Brexit

[sabotabby]

Woke up to the news, still kind of reeling.

To my British friends: My condolences. I'm sorry that so many of your fellow citizens voted with the fascists and gave into terrorism.

At least the Pigfucker's gone, though I guess he was going to go anyway and it's a countdown to Führer Farange or Boris as PM now. Just, damn.

Comments

[mad-bertha.livejournal.com]

The demographic breakdown is damning and sad.

I get it now. Just insert 'immigrants out' and the world's your oyster. I am aware there are legislative, economic and political motives but I think the broade appeal was less subtle and complex.

[sabotabby]

Yeah. I'm sure there were people who had other reasons for voting Leave but they weren't the majority.

I'm really pissy about the Lexit types because they live in a fantasy world. So did I, for awhile. I marched in so many anti-globalization actions but we never once thought that if the neoliberal order started to fall, we wouldn't be the ones who came out on top.

[ltmurnau.livejournal.com]

Two thoughts:

This is not an overwhelming mandate. There was a difference of less than 1.3 million votes out of about 34 million votes cast, from a total of 47 million possible votes (since it was a turnout rate of 72% IIRC).

Time marches on. Many of the people who voted to Exit will, frankly, be dead or incapacitated in 10-15 years (as will many Trump supporters and Tea Party members). And while you can make dead people vote, it is a lot of work and bad for you if you get caught doing it. So while you can have a referendum on whether to leave, you can also have one later to get in... (the last time the UK had a national referendum was 1975, and it was about whether to stay in the EEC/Common Market, and the vote was 67.2% to join) and the EU itself may well be a very different organization in that time, because it will be run by different people too.

[sabotabby]

Yeah, I'm feeling a lot less panicky about it than I was earlier today. Someone else pointed out that the banks won't let it happen. Which shouldn't be reassuring, but oddly was.

This morning felt pretty apocalyptic. And it still worries me, because I know plenty of fascist young people too, and there are entire generations that have no direct experience with how bad things can get.

[ingenious76.livejournal.com]

Fuhrer Farage?

I doubt it. The number of people realising that they were lied to by Leave is quite something.

Still, they voted for it.

[sabotabby]

Are there takebacks?

[ingenious76.livejournal.com]

Nope.

[joysilence.livejournal.com]

Yeah, Duffy and I are not very pleased about it. I think a lot of people took the opportunity to give London and the South-East a kick in the teeth, without thinking about the wider issues. Or maybe Britain does indeed hate furriners to an enormous extent, I wouldn't be surprised.

I'm worried a lot about possible changes to human rights, labour laws, and environment laws, but the whole fascism thing is obviously a major concern too. When I was growing up there was always an old-timer or two who could be called upon to visit the kids in schools and show them his or her concentration camp tattoo (our high school once arranged for a double act of two epically morose Jews to come and shove their forearms in each of our faces individually), but I don't really know what's going to happen when the last camp survivors are dead and there is no-one to provide a direct link with the consequences of European fascism. Maybe some kind of amazing augmented reality experience.

[ironed_orchid]

Maybe?

[sabotabby]

Huh. Go figure!

[sabotabby]

I think that's such a big generational difference. When I was growing up, we semi-regularly met with actual Holocaust survivors that would talk about their experiences. While many of my students (particularly the Tamil ones at my last school, or the First Nations students at my current school, or one of my students who came to Canada to escape a civil war in his country) have more direct experience with genocide than that, for kids born in Canada to white families, it's much more distant than it was to us.

Then again, the young in the UK overwhelmingly voted Remain, so they at least have a sense of the present if not the past. It sounds like it was the Boomers that were the problem.

Anyway, my main concern is also human rights, labour, and the environment, and secondarily the effect that an economic crash will have on all of those things. It's fertile ground for fascism; they are all quite linked.

[radiumhead.livejournal.com]

sometimes the govt has to act like a parent and tell the people NO, WE'RE NOT DOING THAT, ITS STUPID, YOURE BEING STUPID. It shouldnt have been up for a vote in the first place.

[sabotabby]

Yep. And that's why I'm not an anarchist anymore.

[davesmusictank.livejournal.com]

Yet is the older folks that wanted us out, and looking at the demographics it was the younger voters who wanted us to stay - i feel so sorrily and angry for them.

[sabotabby]

I find this so weird. I always think young people are more conservative than their elders, but I guess they also want jobs and such.