A Victory for Euroscepticism?

So the results are now in, but what do the results of the European Parliamentary elections mean?

Well they are certainly the most important elections that the EU has held since voting to the European Parliament began in 1979. Eurosceptic parties did well across the continent, but in particular they did well in Greece, Italy, France, Britain and Denmark. In Greece the radically left-wing (and Eurosceptic) SYRIZA won the largest amount of seats whilst the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn won three seats. In France Marine LePen’s National Front managed to place first. In Italy Beppe Grillo’s Five Star Movement came in second to the pro-EU Democratic Party. In both Britain and Denmark Eurosceptic parties managed to beat out pro-EU left wing rivals to the top of the podium. Note: I will be doing separate posts on Greece, France and Britain, so I won’t write about them anymore in this post.

A lot of the media attention has been on the success of the far-right, but thankfully it has been largely exaggerated. In Hungary the neo-Nazi party, Jobbik, was hoping to increase the amount of seats it held in Europe from three. Fortunately it was unable to do so and in fact their share of the vote declined very slightly from 2009 (-0.48%). In Britain support for the BNP crumbled into nothing, France’s National Front isn’t truly far-right anymore. The only real success the neo-Nazis got was in Greece where Golden Dawn managed to gain three seats.

It is extremely important to note that the four largest European Parliament groups are all pro-EU and together they received 63.6% of the vote and 498 of the 751 seats in the European Parliament. Although the Eurosceptic parties did have their best night in European election history, don’t be fooled into thinking that they did far better than they actually did.

Parliamentary group	Vote	Change	Seats	Change	Pro or anti EU	Countries
EPP	24.2%	-8.33%	208	-59	Pro	12
S&D	24.4%	+1.62%	186	-2	Pro	5
Liberals	7.6%	-2.47%	58	-23	Pro	4
Greens	7.4%	+0.02%	46	-9	Pro	1
Left	6.1%	+2.09%	42	+7	Anti	1
EFD	5.2%	+0.28%	38	+9	Anti	2
Conservative	4.2%	-0.65%	45	-11	Mixed*	0
Other	21.0%	+7.45%	117	+88	Varies**	1

*They wish to repatriate powers from the EU, but do not wish to withdraw from the EU.

**As it is not a parliamentary group, the parties in this category do not have a defined political opinion. Yet most of the parties in this category are Eurosceptic.  

The Anti-EU vote includes all of the Left, EFD,
Conservatives and other

The difference between the 2009 and 2014 European elections
Colour represents the country's largest delegation
Purplish red - Left
Red - Socialists & Democrats
Light blue - EPP
Dark Blue: Conservatives
Purple: EFD
Green: Greens
Yellow: Liberals
Dark Grey: Even split or other

Britain - the Best Place to be Gay

Britain has been revealed to be the best place to be gay in Europe, according to the International Lesbian, Gay, Trans and Intersex Association (ILGA). The organisation rates countries based on their treatment by the law, rather than by society at large. It rates countries based on five categories (the percentage indicates how much it contributes to the final score)

1.       Laws & policies against discrimination (25%)

2.       Family recognition (25%)

3.       Protection against hate speech/crime (20%)

4.       Legal gender recognition (15%)

5.       Respect of freedom of assembly, association & expression (10%)

6.       Asylum (5%)

Britain scored 82%, coming in well ahead of Belgium (78%) and Spain (73%). It should not surprise you that Russia had the poorest score of only 6%, marginally worse than Azerbaijan (7%) and Armenia (9%).  Malta wins the award of most improved country, the country added 22% to their old score of 35%, which means that they are now one of only fifteen countries to have a score greater than 50%. Montenegro also improved significantly over the past year, adding 20% to their score of 27%, meaning they are just short of 50%. Bulgaria was the third best improver, increasing from 18% to 30% (a change of 12%).

The mean score for Europe unfortunately only went up 3% from 33% to 36% and only 15 countries are above 50% (Austria, Croatia and Malta are the new members of this group). The split in Europe can be seen clearly when you look at non-EU versus EU countries. The average for the EU is 46% whereas for non-EU countries the average is a measly 24%.

Thankfully it looks likely that Europe’s improving rights for LGBTI* individuals will improve again for the 2015! Already there are bills pending or proposed in 15 countries that would improve the recognition of same-sex couples**.

