Not British but asking, is there anyone in the U.K. defending Brexit at this point? I mean it sounds like we're just debating how bad it was, not whether it was bad.
What do you mean by this, concretely? Or in other words, if we check back in 5 years, what would cause you to say 'yeah I was wrong, eu newfascism {doesn't exist || hasn't progressed as badly as I expected}'?
edit: to the downvoters, what do you object to here?? I'm trying to pin down the meaning of the parent comment, because without some kind of definition, a phrase like 'eu newfascism' is all heat and no light. My 'in other words...' framing was not based on the assumption that the parent commenter will be proven wrong; I'm just asking 'what would it take to falsify this?'
Let’s see how that work out.
It is also a matter of class identity. Being a remainer is a lot posher than being a leaver.
I live in EU, but I am not originally from Europe. I have a EU citizenship at this point though.
That said, I am staunchly pro EU, and would always vote for further integration. In truth, I even think that EU federalization would be a good idea.
I have no idea why immigrants of all people would have a nationalistic stance on this.
It is necessary. Having a common currency without a common budget has been a disaster.
> I have no idea why immigrants of all people would have a nationalistic stance on this.
How is it a nationalistic stance? You are preferring one identity over another - either way is just as nationalistic.
Immigrants from outside the EU do not like immigrants from the EU being given preference from their countries of origin, often places with strong historical links to Britain, where English is widely spoken, etc.
English first, European second. Indeed, the people of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland likely feel the same, and it’s unclear why that union should be considered worthwhile when a larger one is not.
> its hard to feel European if you are not of European origin.
All British-born people are of European origin. That is a simple geographic fact.
Lots of people are British born who are not of European ancestry. Unless you are defining "European origin" to mean "born in Europe" in which case your claim is tautologous. The other possibility is that you are defining "British born" to mean ethnically white British which does not really need any comment.
Even if it is not what you meant, European has strong implications of European ethnicity.
I would invert your question. Why do many people consider the larger union worthwhile but the smaller (and more workable one) not worthwhile? The only areas outside London that had a majority remain vote, are those where the vote was swung by Scottish or Welsh nationalists. In general the supporters of one union oppose the other.
Your statistics are also trivially falsifiable by simple counterexample - the town I lived and voted in during the 2016 EU membership referendum is not London, or the London area, is in England, and voted remain by 57.9% to 42.1%. The major city next door did so by an even more overwhelming margin: 61.7% to 38.3%. Not too many Welsh or Scottish nationalists in either…
So you’ll no doubt forgive me for not taking you too seriously when you spout horse shit dressed up as thoughtfulness.
By the way, I do indeed consider anyone born within the borders of the geographic boundary of Europe to be European, just like anyone born in the United States of America is American. The only arguments against such ideas are dog whistles (or let’s face it, full on soccer whistles at this point).
Some of these people think this means they can influence the country more for their own gain; some think it protects them from people influencing the country unduly.
Either way, its hard to argue against brexit having given the UK has more on paper long term control, and its hard to argue against brexit being costly both theoretically and in practice, and its hard to argue that the UK wouldn't currently be better off in the EU. Its hard, but people are doing it.
Maybe over half would now vote to remain, but most pundits thought this would be the case before 2015, so who can say for certain (e.g. Nigel Farage is more popular than ever and he is Mr Brexit).
It is way too early to judge the success or failure of leaving the EU, and part of it will be down to chance. There are also intangible reasons (e.g. feeling of national identity, distaste for bureaucracy) people voted leave and, while I don't think they make up for the loss, I don't think they should be poo-pooed.
I personally would have liked to remain in the EU but I don't think the EU is obviously good, or leaving the EU is obviously a terrible idea.
Sophistry incarnate, that bunch.
-Commission’s monopoly on legislative initiative
-Technocratic “fast-tracking” of democracy via trilogues. -cult-like mentality around ever-closer union making devolution unthinkable within the commission.
-Commission’s direct funding of media and its proposed expansion of the Media+ budget give it the ability to spend money directly promoting the narratives and priorities it wants to see amplified.
-Legislative attrition; passing legislation not through genuine consensus, but through persistence — re-proposing it until the Commission secures its preferred outcome. As we’re currently seeing with the chat control proposal
The way the EU has behaved in defense negotiations has further solidified my thoughts on this. Tying fishing rights to defense cooperation[0] then after the UK made concessions demanding billions with no say on how the money will be spent.
[0] https://www.politico.eu/article/uk-eu-defense-pact-really-do...
From an economic point of view, it will probably never make sense because the UK was shielded from most of the EU most stupid decisions through carve out. They were out the disastrous currency union. They were not fully in Schengen. They had a lot of leeway with regulations.
Coming back would probably be a mistake however. They would most likely be forced to join the eurozone.
I think it's a real argument personnally and the heart of the issue. That was the main question of the Brexit referundum: do you want to be a part of this pan-European union of people and surrender some of your country power to this union?
You can argue that the subsequent trade agreement and the alignment that followed have reintroduced some of the same constraints, which is true, but practically and conceptually speaking it is a very different kind of situation.
Compare how the UK has done since 2016 compared to either the government forecasts of what would happen in the event of a Brexit vote, or to the other big western European economies and you can see the problems. The fact that one estimate is double another gives you a clue to how uncertain these estimates are.
Which is horseshit, obviously.
Brexit was necessary for those ideas to be implemented. An individual's view on whether those ideas are good or not will correlate with their continued support of Brexit.
Now i can't accuse the Brexit negotiators of acting with competence. Neither can i claim that it has brought any short to medium term benefits. But the situation wasn't great either way. The referendum was a choice between a bad option (remaining) and an even worse option.
EU Members of Parliament for the UK were elected via proportional representation, whereas Westminster MPs are elected via the comparatively undemocratic first-past-the-post system, where a party with 14% of the national vote gets just 1% of the seats in Parliament (Reform UK, GE 2024), and one with 34% of the vote gets 63% of the seats (Labour, GE2024).
The constitution was rejected by referundum by at least two members states before being plainly reintroduced as a treaty and summarily imposed. Parliament has no power of initiative. Commissionners appointments are frankly opaque when it comes to how portfolios are handed out.
Then, you have the way the eurozone is structure. It's literally a prison. The treaties don't provide an orderly way out of and TARGET 2 ensures that leaving means complete economic chaos so countries are basically stuck. This situation has been used in the past to justify bludgeoning a population into obedience and impose extrem austerity to protect rich members unwise creditors.
Brexit was only possible because of the pound sterling and that's not a possibility the union extends to new comers.
Elaborate how exactly it is undemocratic.
I always ask imbeciles that repeat this bullshit, and they can never articulate this point. They either never reply or change the subject.
Typically they gesture at the EU commission being unelected, but they ignore that the commissioners are nominated by each member state (and all member states are supposedly democracies. And I say supposedly because Hungary exists). The nominees then have to be approved by the EU parliament (which is elected).
Saying that EU is undemocratic is like saying that a country with a prime minister is undemocratic because he was not directly voted for. Which is not an argument that can be taken seriously.
And I say this as someone that dislikes that EU commission is appointed by the member states government. The problem with this is that it mixes internal politics with EU politics - for example, in national elections I may vote for parties based on national issues, but I would vote for a different party in an explicit EU election.