When things turn ugly the weakest suffer the most. With the Brexit, hard or soft, the UK is positioning itself as a weaker country than it was inside the EU. If the car industry is going to suffer, it's going to suffer more in the UK than in the EU.
Obviously it could turn out that Brexit will be good for the UK, but IMHO not in the immediate future. It will take time.
I think plenty of people that voted Leave put other concerns - identity, sovereignty, community etc - above the strictly economic. And why shouldn't they? We don't only live for money, do we?
Tying your identity to your country's can never end well, because every country has a nasty past and is full of despicable acts, which are very difficult to come to terms with. The UK, for instance, with its conduct when bombing Dresden, or when dealing with the famine in Bengal.
I am not sure how the EU is imposing upon the community of the UK, when it famously has some of the most stringent requirements for immigrants.
So the British are not permitted their own identity now?
Both Dresden and the famine you cite are debatable.
But anyway you are mistaken if you think I am advocating. I'm not. I am observing/speculating that I think many people that voted leave looked at the economic arguments and rated those lower than intangible feelings about identity etc. I don't think this is controversial! Politicians everywhere even when they make economic arguments couch them in emotional terms in order to sell them. It's standard politics.
I'm saying tying your identity to a nation is a cesspit to begin with. cf George Carlin's fantastic views [0]
For shits and giggles, I'd LOVE to see you take a gander at justifying the inferno that was Dresden, and for extra credit, Churchill's: "I hate the Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion".
I'm all ears cause I'm Indian, see.
PS: I hope you don't get the impression that I think you're advocating for brexit. I do get that you're just explaining the Why. But I do not agree that it ISN'T controversial. Thanks to the shenanigans of the Leave dickheads, Britain has fucked not only itself, but a lot of other things as collateral.
> I'm saying tying your identity to a nation is a cesspit to begin with.
Well, good luck in your re-education programme for the majority of the world's citizens then that identifying with their nation is horrific. Who are you, or anyone else to stand in judgement?
My view on Britain's history is that Europe/the World was a bad neighbourhood back then, and to apply today's standards is dishonest. And how far back do you want to go? Also I could throw in that India itself dealt out some pretty unpleasant ethnic cleansing during partition if you like. I suppose that's all the UK's fault as well though.
I think you are being a little bit Mary Poppins in calling out the shenanigans of the Leave side alone. It's all just politics, Leave did nothing especially egregious. Even the £350m pledge is now shown to have been accurate. UK politics sadly is becoming one long history of lies, broken manifesto pledges and xxxxing over of the British public.
> the £350m pledge is now shown to have been accurate.
Wut? It's today's news that the government has already spent £ 4 billions to brexit preparations, with the prospect of spending more from here to October and beyond. There won't be any "dividend" from brexit, let alone 350m a week.
I do NOT associate my identity with my nation though. I associate it with my hobbies and work. Indian conduct has been equally abhorrent, that is my point, yes. EVERY nation.
The reason I'm spewing bile is because of this fallacy that both sides, Leave and Remain, were equally bad. I see the same thing when people say climate deniers should be given equal airtime, or when people say the US Democrats are just as bad as the Republicans.
> I do NOT associate my identity with my nation though. I associate it with my hobbies and work. Indian conduct has been equally abhorrent, that is my point, yes. EVERY nation.
No worries. But you don't get to determine how other people feel, or to tell them what to think. Acting like you do is just as dangerous as nationalism.
Edit: question for you: you said 'saying tying your identity to a nation is a cesspit to begin with' - so to take the First Nation peoples in Canada as an example (and I know there are a multiplicity of different groups here) - going by your statement it might be thought best to deprive them of ties to their traditions and history, because this equates to them tying their identity to a nation (group of people). Agree, or not? And if not, how is their situation different to any other nation?
> The reason I'm spewing bile is because of this fallacy that both sides, Leave and Remain, were equally bad. I see the same thing when people say climate deniers should be given equal airtime, or when people say the US Democrats are just as bad as the Republicans.
That's just your opinion. What makes you the omniscient, perfect judge? There are people on the other side that would argue the direct opposite of what you say - 17.4m or so of them perhaps. You would argue that they are all just stupid/ignorant/evil etc?
Dresden was a major transport hub for weapons and other supplies going to the eastern front. The area bombed was a decent approximation of the area used for that transport. It was also an area where many people lived and with many priceless buildings.
As for Churchill and India, he got 100,000 tons of wheat shipped to India, during a war. India has been invaded seven times, right? Did any of the other six ship comparable quantities of drought aid across either the Himalayas or the ocean when there were droughts in a part of India?
