OT. The futures Bright, the Futures Brexit!!!

[Manofpride]

A follower of the great philosopher Ayn Rand once wrote 'If you choose not to decide you still have made a choice', so all those who chose not to vote chose to let us who did decide for them!

Very true it is too!

[ramAnag]

In answer to your question Adi, I think my thoughts are that it can be a very honest and laudable thing to do to recognise or believe that one doesn't actually know enough to cast a vote on a specific subject. Indeed I doubt very much that the majority of people, and I include myself, were as informed as they should have been and that, coupled with the lies that were undoubtedly told, brings the whole process into question.

Should those who were honest enough to say...'sorry I don't think I know enough' be treated as being of less value than those who said either, 'I don't know enough but I don't like immigrants' or 'well I don't understand it really but I don't want my summer holiday to be more expensive'?

So Andy's Rand quote...'so all those who chose not to vote chose to let us who did decide for them' is fair enough on one level but it presupposes two things, 1) that choosing not to vote is an abdication of responsibility rather than a statement of honesty and integrity and 2) that those who did actually vote did understand the choice and were better informed.

Ultimately I think the only way, if there is a way, for a referendum to have any value is for there to be a compulsory vote with an option to abstain on the ballot paper and a requirement for a majority of at least 51%. That way it may at least lay fair claim to being democratic and representative of the 'voice of the people'...I'm sorry but that's something that 37% can never be.

[macstheman]

I agree with you ramAnag but the problem is that the very people who should have voiced such an idea ie. the politicians are the ones least likely to come up with such a suggestion! So the fact is both votes (to join and to remain) were held under the same system and both produced minority results. Thus, one could say that as both Referendum were held under equal conditions is it that the difference in results was that the vote to join was held when NO ONE really understood what this Euro idea was about whilst the second one was held after having had a long standing involvement in it!! At least that involvement gave one something of an idea of the whole concept and therefore a basis upon which to vote. That it led to the out vote going up may or may not be significant.

[Ram59]

Okay...taking the last few points in some sort of order.

I understand the argument about our system rarely achieving a genuine majority but there is a difference between elections and referendums. At a General Election a choice is being made between anything from three to as many as eight or more candidates/choices so the chances of winning an overwhelming majority are much reduced. That is fundamentally different at a referendum. You have just two choices so should surely expect the winners to be able to achieve the support of more than 37% of the electorate. Personally I'd go further and suggest that in any two choice Referendum the 'winners' should be able to claim the support of numbers equivalent to at least 51% of the electorate and Andy...as for your point about 'a slight win' by the 'Remains' being equally invalid, didn't Mr. Farage make exactly that point on the eve of the vote?

Ram59...you've obviously taken exception to my description elsewhere of your 'xenophobic' tendencies but please don't make out that I believe all 'Brexiteers' to be xenophobes. I have never suggested that and I accept that there are valid arguments for leaving the EU including many economic ones that I don't actually understand as well as some others. What I do feel strongly about are those Brexiteers who doundoubtedly display xenophobic and racist behaviour. The type who believe the term 'immigrant' to be synonymous with 'rapist', '*** offender', 'undesirable' or worse and the type who, as soon as the result of the Referendum was announced, took it as giving them some sort of mandate to behave in a thoroughly objectionable way to perceived 'foreigners'.
You possibly also need to recognise that although only 34% voted to 'Remain' it is a fact that 63% did not vote to take the action we now seem intent on following.

Southern...you're right, it is a 'free country'...that's kind of my point. That's why the likes of myself and Swale, amongst a great many others, reserve the right to argue our point without being accused of 'bleating' or being told, rather self righteously imo, to go and live somewhere else if we don't like it. I'm not sure I understand your point about the government having purposely 'crashed the voting registration' but whichever way you look at it, 37% is a minority and having the support of just over one third of the electorate is not much of a mandate in a situation of such significance imo.

I do wish you would refrain from describing me as xenophobic, it is deeply insulting. I have stated in my posts that I appreciate the valuable contribution to our society made by immigrants, but that I wish to have the ability to refuse entry to the few less desirable ones.

