You don't get to ignore the democratic process when it doesn't turn up the result you wanted. Article 50 should be invoked. "Oh wait, but this time it's different because-" nope. Democracy. Voting. Consequences.
On the other hand, I expect a government to govern, and invoking Article 50 would be an awful form of governance.
Yeah, but the government should have governed by not putting something this important up to a referendum in the first place. They did. That's their fuck up, and the fuck up of the electorate for voting badly. No do overs.
It's similar to when the Tories won in 2010 and the organised left enacted massive protests and strikes because their guy didn't win. The best take on it I saw (from the daily mash of all places was "when Labour win, at least the Tories still show up to work"
You don't get to ignore the democratic process when it doesn't turn up the result you wanted. Article 50 should be invoked. "Oh wait, but this time it's different because-" nope. Democracy. Voting. Consequences.
On the other hand, I expect a government to govern, and invoking Article 50 would be an awful form of governance.
Yeah, but the government should have governed by not putting something this important up to a referendum in the first place. They did. That's their fuck up, and the fuck up of the electorate for voting badly. No do overs.
It's similar to when the Tories won in 2010 and the organised left enacted massive protests and strikes because their guy didn't win. The best take on it I saw (from the daily mash of all places was "when Labour win, at least the Tories still show up to work"
What about the edge case of a General Election bring triggered, Brexit being an issue and an anti-Brexit government comes to power? Should they abide by the referendum if they campaigned to stop it?
No do overs. It's pretty disgusting that a party called the liberal democrats are willing to run on a platform of ignoring the democratic process, but I guess nothing about that snivelling coven of cowards should surprise me at this point.
I don't know, ask the guy that made that decision. At no point was this presented as a "what do you reckon? because we're not going to do it if you come up with the wrong answer so don't worry about it"
Best way I see this working out getting the country's leadership sorted, invoking Article 50 to stop uncertainty fucking everything up further, entering into negotiations in order to get the 'best possible deal' for Britain, whatever that is, and in six months hopefully being able to work on messaging that effectively communicates that, on balance, we are much stronger in than out, and that the position that the Leave campaign ran on was ill-conceived and proved untenable.
That all reads like an impossible dream given the current situation, which is tragic because it's hardly out there.
Best way I see this working out getting the country's leadership sorted, invoking Article 50 to stop uncertainty fucking everything up further, entering into negotiations in order to get the 'best possible deal' for Britain, whatever that is, and in six months hopefully being able to work on messaging that effectively communicates that, on balance, we are much stronger in than out, and that the position that the Leave campaign ran on was ill-conceived and proved untenable.
That all reads like an impossible dream given the current situation, which is tragic because it's hardly out there.
Once article 50 is invoked, the only way to cancel leaving is to get the other 27 members to agree.
I have no idea how feasible this is, but I think getting 27 countries to agree with anything is a tall order.
Doesn't fucking matter. It was, in principle, a democratic vote to leave the EU. The country spoke, and it spoke dumb.
Only 70-odd % of people voted, mind
that sounds like enough to count to me, and even if it weren't, they didn't explicitly say beforehand "at least this much of the population must vote for the referendum to count" so the turnout super doesn't matter.
While the UK suffers to leave, the EU also suffers if the UK leaves, because it's the world's financial centre and they want that, desperately want that, as part of the single market
I mean, also not conductive to democracy is lying so blatantly in your campaign that it might as well not exist the day after the vote.
Or is it okay if from now on we all jump off cliffs based on a mislead majority? Because that's as much a depressing dystopia as ignoring a close vote.
They track people's attendance, right? What if they had a second vote but you can only vote if you didn't the first time? Then they're not overturning anything, they're just increasing the sample size.
I realise this is probably a terrible idea, I just desperately want Britain to have a way out of this that isn't also a great big kick in the teeth to democracy.
I suppose, and this all from an American who didn't know about this whole deal until it pretty much happened, that the argument could be made that Leave supporters were fed misinformation and thus they could ignore the referendum on that basis. Which admittedly seems like a weak point from the outside? I can see it being made, though.
