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I like to remind people that the French (and I believe a few other nations) voted against the current EU constitution in a referendum before their governments w

I like to remind people that the French (and I believe a few other nations) voted against the current EU constitution in a referendum before their governments went ahead and ratified it anyway.

varispeed 3y ago
Is it allowed to be said publicly now? Just a year or two ago such comment would have been downvoted to oblivion, perhaps even risking a ban from whatever platform it was posted on. I wonder where does it come from, treating EU as some sort of divine deity not capable of any wrong doing and such an effort to sweep its flaws under the rug while chanting "EU is great!". It's probably the most corrupt and undemocratic organisation on this side of the planet.
- rdm_blackhole 3y ago
  You can say it but nobody listens. For years now, the people who tried to say that the EU in its current form is not working have been silenced by the media or labelled as conspiracy nuts.
  - g-b-r 3y ago
    The problem is that the wide majority of them were (and still are) conspiracy nuts
    - petre 3y ago
      Or Russia's useful idiots.
    - omginternets 3y ago
      When the majority of a country votes against the EU constitution in a public referendum, "conspiracy nut" is a very tough sell.
    - rdm_blackhole 3y ago
      Maybe so but it wouldn't be the case if the other parties did their job and denounced the abuses from the EU when those happen. Instead, it leaves the parties on the fringe as the only ones doing the criticizing. Why should it be controversial to say that the EU is not perfect and that leaving it could work out better for certain countries? Instead it's like no one can imagine a time where the EU did not exist and it's almost like we have forgotten that the EU is not the end all be all of everything.
      - g-b-r 3y ago
        The parties on the fringe usually criticize bs rather than the real problems, because they at most don't care of improving the EU. In the best case when it doesn't work well it's a convenient target to blame (when it's their own fault). In other cases they'd like the freedom to be *more* (much more) authoritarian than EU membership allows. But currently let's be honest, most simply work for Putin or China and the aim is just to wreak havoc.
      - g-b-r 3y ago
        But yes for sure there should be other parties, or/and the tiny ones that do a great job on internet matters such as the pirate party should get a lot more votes.
    - omginternets 3y ago
      Ah yes, the classic "you voted wrong; try again" posture.
- omginternets 3y ago
  As someone who has spent a fair bit of time both in the EU and the US, one thing that continues to puzzle me about the average Western European voter is his unshakeable trust in government institutions. Given what happened in living memory, I would expect a very different relationship with Big Government.
  - g-b-r 3y ago
    You probably spent time in northern Europe (Scandinavia, in all likelihood)
    - omginternets 3y ago
      Actually, no. I spent most of my time in France, Italy, Spain and the UK. I insist: most upper-middle class (and above) voters are stuck in what I can only qualify as a "govern me harder, daddy" mindset.
      - g-b-r 3y ago
        Hmm, if you were raised to dread the "nine most terrifying words" I suppose you could see it like that, but southern Europeans most definitely don't look at their institutions with trust and confidence
        omginternets 3y ago
        I've found it to be a class divide more than a national divide.
        g-b-r 3y ago
        Mah, higher class people are for sure generally more convinced of the necessity of the European Union
      - gpderetta 3y ago
        You mention Italy: there the EU is often (but very much not always) seen as the lesser of the two evil compared to the local government.
- rightbyte 3y ago
  Maybe it was spillovers from "Brexit" arguments where some UK people thought any critique of the EU was in support of Tories? I mean, since when is complaining about the EU controversial otherwise? You can still see some bitterness regarding Brexit where brits are mocked for choosing the wrong path etc.
