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>I wonder whyI always get downvoted into oblivion for stating that which to me is an obvious fact Well when you write obviously non factual nonsense like >The

>I wonder whyI always get downvoted into oblivion for stating that which to me is an obvious fact Well when you write obviously non factual nonsense like >The EU is the opposite: One giant thing which does nothing well You tend to get downvoted. When you write hilarious nonsense like this >In Denmark, we've had 'cinnamon patrols' go from bakery to bakery to verify that only the allowed amount of cinnamon was sprinkled on buns. And imply its the EU's fault, you get downvoted.

morsma 8y ago
>You tend to get downvoted. When you write hilarious nonsense like this Can you name anything the EU has done well?
- pas 8y ago
  first Google hit for EU accomplishments: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/03/6-things-the-eu-has-achieved-60-years-on-from-its-founding-treaty-7609e02c-01bb-4763-8cbf-716d2287a647/ https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/03/6-things-the-eu-has-a...
- dmitriid 8y ago
  GDPR
- Ralfp 8y ago
  It forced my government to break national monopoly on internet access, bringing ASDL prices down from $265 month to just $8.
- dmitriid 8y ago
  "Europe is still the closest thing to paradise on Earth" https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/sep/19/europe-paradise-on-earth https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/sep/19/europe... It's from 2012, but the vast majority of what's said there is still true.
  - hollerith 8y ago
    Europe is however more likely than the US is to get bad quickly. It became a bad place to live for example from 1914 through 1918 and then again from 1939 through 1945 with, e.g., shortages of food and other life essentials while the US remained OK unless you were in the small fraction of the population that got drafted into the US military (and even then you would not have endured food shortages). Although the creation of the EU was motivated in large part to prevent the recurrence of that sort of badness, the EU does not have the power to restrain the militaries of the individual European countries. Note that the EU was shown not to have the power to compel the Italian government that came to power because of the general election of March 2018 to adhere to EU regulations on deficit spending.
    - Dumbdo 8y ago
      There was no such thing as a European Union in WWI and II, which the discussion is about. That's why I don't understand how your comment is relevant here.
    - dtech 8y ago
      War within the EU is really really unlikely. A successful part of the EEC/EU is integrating the economies of its countries to such an extend that war becomes economically un-viable. Nowadays war between France and Germany is close to as absurd a thought as a war between Calafornia and Texas is. It's not remotely comparable to 1900-1950. Russia is the largest threat for European countries, but currently an attack on a NATO member seems unlikely.
      - hollerith 8y ago
        That's what experts were saying before 1914, too: war is really unlikely because the economies are more integrated than they have ever been.
        Ralfp 8y ago
        This is patently false. Theme in pre-1914 continental European press was monarchies struggling with independence movements, question of next Franc-Prussian conflict (because everybody was certain that peace between those two can't hold), and stability of Russian empire (that was at time engaged in bloody war with Japanese while being shaken by internal tensions). Inter-war period was hardly one of economical integration, considered that most of European countries were engaged in economic war with other - eg. Poland had no economic exchange with its neighbours.
- dtech 8y ago
  Forced an end to high roaming charges for within-EU mobile usage and forbade charging for receiving SMS while abroad. Removed internal borders, so you can travel from Denmark to Spain without 5 border crossings. Created a common market, so you can order an item from a German web shop as a Belgium citizen without hurdles. Made war between European countries economically unattractive because economies are closely intertwined.
- kazen44 8y ago
  allowed for unproppeled growth across europe? The internal market is a massive advantage. Also, throwing it weight around on the geopolitical stage has been proven more then useful for european nations, compared to getting picked off by either china/USA/Russia.
- MadraRua 8y ago
  Its generally improved the economies of its 28 member states and the standards of living for over half a billion people.
lbj 8y ago
I'm glad you find it hillarious. You must not be paying for it.
- guitarbill 8y ago
  For anybody following along, this kind of garbage rhetoric is exactly how Brexit started. 1. Spread misinformation and sow discontent against the EU 2. ??? 3. Profit
  - Silhouette 8y ago
    I might not put things in quite such confrontational terms, but the general complaint some people are making here is valid. The EU does have a track record of taking on technical issues without adequately understanding them and so legislating with perhaps good intentions but not always good results. This has caused significant damage to many organisations because of (presumably) unintended side effects, and obviously that does then have a chilling effect on things like investment plans and even whether to start new businesses at all.
    - guitarbill 8y ago
      So do all governments. It's just easier to hate the EU
      - Silhouette 8y ago
        So do all governments. That's true, but not all governments do it with the same ratio of genuine benefit to unwanted side-effects and collateral damage.
  - DuskStar 8y ago
    I think this formulation is a bit more accurate: 1. Mention an obscure irritant that is superficially not the EU's fault, and blame the EU for it 2. EU supporters pile on and say that this is what all anti-EU arguments are like 3. When examined in more detail, the irritant actually IS the EU's fault 4. People then accept #2 as true, and hate the EU more (since apparently if they examined all the obvious BS about the EU more closely, they'd find it to be true)
lacey 8y ago
It seems like the cinnamon patrol comment is related to this, which does seem to indicate the interpretation of an EU law is to blame: https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/12/25/256602581/when-is-cinnamon-spice-not-so-nice-the-great-danish-debate https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/12/25/256602581/wh...
- arama471 8y ago
  It seems like the EU explicitly made it so the cinnamon rolls wouldn't be affected: > The EU's regulations on a common type of cinnamon called cassia limit how much bakers can use: 50 milligrams per kilogram of dough, if it's a traditional or seasonal pastry, or 15 milligrams per kilogram if it's just a regular old everyday pastry. But the Denmark decided their traditional seasonal pastry was an everyday one > This particular kerfuffle comes because the Danish food authority recently classified kanelsnegler, or cinnamon rolls, as an everyday pastry So really this is the "fault" of the Danish government, isn't it? Source for quotes: https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/12/eu-worried-danish-cinnamon-rolls-could-cause-liver-damage/282678/ https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/12/eu-worrie...
  - morsma 8y ago
    But a "kanelsnegl" is an everyday pastry in Denmark.
    - arama471 8y ago
      But it didn't use to be? From the article it sounds like it used to be a "traditional pastry"
  - michaelmrose 8y ago
    Can you please explain to me why anyone on the face of this earth would want their government deciding how to classify types of pastry in order to determine how much cinnamon people are allowed to use? It kind of sounds like the issue is that outside of safety regulations someone told some petty tyrant that they got to decide how to classify pastry so of course they decided to classify it in such a way as to require action and importance on their own part at the expense of everyone's inconvenience. I suspect the proper fix is to fire everyone in that department and start over.

