Talk me off the edge: UK democracy

Great Debates
1

I’ve experienced disappointment in elections before. I have always been a floating voter. I voted Lib Dem in my first election in 2001, again 2005, then Tory 2010, Green 2015, and Labour the past two. I was surprised when the Tories won in 2015 but I was keen to tell my heartbroken friends that we should respect our counterparts.

But I don’t feel that way this time. Something is different. Before, elections were broadly run with all sides sharing a mutual set of facts and interpreting them through different ideological lenses. Yes, there were lies, but…again, this time is different.

The victorious Conservatives ran their campaign with minimal insight into their future policies. They avoided scrutiny. They worked with the press to manufacture lies about their adversaries and bury bad news about themselves.

A government that tried to shut down Parliament to avoid scrutiny, and lied to the Queen to do it.

A government that threatened judges with retribution for not ruling in their favour and indulging in claims that they’re enemies of the people.

A government that was ruled in contempt of Parliament and with a chief of staff to the PM specifically condemned of the same.

A PM who ducks out of difficult interviews and hides in fridges.

A government that threatens news networks like the BBC and Channel 4 with suspension of their charters the moment they timidly call him out on this.

Tell me how I’m supposed to be reassured that they won’t do it again next time. We’re turning into Turkey. why shouldn’t Labour adopt these tactics, and if they in in future, pass a law to shut down the media that criticises them?

I’m sore about losing, but this isn’t about being a sore loser. It’s seeing democracy hollowed out and any and all kinds of cheating justified so long as your side wins. The degree to which it’s taken over all discourse shows democracy is pretty much dead.

2

Be reassured. You are not turning into Turkey.

This is basically how the UK ran her colonies. So, be assured these all are most assuredly, still quintessentially British.
Maybe even the best British.

3

Perhaps this election will be the trigger to a future where the Ks that are Ued are just England and Wales. Or is there a Welsh independence movement too?

4

There is a Welsh independence party, yes. Although Wales also voted to Leave.

5

Leave the UK?

6

The EU.

7

I think you are far more worried than you need to be. You are just at the pointy end of a slightly disruptive poltical period in a time of all-pervasive social media.

8

What makes you sure that will pass? Social media isn’t going anywhere. It’s only going to get more and more pervasive. And it’s been captured by those who know how to motivate and attract the credulous.

9

You’ll get used to it and learn how to deal with it I suspect. I personally think it is toxic and have chosen to opt out. As such I don’t get exposed to every half-arsed “reckon” that floats across people’s brains.

It is a hoary old chestnut but “be the change you want to see” is not a bad place to start. If you are passing on social media memes and clickbait it is a racing certainty that you yourself are also transmitting lies and misinformation. You can pull back from it and search out better news sources.

10

How does one ‘deal with’ the end of meaningful democratic discourse?

This only works if everyone else does the same. Otherwise you’re just isolated.

I was arguing with someone yesterday and her response to me disagreeing was that I should ‘go out and see the real world’. I’m a fucking stay at home dad with a weekend job and my family hasn’t been able to afford even a UK-based holiday in years. And I’m apparently some ivory tower bubble-dweller because I didn’t agree with her.

How do you get round that?

11

There have always been people with absurd views, from Churchill saying the Labour Party’s manifesto meant they’d have a sort of Gestapo to my father being convinced that Harold Wilson was a Communist and Soviet agent.

On a personal level, there will be some people you cannot persuade, but others where you might be able to reframe what you believe in a way that will resonate with the fundamental principles they espouse.

The Brexit boat is sailing, so we have to assume that, in the long run, this country has to find some new and inevitably lesser identity than hitherto. Not quite post-imperial Spain or Portugal (I hope), but definitely of less consequence than Johnson and his like imagine.

On the constitutional front, I share your anxieties, but I take comfort from the incompetence and lack of attention (sheer laziness) in the Tory leadership that will probably run into the sands any attempt to operationalise fiddling around with the Supreme Court and the Human Rights Act, or open assault on the concept of impartial and professional public service. But for such attempts there is always the argument “Imagine if a Labour government did what you’re proposing, and used it against you - would you be so keen then?”

I’d be more worried about piecemeal and small-scale hollowing out, as might happen with forcing cherry-picked subcontracting of NHS services.

12

I don’t share your pessimism that such a thing has happened or is at risk of happening

Isolated from what though? If you are thoughtful with your choice of, and questioning of, your news providers then all you are doing is making yourself better informed. If you aren’t conusming “news” from social media what are you actually losing?

As I don’t know what the detail of the argument was I’m in no position to know if you were speaking from a position of ignorance or not so I’m not sure what there is to get around. In any case, in what way are you incapable of seeking out reputable and accurate news and information? You certainly are better able to do so than at pretty much any other point in history.

13

An 80 seat majority hardly looks like incompetence and lack of attention. You’d need to cast your eyes a little leftward for that.

14

Campaigning and governing are two different things. Johnson’s lucky that the negatives and gaffes in his campaigning didn’t outweigh the dislike for Corbyn. But in governing, he’s not up against just public perceptions and the opposition, he’s up against reality: how his Northern Ireland border proposal will actually work in practice, how he can tie down into a justiciable treaty the new relationship with the EU and how all those new trade deals with third countries will be concluded in less than a year. His personal track record as May’s short-lived Foreign Secretary isn’t encouraging, not to mention other members of his cabinet.

15

I think you misunderstand me. I could very well find excellent sources of accurate news. But unless at least half the country bucks up pretty soon and does the same, then it doesn’t matter much, does it?

16

Once again: they’re extremely competent at displacing blame on Europe for all their failures. Why shouldn’t it work once again? He has five years to do this.

17

Whivh begs the question : what are they ever gonna do when they have neither the EU nor Labour to blame their utter fuckery on ?

18

Oh, they’ll continue to blame them. They got voters on their doorsteps to say they’d had years of poor schools and an education crisis and they still voted for the party that had been in power for nine years.

19

Neoliberalism is one hell of a drug, man.

20

I think you may be over-reacting ever so slightly to your side losing an election.

The wheel turns. The ‘‘new boss’’ will screw up in short order. And it will be duly screamed about, including on social media. :slight_smile: