Do people genuinely feel they are a 'European Citizen'? And why?

[mrsvilliers]

Genuinely interested and not having a dig at anybody. This has come up on my social media a lot recently and culminated today in DM informing me she had managed to dredge up an Irish relative from somewhere which meant she could apply for an Irish passport. When I asked her why she informed me she was a European citizen and want to remain one. Fair enough but I am genuinely baffled. I speak two European languages, have travelled, worked and lived extensively in Europe and would never refer to myself as a European citizen. European yes, in that I am not African or Asian or North/South American etc but not in reference to being a citizen. Honestly genuinely interested and can't ask on social media as would get flayed!!

I am wrong in saying the the citizen if the UK feels they have a direct like with central government? Really?

But what they feel is pretty irrelevant when it's not what actually happens. This whole sorry mess has been caused by people's feels rather than understanding of facts. At the same time people who feel actual grief at what's happening have their emotions dismissed as irrational.

I suppose we have different ideas of rudeness

Yes, and yours is wrong.

Quite frankly, your statement about the UK institution shows you don't know how it works or what you vote for.
And then you also show you don't know much about European institutions.

Your self-quote about "feel" is also misrepresenting the context in which you said it.
People may not feel they have a say in central European government whereas they do nationally, and that is a problem with perception more than reality.

When John Major or Gordon Brown first went to power they weren't voted in nationally.
And your constituency vote only indirectly elects a PM. What do you say when a party has a minority vote and has parliament majority? How much of a voice do you feel you have?

No I don't believe I am a European citizen.
I am Irish and proud of it.
I am not proud of our Irish politicians though, either in Ireland or the European Parliament.

Regarding representation, I have a good friend who is a left-leaning voter in a safe Tory seat where the local MP is perceived by many to represent the interests of only his conservative-voting constituents. He says that he feels much more represented in Europe, by the Green MEP for whom he voted.

Calm down, dear. Who said I voted? If you read my statements carefully, I said I was American. And you are incorrect, I know quite a bit about European institutions and government. I also am well aware of everything you claim I did not know about - that is not what I was commenting about. If someone wanted to understand why there is deep division on the Brexit vote, all they need to read is your reaction and see how blind and narrow your response is. The question was on how makes people feel like a European citizen, and it was this I wanted to understand as all the posts above mine were quite vague.

I will skip over your lesson on manners as we obviously come from 2 different cultural points of view about manners, and I am not rude enough to impose mine on others.

Clearly you are not one of the British voters who feel their vote doesn't count as they live in a safe seat.

It's funny, then, how you presume to know personally (as apparent from your statements) how British voters feel.

And challenging someone in their views is not being rude. That's how stupidity (vaccine scaremongering and creationism) flourishes in the USA.

Mominatrix I agree with you that the EU as it stands is a weird sort of halfway house. It has always intended to ultimately be a federal system and has been creeping towards it steadily. It it probably the only way it could work. I don't know how other countries feel about that, only that there is clearly no stomach for it in the UK, and I'm not convinced that it was practical to continue to belong to something whose vision was so different from our own.

Regarding representation, it's obvious that there are many flaws in both our own parliamentary system and that of the EU, but I'm not sure its logical to say that if we accept one we must accept both.

By the way, I live in a safe seat but I am a member of the opposition party. That doesn't necessarily mean I am not represented, just that I have to shout louder!

What is not logical is to present them as very different systems where one is perfect and people are truly represented, while the other isn't as representative.

Both can be improved.
However, whereas the EU system has been evolving and changing (some political groups have started to be upfront of who they will support as Commission President), the UK system continues to be entrenched in a barely representative system that is very far from what we'd call democratic in other countries where votes for government count more directly.

Thank you for starting this thread OP. There have been really interesting comments and, because it is all about how people 'feel' there is no such thing as a wrong or right answer.

If I had my back up against the wall and had to choose between the Commonwealth and the European Union it would have to be the Commonwealth. My family is spread over 5 continents and being in the Commonwealth is what unites us. Going to Australia does not feel like going to a foreign country. Personally I think the great strength of the Commonwealth is that it has no coercive elements. It is built on a foundation of mutual affection and recognition of the value of independence and individuality. Whether, on an emotional level, that supported my rationale for voting Leave, I don't know.

I don't think my sentiments regarding the Commonwealth are sufficiently widely felt to have swung the vote result, but I know I am not the only one who feels that way. According to the press the result was what it was because of large numbers of people who live very local lives and do not feel European at all. They struggle emotionally with the demographic changes that EU membership has brought to their doorstep over the last decade and a shiny new public building built with EU funds doesn't really improve their quality of life. It is hard for them to articulate the feelings of disquiet about rapid change without sounding racist and associating themselves with people who really are horribly racist, so they are shy about revealing their views in polls.

