The EU Referendum • Page 8

Good point. I think I'd always be pro-EU. Partly because I love being able to travel and work with Europeans (I consider myself more European than British). But also because I cannot see a point where the UK would ever be strong enough to really do better on its own. Not without radical changes. Our economic power is entirely based on financial services which we are seeing now, are quite easily relocated if the powers that be want to.

Overall. I think this Referendum should not have taken place at this moment in time. The UK is far too broken to be undertaking a decision like this and the vote should only have been dealt once we address some of the major issues that have ended up being the driving emotional force behind the vote to leave by many.

It's the political and democratic equivalent of play fighting when you are steaming drunk. You know it's always going to spill over into genuine aggression.

The most frustration part for me, aside from all the backpeddling from the leave campaign. Is that many have clearly voted without educating themselves.

We are seeing communities that voted to leave now realising how much money the EU put into their economy. Sheffield where I am from voted to Leave but everywhere you go, you see he EU logo signifying investment.

The company I work for undertook a £10m investment last year on the back of an EU grant that allowed us to move to a new factory and install a number of new machines. As a result we placed 50th on the Sunday Times Fast Track 100 list among companies like Brew Dog. Since I've worked here weve gone from having 50 staff to 260, with more plans to recruit in large numbers.

We've created a ton of new jobs and launched careers in an area of the country that is still feeling the effects of the shutdown of our steel industry. That was what the EU did with money that we paid into it. So when I see people in the office celebrating the result that I know are in work because of the very thing they voted against I can barely contain my anger. Is it too petty to suggest that, should we end up having to make cutbacks in the ensuing recession, they should be the first to go?

 

In short.

This whole thing has been a snake oil revolution.

The hard right have somehow managed to convince the vast swathes of people that are hurting in a broken Britain to pass the power over to them, when they are the people that put the electorate in this mess in the first place.

It also seems to have vilified racism and xenophobia. There are huge reports that across the country of it now. I have a friend that is from China, she has lived here for 10 years and has a PhD in engineering. She got told to go home because she was no longer welcome while grocery shopping with her kid. That's fucked.

This is an interesting if imaginative theory though. I hate what Cameron's government has done to this country, but it'd be worth praising were this theory to prove true.

 

I'm disgusted that just three days in, we're already hearing multiple reports of stuff like that. Kids going to school and being told they're not welcome any more. It's an absolute disgrace.

I've seen people ranting and raving at bigotted lefties for painting the Leavers as stupid racists. They're doing well to prove the stereotype. If this is happening already, I dread to think how bad it's going to get. It's like we've managed to step back into an attitude from before when I was born, with one poorly timed political stunt.

 

Yeah, I'm not massively enthusiastic about the EU in itself so there are circumstances where I'd have probably at least considered it. But as it is it's left us at the mercy of a government that's already pretty awful and will probably only get worse, and it's basically given a mandate to the fair right or at least that's the way they'll try to play it.

 

The Tories are all wimping out, apparently. Still probably won't end well if they try to go back on it after the fervour they've whipped up, though. God knows what could end up trying to fill the void they and Labour are creating.

 

The theory that Boris didn't want out looks a bit stronger with tweet. I expect him to do some more backtracking throughout next week.

Regarding Labour, I can't see a better possible leader for them than Corbyn at the minute. Who else will strongly oppose the promised emergency budget, should George Osborne appear in public again? Certainly not one of the Blairites.

 

I'm thinking Clive Lewis, possibly someone like Lisa Nandy even, but if the people enacting the coup have their way I'd be very surprised if it's someone from towards that end of the party again. That said, Corbyn has said that if they want to challenge him it'll be an election.

 

My understanding its that its less that Boris "doesn't want out", and more that he doesn't want to be the one to have to make the call. He was hoping Cameron would trigger the exit before resigning.

 

First time poster in here but I'd like to think I'm fairly well read on the subject.
If Cameron doesn't end up triggering article 50 himself in the time that he stays on as PM, it's a masterful bit of work on his part, although one that chooses between wrecking the tory party by going against the electorate or one of their MPs falling on the sword, and taking us into an economic and social wilderness that they'll likely receive a lot of hate for.

Personally the Labour situation is the more interesting one to me. Unless Corbyn resigns a rift will be created between the PLP and the party membership due to the different voting habits. I absolutely am on his side, but it's not inspiring a lot of faith in the party if the no confidence motion goes ahead.

Does anyone think this is something that the Lib Dems will be able to capitalise on? They seem to be the only fully UK political party that is structurally sound at the moment- can imagine, with the right marketing they'd be able to take a lot of the vote from the remain-voting tories.

 

I guess you can't rule it out when everything is up in the air. Maybe I'm being cynical, but if the Tories keep digging their heels in about triggering the notice (not that I want them to or that I'm trying to argue for acceleration or whatever, but like I said I don't think there'll be a clean getaway at this point), I think UKIP or other groups along those lines are most likely to capitalise.