If the other 27 states can agree on canceling the leave, I'd imagine it'd be in their best interest to do so should the UK put it on the table. It sounds like there are others who are flirting with the idea of breaking away and seeing one of the larger members actually do that, realize how shit it is for them, and want back in would maybe quell some of those sentiments. Although right now I imagine they're still a bit... spiteful. So, maybe Cameron resigning will give enough time for cooler heads to prevail.
any special requirements added on after the fact would be tainted by the stink of "democracy is only acceptable when we get the result we want" which brings to mind failed democracies run by corrupt dictators that are all in favor of democracy as long as they get everything they want and can never be removed from power.
while I think 'give the people what they want' is an acceptable argument, I also think the parliamentary supremacy argument is acceptable. Electeds should be able to use the power delegated to them, and if not throw'em out (whether yall have a critcal mass of MPs willing to get on the 'throw me out then' train is unclear.)
it was the smallest on the list but
Pluto was a planet and I'll never forget
I suppose, and this all from an American who didn't know about this whole deal until it pretty much happened, that the argument could be made that Leave supporters were fed misinformation and thus they could ignore the referendum on that basis. Which admittedly seems like a weak point from the outside? I can see it being made, though.
If the other 27 states can agree on canceling the leave, I'd imagine it'd be in their best interest to do so should the UK put it on the table. It sounds like there are others who are flirting with the idea of breaking away and seeing one of the larger members actually do that, realize how shit it is for them, and want back in would maybe quell some of those sentiments. Although right now I imagine they're still a bit... spiteful. So, maybe Cameron resigning will give enough time for cooler heads to prevail.
Or you know, everything explodes.
If the UK wants out the other 27 states can do nothing about it.
In my opinion its strange that Farage and Johnson have been permitted to quietly leave the political stage instead of facing repercussions for the shit show they put on and lies they told.
In our country we would most likely start a national inquiry.
You don't get to ignore the democratic process when it doesn't turn up the result you wanted. Article 50 should be invoked. "Oh wait, but this time it's different because-" nope. Democracy. Voting. Consequences.
The idea of the British govt ignoring the vote scares me, I admit, even though in theory there would be no direct consequences on the US. As mentioned in this thread and elsewhere, there's already a whiff of fascism coming back into vogue, and there's nothing less democratic than for a government to nullify a popular vote, regardless of how close. Some people would say that a government ignoring the vote is why we need fascism "to protect us". shudder.
A bit over a year ago, the UK elected a parliament made up of a super-majority of ministers in favor of Remaining. That included most of the Tories, and nearly all of Labor and the SNP (maybe close to 70% total of parliament). So which vote is more important? The vote in 2015 when the people elected a government overwhelmingly in favor of Remaining, or a non-binding referendum in which Leaving won by a small but significant amount?
There's no whiff of fascism for the current parliament to think that staying in the EU is the right thing to do if that's what they believe and that's what they were elected on. And even if you think that the Brexit referendum vote completely supersedes the parliamentary anti-Brexit super-majority because of... reasons, I still think that you have to at least acknowledge that UK voters have contradicted themselves in a fairly short amount of time. When you take the last UK general election into consideration, it's hard to believe that British electorate are really and unambiguously in favor of Brexit.
So yeah... given that the Remainers are both an absolute parliamentary majority and a majority of Tory ministers and that they were elected just last year, I don't think Brexit is going anywhere fast.
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Brovid Hasselsmof[Growling historic on the fury road]Registered Userregular
I seem to remember some people in this thread liking the british habit of colourful folksy insults, so maybe people will enjoy this
You don't get to ignore the democratic process when it doesn't turn up the result you wanted. Article 50 should be invoked. "Oh wait, but this time it's different because-" nope. Democracy. Voting. Consequences.
The idea of the British govt ignoring the vote scares me, I admit, even though in theory there would be no direct consequences on the US. As mentioned in this thread and elsewhere, there's already a whiff of fascism coming back into vogue, and there's nothing less democratic than for a government to nullify a popular vote, regardless of how close. Some people would say that a government ignoring the vote is why we need fascism "to protect us". shudder.
A bit over a year ago, the UK elected a parliament made up of a super-majority of ministers in favor of Remaining. That included most of the Tories, and nearly all of Labor and the SNP (maybe close to 70% total of parliament). So which vote is more important? The vote in 2015 when the people elected a government overwhelmingly in favor of Remaining, or a non-binding referendum in which Leaving won by a small but significant amount?
There's no whiff of fascism for the current parliament to think that staying in the EU is the right thing to do if that's what they believe and that's what they were elected on. And even if you think that the Brexit referendum vote completely supersedes the parliamentary anti-Brexit super-majority because of... reasons, I still think that you have to at least acknowledge that UK voters have contradicted themselves in a fairly short amount of time. When you take the last UK general election into consideration, it's hard to believe that British electorate are really and unambiguously in favor of Brexit.
