Canada @lemmy.ca RelativityRanger @lemmy.ca 2d ago

Group photo at the European (w/ Canada) summit

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Would Canada be interested in joining the EU? Might make sense considering what a bad neighbor the US has become.
- Canadian here, everybody I know would love this
  
  Another Canadian here... yes please.
  
  I'm not opposed to it!
  
  I’m sorry but I I have to agree
- And Canada does have a land border with an EU country - Denmark. Canada and Denmark had a long standing border dispute over Hans island featuring multiple armed raids. It was resolved in a mature and sensible fashion to just divide the island. Good for all involved.
  
  Canada also has land in France. The Vimy Ridge memorial is officially Canadian territory, granted by France.
  
  France also has St. Pierre and Miquelon that shares a border with Newfoundland.
  
  Maritime border. They are a couple km off the coast.
  
  multiple armed raids
  
  I mean...technically....sure. But the two armed groups were never actually there at the same time. They simply came at different times to swap Whiskey and Schnaps.
  
  Taking whiskey and leaving fucking schnapps is the real crime here.
  
  Welp, now the Danes are going to vote no.
  
  Hahaha. All in good fun. We're basically cousins at this point.
  
  And to lower the other's flag
  
  The only 'dispute' I know about on Hans island was the Whisky Dispute, which was resolved peacefully after years of soldiers 'claiming' the land by stealing each other's flags and leaving booze for each other. More like a very lazy game of capture the flag if you ask me.
  
  Are these the armed raids you refer to?
  
  Yes. The raids were mostly to not to forfeit their territorial claims, booze left as a sorry for the trouble gift.
  
  It was resolved in a mature and sensible fashion to just divide the island.
  
  Along the obvious seam that was there the whole time.
  
  I'd hate to be the custom's agent posted there.
  
  And another (and older) maratime border with France.
- As a Canadian... we didn't know this was an option. But hell yeah, we'd join the EU.
- This Canadian would be happy to join.
  
  I think the EU is waiting to see if we get PP or not since we're on the brink of stupidity like the US was. If we elect a PM interested in being a civilized member of the global stage, I think we'll be invited in.
- I would be happy if we at least could ratify CETA finally. Sheesh
- I would love to join the EU, my grandpa immigrated to Canada from the Netherlands after WW2 but Netherlands doesn't offer citizenship to grandchildren ):
  
  Would be nice to have the freedom of travel to the EU and vice versa if anyone wants to come over and visit Canada.
- I'm doubtful full membership will ever happen, and even an EEA Norway-style agreement where we adopt 75% of the EU's laws without representation but keep our fishing and agricultural policies (pre-requisites for the Atlantic and Prairie Provinces to agree), would take decades to be negotiated, signed and ratified with all the dysfunctional, proportional representational governments in Europe right now.
  
  There's been discussions about "associate membership" in the EU to bypass the European-ness requirement, but I don't think that's gotten any traction.
  
  I would be grateful for any kind of free movement agreement that gains traction right now, even with CARICOM or MERCOSUR.
  
  Nonsense those countries with proportional representation are more stable and perform better on a variety of issues.
  
  They score higher on the democracy index than we do.
  
  Of course you're getting downvoted, this is the rational answer.
- At first glance it sounds good but joining the EU officially is unnecessarily complex. It would make more sense to join Europe similar to Iceland and Norway.
  
  Which isn't actually mutually exclusive - kind of the opposite actually.
  
  Sorry I think it's too early for me to understand what you mean haha.
  
  Aren't Iceland and Norway in the Schengen area, but not actually in the EU?
  
  And a bunch of other related agreements (Norway at centre left):
  
  Arguably, as it has worked out, being in the EU is like the capstone of aligning with Europe in those other ways. To get closer to Europe you get closer to joining the EU, even if you never actually do.
  
  That infographic is fantastic
  
  Wikipedia has them for a bunch of regions, actually. Ours is way more of a clusterfuck.
- It would be terrible for our country, just look at the impact the mere thought of tarrifs has had on our economy. A full renegotiation of the US Canada trade border would be chaos.
  
  Europeans are cool and I wish we had your public transit, but EU membership of a NA country will never happen.
  
  A full renegotiation of the US Canada trade border would be chaos
  
  But that is precisely what Trump is demanding now. Even though he tore up NAFTA and renegotiated the deal in his first presidency (I am sure I remember him saying it was the greatest trade deal ever signed and the greatest win for ~~Trump~~America).
  
  You're getting downvoted. But I agree with you.
  
  Canada can accomplish most of its goals regarding diversifying its trade away from the U.S. without having to go to full EU status.
  
  But I sure wouldn't mind having some of those lovely French nukes sitting on our southern border right now. If full EU membership is what it takes for that to happen, so be it.
- hungary will block it probably
- At the very least, Canada should be allowed to participate in the Eurovision song contest!

87 comments