• Replies 36 replies
  • Subscribers 92 subscribers
  • Views 1220 views
  • Users 5 members are here
Options
Related
Hints and tips
  • To quote someone's message, first select/highlight the relevant text, and then use the Quote button that appears
  • To "mention" someone, type @ followed by the start of the forum name, and choose from the list; that person will get a notification of being mentioned

Another elephant in the room

TheCatWoman

This time Brexit. I think everybody who voted for Brexit knew what they were voting for, but, apart from some commonalities I think everyones idea of Brexit was different and probably quite individual. But not only was this never addressed at the referendum properly by the leader of the charge out of Europe, but during the Brexit discussions after the vote.

Brexit was won by a narrow majority and not only were the 48% who wanted to stay totally ignored, but leavers were never asked what they really wanted either? I really think that as a national issue it should have been a cross party thing, not a one party thing from a minority government. Is it any wonder that so many people now think Brexit was a bad idea or that it's not worked out as they thought or had been promised?

I'm not a Labour supporter, but I do think Andy Burnams right to bring this up now and get people talking, to get an idea of what people really think and want before making any big desicions ahead of a new manifesto for the next parliament.

I think the world has changed so much in the last 5 or 6 years, war in Europe, war in the Middle East and an American President that seems happy to abandon alliances, including NATO and cosy up to Putin. I think we need to be much more united as a continent in the face of threats and should be much closer in National Security terms.

Of course Europe itself might be a different place next year as elections take place with the far right on the up.

Parents
  • TheCatWoman said:
    Brexit was won by a narrow majority and not only were the 48% who wanted to stay totally ignored, but leavers were never asked what they really wanted either?

    Is that not like a group of people voting to have a light switched on or off, then those who lost the vote complaining that their opinions were not taken into consideration.

    It was a binary choice with little nuance - be in the EU or out.

    TheCatWoman said:
    I think we need to be much more united as a continent

    Have you lived in any other European countries (excluding Ireland)? They all have very strong ideas of their national identity and getting them to all agree on stuff - especially stuff that heavily impacts themselves - is a nightmare.

    The EU works well on an everyday bureaucracy level but not so well for big decisions like this, plus Russia has a lot of influence in key areas through people who it controls who can veto key decisions or slow them down so much that they become unusable.

    China are getting up there with their influence peddling as well although for different reasons, so getting any sort of united front as you suggest is going to be highly unlikely.

    I think the best we could hope for is for individual countries (eg Poland) to react to an incursion by Russia and persuade a bunch of other neighbours to respond with force. Russia seems so ground down militarily by the Ukraine war that a sustained and focussed response could lead to the government being overthrown which is the best chance for peace.

    Sorry if this seem bleak but I try to be realistic rather than idealistic about what can happen.

Reply
  • TheCatWoman said:
    Brexit was won by a narrow majority and not only were the 48% who wanted to stay totally ignored, but leavers were never asked what they really wanted either?

    Is that not like a group of people voting to have a light switched on or off, then those who lost the vote complaining that their opinions were not taken into consideration.

    It was a binary choice with little nuance - be in the EU or out.

    TheCatWoman said:
    I think we need to be much more united as a continent

    Have you lived in any other European countries (excluding Ireland)? They all have very strong ideas of their national identity and getting them to all agree on stuff - especially stuff that heavily impacts themselves - is a nightmare.

    The EU works well on an everyday bureaucracy level but not so well for big decisions like this, plus Russia has a lot of influence in key areas through people who it controls who can veto key decisions or slow them down so much that they become unusable.

    China are getting up there with their influence peddling as well although for different reasons, so getting any sort of united front as you suggest is going to be highly unlikely.

    I think the best we could hope for is for individual countries (eg Poland) to react to an incursion by Russia and persuade a bunch of other neighbours to respond with force. Russia seems so ground down militarily by the Ukraine war that a sustained and focussed response could lead to the government being overthrown which is the best chance for peace.

    Sorry if this seem bleak but I try to be realistic rather than idealistic about what can happen.

Children
  • in reply to Iain

    "Is that not like a group of people voting to have a light switched on or off, then those who lost the vote complaining that their opinions were not taken into consideration. It was a binary choice with little nuance - be in the EU or out."

    Your analogy doesn't work at all and just highlights the main issue. It was presented as a binary choice but the reality is anything but binary. If it were, we'd have just left and all the arguing about the deal we would have with the EU afterwards that saw for Theresa May wouldn't have happened. It's the oversimplification of complicated issues that populists like Farage and Johnson (plus many others around the world) always push. A large part of the electorate don't want nuance, or uncertainty or benefits and drawbacks etc. They just want to be told that the thing they think is a problem can be solved very easily if we just do this one simple thing but the elite are lying to you about it.

    The analogy also fails because turning a light off has very basic consequences that everyone can easily understand - it gets darker. If those people were told that by switching off the light, they'd have better healthcare and then that turned out to be false, there would be a case for suggesting that the vote was fraudulently influenced.

    To run with your flawed analogy further - you could also consider that some people that campaigned for turning the light off had their own enormous torch that they could use instead,that would only benefit them and not everyone else i.e. rich people who are insulated from the negative effects by their wealth.

    I could go on but to summarise, no, it isn't like that at all and the suggestion that it is demonstrates exactly why the leave campaign was a huge lie.

  • in reply to Iain

    I'm just opening a conversation and certainly not one with the lack of nunace of the last debacle