My mother is crying this morning. You might think this is an overreaction, even if she is a staunch Remain voter. But the reason she’s crying is because she is an EU immigrant.
She was born in Germany, has lived in the UK for over 20 years, and loves it here. She married a British man and raised two children here. Here is where she works, teaching children with autism and learning difficulties.
And this morning, over half the UK gave the message that it doesn’t want people like her here, purely because of where she was born, and where her parents are from.
I hope Brexiters are okay with that. I hope that in the months to come, they remember what they did yesterday. Most of all, I hope to god they’re proud of themselves, because they’ve made me ashamed to be British.
Tag: politics
if you ever feel like a fuckup, just think you will never in your life fuck up as badly as david cameron, the prime minister of the united kingdom, whose political gamble in calling this referendum has completely backfired and britain has not only voted to leave the eu but it might also cause scotland and northern ireland to break up from the union. so if you ever feel like a fuckup, just think of dave and how he, the prime minister of the united kingdom, has single-handedly put at risk the economic prosperity, political stability and unity of his country for the advancement of his own political career and that he had to resign knowing that this will be his legacy as prime minister
And here’s possibly his attempt to ‘steady the ship’: X
Eighteen hours later.
Hate gets its running shoes on.
Should we be surprised
This is terrifying
But it wasn’t about race, they say.
I am 22 and my cousins are Spanish, my friends dad is Jewish and one of my closest friends is Indian. I love them all dearly. Please don’t generalise because a handful of “outs” voters may have been racist, that would be like generalising all Muslim people to be terrorists. This is not about race. It is about shear numbers. We are a tiny country and the reason there is never a morning without traffic, always cues at our clinics and the lack of housing is due to the fact we aren’t coping.
Sure, maybe racist was the wrong label. Maybe should have opted for xenophobe.
The reason ‘we aren’t coping’ is because of funding and staff cuts to the NHS. That’s why there’s queues at clinics. Not because of a flood of immigrants. X
It’s because subsidies to bus routes have been reduced by £78m since 2010. That’s why there isn’t a morning without traffic. X
The housing shortage is actually shrinking. In the past year(based on an article dated Nov 2015), more than 155,000 homes have been built, up by 25% year-on-year. And it was also significantly higher than recent previous estimates of just over 124,000 new homes. On top of that, more than 20,000 new homes were created by converting commercial premises. That was up by 65% on last year. As for London, more than 24,000 homes have been built, compared to earlier estimates of just over 18,000. X
The UK’s problems are not caused by immigration. They’re not caused by the EU. They’re caused by self-serving UK governments and policies. And even if immigration were the issue, booting out everyone that isn’t a citizen isn’t going to solve problems.
Many companies are already making contingency plans to relocate back inside the EU if the UK leaves. There go the jobs people think are being stolen from them. There goes revenue that could have softened the blow to underfunded public transport and NHS services. X
But the other problem with suggesting ending free movement would reduce numbers and take the strain off the UK’s infrastructure is UK citizens living and working elsewhere in the EU. Many of them are retirees, who, assuming they wouldn’t be able to acquire a visa, would then have to return home. These people will need houses to live in, they will be driving cars on UK roads, and they will be queuing at clinics. X
update from the UK lads
- gove and boris, pioneers of the leave vote, are literally MIA. like…no one knows where any of the leave campaign are
- the chancellor is basically missing
- we effectively have no PM
- the tory party are in the midst of a civil war so brutal john major’s tenure looks chill
- there may or may not be a snap election
- the labour party literally barely exists as its shadow cabinet resigns en masse
- labour’s deputy leader, hero of the story tom watson, spent the whole of the leadership crisis last night at a silent disco at glastonbury, while snapchatting
- this fucking hilarious video in which it is revealed vote leave have no contingency plan and the presenter literally ends saying “i don’t know what to say to that”
- no one actually wants to press the big red button (article 50) to start the process of brexit
- this conspiracy theory appears to be entirely correct. seriously, read it. it basically suggests brexit is entirely impossible
- nicola sturgeon, separatist first minister of scotland, is effectively the only leader with a plan: that plan being the break up of the united kingdom
- literally we have become a meme
has this been done yet
m8, it was a democratic vote to leave an undemocratic union, not the seizure of ‘emergency powers’ by emperor fucking palpatine
shit thanks for clearing that up I was really sure Boris Johnson was actually Jar Jar Binks
And wow how democratic. A bunch of elderly racists that don’t know how to interface with poc they can’t exploit from afar have made a decision that will have consequences they won’t have to deal with. The younger generations, however, who do need to worry about jobs and the economy, and who did not want to leave the EU, are forced to reckon with an economy that has already started to nose dive.