Britain’s score of 82% is an improvement of 5% on 2013’s score. The improved score was as a result of increased recognition of same-sex families and gender identity. The legalisation of same-sex marriage in England & Wales, and Scotland was the most important factor here. Northern Ireland also finally equalised adoption rights for same-sex couples. There’s a certain irony to Britain being the world’s leading voice when it comes to LGBTI rights. When Britain colonised the world it brought with it its homophobic laws and ideas to places which previously had none. If you look at a map of the countries which still criminalise same-sex relationships, they tend to fall into two of the following categories: Muslim majority or former British territory. A legacy like this is embarrassing to say the least, but the best we can do it show how wrong we were and continue to lead the world on gay rights issues.

For more information visit ILGA's website: http://www.ilga-europe.org/home/publications/rainbow_europe

*lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans & intersex

**Full marriage bill pending in Andorra, Austria, Finland, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and Switzerland.

Civil union (or equivalent) bill pending in Croatia and Italy, proposed in Cyprus.

Other recognition of same-sex couples bill pending in Austria, Estonia, Germany, Greece and Poland, proposed in Albania, San Marino and Slovenia.

In Ireland same-sex marriage is to go to a referendum in 2015, highly likely to succeed.

Five Worst Bible Verses

I feel lucky to live in the United Kingdom, and although 58% of the country identified as Christian, religion does not get brought into politics very often. The only recent debate in which religion featured predominantly was the same-sex marriage debate. The same cannot be said of the United States in which Christianity features heavily in every debate. Religion should be a private affair, between you and your God, not with the rest of the country. As a irreligious person this might really anger you, so here are five bible verses that contradict the idea that the God of the bible is a loving God.

1.       God kills 42 children: 2:23-24

"Elisha left Jericho to go to Bethel, and on the way some boys came out of the town and made fun of him. "Get out of here, baldy!" they shouted. Elisha turned around, glared at them, and cursed them in the name of the Lord. Then two she-bears came out of the woods and tore 42 of the boys to pieces."

That’s right, God killed 42 children just because they called his prophet bald.

2.       God condones slavery: 1 Timothy 6:1-2

“Those who are not slaves must consider their masters worthy of all respect, so that no one will speak evil of the name of God and of our teaching. Slaves belonging to Christian masters must not despise them, for they are their brothers and sisters. Instead they are to serve them even better, because those who benefit from their work are believers whom they love.”

Perhaps God would have been on the side of the Confederacy during the American Civil War, because apparently he’s perfectly fine with slavery.

3.       God on rape: Deuteronomy 22:28-29

“Suppose a man is caught raping a young woman who is not engaged. He is to pay her father the ‘bride price’ of fifty pieces of silver, and she is to become his wife, because he forced her to have intercourse with him. He can never divorce her as long as he lives.”

This really gives you an insight into how women were once treated. They are the property of their father until they get married. Basically, according to this bible verse. If you have 50 silver pieces, you can rape any woman who is not married or engaged, you just have to marry her afterwards. Poor you. I tried to find out how much 50 silver pieces is in today’s money but ‘piece’ is a rather undefined amount and silver is significantly less valuable today than several millennia ago.

4.       Killing innocent babies: Psalms 137:8-9

“Babylon, you will be destroyed. Happy are those who pay you back for what you have done to us – who take your babies and smash them against a rock.”

Apparently murdering babies is cool with God. At this stage I’m not too sure if I’m reading the word of God or the word of Joffrey Baratheon.

5.       Human sacrifices: Judges 11:30-32

“Jephithah promised the Lord: If you give me victory over the Ammonites, I will burn as an offering the first person that comes out of my house to meet me when I come back from victory. I will offer that person as a sacrifice.”

If you read the rest of the verse he ends up sacrificing his daughter, at no point does God intervene and stop it. But it was all OK as his daughter was fine with it, the only thing she was upset about was that she would die a virgin.

In my opinion you have the right to follow any religion: even if I feel that the religion is full of hate and a poor source for ‘moral’ behaviour. That’s your choice. But you don’t get to try and enforce your religion on the rest of society.

When all Christians stop trying to force their religion on other people, I will stop pointing out the parts of the Bible that are really nasty.  

If you want to find even more bible verses that should be condemned, visit www.evilbible.com

Note: The bible I used for these quotes is the Good News Bible, published by “The Bible Societies/Collins” which is a division of HarperCollinsPublishers. I used the 2004 version.

In Defence of Homophobes

Gay rights has made great progress across the West in recent years. At the start of this century not a single jurisdiction recognised same-sex marriage, now 19 countries (or parts of them) recognise same-sex marriage. In the US 17 states still had sodomy laws that banned gay sex in 2000.

