| ▲ | ericmay 3 hours ago |
| > It would then be up to the EU to execute its Guillotine clause. These kinds of morally-superior, we'll show them, type of attitudes and suggestions are precisely why so many folks have come to be anti-EU. Nevermind the actual other real day-to-day issues with the organization. I'm sure you're also staunchly against Scotland and any referendum to join the EU, and against Catalonia becoming independent as well? Why should Taiwan be an exception and not part of China? Seems many of the EU are of the opinion that "We support sovereignty when it conveniently aligns with my chosen organization". The default and perhaps what is best for democracy is to have many smaller nation states, city states, and the other various confederations and the like. The super-organization of nations into these unwieldy states is in many respects anti-democratic and perhaps only temporary as these large nations and alliances were built precisely to fight other, large nation states. |
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| ▲ | Aarchive 24 minutes ago | parent | next [-] |
| It's the opposite of what you think, if some countries get privileges without following the basic principles, then the EU would be unpopular. |
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| ▲ | JumpCrisscross 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| > sure you're also staunchly against Scotland and any referendum to join the EU, and against Catalonia becoming independent as well? Why? I think the first is a good idea and the second fine if that’s what they want. |
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| ▲ | ericmay 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | Because those would be breaking up the unions of those countries. It's no different morally or philosophically from Switzerland leaving the EU. | | |
| ▲ | AnimalMuppet 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | Say what? Switzerland isn't in the EU, how can it leave? It has treaties, but not membership. That doesn't make it "leaving" if they annul the treaties. | | |
| ▲ | ericmay 3 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | This was the OP: > It wouldn’t be full Chexit. Just renegotiating and then rejecting the Schengen chapter. It would then be up to the EU to execute its Guillotine clause. My terminology was matching what was used here. | | |
| ▲ | SiempreViernes 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | [flagged] | | |
| ▲ | 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | [deleted] | |
| ▲ | ericmay 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | This is pointlessly argumentative, but I'm just going to continue having a conversation using the terminology brought up by the OP and what I interpreted them to mean. It seems to be working just fine for us. |
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| ▲ | 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | [deleted] |
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| ▲ | jltsiren 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Those "guillotine clauses" mostly exist because member states didn't want to cede their sovereignty to the EU. If a treaty covers areas where member states have shared or full responsibility, it must be ratified unanimously by every member state. (Which in some case requires ratification by regional parliaments.) Any changes to such treaties must also be ratified, which means there will be 30+ parties negotiating and trying to win new concessions. |
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| ▲ | Barrin92 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| >These kinds of morally-superior, we'll show them, type of attitudes This is a strange framing that itself usually comes from a standpoint of moral superiority. When you sign agreements with a governing body, like the EU on freedom of movement, and you break that agreement then there's consequences. And I don't mean that in an underhanded agressive way, but just literally you've broken the terms you had negotiated. The superiority complex really often seems to come from countries like Switzerland or the UK in the Brexit situation. Countries that already have often privileged deals and then decide to forfeit them, which they are allowed to do, it's not an attack on their sovereignty, the EU is not mainland China and Switzerland or the UK were not Taiwan, they're free to do what they want, they just can't have their cake and eat it too. |
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| ▲ | ericmay 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | > This is a strange framing that itself usually comes from a standpoint of moral superiority. When you sign agreements with a governing body, like the EU on freedom of movement, and you break that agreement then there's consequences. And I don't mean that in an underhanded agressive way, but just literally you've broken the terms you had negotiated. I don't think so. Even in the case where the Swiss or UK are breaking agreements or demanding changes to those agreements, it isn't something that's uncommon as countries and nations and companies and all sorts of entities break or renegotiate agreements or contracts all the time. In the case of Switzerland let's say they no longer feel the EU's freedom of movement policy works with the existing agreement because the EU has failed to protect its borders. You're painting a breaking of the agreement in the sense that nothing has changed in the agreement, but that may not be true and so breaking the agreement by the Swiss would have actually been because of a break in the agreement by the EU. These interactions taking place and then now all of a sudden the Swiss are to be the recipient of some draconian action "we'll show them" is not really that strange given it's relatively straightforward to see how these two entities can reasonable come to a disagreement which may or may not resolve itself. | | |
| ▲ | Barrin92 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | >it isn't something that's uncommon as countries and nations and companies and all sorts of entities break or renegotiate agreements or contracts all the time. what the Swiss are trying to do here is very uncommon, in fact it's so uncommon literally nobody has ever done it before. No country in history has imposed a numerical population cap on its population, and in addition, freedom of movement isn't a detail. It's the very core of the Treaty of Rome and the Schengen agreement that Switzerland is part of. That Europeans can now move freely between countries is the bedrock achievement of virtually all its labored for. And the EU is not going to do braconian measures, the EU does not bully its smaller neighbors. Britain wasn't intimated, threatened and nobody tried to interfere with it when they wanted to leave. THey decided to do so and did. Swizterland can cap its population and deny freedom of movement, nobody's going to bully them, but they're obviously not going to have the relationship they had with the EU. To even rhetorically compare the EU to the US (which has threatened to annex an ally's territory) or China (which throws minorities into camps and threatens a democracy with force) is pretty damn absurd. Ask Taiwan if they want to trade places with Switzerland on the world map if they could. | | |
