4 ms·

That's what they said about Brexit. 52% of the population voted yes in a single election, and the rest got dragged along for a multi-year ride. Current polls pu

That's what they said about Brexit. 52% of the population voted yes in a single election, and the rest got dragged along for a multi-year ride. Current polls put support for the decision at 31%, but it's too late.

iso1631 5mo ago
About a quarter voted yes, about a quarter voted no, about a quarter didn't vote and a quarter couldn't vote
- bonesss 5mo ago
  Rationally, and unlike what that dirty old lady in The Holy Grail suggests, binding votes impacting foreign relations should happen on a single 50.01% vote and never ratified or verified. More rationally, if some 25% of the country can’t express themselves and another 25% are unsure/uncommitted one should assume their interests are best represented by the most invigorated and unified minority. I wish I could drop an ‘/s’, but, uh, ‘/no-really-thats-this-timeline’.
Aachen 5mo ago
> 52% of the population voted yes Huh? 37% of the eligible voters, much less the population, voted yes according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_United_Kingdom_European_Union_membership_referendum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_United_Kingdom_European_U...
- BadBadJellyBean 5mo ago
  Everyone who didn't vote and had the ability, voted yes as well. If you don't vote you go along what the majority wants. So for me 52% is correct. You have to vote for what you want or at least against what you don't want. Otherwise you are an enabler.
  - Aachen 5mo ago
    That makes no sense to me. They didn't know the outcome beforehand; had odds fallen the other way, your argument would have stated that they voted no. Were they in a superposition before the results came in, voting both yes and no simultaneously?! We can't know what they want if they don't or can't vote. Putting "they voted yes" in their mouth sounds insulting to me, but I'm an outsider to the UK so maybe it's wrong for me to say that
    - u_fucking_dork 5mo ago
      > They didn't know the outcome beforehand; had odds fallen the other way, your argument would have stated that they voted no. Were they in a superposition before the results came in, voting both yes and no simultaneously?! Yes, of course, they didn’t give a shit. They couldn’t be bothered. Outcome was whatever for them.
      - Aachen 5mo ago
        Or they couldn't vote (besides work and caretaking, Wikipedia mentions that a few thousand's ballots were invalid before the vote even started due to an accounting error), or they thought "don't give our neighbors the finger" was a foregone conclusion. I should also hope that such a vote in my country, where it's economic suicide much more than in the UK, goes to an easy "no", but since Brexit I've learned that I need to always encourage everyone to make time and vote anyway no matter how dumb it seems. They didn't have that example and I'm not so sure if a confirming vote would habe turned out the same way for example You can say a lot of things about the majority of this group but not that it was necessarily irrelevant to the whole group
    - ryandrake 5mo ago
      If you choose not to vote, then you are implicitly voting for "whatever ends up winning."
      - Marsymars 5mo ago
        It's conceptually pretty weird to have a mental model where the single vote that brings one side to 50%+1 implicitly flips millions of other votes.
burnt-resistor 5mo ago
Because of a well-funded manufacturing consent PR campaign that activated ethnonationalist sentiment.

iso1631 5mo ago

About a quarter voted yes, about a quarter voted no, about a quarter didn't vote and a quarter couldn't vote

bonesss 5mo ago
Rationally, and unlike what that dirty old lady in The Holy Grail suggests, binding votes impacting foreign relations should happen on a single 50.01% vote and never ratified or verified. More rationally, if some 25% of the country can’t express themselves and another 25% are unsure/uncommitted one should assume their interests are best represented by the most invigorated and unified minority. I wish I could drop an ‘/s’, but, uh, ‘/no-really-thats-this-timeline’.

Aachen 5mo ago

> 52% of the population voted yes Huh? 37% of the eligible voters, much less the population, voted yes according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_United_Kingdom_European_Union_membership_referendum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_United_Kingdom_European_U...

BadBadJellyBean 5mo ago
Everyone who didn't vote and had the ability, voted yes as well. If you don't vote you go along what the majority wants. So for me 52% is correct. You have to vote for what you want or at least against what you don't want. Otherwise you are an enabler.
- Aachen 5mo ago
  That makes no sense to me. They didn't know the outcome beforehand; had odds fallen the other way, your argument would have stated that they voted no. Were they in a superposition before the results came in, voting both yes and no simultaneously?! We can't know what they want if they don't or can't vote. Putting "they voted yes" in their mouth sounds insulting to me, but I'm an outsider to the UK so maybe it's wrong for me to say that
  - u_fucking_dork 5mo ago
    > They didn't know the outcome beforehand; had odds fallen the other way, your argument would have stated that they voted no. Were they in a superposition before the results came in, voting both yes and no simultaneously?! Yes, of course, they didn’t give a shit. They couldn’t be bothered. Outcome was whatever for them.
    - Aachen 5mo ago
      Or they couldn't vote (besides work and caretaking, Wikipedia mentions that a few thousand's ballots were invalid before the vote even started due to an accounting error), or they thought "don't give our neighbors the finger" was a foregone conclusion. I should also hope that such a vote in my country, where it's economic suicide much more than in the UK, goes to an easy "no", but since Brexit I've learned that I need to always encourage everyone to make time and vote anyway no matter how dumb it seems. They didn't have that example and I'm not so sure if a confirming vote would habe turned out the same way for example You can say a lot of things about the majority of this group but not that it was necessarily irrelevant to the whole group
  - ryandrake 5mo ago
    If you choose not to vote, then you are implicitly voting for "whatever ends up winning."
    - Marsymars 5mo ago
      It's conceptually pretty weird to have a mental model where the single vote that brings one side to 50%+1 implicitly flips millions of other votes.

burnt-resistor 5mo ago

Because of a well-funded manufacturing consent PR campaign that activated ethnonationalist sentiment.