'm pro-democracy. I'm pro-elections. I'm hugely pro-democratic reform, including the introduction of full proportional representation and indeed I want to see greater experimentation with e-democracy. I want turnout to rise. I want to see democracy thrive again. But I believe I'm not acting unreasonably to be sceptical about single-issue referenda.

Completely agree with this, voters not turning out should assume a large element want none of the available choices. I would be amongst them, I prefer to vote currently but don't begrudge anyone who doesn't. Everyone I talked to doesn't believe anything changes and can certainly see why they would think that when the main parties are like clones these days. I agree, and won't vote for a main party for the foreseeable future.

There should be a vote of no confidence available that enforces a referendum on the role/type of government available with an independent reserved fund available for any of the elected options. Way more democratic and ensures the people are better represented.
 
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