A+A on Brexit - The Return of the Living Dead

recedite

robindch wrote: »

What happened in the brexit referendum was, therefore, profoundly democratic - not that I would expect the citizens involved to care about that little detail very much.

Did you mean to say undemocratic?

Leaving aside the pros and cons of the actual brexit, it is an interesting lesson in democracy.

Take Farage; he achieves his main ambition as a politician, so he retires. It seems seems sensible and honest, yet the sore losers accuse him of "fleeing the wreckage".

Take Boris; He picks the Leave side because he guesses that if it wins, Cameron will resign and that will give him a good shot at the prime ministership. But its only when an angry mob gathers outside his house the morning after the vote, that he realises how intolerant the Remain supporters really are. Suddenly he realises that he has alienated his own local electorate, which is London. He has also alienated himself from most Tory MPs in the party leadership vote, by going against the party line.

By winning the Brexit campaign, he has shot himself in the foot. Its the equivalent of Enda Kenny doing something that makes him popular in every part of the country except Mayo, where he gets elected.

These are the nuances of democracy.

orubiru

robdonn wrote: »

Person A: You're an idiot if you walk off that cliff.
Person B: Typical fear mongering from the don't-walk-blindly-off-the-cliff parade!

That's not a fair analogy though.

A lot of people on the Remain side would admit that there are problems with the EU.

So Leave voters were never "walking blindly off a cliff". For a lot of these people, life is not great or it's a day to day struggle. They are fed up with the status quo and they want change.

As another poster said, it really seems like a lot of people actually outright hate the "Ordinary Man" and see them as uneducated buffoons who need to be told what to do and then forced if they don't obey.

Person A : You aren't one of those unemployed, uneducated, impoverished racist idiots, are you? You're an idiot if you vote Leave!

Person B : I don't have an education or a job and I'm struggling to provide for my kids. When I had a job it destroyed my physical health and uncertainty about the future is now destroying my mental health. How could things possibly be worse? I'm going to vote for change!

Are people really incapable of understanding why people might actually want to vote for change?

Hey, what if "blindly walking off the cliff" and hoping for the best is all that some people have left?

So many "Remain" supporters accuse "Leave" supporters of being prejudiced but it really seems like it works both ways.

robdonn

orubiru wrote: »

That's not a fair analogy though.

A lot of people on the Remain side would admit that there are problems with the EU.

So Leave voters were never "walking blindly off a cliff". For a lot of these people, life is not great or it's a day to day struggle. They are fed up with the status quo and they want change.

As another poster said, it really seems like a lot of people actually outright hate the "Ordinary Man" and see them as uneducated buffoons who need to be told what to do and then forced if they don't obey.

Person A : You aren't one of those unemployed, uneducated, impoverished racist idiots, are you? You're an idiot if you vote Leave!

Person B : I don't have an education or a job and I'm struggling to provide for my kids. When I had a job it destroyed my physical health and uncertainty about the future is now destroying my mental health. How could things possibly be worse? I'm going to vote for change!

Are people really incapable of understanding why people might actually want to vote for change?

Hey, what if "blindly walking off the cliff" and hoping for the best is all that some people have left?

So many "Remain" supporters accuse "Leave" supporters of being prejudiced but it really seems like it works both ways.

Nobody is saying that they're stupid for wanting to change the EU or leave it, but it is stupid to leave it without a plan. This is what I meant as walking blindly off a cliff.

People who wanted to leave the EU could have voted to remain until a plan was actually presented to show how the UK could be better without it, as some people did, but other's went into the voting booth with a "**** you, EU!" attitude instead (the blind bit). A remain vote did not discount leaving the EU at a later date, but a leave vote meant (probably) never getting back in, even if everything went tits up (the cliff bit).

This uncertainty is a valid reason to vote to remain even if you want to leave but the Leave campaign, instead of actually addressing the uncertainties, simply labelled them as fear tactics.

robindch

orubiru wrote: »

Or maybe The Brits ARE just a bunch of raving, delusional, racists!

The leaders of the Leave campaign treated their constituency as a bunch of low-information, paranoid racists - and it worked.

Similar arguments and leader-behaviour has worked here in Ireland and I'm specifically referring to individuals like (a) Declan Ganley and the hatchet job he did during the various referendum(s?) he was involved with; and (b) the religious individuals who bang on about the EU and abortion.

People can claim that this was a class war, or indeed they can claim whatever they like. But it boils down to a simple fact that the Leave side successfully frightened the crap out of more people than were aware of the often rather subtle benefits of the EU.

Or more simply still, Leave demonstrated quite adequately that it's harder to make people think, learn, understand and co-operate than it is to make them fear and make them hate.

recedite

The hate mob has been deployed mainly against Farrrage and Borrris as far as I can see. After losing out to democracy.

Pherekydes

recedite wrote: »

The hate mob has been deployed mainly against Farrrage and Borrris as far as I can see. After losing out to democracy.

Huh? Has anyone told them to f**k off home?

robindch

orubiru wrote: »

Are people really incapable of understanding why people might actually want to vote for change?

The vote was not "for change". It was an advisory vote to remain or withdraw from the world's largest free-trade, free-travel, free-services and free-capital bloc - a bloc which is so clearly beneficial that one has to wonder about the sanity of somebody who would vote against it.

