Can this be the yes side of the argument?

national | miscellaneous | news report Sunday October 06, 2002 21:12 by Buzz

A run in with the Yes side, can this be called an argument?

A run in with the Yes side, can this be called an argument?

Earlier today whilst out getting lunch with my partner we came across a very large contingent of leafleters handing out material calling for a Yes vote in the second round of the Nice Treaty. To my dismay many of these leafleters were of similar age to myself and my partner.

On my return from lunch I decided to question one of these leafleters (who were accompanied by a large bus, this was the Better off in Europe Campaign) on the complexities of the Nice Treaty. So, once I had been offered a leaflet I asked the chap who gave me the leaflet "Do you actually understand the complexities of this treaty?". He replied, "Yes actually, I have read the Nice Treaty in it's entirety". With that, I asked him to explain to me then in his own words Article 133 (Article 133 will give the EU Council and Commission power to negotiate agreements on privatisation of services with the WTO, rather then national governments and also allows the EU to order national governments to privatise such services).

Article 133 in my opinion which is shared by many a poster on this site is a significant element of the Nice Treaty, but our friend on the Yes side simply put it this way, and I quote
"Oh, you mean the privatisation thing, , well, , you would deny all the people's of Eastern Europe a chance to gain entry to the EU over privatisation?". Now this was pure ignorance, he refused to be drawn anymore on this element and insisted on playing what I have come to call the sympathy card.

To that sympathy card I replied, "I know quite a few people from Eastern Europe, as I go to college with them, and I also meet them in my day to day workplace, and I know from there own mouths that they have little opinion of the EU, little want to join it and for that matter believe it to be undemocratic". The reply, "So you would have it, they cant vote on it at all?", obviously our friend didn’t understand the Nice Treaty after all. To that I replied "Well, actually they cannot vote on any element of the Nice Treaty the elements within will be forced upon them upon entry, including Article 133".

It would appear my "nemesis" from the Yes side wasn't even the passionate about the treaty. I asked him, as our debate went on why the leaflets he was handing out implied that we were voting to leave or stay in the EU, you all may remember the posters "We're better off in Europe". His reply, nothing, he simply stared me in the face and jumped again to a different angle, this time he claimed a No vote was a vote for Justin Barrett and other fascists.

He claimed that a No vote would give Barrett and co. a mandate to go to represent people. I told our friend that fascism would never reach a level it had before in Europe, that the vast majority of people would see this as nonsense and that the only way Justin Barrett and co. are being empowered is by people like him claiming Barrett's clan won the last No vote. He couldn't understand that in my opinion most people voted No, 1) because they didn’t understand the damned thing 2) as a fear of militarisation of Europe (something which btw the no side has made up).

Sadly, the fun and games were ended when this guy's minder whisked him away to the awaiting bus ready to move on to the next town to distribute more lies in the name of the truth. But, this showed how bad the case was for a Yes vote, that people who had "read" the Treaty couldn't even point to something with which they could hold up as positive.

VOTE NO TO NICE
VOTE NO TO MILITARISATION
VOTE NO TO PRIVATISATION
VOTE NO TO FORTRESS EUROPE