Should the UK stay in or leave the EU?

And that's unfortunate, given the baggage within the UK this has uprooted. Potential Northern Irish and Scottish referendums, Cornwall seemingly realising they've shagged themselves out of £750m a year EU funding and this 1.5m petition to rerun it. Its a shitstorm.

@shindig: Or perhaps the bigger issue is that the Remain campaign, and the EU in general, have done a piss poor job of communicating its benefits and achievements to the electorate. The Schengen agreement that allows for free passage between EU member states? EU agricultural subsidies? Free movement of workers inside the EU? EU funding for economically less developed areas? There are a lot of policies set in place by the EU that are beneficial to its citizens.

The weirdest thing though is that among the global rise in resentment against politicians in general, is that people are switching out the political elite they elected in Brussels for the political elite they elected in their own capital. I guess at least it's their political elite then?

I barely heard a peep out of Remain beyond the mud slinging. Its like they left it til the day of the vote, around Durham. The only campaign advert I saw on TV was Leave's dumb waiting room one. Its been a shambles but I do feel like those only make a difference to the fence sitters. I feel like a lot of people knew exactly which camp they were in when they voted.

I just feel like there's a lot of people who didn't vote who are now all over social media crying about the results. People need to stop dismissing the other side of the argument as racism or bigotry. It's the same reason that Trump has a very real chance of winning in the US. People are so busy calling all of his supporters idiots or worse that they're making their own side look bad.

soooo we lost 2 trillion from the global economy, dropped to 6th largest economy, had our credit rating downscored and the pound fell to its lowest in 30 years. project fear? more like project reality.

Markets are always very reactionary.

Football teams in England will have a bigger issue recruiting European youth now because of this. Unfortunate, I think. Maybe not a huge deal but its one of many things that can and probably will change as a result of this.

Not about football, the markets will recover once everyone adjusts.

36% turnout for the 18-24 lot. Tough shit, lads and lasses.

It's strange how people are supposedly wisest in their twenties and then get stupider as they gain experience and grow older.

From GQ UK: We should ban old people from voting. I think it is hilarious to hear people in this thread make arguments that the author of this idiotic article makes.

Perhaps the last word on the subject.

"Europe. [scoffs] Like that's a place." ~ Jeff Gerstmann

@aethelred: omg that would be awful. If young people were the only ones allowed to vote right now we'd have a 99% tax bracket and no businesses because capitalism and money are evil. They've had no real life experience yet.

I actually think the reverse though, only people aged 35 and up should be able to vote. I say this as someone who isn't 35.

@aethelred: slacktivism at its finest.

Sorry guys. Things worked out when the UK didn't convert to Euros... sort of. I hope this will work out too....

Either way, you've got a friend here in the US, for what it's worth.

@btrdeadthanred: nothing like tarring an entire generation with the same brush. Bravo.

"Europe. [scoffs] Thank fuck we got out of there." ~ Leave voter

I absolutely love this post. This sums up my feelings exactly, and it's precisely why I'm voting for The Donald. After 10+ years of labeling, name-calling, and marginalizing from the left I'm going to vote for whoever you hate the most. Trump is my giant middle finger to everyone who has hysterically screamed "racist" for the past decade. If I were a UK citizen I would have voted Leave for the very same reason.

I think the different between this vote and Donald Trump is that some of the stuff he spouts is genuinely inciteful. Whether I see the man as genuine is another matter and, as others have said, he has to jump through some serious barriers, even as leader of the free world. This will be a compromised departure. Trump's potential presidency will also be compromised and hamstrung.

God dam this is horrific, some people are so hopeless the only course of action they have is to punch themselves in the face.

@spacefish: delicious ignorance. It tastes of hate and smells of pain.

@rethla said:

Imagine if the UK had held a referendum to legalise gay marriage, and it failed. Would you tell gay people to just deal with it? In Ireland, there's a campaign to hold a referendum to repeal the 8th Amendment of the constitution, which outlaws abortion even in cases of rape, incest or foetal abnormality. If that fails, should women with an unwanted or unviable pregnancy just deal with it?

The beautiful thing about democracy is that don't have to just accept shit. You can change your government, your laws and, if given the opportunity, your decisions. I see nothing wrong with holding subsequent referenda if there's a change in circumstances, like a general election or adjustments to EU law.

Quoting tweets out of context is a shitty thing to do in the best of circumstances, but especially when the tweet in question has long since been deleted. Also, she lives in England so it's not like this decision doesn't affect her.

The Leavers voted (from what I can tell) based on wrong information and ignorance ("What is the EU" was one of the most searched phrase in google in GB AFTER the vote for god's sake) and this decision will bite the UK in the ass sooner rather than later. What we as Europe don't need is rampart nationalism, that helps nobody.