The vote certainly was not, as it was successfully portrayed by the Leave side, one which would provide more money for the NHS (false) and one which would keep people with funny accents and/or black/brown/yellow skin out of the country (also false). Nonetheless, enough people believed them and they voted in the profoundly undemocratic way they did.

And when the voters were warned of the likely outcome - massive financial dislocation, the two main parties without effective leadership, no plans of any kind in place to address any of the turmoil which would result, not to mention the increase in hate crime and the likely breakup of the UK - well, all we heard was "Project Fear" and a cheap insult about "the people have had enough of experts".

If that's democracy, then the Houses of Parliament should be turned into a carpark and some dictator invited to do the hard work of thinking for the newly-poor and newly-disenfranchised Brits.

robindch

recedite wrote: »

After losing out to democracy.

Well, in all fairness, I recall you claiming that Putin's Crimean referendum-at-gunpoint was free and fair as well - so perhaps your bar is set at a different height to the rest of us on what constitutes democracy.

orubiru

robindch wrote: »

The leaders of the Leave campaign treated their constituency as a bunch of low-information, paranoid racists - and it worked.

Once again, absolute nonsense.

Plenty of well informed people voted to Leave the EU.

You can't just pretend that only "low-information, paranoid racists" voted Leave.

To be honest there were probably plenty of low-information voters on both sides.

You can't criticise people voting for Leave by saying that they probably didn't know enough to make an informed decision when you know damn well that there would be people voting Remain who are equally clueless about the issues.

Just to be clear there were well informed and low-information voters on both sides.

The constant use of the "racism" card is getting tiresome.

Hell, there were probably racists who voted Remain.

orubiru

robindch wrote: »

The vote was not "for change". It was an advisory vote to remain or withdraw from the world's largest free-trade, free-travel, free-services and free-capital bloc - a bloc which is so clearly beneficial that one has to wonder about the sanity of somebody who would vote against it.

This just cements the point that the Remain side utterly botched their campaign.

If the case for "Remain" was so solid then how come they lost the vote?

I'm not saying that Leave is the right choice, I would have voted Remain but the difference is I'm not willing to just dismiss people who voted Leave as low-information paranoid racists.

It's the same in the USA, I cannot understand AT ALL why anyone would ever vote for a Republican candidate but people do. They vote in extremely high numbers. So, at least, I try to understand why these candidates and these stances on social issues appeal to them. The last thing people should be doing is just dismissing them as lunatics.

17.5 million people from all parts of the UK voted to Leave the EU.

Leave was successful because they got more votes than Remain.

If it was such a black and white situation, Remain is right and Leave is wrong, then really the criticism should be direct at the people campaigning for Remain.

If this was such a clear cut decision for the public to make then how did Remain manage to fail so spectacularly?

"The other side told lies". Nah, that's not good enough.

robindch

orubiru wrote: »

If the case for "Remain" was so solid then how come they lost the vote?

For the reasons which I have outlined in three previous posts in this thread today.

orubiru wrote: »

I'm not willing to just dismiss people who voted Leave as low-information paranoid racists.

Perhaps you didn't have time to read what I wrote. Here it is again:

robindch wrote: »

The leaders of the Leave campaign treated their constituency as a bunch of low-information, paranoid racists - and it worked.

Please note that I am placing the blame for this idiotic result on the leaders of the Leave campaign, not the people who believed - no doubt sometimes in good faith - their deceitful, xenophobic paranoia.

orubiru wrote: »

The last thing people should be doing is just dismissing them as lunatics.

Again, perhaps you didn't have time to read and understand my point - see the sentence immediately above.

orubiru wrote: »

If this was such a clear cut decision for the public to make then how did Remain manage to fail so spectacularly?

For the reasons which I've outlined in three previous posts in this thread today - in summary, because it's harder to sell honesty, thought, care and attention than it is to sell fear and hate.

It might offend the dignity of people who bought a lie to realize they bought a lie. But it doesn't change the fact that they bought a lie.

There's an entire spectrum of Leave voters, and it's ridiculously reductive to try to group them as one. I'm going to also be reductive but to a lesser extent. I am not going to go into the validity of claims / opinions, but it's important to note that there are quite a few different types of 'Leavers'.

1 - Hannan/Boris Type -> These people were happy to remain within the EEA, trading succesfully with the EU under an agreement akin to the Norway model. They see the benefits that access to the Single Market brings, and believe that the costs (freedom of movement of labour and EU payments) of that access as reasonable and fair. They weren't arguing for a drastically different relationship with 'Europe', just a removal from the EU elements. They have no interest in being part of a Political Union with the EU. They do see the economic union as something to work with. (This Person)

2 - Gove Type -> These people wanted to remove themselves from the EU and look further afield with the economy. They have taken time to consider the ramifications and have resolved that the costs of Single Market access were not worth the benefits. They wanted full removal from the EU and EEA and so have far more control over what sort of a country and economy they were building. They wanted to forge a different type of UK, looking further afield than just the neighbors. They have no interest in being part of a Political or Economic Union with the EU.