 

Part of me assumes their party will lose a lot of traction now this referendum is up honestly. The other prominent figures seem to be quickly disowning Farage over that godawful poster (quite rightly too) which could throw them into disarray, but then there's also the idea I think is in the mind of a lot of liberal-minded people that it's a party that represents a lot of xenophobia and traditional right wing ideas that they wouldn't be comfortable supporting (repeal of gay marriage, for example), whether or not that's right or wrong to conclude.

 

Hopefully you're right. Maybe not UKIP specifically, but I figure that even with a backlash against Leave a lot of people who are already in that area politically will be upset at the government screwing around over it, feeling like the referendum's qualified them, or upon realising they've been had, so even if we aren't heading for total unmitigated disaster exactly there's definitely still room for it to get worse.

 

I said to my dad last night. As someone who is very proud of their socialist stance, I'm finding it very difficult to continue fighting for a little man that shoots themselves in the foot. And yes I have a very good idea of how hig and mighty and snobby that sounds.

 

I think we could very likely be looking at our 2 main political parties, splitting into 4. Which wouldn't be a bad thing.

We have swathes of labour supporters defecting because neither Tory or Labour can really maintain their appeal to everyone.

We'll end up with some kind of socialist party, a centre swinging Labour Party, a centre right and a hard right.

I said this yesterday. Many are pointing the finger at Corbyn for not doing enough (which isn't entirely unjustified) but part of me thinks that a known eurosceptic that seem to sit on the fence could be just what the country needs to unite it again. I wonder if he consciously knew that were he to be so strongly campaigning to stay, he'd alienate a large chunk of traditionally labour voters. It sounds like a crazy gamble but hey.

Also, anyone who really listened to Corbyn would know, he was only really opposed to leaving because he feared what the right wing would do as a result, just as we are now.

In some ways I think he's the best candidate to take us forward if we have to do this.

 

Lib den are finitely trying to capitalise on it. They're already saying they will stop Brexit. I'm not sure people will forget their back peddling though. It's a shame as I think, they'd have done a good job if they had just sided with Labour and not the Tories.

I think people don't realise because they are branded as communists, but the Green Party is picking up huge support. We cld end up with a really bizarre hung parliament we've ever seen.

But to be honest, I'm more concerned with how much more damage the current one can do between now and 2020.

 

Sorry for the overkill positing as well.

But I'm also not really upset by the members of the shadow cabinet that have gone.

Hillary Benn is widely praised for his emotion stirring speech but in reality all he has done his whole career is support any notion of war. He supported Blair going into Iraq and Afghanistan. Then Yrian air strikes. T be honest, I don't see what he brings to the table other than a trigger finger.

Corbyn needs to come out swinging to show the country that he isn't a weak idealist, which he is often painted as. But this is also his change to fix a broken Labour Party. The people being touted to replace him, do not comfort me. They are all Blair pt 2. The safe options. Labour are better off re-establishing themselves as what they are meant to be.

Honestly, I think Ed Milliband is the greatest prime minister there never was.

 

Just been sent a link on Fb to a lady who had put together examples that she has come across of open racism since the vote results on Friday. I genuinely cried reading them.

I used to be proud that this was a nation that was built on celebrating its differences, I.e. Enjoying how multi-cultural we are. I was obviously very naive.

Also woke up feeling angry that Cameron has allowed this to happen. These feelings were obviously there all along for a lot of Britain but this referendum has given them the outlet they wanted. Would the Tories won the election without the promise of the referendum? I don't know but it seems foolhardy to have promised one.

All this making Britain great again reminds me of learning about how hitler captured the mood of the country with make Germany great again.

Really worrying times

 

Part of why the right wing is doing so well right now in many countries is because voters on "the left" are losing themselves in pedanticism, leading them to vote non-strategically or not at all. In most western countries, the majority of the electorate does not actualy support right-wing parties, even though it sometimes appears to be that way. However, historically, it's the right that starts culture wars, but they also almost always end up loosing, so it'll probably be alright.

 

It's good to know the English Labour is even worse than the Irish Labour. Sham parties at the minute.

 

Delay Brexit negotiations so we can go on holiday first, Vote Leave chief Matthew Elliot says
Hahaha they're going to keep this up for as long as possible I bet

 

AKALA

Pretty good piece on Brexit by UK Hip-Hop artist Akala. A very knowledgeable dude IMO.

 

welp

 

I'm fairly confident he'll still win a leadership battle. He has the backing of the labour members.

 

If the PLP itself cared about that, they wouldn't have gone for a vote of no confidence.

 

God damn this whole referendum nonsense for forcing me to use my Snrub account for serious posts!

I thought I was the most ashamed of my country I could ever be on Friday morning, and then the massive spate of racist attacks began and now here we are. That instead of seizing on the current disarray in the Tory party, the opposition has opted for a lemming-style jump off a cliff is just the crap flavour icing on the economically disastrous cake.

Here's hoping I have a long lost German relative or something.