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If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

Old Nov 8th 2019, 12:54 am
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Default If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

I don’t know to what extend it will concern us living here in the US, I guess it will if one is moving back to the UK at some point but I voted for “leave” 3 years ago, had I known the government and MPs would mismanage the entire process I would have voted “remain”, not worth the 3 years waiting with uncertainly, most likely I will vote for remain should the public given the chance of a 2nd referendum.

Apologize if if this is not the right forum I’m just nagging lol

what would you vote for and is it worth it after the 3 year brexit saga
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Old Nov 8th 2019, 1:45 am
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Default Re: If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

Same as you. I voted leave, but if I thought the dogs breakfast which followed would be the outcome i'd have voted remain.

I'm at a loss regarding the state of UK politics. It almost makes Trump seem functional.
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Old Nov 8th 2019, 11:12 am
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Default Re: If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

I didn't vote as I didn't feel that it really mattered to me as I will never again reside in the UK.

That said, I would have voted to leave I think, but it is now clear that that is impossible so I would vote to remain.
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Old Nov 8th 2019, 11:23 am
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Default Re: If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

I voted Remain and would do so again.
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Old Nov 8th 2019, 11:43 am
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Default Re: If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

I voted leave, despite the EU being touted as the font of all globalisation has to offer, it by its very nature is incredibly eurocentric, causing unfairness in immigration, and wider issues with it taking such a consensus to achieve anything, it slows progress.

However the Brexit referendum has now bought the archaic nature of westminster to the fore, ridiculous interpretations of procedure and the failure of allowing a minority government which cannot actually do anything (Theresa May's fault for throwing her majority in with the chaff!)

Its really hard to see a way out from here, unless someone has the gall to revoke article 50 i cannot see another referendum delivering a definitive result.. the only other option is the EU kicking us out but that appears rather unlikely as the proposed leave dates (that are written into law apparently!) actually just mean the next date to restart the countdown....

i really couldn't decide which way i'd vote in another referendum, it would have to be a wholly different question in order to have any democratic decency..
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Old Nov 8th 2019, 2:01 pm
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Default Re: If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

I voted Remain and would do so again in less than a heartbeat.

There were two major failings of the EU referendum;
  1. Electoral irregularities amongst the Leave campaign call into question the legitimacy of the result and undermine the mandate of the referendum.
  2. A completely flawed question makes it impossible to determine what the result actually was - "Leave" doesn't actually exist. There are 3 or 4 mutually exclusive versions of leaving the EU and it's not clear that there's majority support for any of them.
The only two ways out of the current impasse that I can see;
  1. Hold a second referendum with either one or multiple specific versions of Leave pitted against Remain to determine the true majority decision.
  2. A majority government takes it upon themselves to implement whatever they believe they can get through parliament regardless of whether it represents the popular will. (And if the Tory's go after a no-deal Brexit it will not represent the popular will, by any stretch of the imagination).
In any case the Brexit debacle has opened a generational schism in British politics that has effectively radicalised the young in favour of the EU. Even if we end up leaving the EU I imagine we'll look to rejoin in as little as 15 years once.

For what it's worth I have a tiny slither of sympathy with the House of Commons. As much of a mess as they have made of this, the reality is the promises that were made by the Leave campaign could never have been delivered. So it's not unexpected that the House of Commons has struggled to do so.
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Old Nov 8th 2019, 5:12 pm
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Default Re: If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

I would have voted Leave but I would begrudgingly vote Remain now. The EU is far far from perfect and needs a lot of reform, but the government has fundamentally failed to resolve important issues such as Northern Ireland. If David Cameron had been more hard headed and explained in detail the ramifications of leaving instead of pissing off to Brussels and pretend-negotiating at the last minute, it probably would have tipped the balance.
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Old Nov 8th 2019, 5:37 pm
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Default Re: If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

I voted Leave and would do so again as my reasoning has not changed, irrespective of the last 3 years. My reasons for voting Leave were about the future issues relating to the necessities of Eurozone integration (the need for a European treasury, taxes, fiscal transfers) and the problems and tensions this would create within the EU, as much as about other aspects like structure, democratic accountability, customs union, precautionary regulatory philosophy (which is not necessarily bad but often overreaches IMHO), and the tendancy towards centralisation and harmonisation rather than leaving many issues to the nation state level.

Regardless of the political mess of the last 3 years, nothing about my reasoning has changed and my judgement is the same. There are benefits of membership, of the single market and customs union, but also costs - not only financial but democratically and in terms of policy flexibility. My judgement remains that the UK is a somewhat square peg in a round hole, and that the UK's exit was inevitable, if not now then it would have come sooner or later.

