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HylianSwordsman said: Why not though? Why is that not justification? Why is the bar so high? I'm not suggesting the elected representatives simply overturn the vote because they don't like it, I'm saying that there could be nothing more justifying to overturn the results of an election than a later election. Obviously there is no consensus in parliament, but that isn't relevant to the discussion at hand, which is not "will parliament do a ranked choice referendum?" (They won't) But rather "what if parliament did a ranked choice vote referendum?" I disagree with your conception of democratic republic, but I don't see any point in discussing that further. In a world where parliament could agree on a format, a second referendum could overturn the results of a first one, so long as it was equally as accurate as the first. Sure it would be better if it provided a more accurate measurement, and a more accurate measurement could provide parliament with sufficient reason to hold a second referendum, but even if they just did a redo referendum, with just Leave or Remain as the only options, if the results change, you just have to suck it up. You would end up on the losing side of democracy, something that happens. Elections have consequences, and all that. This elections consequences would just be to undo the consequences of the election your side won. Oh well, that's democracy. You've yet to explain why my reasons don't justify a new referendum, or why referendums should never be overturned even by other referendums, beyond "we've never done that before!" It's just not enough of a reason to not have a second referendum. At the very least, they could have a "second referendum" referendum with Yes and No options for holding a second referendum, and then what happens? That referendum referendum isn't itself a referendum, so it doesn't defy your arbitrary rules, but if the nation votes Yes to that referendum, then there's a contradiction in your logic. You have to honor both referendums, even though honoring the second referendum would mean a third referendum could overturn the first, but since the second one wasn't directly against the first, it's fine. It's just asking the electorate what it thinks. Why is what the electorate thinks on something a sacred matter for the first referendum, but not for subsequent referendums? Simple, it's because your side won the first referendum and you're scared of losing. Ultimately, if parliament decided to hold a second referendum, you could whine all you want, it would change nothing. If a referendum referendum were held and the result were Yes, then you really would have no ground to stand on, since the electorate spoke and said they wanted a redo referendum, and got what they asked for. You're constantly moving the goal posts here so that democracy is sacred when it works to your goals but something that must be defended against or somehow in conflict with itself if it is against your goals. |
The standard is high because respecting the past precedent is a part of just about EVERY western liberal democracies institutions. We pay the price of having to uphold the original democratic results in order to keep stability. if we don't apply calling for elections before a politician's term has ended then it shouldn't be applied to referendums before the result is implemented. Stability, social change, and protecting the legitimacy of democracy are the benefits we get by upholding result and if you don't believe the reasoning behind why these benefits outweigh the drawbacks then we'll agree to disagree but by that point you should question if you're truly an advocate for democracy ...
I did not move goal posts, it's that you do not to actually care about respecting the results. You didn't see me pout or cry foul when Obama won all the while rabid calling for another immediate election so it's now time for you to accept both Trump and Brexit as the legitimate outcomes. In democracy there are NO right sides and if you can't come to terms with it then you need to stop speaking for democracy ...
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HylianSwordsman said: Oh good grief. Why? This is an unsubstantiated opinion. Give some reasons WHY things have to be so extreme to have a second referendum? Because that's what we're talking about here. Not "breaking a vote" which would be parliament going against the first referendum WITHOUT a second referendum to mandate it. We're talking about a second referendum, but you keep talking about it like the second referendum itself is the first vote being broken, when if it did get broken, it would get broken BY ANOTHER VOTE FROM THE PEOPLE. Why isn't that okay? You just keep making unsubstantiated claims that your definition of democracy is the right one without explaining why yours is right or mine is wrong. |
Instead of demanding a reason from me as to why we shouldn't break a precedent, give me a better reason why we should in this instance with Brexit ?! Elections in the US have NEVER been overturned even when the confederate states challenged Abraham Lincoln's ascension to the White House and the UK has made good on it's obligations so far regarding all referendums it's held ...
As a famous politician once said, "elections have consequences" and if you can't come to that reconciliation then maybe we shouldn't have had him as president in the first place ?
