There's no pleasing some people. According to pundits, this election lacked real issues, forceful debate and passionate engagement. Oddly, during Nice take one, the presence of those very things was considered to be highly negative, because they were a feature of the wrong side. Dissenting voices during Nice take one were accused of sowing confusion, which people were instructed to ignore in favour of obediently voting Yes, writes Breda O'Brien
However, when No campaigners during the abortion referendum decided that their best tactic was to represent it as hopelessly confusing, that time our betters told us the only possible response was to vote No.
The Irish electorate are not eejits. They know that they will be told that they are sophisticated and intelligent when they are voting the way the opinion leaders would like, and that they are very dim indeed when they appear to be voting the wrong way.
The Europhiles just don't get it. They think that the rejection of Nice was about neutrality. There is no doubt that that was a factor, but to quote the Stay Safe programme, the major reason was a "No feeling". The EEC we joined in 1973 to access the single market, is turning into a bureaucratic monster with aspirations to be a superstate, with its own army, intelligence service and proto-constitution. Many of those watching this got a very "No feeling" indeed. The emotional blackmail did not help. The suggestion was that the only reason anyone could possibly have for voting No was selfishness. It had to stem from a desire to kick in the face those nice Eastern Europeans who had only just dragged themselves out from under the caterpillar tracks of the tanks of the Soviet Union.
I am indebted to Prof Brigid Laffan for the discovery that I am a soft Eurosceptic. She quotes some research by the University of Sussex which divides Eurosceptics into hard and soft. The former are opposed to the European project entirely, and would like to see us leave the EU. Soft Eurosceptics can be sub-divided into "policy Euroscepticism" and "national interest Euroscepticism".
Any aspect of policy may trigger policy Euroscepticism, and as a result, people can be opposed to the EU for widely differing reasons. "National interest" Eurosceptics, on the other hand, "employ the rhetoric" of standing up for the national interest as a central plank of opposition to certain developments within the union.
No chance that they might really believe that the national interest was being compromised, they are just employing the rhetoric of national interest. Anyway, whether the 54 per cent of the electorate in an admittedly low turnout who rejected Nice take one were hard or soft, the message is clear. Error has no rights. The only option is Yes, and we had better realise that fast or we will become "outliers" in the European Union.
If anything were designed to cause Irish voters to dig their heels in and vote No in still greater numbers, this is it. We live in a culture which has given choice an elevated value. This is not an entirely positive development, but is a reality nonetheless. Telling people that they have no choice is a sure way to inspire a reaction exactly the opposite to the one wished for.
Nice take two will be Nice take one with a declaration on neutrality, which has no particular legal force, tacked on to it. This simply reinforces in people's minds the idea that they are being bullied and deprived of real choice.
The only way to change people's minds is to demonstrate unequivocally that the EU does not have aspirations to be a superstate, that it is not a bureacratic monster usurping more and more of the sovereignty of the individual member states. And since the evidence points mostly in the other direction, that is going to be very hard to do. Decisions are being taken at further and further remove from us. For example on Wednesday it was decided by the EU that stem cell research was justified. At the moment, it has stopped short of endorsing research on embryos expressly created for such a purpose. Research is permitted on embryonic stem cells from terminations of pregnancy and as well as on stem cells from so-called supernumary human embryos, that is, embryos created for IVF which have not been implanted. As a result, all member states, including Ireland, will effectively be funding destructive embryo research under their participation in the EU funding of the sixth framework programme.
Those who are aware of such decisions, and they are few, might wonder why the Irish Government is bothering to seek submissions on embryo research from interested parties here in Ireland with a view to formulating Irish policy, while at the same time funding research at EU level. It brings us neatly back to Ms Laffan's policy Eurosceptics.
The majority of Irish people might be uneasy at the destruction of very early forms of human life, and there might also be those who feel exactly the opposite, that experimentation should also be allowed on embryos brought into being especially for the purpose. But wherever your "policy Euroscepticism" comes from, you can forget it. You have no power to influence, and you probably did not even know about it.
Europhiles are so anxious to sell Nice take two to us that they cannot acknowledge any fears or admit to any flaws in the treaty. They cannot really engage with the issues.
They have to attribute dubious motives to those who oppose Nice take two, because they cannot afford to admit that it is quite extraordinary to submit an essentially unchanged referendum to the Irish people so quickly again.
Those opposed to abortion had to lobby and slave for ten years in order to merit a second chance to put a democratic choice before the Irish people.
For that they were pilloried for inflicting yet another abortion referendum on the electorate, as though they were held on a yearly basis.
Powerlessness is not a "Yes feeling". Being shoved and bullied and told that you are irresponsible is not a "Yes feeling".
We train our children to take such feelings very seriously indeed. Now those who want us to accept Nice take two had better start taking them seriously, too.
bobrien@irish-times.ie