3 - Farage Type -> These people are blatant Eurosceptics. They distrust and dislike all EU related issues. They simply want out of all aspects of the EU. Their vision for the UK is not terribly dissimilar from the Gove Type, but they possibly don't have the appreciation for the costs that they must bear to get there.

4 - Griffin Type -> Don't like other people. Want an isolationist UK. No thoughts whatsoever for the costs to achieve that. Don't care.

---

The problem for the group 1 type there is that in the end the campaign fell down to the lowest possible level. And the Leavers in group 1 also have been undercut by this level as it defeats their reasoning just as badly as it defeats the 'Remain' side.

smacl

I think you could add a few groups;

5 - Those who were generally unhappy with their lot, felt dis-empowered and disconnected from their government and considered the leave vote an attack on the status quo without actually considering the consequences.

6 - The grey vote who vaguely remember days of empire, seen through rose tinted glasses perhaps, who would like to return to those days. Again, it is questionable how many of them thought through the ramifications of their actions.

I sincerely hope the UK make an economic recovery from brexit sooner rather than later, for their sake and ours, but suspect it will be a long and rocky road.

MrPudding

orubiru wrote: »

Once again, absolute nonsense.

Plenty of well informed people voted to Leave the EU.

You can't just pretend that only "low-information, paranoid racists" voted Leave.

To be honest there were probably plenty of low-information voters on both sides.

You can't criticise people voting for Leave by saying that they probably didn't know enough to make an informed decision when you know damn well that there would be people voting Remain who are equally clueless about the issues.

Just to be clear there were well informed and low-information voters on both sides.

The constant use of the "racism" card is getting tiresome.

Hell, there were probably racists who voted Remain.

Have you spoken with many leave voters? I have, dozens and dozens of them. Whilst they couldn't be considered to be a representative sample, for polling purposes, there was a definite theme. Of the many I have spoken to, either casually in the run-up, in work, friends and acquaintances, and people I spoke to when I was manning a remain stall in my town I lost count of the number of conversation that started with "I'm not racist but..." Very few people had any reasons other then getting rid of immigrants. One person I spoke to, I have al;ready mentioned him, was voting leave because "there are too many pakkis".

I am sure there were plenty of people with well-reasoned (in their heads) grounds for leaving, but I didn't meet many of them. The most shocking thing for me was the sheer level of ignorance. "I don't even know who my MEP is!" I don't know how many times I heard that. Is it the MEP or the EU's fault that people won't educate themselves? Additionally there was ignorance on how the EU worked, what it cost, what it gave us and what leaving would mean.

There was just this kind of super single issue focus, and that single issue was usually immigration. They were played. There seems to be, in general, a real dumbing down in the UK coupled with anti-intellectualism. Gove hit the nail on the head, people are fed up with experts. What does that say for a society? I am a big fan of House, and I roll this quote out so often, usually about religion, but it works really well with Brexit too; "you can't reason a person out of a position he didn't reason himself into."

There were a lot of low information paranoid racists, of that there is no doubt. Then down from that, even more people that I wouldn't call out and out racists, but certainly have some issue with foreigners. But the main thing is the low-information.

Irrespective of whether or not a person was a racist, if they did not have good information, and had no interest in getting that information themselves, or educating themselves on the subject, the leave campaign was simply more attractive. It played to people's concerns, it took the problems people have, problems caused by successive governments failure to do their jobs properly and blamed those problems on the EU and on immigrants. And they ate it up.

The governments of the UK have spent the last 4 or 4 decade blaming the EU for every problem the country has had, whether it deserved the blame or not. It poisoned the population and this, coupled with apathy towards experts and book learnin' has us where we are now.

EDIT: Another point, there is a massive difference between voting in ingnorance for things to stay the same and voting in ignorance against the advice of almost every single expert and organisation with knowledge in the field of the vote.

MrP

FA Hayek

Does it not show though that if governments choose mass migration over all else that we get this type of backlash. We see it elsewhere in Europe now as well. You would see the same in Ireland if we were getting the same level of migration year in year out for 20 years but you are not allowed to even mention it in the media.

The vast majority would be fine with small amounts but the unrelenting nature of it seems to upset many. Of course even speaking out about it you have some media gentleman or lady in London mounting the high horse and telling you that you should be ashamed of yourself and that you are a terrible person.

Of course the irony is that Pakistanis or whoever are usually not EU citizens so this issue has been festering for a time and been ignored for a generation. This referendum was a protest vote in some way and protest they did. So what now. If the majority of a country want to curb or control or limit migration as we have seen in this vote then either the government of the day does that or will it just ignore the wishes of the people on plow on regardless as they have done before and making people even more pissed off then before.

MrPudding

FA Hayek wrote: »

Does it not show though that if governments choose mass migration over all else that we get this type of backlash. We see it elsewhere in Europe now as well. You would see the same in Ireland if we were getting the same level of migration year in year out for 20 years but you are not allowed to even mention it in the media.

I am not sure what you mean by “mass migration over all else”. That seems a little hyperbolic. Can you point to any government papers, or legalisation where anyone in government has said or suggested “lads, what we need above everything else is mass migration.”?