If you continue in this vain, should I interpret your defence of the rights of immigrant *****philes to mean that you are one yourself and that every time you post, that I shall reply to the same effect. I accept reasoned, if in my opinion flawed, argument, but not unjust name calling by anybody.

[ramAnag]

Ram 59...let's be perfectly clear. In post 464 you raised the topic of immigrants to this country and associated them with 'convicted rapists, *** offenders and other non-desirables'.

That suggested to me, as I said at the time, that you exhibit something of a fear of foreigners i.e. 'xenophobic tendencies'.

I then wrote today criticising 'those Brexiteers who believe the term 'immigrant' to be synonymous with the terms 'rapist, *** offender, undesirables or worse'. I did not specifically at any time mention you and actually was complimented by two posters, Adi and Andy, for the way I had put my case, even though we disagree.

Within that context your last post is just weird. First paragraph, fair enough, but the second is just bizarre as you go through the whole thing again by going out of your way to introduce 'immigrant p**dophiles' into the topic. Then to compound things you appear to jump to the ludicrous conclusion that I have somehow been defending 'immigrant p**dophiles' (I haven't, never would and I do speak as one who has worked in the area of child protection) and therefore you would be justified in concluding that I must be one.

I honestly don't know what to say. Your post defies belief and it's always difficult where reasoned debate has obviously failed. Some posts occasionally transcend stupidity and I'm afraid #559 is one of them.

[southernram22]

no agree usa could not stop 9-11 but swale we have to try to stop the terrorism and unwanteds coming the romanian gypsis at the bottom of every underground station who use subways as toilets who have no intention of working just to rip people off . or islamic terrorists who are hell bent on murder . i have many many good foreign nationals as friends . leaving the eu may or may not stop any of this but we must stand up and try . its no good hiding behind a keyboard moaning about reasons now the remain side have three things to blame arrogance cameron and osborne . rightly or wrongly ? if i am honest i would have been peeed off if we had stayed but i would have got on with my life and agreed to disagree. all i can see from remain is whinging whining excuse making arguments why we should have another poll till they win . for goodness sake guys lets put it bluntly you lost fairly man up or shut up lets get on with footy it starts this week . if you keep whinging it will destroy you. and my last word on this if nicola sturgeon thinks the people of scotland are unaware of her own political goals she needs to tread carefully because europe doesnt want them and they wont survive on own shes leading them into a cul de sac.

[swaledale]

despite tricky being a red he has one thing which you have failed to grasp as a human swale we still voted out rightly or wrongly . know why you cling on to some obscure hope that we may not invoke the leave clause or some legal challenge may overturn a government that has openly stated there will be no u turn people and democracy have voted. you have two choices really move on or move to europe. i would listen to youe views if you tried without sniping to listen to others its a free country i am sorry you have thrown dolly out of pram because you lost but there it is like it or leave it .

Wrong on so may fronts, I do not judge a person by the football team one supports, anymore than I judge a person due to their religion or lack of it or how they voted in the referendum. I make judgements on what people say or on here the views they articulate through posts, and Tricky has posted some revealing stuff, which summarised indicates a view that i find distasteful at best and frankly appalling at worst - then he retracts these claiming to be insulted because I say he has xenophobic views, then a few posts later posts headlines about Syrians.

I don't an din fact never have expressed any obscure hope about Brexit not becoming a reality, rather I have tried to fathom through this debate the reasons why people think that brexit is a good choice and why they voted for it - to be given by Tricky to an excess a rambling incoherent and deffo xenophobic line about all those eastern european, then muslim criminals and terrorists that have flooded the country since we joined the EU plus a load of *******s about how Eu migrants have "stolen" the jobs of UK citizens, some crap about a grand plan which we couldn't have resisted if we had remained in the EU - I have batted those back asking for the facts the detail which supports those views and got nothing.

I take a balanced view, recognising that there is some truth and some reasoning as to why some people would have voted Brexit - but when I listen as i did the other day to people from Hartlepool going on about voting Brexit because they dont like immigrants coming in and taking jobs that should go to Uk citizens, when as the interviewer points out, the population of that area is 98% white UK citizens who dont actually have that problem, in a free country one is entitled to question on what the **** they voted for.

