EU referendum, brexit and the aftermath

The aminosity is directed at you not because of your opinions but because you trolled the thread using an anonymous account.

It has been quite acidic, though.

The grandson of a Chemist couldn't let that pass!

I've always thought the user91922 persona was a bit fishy.

All you other hand-wringers, what do you think you're appeasing by showing such civility to what is the most uncivil of movements in our society since Enoch Powell?

This.

Someone up thread mentioned people who had seen their jobs taken by EU immigration voting leave. As much as I disagree with it (and I admit that I disagree with it largely because I simply don't encounter it), that's probably a perfectly reasonable , considered and urgent position to arrive at. I doubt there was enough of these votes to carry the referendum.

Most leavers I've met have been old white people who are simply closet racists. People who live in wealthy parts of Hertfordshire and Warwickshire (family live there) who have never spoken to an immigrant, and who don't work anymore and have had absolutely no negative economic impact from any form of immigration.

They seek me out to gloat because I'm from 'That London', then they tie themselves in knots trying to explain themselves without muttering something openly racist; there's no point in being polite to them, it legitimises them.

There's nothing to understand. They're thick enough to believe the lies that the odds-on favourite to become the next leader of the Tories has peddled to the press since the '80's and built a career on facilitated by the chumocracy.

You couldn't get a clearer illustration of venal self-interest conquering the truth, but still they swallow it down out of misplaced patriotism and a faith in their 'university of life, college of common sense' worldview.

https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/uk/2016/07/boris-johnson-peddled-absurd-eu-myths-and-our-disgraceful-press-followed-his

Anyone that thinks this can be appeased away or wants to bend over backwards to accommodate such ignorance is channeling the spirit of Neville Chamberlain.

Round me there are loads of farmers. They need and like the seasonal workers who work for them. But they believe the common agricultural policy is detrimental to their livelihood. At no point when talking to them have I felt any underlying racism. They just voted with what they thought was their best interest. Though as far as I understand their rationale is what we have isn’t working so let’s vote for the unknown.

I am not defending their views, just trying to understand what their thinking is.

If only they had MEP's who actually turned up for meetings instead of misappropriating EU funds to use against it and forming strategic alliances with other right wing groups across the continent to coordinate their efforts...

Yeah - maybe racism the wrong word? Something else that means foreigners are ok in their own country, but inferior somehow (probably in some nebulous quality like 'character'...).

Those farmers possibly had a legitimate economic view about the CAP, and voted accordingly. I've no idea if it was right or wrong, they'd know better than me.

Economic arguments, or anything about trying to improve the lot of farmers, fishermen, car factory workers has been forgotten a while back I feel - it's all about people like the anonymous user above crowing. It's about as worth engaging with them as it would be with me if I repeatedly and forcibly insisted that the reason I voted remain was because I wish I was as chic as the French.

they believe the common agricultural policy is detrimental to their livelihood

Where "detrimental" means "receive more in EU subsidies than they make from actual farming".

Take away the subsidies, and you're left with an entire nation's agricultural business being bought up by a few giant agribusinesses.

Enjoy your indentured servitude, farmer Giles.

I don’t agree with their assessment but crucially they had been led to believe (lied to) that CAP is bad for them.

At least when we understand the basis for their beliefs then the lies can be challenged rather than attacking the people themselves.

There is a difference between gammony cunt and someone who has been lied to.

I don’t agree with their assessment but crucially they had been led to believe (lied to) that CAP is bad for them.

A digression, but can't they literally see in their own accounts where their money comes from? I feel it should be relatively difficult for a govt to lie to you in the face of your own P&L.

edit: or is CAP adjustment hidden away by inflating the prices of the goods produced somehow?

There is a difference between gammony cunt and someone who has been lied to.

Granted, there is.

But similarly, people pick and choose to listen to whatever reinforces there own worldview.

We all live tend to live in bubbles and have entrenched views.

Gammon gammon let's kiss EU goodbyeyeyeye.

I know one Brexit voter from work. He is not anti immigrantion. He thinks a lot of IT is sexist which gets shouted down as "snowflake" stuff by true gammons.

He does read the Torygraph which sells Brexit as easier/the EUs is bad more perhaps than other papers.

He hates Ireland w/o realizing it, but that is because of the past in Norn Ire, can't blame him for this loyalty to a disloyal UK. I agree with him actually on some things.

And yes being in the EU means more compromise/abstraction of power. That is a downside, which gets paid back with having a lot more clout. But it cannot be said it does not exist.