I would agree that this has not been talked about enough. I would love for there to be PR voting in the UK, even though that would mean that UKIP would have secured 50 odd seats in the last election. The reason I could live with that is that if UK had a number of MPs commensurate with their share of the vote we would have been talking about these things. It might seem counter intuitive to think that having anti-EU MPs in government would help us stay in the EU, but I genuinely believe that if those conversations happened, and UKIP were engaged with by the other parties, things might have turned out differently.

FA Hayek wrote: »

The vast majority would be fine with small amounts but the unrelenting nature of it seems to upset many.

A couple of points. First, unrelenting? Really? You do know that Farage’s poster wasn’t the UK, don’t you? Secondly, I am not sure about the vast majority. I would allow that a majority are probably ok with some immigration, but there does seem to be a fair number that want none. I don’t really blame them, well not completely. They have been brought up on a diet of “all your troubles are caused by the EU and the immigrants” and that fits well enough with them that they have no interest in actually finding out if that is actually true.

FA Hayek wrote: »

Of course even speaking out about it you have some media gentleman or lady in London mounting the high horse and telling you that you should be ashamed of yourself and that you are a terrible person.

I do agree with you here, to a certain extent, see my point above about UKIP MPs, but at the same time, a lot of people really should be ashamed of themselves. A person, like my mechanic friend, that votes leave because there are “too many pakkis” really should be ashamed of himself. Would you not agree?

FA Hayek wrote: »

Of course the irony is that Pakistanis or whoever are usually not EU citizens so this issue has been festering for a time and been ignored for a generation. This referendum was a protest vote in some way and protest they did.

This was, or should have been, a vote as to whether or not the UK should stay in the EU. Causing untold financial damage and fostering an atmosphere of hatred and suspicion is not a protest.

FA Hayek wrote: »

So what now. If the majority of a country want to curb or control or limit migration as we have seen in this vote then either the government of the day does that or will it just ignore the wishes of the people on plow on regardless as they have done before and making people even more pissed off then before.

No, have you not been keeping up? Immigration was not the primary driver, it was sovereignty. Here’s the thing, I was a Remainer. I genuinely believe that leaving the EU will be a disaster for the UK. At the same time I believe the people, however ignorant, misinformed and lied to they were, have spoken. I don’t think we can simply ignore the result, nor do I think we necessarily need to rush headlong into the dark.


I would like Brexit to the cancelled, but for me there needs to be an indication, at least as strong as the referendum, that the UK now does not want to leave. Ideally, I think, there would be another referendum, but that could only be after there was some material change, something that could be held up as a reason for another vote. If that did happen the whole way in which the campaign was run would have to be different. People on both sides, and the media, need to be held to account for what they say, and there needs to be a genuine attempt to inform people and educate them on what this stuff means. People being fed up with experts needs to be addressed.

MrP

Quantify 'Mass' in your use of 'Mass Migration' please FA Hayek if you could?

swampgas

MrPudding wrote: »

I would agree that this has not been talked about enough. I would love for there to be PR voting in the UK, even though that would mean that UKIP would have secured 50 odd seats in the last election. The reason I could live with that is that if UK had a number of MPs commensurate with their share of the vote we would have been talking about these things. It might seem counter intuitive to think that having anti-EU MPs in government would help us stay in the EU, but I genuinely believe that if those conversations happened, and UKIP were engaged with by the other parties, things might have turned out differently.

Really think this is a key point which is being overlooked in the UK.

The Lib Dems had (I believe) an offer of PR voting in from Labour (under Brown) a few elections back - instead they went into coalition with the Conservative party. I think that was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity missed.

FA Hayek

A lot of thing talked about here so I will touch on the briefly.

What is mass migration. Well it is the belief rightly or wrongly that a country is a few degrees away from open borders. Now the UK of course does not have open border for non-EU citizens. But last year the figure was 330,000 net migrants. That is a high number whatever way you mince it but what should it be? No idea myself as its very subjective but shouldn't there be government bodies out there recommending what this should be? Do they even exist? Like we have all types of quangos recommending us how many bowel movements to have a day or the thread count in a pillow case, yet there seems to be a deliberate gaping hole here in regards proper research to what is the appropriate number. There will always be immigration but the consensus even from the left and Labour is that it should now be talked about even after the horse has bolted and won the Grand National in the meantime, I presume a much lower figure will be hashed out.

When the eastern european states gained accession to the EU the UK did not put any restrictions on migration from these states and the Home Office stated that only 12,000 people would migrate from Poland to the UK. Well they were wrong by a light year. Over one million arrived in the proceeding years. Jack Straw admitted that it was a huge mistake.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-24924219

Having no restrictions on eastern European migrants in 2004 was a "spectacular mistake", former Labour home secretary Jack Straw has said.
The Labour MP said handing immediate working rights to Poles and others when they joined the EU nine years ago was a "well-intentioned policy we messed up".
Labour relied on research suggesting 13,000 migrants a year would arrive.
But the influx was much larger than expected and contributed to net migration rising above 200,000 a year.

I am not saying it was deliberate conspiracy stuff of some new world order. Its just that they were found out to be totally and utterly incompetent in anticipating the results of their actions. So we are where we are now, primarily because of this incompetence from those Labour years in government, which ironically could see the death of Labour as we know it.