The other thing which I keep pointing out but which gets ignored is that what happens when and this is a very likely scenario, we do leave the EU and those people who voted leave find that life for them does not change?

As for throwing my dolly out of the pram, far from it, personally I wont be affected, in fact I may even benefit, but it sure is funny when people who clearly do not have a clue what will happen give reasons for voting leave which bear no relation to reality, squirm and shift position when they are questioned as to the reasons why they made that decision. Its clear they do not have a clue!

[swaledale]

no agree usa could not stop 9-11 but swale we have to try to stop the terrorism and unwanteds coming the romanian gypsis at the bottom of every underground station who use subways as toilets who have no intention of working just to rip people off . or islamic terrorists who are hell bent on murder . i have many many good foreign nationals as friends . leaving the eu may or may not stop any of this but we must stand up and try . its no good hiding behind a keyboard moaning about reasons now the remain side have three things to blame arrogance cameron and osborne . rightly or wrongly ? if i am honest i would have been peeed off if we had stayed but i would have got on with my life and agreed to disagree. all i can see from remain is whinging whining excuse making arguments why we should have another poll till they win . for goodness sake guys lets put it bluntly you lost fairly man up or shut up lets get on with footy it starts this week . if you keep whinging it will destroy you. and my last word on this if nicola sturgeon thinks the people of scotland are unaware of her own political goals she needs to tread carefully because europe doesnt want them and they wont survive on own shes leading them into a cul de sac.

Southern, explain to me how leaving the EU will aid our ability to stop terrorists or undesirables? If it may or may not - actually it won't because even outside the EU, we will still admit people with valid documentation and no police or intelligence record, and even in the Eu that was still possible.

Seeing as we have several thousand illegal immigrants in the country, those chinese cockle pickers and vietnamese cannabis and farmers and indeed the Syrian assylun seekers did not slip in here posing as EU citizens!

I'm not whinging, but if people don't like having their reasons as to why leaving the EU is a good thing dismantled by close examination of the facts, thats their problem not mine, by all means have view, but dont take umbrgae when the reasons for that view dont bear close examination!

How will it destroy me?? I find it amusing that most of the reasons for Brexit are based on assumptions that largely aren't true and even funnier that a lot people who voted for leave don't seem to have worked out that for them personally it wont have the chnage they anticipated or at least the changes they think it will - again if they can't see that and get offended when its pointe dout to them well thats their problem not mine!

As for the SNP, well democracy suggests that a fair majority of Scots who voted in the last election seemed to like what she says, after all its not as if she has been in anyway coy about it, so they may well get a chance to vote again and if they do then thats their right, so thats a bit perverse of you to criticise, when you seem to imply that voting leave was the right thing to do here.

I,m not whinging about the vote to leave I, m merely through this debate trying to fathom the reasons why people voted as they did and I ahve to say I'm not getting a lot of reasons that bear scrutiny, i.e. most are at worst completely false and at best exaggerated assumptions.

[swaledale]

my point is ramanag if you dont like obviously as swale does not the democratic right of people to offer up a different argument why belittle them with his views which even you have commented on are one sided . my view is why keep on belittling people who have other opinions. no i dont change sides its my view but as an adult i get on with life rather than trying to make others look silly which swale is obviously trying to do.
i dont care what 37% said but ramang it was more than the remain side would you not agree.

Don't have to try and make people look silly, at the moment they are doing a pretty damn good job themselves, Tricky especially is getting lathered up about stuff that actually has nothing to do with being in the EU and wont change when we leave, maybe if reality offends, people had better return to their own fantasy world where complex issues can be resolved?

Except of course in the real world stuff still happens and no solution is offered.

[Andy_Faber]

Don't have to try and make people look silly, at the moment they are doing a pretty damn good job themselves, Tricky especially is getting lathered up about stuff that actually has nothing to do with being in the EU and wont change when we leave, maybe if reality offends, people had better return to their own fantasy world where complex issues can be resolved?

