Trump and Brexit: What has happened to the world?

Trump (and Brexit) appealed on a gloriously simplistic levels to two distinct demographics. People who want to turn the clock back to a time when life was simpler and better. And people who think that a protest vote is the first step to tearing the whole thing down and starting all over again. Nobody is interested in boring solutions to the woes of the world that actually reflect reality. Stuff like "it's complicated, we're not sure how to fix it or even if it can be fixed but let's at least try not to turn on each other". They want simple solutions and they want them now. Even though life doesn't work that way.

Add up the numbers of people who hold those two radically different world views and you can win a two horse race.

Of course, an inevitable consequence of selling people pipe dreams is the fact that people won't get what they voted for. Nobody can turn back time and helping power hungry megalomaniacs achieve their political ambitions is the worst possible way to try to take power away from the elite.
 
George Owen said:
People just got sick of how the establishment is running things.

The wealth of the world's richest 1% equals to the other 99%, and every year the gap keep increasing. Its fecking ridiculous, and that have been happening under democrats and republicans, right and left governments, so people is waking up to the scam that their democracy was not a real democracy.

Hillary is the only reason Trump won. She is the official mascot, the political face of the establishment. People is fed up with them.

If Bernie had ran, he would have won this shit.

2020 is the chance for a third party runner to take over.
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So they voted for a Billionaire who has a rich father and they were both part of the establishment... Yep makes perfect sense lol!
 
Amir said:
Yeah, it's happening in Israel too.

Another thing that happen in the US elections and Brexit, and also Israeli elections in 2015, is the unability of pollsters to get it right. Seems like they can't get the right reading on the ordinary people away with the big cities. Maybe I'm generalizing it too much.
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Polling problems are something else, a symptom of a broken system.

Polling now, largely belongs in the hands of vested interests (In the UK, mostly Tory Peers). Polling today is not about predicting a result, more about shaping it.

Polling has become a tool to shape events rather than report on them, with biased questions and skewed samples. A good example is during the recent labour leadership election, a poll result cam out saying that 70%+ of union members wanted Owen Smith. It turns out that the poll was taken on just 68 people, all of whom had identified as being conservative voters. Polls are designed to say whatever the pollster wants. This is why they get it so spectacularly wrong.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Trump (and Brexit) appealed on a gloriously simplistic levels to two distinct demographics. People who want to turn the clock back to a time when life was simpler and better. And people who think that a protest vote is the first step to tearing the whole thing down and starting all over again. Nobody is interested in boring solutions to the woes of the world that actually reflect reality. Stuff like "it's complicated, we're not sure how to fix it or even if it can be fixed but let's at least try not to turn on each other". They want simple solutions and they want them now. Even though life doesn't work that way.

Add up the numbers of people who hold those two radically different world views and you can win a two horse race.

Of course, an inevitable consequence of selling people pipe dreams is the fact that people won't get what they voted for. Nobody can turn back time and helping power hungry megalomaniacs achieve their political ambitions is the worst possible way to try to take power away from the elite.
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This is the truth, the whole truth and blah blah blah.

Bang on the money Pogue.
 
Ultimately it doesn't really matter, what you say on the campaign trail and what actually happens are vastly different, Obama pledged to close Guantanamo and end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

If Clinton had won the election and the Republicans had won the Senate and the House (which they did), they would just continue to do what they have been doing for the last 8 months and refuse to pass anything the Democrats put forward. They threatened to do just that like 2 weeks ago, by promising to block the nominee for the supreme court for the next 4 years.

Democracy is weird sometimes but the Republicans are totally in charge now they don't really have anyone to blame but themselves for what comes next.
 
Regulus Arcturus Black said:
Well for example..

• Moving to a more renewable energy future and building the renewable plants in coal country.

Trump in turn says climate change is a hoax & wants to reopen the mines. He has given zero information on how on Earth this would be plausible, truth is... it's not.

• cooperation taxes- fairer tax system
• criminal justice system
• gun violence protection

Etc etc etc

If you watch any Hilary speech or any debate or just read the quick front page of her campaign, you know what Hilary is planning to do and more importantly how. Trump is promising things that make zero sense and hence can't go into detail on how he plans to keep these promises.
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I'm not arguing who has the better policies, just whose policies where more known to the average American voter. Most of Clinton's campaign was spent persuading people NOT to vote for Trump rather than why they should vote for her.

On a side note, I fear for the prospects of a greener future.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Trump (and Brexit) appealed on a gloriously simplistic levels to two distinct demographics. People who want to turn the clock back to a time when life was simpler and better. And people who think that a protest vote is the first step to tearing the whole thing down and starting all over again. Nobody is interested in boring solutions to the woes of the world that actually reflect reality. Stuff like "it's complicated, we're not sure how to fix it or even if it can be fixed but let's at least try not to turn on each other". They want simple solutions and they want them now. Even though life doesn't work that way.
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When Michael Gove said people were fed up of experts, I think he might've been more on the money than either himself or the rest of us realised.
 
