Hacker News Reader

Comment by adamrezich | Hacker News Reader

Why "should" the Brexit referendum get the special privilege of a "do-over?" I have no idea how the law works over there but surely that would set some sort of terrible precedent?

I have zero skin in that game but the idea that people can espouse the virtues of democracy one minute only to make endless excuses as to why the result of a wholly democratic vote is wrong, invalid, or otherwise "deserves" a do-over the next minute makes zero sense to me as an American.

Either you trust the will of the people or you don't.

View on HN

I don't think "the people voted wrong, so we'll make them keep voting until they vote right" is the answer to anything. That kind of elitist, we-know-better-than-you attitude is, in my foreign opinion, a part of why Britain voted for Brexit in the first place - because they were sick of Brussels treating them that way.

At the same time, it seems to me that both "hard Brexit" and "soft Brexit" proponents voted Leave, because of the way the question was written on the ballot. We're going to get either a hard Brexit or a soft Brexit, but not both. So if we get a hard Brexit, say, do the people who wanted a soft Brexit want that? Should their Leave vote count as authorization for a Leave that isn't of the form that they wanted?

But if they re-vote once the deal is known, they're going to get accused of "re-vote until they vote right". May is going to have to show more skill than she has so far to keep that from gaining traction.

Nobody should trust the will of the people. That's why we have representative democracies and not direct democracies.

The Brexit referendum shouldn't get a special "do-over". Instead, the result should be ignored because leaving the EU is a bad idea regardless of the people's will.

I'm sure a majority of the people have many other terrible ideas that they agree with, especially when you only need 51% of those who care enough to vote to constitute a "majority".

Trusting the will of the people is the philosophy of a lynch mob, not a government.

Yes. A referendum on restoring the death penalty in the UK would likely get a strong yes vote. In that case the people's will would be wrong. The most important feature of democracy is that it gives enables people to remove governments without violence. The ability to choose or influence what govts do is secondary.

I agree completely w.r.t. representative democracy vs. mob rule... yet, "the result should be ignored because leaving the EU is a bad idea regardless of the people's will" makes zero sense to me. I have seen arguments for and against Brexit, so where does this authoritative "Brexit would definitely be bad and any result other than Remain should be ignored" come from?

The authoritative view that Brexit is a bad idea comes from the fact that is was sold almost entirely with lies and xenophobia, and even then barely got a majority.

I would not consider Brexit an authoritatively bad idea if the leave campaign had been more scrupulous and the vote had a larger margin of victory.

"We pay £350 million per week to the EU"

"We will be able to stay in the single market"

"Migrants are overrunning the country"

"We are not a sovereign state as long as we are a member of the EU".

> Nobody should trust the will of the people.

How then, should the people rule themselves?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com