  - omginternets 3y ago
    I distinctly recall that the omertà on this particular issue predates Brexit ... by about 15 years. There was a brief outcry when the EU constitution was ratified before the topic suddenly and mysteriously vanished from public discourse (at least, insofar as such discourse took place on mass media).
    - rightbyte 3y ago
      Ye ok I was too young at the time to notice. I agree with the phenomena though. Unless you look you don't notice really. It is like if someone presses a switch and the consensus changes for no reason at all.
- scarface_74 3y ago
  It’s okay when the EU goes after those evil American BigTech companies since the only thing that the EU can “innovate” on when it comes to tech is legislation
rdm_blackhole 3y ago
Tell me about it. The French were not the only ones turning it down either.
arp242 3y ago
What ended up being passed wasn't the same treaty, so that's not entirely true. Complex situations like this can't just be reduced to a yes/no decision. What does a "no" vote even mean? Does it mean that nothing like that treaty can ever be passed? What about something which resembles the original but tries to address the concerns that were raised by the people who voted against it? What about just certain sections? Simply "yes/no" is a very crude measurement to actually know what people think or what a good solution would look like. I was somewhat in favour of Brexit, but for very different reasons than Farage (basically: "fuck the fuck in or fuck the fuck off", but not this "we want all of the benefits but none of the costs"). This is why parliaments can amend bills and the like. Maybe we should choose people to represent each side so they can debate each other and reach a compromise. Oh, wait... --- I don't know about the French one, but the Dutch one was rife with misinformation and nonsense. You know, like that Brexit one, or the EU-Ukraine association treaty one there was a few years later. Except worse because there was bullshit and nonsense on both sides (the amount of "if you vote no" fear-mongering was pretty ridiculous). Also, like Brexit when asked many people voted yes/no depending on how much they liked the government, or other factors which had little to do with the actual treaty being proposed. One can say "a vote is a vote, and you shouldn't police motivations". There is something to be said for that. But on the other hand it's hard to ignore that the vote was made in the context of misinformation, and people didn't actually vote on the asked question. In general I'm actually hugely in favour of more direct democracy, but every single referendum I've seen up close (in Netherlands and when I was living in the UK) has been nothing short of a clusterfuck, in addition to the more fundamental problems I mentioned. I didn't vote in any of them as I didn't think they were valid tools for good decision-making.
- omginternets 3y ago
  The general line against the EU constitution was "this is not a representative democracy". That core truth hasn't changed.
  - arp242 3y ago
    How do you measure the "general line"? And how do you know if you've addressed something like that? What exactly is your definition of "representative democracy" in the first place? This is really my point: you can't really have a conversation like that via a referendum. Repeat referenda are not really an option as your results will be increasingly biased towards the people with the strongest feelings/motivations. Furthermore, the EU more or less worked the same before the treaty, and this treaty didn't really change that. In that sense it was a rather poor way to voice the specific criticism that the democratic nature of the EU should be reformed. I actually agree with that! I just don't think the referenda's were meaningful. If anything, it was counter-productive as the amount of nonsense mixed in with the better arguments just makes the criticism easier to ignore, and people who "just say no all the time" are generally easy to ignore in the first place (voting "no" is not a constructive way to improve things).