When I say unrelenting, the perception is again when will migration curtail as it has been at an all time high over the past few years. Net Migration over the past 20 years has been around 3 Million people. The greatest period of migration in British history even going back to the time of the Anglo-Saxons. Naturally people have valid concerns. In some ways net migration figures hides the true picture. Actual inward migration for last year was 630,000 people, outward emigration 297,000, about half of them were British citizens. So there is a larger demographic change going on. British people are leaving to go elsewhere so the social make up of may towns and suburbs are changing faster then ever. Is this good or bad? I do not know but for those that are still living in these areas, areas they grew up in and have an attachment to you can understand the concerns what another 20 years record level of migration will do to a place.

There will always be people against migration full stop, they are mostly assholes, just as there will be people who advocate transporting enmasse the entire population of Syria to England, the completely open border fanatics. However, what is the appropriate number? No one seems to have that answer even when pressed.

Whatever it may be, the current level is too high. This also ignores what happened last year in Germany when Merkel decided to suspend the Dublin regulation which saw 1.4 million people arrive in Germany in one year, most of whom are economic refugees. When ordinary people who are not racists or xenophobes see this level of pigheadedness and complete lack of common sense from the most practical of EU leaders they are left scratching their heads in bewilderment and wonder is the EU project really worth it after all.

Yes, people are fed up with experts especially when its experts that usually get it wrong time and again. Media commentary is diabolical in general as we can see. Do you honestly think self proclaimed experts in comfortable jobs and living in well to do areas in London have any idea what goes on in the rest of the UK? I have mentioned it before but these experts proclaim to speak for the ordinary person but in fact they hate them. People have been saying it for years about the divide between the London press and its metropolitan elite to the rest of England but this referendum has proved that such a divide exists and is bigger than ever. Again, this is not a unique British thing. Look at the US, look at France.

FA Hayek

FA Hayek wrote: »

A lot of thing talked about here so I will touch on the briefly.

What is mass migration. Well it is the belief rightly or wrongly that a country is a few degrees away from open borders. Now the UK of course does not have open border for non-EU citizens. But last year the figure was 330,000 net migrants. That is a high number whatever way you mince it but what should it be? No idea myself as its very subjective but shouldn't there be government bodies out there recommending what this should be? Do they even exist? Like we have all types of quangos recommending us how many bowel movements to have a day or the thread count in a pillow case, yet there seems to be a deliberate gaping hole here in regards proper research to what is the appropriate number. There will always be immigration but the consensus even from the left and Labour is that it should now be talked about even after the horse has bolted and won the Grand National in the meantime, I presume a much lower figure will be hashed out.

When the eastern european states gained accession to the EU the UK did not put any restrictions on migration from these states and the Home Office stated that only 12,000 people would migrate from Poland to the UK. Well they were wrong by a light year. Over one million arrived in the proceeding years. Jack Straw admitted that it was a huge mistake.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-24924219



I am not saying it was deliberate conspiracy stuff of some new world order. Its just that they were found out to be totally and utterly incompetent in anticipating the results of their actions. So we are where we are now, primarily because of this incompetence from those Labour years in government, which ironically could see the death of Labour as we know it.

When I say unrelenting, the perception is again when will migration curtail as it has been at an all time high over the past few years. Net Migration over the past 20 years has been around 3 Million people. The greatest period of migration in British history even going back to the time of the Anglo-Saxons. Naturally people have valid concerns. In some ways net migration figures hides the true picture. Actual inward migration for last year was 630,000 people, outward emigration 297,000, about half of them were British citizens. So there is a larger demographic change going on. British people are leaving to go elsewhere so the social make up of may towns and suburbs are changing faster then ever. Is this good or bad? I do not know but for those that are still living in these areas, areas they grew up in and have an attachment to you can understand the concerns what another 20 years record level of migration will do to a place.

There will always be people against migration full stop, they are mostly assholes, just as there will be people who advocate transporting enmasse the entire population of Syria to England, the completely open border fanatics. However, what is the appropriate number? No one seems to have that answer even when pressed.

Whatever it may be, the current level is too high. This also ignores what happened last year in Germany when Merkel decided to suspend the Dublin regulation which saw 1.4 million people arrive in Germany in one year, most of whom are economic refugees. When ordinary people who are not racists or xenophobes see this level of pigheadedness and complete lack of common sense from the most practical of EU leaders they are left scratching their heads in bewilderment and wonder is the EU project really worth it after all.

Yes, people are fed up with experts especially when its experts that usually get it wrong time and again. Media commentary is diabolical in general as we can see. Do you honestly think self proclaimed experts in comfortable jobs and living in well to do areas in London have any idea what goes on in the rest of the UK? I have mentioned it before but these experts proclaim to speak for the ordinary person but in fact they hate them. People have been saying it for years about the divide between the London press and its metropolitan elite to the rest of England but this referendum has proved that such a divide exists and is bigger than ever. Again, this is not a unique British thing. Look at the US, look at France.