I agree with you in principal but Brexit wasn't a direct economics vs sovereignty trade-off. It's not clear that the UK will actually benefit in the categories you mentioned as a result of Brexit.
I'm not arguing on the rationality or otherwise, just saying that the dry economic arguments aren't necessarily the ones that have traction with voters. I don't think that's a controversial thing to say.
On those other issues I would say it's more subtle, in that leaving the EU at least opens the door to genuine controls on migration, for example, but the major parties are united in their refusal to offer the choice to the public.
Can you be extremely clear on what you mean by this, and what you expect to achieve by restricting migration of EU nationals to the UK and UK nationals to the EU? And also acknowledge that the UK's controls on non-EU migration are extremely onerous and not a matter of EU policy?
As with another poster, you are mistaking me advocating for these things, whereas I am just observing.
The argument is made that leaving the EU for more or less tangible feelings around sovereignty, identity etc. is futile because leaving the EU won't deliver changes in those areas. What I'm saying is that I agree it won't on its own deliver changes, but that it at least opens the door to changes in those areas. However, genuine change would require a political party to offer genuine controls on migration, for example, which none of the major parties are offering (Brexit Party arguable). Even Boris is offering an amnesty for illegal migrants already in the UK, and not offering any hope that migration will go down under a points based system.
I don't think it's sensible to argue that we are not on the path towards a United States of Europe, and that leaving opens the door to a different future, I mean, why would the fight to keep the UK in be so fierce unless there were a lot at stake?
It's futile arguing on the substance with me as if I'm advocating for it, I'm not, I'm just analysing.
But none of those have a substance, they're mostly products of the newspapers misleading people! The idea that the UK somehow lacks "genuine controls on migration" is a total fiction, but Brits who haven't been through them or don't know people who have believe it because the newspapers have lied to them.
Can't reply to your post below, but - net migration to the UK is running at hundreds of thousands per year, which is apparently causing all kinds of tensions with public services and society. You can't just hand wave that away by saying that the public are stupid for believing lies in the papers, and I would say this betrays on your part a contempt for your countrymen, and what's more I would say is inaccurate when the evidence of migration is glaringly obvious in pretty much any town of a reasonable size. No one needs to read the papers to know the country is changing before our eyes. And perhaps that's ok - if people are offered the choice and vote for it.
In a democracy the populace should be offered a choice and have their choice respected. If you don't believe that, you believe in tyranny.
> this betrays on your part a contempt for your countrymen
A lot of people would deny this, but I'm at the stage where I am openly contemptuous of a lot of my countrymen for their aggressive refusal to listen to reason and their vindictive pursuit of policies which have harmed a lot of my friends. I count both EU and non-EU immigrants among my colleagues. Are you saying I should choose loyalty to random idiots I've never met but happen to share a birthplace with over people I actually work with and like?
> evidence of migration is glaringly obvious
People's immigration status is not written on their foreheads. What you mean is that you can see nonwhite or hear non-English-speaking people.
> In a democracy the populace should be offered a choice and have their choice respected. If you don't believe that, you believe in tyranny.
Sounds great, but what if the choice is meaningless, impossible, or infringes the rights of others? We can't "respect the choice" to, say, abolish rain on days when cricket is being played. And we should not respect the choice to take away the rights of others, such as the deportation and de-citizenship of British nationals who were born in Britain but happen to be of non-white ancestry.
> I am openly contemptuous of a lot of my countrymen for their aggressive refusal to listen to reason and their vindictive pursuit of policies which have harmed a lot of my friends
Appreciate your honesty, but you live in a society and other people have strong opinions also. Your opinion doesn't trump theirs, no matter how heartfelt it is or righteous you might feel
> People's immigration status is not written on their foreheads. What you mean is that you can see nonwhite or hear non-English-speaking people.
Yes? And? So what? I'm not allowed to believe the evidence of my own eyes now else I'm racist?
> Sounds great, but what if the choice is meaningless, impossible, or infringes the rights of others? We can't "respect the choice" to, say, abolish rain on days when cricket is being played. And we should not respect the choice to take away the rights of others, such as the deportation and de-citizenship of British nationals who were born in Britain but happen to be of non-white ancestry.
Immigration could be drastically reduced if there were the political will, but all major parties are fiercely pro-immigration. And you are having a laugh if you are seriously arguing that the drastic change observable is all British nationals.
There's no point in us going much further as neither of us will convince the other. Bottom line: voters should be offered a choice, and that choice should be respected no matter how hateful you might think the motives. It's called democracy and it's all we have between us and the Gulags. Efforts to undermine it and free speech should be resisted at all costs.