So yeah... given that the Remainers are both an absolute parliamentary majority and a majority of Tory ministers and that they were elected just last year, I don't think Brexit is going anywhere fast.
That depends on how much they want to stay in Parliament. It's easy for the mental calculus to go "The country as a whole (or my constituency specifically) voted leave, if I go against that they might vote me out".
The referendum is advisory, so while completely ignoring it and trying to pretend it never happened would be undemocratic, considering what to do about it in parliament and then making a decision one way or another would not, necessarily, be undemocratic.
Also, we might have reached a situation where any possibility would be considered "undemocratic" in some way, and one bad option is going to have to be picked from the shitbucket.
He just took the evidence and spun it so hard that you could put some wet clothes in there are call it a tumble dryer.
There seems to be a general agreement that the report was thorough and fair. Not at all kind to Blair or his administration, but absolves them of the worst accusations of wrong doing. We shouldn't have gone in, there's a chance that it would have been worse if we left the Americans alone to do it but not much evidence that we made it better. It'll set you back about £800 if you want the entire thing in hard back.
It will take... a very long time for that account to finish posting. I think someone said 9 years somewhere
You know, I guarantee that in 9 years time I'll hear about ChilcotBot finally hitting the end of the report, and I'll remember reading this.
Hi future me, hope things are good!
Democratic voting is not exactly the be-all end-all of governing decisions. It's very important, and must be treated with care as an institution, but "there was a vote, so that's it" isn't how things actually work in most democracies.
For example, in the US democratic votes led to state laws that banned gay marriage. The courts then stepped in and said no, you can't have this law, and they were all stricken down.
Of course these votes aren't the same thing -- judges overriding democratic votes due to constitutional rights is not really comparable to a government ignoring the results of a referendum. But it establishes an important baseline: democratic majorities don't always get to decide what happens in a country. And for the most part, this is something I think we all agree on in general.
"It doesn't matter" seems to too readily dismiss the note about the referendum being nonbinding. That's a very important detail. The technical reason that the vote can legally be ignored is super important because that would mean that passing on invoking Article 50 does not threaten the nation's democratic institutions. It isn't making up the rules as it goes along to suit the whims of its leaders; it is instead following all the rules that were laid out. If this conclusion is unsatisfactory to the electorate of the nation, they can use (actually binding) votes to elect a new administration that either promises to invoke Article 50 or to hold a binding referendum on the matter.
There's also the question as to whether the results would have been the same if it were a binding vote. We already know that a common reaction from those who voted Leave and got it was a mix of surprise and dismay. They wanted to send a message of dissatisfaction, not actually leave the EU. They may have been more willing to send such a message when placing a nonbinding vote. Would the results have changed if the referendum were binding? Would people have been less willing to take that risk with their vote? Maybe. Probably not, but it's possible, and the results were fairly close as-is.
There's something satisfying about being able to say "you got what you wished for, now deal with the consequences" or "voting matters, remember that next time." But this isn't a game where you can just try another tactic on the next round. This is the world economy and a whole lot of people's lives. At consequences of this scale, it's not hard to imagine that it's going to result in people dying, not to mention a lot more poverty and misery. Maybe that's just important enough that a government that's legally capable of eschewing the declared will of a very small democratic majority of its populace should in fact choose to not follow through. This doesn't necessarily mean openly ignore the results; the people sent a message, so maybe find some ways to deal with those grievances.
Without, you know, continuing to tank the world economy.
Fleur de Alys on
Triptycho: A card-and-dice tabletop indie RPG currently in development and playtesting
yeah i dunno i have a hard time saying "well that's what they want so that's what they get" when the consequences are gonna hurt a ton of people, including people who don't even live in the country that held the vote
Democratic voting is not exactly the be-all end-all of governing decisions. It's very important, and must be treated with care as an institution, but "there was a vote, so that's it" isn't how things actually work in most democracies.
For example, in the US democratic votes led to state laws that banned gay marriage. The courts then stepped in and said no, you can't have this law, and they were all stricken down.
Of course these votes aren't the same thing -- judges overriding democratic votes due to constitutional rights is not really comparable to a government ignoring the results of a referendum. But it establishes an important baseline: democratic majorities don't always get to decide what happens in a country. And for the most part, this is something I think we all agree on in general.