0.5% population growth per year attributable to net migration is too high?

https://fullfact.org/immigration/



~ 250k figure 10 years ago btw

orubiru

MrPudding wrote: »

Have you spoken with many leave voters? I have, dozens and dozens of them. Whilst they couldn't be considered to be a representative sample, for polling purposes, there was a definite theme. Of the many I have spoken to, either casually in the run-up, in work, friends and acquaintances, and people I spoke to when I was manning a remain stall in my town I lost count of the number of conversation that started with "I'm not racist but..." Very few people had any reasons other then getting rid of immigrants. One person I spoke to, I have al;ready mentioned him, was voting leave because "there are too many pakkis".

I am sure there were plenty of people with well-reasoned (in their heads) grounds for leaving, but I didn't meet many of them. The most shocking thing for me was the sheer level of ignorance. "I don't even know who my MEP is!" I don't know how many times I heard that. Is it the MEP or the EU's fault that people won't educate themselves? Additionally there was ignorance on how the EU worked, what it cost, what it gave us and what leaving would mean.

There was just this kind of super single issue focus, and that single issue was usually immigration. They were played. There seems to be, in general, a real dumbing down in the UK coupled with anti-intellectualism. Gove hit the nail on the head, people are fed up with experts. What does that say for a society? I am a big fan of House, and I roll this quote out so often, usually about religion, but it works really well with Brexit too; "you can't reason a person out of a position he didn't reason himself into."

There were a lot of low information paranoid racists, of that there is no doubt. Then down from that, even more people that I wouldn't call out and out racists, but certainly have some issue with foreigners. But the main thing is the low-information.

Irrespective of whether or not a person was a racist, if they did not have good information, and had no interest in getting that information themselves, or educating themselves on the subject, the leave campaign was simply more attractive. It played to people's concerns, it took the problems people have, problems caused by successive governments failure to do their jobs properly and blamed those problems on the EU and on immigrants. And they ate it up.

The governments of the UK have spent the last 4 or 4 decade blaming the EU for every problem the country has had, whether it deserved the blame or not. It poisoned the population and this, coupled with apathy towards experts and book learnin' has us where we are now.

EDIT: Another point, there is a massive difference between voting in ingnorance for things to stay the same and voting in ignorance against the advice of almost every single expert and organisation with knowledge in the field of the vote.

MrP

Obviously I can't defend people who actually are racist and I can't defend people who would vote to leave the EU just to stop immigration.

Can I ask if you can see any valid reasons for the UK, or any other country, to leave the EU or reasons why other countries would not wish to join the EU?

Obviously I understand that you have a strong belief that Remain was the correct vote here but surely you have some doubts? Even minor doubts?

I can understand that pro-EU protesters on the streets of London would be just a stubborn as your backwater "don't like foreigners" buffoons but what about people who were/are undecided on the issue?

I'm struggling to believe that sensible people see this as a totally black and white issue. There must surely be pros and cons that come with the EU?

Fair enough if you have come to the conclusion that the pros outweigh the cons but if there are cons then you can surely understand why "leave" would seem like the best option for some?

Obviously the short term impact of staying in the EU is "everything remains the same" and the short term impact of leaving is "everything becomes unstable and/or goes to hell".

What about the long term consequences though? What if the break up of the EU is, eventually, better for everyone? Is it even possible that it could ultimately be better?

You talk about the dumbing down of the UK but what if that applies to the Remain side too? What if you're wrong? Have you, and other posters too, even considered the possibility that you might be wrong?

robindch

Deleted User wrote: »

There's an entire spectrum of Leave voters, and it's ridiculously reductive to try to group them as one.

Who's reducing the leave side to a constituency of one - I trust you're not referring to me as that's certainly not my view :rolleyes:

The people leading the Leave side delivered a campaign of sustained lies and xenophobia.

The people consuming this propaganda accepted different parts of it to different degrees. Not all Leave voters were gagging xenophobes, and not all xenophobes voted Leave to increase funding to the NHS. Instead, there was a wide spectrum of reasons on offer - all the ones I can immediately think of being false to varying degrees - and voters simply picked and chose what they wanted to without seemingly troubling themselves to verify anything.

robindch

orubiru wrote: »

What about the long term consequences though? What if the break up of the EU is, eventually, better for everyone? Is it even possible that it could ultimately be better?

Depends on what you mean by "better" - the EU is, broadly, an economic union and it does a lot of work, where it can and mostly behind the scenes, to make sure that the economies of its member nations grow in a stable, co-operative fashion - with the understanding that stability and growth leads to peace.

If, however, you believe that the continent would be a better place if it tilted towards trade wars and other forms of international hostility, then yes, the continent would be "better" without the EU. I would, in this case, question your understanding of the word "better".

recedite

robindch wrote: »

If, however, you believe that the continent would be a better place if it tilted towards trade wars and other forms of international hostility, then ...

Introducing strawman arguments is unhelpful.
Listen to Nigel.

U.K. Independence Party leader Nigel Farage comments on the possibility of Vodafone moving its headquarters elsewhere and the need for a free trade agreement between the U.K. and the EU

Hotblack Desiato

swampgas wrote: »

Really think this is a key point which is being overlooked in the UK.

The Lib Dems had (I believe) an offer of PR voting in from Labour (under Brown) a few elections back - instead they went into coalition with the Conservative party. I think that was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity missed.