This was a vote based mostly on fear of immigration and by people who benefit the most from the EU ... Honestly ... something like this should not ever be decided by a popular vote. The issue is way too complex to explain to people (I dont understand half of it) and people just want easy answers ... but there are no easy answers to complex problems.

@spacefish said:

To be fair you must admit, that's not the smartest reason to vote for somebody.....

Just as a heads up, while I love that this kind of discussion can happen on GB, continued insults or arguments will result in this thread being locked.

Please keep it civil.

@conmulligan: Well i wasnt talking about accepting a failed cause but about invalidating an public vote for nonsense reasons. I would love for the people in the UK to keep on fighting for the human values EU stand for even when they are not being a part of it but you cant exactly join and leave as you wish. There are long standing effects of votes like this no matter the outcome and you have to deal with it. Thats exactly what democracy means.

Actually, some of the Leave element voted simply because they had a distrust of the EU system and it's unelected officials. So it's a vote on principle, rather than looking at the numbers and the stability a Remain vote would bring. They want to take the hit now in the belief it benefits us in the long-term. It's a scary thing to commit to but, with the PM going, the EU commisioner going and some other casualties bound to be in the crossfire, its something that we really can't reverse.

It's on.

Yeah. It's way too unsafe to let people have a say in matters of substantial weight that affect their lives. I mean, it's fine if you let them choose a poster child of the country a couple of years, but sometimes it should be up to the wiser, more impartial and more selfless elites to determine the course of society.

Two million signatures for a petition to hold a new referendum. Fucking idiots.

This is what you get for not knowing the issues; you voted, now live with it. You don't get a do over.

*edit*

Well unless they get more than 16 000 000 signatures i dont see a point to hold a new referendum. Am i wrong?

Sorry, I'm trying to understand your post. Who is the "you" you speak of? Remainers? What are the issues they should have known and what is it that they "get" for not knowing them? How did not knowing those issues result in them getting whatever it is that they 'got'? And what exactly do they have to live with? Whatever it is sounds pretty terrible.

@imsh_pl: I know you're being sarcastic here about leaving decisions to 'the elite' but that's what a representative democracy does.

If you don't like the idea of politicians making decisions like EU membership then you should also protest them making any decision. Including the 'elites' who are going to be negotiating all these new trade deals or deciding new immigration rules, or writing budgets etc etc.

I'm glad you liked my post, but I still feel it's a shame that what I said will probably happen a fair amount in the next US election. People called racist or stupid will vote Trump to spite the people who insisted that they're racist or stupid. That's still a bad reason to vote for someone, though.

The same is true for people who instantly supported "remain in," once they learned that Trump supported the exit. I don't like John Oliver at all, but just because he made a video mocking anyone who supported the brexit side of the issue, that doesn't mean I should automatically make up my mind on that issue because I don't like John Oliver, so he must be wrong. I still haven't taken a side in this, partly because I don't need to, and partly because I haven't looked into it enough.

If you want to vote Trump, that's fine, but you should do it because you've looked at Hillary and Trump, and you agree with Trump on more issues than you agree with Hillary. And you should also look into their past political opinions, and try to determine how they actually feel about issues that are important to you, not what they're telling you now. That takes more work than voting to spite people making hateful allegations, but I would hope you agree that it's the better way to go.

@snowypliskin: right, like generalizing the babyboomers and calling for their voting rights to be revoked. You mean that kind of generalizing?

Sanj:

To clarify,

People who voted to leave without doing research into one of the most important votes in 40 years, who then call for a redo.

A vote is a vote. It's now a mandate. They now have to live with the fact they voted for this.

Now that I think about it, I don't think anyone inside the Tory government wants to be the guy to invoke Article 50. Boris didn't sound jubilant, he sounded pensive.

I'm not going to jump in and claim to know much about UK politics. Way too much of that going on from Americans right now. However, I would love to share this outstanding Greenwald piece that looks at Brexit and Trumpism and other movements and asks why people are so angry that they are supporting what are regarded as extremist angles.

In summation, it is the marginalized supporting anyone who is anti-establishment because the establishment is a gigantic, corrupt failure with zero interest in fixing itself or acknowledging its own problems. And the anger is only fueled by a media and elite group that looks at these marginalized and and angry voters as racists and idiots in equal, essential parts instead of asking why they might be driven to support these causes.

Been very glad to see some in the media doing more than calling these general public voters idiots and racists and leaving it there.

