So, Brits. How's Brexit Going?

[Fireball]

How about "breaks-it-heres"? I's sorry to see that the stupidity in our government and population is replicated elsewhere.

[The Grand Nudger]

I'm not familiar with the debate about Brexit, living in America where, the news only brings us news about America.  But I can imagine those in favor of Brexit had their reasons.  Here on the forum, I seem to only hear the anti-Brexit side, which might explain where overall I'm against Brexit.  But I might view the situation differently if I were familiar with the arguments that were made by those in favor of Brexit.

We have relatives who voted Brexit "to get the foreigners out" that was all. I have heard some people mention some strange rules set by Europe as well but mainly it was the racism.

Has the purge been scheduled yet...did they get what they wanted?

[I_am_not_mafia]

We have relatives who voted Brexit "to get the foreigners out" that was all. I have heard some people mention some strange rules set by Europe as well but mainly it was the racism.

Has the purge been scheduled yet...did they get what they wanted?

It started the very next day after Brexit and is still continuing.

[downbeatplumb]

We have relatives who voted Brexit "to get the foreigners out" that was all. I have heard some people mention some strange rules set by Europe as well but mainly it was the racism.

Has the purge been scheduled yet...did they get what they wanted?

We aren't out yet and all that's happened so far is the devaluation of the pound and companies fleeing the UK in preparation for a no deal exit from the EU.

The shit hits the fan next year.

[I_am_not_mafia]

So this is something I have been wondering about recently.

I was in a debate with a Brexiter who was claiming that the government was pro-Remain. He had a good point in that they did send round a leaflet paid for by taxes as to why the government thought that it was better to remain in the EU.

This was Cameron's Tory government. He had the power to call a referendum. His government sent round the leaflet. So my question is this. Why was the referendum set up to maximise the chance of a Leave vote?

The point I had been making was that it was an advisory referendum taken as binding which meant that people did not have to know what they were voting for. If it was binding then people would have realised the consequences of leaving and been less likely to choose that option.

But then it occurred to me that they did something even more indicative of ensuring the Leavers won. The deliberately excluded a large majority of Remainers. Both the British citizens living in the EU and the EU citizens living in the UK.

See they could have chosen one or the other. In the Scottish independence referendum anyone who lived in Scotland at the time could vote. This excluded Scots living abroad. But that made sense because it is the people living in the country that form the country. They are the ones who have to live with the consequences of the decision.

Or you could argue that a country is made up of those that were born there in which case the British expats abroad should have been given a vote. But no, they chose to cherry pick only those born in the country who were living there at the time. Which means they selected the part of the population more likely to have a more insular view of the world.

But this was David Cameron's government. He had the power to call a referendum. He must then have also had the power to implement it. So I am wondering if his hand was forced, maybe he was blackmailed (we know photos exist of him fucking a pig's head) and all he could do was send out a leaflet advocating staying in the EU. Or maybe that was to encourage the protest vote?

The more I think about this, the more I come to the idea that there has been a coup in this country.

[robvalue]

The campaign he ran was so incompetent that I could believe it was intentional.

It's really hard to know what's going on. If I had to guess, I'd say Cameron was immensely worried by Farage promising a referendum if UKIP won the general election. He thought they were a viable threat, and so felt it was necessary to promise one himself to ensure victory. His downfall though was his supreme overconfidence that he would win. This meant he didn't even think about the possibility of losing, or how easy he was making that, because he assumed it was a formality. This is the most charitable scenario, but the one I lean towards.

The third option is that he just wanted to win the election and didn't particularly care which way the referendum went.

[Minimalist]

The point I had been making was that it was an advisory referendum taken as binding which meant that people did not have to know what they were voting for.

Don't give voters too much credit.  We had a similar choice in 2016 and look at the pile of noxious shit we ended up with.

[downbeatplumb]

So this is something I have been wondering about recently.

I was in a debate with a Brexiter who was claiming that the government was pro-Remain. He had a good point in that they did send round a leaflet paid for by taxes as to why the government thought that it was better to remain in the EU.

This was Cameron's Tory government. He had the power to call a referendum. His government sent round the leaflet. So my question is this. Why was the referendum set up to maximise the chance of a Leave vote?

The point I had been making was that it was an advisory referendum taken as binding which meant that people did not have to know what they were voting for. If it was binding then people would have realised the consequences of leaving and been less likely to choose that option.

But then it occurred to me that they did something even more indicative of ensuring the Leavers won. The deliberately excluded a large majority of Remainers. Both the British citizens living in the EU and the EU citizens living in the UK.

See they could have chosen one or the other. In the Scottish independence referendum anyone who lived in Scotland at the time could vote. This excluded Scots living abroad. But that made sense because it is the people living in the country that form the country. They are the ones who have to live with the consequences of the decision.

Or you could argue that a country is made up of those that were born there in which case the British expats abroad should have been given a vote. But no, they chose to cherry pick only those born in the country who were living there at the time. Which means they selected the part of the population more likely to have a more insular view of the world.

But this was David Cameron's government. He had the power to call a referendum. He must then have also had the power to implement it. So I am wondering if his hand was forced, maybe he was blackmailed (we know photos exist of him fucking a pig's head) and all he could do was send out a leaflet advocating staying in the EU. Or maybe that was to encourage the protest vote?

The more I think about this, the more I come to the idea that there has been a coup in this country.

They assumed that everyone would vote logically and in the best interests of the country. 


What they failed to understand is that at least some people saw it as a vote against the government and they had just made themselves hugely unpopular by austerity.

What they also failed to do was lay out the benefits of the EU, (I think the just thought they were so obvious) and attacked the downside allowing the Brexis to taint it with the inaccurate "project fear label" and they also let them get away with outrageous lies like £350 million extra a week for the NHS which will never materialise.

Even Boris Johnson assumed they would lose. He wanted to be the heroic leader of a doomed movement. The look n his face when they won spoke volumes and he went into hiding for a bit until he worked out new tactics.

[I_am_not_mafia]

Even Boris Johnson assumed they would lose. He wanted to be the heroic leader of a doomed movement. The look n his face when they won spoke volumes and he went into hiding for a bit until he worked out new tactics.

Yeah I agree that there was definitely a sense that the Remainers would win. After all, people generally prefer the status quo and you're right that there was a definite protest vote going on to effectively smash the system. But this still doesn't explain why both EU citizens and British expats were excluded from voting in the referendum. Even people from the Commonwealth were allowed to vote. I can't square this with any of the other theories about what caused Brexit.

I'm wondering if those in charge of implementing the referendum planned for the protest vote and made sure this happen by persuading David Cameron, a remainer who expecting to win, to make it clear in people's minds that the government was pro-EU. After all, we know from general elections that if it seems too likely that one side is going to win then their supporters don't always bother voting and this means that they end up losing.

I really want to know more details about what went on behind the scenes.

---

The point I had been making was that it was an advisory referendum taken as binding which meant that people did not have to know what they were voting for.

Don't give voters too much credit.  We had a similar choice in 2016 and look at the pile of noxious shit we ended up with.

True. I forget that things are now different in Scotland. The independence referendum really energised the population because for once they felt like their vote actually meant something. The issue was debated in depth for a long time up here in all the media and engaged a lot of people. For too long now it hasn't made any difference how Scotland has voted. We still end up with the government decided by English voters because there are just so many more of them. Listening to the piss-poor barely thought out reasons from relatives I know down south, many seemed to just parrot simple views fro newspapers.

[LastPoet]

Speaking of Brits, why do they get up at 11am to go to the beach? Is getting skin cancer a national sport or something? It's fucking searing and They seem like lobsters.