Can we stqrt calling it what is is?

[Itisnoteasybeingdifferent]

It's not exit, it's independence. Alternatively we should call it sovereignty or self rule.

Oh for goodness sake - there are thousands of Migrants floundering in Greece right now at this moment, Greece is still begging the EU for help. They asked for over 400 people to help process migrants - they got 40. We all know - Syrian refugees are only a part of the wave of migration Merkel actively encouraged with many men coming from Safe countries like Morocco, Tunisia, etc etc etc. We know the external borders of the EU are pretty much non existent! We know local officials wrote begging letter to Merkel saying " we cannot process these people safely - we do not know where they have come from help us". The way it was done - has created tensions and fear.

Why would anyone place more trust in Trump's US than in membership of the EU? Or is the U.K. going to go it alone in the world without friends, alliances and loyalty?

Debbie I think you misunderstand what we are discussing, it is not putting leavers into boxes, it is recognising those boxes exist. As baby boomers ourselves we are discussing the influences on our generation that swung the vote a certain way, and the attitudes that are influencing our politicians. That May is a 6o year old woman from a certain background is not irrelevant.

Like it or not the boomers are over represented amongst Leave voters, Daily Mail readers.

As to finding the rhetoric on some boards facile and hyperbolic, well apart from a good debate recently on regional variation in wages, yes, it often is devoid of argument, debate or evidence. Fine if you want that sort of conversation but don't expect people not to call it.

I am not spiteful towards leavers,
Fair enough, I was generalising myself even though that's what I was arguing against (the irony is not missed on me!).

I am genuinely interested in why they take the views they do, and what it was that caused the vote in June to go the way it did. It's not my fault that every single argument put forward does not make any kind of sense to me and to the millions of remainers out there.
And there lies the problem really.

The arguments/reasons do not need to make sense to you as a Remainer (in fact, they mostly will not); understanding the 'why' involves listening/reading and acknowledging that those reasons were valid to that person.

Only when you (general you) understand, can the right practical changes or arguments be made to 'win the hearts and minds' - this was not done for decades - hence we ended up where we are today.

(Hope that makes sense).

As to finding the rhetoric on some boards facile and hyperbolic, well apart from a good debate recently on regional variation in wages, yes, it often is devoid of argument, debate or evidence. Fine if you want that sort of conversation but don't expect people not to call it.

And it has repeatedly been pointed out that posters on that thread are heartily sick of the constant interrogation over the same things day in, day out.
The Westminster thread is a serious and informative, wide reaching thread, the pub thread should sit comfortably alongside it as a less weighty thread.

I am genuinely interested in why they take the views they do

But when for instance I am interested in a subject I don't understand I do pick things up If I want too. I always feel we are staring back at ground zero with Remainers as if they have not taken on board a single point?
I don't understand with all the stuff written across so many threads, some remainers are still asking the same questions over and over again? Its perplexing.

So for instance - after the Bataclan attacks - there was an article widely circulated on here called
" The Path To Death"
"How EU Failures Helped Paris Terrorists Obtain Weapons"
"Where did the weapons used in the 2015 terror attacks in Paris come from? Files from the ongoing investigation now make it possible to follow the trail. Years of EU shortcomings helped the firearms on their way."
An in depth article following the guns, used in Frances 2015 attacks to kill. Do you remember that article, it was had to miss, posted on so many threads.....how the warnings sat on a desk somewhere in the EU for seven years - on the dangers of these guns, where they came from, how they could be used?

Stuff like that deeply disturbs and worries me, and tells me about the level of duty and care - Brussels feel about its citizens across the EU. It worried me when immediately after the attacks the first thought on the TOP EU officials mins was " don't ask me to close borders this will not happen."

This has all been said before many many times Mother but I am giving a small snap shot now - again of some of my views why I dislike the EU. I just don't know - how for instance that Der Speigel article could have been missed/ here it is again, if your really interested.

www.spiegel.de/international/europe/following-the-path-of-the-paris-terror-weapons-a-1083461.html

Genuine Refugees have rights, Merkel is trying to deport the others.

what i find MOST frightening, is:

regardless, of whether you think that Brexit was, in DM speak: 'our finest hour'' or 'madness' is that the people in Govt have not the first fucking CLUE what they are doing (or any accountability - glares at Cameron)

sorry. badly put. incoherent with fear/rage about all this

Mother, I'm actually of the opinion that Britain voting to Leave is the kick that the EU machine needed - reform has been desperately needed for some time, but the leaders were too pigheaded to do anything meaningful wrt change.

It's unfortunate that it took Brexit, but hopefully the much needed reform and re-imagining will move forward now in the best interests of the EU project & all its member countries.

There is no reason that a successful Brexit settlement can't happen alongside a successful EU.
Friends & allies, just not bedfellows.

I don't expect Muslims to continuously affirm that Islamic terrorists do not speak for them.