Except of course in the real world stuff still happens and no solution is offered.

What I think you're missing is that Tricky represents a silent minority who voted leave for wider reasons than the EU. and saw a silent protest (OK not in Tricky's case) as more effective than trying to argue through a point with those with a different stance and being called 'racist' as a default

[Trickytreesreds]

What I think you're missing is that Tricky represents a silent minority who voted leave for wider reasons than the EU. and saw a silent protest (OK not in Tricky's case) as more effective than trying to argue through a point with those with a different stance and being called 'racist' as a default

Andy, all people have to do is look at the bigger picture.
The Superstate- it has and is still the plan. Some people may not have a problem with it, but I do. Don't give me all this *******s that it won't get voted in. You only have to open your eyes and ears. They talk about it all the time.
Europe is to be dismantled.
Quotes from Junker or any of the others. They talk about all the points openly.

That means-
1. One currency
2. One law court
3. One army
3.one government
4. one set of policies.

Not my words, THEIRS!!

There was scoffing of the Koudenhove Kalergi plan as a conspiracy. Really?
The EU has a prize in its name, for the most influential person to push its ideals. (Merkel) is a former winner.
Read it and form your own conclusions.
All this has been going on, slowly and surely for over 50 years. Do your own research.
We may never get to end game in my life time, but we;re getting there.
So yes, as a silent majority. Lots of folks have looked at how quickly their area or country has changed and said, enough!!
Slate that all you like, but that is the crux of it.

Swale and Anag, come up with lies/lies/lies. Would never dispute that fact, but you guys never mention the remain lies and lets be honest here. The whoppers told were incredible.
Many of the so called experts quoted have since been found out.
The IMF needs disbanding after its recent outbursts. Everyone knows it is EU influenced.
From the doom prophecies of not joining the Euro/ to the economy implosion the day we leave.

As for sturgeon, well she has never changed her stance. I wouldn't want the UK held to ransom to pacify 5 million Jocks.
Fact is, her leave campaign is really thin anyway and recent polls in jock land suggest she is greatly misjudging the situation.
But EU or not, the SNP are never going to let this go.
If they really want it, just GO.

[ramAnag]

Tricky, I really hope that 'Swale and Anag come up with lies/lies/lies' comment means - as I think it does - that we bring up the Brexit lies rather than that we ourselves actually 'lie/lie/lie'.

If it's the former then fair enough, although I have never disputed that lies were told on both sides and I have absolutely no time for Cameron - who I think will be recognised by history as one of the most inept PM's of all time following this particular misjudgement - or Osborn and it comes as no surprise that they lied.

My point about people being misled by lies though is that there were no bigger or more carefully cultivated lies than the one on the side of Boris' battle bus which was on TV every day throughout the campaign and Farage's 'immigrant poster'. When a vote of such significance is 'won' by so slender a margin, the role of such a 'lie based campaign' does have to impact upon the integrity and validity of the result.

[southernram22]

swale i think its pretty obvious you listen read and ignore others views as you have done with ratteas views for years i disagree with your view but still have mine and we will still be out at end of it all.

[Andy_Faber]

What I think you're missing is that Tricky represents a silent minority who voted leave for wider reasons than the EU. and saw a silent protest (OK not in Tricky's case) as more effective than trying to argue through a point with those with a different stance and being called 'racist' as a default

NB Swale that's not intimating that you pull the 'racist' card. But my God, if you think we have polarised views on here, I was within 100 metres of (one of?) the Byron demonstrations yesterday and it was a bit ugly, and the opinions were SO polarised. The protesters (and I didn't speak to any direct but I caught a couple of them 'in conversation') clearly had the view that an illegal immigrant has more rights than someone with a legal right to work in UK does, which I just find totally perverse.

[roger_ramjet]

Its wierd that protest. I do not get why people protest at companies sho help clear illegal immigrants out of the country. Human rights my arse - think of the human rights of the people whose jobs they take. Seems like Byron cut a deal though to get immunity from prosecution for employing them in exchange for setting them up. Well done Byron - as all our Eastern European cousins would say: saving our jobs 😊😊☹😊