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HylianSwordsman said: What are you on about now? Referendums aren't parties, or decisions by parties, they're decisions by the people. There are Conservative Remainers and Labour Leavers. Referendums aren't one-party rule. If anything, they're a way to subvert one party rule, as if there is a referendum, and it goes against a majority parties wishes, that majority party has little recourse. You keep projecting your own issues onto me. I would like to see a second referendum with a new format. If the new format resulted in Hard Brexit, I wouldn't contest that (even if I were a UK citizen). You're the one who is scared that society might not agree with you. I'm not. It's not even my society for Christ's sake. It's yours. I live across the ocean. If you leave or remain it has little effect on me. Have I mentioned morality even once with regard to whether Leave or Remain is correct? No, I haven't. I've merely said that if I had a say, I'd want a second referendum, and described what I would want that to look like. And as for "trivializing" a sacred custom, there you go again making democracy sacred when it suits you. Why is another democratic choice not sacred just because it could go against the democratic choice you agree with? What makes the election you won sacred and the one that could overturn your results profane? They're both democratic referendums, one merely is more fair (mine, unless you'd like to say why first-past-the-post is more fair, something you've yet to do), but even if you did a straight redo of your FPTP referendum, that would just make both referendums the same, yet one is sacred because you won it, and the other is profane because you might lose (YOU MIGHT NOT, WOULD THE SECOND RESULT BECOME SACRED THEN?). And as for "trivializing" a sacred custom, that's nonsense. I made an analogy. A good one. That made a good point, that you couldn't argue with, so you just shooed it away as "trivializing the sacred." I merely described a scaled down version of what you disingenuously consider sacred when it suits you. |
I could've used the term 'faction' instead of 'party' and my point still stands at the end. In democracy, there are NO right sides and referendums can also exist to enhance a single party's rule like we see with the 2017 Turkish constitutional referendum letting Recep Tayyip Erdoğan having an even tighter grip on power so case in point it goes both ways ...
@Bold It's hypocritical of you to call me scared when you won't respect the results of the original format. A new format is not necessarily better ...
If you don't see democracy as being sacred then why on earth should we even accept any results at all or even with a second vote ? If there's anything I've learned it's that you do not like the democratic results when it does not suit you which is why you are invested to have an argument over Brexit ... (it's not THAT hard to see that if you can take in Trump as being the president then you can accept Brexit as well)
BTW, a flaw with your "ranked voting" proposal is that there is no way to define either a 'soft' or a 'hard' Brexit so what exactly is the "middle ground" in this instance ? If you can't define that then don't bring up the idea again because otherwise there was no flaw with the original referendum in that regard since both options and the question were clear and unambiguous. The original referendum can be described as watertight. It's also a failure on the part of a democracy to NOT honour it's own results so if it doesn't then it may as well be a failed democracy ...
A single vote matters more because the date becomes of even greater importance thus we can also get an accurate reading of turnout ...
So not only did I layout a previous case against holding a second vote but we can also add another reason such as lower turnout ...
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HylianSwordsman said: You merely said, do-over, not specifically referendum. And here you are on again about anti-democratic mechanisms. We apparently need outside institutions to protect us from the sacred. You continue to fail to understand the fundamental ways that various governmental systems work. |
We also need institutions to protect democracy as well so it's balancing act and protecting it's results is the consensus ...
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HylianSwordsman said: Yep. You're completely out of touch with what democracy means. Maybe in your society it is fine for representatives to not represent the people that voted for them, but not in America. We clearly have fundamentally different values and principles regarding what democracy is and what the purpose of an elected official is. We can hardly argue something like this if we can't agree on the meaning of the terms we're supposed to be arguing about. |
@Bold Even in America a representative doesn't have to fall in line with it's voters because they are simply not obligated to. The voters only compel politicians to take seats, not for politicians to decide on behalf of them so that goes squarely with the republic. This is why America is bipartisan so the representatives will very often vote along party lines despite the fact that there are probably districts that are middle ground on a multitude of issues. Perfect representation is NOT a thing ... (it's not physically possible to gauge what exactly over hundreds of thousands of people want as a single person)
The UK doesn't have much that's fundamentally different to the US aside from being a monarchy and they even have "boundary review" (redistricting in the US) along with "unequal voting power" just like the electoral college ...
Matter of fact, Americans are so culturally and historically tied by heritage to the entire developed commonwealth realm to the point where they don't even have EU style freedom of movement! Oops, I guess freedom of movement was wrong for the UK after all if they feel there's more friction to be had from the other Europeans rather than the high end Anglosphere outsider nations ...
