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Nearest national capital (lemmy.world)
submitted 8 months ago by to c/map_enthusiasts@sopuli.xyz
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[–] 33 points 8 months ago (2 children)

I guess this map doesn't count Edinburgh, Cardiff or Belfast as capital cities

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  • [–] 20 points 8 months ago (3 children)

    That's why it says "national" capital. The national capital of those places is London.

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  • [–] 15 points 8 months ago (2 children)

    Often we forget just how unique the UK is. 4 countries but also just 1 country depending on the context.

    When it comes to sports competitions, sometimes they're all the one team and sometimes they're separate teams.

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  • [–] 10 points 8 months ago (2 children)

    Lots of places have subnational entities which they may or may not call something that translates to "country". Nothing particularly unique about the UK. The only thing that is unique is that in some sports, the UK's subnational entities have separate teams, you are right about that part.

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  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago (1 child)

    Quite typical of the Brits to get pissy about you saying the truth.

    They went all over the world drawing arbitrary lines separating or forcing peoples together, but try to get them to understand that the world considers the UK to be a singular entity and they blow a fucking fuse over the semantics. And they're not even correct about the semantics!

    The entitlement some British people feel over foreigners giving a shit for their internal politics is frankly outrageous.

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  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago (1 child)

    Quite typical of the ignorant to ignore years of history of rebellion, genocide, imperial conquest, cultural warfare, and indoctrination.

    The Roman Empire spanned Europe but you wouldn't blame the subjects in, for example, France, for the decisions and conquest of the Roman leaders. How exactly does the same logic apply to us?

    England are an imperial power, they gained their power through military conquest. Who were their first targets? Their neighbours. Maintaining a military conflict within your island is difficult so eventually they resorted to cultural warfare as well as military. For example, outlawing the Scottish language, dress, instruments, and ultimately identity. A crime to be yourself.

    You empathise with people all over the world having arbitrary lines drawn and the separating/forcing of peoples apart/together but not with Scotland/Wales/Ireland because of your dislike of Brits.

    You're blinded by your own hatred. My hatred of Brits is likely higher than yours, and I am one in your eyes, which only exemplifies part of why I hate "Brits". A made up term for a made up people.

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  • [–] 4 points 8 months ago

    Sorry, I don't hate the Brits, I just think UKans are being ridiculous to expect us to care. The onus is not on foreigners to have an opinion – much less weigh on – domestic issues such as Scottish Independance or Irish unification. Even if I wanted to have an opinion, I'm more than likely to eat my own foot.

    Scotland and NI are nowhere near unique in their having a federalized governance and internal struggle for independence. However until independence happens, Scotland and NI are part of the UK and you can't be mad at maps of Europe for reflecting that fact.

    I support a sovereign Ukraine but a 1980 map of Europe would have it as a non-sovereign Soviet Republic and that's not a contradiction.

    Also very ironic that you would talk about "made up people" to a Belgian. I don't even talk the same language or receive the same TV channels as my compatriots 50 km over. We've mastered having a national identity built on not having a national identity.

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  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago (1 child)

    Lots of places have subnational entities which they may or may not call something that translates to “country”.

    Not saying you're wrong, but I'm curious as to some examples of this. I've heard various languages translating words for a country's subdivisions as things like state, province, prefecture, etc, but I haven't run across a country within a country before (unless you're talking about enclaves like the Vatican).

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  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago

    Germany and Austria are divided into Länder (singular: Land), which literally just means country. (Germany has 16 of them, Austria 9.) This is usually translated as states or provinces in English, but the word in German isn't Staaten or Provinzen, which is what we call the subdivisions of Australia, Canada, and the US.

    The Kingdom of the Netherlands is also divided into 4 countries.

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  • [–] 4 points 8 months ago (1 child)

    The nation of Scotland would beg to differ...

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  • [–] 9 points 8 months ago* (1 child)

    If everyone who sometimes calls themselves a nation counts, surely Barcelona must too… 😉

    "National capital" = capital of an independent sovereign state.

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  • [+] -7 points 8 months ago (3 children)

    Does Barcelona have it's own parliament, legal system, justice system, education system, taxation system, benefits system, housing system?

    Scotland isn't "sovereign" but it's far beyond what would be regarded as a region in other countries either.

    The United Kingdom is, as the name implies, a union of nation states. So despite your patronising tone it is a nation within a nation.

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  • [–] 22 points 8 months ago (1 child)

    Catalonia (the autonomous community or "nation" which Barcelona is the capital of) absolutely does have:

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  • [+] -13 points 8 months ago* (1 child)

    Perhaps that's why they have a strong independence movement then... Y'know, as a people who have their own unique national identity that have been oppressed into subjugation by a larger state. Ringing some similar bells with Scotland.

    Maybe instead of denigrating people for wishing for self determination and supporting the oppressive larger states, you should consider your list, which are pretty common determinates of nationality, and think on whether that therefore qualifies these people for independence and the right to state their capital city is their national capital.

    I certainly don't regard London as my capital city. My parliament is in Edinburgh, my immigrant friends go to Edinburgh for embassies, Edinburgh is the cultural hub, the financial hub, and legal focal point for the peoples of Scotland, why would they regard London as their capital?

    The same, I'm sure, can be said for the peoples of Wales, the North of Ireland (to a lesser extent, with some, er, troubles there), and Catalonia.