The decision by UK voters to leave the EU is such a glaring repudiation of the wisdom and relevance of elite political and media institutions that – for once – their failures have become a prominent part of the storyline. Media reaction to the Brexit vote falls into two general categories: (1) earnest, candid attempts to understand what motivated voters to make this choice, even if that means indicting one’s own establishment circles, and (2) petulant, self-serving, simple-minded attacks on disobedient pro-leave voters for being primitive, xenophobic bigots (and stupid to boot), all to evade any reckoning with their own responsibility. Virtually every reaction that falls into the former category emphasizes the profound failures of western establishment factions; these institutions have spawned pervasive misery and inequality, only to spew condescending scorn at their victims when they object.

The Los Angeles Times‘ Vincent Bevins, in an outstanding and concise analysis, wrote that “both Brexit and Trumpism are the very, very wrong answers to legitimate questions that urban elites have refused to ask for thirty years”; in particular, “since the 1980s the elites in rich countries have overplayed their hand, taking all the gains for themselves and just covering their ears when anyone else talks, and now they are watching in horror as voters revolt.” The British journalist Tom Ewing, in a comprehensive Brexit explanation, said the same dynamic driving the UK vote prevails in Europe and North America as well: “the arrogance of neoliberal elites in constructing a politics designed to sideline and work around democracy while leaving democracy formally intact.”

Or maybe they're just tired of being punched in the face over and over again by the government and told everything is fine.

I'm ashamed and embarrassed to be British.

I thought this was amusing and relavent, from Michael Goodwin's article in the New York Post, comparing the Brittish exit to the American revolution:

"While the original Redcoats tortured rebels, killed their families and confiscated their lands, the new Redcoats in Washington and Brussels kill the spirit of innovation, enforce conformity with regulations and punish dissidents with charges of bigotry."

The whole thing is a great read if you were in the Leave camp, link here: http://nypost.com/2016/06/24/brexit-strengthens-global-effort-to-unseat-unresponsive-elites/

Huh? yeah the 2 statements aren't mutually exclusive.

2.5m signatures. Annoyingly, anyone can sign it.

No one thought Leave would win (besides the average voter), the Tory politicians only did it for political strength (Boris and Nigel wanting to be PM). Now every lie Boris and Leave told (350 million to the NHS every week for example) will come back to haunt them as they are impossible to come close to. Whomever invokes Article 50 is committing career suicide. As well every EU deal that includes free trade will include free movement and no one wants to be apart of that negotiation on the UK side. Whoever is the next Tory leader (and probably PM) is screwed politically.

@btrdeadthanred: Ah, I see. I agree, leavers who regret their decision should have put more thought into it. I'm fairly certain the petition was started by remainers, though.

@jmdoane: That's a childish approach to things, people who think "i can't have my way so lets burn it all down" should be marginalized, that's a sign of lunacy.

Debate with the people who marginalize you, if you can't come up with a good defense of your ideas, maybe think about changing them, but don't go shooting yourself in the foot because the donald engages your inner preschooler who wants to play tag by their rules alone or not play at all.

Like it or not, there are problems that need to be addressed by people that actually have knowledge in their field. Some things are just too complex for the average person (and I include myself in that) to answer and judge, thats why we have experts. I don't get to vote on how to assamble a nuclear power plant or if we should send soldiers to invade a country I don't like, I shouln't get to vote over weather my country stays in the EU or not (german btw) because the whole subject is way way way too complex and has too many ramifications I can not know about.

Thats why we elect politicians that use the ressources they have available to make decisions like that.

The question if there is a political elite in western society that has lost touch with the people they are supposed to represent is a different one and I would agree that happens way too much, but the UK leaving the EU is not something that should have been decided by popular vote, I stand by that. Worst case? Europe falls apart and everyone suffers because people that were lied to and poorly informed made a gut decision out of a wrong feeling of "our country first" ... Best case? The EU stands, the UK gets the short end of the stick and falls into a ressesion and maybe politicians get a wakeup call.

Right wingers in Holland, France and Italy are already sharpening their knifes, Germany will probably follow soon ... and who cares right? What bad thing ever came out of poor economic conditions and overblown nationalism? ... Oh ... wait ...

@2headedninja: The problem is that there has been an increasing movement against "intellectualism" the last few years.

Whether it is the rise of creationism, anti-vaccinationists, climate change deniers, or religious extremism, the general populace has shown a tendency to balk when people tell them what they need to do. Anthropologists in the future are probably going to say that the rise and decentralisation of information media has lead to a distrust of authority figures, but that is a discussion for another time.

Fighting that with the same methods the demagogues are using is probably the best way, but that could also lead to a situation in which all connection with reality is lost.

Did you even watch the video? Ok, humor is down to personal tastes and all of that but most of that episode dealt, as is always the case with Last Week Tonight, with facts. Facts that have been proven right a mear 24 hours after the referendum.

You may not dig the jokes but Last Week Tonight is a researched and serious show when it takles these big issues.