That's because Great Britain is a geographical name for the island, while the UK is a political term for the country... the same thing happens with the USA (the country), which everyone calls America (a pair of continents).

Although Great Britain is also used sometimes as a political term for the combination of England, Scotland & Wales, I guess because the island of Great Britain happens to include 99% of the land mass for those 3 countries.

It should still be their choice. The EU's obnoxiously anti-democratic attitude bugs the shit out of me. During the ratification of the Constitution, you were lucky if your country decided to hold a referendum on it. And Juncker's (the guy who was playing at being "president of Europe" at the time) attitude on the subject was, "If it’s a ‘Yes,’ we will say ‘on we go,’ and if it’s a ‘No’ we will say ‘we continue.’" In other words, fuck you, French and Dutch voters. We'll pretend that your opinion matters only as long as you choose the right option.

wtf. I didn't know that. When Stuart Pearce choose the GB football team they said he didn't choose anybody from scotland or n ireland. Why make a point of him not choosing somebody from n ireland if they aren't part of gb. Or is it different in the olympics?

The other night (July 2) Bruce Dickinson, lead singer of Iron Maiden, made a joke about the 4th of July not meaning much to him (he's British), then smiled and said we've done pretty darn good for ourselves all things considered.

So yeah, Iron Maiden loves America. Put that in your pipe and smoke it while you go back and listen to your One Direction album, beeeeyotch!

If you like England so much, then by all means, buy a ticket and move there.

Until 1922 the Republic of Ireland was part of the UK and GB, and last time i check was still part of the British isles, Northen Ireland is still part of the UK.

Until 1922 Ireland was indeed part of the UK, and yes N.Ireland is currently part of the UK, but neither have ever been part of Great Britain in any official terminology. However what ASStronaut pulled you up on was not as much a mistake as he thought... the term "Britain" (without the "Great") can be used as a shortened name for the full country: The United Kingdom of Great Britain & Northern Ireland. (You were wrong to include 'South' Ireland though... yes it was once part of the UK, but it isn't any more)

So 1. You were wrong to include the Rep. of Ireland in your post.
2. ASStronaut wrongly assumed "Britain" can only mean "Great Britain" (which is the name for the largest of the British Isles, or can refer to the conglomeration of England, Scotland & Wales)

The British Isles is purely a geographical term. It does indeed include GB & the whole of Ireland and all the islands around it, but the term "Britain" is not the same. For example you shouldn't call someone from Rep. of Ireland 'British' in the same way that you shouldn't call a Mexican 'American' (even if in geographical terms both are true)

@digitalnasties

On topic of the American Civil War, the British actually nearly allied with the Confederacy. The two were doing business with each other when a Union ship starting interfering in said business to prevent the Confederacy from getting more supplies. Britain didn't take too kindly to this and they started putting troops in Canada just in case they went to war with the Union. Abraham Lincoln had the foresight to realize that fighting two enemies on two different sides of the nation probably didn't bold well for the Union so he cooled the tensions with the Brits and got the war back on track to just Confederacy vs Union.

We don't want to piss God off by asking for too much.  Make a song called "God bless the entire world" and he'll probably flood us again.

Lol! Yes, but we have the 'Kardashians'  A whole family known because one of them made a bad porn and hired an expensive press agent.  It's nearly impossible to go a day with out them showing up, somewhere.  Have any of them ever done anything good?  Like develope a new technoligy, cure cancer, win a Nobel prize, etc.

As much as I could care less about a 'Royal Family' I would prefer them over the 'reality show attention whores.'  But we really don't need any of them.