morsma 8y ago

>You tend to get downvoted. When you write hilarious nonsense like this Can you name anything the EU has done well?

pas 8y ago
first Google hit for EU accomplishments: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/03/6-things-the-eu-has-achieved-60-years-on-from-its-founding-treaty-7609e02c-01bb-4763-8cbf-716d2287a647/ https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/03/6-things-the-eu-has-a...
dmitriid 8y ago
GDPR
Ralfp 8y ago
It forced my government to break national monopoly on internet access, bringing ASDL prices down from $265 month to just $8.
dmitriid 8y ago
"Europe is still the closest thing to paradise on Earth" https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/sep/19/europe-paradise-on-earth https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/sep/19/europe... It's from 2012, but the vast majority of what's said there is still true.
- hollerith 8y ago
  Europe is however more likely than the US is to get bad quickly. It became a bad place to live for example from 1914 through 1918 and then again from 1939 through 1945 with, e.g., shortages of food and other life essentials while the US remained OK unless you were in the small fraction of the population that got drafted into the US military (and even then you would not have endured food shortages). Although the creation of the EU was motivated in large part to prevent the recurrence of that sort of badness, the EU does not have the power to restrain the militaries of the individual European countries. Note that the EU was shown not to have the power to compel the Italian government that came to power because of the general election of March 2018 to adhere to EU regulations on deficit spending.
  - Dumbdo 8y ago
    There was no such thing as a European Union in WWI and II, which the discussion is about. That's why I don't understand how your comment is relevant here.
  - dtech 8y ago
    War within the EU is really really unlikely. A successful part of the EEC/EU is integrating the economies of its countries to such an extend that war becomes economically un-viable. Nowadays war between France and Germany is close to as absurd a thought as a war between Calafornia and Texas is. It's not remotely comparable to 1900-1950. Russia is the largest threat for European countries, but currently an attack on a NATO member seems unlikely.
    - hollerith 8y ago
      That's what experts were saying before 1914, too: war is really unlikely because the economies are more integrated than they have ever been.
      - Ralfp 8y ago
        This is patently false. Theme in pre-1914 continental European press was monarchies struggling with independence movements, question of next Franc-Prussian conflict (because everybody was certain that peace between those two can't hold), and stability of Russian empire (that was at time engaged in bloody war with Japanese while being shaken by internal tensions). Inter-war period was hardly one of economical integration, considered that most of European countries were engaged in economic war with other - eg. Poland had no economic exchange with its neighbours.
dtech 8y ago
Forced an end to high roaming charges for within-EU mobile usage and forbade charging for receiving SMS while abroad. Removed internal borders, so you can travel from Denmark to Spain without 5 border crossings. Created a common market, so you can order an item from a German web shop as a Belgium citizen without hurdles. Made war between European countries economically unattractive because economies are closely intertwined.
kazen44 8y ago
allowed for unproppeled growth across europe? The internal market is a massive advantage. Also, throwing it weight around on the geopolitical stage has been proven more then useful for european nations, compared to getting picked off by either china/USA/Russia.
MadraRua 8y ago
Its generally improved the economies of its 28 member states and the standards of living for over half a billion people.