This is as much if not more a protest vote against the effects of decades of Thatcherism and New Labour (if there's a difference) and domestic political disenfranchisement as it is against the EU.

PR is not perfect but it's got to be better than the usual UK general election, where millions upon millions of voters might well have not bothered to turn up at all because whatever way they vote will have zero effect on the result. Our system certainly does have its flaws and elects its fair share of gobsh!tes, but every vote really does count and every voter can affect the result no matter where they live.

MrPudding

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

This is as much if not more a protest vote against the effects of decades of Thatcherism and New Labour (if there's a difference) and domestic political disenfranchisement as it is against the EU.

PR is not perfect but it's got to be better than the usual UK general election, where millions upon millions of voters might well have not bothered to turn up at all because whatever way they vote will have zero effect on the result. Our system certainly does have its flaws and elects its fair share of gobsh!tes, but every vote really does count and every voter can affect the result no matter where they live.

I think the figures for the last election are something like this: UKIP and the Greens, 6 million votes securing them 2 MPs. Conservatives 11 millions votes securing them 350 MPs.

Chris

orubiru

robindch wrote: »

Depends on what you mean by "better" - the EU is, broadly, an economic union and it does a lot of work, where it can and mostly behind the scenes, to make sure that the economies of its member nations grow in a stable, co-operative fashion - with the understanding that stability and growth leads to peace.

If, however, you believe that the continent would be a better place if it tilted towards trade wars and other forms of international hostility, then yes, the continent would be "better" without the EU. I would, in this case, question your understanding of the word "better".

Shall I just take that as a "no" then?

Can you see ANY valid reasons for the UK, or any other country, to leave the EU or reasons why other countries would not wish to join the EU?

I understand that you have a strong belief that Remain was the correct vote here but surely you have some doubts? Even minor doubts?

What if you're wrong? Have you even considered the possibility that you might be wrong?

During the Scottish Independence referendum would you have leaned towards the "Yes" (leave the UK) side or the "No" (remain in the UK) side?

silverharp

robindch wrote: »

Depends on what you mean by "better" - the EU is, broadly, an economic union and it does a lot of work, where it can and mostly behind the scenes, to make sure that the economies of its member nations grow in a stable, co-operative fashion - with the understanding that stability and growth leads to peace.

If, however, you believe that the continent would be a better place if it tilted towards trade wars and other forms of international hostility, then yes, the continent would be "better" without the EU. I would, in this case, question your understanding of the word "better".

it sounds good but if you are a younger person in Greece , Spain or Italy you might be a bit more sceptical with unemployment rates near or above 40%. Europe has been in a greater depression since 2008 and is just limping along on cheap debt, if the bond market gets tired of Europe and pushes rates up its goodnight Irene

silverharp

silverharp wrote: »

it sounds good but if you are a younger person in Greece , Spain or Italy you might be a bit more sceptical with unemployment rates near or above 40%. Europe has been in a greater depression since 2008 and is just limping along on cheap debt, if the bond market gets tired of Europe and pushes rates up its goodnight Irene

What is the solution outside of the EU that helps any of these younger persons in Greece Spain or Italy though?

(Spain & Italy starting to turn around from outrageous highs. Greece was on the way before they decided to threaten the EU with a suicide vest and had to curtail everything!)

It's very difficult to simply step away from the economic shocks that were the sub prime mortgage crisis and then the EU Debt Crisis. Countries had a big fall (both in and out of the EU, both in and out of the EZ). The idea that being outside of that offers solutions to those shocks isn't invalid, it's just not exactly airtight, or reasonable in all cases. (Greece would be in a far worse place, even Tsipras realised that when he showed the vest was candles not TNT)

The Bond market won't get tired of Europe unless Germany gets tired of Europe. It's in all of our interests to not let that happen.

MrPudding

orubiru wrote: »

Obviously I can't defend people who actually are racist and I can't defend people who would vote to leave the EU just to stop immigration.

That’s reassuring.

orubiru wrote: »

Can I ask if you can see any valid reasons for the UK, or any other country, to leave the EU or reasons why other countries would not wish to join the EU?
Obviously I understand that you have a strong belief that Remain was the correct vote here but surely you have some doubts? Even minor doubts?

Any valid reasons for leaving? Honestly, no. But let me expand upon that. The first point is that whilst I do have a pro-EU bias I genuinely made a pretty serious effort to educate myself on the subject. I studies EU Law as part of my law degree, so I was reasonably comfortable with how the EU works. I also knew that a lot of the “problems” that were being blamed on the EU, like hoards of Eastern Europeans coming here to work, were due to the UK government not putting restrictions in place, restriction that they were perfectly entitled to put in place and which other EU countries did put in place.


Aside from that, I tried to read a widely as possible on the subject and the possible and probably consequences of leaving. I read UK sources, I read international sources, I listened to experts, I did everything I could to educate myself on both sides of the argument. This was going to be one of the most important votes I am ever likely to make, so I researched it.