As a direct result, being homophobic is becoming increasingly unpopular, so much so that it is causing people to lose their jobs! Earlier today the news broke that two brothers, David and Jason Benham, had their show on HGTV (an American channel) cancelled before it even started. Why? Right Wing Watch published an article in which it accused them of being virulently homophobic, with evidence attached. This caused the collective outrage machine, also known as the internet, to attack the brothers and demand that HGTV cancel their show. Back in March Mozilla Firefox appointed Brendan Eich as its CEO. This angered many gay rights activists who were upset at a $1000 donation Eich had made back in 2008 to California’s Proposition 8 which banned same-sex marriage. They demanded Eich’s head, and with the serious threat of a boycott, he resigned on the 3^rd of April, he lasted just ten days.

So is it right to fire people for their opinions, especially when those opinions are shared by millions within their respective country? I say no, we all have opinions which others would be horrified by, how would we feel if we got fired because of our opinions. So long as it doesn’t affect the ability for you to do your job, and it’s not illegal, you shouldn’t be fired, in my opinion.

Sarah Palin was one of many conservative politicians
who rallied to Chick-fil-A's side in 2012.
source: hypervocal.com

There are other reasons why gay rights activists should be careful demanding boycotts and people’s heads on spikes. One would be the potential for backfire, particularly in the US. Remember in 2012 and the whole Chick-fil-A scandal? Gay rights groups got very angry over anti-same-sex marriage donations and statements made by the COO Dan Cathy and demanded a boycott. Big mistake. Many conservatives rallied to Chick-fil-A’s side going so far as to have a “Chick-Fil-A appreciation Day” in which people went to the restaurants to celebrate the company’s homophobia. The direct result of the “boycotts” was a 30% rise in Chick-Fil-A’s profits. Opps.

There is another potential problem: inconsistency. It’s very easy to demand the boycott of Mozilla Firefox when you already use Google Chrome, or refuse to watch HGTV when you’ve never even heard of the channel. It’s easy to say that you’ll never eat at Chick-fil-A when you’ve never previously visited the establishment. It’s easy in those situations because all you are is a “keyboard warrior*”, who is sacrificing zilch. When was the last time that you heard of a serious demand to boycott Saudi Arabian oil, as the country puts homosexuals to death? After all, that is a lot worse than banning gays from getting married. If you demand that Eich, Cathy or the Benham brothers lose their jobs over anti-gay comments or donations, then I can only assume that you make sure that none of your clothes come from Pakistan or Bangladesh as they throw homosexuals in prison. You should demand these boycotts, but you might find yourself short on allies as those boycotts would actually cost people money and require effort.

Mob action also harms the gay rights movement in another way, it makes us look like the homophobes we hate; people with a dogmatic world view who ferociously attack anyone with a dissenting opinion. You don’t convince people to your side of the debate by shouting them down or forcibly silencing them. You have to engage in a debate, only then can you win. Of course there will be people who cannot be swayed by logic or reason, but we don’t need them. So long as a solid majority can be persuaded to our viewpoint, we will win. You also have to remember that their companies employ thousands of other people. By boycotting a company which has a high-ranking employee who makes a homophobic statement, you harm all their employees who are not homophobic. Is this really fair? Of course not.

There is one group of people who this does not apply to: elected officials. Elected officials are supposed to represent the public, unlike CEOs or TV hosts, and hence losing their job for shocking opinions should be what happens. Remember the UKIP councillor from Henley-on-Thames, David Silvester, who blamed the recent floods in the UK on gays? UKIP was absolutely right to throw him out of the party.

I do understand why people want to fire homophobes, but I do fear that it could do more harm than good to the gay rights movement.

*I appreciate the irony of using this phrase as I am also a keyboard warrior. I love the work of many “keyboard warrior” organisations, such as Avaaz; I am a proud follower and donor. But I dislike it when people only sign petitions.

For a full list of countries who ban homosexuality, click here. Note there are two revisions, India now gives homosexuals a minor sentence and Brunei puts them to death.

Strategising for the Democrats

The election of George W. Bush in 2004 was incredibly close, Bush beat his Democratic rival, John Kerry, by 2.4%. In terms of the Electoral College, Bush won 35 more votes than Kerry. This means that if a state worth 18 or more votes in the Electoral College had voted for Kerry instead of Bush, the former would have won the election.

