24hrs later, It strikes me that ...

TTony

... we were asked the wrong question.

Now, I don't now what the *right* question would have been - or could yet be - so I'm just taking the easy option of criticising what was done without suggesting what could have been better.

But look at the outcome.

The "United" Kingdom is about to be shattered.  

Our country is likely to be split up (which may, or may not have happened anyway) as the SNP pull away and head off into their own brave new world.  Good luck with that one, although I'd trust Nicola Sturgeon to do a better job for her electorate than most English political "leaders" do for theirs.

Our main political parties are about to spend the next 2 years on introspective self-interested debate rather than giving the country any leadership through the most interesting period any of us will experience.  Complete abdication of responsibility of the role, although I'm not at all sure that the people who got us into this mess are the right people to get us out of it.

Neighbourhoods are divided, along almost sectarian lines with levels of religious-like "belief" that denies any rational discussion.  So, positions that are primarily based on ignorance and determined by who they feared most.  Maybe that's the way its always been and that today's social media just makes it more obvious than ever before.

Families are split, largely generationally, although I know of plenty of families where husband & wife cast opposing votes and neither can understand the other.  Husbands and wives, who share pretty much everything, can't understand each other's views.

The debates here evidence all of the frustration, incomprehension, dogmatism, sound bite bombing, futility and ultimately dissatisfaction with the process.

Oh, and I'd put money on other countries in the EU following us down this particular path, so where we lead in division, others will become similarly divided.

And after all of that, the voting was marginal.  51.9% plays 48.1%.  Or, if you account for the "I don't knows / cares", 37.5% (out) plays 34.7% (in) plays 27.8% (don't knows).  That's a 2.8%pt margin.

That's hardly a clear-cut mandate for anything.  If you looked at the result in terms of a statistical test of a hypothesis, you'd most likely conclude that the test itself was wrong because the true/false outcome was so close, and because of amount of null responses (ie the 27.8%).  You'd want to improve the test and try it again so that you got a decisive result.  You'd not be allowed to put a new drug on the market that failed 34.7% of the times it was used.  

You'd not launch a new dog food if 34.7% of your marketing focus groups said that they didn't like the colour of the packaging.

Which brings me back to, we were asked the wrong question and the only valid conclusion you can draw from the result is that you can't act on the results.

So, please can we sort this out before it's too late.

quarky

I voted leave, but agree. As much as I hate the fucking smug leftiest* people  telling everyone else what is best for them (so last century), I don't think the margin was big enough. It has been a good shake up for politics though, and I hope that if nothing else, it has given those ruling a bloody good kick.

Also, as much as I think leave is the best decision long term, if it is going to result in a long period of violence and hatred from the left, that negates the benefits to some degree. We all want people to be happy I think.

*edited, as that wasn't very fair or clever as Sporky pointed out.

bodhi

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/131215

I normally just get on with life, whatever happens.  But a second referendum now that we already have the benefit of a bit of hindsight would maybe not be such a bad idea.

I got the impression that perhaps the Leave vote was more of a "f*** you" vote aimed at the politicians and the system and such, with the intention to give them a wake-up call, but that they didn't really expect to win.  Now that they have, maybe there's a bit of an "oh shit - what have we done.." realisation creeping in.

Maybe, I don't know - but the uncertainty this has caused is pretty scary to me in terms of my children's future.

The funny thing is - I listened to both arguments and both sides made some perfectly valid assertions.  There should have been some middle ground alternative way of going about it all, though.  This jump into the unknown doesn't feel like the best way of going about change.  It's like people think it can't get any worse, so let's just throw caution to the wind.  I think it can get a LOT worse.  But I hope it won't.

DanR

Are you happy with the way the EU is currently run?

Yes.
No.

I'd of voted no.

I think that would of given a much clearer view one way than we have received with question asked.

I voted remain.

digitalscream

The question was right, but the information available for a solid decision was absent; it strikes me that the rules give us an opportunity here, and @clarky was right in one of the other threads - once negotiations are well underway and we know what we're in for, have another referendum based on actual facts, with no campaigning allowed.

Either way it went, we'd see a markedly more emphatic result from that referendum with which to get an actual mandate to do something.

siremoon

Yes let's keep having referenda until the voters get it right.

I would be in favour of a second vote if and only if the EU puts its hand up and accepts that what they offered us before was inadequate, that they need to be more flexible and make changes that address the genuine concerns we have. 

bodhi

siremoon said:

Yes let's keep having referenda until the voters get it right.

Come on.  It's not the politicians asking for another go.

digitalscream

siremoon said:

Yes let's keep having referenda until the voters get it right.

I would be in favour of a second vote if and only if the EU puts its hand up and accepts that what they offered us before was inadequate, that they need to be more flexible and make changes that address the genuine concerns we have. 

No, you're missing the point - the second referendum is not to get a different result (although I'd certainly be in favour of that). It's to make a decision based on facts rather than emotive campaigning and get more than a 2% margin.

siremoon

bodhi said:

siremoon said:

Yes let's keep having referenda until the voters get it right.

Come on.  It's not the politicians asking for another go.

No it's those who think the result we got first time is inappropriate

bodhi

digitalscream said:

No, you're missing the point - the second referendum is not to get a different result (although I'd certainly be in favour of that). It's to make a decision based on facts rather than emotive campaigning and get more than a 2% margin.

This.

Wazmeister

It was obvious before the voting, and obvious since... There were enough warnings, from every source of interest, power and influence that it would rent the country assunder...

Please dont spout ignorance if you voted out.

siremoon

digitalscream said:

siremoon said:

Yes let's keep having referenda until the voters get it right.