On the whole human nature is instinctively anti-change. The government knew this and miscalculated. They thought Leave was the vote for change and stay was the vote for familiarity, when for many people the EU has brought rapid changes to their communities, so Leave was the vote for familiarity and a vote against change.

Challenging a post and calling someone ignorant are not the same. I accept and welcome challenging my beliefs - it is the only way to continually educate ourselves.

I think that's an interesting point about the Commonwealth. My DM, who is in her seventies, would say that she felt more kinship with the Commonwealth countries than with the EU. She still voted to Remain though! I wonder whether 18-24 year olds even know what the Commonwealth is/was?

I do! Or until a week ago, I did.

I used my treaty rights to live and work in an EU country. And I loved it.

Now I am applying for nationality of that EU country, been filling out the forms this morning.

An I know personally how British voters feel on both sides as I have been living in the UK for 14 years . I see that I have stumped you with the statement that I am American.

This goes to the crux of this thread - identity. I have live on 3 continents - my birth continent (Asia), my growing up in continent (N America) and my adult life continent (Europe). I don't identify myself with my birth continent because culturally I am too different from it. I don't identify with my adult continent because I am not accepted there as I have an Oriental face. I identify as American because it is there were I feel completely accepted, despite the fact that I find myself at odds with many culturally American things.

A lot of this is really quite fictional - lots of people in Yorkshire would say they have nothing in common with Lononers (in fact there are plenty of Londoner bashing threads and thread tangents on MN) but certain posters on this thread are taking it for granted that both have everything in common and the true Yorkshirewoman/man has barely any difference in outlook to the born and bred Londoner (insert many other parts of the UK outside the SE in place of Yorkshire obviously).

I don't think (pre referendum) very many people outside the far right wandered about consciously "Feeling British" - pre referendum people would occasionally talk about being Scottish or Welsh (or northern Irish to extend it to the UK) or from a specific county or region in England or from a certain big city...

"Feeling British" is as diverse as "Feeling European" - and saying sense of national identity is intrinsic linked to voting rights is both largely fiction (invent a definition and then just insist it is right...) and also self contradictory, given the fact pre referendum we did of course get to vote for MEPs, and that the UK's parliamentary democracy is not a "classical democracy" either. People who claim they wanted out of the EU because they want to "take back control" seem to be under some kind of delusion that the UK is a direct democracy...

Monimatrix
Funny that. Have similar background to you, but grew up in the EU with school stints int the US and Australia. Don't have an American passport, but every time I go to the US (which is about every1-2 years), I feel like I'm going home.

... And to add... because I can't possibly be American, for lack of an American passport, the next best thing for me is identifying as European (but not a particular European country).

An I know personally how British voters feel on both sides as I have been living in the UK for 14 years

You know about the same as I do, having lived in the UK for 15 years and having kept in touch for another 5.
I wasn't stumped by you being American, but by you speaking as if you were British
I don't presume to talk about how British voters feel other than report how they say they feel.
I do know how I feel as an European, though.

Calmara, I'm an immigrant from Australia and while visiting Australia may not have felt foreign to you, as an immigrant Britain was definitely a foreign country to me.

You said way upthread:

Immigration from Australia is currently 15% of what it was at the start of the century and it is much harder for young Aussies to come here to work, get to know their extended families and learn about where they came from.

I wanted to pick up on this, as it's such a colonial relic idea of what Australia is and who Australians are. The proportion of Australians with any Anglo-Celtic heritage is rapidly declining, and the majority of those with that heritage won't actually have any 'extended family' in the UK, they're probably just as likely to have extended family in Greece, Italy or China when you look at recent waves of immigration (apart from of course the million-odd British born people in Australia, but their kids won't have any problems living in the UK). Australia: it's not all about the UK.

And as an Australian immigrant who is about to get British citizenship, here's how I identify. I'm an Australian and a Londoner. I will soon be British and I am profoundly sad that British citizenship will no longer have European citizenship as an integral element.

That said if we were to end up with a free movement area between the UK and Australia as some have suggested I wouldn't be against it, it would save me thousands of pounds for DH's visa.

Sorry, that was hugely long and way off-topic. But I find the Commonwealth (as long as it's the 'right' Commonwealth) narrative on this utterly bewildering.

Did I ever speak as if I were British? That was your interpretation as I never said that nor implied it. I clearly stated that I was American!

The British situation in relation to previous colonies is not that dissimilar to other countries in Europe, including France, Spain, Portugal and others.
We have strong links and share many identity traits with those former empire countries. We do manage to reconcile those links with an European identity or at least membership of an European Union.
The UK is not particularly special, not even in feeling particularly special or unique. :)

I think of myself as european. Im actually scottish born and live in england, but both my grandparents were immigrants from different parts of europe and my partner is from mainland europe. I feel even less english after the referendum result than ever. In fact I feel like 52% of england can go fuck themselves

Not particularly. I'd probably feel closer to the U.S.