It just isn't 1833 any more

[bunn]

I see that the residents of the Falkland Islands have voted to stay British again. I'm glad they are getting a choice. I really don't feel that 'they were Argentinian in 1833' is really much of an argument. Imagine if we rolled everything back legally to the status in 1833! It would certainly be entertaining (who's going to volunteer to tell China that they should be a monarchy again?), but I can't help feeling that 'let's just ask people which nation they want to belong to now' is the more practical approach.

Comments

[purplecat]

I remember once pointing out to an American who was holding forth on how the descendents of English settlers in Northern Ireland should really just go back to England, that the families of said English Settlers had, in many cases, settled in Nothern Ireland long before the families of most Americans had settled in North America.

EDIT: Mind you, I've always been in favour of Northern Ireland becoming the 51st state of America, irrespective of what any particular population wants and based entirely on the observation that America seems to think it has a magic solution to the problems there.

[parrot-knight.livejournal.com]

The intermarriage of 'English' (and the 'active ingredient' in the polarisation of views in Northern Ireland were Scottish) and other elements in the Irish population is such that this would be very difficult...