"It doesn't matter" seems to too readily dismiss the note about the referendum being nonbinding. That's a very important detail. The technical reason that the vote can legally be ignored is super important because that would mean that passing on invoking Article 50 does not threaten the nation's democratic institutions. It isn't making up the rules as it goes along to suit the whims of its leaders; it is instead following all the rules that were laid out. If this conclusion is unsatisfactory to the electorate of the nation, they can use (actually binding) votes to elect a new administration that either promises to invoke Article 50 or to hold a binding referendum on the matter.
There's also the question as to whether the results would have been the same if it were a binding vote. We already know that a common reaction from those who voted Leave and got it was a mix of surprise and dismay. They wanted to send a message of dissatisfaction, not actually leave the EU. They may have been more willing to send such a message when placing a nonbinding vote. Would the results have changed if the referendum were binding? Would people have been less willing to take that risk with their vote? Maybe. Probably not, but it's possible, and the results were fairly close as-is.
There's something satisfying about being able to say "you got what you wished for, now deal with the consequences" or "voting matters, remember that next time." But this isn't a game where you can just try another tactic on the next round. This is the world economy and a whole lot of people's lives. At consequences of this scale, it's not hard to imagine that it's going to result in people dying, not to mention a lot more poverty and misery. Maybe that's just important enough that a government that's legally capable of eschewing the declared will of a very small democratic majority of its populace should in fact choose to not follow through. This doesn't necessarily mean openly ignore the results; the people sent a message, so maybe find some ways to deal with those grievances.
Without, you know, continuing to tank the world economy.
I don't think anyone in here is going "wow you guys are dumb, no takebacks, we're gonna point and laugh as millions suffer." The political reality is that there currently seems to be a low chance that article 50 will not be invoked and now everyone has to deal with David Cameron's stupid, stupid mess.
An Asian friend of mine who lives in the states went back home to the UK and it struck me that I was genuinely worried about his safety for the first time.
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UnbrokenEvaHIGH ON THE WIREBUT I WON'T TRIP ITRegistered Userregular
An Asian friend of mine who lives in the states went back home to the UK and it struck me that I was genuinely worried about his safety for the first time.
I have a friend from high school who is from the UK originally and she's worried about visiting home in September because her new fiancé is Asian-Canadian
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Brovid Hasselsmof[Growling historic on the fury road]Registered Userregular
Man I am worried about one of my mates back home who is white and English just cos he has a Polish surname. Which is ridiculous.
Posts
Yeah, but the government should have governed by not putting something this important up to a referendum in the first place. They did. That's their fuck up, and the fuck up of the electorate for voting badly. No do overs.
It's similar to when the Tories won in 2010 and the organised left enacted massive protests and strikes because their guy didn't win. The best take on it I saw (from the daily mash of all places was "when Labour win, at least the Tories still show up to work"
What about the edge case of a General Election bring triggered, Brexit being an issue and an anti-Brexit government comes to power? Should they abide by the referendum if they campaigned to stop it?
I hate this situation. It's a Tory civil war that we all lost.
That all reads like an impossible dream given the current situation, which is tragic because it's hardly out there.
Only 70-odd % of people voted, mind
Once article 50 is invoked, the only way to cancel leaving is to get the other 27 members to agree.
I have no idea how feasible this is, but I think getting 27 countries to agree with anything is a tall order.
that sounds like enough to count to me, and even if it weren't, they didn't explicitly say beforehand "at least this much of the population must vote for the referendum to count" so the turnout super doesn't matter.
While the UK suffers to leave, the EU also suffers if the UK leaves, because it's the world's financial centre and they want that, desperately want that, as part of the single market
Or is it okay if from now on we all jump off cliffs based on a mislead majority? Because that's as much a depressing dystopia as ignoring a close vote.
I realise this is probably a terrible idea, I just desperately want Britain to have a way out of this that isn't also a great big kick in the teeth to democracy.
If the other 27 states can agree on canceling the leave, I'd imagine it'd be in their best interest to do so should the UK put it on the table. It sounds like there are others who are flirting with the idea of breaking away and seeing one of the larger members actually do that, realize how shit it is for them, and want back in would maybe quell some of those sentiments. Although right now I imagine they're still a bit... spiteful. So, maybe Cameron resigning will give enough time for cooler heads to prevail.
Or you know, everything explodes.
Pluto was a planet and I'll never forget
If the UK wants out the other 27 states can do nothing about it.
In my opinion its strange that Farage and Johnson have been permitted to quietly leave the political stage instead of facing repercussions for the shit show they put on and lies they told.
In our country we would most likely start a national inquiry.
