National or European

[Furunculus]

The only one linking this thread to EU-membership is you, frags.

nope, i am 'guilty' of that too:

The crucial feature of indirect democracy is the perception of representation, the collective trust in shared aims and expectations that allows the people to put their destiny in the hands of another, safe in the knowledge that even if ‘their’ man doesn’t get the job then the other guy will still be looking after their best interests.

The manner in which this trust is built is the knowledge that you and ‘he’ have a history of cooperation, and that your respective families likewise have a shared social and cultural history of cooperation, all of which allows you to trust that when adversity strikes ‘he’ will act in a predictable and acceptable way.

I simply do not recognise a sufficiently congruent set of aims and expectations to assent to being governed by the common will of the EU.*

Ergo, I recognise a British identity, and that our neighbours are european's of various flavours.



* This should not need saying, but; this does not mean that we should not strive towards harmonious cooperation and collaboration wherever a common viewpoint will bring a more effective outcome.

in fact, it seems pretty fundamental to the basic function of the thread:

Statement:

One cannot be [insert nationality here] without being European, rather [your nationality here] is how you are European.

For example, I'm Norwegian. I am a European. I cannot be just one of the two, I am Norwegian only as a specific form of European. An Englishman can never be just English, being English is his way of being a European.

Thoughts?