Everyone knew that the election would be a close one and so Karl Rove, a senior adviser to the Bush-Cheney campaign devised a plan to boost turnout amongst the Republican Party’s evangelical Christian base. So in eleven states around the country Rove managed to get referendums on same-sex marriage bans on the ballot. The hope was that this would encourage evangelicals to turn out to vote to ban same-sex marriage and at the same time they would cast a ballot for George W. Bush. Amongst those states was Ohio, worth 20 votes in the Electoral College, enough to swing the election. The margin of victory was only 2.1%.

Currently the Democrats have 55 Senators to the Republicans’ 45, which means that a net change of six seats would tip the Senate into the hands of the Republicans. So if the Democrats want to keep the Senate they need to be strategic. One of the ways that they can do this is by copying Rove’s 2004 strategy and get issues on the ballot that increase turnout. The Democrats have two issues which could help them in 2014: the minimum wage and marijuana.

According to a recent George Washington University poll, having marijuana legalisation on the ballot makes 40% of people “much more likely” to vote, whilst it makes a further 30% “somewhat more likely” to vote. This is good news for Democrats as it boosts turnout, particularly amongst young people who are notoriously bad at voting in midterms and a heavily Democratic demographic. Another constituency of the Democratic coalition are poorer people, who have the most to gain from raising the minimum wage. It is a massive encouragement for people to vote if what they are voting for is a basically a raise.

The minimum wage is highly popular and very successful on the ballot. Since referendums on the issue started in 1988 it only failed twice, once in Missouri and Montana, both in 1996. Since 2004 it has averaged 66% in favour and only 34% against. Having such a popular question is hugely beneficial to the Democrat in the same race as it brings the question of the minimum wage to more prominence.

If Democrats want to keep hold of the Senate then they need to make sure that Republicans gain no more than five seats (assuming the Democrats gain none). To do this the Democrats should get marijuana and the minimum wage on the ballot in as many states as possible, especially in ones where a close race is expected. Even in states without a competitive Senate race, it is still a good idea to have these initiatives to help bolster House Democrats. There are attempts to get the minimum wage on the ballot in several states, but so far only Alaska and South Dakota definitely have it on the 4^th of November ballot. Alaska is also the only state with marijuana legislation on the ballot and Florida has medical marijuana on the ballot. Alaska is also one of the states with a good chance of going Republican in November, having both on the ballot should boost Senator Mark Begich’s chances of being re-elected.

Ukrainian Crisis Approaches Boiling Point

The crisis in Ukraine has continued to get even hotter over the past week despite attempts by diplomats to secure a peace deal.

Eastern Ukraine has a large proportion of ethnic Russians, and many Ukrainians who are supportive of Russia. This is why the Kremlin has moved its focus from Crimea to the rest of eastern Ukraine. The series of events which resulted in Crimea joining Russia has begun to play out across the east. Armed men have taken numerous government buildings, erected Russian flags and demanded that they be allowed to join Russia. Just like the armed men in Crimea they are too well-organised to simply be pro-Russian locals. Rather, they are mostly members of the Russian armed forces. Of course Russia denies that the militia are connected to the Russian military, but they made the same statements about the militia in Crimea and have since admitted that they were actually Russian soldiers.

Yet, as I have said in my previous posts, these areas are not like Crimea. They are not majority Russian and hence the Ukrainian government will put up more of a fight for control of the region. Already Kiev had sent troops in to take some key positions back from the Russians.

Despite the chaotic situation in the east, there did seem to be some hope that a peaceful solution might actually be reached! The governments of Ukraine, Russia, the US and EU reached an agreement in Geneva. The agreement called for the dissolving of all illegal military groups, amnesty for all anti-government protesters and that the militias that have taken control of government buildings must leave them. Unfortunately that deal seems dead in the water as one of the spokesmen for the separatists has said that they are not bound by the deal.

This all plays perfectly into Putin’s hand; he gets to look like a sensible diplomat whilst continuing to destabilise eastern Ukraine through these separatists. If you want any more proof that Putin is planning on take eastern Ukraine, all you need to do is watch the press conference he held earlier this week in which he referred to the eastern parts of Ukraine as “new Russia”! If that isn’t a clear sign that he plans to go even further into the territory of Ukraine, I don’t know what could be!

We Need to Talk About Appeasement

When Russia took Crimea from Ukraine the West responded with shock. The reaction in Eastern and Central Europe was very different, for years leaders in those countries had warned that Russia had never lost its imperialistic ambitions. Fear is particularly rife in the Baltic States who, bar a brief period of independence between World Wards, spent several centuries under the rule of Russia.