| ▲ | ericmay 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | > what the Swiss are trying to do here is very uncommon, in fact it's so uncommon literally nobody has ever done it before. No country in history has imposed a numerical population cap on its population, and in addition, freedom of movement isn't a detail. It's the very core of the Treaty of Rome and the Schengen agreement that Switzerland is part of. That Europeans can now move freely between countries is the bedrock achievement of virtually all its labored for. I think you are putting this referendum on a pedestal it doesn't need to go on. All countries control population to some extent, whether that's in how they support parental leave or how they support mothers, or through immigration control, quotas, points systems, &c. Switzerland is just adding in another wrinkle. Plus all legislation was at one point new. |
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| ▲ | phoronixrly 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| You are mistaken. I am pro-Scotland independence and EU admission but anti Catalonia independence. Simply because the former will expand and strengthen the EU and the latter will divide and weaken it, especially since it's supported by Russia. |
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| ▲ | ericmay 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | [flagged] | | |
| ▲ | JumpCrisscross 3 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | …if Greenland voted to join the U.S., the conversation would be quite different. | | |
| ▲ | ericmay 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | I don't think it would be - you're focusing on the actions of the territory (for lack of a better term) and ignoring the parent organization. It's a bit of a stretch to be upset at Switzerland who would be serving in a role similar to Scotland or Greenland here for voting to take an action and then being ok with it in other instances. There isn't any consistency in this position in how you are picking and choosing what sovereignty you respect and what sovereignty you don't respect. Well, you can be consistent if you are in favor of the EU as an imperial organization that seeks to enlarge itself and punish member states, but I'm not sure if that's your belief. | | |
| ▲ | JumpCrisscross 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | > you're focusing on the actions of the territory (for lack of a better term) and ignoring the parent organization That’s how self determination works. > bit of a stretch to be upset at Switzerland who would be serving in a role similar to Scotland or Greenland* You’re muddling wildly different situations with wildly different levels of sympathy. | | |
| ▲ | ericmay 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | > That’s how self determination works. Right, like when the UK left the EU. > You’re muddling wildly different situations with wildly different levels of sympathy. I'm not sure they're really that different at a high level. The population of Spain would vote against Catalonia leaving. The population of the UK would vote against Scotland leaving. How can these groups (Scotland and Catalonia) self-determine to leave? | | |
| ▲ | JumpCrisscross 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | > population of the UK would vote against Scotland leaving The UK literally let Scotland vote on it [1]. On the other end of the spectrum, Greenland is a proposed military invasion and unilateral annexation. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_Independence_Referend... | | |
| ▲ | ericmay 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | The UK government let Scotland vote, it didn't allow the entire nation of the United Kingdom to vote on it. And they allowed it because they know it will fail and the smart thing to do if your aim is to keep the UK together (much to Russia's dismay of course) would be to let these referendums proceed when you know they don't have the votes and then they'll sort of fizzle out over time. You did support Brexit though, right? I mean they voted on it after all. > Greenland is a proposed military invasion and unilateral annexation. I don't think that is/was the only option on the table nor do I think it was a serious threat albeit it did have the intended effect which was to help scare the EU straight on spending a lot more on defense in Greenland. But let's say the US pulls together some package deal for Greenland, say, hey everyone who lives in Greenland if they vote yes to join the United Stats they get a million dollars and American citizenship (it could be something else, just a random example) and if they do so of course Denmark and the EU would be against it, but why? It's morally no different than dangling EU membership and billions of Euros in eventual aid to Scotland if it were to leave the UK. | | |
| ▲ | JumpCrisscross 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | > UK government let Scotland vote, it didn't allow the entire nation of the United Kingdom to vote on it The UK government represents the UK. Everything doesn’t need to be a referendum. > they allowed it because they know it will fail Irrelevant. They allowed it. If the EU agreed to Switzerland voting on Schengen per se, then it would be comparable. > don't think that is/was the only option on the table But it was on the table. That makes it distinct from the other examples. Again, I think you’re muddying very different situations in a way that undermines your own arguments. | | |
| ▲ | ericmay 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | > The UK government represents the UK. Everything doesn’t need to be a referendum. > Irrelevant. They allowed it. Respectfully I just don't agree with your framing here. Another wrinkle could be Northern Ireland if we want to go into this further with the UK specifically. > But it was on the table. That makes it distinct from the other examples. It was on the table but it seems that it was on the table as a bargaining chip for a different aim which was to scare the EU straight on spending the money necessary to secure Greenland and these arctic routes. While I agree that the situation itself is distinct, that's true of basically all separatists movements, whether that's Scotland, Taiwan, or Catalonia. Setting aside American "threats", we can look at tools the United States could use, similar to tools the EU can use with respect to Scotland, to achieve a popular vote in favor of secession that would be detrimental to the organizing entity (UK/Denmark). At what point is such a thing hostile, and at what point is it simply a population exercising what we consider to be a fundamental right? Is Spain being undemocratic by not even permitting Catalonia a vote on independence? How do you feel about the separatists movement in Alberta? Would you fully support that as well if they decide on a referendum in Alberta to leave Canada? What about Quebec? Genuinely curious. | | |
| ▲ | JumpCrisscross an hour ago | parent [-] | | > How do you feel about the separatists movement in Alberta? I’d say they have nothing to do with a Swiss immigration vote. |
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| ▲ | SiempreViernes 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | This is not pointlessly argumentative, this is just downright trolling. | | |
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