Who owns the Language

Now I know that Europhiles want the EU to control every bodily function that we ever indulge in, but I hadn't realised that they wanted to control the English Language. The wonderful Yes Blog has decided that only it has the right to define the term Pro-European.

The term “pro-European” is a short-hand for the political view that favours (1) the democratic unity of Europe and (2) the steps which the EU is taking towards it. An anti-European, therefore, is someone who opposes this.

You may or may not agree. Its not an unreasonable definition but his logic is beautifully flawed:

To say that it is possible to be pro-European without supporting points (1) and (2) above is to remove from the term any political meaning whatsoever. In that view, Europe is nothing more than a geographical expression. To be in favour of Europe is no more meaningful than to support the Sargasso Sea or to be passionate about the Limpopo River.

Which is more or less what we have been saying all along. The terms Pro-European and Anti-European are meaningless. As an aside, the website has a very interesting name: Yes, Yes. I may be wrong, but normally the only time one hears the word yes repeated, it is by someone getting a good f**king. Not a bad name for a Pro-EU site.