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The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

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Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#481

Post by gshulegaard »

27182818284 wrote: post #277
gshulegaard wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was my understanding that the effectiveness of direct democracies has been inversely related to size of population throughout history... So, specifically in the context of discussing direct democracy, size does matter.

That is a good point, but, how many of those democracies took place in the era of fast communication by locomotive, telegraph, email, SMS, the long distance phone call, Skype, and others? Surely there is a difference between the Roman Empire being stretched and sending messages by foot and FDR addressing the US by radio.

This is a fair point, but the largest issue (IMO) wasn't directly related to communication time...rather it has been the risk of Tyranny of the Majority.

Even in the relatively recent founding history of the United States, the Federalist Papers discuss and try to address a variety of issues which can lead to this outcome.

And ultimately, I think this is what we see with the Brexit outcome and the current Trump campaign in the US. These aren't "new" concepts...throughout history we can see similar outcomes for similar events with similar reasons.

You raise an excellent point though, which is with the ease of communication in the modern era, why don't we have a more informed public? This is something I have thought about trying to tackle with a side dev project...but the issue is complex and difficult to address directly.

Side note, I believe the Roman Empire was a Republic, not a Direct Democracy :)

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#482

Post by zepto »

jacquesm wrote: post #475
aidos wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So I was thinking today, we could weight the votes by life expectancy. The fewer years left in your life, the less your vote counts. In this case I wouldn't have to go home and explain to my children why it is that they probably won't be allowed to go and live in Europe for a bit when they hit their 20s anymore.

I do not think you'll have to explain them that they will be just as welcome as everybody else.

What are you talking about? Prior to Brexit, British citizens could live and work in European countries without qualification. This is not true for the rest of the world.

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#483

Post by flubert »

maxerickson wrote: post #175
emsy wrote: post #167

What I're read so far about pro-leavers: -They are stupid. -They are xenophobic racists (over 50% of the population!). -Trump welcomes the Brexit, so being pro-leave is stupid. -Old people vote "leave" since they don't have to face the consequences as long as the young people, and old people have no clue. -"Leave" votes come mainly from E.U. subsidized areas, thus they bite the hand that feeds them. -Pro-leave doesn'…

Lots of people didn't vote, so leave won even though only 37% of the population voted that way.

Honest question, what percentage of the population voted to join the EU originally?

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#484

Post by PKop »

zghst wrote: post #456
Moshe_Silnorin wrote: post #434

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you put someone through something as humiliating as a college education, and their final exams? Presumably you want a measure of their knowledge and capability. In my system, no one has the right to become a representative. It's a job like any other, that requires non-standard admissions procedures (namely random sampling) to avoid corruption. I'm unsure if traditions could be enshrined to make my system st…

So how do communities gain appropriate representation in your system? Does everything come down to a test?

Maybe there could be 2 parallel branches, like the House and Senate, one of which uses this random sampling / testing system. The other uses something resembling a popular vote.

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#485

Post by mikeash »

flubert wrote: post #467
mikeash wrote: post #379

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought it was remarkable that the course of an entire nation can be so greatly changed by a 51.9% victory in a single vote. Seems like such an important change should require a supermajority of some sort. (And, of course, the original choice to join ought to have as well.) People are fickle and easily divided. For normal elections, we hold them regularly, and that gives people a chance to correct their mistakes or…

I'm wondering if someone can fill us in on the history of the UK's entrance into the EU. Was there a vote at all? It seems complicated by the whole European Community thing.

Great question. I perused Wikipedia a bit, and it seems like the relevant event would be the UK joining the European Communities, which eventually transformed into the EU. The UK government directly decided to join, but a referendum was held two years later, and "stay" won with 67% of the vote:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_European_Commun...

The formal entry into the EU was done with the Maastricht Treaty in 1993 and didn't have a referendum, but it was basically a direct continuation of their EC membership. Although I imagine someone opposed to EU membership might argue that this was the most important point, and the people did not have their say in it.

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#486

Post by PKop »

arcticbull wrote: post #388
zghst wrote: post #314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about decisions like electing the leader of the free world? The most powerful person on earth? Should that be left up to every day people? I think that people should be able to make big decisions that effect them. Direct democracy is more useful than ever, the elites use our republic to manipulate people more than ever. They game the system and with no balance or checks on their power.

IMO its as easy for the elites to manipulate the public via media as it is for them to manipulate elected representatives and the latter is easier to address via checks and balances, though nobody seems willing to put them in. Elections are in the public interest so campaigns should be solely funded by the government, not by private backers. Private parties should not be able to run media campaigns on behalf or again…

But what's a "media campaign"? Does this include social media? How about public speeches, broadcast on youtube?

This distinction seems arbitrary and basically restricts the ability for someone or some association of people to promote their ideas.

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#487

Post by superswordfish »

aidos wrote: post #222
netcan wrote: post #82

I'm strangely moved by this whole thing. It's a pretty decent status check on where we are with democracy ATM. I'm not against democracy, but I do think we need to pay attention to what it can & can't do. On one hand, this has been a model of democracy. A primary election agenda and referendum. The phrasing of the question was simple, clear and unbiased. The "will of the people" won over the will of the ruling struct…

So I was thinking today, we could weight the votes by life expectancy. The fewer years left in your life, the less your vote counts. In this case I wouldn't have to go home and explain to my children why it is that they probably won't be allowed to go and live in Europe for a bit when they hit their 20s anymore.

Agreed, those with hazardous occupations should be disenfranchised.

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#488

Post by makomk »

zghst wrote: post #348
k__ wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it was exactly the opposite.

I'm curious, I'd like to hear more =)

Our biggest newspapers, the Sun and the Daily Mail, have huge political influence here. They were both strongly pro-Brexit, as was the Telegraph. They've also been anti-EU for decades.

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#489

Post by tosseraccount »

anu_gupta wrote: post #396
Inthenameofmine wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, it's not like the swiss didn't have their fare share of ethnic issues in th past. Keep in mind that Switzerland is linguistically diverse. The difference is that because of direct democracy and every male being armed to the teeth, the government steps in and tries to reduce inequality. That way democracy works again. I mean, Jura used to have straight up ethnic riots.

It's also not like your 'perfect' system wasn't financed by of the dirtiest money humanity has ever seen.

Switzerland should be compared with their closest money ~handling~ competitors : Cayman Islands and the Channel Islands.

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#490

Post by vidarh »

mafribe wrote: post #316
matthewmacleod wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is ridiculously reductive to claim that improving income inequality is a Stalinist policy.

But it's a policy Stalin and his ilk carried out, at near global level. With fairly disaterous results.

No, they didn't. They claimed they did, and then they elevated the party elite to a new upper class and brutally murdered anyone who dared continue to criticise it, including their own party members.
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