I don’t think you understand how democracy works. Democracy allows people to vote for what they believe is right. No matter how old they are, they are still a citizen of this country and deserve a voice.
The fault lies in those who didn’t vote, the 18-25 demographic have the highest percentage of remain votes than any other demographic. They are also the demographic with the highest % of people who won’t vote. It is also from my experience on social media today that the young people who didn’t vote are the most salty and are crying that it’s their future. They didn’t vote, they can’t say shit about this result because they didn’t practice their right to vote in a democratic society.But I don’t think most of tumblr understands (they never do) that just because we voted out of the EU, we aren’t all fucking racist. In probably 90% if not more, of the leave voters don’t give a fuck whether immigrants come here or not. Our problem is with the EU itself, how it’s run, it’s corruption and the fact that it is a threat to our own democracy.
Read into it before you put everyone who voted out under the racist label.I would honestly love to hear what sort of pure democracy you think Farage and Johnson, etc. are going to usher in. How do you think this is going to unfold? How does a drastically devalued currency serve the UK? How do you feel about the immediate flip on the £350mil claim?
Say whatever the hell you want about Farage, he is a man of the people. He is the only well known politician not born with a silver poon in his mouth and knows what it’s like to be an average joe. He has done more for democracy than any other politician and he never even became prime minister. He has some weird ideas but the whole point of democracy is to let the people decide whether your ideas are reasonable or not. Nigel cares about the country, perhaps in an old fashion way but not an aggressive or elitist one.
Johnson I am not too happy about, the man is an idiot who cares too much about a positive public image as a goon. We don’t need that in a politician, especially not a prime minister. However he is a logical man and is quite fair, speaks his mine and is a man of democracy.
How will this unfold? It is expected to be rough at first, clearly demonstrated by the drop in the GBP. However as we progress through this our economy will get better, realistically it won’t be “the great country it was” it won’t be as great most likely, things won’t go back to the way they were, humanity has progressed and it won’t be the same.
As for the £350million “probably not entirely going on the NHS”, it’s a bit shit. In Farage’s ideal world, he would put all the money he could on the NHS, but in all honesty the money being spent on other things is to be expected and anyone who believed that it would and could go entirely on the NHS, are idiots. Government is not and will never be that simple, money needs to be spent on stuff like education and funds for the army etc. But don’t forget we still have our taxes contributing to the NHS so overall it won’t have a disastrous effect if some of the money is spent elsewhere. It was a lie, so overall I am not happy about it but at the end of the day it was not a surprise.
Nigel Farage’s father was a London stockbroker.
He attended Dulwich College, a public(for those keeping score at home: this means a fee-paying school in the UK, as opposed to a ‘comprehensive’, which is what Muricans would refer to as a public school) school that’s part of the Eton Group, and where his teachers described him as a racist and a fascist. X
He went on to be a commodity broker with several companies abroad.
His house is estimated at £540,000. And he once claimed his EU salary and expenses were worth about
£250,000 a year. X
The Farages pull about
£109,000 a year.
The 2013/14 HBAI report gave median household income (2 adults) as £23,556. X He also pulled about
£2mil in expenses between 1999 and 2009. X
What on earth does he know about being an average joe?
has this been done yet
m8, it was a democratic vote to leave an undemocratic union, not the seizure of ‘emergency powers’ by emperor fucking palpatine
shit thanks for clearing that up I was really sure Boris Johnson was actually Jar Jar Binks
And wow how democratic. A bunch of elderly racists that don’t know how to interface with poc they can’t exploit from afar have made a decision that will have consequences they won’t have to deal with. The younger generations, however, who do need to worry about jobs and the economy, and who did not want to leave the EU, are forced to reckon with an economy that has already started to nose dive.
Your calling the voters of the U.K. racists without any foundation for the claim doesn’t make the vote less democratic. And as for the idealistic younger generations with little knowledge of the real world, workplace, economy etc… Maybe they ought to learn from their elders. They’ve been voting years before you, so sweeping them aside and calling them idiots is terribly smug and short-sighted. And as for your assumption that the pound’s crash in value is permanent… That says it all.
