EU — Can I Stay Or Must I Go? — An EU National's Perspective

The blog publisher has belatedly received/opened the following from 'An EU National' who had no say in the UK's EU referendum. the blog publisher delights in publishing it on an otherwise very sad day, and in knowing Ivy and proclaiming greater allegiance to his 'EU National' commentator, friend and comrade and what she stand for than any allegiance for the British crown.

EU — Can I Stay Or Must I Go?

With lyrics such as:

Should I go there will be trouble

Should I stay it will be double...

I’m not surprised Mick Jones from Clash doesn't want his song associated with EU Referendum.

But then I’m really tired of same “In or Out” rhetoric ignoring our lack of voting rights.

If Scotland prevented its English citizens from voting – there would have been a public outcry. The Scottish Referendum would not have been allowed then.

But when EEA* Nationals lost voting rights in EU Referendum – who cared?

Certainly not LEXIT** or Abstain from Vote brigades, busy rebranding themselves as “not racists” only against the institution of EU. If they poured as much energy into fighting for equal voting rights at EU Referendum – then I would have believed them. Instead they enabled a right-wing narrative on how Britons only should vote. Rather than quit ignoring how EEA Nationals & other migrants have been denied a vote which will determine if we can stay or lose rights to benefits, etc.

Scratch the surface & this exposes a view of people as “us” or “them” instead of just “we”. Migrants are not seen as people living in UK, let alone as people settled in UK. Because migrants are seen as some external workforce which Britons can allow, restrict, send away or deny equal rights to.

So instead of colluding with EU Referendum being all about Britons staying or leaving EU, I ask those of you who are British to examine your privilege. This is similar to when white people are asked to examine our privilege, instead of pretending that people of all races are treated equally.

ü  The privilege of not being forced out of UK when you can’t support yourself.

ü  The right to claim benefits & not losing those right due to nationality.

ü  The privilege of having a UK citizenship & not been denied one

ü  The privilege of not risk getting deported if you’re an activist opposing the regime***

ü  The privilege of not having to pay around £1500 just to apply for a citizenship without getting any (or barely any) money back if you’ve been denied.

ü  The privilege of not having to apply for Permanent Residence Cards, pass English tests, redo complex life in UK tests & pledge allegiance with the Queen just to be British.

And as of today:

ü  The right to vote on whether EEA migrants should be able to stay, get benefits, etc.

ü  The privilege of not having to vote without losing any of your above mentioned rights

This is by no means an exhaustive list. And sure, it is a lot worse for non-EEA migrants, asylum seekers, refugees, paperless immigrants... 

I just wanted to show how people who wonder how & if they should vote today, enjoy rights that other citizens in UK don’t have. And how you will continue to enjoy these rights even if you don’t vote. Same cannot be said about EEA & other migrants whose lives will be dictated by your choices.

Secondly, I’d like you to imagine what it would be like if you didn’t have those rights. And how you would like others to vote in an election which will directly affect your life – right to stay & right to benefits.

-Ivy-

* EEA – European Economic Area  

** LEXIT – left-wing version of leaving the EU (European Union)

*** Operation Nexus – protecting us from terrorism, apparentlyhttp://www.airecentre.org/news.php/226/operation-nexus-the-unlawful-deportation-of-eu-nationals

Imbalance of bargaining power in DWP benefit agreements and software licensing agreements

I believe an excellent analogy for the lack of bargaining power that benefit claimants have in what they/we get signed up to is in computer software licensing agreements. If we do not agree to the latter, we cannot get the benefit; and if we do not click to say, "I have read and agree to the terms of the [software in question's] License Agreement..." we cannot install it to our computers.

Faced with loads of gobbledygook such as the labyrinth of languages beyond the labyrinth of irrelevant-to-the-current-upgrade other software licenses that, say, Adobe Flash Player presents the reader/user with beyond the 'Read the license here' presents one with, I would not be surpised if most users resign themselves to signing without reading what they are supposedly agreeing to. 

Pressed for time as a person with a learning difficulty — resulting in extremely slow reading speed — anyway I have mostly not bothered to read the damned corporate legalese. Yet today I decided to have a go at the challenge presented by the 'Read the license agreement here' clickable link, with the aid of using the 'find' key combination at the eventual multilingual 54 page pdf document for Adobe Flash Player http://wwwimages.adobe.com/content/dam/acom/en/legal/licenses-terms/pdf/Flash_Player_21_0.pdf

And there I found this item:

7.3 Local Storage. Flash Player and Adobe AIR may allow third parties to store certain information on your Computer in a local data file known as a local shared object. The type and amount of information that the third party application requests to be stored in a local shared object can vary by application and such requests are controlled by the third party. To find more information on local shared objects and learn how to limit or control the storage of local shared objects on your Computer, please visit http://www.adobe.com/go/flashplayer_security.

What would those 'third parties' stand to gain from such data collection? What safeguards would operate to ensure that the user is not abused through such agreed snooping? Why should anyone be obliged to sign up to such a contract clause? Maybe it's time for me to uninstall Adobe Flash Player and thus rule myself out of receiving online video content?

The title of a 1990's book by David C Korten comes to my mind: 'When corporations rule the world'.