If we look at demographics they may have a reason to fear Russian aggression. Estonia and Latvia have sizeable ethnic Russian minorities, particularly in the east of their countries. The county of Ida-Viru in north-eastern Estonia is over 70% Russian, even more ethnically homogenous than Crimea! When Putin decided that he was going to invade Crimea he used the excuse that he was only doing it to protect Russians from the new government in Kiev. In Latvia, Russians are frequently treated like second-class citizens. Perhaps Putin could use this as a pretext to invasion?

Yet there are massive differences between Ukraine/Crimea and the Baltic states. The origins of the Crimean Crisis is the debate of whether Ukraine should tie itself closer to Russia or the EU. There is no such debate in the Baltic States, all three are members of the EU and NATO and are fully within the Western fold. Membership of NATO is of key importance here, no sovereign nation has invaded on of its members since its formation in 1949.

Another difference between Ukraine/Crimea and the Baltic states is of demographics and population. Estonia and Latvia have the highest proportions of ethnic Russians of the former USSR with 24.8% and 26.9% respectively. Compare this to Ukraine which has ‘only’ 17.3% ethnic Russians. But comparing country-wide percentages is not being intellectually honest. Russia has not invaded all of Ukraine, only Crimea. In Crimea 58.8% of the people are Russian. The population of these states is also important. Crimea has a population of 2.4 million, larger than both Estonia (1.3 million) and Latvia (2 million), only Lithuania with a population of 3 million is larger than Crimea. Lithuania has also got far fewer ethnic Russians, who make up only 5.8% of the population. There are more Russians in Crimea than the three Baltic States combined. The Estonian county of Ida-Viru has only 140,000 people in it. Would Putin really risk war with the West over an insignificant Estonian county? (no offence people of Ida-Viru county) When looking at the Baltic States Putin would be forced to do a cost-benefit analysis. He would then find the potential costs way too high and the benefits too few. It would seem inconceivable, but Putin has proved to be unpredictably before and will likely be so in the future.

So if the Baltic States will not be his next target, what will? The most commonly talked about are eastern Ukraine and Moldova.

Moldova is a small, landlocked country sandwiched between Ukraine and Romania. The fact that it does not border Russia, or even the sea, makes it seem strange that it might be the next flashpoint in a new Cold War. The fact that only 9.4% of Moldova is ethnically Russian further confuses the situation. Yet, as was the case with Ukraine, the problem is only part of the country. When Moldova seceded from the Soviet Union in 1991 the eastern portion of Moldova, Transnistria, seceded from Moldova. Although no UN member recognises the independence of Transnistria, it has been de facto independent for over 20 years. Another key issue is the demographics of the pseudo-independent state, it is roughly evenly split between Moldovans, Russians and Ukrainians (32, 30 and 29 respectively). Unlike the Baltic States, Moldova is not an EU or NATO member and hence is not well protected from foreign aggression.

Yet the major problem with invading Transnistria would be how could they get there? The most likely scenario would involve going through Ukraine and possibly Moldova. This could further destabilise the situation in Ukraine, especially since it would put Russian troops extremely close to Ukraine’s 4^th largest city, Odessa. Once they had control of Transnistria there would be the issue of what to do next? To move in/out of Transnistria would involve going through Ukraine, or Moldova and Romania. Considering Russia would have violated the sovereignty of the former two, they would be unlikely to willingly help Russia. Another option would be to take more territory, considering Putin’s actions already, it is not unthinkable. One issue that could prevent Russian action in Transnistria is the reaction that the rest of Moldova would have. Moldova is hoping is one day enter the European fold, Russia violating their sovereignty would likely cause them to seek closer ties with Europe sooner.

So if Transnistria is unlikely to happen, what really are the chances of Russia invading eastern Ukraine? As I have explained previously, no Ukrainian Oblast has more than 40% ethnic Russians (other than Crimea). Yet who says that Russia has to take an entire Oblast, perhaps just part of it. The city of Donetsk is 48% Russian, could Putin decide that he would likely to take that city?

Assigning probabilities is pointless as it all depends on how the West acts going into the future. If the West does nothing then the chances of Russia taking action in Transnistria, eastern Ukraine or the Baltic states would increase. If Putin does go further and the West does not take military action then we are taking about appeasement. I know accusing Putin of acting like Hitler seems drastic, but it is true. Hitler took Czechoslovakia and Poland to ‘protect’ ethnic Germans. If Putin takes Ukraine and Moldova to ‘protect’ ethnic Russians then how is he any different?