lbj 8y ago

I'm glad you find it hillarious. You must not be paying for it.

guitarbill 8y ago
For anybody following along, this kind of garbage rhetoric is exactly how Brexit started. 1. Spread misinformation and sow discontent against the EU 2. ??? 3. Profit
- Silhouette 8y ago
  I might not put things in quite such confrontational terms, but the general complaint some people are making here is valid. The EU does have a track record of taking on technical issues without adequately understanding them and so legislating with perhaps good intentions but not always good results. This has caused significant damage to many organisations because of (presumably) unintended side effects, and obviously that does then have a chilling effect on things like investment plans and even whether to start new businesses at all.
  - guitarbill 8y ago
    So do all governments. It's just easier to hate the EU
    - Silhouette 8y ago
      So do all governments. That's true, but not all governments do it with the same ratio of genuine benefit to unwanted side-effects and collateral damage.
- DuskStar 8y ago
  I think this formulation is a bit more accurate: 1. Mention an obscure irritant that is superficially not the EU's fault, and blame the EU for it 2. EU supporters pile on and say that this is what all anti-EU arguments are like 3. When examined in more detail, the irritant actually IS the EU's fault 4. People then accept #2 as true, and hate the EU more (since apparently if they examined all the obvious BS about the EU more closely, they'd find it to be true)

lacey 8y ago

It seems like the cinnamon patrol comment is related to this, which does seem to indicate the interpretation of an EU law is to blame: https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/12/25/256602581/when-is-cinnamon-spice-not-so-nice-the-great-danish-debate https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/12/25/256602581/wh...

arama471 8y ago
It seems like the EU explicitly made it so the cinnamon rolls wouldn't be affected: > The EU's regulations on a common type of cinnamon called cassia limit how much bakers can use: 50 milligrams per kilogram of dough, if it's a traditional or seasonal pastry, or 15 milligrams per kilogram if it's just a regular old everyday pastry. But the Denmark decided their traditional seasonal pastry was an everyday one > This particular kerfuffle comes because the Danish food authority recently classified kanelsnegler, or cinnamon rolls, as an everyday pastry So really this is the "fault" of the Danish government, isn't it? Source for quotes: https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/12/eu-worried-danish-cinnamon-rolls-could-cause-liver-damage/282678/ https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/12/eu-worrie...
- morsma 8y ago
  But a "kanelsnegl" is an everyday pastry in Denmark.
  - arama471 8y ago
    But it didn't use to be? From the article it sounds like it used to be a "traditional pastry"
- michaelmrose 8y ago
  Can you please explain to me why anyone on the face of this earth would want their government deciding how to classify types of pastry in order to determine how much cinnamon people are allowed to use? It kind of sounds like the issue is that outside of safety regulations someone told some petty tyrant that they got to decide how to classify pastry so of course they decided to classify it in such a way as to require action and importance on their own part at the expense of everyone's inconvenience. I suspect the proper fix is to fire everyone in that department and start over.