Over the past few days I have seen a lot of discourse on whether the Brexit referendum was democratic or not. Naturally, the losing party (Remain) deems it undemocratic due to its low turnout and relatively low winning margin, while Leave deems it an example of proper democracy. But now I have found an absolutely fucking ridiculous article which highlights not only the childlike manner of reasoning by Remain, but also the hypocrisy. I present to you Kenneth Rogoff, Professor of Economics and Public Policy at Harvard.
https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/brexit-democratic-failure-for-uk-by-kenneth-rogoff-2016-06
Some quotes:
>it was the absurdly low bar for exit, requiring only a simple majority. Given voter turnout of 70%, this meant that the leave campaign won with only 36% of eligible voters backing it.
This isn’t democracy; it is Russian roulette for republics.
>Indeed, no one has any idea of the consequences, both for the UK in the global trading system, or the effect on domestic political stability. I am afraid it is not going to be a pretty picture.
>Brexiteers did not invent this game; there is ample precedent, including Scotland in 2014 and Quebec in 1995. But, until now, the gun’s cylinder never stopped on the bullet. Now that it has, it is time to rethink the rules of the game.
>The idea that somehow any decision reached anytime by majority rule is necessarily “democratic” is a perversion of the term.
>The current international norm of simple majority rule is, as we have just seen, a formula for chaos.
>>78905136
>The system worked when it gave us the results we wanted
>Now that it hasn't, it's undemocratic and needs to be changed
>>78905136
>its low turnout
70+% is not low turnout.
Voter turnout is a meaningless metric to me.
If people can't be fucked to vote considering how mind numbingly easy it is, they lose their say.
>>78905136
That guy is a fucking idiot. And people thought the leave voters were the stupid ones.
>>78905136
Do we have to leave the EU? I fucking hate old people they are fucking parasites on our society. We need to round all these old fucks up, put them in camps and find some way to make them useful. Those that are a drain on society should be put to death and then be cremated. We could facilitate a grand scheme to accomplish this using trains and a camp system all over Europe. That is to say, we concentrate them in these camps away from us, the future of our countries. Post guards so they can't escape and find some menial labor for them to do that benefits us.
>>78905136
>low turnout
lol, not at all
>low winning margin
>winning margin
sounds like stay is just salty
>>78905136
The mass immigration to Europe the last decades is 15 orders of magnitude worse than anything the Brexit can possibly cause. It's worse in the long run than both the world wars times 10. It's the permanent destruction of a civilization in express speed.
I will vote for any party or cause on the political spectrum that promises to stop it. There is literally nothing more important.
>>78905136
>low turnout
It had the highest turnout of any vote in modern history.
>low turnout
lol what?
>>78905909
Yes but it's good for the economy.
The people who benefit from mass immigration are the same people who benefit from the single market: Big Businesses.
>>78905401
>>78905825
>>78906113
>>78906164
I agree there was not a low turnout, I am only parroting what the Remain camp has stated. They deem 70% to be not enough for such a monumental decision. As if ever 100% would vote.
>>78905136
>Over the past few days I have seen a lot of discourse on whether the Brexit referendum was democratic or not. Naturally, the losing party (Remain) deems it undemocratic due to its low turnout and relatively low winning margin, while Leave deems it an example of proper democracy.
Low turnout? It was something like 72% overall which is a significant amount of the population able to vote, that number is quite a lot higher than people who voted in the last general election so you'd have to also argue that general elections are un-democratic.
Democracy is simply allowing everyone the ability to vote which includes allowing people to abstain from voting which some people did, and it doesn't matter that the margin which won was small, that's how democracy works, you don't get to change decisions simply because it was close.
People had one choice to make and months notice to vote which means they had plenty of time to investigate the claims on both sides and make a choice, if the other 28% wanted to vote then they could have, either way. Their lack of a vote doesn't mean they couldn't vote, it meant they didn't care to or couldn't make up their mind. If they explicitly wanted to stay then they should have voted to remain.
People are fucking stupid and complain because the vote didn't go the way they wanted and so they're doing absolutely everything in their power to subvert democracy.
>>78905136
>The idea that somehow any decision reached anytime by majority rule is necessarily “democratic” is a perversion of the term.
Funny seeing how Amerifats/Jews were spreading "democracy" throughout the world and Middle East in particular. But now they argue against democracy
Fuck the West. Get one result you don't like, and suddenly democracy is dead. Then why the fuck did you invade Iraq and force other to be democratic?
>>78907374
Democracy has been dead for quite a while now little roach, Nat-Soc is the only answer (apart from Monarchism, god save the queen)
>>78905136
there is no relativity when it comes to democracy - result is either valid or unvalid; past referendum was lawful, valid and in accordance with the agreed-upon rules
voter turnout card is bullshit; there are societies where voting is mandatory for all eligible voters but UK ain't one of them
academic salt is even more delicious than regular salt
>>78905136
>its low turnout
70+%
>its low winning margin
talking about millions of people.
Fuck off. Does anyone seriously believe these people would be making this argument if the vote was 52% remain? This is a disgrace and these anti-democratic shits should be ashamed of themselves.
>>78905355
isn't that just democrocy in a nutshell?
>>78905604
I agree while we're at it lets do the same to the 13 million voters that couldn't be arsed to vote, the immigrants that contribute nthing to the country and lets not forget all the government officials that didn't plan for both sides of the vote.
If memory serves, Austria got an election won by left by a very slight margin.
NO ONE COMPLAINED.
Here "left" lost, and it's shitting everything up.
Democracy is this, not "unless the vote goes how the left say".