Take a look at the leave side, they had three things: fear, “Breaking Point”, “The Turks Are Coming”; lies “We Send £350m Per Week To Brussels”, “The Turks Are Coming”; and mental reservations “We Could Spend That Money On The NHS”, “We Could Cut VAT On Energy Charges.” They literally didn’t have a single argument of any substance. Even their taking back control argument did not hold any water. “We will take back sovereignty”, really? Back from where? Where has it gone? Do you have any other sovereignty you could take back from anywhere else? This ignores the fact that any international agreement requires the surrender of a little bit of sovereignty. Any time two countries make an agreement, like a trade agreement for example, each country effectively says “I am going to agree to do this thing, I could do some other thing because I am a sovereign nation, but I am choosing to restrict or to not exercise that right, because we have made this agreement for our mutual benefit.” That is how international law works, every single international agreement, be it trade, travel or any other kind of cross-border agreement, requires the parties to the agreement to restrict their own actions. If this were not the case we couldn’t have any international agreement.


After all this I came to the genuine conclusion that it was best to remain. Even taking my bias into account it seemed to me that the case for staying was stronger. I genuinely could not see a valid reason for leaving.


Now, here is the important bit. Whilst I might think there is no valid reason for leaving that does not mean I think the EU is perfect. It isn’t. It does have problem, but I don’t believe that those problems justify leaving either. I firmly believe that the best option for both the UK and the EU is for the UK to stay and for the EU, with the input of the UK and the other nations that want changes, to reform.


I think that reform is coming, it has to. And I think the EU might end up as something the UK will be happier with, but they won’t be in it and they won’t have helped create it, except in the sense that their leaving was the catalyst for change.

orubiru wrote: »

I can understand that pro-EU protesters on the streets of London would be just a stubborn as your backwater "don't like foreigners" buffoons but what about people who were/are undecided on the issue?
I'm struggling to believe that sensible people see this as a totally black and white issue. There must surely be pros and cons that come with the EU?
Fair enough if you have come to the conclusion that the pros outweigh the cons but if there are cons then you can surely understand why "leave" would seem like the best option for some?

Can you point out what the cons are? As I said, I will happily agree that the EU is not perfect, but again I don’t think that justifies leaving. It isn’t a black and white issue, but many of the brexit people saw it as a black and white issue. I know it isn’t. The vote for Brexit is the bastard child of cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face and throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

orubiru wrote: »

Obviously the short term impact of staying in the EU is "everything remains the same" and the short term impact of leaving is "everything becomes unstable and/or goes to hell".
What about the long term consequences though? What if the break up of the EU is, eventually, better for everyone? Is it even possible that it could ultimately be better?

What if? What if a meteor ended life on earth tomorrow? What a lot of people seem to ignore is that when we talk about the short term impact of leaving it is, or will, actually impacting people’s lives.
Perhaps you could point me at the negative short and long term consequences of remaining. I was able to find lots of commentary and opinion on the short, medium and long term consequences of leaving. Even if one accepts that it might be overstated, the consequences are still generally accepted as being negative. I am not sure I saw so much about the negative short, medium and long term consequences of staying. Seriously, can you please show me it?

orubiru wrote: »

You talk about the dumbing down of the UK but what if that applies to the Remain side too? What if you're wrong? Have you, and other posters too, even considered the possibility that you might be wrong?

Of course I have considered that possibility. But here is the thing. I know a little bit about law. So I know what EU law does for us. One of the aspects I considered when weighing leave or remain was what the impact on me as a citizen would be. I am comfortable with the legal protections I have under EU law. I am happy with the restrictions EU law places on the government and what it can do to me, and I accept the restrictions and obligation I have. It is a balance I am happy with. When I saw the leave side talk about “reducing the costs of bureaucracy” I know they were talking, though they wouldn’t say it, about reducing worker’s rights as well as environmental and health and safety restrictions. I don’t want that. I considered that I had enough knowledge of law to make this determination myself. I still read other opinions, but I came to the conclusion that on the balance of probabilities, in this area, the correct answer is remain. Could I be wrong, of course, but I don’t think I am.


The other big one for me was the economy. I am reasonably intelligent, but I am not an economist. In this area I had to rely more on external sources. Those external sources were, in the vast majority, on the remain side. I did not make my decision based on weight of numbers, I did my best to compare the views and try to come to an, if not educated, at least a reasoned conclusion. I found the argument for remain to be more compelling. I am conscious that I have a bias, but even trying to allow for this, the sheer weight of opinion to remain must add some strength. I was unconvinced by the leave side’s economic argument, even one of their own economist admitted that brexit would mean the end of manufacturing in the UK. And this was another thing that solidified my belief in remaining. The leave side seemed to be simply saying “let’s just get out and damn the consequences.” One of the supporters, can’t remember if it was Arron Banks or not, said, having been asked what he thought about the statement that households would be £4k worse off annually (a figure I don’t fully agree with by the way), “that would be a price worth paying”. Yes, if you are a billionaire I am sure paying a measly £4k to get what you want would be more than satisfactory, but what if that was 10, 20 or even 50% of your household income.


Yes. I did consider that I could be wrong but first, given the preponderance of evidence, I felt that on the balance of probabilities I probably wasn’t and second, even if I was wrong the consequence of remain being wrong was much less serious than the consequences leave being wrong. If we voted to remain we would always, in future, have the option to leave. Once we are gone, getting back in will be harder, much harder.

MrP