To feel sorry for Theresa May

[thinkiamgoingcrazy]

I think she has been an awful PM: evasive / divisive / arrogant / authoritarian / sneering / dog whistling.

I am glad that she no longer has a majority, hopefully allowing more voice to the many and diverse opinions in the oppositions as well as in the moderate wing of the Tory party.

I am also glad that we are apparently going back to government by cabinet meeting rather than by advisers (probable overstatement I know).

And yet I feel sorry for her . Now a puppet at the mercy of her ruthless party.

She reminds me of Glenn Close at the end of Dangerous Liaisons.

Her arrogance has come home to roost. Save your sympathies for those who have lost their jobs, had housing benefit and disability allowances cut to the point they had to choose between heating or eating this past winter.

Yabu

I'm with you, OP. I don't disagree with what other say about saving sympathy for those affected by her policies. Given all she has done, it IS unreasonable but I can't help feeling sorry for her either!

Hackmum that was one of the few things she got right. David Cameron was completely right when he proposed using the navy to tow the boats back to their point of origin the destroying them. Importing millions of people whose beliefs and attitudes are about 1000 years behind those of the DUP is going to end in carnage of WW2 proportions.

We had the Referendum which was done in the interests of the Cons party

To be fair, Cameron had no choice. UKIP polled nearly 4 million votes in the last election - way more than the Lib Dems, SNP etc. It is only because of our 'first past the post' electoral system that they didn't have any MPs. If this was a proportional representation system, following the 2015 election UKIP would have had 83 seats!! (To give you a comparison the SNP would have had just 25 instead of the 56 they achieved). UKIP would easily have been the third party in the House of Commons by some way, had our electoral system been different.

UKIP were a one issue party and a force that were pulling millions of votes from both the Conservatives and Labour. Whoever had been prime minister then - Conservative or Labour would have had to have agreed to a referendum at some point because the UKIP threat to both parties wasn't going to go away. If anything it was growing.

When the referendum came, most senior Conservatives were pro-remain and campaigned on that basis - including Theresa May. With virtually every other party - in the main - pro remain, it is pretty clear that the Conservative hierarchy thought they would win. The matter of our membership of the EU would be resolve once and for all, and it would be business as usual.

But no-one anticipated the antipathy towards the EU institution, that existed in the country and we all know what happened. But you can't lay that blame entirely at the door of the Conservatives because regardless of who was in power - a referendum on EU membership would have been inevitable at some point due the political pressure being exerted by UKIP, and their taking of millions of Labour and Conservative votes.

Don't these campaign advisors realise that it's really outdated to keep repeating the same words, same slogan . The public see through it . The repetitive slogan is just used as a wall because they are not going to explain themselves or their policies adequately . Theresa May was just a boring block of concrete repeating herself yet we all knew she was going to clobber us .

To be fair, Cameron had no choice

Cameron had a choice.

I don't feel sorry for her. I don't wish her ill, so I hope she leaves asap as this situation (entirely her own fault) must be playing hell with her mental and physical health. But sympathy? No. I have none for her.

Cameron had a choice.

What was that choice then? To ignore UKIP and hope they'd go away?

They were already the largest UK party in the European Parliament and were beginning to make inroads into Westminster. They also polled 3.9 million votes compared to the Lib Dems 2.4 million in the 2015 election. They were easily the third party in the country already and rising.

You cannot ignore that I'm afraid whether you are right of Atilla the Hun or left of Lenin. Cameron could have delayed but ultimately a referendum was inevitable. The political pressure exerted by UKIP was too great for any prime minister of any political persuasion to ignore.

Her campaign was diabolical. She repeated the same old tired phrases again and again, it was incredibly patronising, assuming that's all the public would need to hear to vote for her.
She never engaged with the pubic, only select invitees at her so called campaign trail meetings. She came across as sneering towards the ordinary voter.
There was very little discussion about policies and when they finally released the manifesto and we could see the nastiness in its full glory , she u turned and made shit excuses.
I,m glad they never returned a majority because I dread to think what punitive austerity cuts we would suffer over the next 5 years if they had got carte blanche

This campaign was run on the premise that the electorate are stupid and will fall for someone refusing to engage with the public and only participating in carefully stage managed events addressing hand picked Tory supporters, refuse to debate with other party leaders and answering 'strong and stable' to every question they are asked. I'm just glad people saw through it.

What was that choice then? To ignore UKIP and hope they'd go away?

He could have examined his party. If he found that his party was amenable to the core beliefs of UKIP, he could have had a difficult conversation with his party.

She will m anage. She remains leader. She will probably get a Queen's speech passed which should thankfully ensure a good few more years of Tory rule.

We have beaten Corbyn and labour. The people spoke and Labour did not get in despite all the hype implying the contrary. All that matters is the numbers.

