It does?
No-one I have spoken to in person seems to have a coherent detailed idea or be able to say anything more interesting or useful than “take back control of our laws and borders”
All that we like about the EU, none of what we dislike. 😂
They want to be in the EU and sovereign at the same time. They want free movement of only the right people, for mutable definitions of right. They want all of the beneficial EU privileges and regulations and none of the bad ones.
Sharpe
3327
Hmm, that sounds to me that Brexiteers DO know what they want: “take back control of our laws and borders” but that many don’t want to pay the price for that, which is losing all the advantages of being in the EU. “Taking back control” sounds nice but it means taking the UK out of the EU, out of the EU legal, economic and regulatory system, which means giving up all the good (lack of tariffs, international mobility and purchasing, etc.) along with the “bad”.
There is simply no way the EU is going to let the UK have all the good aspects of the EU with the UK having some kind of unilateral veto over anything the UK doesn’t like. There’s no way to “take back control” without giving up all the benefits.
So it seems to me that is the essential conundrum: what the Brexiteers want comes with a heavy price they don’t want to pay. There is a group of Brexiteers who seem to be willing to the pay the price (or who live in denial there will be one) and want a No Deal Brexit but a lot just seem to keep thinking that they can magically somehow have their cake and eat it too.
For the people who somehow against all logic seem to think the UK can leave the EU without giving up the benefits, how does that work? How do they think a Brexit that doesn’t leave the UK out in the cold works? Also, how on Earth do they think they can persuade the EU to agree to that? What are they going to offer? They don’t want to pay the price of being outside the economic union, so what possibly could they offer to persuade the EU to give them special preference over the other 30+ member nations? How does that chain of illogic even work?
spiffy
3328
Brexiteers who think this also believe the UK is holding all the cards, that the EU needs them more than the UK does, and that May is just doing a terrible job at negotiating.
Sharpe
3329
So it’s pure fantasy “alternate facts” type of thinking, based on nationalist sentiment?
spiffy
3330
From what purely anecdotal evidence I’ve read on message boards, Quora, etc, it does seem like those who understand the ramifications of leaving and accept that there will be consequences and a hit to their standard of living do exist, but are in the minority. As for the rest, yes.
Yeah, those shitnozzles are currently on reddit and socmedia explaining why the car industry is going to die anyway so it doesnt matter if we lose it. All are literally wanking themselves silly over the thought of job losses. “Its what we voted for, we ran a campaign saying that this will cause job losses and screwed economy” they insist and swear blind in the face it happened. They are getting a kick out of inflicting pain and misery on other people at this point, they know they are wrong, what they have done but they dont care. The cult of Brexit is populated by psychos.
Thanks Brexiters, I really missed this.
It’s a good soundbite but when asked, none of them could define how it would work in practice.
Ditto control of our laws. None could name a single law that was imposed.
edit : someone mentioned bananas.
And none of the ones I asked could articulate what the good was or the bad.
When I asked, pointedly, where they had last gone on holiday (France) I asked if they had required a visa, had required lining up, or if they could just go easily.
Then I explained that that, right there, was a benefit of being in the EU and if we leave, there is no guarantee it stays because it is one of hundreds of things to be negotiated, so it is by no means a simple “get on with it” issue.
Sharpe
3334
It’s actually worse than that, b/c if they really don’t want the EU to have any control over the UK, then they are never going to have the borderless/passportless/smooth vacations they have been enjoying. That’s because every single one of these things is reciprocal. You want to be able to enter France no hassle and lounge on a French beach no hassle? Then the French get to come to the UK and hang out in front of Buckingham palace or whateva. You want to be able to buy the stuff you want from EU countries with no tariff, no restriction, no queuing or waiting for approval? Then the EU folks get to buy the stuff they want from the UK same deal.
It’s like they don’t understand reciprocity, which is the foundation of the whole EU concept.
Almost makes me wonder that this is one of those “5 moral foundations” deals where the Brexiteers are just fundamentally unable to grasp the concept of reciprocity (which is highly tied into the Care/Harm and Fairness Foundations). I would not be surprised if the Brexiteers were all about the Authority, Liberty and Purity Foundations and apathetic to Care/Harm and Fairness. Which, since I’m not a moral relativist, means that I would think they are fundamentally immoral assholes.
jsnell
3335
What passportless vacations? Those in Ireland?
kedaha
3336
He probably means visa free, to be fair.
jsnell
3337
Yeah, but the EU has already committed to visa-free travel even in the case of a no-deal Brexit, unless the UK starts requiring visas from citizens of any EU country.
draxen
3338
This is a non argument in my opinion since there is already an agreement for visa free travel after Brexit.
“UK citizens will not need to apply for a Schengen Visa like many other nationalities. On February 1, 2019, the European Council said: “EU ambassadors today agreed that, following Brexit, UK citizens coming to the Schengen area for a short stay (90 days in any 180 days) should be granted visa-free travel.””
Also, visa on arrival is no hardship either.
Indeed, in this case an agreement has been reached.
One down…
a few more hundred (?) to go, and all before March 29th.
Good progress.
Brexit wants to strip me of my right of EU residency. Thats more than enough of a reason to want it stopped for me.
Sharpe
3341
I don’t know the details of Euro travel, being an unwashed American, but even in the case of the no-visa travel deal referenced above, doesn’t that mean, since the no-visa travel is reciprocal, that the UK has already agreed that even after Brexit, they will give up some control (the ability to require a Visa)? So even by reaching a single post-Brexit agreement, they’ve already ceded a fraction of 100% pure UK sovereignty on that issue?
The basic concept to me that is that the entire EU and all of its subsidiary benefits/agreements/what-have-you are reciprocal in nature and that means inherently for every single benefit the UK negotiates for, they give up that corresponding amount of control, unless the EU agrees to a double standard, “the UK can have its cake and eat it too” type of deal which seems both unworkable, and also just never going to happen politically.
Basically from my POV if you are a hardcore UK sovereignty uber alles no-outside-control type of person, then the only option is a full blown no-deal Brexit.
How do the Brexiteers imagine this works? They get to have full economic access to the EU on preferential terms but the EU gets no access to the UK except that which benefits the UK?
Again, I feel like the whole concept of reciprocity is lost on the Brexit faction.
It’s deals between countries, they don’t have to be fair and they’re driven by the relative power of each side.
It’s just that Brexiteers and the EU see the relative power of the EU / UK vastly differently. And what was promised to the people who voted for Brexit, it isn’t going to happen, no way, the EU will never accept it, even if the UK was truly essential and “they need us more than we need them” was true. The moment you give a former member a better deal than members get, it’s the moment current members start leaving en masse.
