European Union Referendum

[mowgli]

the stay in vote on the 1ff poll has climbed a bit over the past two weeks

Means nothing. The latest poll has Brexit 4% ahead.

 

[blade1889]

Have we not worked out after the GE that polls aren't that accurate? Whether it be a 1FF poll or supposedly 'nationwide'. I still fully expect us to stay in cos 'better the devil you know'

 

[Dr Mantis Toboggan]

Means nothing. The latest poll has Brexit 4% ahead.

it means everything actually 1ff is entirely representative of society

 

[mowgli]

Complacency will not help us, "Better the devil you know" is no reason to vote to stay in. Where would we be if British explorers decided not to try and find out what was beyond our shores? How can anyone be happy with the amount of money we pay to The EU when they tell us who we can't deport for terrorism ideology and who we must let in, when London has a major terrorist atrocity like in France and Belgium then come back to me telling me should remain even though the suicide bomber conned his way into Europe and we couldn't stop him coming him because of The EU rules on so called asylum seekers even though they admit Terrorists are entering Europe claiming to be fleeing from war zones when they helped with the violence in Syria/Iraq.

 

[Cheese & Biscuits]

when London has a major terrorist atrocity like in France and Belgium then come back to me telling me should remain

Yep, London has never had a terrorist attack.

 

[blade1889]

I was merely saying what I expect to happen. Whether people outright decide the reason is 'better the devil you know' or a more disguised version of 'we cant be certain about trade etc. should we leave' I expect many will vote to stay in for those reasons and those people will ultimately decide the outcome of the referendum.

 

[Cheese & Biscuits]

I was merely saying what I expect to happen. Whether people outright decide the reason is 'better the devil you know' or a more disguised version of 'we cant be certain about trade etc. should we leave' I expect many will vote to stay in for those reasons and those people will ultimately decide the outcome of the referendum.

I'm not sure what the issue with the 'better the devil you know' thinking is anyway. Surely you only change something if you think the alternative is better. I'm still to hear anything that tells me that's the case so I'll be voting to stay in.

Also, the terrorist angle is tiresome. Anyone who thinks the problem ceases if we leave the EU is a moron.

 

[.V.]

Complacency will not help us, "Better the devil you know" is no reason to vote to stay in. Where would we be if British explorers decided not to try and find out what was beyond our shores? How can anyone be happy with the amount of money we pay to The EU when they tell us who we can't deport for terrorism ideology and who we must let in, when London has a major terrorist atrocity like in France and Belgium then come back to me telling me should remain even though the suicide bomber conned his way into Europe and we couldn't stop him coming him because of The EU rules on so called asylum seekers even though they admit Terrorists are entering Europe claiming to be fleeing from war zones when they helped with the violence in Syria/Iraq.

I would agree if the out camp could give us a unified and realistic vision of what a Brexit would look like for us.

 

[blade1889]

I'm not sure what the issue with the 'better the devil you know' thinking is anyway. Surely you only change something if you think the alternative is better. I'm still to hear anything that tells me that's the case so I'll be voting to stay in.

Also, the terrorist angle is tiresome. Anyone who thinks the problem ceases if we leave the EU is a moron.

Fair point...i will let you and Mowgli fight it out and retreat to a corner to watch

 

[Alty]

I'm not sure what the issue with the 'better the devil you know' thinking is anyway. Surely you only change something if you think the alternative is better. I'm still to hear anything that tells me that's the case so I'll be voting to stay in.

Also, the terrorist angle is tiresome. Anyone who thinks the problem ceases if we leave the EU is a moron.

Having to abide by EU Freedom of Movement rules does make us more vulnerable to a certain type of terrorism though.

The counter to this from Remain seems to be all the wonderful intelligence sharing we do with our EU neighbours. The slight flaw in that argument is that we do almost no counter terrorist intelligence work via the EU. We work much more closely with the Five Eyes and even when we do cooperate with the likes of France, we do so bilaterally.

I don't really think the terrorist angle is a particularly good one to work though, I must say. There are far more clear cut arguments.

I find the total lack of national self-confidence in this country depressing, I must say. Willingness to remain part of a creeping superstate because people haven't been given a cast iron guarantee that they'll get wealthier after Brexit is just...yeah...don't understand that mind set.

 

[Cheese & Biscuits]

I find the total lack of national self-confidence in this country depressing, I must say. Willingness to remain part of a creeping superstate because people haven't been given a cast iron guarantee that they'll get wealthier after Brexit is just...yeah...don't understand that mind set.

I can understand that but on the other hand, the xenophobia around losing national identity through being part of Europe depresses me.

I honestly have no strong feelings either way with this debate other than I wish it was over with. Either way, things won't change that much for most people and all the scaremongering from all sides is unhealthy.

 

[Ebeneezer Goode]

I can understand that but on the other hand, the xenophobia around losing national identity through being part of Europe depresses me.

How is that xenophobic?

 

[Dr Mantis Toboggan]

yeah, it's more bigoted than xenophobic

 

[Ebeneezer Goode]

It's neither. It's not anything that pretty much any person would normally begrudge any nation of people outside of the West.

 

[Cheese & Biscuits]

Surely a fear of losing a national identity is intrinsically a fear of foreign culture? Anyway, whatever you want to call it, I find it strange. I find the enrichment of having many cultures wonderful.