As far as I am aware the BBC have not had ISIS supporters on Question Time and other programmes week after week in the way Farage and Cronies have been. If they had done so, I would indeed expect the Muslim community to speak with the angriest voice possible that such people only speak for a small minority and that the majority of the community are peaceful decent people. As it stands, many Muslims have already been vilified for the actions of a few.

Unless you are happy with us being at the back of Americas queue?

If all Trump offers is a shit deal which damages the UK then I would gladly be there or not in the queue at all. Noticeably in Gove's interview with Trump when Gove asked whether the UK was now at the front of the queue, Trump didn't give an affirmative answer, but said "You're doing great".

I'm a Farage supporter whilst I don't agree with everything he says and does I think he has worked hard and tirelessly for his goals despite verbal and physical threats against himself and his family. He suffers from appalling press bias and imo deserves a knighthood for continuing to work to save us from the EU. I don't believe he is racist or sexist you can paint him a monster and wish him ill all you like that just makes you look small minded. Many many people agree with me but the keyboard warriors on here shout them down.

OP: Are you also advocating UK withdrawal from ICJ rulings?

@InfiniteSheldon - Farage is extremely generously rewarded for his labours through his EP salary and allowances. He will also receive a very generous EP pension. He is paid for representing his constituents in Europe a job he is clearly neglecting while lining his pockets at LBC etc

Debbie Agreed European bureaucracies, including the UKs, are faulty. Bureaucracies generally are, the EU, and Britain's are actually not as faulty as the US, who have also been known to fail to act on process and intelligence that would have prevented terrorism and where the PEOTUS has just undermined his entire intelligence community, and the apparatus of his country's security, or as overeactive as say China where an innocent citizen has no protection via process or human rights legislation if the state decides they are a terrorist threat, and even to put a bullet through the back of their neck.

I have every reason to be frightened of terrorism, I have lived with it for my whole adult life. I have been close to several bomb explosions in London, saw the smoke rise over the rooftops from the Old Bailey bomb, would have been walking past the bin that exploded at Victoria were it not for an anti natal appointment, and spent several anxious hours when DH was in a lockdowned building with no phone network on 7/7. Sometimes that has literally been terror but I do see that as terrible as all the deaths at the hands of terrorism have been, they are still minuscule in number compared to the experience of those in the Middle East or Ireland. It is all about perspective isn't it? Terrorists do not attack because of failures of intelligence, they are far more often foiled than they succeed, they attack because they are motivated to target us because we are western or in the case of the IRA, on the mainland, and they hold us responsible for what has been done to their people. The EU played a vital part in bringing about the GFA and, the cessation of those bombings. it is currently focusing efforts on supporting refugee camps in the Middle East and in trying to find some so,utiin to the terrible war in Syria and in the wider Middle East. The EU stands for something shared politically throughout Europe, including the U.K. that sits in contrast to the authoritarianism of Russia and China and the neocons of the US.

It really frightens me far more that we are no longer going to be part of the EU standing up for our shared values in the face of the evolving world order, I think that is going to be far more likely to generate future terrorism.

Mother Everyone might know reform is needed, but is there the will to do it? I don't think there is, especially within the Berlaymont bubble. I don't live that far from you, and it was interesting on NYE, spent with our Flemish and German neighbours, to hear their views on the reform needed for Belgium, let alone the EU.

I have a friend who used to sit on the PSC as a junior ambassador (not a Brit), and she said it was like herding cats....national interest trumped everything else, especially the French, and the entire thing was utterly dysfunctional.

Whilst there are uber Federalists like Verhofstadt in place, then there won't be reform.

I clicked on the thread title assuming this was about the word vulva

My bad.

The Westminster thread is a serious and informative, wide reaching thread, the pub thread should sit comfortably alongside it as a less weighty thread.

I agree it would be good to have a less weighty thread alongside the Westminster one (I appreciate the relevance of the Trump stuff but don't have time to read it all as well) but the pub thread is no longer worth participating on.

It has become an absolute joke, highlighted last weekend by a poster specifically asking why I wasn't bothered about the UK losing our sovereignty, national identity and economic independence but being completely unable to give any examples of this for me to respond to.

The thread is just for ridiculous memes and toasts to our so called bright future. the comments yesterday were all gushing about TM and saying This is what I voted for etc.

The trouble is, it wasn't at all what was voted for because yesterday's speech was just a great big wish list stating we want all the benefits of being in the EU without any of the downside.

That is not, and was never on offer.

Had it been, many more might have voted to leave.

Had it been, many more might have voted to leave.

And had there been a proper debate e.g. a white paper published, with costings and realistic plans about what could be achieved then Remainers might not be so angry. At the moment, we have had more wishful thinking. May's trade visit to India - announced with much fanfare, went quiet when the sticky issue of visas arose as just one obvious example.

So now we have a 12 point list from May which is more of the 'we will have our cake and eat it' with the added insult that 65 million people support it. Don't just assume because you are a turncoat, May, that the rest of us are.