I considerer myself to be a British EU citizen exercising my right to live in France.
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Well you have obviously done better than me.
According to l’INSEE and their census information… I am an immigrant from a country within the European Union. 
seems fair enough to me.
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Gendarmes are just people - obviously there are good ones and bad ones. I’m sure people have polar opposite experiences with police in the UK and any other country too.
I agree with you Jane, we’re currently EU Citizens and have freedom of movement rights, not immigrants, who have much more restrictive conditions if they want to move here. If brexit happens, future movers both from Britain to the EU and from the EU to Britain will soon appreciate the difference. Hopefully an agreement will be ratified and we (British already in the EU and EU expatriates already in Britain) will retain most of our current special status.
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Me too, David. My Irish grandmother was born in Singapore. My mum can get the Irish passport and I would have been able to had she done that before I was born.
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And I started wondering where all the ‘immigrants’ in the UK came from - so I looked it up!
Migrants in the UK - Published Feb 2017
Now then - you’ll see that 8 of the Top 10 ‘sender’ citizen countries are in the EU (accounting for nearly 50% of all UK migrants) - with a massively important 15.7% share going to the Polish.
So my question is - when folks in the UK refer to immigrants, are they including the EU migrants or not? Are they just exercising their rights of free movement and therefore not real immigrants? Or - were they just all lumped in together to feed Brexit fever?
Proud to be an immigrant in France - Yeah! 
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I very much suspect that ‘immigrant’ conjures up a semi-subconscious image of someone brown or black or yellow who doesn’t necessarily speak good English or live somewhere nice or do nice job if any job and that mr and mrs average pinkish British person wot talk English proper don’t want to be considered the way they more or less overtly consider someone who corresponds to that description. And it probably conjures up that sort of image and reaction all over Europe, not just in GB.
It is a bit like straight men being twitchy around gay men because they think the gay men may have the attitude towards them that they (the straight men) have towards women.
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Vero - brilliantly put!! :-
Despite being British my father’s side of my family right down to my children have been a bit transient in their nature. As I mentioned before my paternal grandmother was born to Irish parents who owned farms in India. She met and married my Scottish grandfather in India where my father and his three sisters were also born. My father went to school in England where he met and married my Welsh mother. They had plans to emigrate to New Zealand but gave up on that idea when they both got jobs in Cornwall. My sisters and I were born there. My children were born in Germany and one of them is in New Zealand at the moment and another has worked in both Singapore and Brisbane although currently she is working for an international company based in London. I moved from Germany to France. Immigrant, expat or whatever I don’t find it hard to understand people who are the tumbleweeds of the human world, those who move around without setting down solid roots. We are living in an age where moving to new places and new jobs is straightforward and that suits some people, it’s a shame those people who may be considered to be a bit different need to be labelled at all.
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How do I contact Dignitas?
It might be cheaper to just unsubscribe, David 
Wonderful sweeping statement which is obviously based on your experience of being in the company of many gay and straight men. I think you are woefully mistaken and l for one have never found myself ‘twitching’ or uncomfortable in any way in gay (male or female) company.
Your broad brush homilies about your view of how Mr & Mrs “Average” pinkish people think is, in my view, is at the best extraordinarily pretentious and at the worse insulting; I might frequently drop my 'Aitches and speak with a East London accent - It doesn’t make me stupid.
Hi Dan
I notice you haven’t been posting for some months… nice to see you back with us.
However, I think you are being a little harsh on @vero
I chuckled at her comment and I can’t see why you didn’t…
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I have actually spent a great deal of my life in the company of men both gay and straight, possibly more gay than straight if I think about it. Does that bother you?
I have probably also been on the receiving end of the genuine attitudes of mr and mrs average pinkish person in GB vis à vis johnny and janie foreigner what with being a frog and slitty-eyed (due respect to HRH the Duke of Edinburgh).
How could I possibly call you stupid before meeting you?
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Vèronique is consommée when it comes to adding a little vinaigrette to her offerings.
“On ne prend pas les mouches avec du vinaigrette” 
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In my younger days nightclubbing I quickly worked out that my favourite haunts were the “gay bars”…No pressure from being chatted up on a night out but just lots of laughing and dancing…and I love laughing and dancing…,it could well have been to do with the fact that one of my family was struggling with coming out to his immediate family at that time but it kind of stuck that if I/we wanted a night out without the hassle of being chatted up then a gay bar it was…My first flight ever out of the U.K. on my own and by myself and I found myself sitting next to two gay men and it was a laugh a minute…I have to admit that I intensely dislike the “transgenderism transhumanist narrative”…as far as I know there are two genders…male and female…Anything that goes on between consenting ADULTS is fine by me…anything that takes advantage of and fails to recognise the abuse of a child who is not an adult in the eyes of the law is unforgivable…
Homosexuality and paedophilia are two completely different things, I don’t know why the latter is even being mentioned in a conversation about normal behaviour.
I don’t know what you mean by transgenderism transhumanist narrative. As far as I can see, there are two sexes, because sex is a biological reality, for the vast majority of people it is clear which they are; while gender is a social construct.
I don’t buy the ladybrain/gentlemanbrain argument but that makes me a TERF according to the TRAs I’m afraid. Maybe that means you are a TERF too😉 I don’t actually care what people get up, or down to, whatever their inclination as long as it is ethically ok.
I entirely agree about the going out as a young woman with your gay male friends, much more fun because they don’t turn into an octopus when you hop into a taxi… there was a great fun place in Cambridge (451???)
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Exactly my point…there are two genders male and female and we are either born male or female and maybe turn out to be heterosexual bisexual or homosexual…who cares not a problem between consenting adults…just that I’ve noticed a narrative that would have us believe that being born male and female no longer applies …”ok well when I took my O level biology there were only male and female…raising a child gender neutral”.,??? School teachers beng fired for calling a child he or she… her or him…??? My time over again raising my kids…,and I was forever falling out with the heads years ago when I got called in to justify my kids apparent relactriacence to conform even then…and It’s far worse now…My time over again I’d probably be 100 times worse than I was back then…who in hell can come up with a “law” that says a teacher has to remain gender neutral…??? My run ins with education had to do with uniform…bullying of my kids over uniform bullying of my kids over taking holidays outside of acceptable holiday periods…threats by the school that if I didn’t agree to interview under caution then…WHAT…??? WHAT EXACTLY…???the list of alleged transgressions is endless…white laces in black shoes…not acceptable…standing up against the teacher for something they are saying that you know is wrong and you’ve been raised to know whats right…??? Not acceptable…School staff harassing a child for his totally valid views so much that eventually he gives up learning and sets out to make his own way free from the bigotry free from the narrow mindedness that can’t see an individuals creative potential from the colour of a shoe lace…??? Maybe France is different…
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Hi Stella - Actually l didn’t know l had been away and why would you mention how often l post - Is it relevant?
Isn’t my post self explanatory as to my thoughts on what ‘Vero’ said. I didn’t find them funny yesterday, l don’t find them funny today and l cant see why you would ‘chuckle’ at them - But l respect your right to do so.
silly me…