and the biggest threat to the UK economy in 2016 is...

Sapphire

.string. wrote: »

What I do understand or rather recognise is that the line of knuckle dragging Dad's Amy view of the world where the villains of a war 70 years in the past are still regarded as alive and well and plotting to rule Europe and us with it.

As to this particular flippant remark, tell that to those who were occupied twice in the 20th century, and throughout the whole of the 19th century, by Germany. They committed acts of unspeakable brutality and cruelty in the countries they occupied (people in the UK go on about the destruction of Dresden, but rarely mention the utter, systematic destruction of the ancient city of Warsaw by the Germans, after the Warsaw Uprising had been defeated). I have heard things from people who experienced these things (because they were there), which would make your hair stand on end. Nations are like people – and there are such things as national characteristics.

.string.

Sapphire wrote: »

As to this particular flippant remark, tell that to those who were occupied twice in the 20th century, and throughout the whole of the 19th century, by Germany. They committed acts of unspeakable brutality and cruelty in the countries they occupied (people in the UK go on about the destruction of Dresden, but rarely mention the utter, systematic destruction of the ancient city of Warsaw by the Germans, after the Warsaw Uprising had been defeated). I have heard things from people who experienced these things (because they were there), which would make your hair stand on end. Nations are like people – and there are such things as national characteristics.

And we had our own moments too - talk to some people in India.

Some people we have both argued with even go back 300 years.

The past is the past.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

Sapphire wrote: »

when Britain's culture (not to mention its economy, in very short order) is overwhelmed by people with a medieval outlook that does not change (it'll happen comic-book style, of course, as shown in ISIS videos).

Wow.

Just.... Wow.

your 'liberal lefty-type views', according to which anyone who does not want their culture destroyed by the 'deserving' millions from the Middle East and Africa, is a 'racist' or a 'bigot'.

In my experience people expressing racist and bigoted views are more often than not just racists and bigots...

But just for fun perhaps you could explain to me how having people from the Middle East or Africa living in my town is "destroying my culture."

I am genuinely curious as to how my 'culture was destroyed' yesterday when my Middle Eastern friends wished me 'Merry Christmas'.

I am also curious as to how 'my culture was destroyed' by the nice families from Africa, the Middle East and Asia that were at nearby tables during our Christmas lunch.

And as I actually lived in the Middle East and Africa for over a decade, and that didn't 'destroy my culture', should I be feeling a bit left out if all this cultural destruction is going on without my knowledge?

Perhaps you'd care to pop back in and enlighten us?

These people are mainly healthy young men, who clearly express why they are coming to Europe – they expect to be given housing, education, girls and so on for free, and have even said so.

So many false stereotypes, such little time....

The 'liberal' press in this country has cynically focused on children that are being used by these healthy young men (held up in the air and so on) to try and get themselves into Europe and elicit sympathy.

Ohhhh.....

So it's all just a 'liberal press' conspiracy and actually the thousands of people drowning in the Med because they're so desperate to reach safety are just doing it to 'elicit sympathy'.

Yeah.... That makes perfect sense. :money:

Meanwhile that same press does little to report what has happened to European countries that have taken in many Muslim migrants, like Sweden, where there have been numerous rapes and other crimes committed by migrants, where these people have been foisted onto small villages and so on.

Migrants are people.

Just like all peoples a small minority of migrants will break the law.

The reason the press doesn't report it much is because it just doesn't happen much, and when it does, it's not any more newsworthy than the small minority of any other people that break the law.

overwhelmingly Christian, don't have any experience of peoples from the Middle East and Africa, and don't wish to have. And the issue of free movement of people is a problem, especially if/when the migrants that Germany is accepting obtain passports and will be able roam around Europe as they please. That's why I'll be voting for 'out'.

I think we all know you'll be voting for 'out'...;)

CLAPTON

.string. wrote: »

What I do understand or rather recognise is that the line of knuckle dragging Dad's Amy view of the world where the villains of a war 70 years in the past are still regarded as alive and well and plotting to rule Europe and us with it.

I fail to understand any logic in your assertion that somehow Germany ordered the rest of Europe to follow her instructions on the migrant issue. I can see a principled stand for a certain approach to migrants/asylum seekers, by Germany, which I happen to disagree with, but not the scenario you are pretending has happened.

I don't happen to agree that Germany is the biggest threat to the UK's economy, the biggest threats are in our own hands, in whether Scotland is tricked into another referendum and ends up screwing up its own economy and damaging ours in the process, or whether the UK population at large are similarly tricked into voting for Brexit by some comic book nonsense about wicked foreigners of one type of another.

It is discourteous to suggest that anyone with a different view to yourself is monkey like.

Germany turned a migrant problem into a huge crisis all by itself and without consulting its EU partner.
If it them had stood by its highly 'principled' decision then that would be fine : in fact is retreated under the weight of German right wing (and other) parties to try to reverse the number of migrant in Germany by attempting to call on the existing shrengen rules to distribute migrant from Germany to other EU countries.
Personally I neither see it neither as 'principled' , intelligent or practical but that's another matter.

