Ok I get your sentiment and I agree that peaceful protest is just woefully ignored in the UK - but someone with a job and a peaceful life typically doesn't want to risk getting arrested, and potentially convicted, trying to cause trouble on a march.
Things have to be much worse before people are going to start taking that risk, and sadly, while things do not look good, the average Londoner is not yet uncomfortable enough to start doing so.
>Paris has real protests
It may not be your intent but "It's not a real protest if something doesn't burn down" is a bit unfair. If things turn violent/destructive on this march public favour will not look kindly on it in the UK.
Remember the student protests for tuition fees? Those who occupied 30 Millbank were vilified as criminals by _both_ sides. Inconvenient and disruptive for sure - but to the press they are "rioters" and to others in the movement "anarchists who don't represent us".
People have been persuaded by the powers that be that any form of non-peaceful protesting is socially unacceptable and that we should chastise it. Convenient eh? Especially because "Without a path from protest to power"[0] there is never going to be any change or acknowledgement from the government.
Any form of protest that could actually get results is a) too risky for people who are currently comfortable enough and b) intentionally socially ostracised by those in power to discourage it.
Be the change you want to see in the world? But one person in a balaclava setting things on fire isn't going to make any difference to the outcome of the protest without a critical mass of others undertaking the same behaviour for a prolonged period of time.
[0]: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/19/womens-march-w...
Brexit was a popular vote, with neither party actually supporting it. The interest in Brexit also grew against the wishes of major parties, industries and most centres of power. A reason parliament can't manage it decently is because parliament was and is mostly against it, including May.
This is not like ip laws, where interested lobbies co-opt the parliamentary systems with as little popular involvement (or knowledge) as possible. This was/is an actual division of opinions among the people. It wasn't imposed from above.
I hope you guys stay in, or at least close but I think it needs to be done in a way that respects the other side too.
The inability to force a clear Leave manifesto is the root of the disaster. What "should" have happened is either a Leave PM, or the 2017 election should have been run on a clear Leave manifesto specifying a realistic deal to be sought against a Remain opposition.
I don't mean to say you're wrong. I'm just saying there appears to be obvious, legitimate concerns here, and your suggesting otherwise seems possibly disingenuous.
Yes, the EU representation is quite distant. The UK has an unelected upper house.
> Foreign authoritative bureaucracies?
This isn't great, but at least the EU one is elected. The alternative in all the other trade deals is unelected. Hence all the opposition to things like TTIP, and earlier complaints about GATT etc.
Fundamentally, voting against the EU doesn't make it go away. Some sort of framework always needs to exist to make agreements with other European countries. If the EU didn't exist, it would probably be necessary to invent it.
Hence the Norway/Switzerland situation: not in the EU, has to follow EU rules without having a vote on them.
> legitimate concerns
Here's the thing: hardly anyone talks about those anymore. Brexit has been absolutely dominated by antipathy towards immigrants, both EU and non-EU (despite this not being anything to do with the EU). There's no way to "unwind" EU immigration without ripping families apart.
(I was a Euroskeptic about the treatment of Greece, for example. But ultimately Greece realised that however bad a situation it was in, crashing out would be worse. The same applies to the UK, with "Tory Syriza" running it)
There were about 3.4 million non-UK EU citizens, many of them settled adults of voting age. They would have voted if they had migrated to the UK and become citizens. But they were told all their lives, that EU citizens don't need to become UK citizens, they have equivalent full rights in almost every respect without doing so, so they lived here in a fully settled way akin to citizenship. Sometimes for decades, with children and grandchildren in the UK. Some of them had respected positions in government.
Any of them, of voting age, could have registered to vote in the referendum if they had known sufficiently far in advance. That is, they could have applied for UK citizenship to do it - though not in the timescale in which the referendum actually occurred.
But EU citizens were discouraged from adopting UK citizenship because there was no need. This led to the perverse situation where non-EU immigrants had the vote, and EU immigrants did not, through no fault of their own.
The UK citizens, of voting age, who were not allowed to vote were all abroad. I expect most of them in the EU.
I'm pretty sure both groups would be pro-EU, and that 3 million number is more than enough to change the result.
So I would not say the Brexit referendum result of 2016 was even the popular result, for any reasonable definition of democracy in my mind.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_I_of_England
Also the later, and peaceful, Glorious Revolution?
'Cyclically, the Middle deposed the High, by enlisting the Low. Upon assuming power, however, the Middle (the new High class) recast the Low into their usual servitude. In the event, the classes perpetually repeat the cycle, when the Middle class speaks to the Low class of "justice" and of "human brotherhood" in aid of becoming the High class rulers.'
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Theory_and_Practice_of_Oli...
After the First English Civil War, there were two broad factions within the New Model Army: the Grandees (aristocratic wing) and the Levellers (the more radical, egalitarian, democratic and progressive republicans). Unfortunately, Cromwell’s faction won that particular power struggle and the rest is history. Nevertheless, this period of revolution acted as inspiration for the colonists in America, which in turn inspired the French republicans, thus influencing countless other revolutionary movements.
Related link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Putney_Debates
As for the Glorious Revolution, what did it do, other than put a German on the throne?
The French make themselves unrulable, while the British have been utterly subjugated by the state. Positive change has completely exited the British imagination, to the point where even progressives can't articulate a positive program, only a defence of whatever happens to exist at the moment.
The fuel blockades of the early 2000's resulted in some significant political action, more than marches seem to have.
[1] https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/m4-m5-blocke...
Since it is illegal, I do not endorse it; instead I will just watch the UK burn itself.