I would be in favour of a second vote if and only if the EU puts its hand up and accepts that what they offered us before was inadequate, that they need to be more flexible and make changes that address the genuine concerns we have. 

No, you're missing the point - the second referendum is not to get a different result (although I'd certainly be in favour of that). It's to make a decision based on facts rather than emotive campaigning and get more than a 2% margin.

No I appreciate that.  There are two snags I see though.  A (significant?) proportion of the electorate are not interested in the facts just what they believe to be true.  And there are no facts about what will happen in future.  We don't know what is going to happen if we come out and we didn't know what was going to happen if we stayed in.  I concede in the latter case we probably had a good idea but we couldn't be certain. 

Several European leaders have called for reform since the vote.  I see that as good but would it have happened if we'd voted to stay in?  My suspicion is probably not, they could well have taken a Remain vote as an endorsement of everything they are doing. I don't believe that every Remain advocate thought the EU was perfect and there was no room for improvement.  I have a feeling the EU thought that though.

digitalscream

siremoon said:

No I appreciate that.  There are two snags I see though.  A (significant?) proportion of the electorate are not interested in the facts just what they believe to be true.  And there are no facts about what will happen in future.  We don't know what is going to happen if we come out and we didn't know what was going to happen if we stayed in.  I conceded in teh latter case we probably had a good idea but we couldn't be certain. 

Several European leaders have called for reform since the vote.  I see that as good but would it have happened if we'd voted to stay in?  My suspicion is probably not, they could well have taken a Remain vote as an endorsement of everything they are doing. I don't believe that every Remain advocate thought the EU was perfect and there was no room for improvement.  I have a feeling the EU thought that though.

Here's the thing - having another vote in 20 months' time, when all the negotiations are more or less complete (or, at least, the 2 year deadline is nearly up), we will have facts. We'll know exactly what we've been able to get in terms of treaties and concessions from other countries, and we'll know exactly where the shortfall is in terms of what's left to do.

If anything, the result we've just had illustrates that there are going to be just as many people on both sides who cling to ideology over facts, so they'll pretty much cancel each other out. It'll then effectively be left to the portion of the population who do care about facts to make the decision, which is exactly the kind of thing we need.

The irony of all this is that because the cutoff is after our turn to take the EU presidency, we'll still get it in 2017.

BigLicks67

I voted remain, but the decision has been made now so let's get on with it.

Percentage wise it seems a small amount but it equates to a million votes in favour of leaving.

There's no point crying over spilled milk and lets face it the reaction of some of the EU bigwigs has been pretty poor and vindictive.

siremoon

Agree totally.  As I said before I am all for having a second vote if a palpably better deal is on offer.

Also agree that our presidency could be very interesting.

Drew_TNBD

I think I agree with all this too.

Emp_Fab

Nobody kicked up a big fuss about where the winning post should be placed before the referendum.

This petition attempting to get another referendum with different goalposts is utterly futile.  No politician in their right mind is ever going to agree with that - unless - they somehow manage to get something like 25 Million signatures - which is simply never going to happen.  The only way the exit could possibly be stopped is if we all elected a new government that promised an immediate re-run of the referendum, in a general election to be held before we leave, that gave a 'remain' result, AND the EU allowed us to stop our exit in its tracks.

Apart from the fact that doing any of that would make the UK the laughing stock of the planet, only the mentally disturbed could ever imagine that scenario ever becoming reality.

Face it folks - we got on the rollercoaster of our own free will and we've all just cut the brake pipes.  Time to hold on tight because this IS going to happen.

thomasross20

Wis to @quarky for those smug lefties telling everybody else what is best for them.

digitalscream

Emp_Fab said:

This petition attempting to get another referendum with different goalposts is utterly futile.  No politician in their right mind is ever going to agree with that - unless - they somehow manage to get something like 25 Million signatures - which is simply never going to happen.

The only reason it's never going to happen is that the debate will be set to occur before it gets that far. Looking at the petition itself, it's had well over 100,000 signatures in the last hour alone, and is currently a hair's breadth from hitting the million mark.

In any case, it's not about moving the goalposts. The referendum was always going to be won on the basis of appealing to people's emotions and prejudice (whichever way it went), and that's probably the worst way to make a decision like this.

We're already the laughing stock of the planet at this point anyway

WezV

Emp_Fab;1125030" said:

Nobody kicked up a big fuss about where the winning post should be placed before the referendum.

.

Except Farage

TTony

siremoon said:

bodhi said:

siremoon said:

Yes let's keep having referenda until the voters get it right.

Come on.  It's not the politicians asking for another go.

No it's those who think the result we got first time is inappropriate

The point is that the result was inconclusive if you look at it rationally.

The question was simplified to a black/white option.  The campaign was led by politicians who were already heavily vested in one or the other and who saw, presented, or allowed for no middle ground (which is where the truth usually lies).

We got division.  Socially, Demographically, Economically, Geographically, even Politically (this wasn't a traditional left vs right or Labour vs Tory situation).  Creating a country that is so fundamentally divided is not a good basis for then adopting the apparent view of either side of that division.  The country would remain divided and recriminations will continue for generations.

We were encourage to believe black OR white.  We had to vote black OR white.

Admittedly, there will be a % of the voters who believe, absolutely, that either black OR white is correct, and they'll never change that view.  That's reality.  But I'd like to believe that the UK population is capable of considering and assessing more than two simplistic options.  

I believe that, if there was another vote where we were asked for our level of satisfaction with the process and the result, there'd be a resounding vote for dissatisfied.

The politicians - our alleged leaders - got this completely wrong.  Just because they made a grave mistake, doesn't mean that we should now follow through with the consequences of their incompetence.  

We need a more intelligent question, a more informed debate (preferably excluding politicians) and an outcome that a significant majority of the population accepts.