But I just don't see his view that leaving the EU is going to be OK. Especially not in NI.

that is true but if I were faced with a decision with such monumental importance, I might be inclined to do a bit of research on the impacts of that decision.

Possibly what this highlights is a) a lack of critical thinking and b) the absolute shambles of the media who have abdicated a responsibility towards sensible and impartial reporting in favour of divisive and sensationalist churnalism.

That can partly be explained by the downfall of print based media, but not fully.

I know two brexiters whose intellect I respect. Their decision was based on the lack of democracy in the EU and the economic restrictiveness (and even unfairness) of being unable to forge independent trade relationships with emerging non-EU economies. I think those are reasonable arguments. Underlying that, though, is I think a greater sense of attachment and perhaps pride of the country that the UK is and how we got where we are. One example is the difference between UK common law and roman law that predominates in the EU (see this link that someone posted earlier). Again, I get this, but for me it isn't enough to justify throwing away the benefits and of the EU and the ability it gives us to face global problems as part of a bloc with global clout.

One example is the difference between UK common law and roman law that predominates in the EU

as I understand the roman law principles still apply in Scotland, which has a separate and distinct legal system

as you'd said those, I think those weak as hell reasons for brexit.

I think there is a fear of creeping slowly into greater union within the EU which, in the case of older brexiters, is also driven by having originally agreed only to forge an economic union. What I don't understand is that we seemed to have such a uniquely nice deal in terms of free trade, but not being in the Euro, rebate etc. I think that the view that we could improve on that is pretty misguided.

Lack of democracy, when cited as a reason, generally means "I don't know much about the EU", given that it's more democratic than the UK.

Yeah, but we can stockpile democracy.

I don't want further integration with the EU is the only valid reason I can think of. That then means completely dropping out of the EU and the EEC and a hard border and trouble in Ireland, a massive headache for Gibraltar/WTO terms/not great tradedeals and a mess for 10-30 years.

At least be honest about it... there is so much denial.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svwGVCaOBwA
some non gammon Brexiters.

This is interesting research:

Previous research suggests media attention may increase support for populist right-wing parties, but extant evidence is mostly limited to proportional representation systems in which such an effect would be most likely. At the same time, in the United Kingdom’s first-past-the-post system, an ongoing political and regulatory debate revolves around whether the media give disproportionate coverage to the populist right-wing UK Independence Party (UKIP). This study uses a mixed-methods research design to investigate the causal dynamics of UKIP support and media coverage as an especially valuable case. Vector autoregression, using monthly, aggregate time-series data from January 2004 to April 2017, provides new evidence consistent with a model in which media coverage drives party support, but not vice versa. The article identifies key periods in which stagnating or declining support for UKIP is followed by increases in media coverage and subsequent increases in public support. The findings show that media coverage may drive public support for right-wing populist parties in a substantively non-trivial fashion that is irreducible to previous levels of public support, even in a national institutional environment least supportive of such an effect. The findings have implications for political debates in the UK and potentially other liberal democracies.

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/british-journal-of-political-science/article/does-media-coverage-drive-public-support-for-ukip-or-does-public-support-for-ukip-drive-media-coverage/81B77DDCA9B0DE26A8DF18B15158EF16

I don't see how a movement that publicly brands elected judges as enemies of the people gets to point to our legal system as the reason we should undertake Brexit...

All the bluster about civil war and last man standing rhetoric also comes from the same side.

Foreign interference, attacks on judiciary, rabid right wing press, domestic fascists forming political alliances with their international counterparts whilst profiteering off the back of stoking civil unrest, shits like Rees Mogg and Cameron trying to dodge new tax avoidance laws that would interfere with their Panama trusts ...

But our fucking great, permissive legal system. I welcome greater EU integration simply because it dilutes the influence of our homegrown ermine cape aspirationals.

meanwhile, convicted criminal tommy robinson is getting all sorts of press coverage for the sake of 'balance'

grim stuff.

I like the batty woman and her unsaid her metaphor of a nation as a colony of bees - I assume she she's the queen and we unquestioningly do all the work for her? She is retired I suppose.

Also

"in business if you don't take risks you can't move forward"

What lazy thinking. In business you bet your own farm, not your farm and everybody else farm, and you only do it when there is a very strong chance of you winning. Arrrghh.

There doesn't really appear to be much substance to what they are saying? Perhaps that's just a reflection of the general vagueness of the whole referendum situation, or maybe it's the Guardian's preference for letting people express themselves in their own words. I dunno.