In the UK the EU has always been talked of, and sold on, transactional terms. It has always been about trade/economics, with the political "tackling greater issues" a somewhat secondary overlay. Whereas across Europe it is spoken of as the European Project, as a fundamentally and primarily political initiative to build a confederation, if not federation, of states. Ultimately I just think a comprehensive free trade agreement, coupled with cooperation on certain things like scientific research, environment, or whatever, on a bi-lateral basis would be a far better and happier arrangement for both UK and the EU.
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Old Nov 8th 2019, 5:50 pm
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Default Re: If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

Originally Posted by vindico
In the UK the EU has always been talked of, and sold on, transactional terms. It has always been about trade/economics, with the political "tackling greater issues" a somewhat secondary overlay. Whereas across Europe it is spoken of as the European Project, as a fundamentally and primarily political initiative to build a confederation, if not federation, of states. Ultimately I just think a comprehensive free trade agreement, coupled with cooperation on certain things like scientific research, environment, or whatever, on a bi-lateral basis would be a far better and happier arrangement for both UK and the EU.
I agree with the first point. The EU has always been talked of and sold on, transactional terms. Until now.

Used to be you'd rarely see a EU flag outside a governmental context in the UK. Now millions of people are wearing them on their chests and marching in London. If anything the prospect of leaving the EU has created an emotional attachment that was fairly lightweight previously.

I don't know where the idea that the UK's exit was inevitable came from. The young are overwhelmingly pro-EU. Brexit is driven by the old trying to recapture a nostalgic vision of Britain that never really existed.

Last edited by GeneralPowerpoint; Nov 8th 2019 at 5:54 pm.
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Old Nov 8th 2019, 6:15 pm
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Default Re: If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

Originally Posted by GeneralPowerpoint

The young are overwhelmingly pro-EU. Brexit is driven by the old trying to recapture a nostalgic vision of Britain that never really existed.
This is it in a nutshell. My sister's children (adults with teenagers of their own) were horrified to learn that their parents had voted to leave; they see it as the older generation -- who won't be around to deal with the fallout -- negatively impacting the future of the younger generations.
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Old Nov 8th 2019, 6:17 pm
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Default Re: If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

Originally Posted by GeneralPowerpoint
Used to be you'd rarely see a EU flag outside a governmental context in the UK. Now millions of people are wearing them on their chests and marching in London. If anything the prospect of leaving the EU has created an emotional attachment that was fairly lightweight previously.

I don't know where the idea that the UK's exit was inevitable came from. The young are overwhelmingly pro-EU. Brexit is driven by the old trying to recapture a nostalgic vision of Britain that never really existed.
I think the people draping themselves in EU flags are in the thousands, not millions. There are about 15-20% staunch Remainers who are full on revoke A50, federal Europe, join Euro, type people. A decent chunk but certainly a minority.

I wholly disagree withy our last point that Brexit is driven by old people trying to recapture a nostalgic vision of Britain. I don't believe it is nostalgia driving it. Sure, in some cases it is, but not substantially. True that the young are more pro-EU and that Brexit support is inversely proportional to age. However, the elderly are the same people who voted to stay in the common market in 1975 and wanted the 'brave new world'. There are a multitude of quite rational and logical and perfectly reasonable reasons for objecting to the EU and the UK's membership of it. Just as there are perfectly rational, logical and reasonable reasons for believing the opposite.

The trope that Brexiters just want the world to stop so they can get off is, frankly, lazy, and Remainers who don't bother to try and understand the underlying reasons for the Brexit vote are doomed. This is why the discourse over the last 3 years has become so toxic. Leavers are smeared in general terms and their motivations are misconstrued, which understandably makes them angry. I get angry whenever I hear it, because I know my reasons, and I am pretty well informed, and Remainers trying to discredit my motivations is rage inducing. I also find it so odd that I can quite easily comprehend the point of view and arguments of Remainers, and yet so often Remainers seem to find it impossible to comprehend that there could be sincere and legitimate reasons behind the motivations of Leavers and that instead they/we must have been lied to, misinformed, voted for distasteful reasons like xenophobia or some such, and that if only we were all as enlightened at they, then we would have obviously) voted to remain. It is a poisonous attitude.

Anyway, my hope now is that Boris gets his deal through, which is a decent deal and path to a comprehensive free trade deal. Then we can move forwards.
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Old Nov 8th 2019, 8:22 pm
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Default Re: If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

Trope's exist for a reason. You may well consider yourself well-informed and believe your reasons for wanting to leave the EU rational, logical and reasonable. In my experience the reasons shared for leaving are usually nebulous, ill-informed and reflect a general dissatisfaction with life that is rarely attributable to the EU.

If you have a philosophical objection to the nature of a supra-national union like the EU, and object to a precautionary regulatory philosophy that's one thing. But I think it would be stretching the truth to pretend this is a majority view. The Leave vote was predominantly populist, emotional and anti-immigrant in nature. None of which will be solved by leaving the EU.
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Old Nov 8th 2019, 9:06 pm
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Default Re: If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

Main reason for leave was to stop flow of economic migrants from poorer EU countries. Interesting to see that many ‘expats’ on an immigration forum have voted to leave. A little ironic I have to say.
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Old Nov 8th 2019, 11:51 pm
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Default Re: If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

I didn't vote as I'm not a UK tax payer so don't feel it's any of my business how the country is run. I also felt both sides were absolutely full of shite and had no interest in spending the time it would've taken to dig through all of that to make a properly educated decision.
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Old Nov 9th 2019, 11:37 am
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Default Re: If you could vote for brexit again, would you?

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