    After all, in the context of international laws, membership of extranational organisations like the EU, how many European nations are even sovereign any more? Does sovereignty matter in the context of this map when it's definition in the key is country?

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  • [–] 12 points 8 months ago

    Nothing I wrote is about "denigrating" people wishing for self-determination, or about "supporting the oppressive larger states". It's just currently a fact of the world that the independence movements in those places have not yet been successful. They might still be in the future!

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  • [–] 7 points 8 months ago (1 child)

    Also applies to the three regions of Belgium, FWIW. Even your ID card and passport will be slightly different depending on where you get it.

    And don't you start grandstanding about what you think that should mean for us, because regardless of what you say your outside understanding will be incomplete and your opinions will be ignorant.

    The UK has a unique history that has led its constituent nations to conceptualize strong cultural and political identities - which is far from unusual. The only unusual thing is that Brits keeps pretending that the UK is somehow Special™ and foreigners should give any more of a shit about its subnational divisions than you do about US states or German States or Canadian Provinces.

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  • [–] -4 points 8 months ago (1 child)

    And don't you start grandstanding about what you think that should mean for us, because regardless of what you say your outside understanding will be incomplete and your opinions will be ignorant.

    ...

    Apply the same logic. Scotland has had a pro- independence party in power since 2007, do you think this manifests in a vacuum or because there's legitimate reason to regard Scotland as a nation?

    75 years ago would you disregard the notion of Ukraine being a nation? Now you'd agree it most definitely is, but back then it was a member of the USSR, does that remove its credentials of being a nation just because it's been subjugated by a larger entity? Despite it's lengthy history, individual culture, etc?

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  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago (2 children)

    Came here to say this, it's wild how people still don't understand that Wales, Scotland and England are not the same country.

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  • [–] 13 points 8 months ago (1 child)

    They are to the rest of the world.

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  • [+] -6 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

    Well, I suppose you can't help stupid right?

    Edit - On second thought, calling people stupid for not understanding what is a fairly complicated political struggle in countries they have likely never been to is a shitty thing to do. My bad.

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  • [–] 8 points 8 months ago (1 child)

    There is no stupid. The 4 countries of the United Kingdom are akin to the states of the United States. No other country will ever recognize them, for one because they’re not even trying to be recognized as individual countries. Second because they literally define themselves as one country, not four. Third because they’re called countries but really they’re provinces or states, the UK just abuses the term country.

    The UK is a constitutional monarchy and parliamentary democracy[o] with three distinct jurisdictions: England and Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland. Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have their own governments and parliaments which control various devolved matters. A developed country with an advanced economy, the UK ranks amongst the largest economies by nominal GDP

    The Acts of Union 1707 declared that the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland were "United into One Kingdom by the Name of Great Britain".[p][22] The term "United Kingdom" has occasionally been used for the former Kingdom of Great Britain, although its official name from 1707 to 1800 was simply "Great Britain".[23] The Acts of Union 1800 formed the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Following the partition of Ireland and the independence of the Irish Free State in 1922, which left Northern Ireland as the only part of the island of Ireland within the United Kingdom, the name was changed in 1927 to the "United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland".[24]

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom

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  • [–] -1 points 8 months ago (2 children)

    You've managed to show how little you understand about the independence struggles within the UK. You state "they're not even trying to be recognised as individual countries" despite the fact that the ruling and largest (Via representation in parliament) party in Scotland is the Scottish National Party. The largest and current coalition partner in power in Northern Ireland is Sinn Fein, and Plaid Cymru is projected to lead the next Welsh government following the next Senedd election next year.

    Each of these parties is seeking Sovereignty and independence for their nations, and their popularity within their respective nations show that there are many people very much interested in that goal too.

    I know this because I'm a political journalist in the UK, and I'm also a Nationalist politician. Throwing the 'UK' Wikipedia page out because you have no fucking idea what you're talking about doesn't make you look good. I implore you to do a little more research before you spout more nonsense about things you clearly have no idea about.

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  • [–] 3 points 8 months ago (2 children)

    You are making an argument about internal struggles within a country. I honestly do not give one shit what you internally call your regions. But to the rest of the world they are not sovereign nations and are therefore not called countries. This would be like any politician in America arguing that California or Texas are countries because they’ve stated they want to split from the USA at numerous points. This is the same for Catalan or Galicia which have been trying for decades to split from Spain. Hell even Palestine is recognized as a sovereign nation by at least some other countries, this is not true for any of the regions of the UK.

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  • [–] -3 points 8 months ago (1 child)

    Honestly I don't even know what you're talking about anymore man.

    We're talking about individual countries that have vastly rich cultures that go back hundreds of years. Comparing that to the essentially fledgling nation that is the USA is crazy. Your states are not like countries at all, what???

    I'll leave this be now as I can see you just seem to be getting angrier and neither of us is getting anything of use out of this.

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  • [–] 6 points 8 months ago (1 child)

    Oh really, so if Scotland wanted to join the EU it'd still be part of the UK then? What if Wales decides not to recognize the monarchy - no issues then I bet.

    It's more wild to see British people be so cucked.

    "We're totally diffwent countwies, we swear! Ignore the English leash around our necks"

    Either pull a France or Canada or figure out that for all intent and purposes you're no different than Alabama, USA.

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