I repeated myself because I thought you overlooked some of my arguments or that I didn’t express myself clearly. But no, you simply chose to ignore half my arguments three times in a row. Nice!

Do you have something to counter my points on EEA vs EU membership, or is “You keep saying this…” all you could come up with?

… yet multiple EU politicians keep expressing a desire for the UK to be in the union.

If that’s a sound argument, then surely Brexit was a splendid idea, too – after all, multiple politicians expressed a desire for it!

Oops, I missed a few words in my last paragraph. My bad.

I agree that the larger market and membership fees would be beneficial to the EU (though it doesn’t need it even half as much as the UK needs access to the market).

Both of these things, however, would also be achieved if the UK only joined the EEA instead of the EU itself (=what i was trying to say in my last comment). Like Norway or Iceland, the UK would retain (more?) control over some areas, including farming and fishing, but would have no say on EU internals.

And since the internal affairs are complicated enough without the UK, I don’t see how minor benefits could outweigh its general stance towards Europe and further integration (which, imho, is needed direlly)

To be honest, I even have doubts about the UKs soft power post Brexit; in my perception, it has decreased drastically since the referendum.

Edit: I am in complete agreement on your points about benefits for the UK. Heck, from the UK’s perspective, full membership would probably be best. I just don’t think it would be in the best interest of the union.

Tbf, I couldn’t find a source for the UK’s voting behavior (and I was being a bit hyperbole). And it’s true tht we haven’t really seen any reforms since then. The EU has many different countries that want different things at times and some (including mine) are incredibly apathetic.

But that is actually the reason why I do not want the UK to rejoin. Structural reforms are incredibly slow and hard as is. Let’s take a common European army for example; afaik a majority would be in favor of it. A member of the European parliament that I once talked with also talked about widespread support within the official bodies of the union. And still, things are slow, though not stagnant; i.e. Germany and the Netherlands have begun integrating their armies into ond.

And all of what has changed i this regard, happened after Brexit (or the referendum, anyway). The UK never had to block votes, because with the UK, any attempts towards a common European army would have been struck down long before anybody got to vote on it. Heck, Eurosceptics loved to use ideas like these to paint Brussels as the boogeyman.

So I’m still not convinced that a full rejoin would offer significant advantages over a Norway type of deal for the EU.

I’m an American, so it’s maybe hard to put myself exactly in the same shoes, but if I were in the EU and able to act freely, I’d personally make the concession to permit the opt-outs to the UK if it permitted for Rejoin (that is, I don’t think that there is great harm, as things were working all right earlier and that any precedent concerns could be addressed arguing that this is a special case)

The EU would be nigh insane if it were to grant the UK its previous opt-outs, in my opinon. They only got them in the first place because they acted as though were special. They never really committed to the idea of the Union and kept using their potential exit from the union as a bartering chip. But, unfortunately them, they fell flat on their faces when they actually left.

And, honestly, things were not all right before; the UK loved to block just about anything that went beyond trade deals.

The EU has nothing to gain if it went back to giving the UK special treatment. And not really a reason to do it, either, because the UK needs the EU much more than the other way around, as the Brexit negotiations demonstrated clearly.

Giving them back their opt-outs would be like giving in to a child that keeps throwing tantrums when things don’t go its way. If the UK wants to come back, then the EU cannot allow anything but a regular membership – if it greenlights the UK’s application at all.

We do, and Ireland, Denmark and Poland have gotten opt-outs, too (link). The United Kingdom, however, was so extreme about it, that Wikipedia dedicated an entire article just to their opt-outs.

The UK was no founding member of the EU by choice, if I remember correctly. And later on, they only joined due to the financial prospects, not the underlying idea(ls). They always acted as though they were special when they were part of the union (see aforementioned opt-outs) and completely lost it during the Brexit negotiations, when they acted as though they had some sort of leverage over the entire EU. I quite like CGP Grey’s video on the topic: youtube.com

In my opinion, the French were right when they didn’t want the British to join the union; most of their initial reservations did come true, after all. So, if the UK rejoined the common market without joining the EU, like Norway, for example, that would be fine by me. But no more.

As long as the British do not change their overall stance to the EU much more (and come to terms with their non-specialness), anyway.

Would it really be that great for the EU, though? After all, the UK was never particularly fond of the European idea generally and further integration (i.e. federalization) in particular, to put it mildly. My biggest fear is the UK might go back blocking just about anything that goes beyond simple trade deals.

So, imho, the EU would be better off it the UK simply rejoined the common market, but not the political union. We have more than enough dissent, as is.