I've no idea why you even suggest that Germany is a threat to the UK economy (certainly not my own view which is that I would expect Germany to act in their own national interests taking a broad long term.)

Your view that a Brexit would be the result of being people being tricked, rather than rational argument, sadly says more about you and your already closed mind, than about the issues or the British people.

Sapphire

.string. wrote: »

The past is the past.

The past shapes the present – and those who forget their past, have no future.

Sapphire

HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »

Wow.

Just.... Wow.

And wow again. Since you and I disagree so utterly, I don't see any point in discussing this issue with you. For myself, I refuse to exist in a fool's paradise.

.string.

Sapphire wrote: »

The past shapes the present – and those who forget their past, have no future.

My wife is Danish, should I be terrified of her in case the Danes try and invade Wessex again?


ps the fact that she does terrify me has no relvance to the discussion

.string.

CLAPTON wrote: »

It is discourteous to suggest that anyone with a different view to yourself is monkey like.

Germany turned a migrant problem into a huge crisis all by itself and without consulting its EU partner.
If it them had stood by its highly 'principled' decision then that would be fine : in fact is retreated under the weight of German right wing (and other) parties to try to reverse the number of migrant in Germany by attempting to call on the existing shrengen rules to distribute migrant from Germany to other EU countries.
Personally I neither see it neither as 'principled' , intelligent or practical but that's another matter.

I've no idea why you even suggest that Germany is a threat to the UK economy (certainly not my own view which is that I would expect Germany to act in their own national interests taking a broad long term.)

Your view that a Brexit would be the result of being people being tricked, rather than rational argument, sadly says more about you and your already closed mind, than about the issues or the British people.

Not monkey, more ape-like. But seriously, when you use words like nonsense and ridiculous you really have to factor in getting it back.

I didn't suggest that Germany is as threat to the economy, rather hinted at the opposite, it was the use of Germany as a sort of Bete Noir that I was referring to.

On the matter of migration, as you point out, it's. A Shengen thing; as such it is somewhat distant to the UK's obligations. In principle we can do as we like in accepting or not migrants from Non-EU countries. That needs to be reinforced, of course, but we start from a good position in terms of our existing autonomy and legally because responsibility should lie with the country of first arrival for those migrants.

The EU migrant situation is different in that we have signed up for free mobility of labour within Europe The crucial thing there is that countries in the EU should give equal rights across borders. I think the key to that problem is in the area of residency, and that may be the eventual area which provides the solution. Residency for 2 or 3 years in the EU country of residence before a move and the same period in the next country before receiving all benefits. I can think of nuances there, but that's the gist.

Personally I would prefer not to bother with such mealy-minded restrictions (with the exception of extended benefit money abroad), because I think it too picky and fear the consequences for Brits abroad.

Edit: I forgot - on the matter of being tricked. I wrote that because almost all the argumentation about migration from the leave side of the argument would have us believe that we are being swamped by ISIS loonies from Non-EU countries and that this would be solved by leaving the EU, which is simply not true, not least because we already have autonomy of action on such migrants.

... Or, indeed, some scary stuff about a Fourth Reich

Sapphire

.string. wrote: »

My wife is Danish, should I be terrified of her in case the Danes try and invade Wessex again?


ps the fact that she does terrify me has no relvance to the discussion

No, you shouldn't be scared of her – she is European (presumably).

To quote from your other post:

'I wrote that because almost all the argumentation about migration from the leave side of the argument would have us believe that we are being swamped by ISIS loonies from Non-EU countries and that this would be solved by leaving the EU, which is simply not true, not least because we already have autonomy of action on such migrants.

... Or, indeed, some scary stuff about a Fourth Reich'

The reason why many people are fearful of the huge influx of migrants from outside Europe is precisely because ISIS promised to import many of its loonies among the migrants (and has probably done so). I don't know how much autonomy of action we actually have when it comes to such migrants. There are people being illegally smuggled into Britain, and the government does not seem to keep track of them, or deport them when they are found. And why have these people (many of them from places like Africa and Pakistan, as well as the Middle East) been allowed to enter Europe illegally in the first place, and moreover to travel right across Europe? Why have they not already been deported, when they threaten lorry drivers with machetes and knives?

As for the remark about 'a Fourth Reich', I do not know what you are talking about – but coming from a background where Germany imposed great suffering on my immediate family (who were Slavs, incidentally), I find the flippancy surrounding such remarks, and saying such things as 'the past is the past' to people who bear great scars, quite abhorrent.

BobQ

Sapphire wrote: »

The past shapes the present – and those who forget their past, have no future.

Indeed it does. How then can you object to some people coming here and possibly changing our culture? After all did we not spend couple of centuries interfering in the cultures of a quarter of the globe? We of course did this as a force for good as we divided and ruled the Empire, while the johnny foreigners coming here today are doing so much harm.

I appreciate your arguments on the facts of our EU relationship (although I do not agree with them), but they are not helped by your implicit racial views.