I voted Remain in the EU referendum here in the UK but, in 2021, a few things have happened that have caused me to question whether that was the right choice and whether, with Brexit, we have the right outcome (albeit for very much the wrong reasons seen through 2016 eyes):
1. Ursula von der Leyen and the EU Commission bullying companies and non-EU countries about vaccine production and provision. A wider point here is that the undemocratic nature of the Commission is something that I have always viewed as a problem.
2. The generally shambolic and inconsistent handling of vaccine procurement and rollout within the EU (which does now at least appear to be running much more smoothly; the UK government did well here but, overall, has handled the pandemic with majestic ineptitude).
3. This[0]. Chatcontrol 2.0 isn't the first ill thought out piece of legislation to get approval in the EU, and it won't be the last, but it is certainly one of the more sinister, and a significant violation of privacy amongst the majority of law-abiding citizens.
Overall I would still probably prefer to be in the EU than not, but I'm simply not as certain about that as I used to be.
[0] This whole assessment is of course contingent on the UK not simply falling into line with this legislation, a la GDPR, anyway. I'm on board with the spirit of GDPR and related legislation but the way every organisation seems to comply has certainly made the web suck more.
Also, one wonders if EU states would have been better at closing their borders at the start of the pandemic (like Australia or New Zealand did) if it wasn't for the EU. Maybe not, because there are always big trade networks on a landmass on this size, but I do think that the 'free movement' ideology played a part as well. (Free movement is wonderful in general, but why in a pandemic??)
> Also, one wonders if EU states would have been better at closing their borders at the start of the pandemic (like Australia or New Zealand did) if it wasn't for the EU.
It's a fair question. OTOH, here in the UK, we were extremely slow to close our borders (in fact we've never closed our borders fully in the way that say Australia or NZ did, nor anything close), with the justification being that the UK is an international hub.
The real reason, of course, is that our government is too spineless and inept to take such decisive action, and has the collective intellect of a colony of woodlice.
I don't know enough about the EU decision making process around closing borders to know if their bureaucracy was a problem. I know Italy introduced restrictions fairly early on (back in February, or maybe early March 2020), but I do remember being surprised that people were still allowed to cross the border between Switzerland and Italy for work purposes even whilst the pandemic was raging in Italy. (Switzerland isn't in the EU, obviously.) I also remember being surprised that ski resorts such as Aprica, in Italy, were still open as late as the beginning of the second week of March in 2020.
The UK is very densely populated, particularly in south east England, compared to many countries, so risk of accelerated transmission is and always has been considerably higher. We also have an ageing population with a history (at a population level) of making poor lifestyle choices who have accrued a significant burden of pre-existing medical conditions (not unlike the USA), with the distribution across the whole of the country not entirely mirroring population density. Again, this increases the severity of COVID for those who fall into affected demographics.
With that being said, I have no doubt that more decisive measures earlier in the pandemic, more consistently applied throughout the pandemic, would have led to a significant reduction in both the human and economic costs of the pandemic in our country.
I would like to see Boris Johnson and his cadre of fawning, useless imbeciles stripped of their citizenships and banished to a frozen wasteland to endure an existence of hard labour for the rest of their natural lives. Their abject failure to step up and lead in the face of the greatest challenge we have faced since WWII - to discharge their most basic responsibilities to the people of this country - absolutely disgusts me.
m8, to me it seemed like all the news I read in the last years, about England and the road to surveillance state, put your country ahead. I'm sure Boris will soon announce they'll do the same.
1. Ursula von der Leyen and the EU Commission bullying companies and non-EU countries about vaccine production and provision. A wider point here is that the undemocratic nature of the Commission is something that I have always viewed as a problem.
2. The generally shambolic and inconsistent handling of vaccine procurement and rollout within the EU (which does now at least appear to be running much more smoothly; the UK government did well here but, overall, has handled the pandemic with majestic ineptitude).
3. This[0]. Chatcontrol 2.0 isn't the first ill thought out piece of legislation to get approval in the EU, and it won't be the last, but it is certainly one of the more sinister, and a significant violation of privacy amongst the majority of law-abiding citizens.
Overall I would still probably prefer to be in the EU than not, but I'm simply not as certain about that as I used to be.
[0] This whole assessment is of course contingent on the UK not simply falling into line with this legislation, a la GDPR, anyway. I'm on board with the spirit of GDPR and related legislation but the way every organisation seems to comply has certainly made the web suck more.