I feel very slightly sorry for her because the whole thing is completely humiliating for her and I don't like watching public humiliation.

However, I feel far sorrier for the people who have the humiliation of having to use a food bank today. In a country as rich as the UK, nobody should need to use a food bank and it is to the shame of all of us that that is happening.

lessworried: "Importing millions of people whose beliefs and attitudes are about 1000 years behind those of the DUP is going to end in carnage of WW2 proportions."

Better let them drown, then? Really?

She fucked up big time and I want her to go.

On a side note, I can't believe she's only 60.

60?????? I thought she was in her seventies, she has not aged well! 😮

7461Mary18: "She remains leader. She will probably get a Queen's speech passed which should thankfully ensure a good few more years of Tory rule."

I think that's the most deluded thing I've ever read on Mumsnet, and heaven knows there's been some stiff competition. Haven't you been paying any attention at all? Even George Osborne called May a "dead woman walking".

I do feel a bit sorry for her. In the press over the weekend you could see her confidence has all dribbled away and her face all puffy and sad.

Never mind that she has brought it all on herself. And I'll bet the foxes don't feel sorry for her.

He could have examined his party. If he found that his party was amenable to the core beliefs of UKIP, he could have had a difficult conversation with his party.

How would a 'difficult conversation with his party' have changed anything?

The referendum came about because of a rising political force - the largest UK party in the EU parliament, the third most popular party in the UK after Labour and Conservative, coming 2nd in 120 constituencies across the country in the 2015 GE. A force gaining so much momentum that no prime minister could ignore it.

People had been doing that for years - calling them nutters and loonies and so on - and it wasn't working. More and more people were voting UKIP and they weren't just traditional Conservatives either.

I'm not quite sure how Cameron 'talking to his party' would have changed that?

Cameron chose to rush the referendum through. He chose to set the threshold at 50:50. He chose not to plan for a leave vote and he chose to tie in his office to leading the Remain campaign. He chose George Osbourne's Project Fear strategy.

I feel uncomfortable for TM. The Tories berate people for their life choices contributing to their own miserable circumstances. Hard not to apply their logic to her choices. But I heard she was in tears before going to meet the Queen on Friday so it seems churlish not to feel a bit of sympathy on a human level.

Don't feel sorry for her at all, and think the whole sorry episode has exposed a gaping chasm at the heart of the Conservatives - could you really see an old fashioned 'one nation' Tory leading the party these days? Seems to be driven by multi-millionaire donors with no real leadership.

Labour may have lost this one but should build on the momentum for the next.

We had the Referendum which was done in the interests of the Cons party To be fair, Cameron had no choice.

Of course he had a choice. He could have faced down his extreme right wing instead of appeasing them. As far as UKIP is concerned he could have gone to UKIP voters and asked what it was they really wanted. Except that this is where he had a problem - much of the vote for UKIP was anti-austerity, and he and Osborne were the architects of that. Apart from a few noisy posters here, and in real life, most people didn't regard the EU as a problem - in fact it's a bonus, cheap flights and much easier to move to Spain to live.

I don't understand at all how you can feel sorry for a woman who quite clearly is all about herself, So desperate to cling on to power she will join up with the DUP,
She doesn't have the needs of this country at the forefront of her mind, If she did she wouldn't talk down to a nurse about the magic money tree and she would be investing in the NHS and in our children for the future.
Instead of bold face lieing that there is nothing wrong with the NHS and with schools.
She doesn't need an NHS she can go private, Shes loaded she doesn't need to worry about pensions she doesn't need to worry about children.
She quite frankly doesn't care about anyone working class that's exactly why in her manifesto they get cuts left right and centre whilst she lowers corporation tax for the wealthy.
When are people going to WAKE UP.

She is a liar and all about herself.
Don't worry for her as unless you are wealthy she doesn't care for you.

I wish I would have wised up sooner.
Only I started watching all her interviews I read all her manifesto and I am so glad I voted labour!

She's as corrupt as they come.

I do feel sorry for her, kind of like I feel sorry for Macbeth at the end of Macbeth. He's facing the end and cuts a sad and deluded figure and reflects on how it all could have been different.

Then you remember the evil things he's done and you think "ah well, serves you right" :o

But I can't help cringing when I think of how she must feel.... she must just feel like SUCH a twat. I kind of wish that instead of trying to brave it out and cling on, she'd come out of no 10 on Friday and gone "Well I messed that up big time. I'm out of here."

I don't feel any sympathy for her at all. She has schemed and misled and lied. She has manoeuvred and schemed to gain and then try to hold onto power. She trots out sound bites (strong and stable), rather than say anything of any substance. She has avoided debate and the general public. She is absolutely where she deserves to be, and it's all self-inflicted. She deserves to be held to account, not to be given any sympathy.

Theresa, if you're reading this... you massive, massive arsehole.