Just how stupid are you? Come on, don't be defensive, you must be fairly stupid. Because we're all a bit thick. And we need people, clever people, astute people, to look out for us. Because, frankly, they know better than we do and someone has to protect us from our own stupidity. Which is why we have organisations like the EU.

What was initially meant as a post-war, placatory common market working under the clever concept that countries are less likely to invade each other when they are trading partners, has somehow morphed into a giant Nanny, with cane in hand, who wants to tell the rest of us what to think, what to believe and, as we have seen in the wake of the Lisbon Treaty, how to vote.

But the latest example of the EU -- or 'the EUSSR', as one Euro-sceptic memorably described it -- legislating how we should think comes from a Swedish politician who wants to ban all commercial advertisements which could be construed as "sexist, demeaning, stereotypical or offensive".

Eva-Britt Svennson, the joyless MEP -- surely a job that is nearly as pointless as being a member of our Seanad -- is outraged that some commercial advertisements use, can you believe it, sexualised imagery. And she's having none of it.

This woman, who none of us voted for, yet she has the power to impact on how Irish society governs itself, says that she wants "a zero tolerance policy against sexist insults or degrading images of women in the media."

Of course, one woman's 'degradation' is another woman's idea of being titillating and sexy. But in the insane world of the European Union, where politically correct cranks and lunatic feminists have long taken over, anything which shows any life, or vibrancy or fun, is not to be trusted and must immediately be banned.

Ms Svennson's argument is typical of the rubbish we have to put up from these people, and provides further evidence for the argument that we should leave this increasingly insidious and powerful and intrusive organisation.

But she is not unique, merely the most recent case of someone who thinks we must be protected from ourselves.

Only last week, new laws were brought in here restricting the rights of junk-food commercials to advertise on television. Why? Because the self-appointed powers that be assumed that you were too stupid and gullible to decide what you or your kids eat and, therefore, they had to step in to protect you.

It's this pathetic infantilisation of our country which allows quango after quango -- all paid for by us, let's not forget -- to issue edicts which impinge on our daily lives and believe me, these people really are as arrogant as they seem.
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