 

[Dr Mantis Toboggan]

that's cause u r some kind of social justice warrior pc health and safety police do-gooder

 

[Cheese & Biscuits]

that's cause u r some kind of social justice warrior pc health and safety police do-gooder

But I'm not a vegan so I have a little way to go to get the full-house.

 

[Dr Mantis Toboggan]

yeah my good friend lordofthepies is vegan though!

 

[Alty]

Surely a fear of losing a national identity is intrinsically a fear of foreign culture? Anyway, whatever you want to call it, I find it strange. I find the enrichment of having many cultures wonderful.

Eh? Wanting to preserve your national identity is nothing to do with fearing anything or anyone else. If anything, buttressing the nation state model helps preserve ALL national identities in Europe. A slow but inexorable slide towards a country called Europe with a single political system, judiciary and culture is something people who value diversity should be desperate to avoid.

 

[Aber gas]

I find the idea that leaving the EU will mean we devolve into a country of racist, xenophobic morons ridiculous. Leaving a corrupt, wasteful and failed project doesn't suddenly send us back to a unspecified dark age.

 

[Pyeman]

Willingness to remain part of a creeping superstate because people haven't been given a cast iron guarantee that they'll get wealthier after Brexit is just...yeah...don't understand that mind set.

I think that's a misrepresentation of the fears that many people have about leaving the EU. I'm voting to remain in the EU, much for the same reason as C&B in that I'm yet to see anything to convince me that the positives of a leave vote outweigh the negatives.

My thinking is nothing to do with the lack of a cast iron guarantee that I'll be wealthier after Brexit. I'm concerned that we'll be potentially worse off if we vote leave. It is this concern, rather than a desire to be wealthier that is influencing my vote at the minute.

At the start of the campaign DC said it wouldn't be about project fear. Personally I think that's bollocks. Fear is an incredibly powerful emotion and I know that for many of the people I've spoken with the fear of what a post referendum Britain looks like is their main consideration when choosing where to cast their vote.

 

[Pyeman]

EU referendum: PM 'makes no apology' for £9m EU leaflets
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-35984991

Is it acceptable to use public money to campaign for the remain side?

Michael Fallon claims in the article that the government has campaigned in every referendum since the original Europe referendum in the 70s. Anyone know how accurate that claim is?

 

[mnb089mnb]

that's cause u r some kind of social justice warrior pc health and safety police do-gooder

The hard left rad fem brigade.

 

[silkyman]

One question I've got for the brexiters is about 'we can't control our borders'...

If we really can't control our borders, how come there are thousands of people in shitty conditions in Calais?

If we really had no control of our borders, they would all be 'in' by now.

And how will leaving the EU make any difference? Schengen will still be a thing in Europe so there'll be no change in people reaching Calais, and anyone who is coming in on trucks etc is doing so illegally anyway, so how will being out of the EU make any difference at all?

 

[Tilbury]

I find the total lack of national self-confidence in this country depressing, I must say. Willingness to remain part of a creeping superstate because people haven't been given a cast iron guarantee that they'll get wealthier after Brexit is just...yeah...don't understand that mind set.

It's not a lack of confidence, it's a lack of nationalism.

 

[Tilbury]

One question I've got for the brexiters is about 'we can't control our borders'...

If we really can't control our borders, how come there are thousands of people in shitty conditions in Calais?

If we really had no control of our borders, they would all be 'in' by now.

And how will leaving the EU make any difference? Schengen will still be a thing in Europe so there'll be no change in people reaching Calais, and anyone who is coming in on trucks etc is doing so illegally anyway, so how will being out of the EU make any difference at all?

Any EU citizen is currently allowed to freely move around, the people in Calais are non-EU citizens and so don't have the same right. Leaving would mean EU citizens would no longer have the freedom to move here.

 

[Alty]

It's not a lack of confidence, it's a lack of nationalism.

That's just it though - for the vast majority, it isn't. There's no appetite in the UK for deeper and deeper European integration. The British people don't believe in a move away from independent nation states towards a federal Europe. That is a view that's genuinely popular on the continent for a whole host of complex historical reasons, but it's not here.

Of course there are some people who favour staying in for genuine, well thought out reasons. I mean, if you believe in a federal technocracy, then yes - voting to stay in makes sense.

However, a hell of a lot of people of a mind to vote Remain feel that way on the basis of a series of misplaced fears and fundamental misunderstandings.

 

[Alty]

Any EU citizen is currently allowed to freely move around, the people in Calais are non-EU citizens and so don't have the same right. Leaving would mean EU citizens would no longer have the freedom to move here.

EU citizens and those who have a right of residence in EU countries too. So all those migrants in Germany, Sweden and elsewhere will ultimately be allowed in too - assuming they're given residency by their host countries.

As for no longer having the freedom to move here - we really don't know what would be agreed post-Brexit. What I do know is that it's bonkers that my American friend is having to pay £1,000+ every year for the right to live and work here while all those European pricks I was trying to deport for criminal activity a couple of years back were able to come here without any conditions. Leaving the EU would allow us to introduce a more equitable and ethical immigration policy. We're so strict on non-EU migrants because it's the only portion of immigration we can control - and it's completely unfair.

 

[Alty]

As for the stuff earlier about leaflets; I see your leaflet and raise you a taxpayer-funded pro-EU one.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-35984991

This is pretty fucking shabby stuff.

 

[Veggie Legs]

However, a hell of a lot of people of a mind to vote Remain feel that way on the basis of a series of misplaced fears and fundamental misunderstandings.

You could say exactly the same about people voting leave.