I like to remind people that the French (and I believe a few other nations) voted against the current EU constitution in a referendum before their governments went ahead and ratified it anyway.

varispeed 3y ago

Is it allowed to be said publicly now? Just a year or two ago such comment would have been downvoted to oblivion, perhaps even risking a ban from whatever platform it was posted on. I wonder where does it come from, treating EU as some sort of divine deity not capable of any wrong doing and such an effort to sweep its flaws under the rug while chanting "EU is great!". It's probably the most corrupt and undemocratic organisation on this side of the planet.

rdm_blackhole 3y ago
You can say it but nobody listens. For years now, the people who tried to say that the EU in its current form is not working have been silenced by the media or labelled as conspiracy nuts.
- g-b-r 3y ago
  The problem is that the wide majority of them were (and still are) conspiracy nuts
  - petre 3y ago
    Or Russia's useful idiots.
  - omginternets 3y ago
    When the majority of a country votes against the EU constitution in a public referendum, "conspiracy nut" is a very tough sell.
  - rdm_blackhole 3y ago
    Maybe so but it wouldn't be the case if the other parties did their job and denounced the abuses from the EU when those happen. Instead, it leaves the parties on the fringe as the only ones doing the criticizing. Why should it be controversial to say that the EU is not perfect and that leaving it could work out better for certain countries? Instead it's like no one can imagine a time where the EU did not exist and it's almost like we have forgotten that the EU is not the end all be all of everything.
    - g-b-r 3y ago
      The parties on the fringe usually criticize bs rather than the real problems, because they at most don't care of improving the EU. In the best case when it doesn't work well it's a convenient target to blame (when it's their own fault). In other cases they'd like the freedom to be *more* (much more) authoritarian than EU membership allows. But currently let's be honest, most simply work for Putin or China and the aim is just to wreak havoc.
    - g-b-r 3y ago
      But yes for sure there should be other parties, or/and the tiny ones that do a great job on internet matters such as the pirate party should get a lot more votes.
  - omginternets 3y ago
    Ah yes, the classic "you voted wrong; try again" posture.
omginternets 3y ago
As someone who has spent a fair bit of time both in the EU and the US, one thing that continues to puzzle me about the average Western European voter is his unshakeable trust in government institutions. Given what happened in living memory, I would expect a very different relationship with Big Government.
- g-b-r 3y ago
  You probably spent time in northern Europe (Scandinavia, in all likelihood)
  - omginternets 3y ago
    Actually, no. I spent most of my time in France, Italy, Spain and the UK. I insist: most upper-middle class (and above) voters are stuck in what I can only qualify as a "govern me harder, daddy" mindset.
    - g-b-r 3y ago
      Hmm, if you were raised to dread the "nine most terrifying words" I suppose you could see it like that, but southern Europeans most definitely don't look at their institutions with trust and confidence
      - omginternets 3y ago
        I've found it to be a class divide more than a national divide.
        g-b-r 3y ago
        Mah, higher class people are for sure generally more convinced of the necessity of the European Union
    - gpderetta 3y ago
      You mention Italy: there the EU is often (but very much not always) seen as the lesser of the two evil compared to the local government.
rightbyte 3y ago
Maybe it was spillovers from "Brexit" arguments where some UK people thought any critique of the EU was in support of Tories? I mean, since when is complaining about the EU controversial otherwise? You can still see some bitterness regarding Brexit where brits are mocked for choosing the wrong path etc.
- omginternets 3y ago
  I distinctly recall that the omertà on this particular issue predates Brexit ... by about 15 years. There was a brief outcry when the EU constitution was ratified before the topic suddenly and mysteriously vanished from public discourse (at least, insofar as such discourse took place on mass media).
  - rightbyte 3y ago
    Ye ok I was too young at the time to notice. I agree with the phenomena though. Unless you look you don't notice really. It is like if someone presses a switch and the consensus changes for no reason at all.
scarface_74 3y ago
It’s okay when the EU goes after those evil American BigTech companies since the only thing that the EU can “innovate” on when it comes to tech is legislation

rdm_blackhole 3y ago

Tell me about it. The French were not the only ones turning it down either.

arp242 3y ago

What ended up being passed wasn't the same treaty, so that's not entirely true. Complex situations like this can't just be reduced to a yes/no decision. What does a "no" vote even mean? Does it mean that nothing like that treaty can ever be passed? What about something which resembles the original but tries to address the concerns that were raised by the people who voted against it? What about just certain sections? Simply "yes/no" is a very crude measurement to actually know what people think or what a good solution would look like. I was somewhat in favour of Brexit, but for very different reasons than Farage (basically: "fuck the fuck in or fuck the fuck off", but not this "we want all of the benefits but none of the costs"). This is why parliaments can amend bills and the like. Maybe we should choose people to represent each side so they can debate each other and reach a compromise. Oh, wait... --- I don't know about the French one, but the Dutch one was rife with misinformation and nonsense. You know, like that Brexit one, or the EU-Ukraine association treaty one there was a few years later. Except worse because there was bullshit and nonsense on both sides (the amount of "if you vote no" fear-mongering was pretty ridiculous). Also, like Brexit when asked many people voted yes/no depending on how much they liked the government, or other factors which had little to do with the actual treaty being proposed. One can say "a vote is a vote, and you shouldn't police motivations". There is something to be said for that. But on the other hand it's hard to ignore that the vote was made in the context of misinformation, and people didn't actually vote on the asked question. In general I'm actually hugely in favour of more direct democracy, but every single referendum I've seen up close (in Netherlands and when I was living in the UK) has been nothing short of a clusterfuck, in addition to the more fundamental problems I mentioned. I didn't vote in any of them as I didn't think they were valid tools for good decision-making.

omginternets 3y ago
The general line against the EU constitution was "this is not a representative democracy". That core truth hasn't changed.
- arp242 3y ago
  How do you measure the "general line"? And how do you know if you've addressed something like that? What exactly is your definition of "representative democracy" in the first place? This is really my point: you can't really have a conversation like that via a referendum. Repeat referenda are not really an option as your results will be increasingly biased towards the people with the strongest feelings/motivations. Furthermore, the EU more or less worked the same before the treaty, and this treaty didn't really change that. In that sense it was a rather poor way to voice the specific criticism that the democratic nature of the EU should be reformed. I actually agree with that! I just don't think the referenda's were meaningful. If anything, it was counter-productive as the amount of nonsense mixed in with the better arguments just makes the criticism easier to ignore, and people who "just say no all the time" are generally easy to ignore in the first place (voting "no" is not a constructive way to improve things).