Well okay for starters I didn’t call them idiots. I don’t think they’re idiots at all. They’re voting for their own interests, and doing what they think is best for them. But that is inherently short-sighted when you’re talking about older, especially 65+, voters. Y’know, it’s that old proverb: ‘Society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in.’
Secondly, if younger generations have little knowledge of ‘the real world, workplace, economy etc…’ it’s probably because older generations’ years of voting has gutted the very programs they themselves benefitted from because the 80s culture of greed is good discouraged paying it forward. Younger people are not living at home and pushing 30 because they’re lazy. They’re living at home pushing thirty because they cannot afford to live on their own. They’re unemployed or underemployed because the jobs are not there, not because they’re too busy taking selfies to apply. Companies are doing things like not replacing employees that retire, and I could go on at length about the classist devilry that is unpaid internships.
Thirdly, I never stated that I thought the pound’s devaluation is permanent. In fact, I didn’t mention the pound at all. Of course it’ll recover. But it’s going to take a long time. 1% changes in currency are considered massive. The pound fell like…8%? 8-10%? Even on the conservative end of that range it’s still very dramatic.
I will also continue to argue that it was undemocratic because the people who don’t have to face the ramifications of this forced a very uncertain, and given the Leave campaigners’ furious backpedalling on their promises, fairly unoptimistic future on their children and grandchildren.
has this been done yet
I’m so confused. How is them becoming an independent country not liberty?
Well for a start, the EU provides protection for workers’ rights, which will probably be a target as UK companies seek to recover from the markets’ instability. (source: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/eu-referendum-workers-rights-paid-holiday-brexit-labour-angela-eagle-a6901146.html )
There could also be less freedom of movement. UK citizens could then have to get visas whenever they want to work elsewhere in the EU. This is currently not the case. Also, UK citizens currently working in the EU would have to either quit and go home or try to get a visa. Lastly, a lot of companies have offices in the UK and are already making plans to relocate back into the EU. Examples include Goldman Sachs, Vodafone (their HQ, anyway), and Morgan Stanley. That means thousands of jobs gone. All of this adds up to a lack of opportunity. Less opportunity means more poverty, and poverty has rarely equaled greater freedom.
My phone is dying so I won’t go further, but suffice to say when you have to lie as much as the Leave campaign has had to, the foundation is probably shakey at best.
has this been done yet
m8, it was a democratic vote to leave an undemocratic union, not the seizure of ‘emergency powers’ by emperor fucking palpatine
shit thanks for clearing that up I was really sure Boris Johnson was actually Jar Jar Binks
And wow how democratic. A bunch of elderly racists that don’t know how to interface with poc they can’t exploit from afar have made a decision that will have consequences they won’t have to deal with. The younger generations, however, who do need to worry about jobs and the economy, and who did not want to leave the EU, are forced to reckon with an economy that has already started to nose dive.
It’s just past 9am and
- The UK has voted to leave the EU 52% to 48%
- The pound has fallen so much so that it is at a 30 year low
- Seriously like 10%? it dropped so fucking fast guys
- As a result the UK is no longer the fifth largest economy, France has overtaken us
- David Cameron the Prime Minister has just resigned with a new leader to be elected in October
- I say elected, I mean Tory members will vote on who from their party should be a our new Prime Minister..they have 150,000 members
- That’s right 150,000 people will choose this entire country’s leader
- Oh btw Scotland? ALL voted to remain so guess who is probably gonna hold another referendum on whether to leave the UK? And probably vote out? And then probably join the European Union on their own
- Meanwhile Northern Ireland (who also voted to remain) are talking about possible unification of Ireland
- Wales let the whole Remain side down by somehow being the country that gets the most EU support and yet also voted to leave
- Nigel Farage has already backtracked saying that the £350 million (not true) we apprently sent to the EU would not in fact go to the NHS as promised and it was a mistake to give that impression
- It’s looking likely that Boris Johnson (Basically Donald Trumps British cousin) is going to be our next PM
- He did a shit job as London Mayor once but apparently he suddenly knows his stuff idk
- he looks like this
- an economic shit show is happening right now as all the experts predicted but we did it anyway
So yeah. How was your morning?
Waiting for Winter 