A bit over a year ago, the UK elected a parliament made up of a super-majority of ministers in favor of Remaining. That included most of the Tories, and nearly all of Labor and the SNP (maybe close to 70% total of parliament). So which vote is more important? The vote in 2015 when the people elected a government overwhelmingly in favor of Remaining, or a non-binding referendum in which Leaving won by a small but significant amount?
There's no whiff of fascism for the current parliament to think that staying in the EU is the right thing to do if that's what they believe and that's what they were elected on. And even if you think that the Brexit referendum vote completely supersedes the parliamentary anti-Brexit super-majority because of... reasons, I still think that you have to at least acknowledge that UK voters have contradicted themselves in a fairly short amount of time. When you take the last UK general election into consideration, it's hard to believe that British electorate are really and unambiguously in favor of Brexit.
So yeah... given that the Remainers are both an absolute parliamentary majority and a majority of Tory ministers and that they were elected just last year, I don't think Brexit is going anywhere fast.
http://m.huffpost.com/uk/entry/uk_577b8963e4b073366f0faf62?edition=uk
That depends on how much they want to stay in Parliament. It's easy for the mental calculus to go "The country as a whole (or my constituency specifically) voted leave, if I go against that they might vote me out".
Also, we might have reached a situation where any possibility would be considered "undemocratic" in some way, and one bad option is going to have to be picked from the shitbucket.
He just took the evidence and spun it so hard that you could put some wet clothes in there are call it a tumble dryer.
There seems to be a general agreement that the report was thorough and fair. Not at all kind to Blair or his administration, but absolves them of the worst accusations of wrong doing. We shouldn't have gone in, there's a chance that it would have been worse if we left the Americans alone to do it but not much evidence that we made it better. It'll set you back about £800 if you want the entire thing in hard back.
It will take... a very long time for that account to finish posting. I think someone said 9 years somewhere
You know, I guarantee that in 9 years time I'll hear about ChilcotBot finally hitting the end of the report, and I'll remember reading this.
Hi future me, hope things are good!
For example, in the US democratic votes led to state laws that banned gay marriage. The courts then stepped in and said no, you can't have this law, and they were all stricken down.
Of course these votes aren't the same thing -- judges overriding democratic votes due to constitutional rights is not really comparable to a government ignoring the results of a referendum. But it establishes an important baseline: democratic majorities don't always get to decide what happens in a country. And for the most part, this is something I think we all agree on in general.
"It doesn't matter" seems to too readily dismiss the note about the referendum being nonbinding. That's a very important detail. The technical reason that the vote can legally be ignored is super important because that would mean that passing on invoking Article 50 does not threaten the nation's democratic institutions. It isn't making up the rules as it goes along to suit the whims of its leaders; it is instead following all the rules that were laid out. If this conclusion is unsatisfactory to the electorate of the nation, they can use (actually binding) votes to elect a new administration that either promises to invoke Article 50 or to hold a binding referendum on the matter.
There's also the question as to whether the results would have been the same if it were a binding vote. We already know that a common reaction from those who voted Leave and got it was a mix of surprise and dismay. They wanted to send a message of dissatisfaction, not actually leave the EU. They may have been more willing to send such a message when placing a nonbinding vote. Would the results have changed if the referendum were binding? Would people have been less willing to take that risk with their vote? Maybe. Probably not, but it's possible, and the results were fairly close as-is.
There's something satisfying about being able to say "you got what you wished for, now deal with the consequences" or "voting matters, remember that next time." But this isn't a game where you can just try another tactic on the next round. This is the world economy and a whole lot of people's lives. At consequences of this scale, it's not hard to imagine that it's going to result in people dying, not to mention a lot more poverty and misery. Maybe that's just important enough that a government that's legally capable of eschewing the declared will of a very small democratic majority of its populace should in fact choose to not follow through. This doesn't necessarily mean openly ignore the results; the people sent a message, so maybe find some ways to deal with those grievances.
Without, you know, continuing to tank the world economy.
http://www.audioentropy.com/
I don't think anyone in here is going "wow you guys are dumb, no takebacks, we're gonna point and laugh as millions suffer." The political reality is that there currently seems to be a low chance that article 50 will not be invoked and now everyone has to deal with David Cameron's stupid, stupid mess.
I have a friend from high school who is from the UK originally and she's worried about visiting home in September because her new fiancé is Asian-Canadian
Tweet from Michael Gove, needless to say people are ripping him to shreds over it, pointing out the EU is exactly what he is asking for here.