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Only stunning if you're totally invested in the status quo and can't conceive of any alternative reality where the people who haven't benefited from your scheme

Only stunning if you're totally invested in the status quo and can't conceive of any alternative reality where the people who haven't benefited from your schemes finally call you to task. I'm sorry but 2016 is the year the establishment got it very wrong and didn't learn its lessons. Yeah, it's not over yet.

ptaipale 10y ago
That is so true, and the same thing seems to go on even after the vote. If I had had a vote in Britain, I would have voted Remain, but I'm not surprised at all by the result and I even see many upsides in it although difficult times are surely ahead for all of EU because of this. But perhaps difficult times are what is needed to find a new direction - is this a project for United States of Europe, or a common market for European nations? Most major politicians as well as major media outlets - from NY Times to HuffPo to most European government broadcasters - have been painting a picture where the leavers are stupid, uneducated, old, xenophobic racists for expressing their concerns about continued integration towards a federal European government, instead of a common market, and ever-rejoiced multiculturalism in form of immigration that should be unrestricted. What are you going to get out of that? You'll get angry people. Angry people who still have a vote, however much you dislike their having a vote. You won't get people who embarrassedly rue their previous opinions and nicely behave the way you want. Rather to the contrary: the campaign on the Remain side - as so many other campaigns - that tries to strengthen the feeling of solidarity in their own bubble simply miscalculated, and it backfired big time. I suspect that the isolation of people, created by social media - Facebook friend selection, Twitter mobs etc - has strengthened a phenomenon where people cannot understand others who have different problems and different opinions from their own. This could be a result of many, many people de-friending others for just having a different political opinion.

ptaipale 10y ago

That is so true, and the same thing seems to go on even after the vote. If I had had a vote in Britain, I would have voted Remain, but I'm not surprised at all by the result and I even see many upsides in it although difficult times are surely ahead for all of EU because of this. But perhaps difficult times are what is needed to find a new direction - is this a project for United States of Europe, or a common market for European nations? Most major politicians as well as major media outlets - from NY Times to HuffPo to most European government broadcasters - have been painting a picture where the leavers are stupid, uneducated, old, xenophobic racists for expressing their concerns about continued integration towards a federal European government, instead of a common market, and ever-rejoiced multiculturalism in form of immigration that should be unrestricted. What are you going to get out of that? You'll get angry people. Angry people who still have a vote, however much you dislike their having a vote. You won't get people who embarrassedly rue their previous opinions and nicely behave the way you want. Rather to the contrary: the campaign on the Remain side - as so many other campaigns - that tries to strengthen the feeling of solidarity in their own bubble simply miscalculated, and it backfired big time. I suspect that the isolation of people, created by social media - Facebook friend selection, Twitter mobs etc - has strengthened a phenomenon where people cannot understand others who have different problems and different opinions from their own. This could be a result of many, many people de-friending others for just having a different political opinion.