Jaxdan said:
This country is not ready for a socialist, whether he puts a name in front of it or not. He would've gotten crushed.
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Not to mention the antisemitism would have gotten a lot louder.
 
When people say Bernie would have won it, I am just curious which voting group would he have won more of??
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Trump (and Brexit) appealed on a gloriously simplistic levels to two distinct demographics. People who want to turn the clock back to a time when life was simpler and better. And people who think that a protest vote is the first step to tearing the whole thing down and starting all over again. Nobody is interested in boring solutions to the woes of the world that actually reflect reality. Stuff like "it's complicated, we're not sure how to fix it or even if it can be fixed but let's at least try not to turn on each other". They want simple solutions and they want them now. Even though life doesn't work that way.

Add up the numbers of people who hold those two radically different world views and you can win a two horse race.

Of course, an inevitable consequence of selling people pipe dreams is the fact that people won't get what they voted for. Nobody can turn back time and helping power hungry megalomaniacs achieve their political ambitions is the worst possible way to try to take power away from the elite.
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There is a lot of truth in this. Its how I also see it.
The only thing is that you cannot under estimate how desperate/frustrated/pissed off people are, especially since 2008, when the establishment royally fecked everyone of these people.

I just hope that some of them now start actually listening, it is hard but there are solutions and these people know there are solutions. They know that the elite don't want to make those changes because for once in their lives they are going to have to hurt their own self interests.

The issue is though that because of all this there is a vacuum that has been created and when that happens, all sorts of evil can fill it and take over. This is what I think we're seeing with all these far right movements.

As for the selling of pipe dreams, many will be disappointed , however I also think many will not care because they never believed the lies anyway, they are out to burn down the establishment by any means. Its not the right way to take power from the elite, but its the only way they can see of doing it now after years of trusting the political process.

Its a shit show tbh, one can only hope the political elites start listening, else its only going to get worse.
 
Regulus Arcturus Black said:
Considering how high the numbers were for people voting for change, I think he'd have won a hell of a lot of votes.

I beleve a huge amount of people voted Trump as a "anything but the norm" vote.
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But trump is exactly the opposite of that. A tax dodging white billionaire. The anti-establishment rhetoric fails to consider that..
 
These populist right wing movements have managed to usurp the language of freedom, democracy and republicanism while claiming to faithfully represent "the people's will". In contrast to "Project Fear", we have "Project Victimhood"

"The people" will be sold down the river.
 
bleedred said:
When people say Bernie would have won it, I am just curious which voting group would he have won more of??
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The lazy young ones who are Democratic but didn't like that much Hillary. Not sure if he would have done as well as Hillary with the center-left though.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
The choice to not vote for an ultra right-wing sociopathic idiot?
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In my opinion, the word "choice" might hinder a full understanding of the situation. Whatever decision a voter makes, it follows from the way she is in a particular situation. Ultimately people do not "choose" the way they are; they are shaped by their genetics and the environment they grow in. The word "choice" posits some obscure capacity to transcend one's state, and might give way to reactions of blame. And blame is the last thing we need right now. There is probably no easy analysis of the situation, and it will certainly require to merge several perspectives (human nature and social/economic/cultural/... environment). When apprehended under these factors, the actions of Trump's voters might not seem as baffling as first assumed.
 
Werewolf said:
In my opinion, the word "choice" might hinder a full understanding of the situation. Whatever decision a voter makes, it follows from the way she is in a particular situation. Ultimately people do not "choose" the way they are; they are shaped by their genetics and the environment they grow in. The word "choice" posits some obscure capacity to transcend one's state, and might give way to reactions of blame. And blame is the last thing we need right now. There is probably no easy analysis of the situation, and it will certainly require to merge several perspectives (human nature and social/economic/cultural/... environment). When apprehended under these factors, the actions of Trump's voters might not seem as baffling as first assumed.
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Well now you're going down the Sam Harris route of there being no such thing as free will. An interesting philosophical debate but taken to its logical conclusion society has no right to punish rapists or paedophiles. So let's not go there.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Well now you're going down the Sam Harris route of there being no such thing as free will. An interesting philosophical debate but taken to its logical conclusion society has no right to punish rapists or paedophiles. So let's not go there.
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I don't think the OP is talking about not having free will. I believe its talking about how people in a certain social/economic/cultural/... environment view may be different and so the issues which move them and what the choice is for them, is very different to what you see as the choice.
 
Cassidy said:
I don't think the OP is talking about not having free will. I believe its talking about how people in a certain social/economic/cultural/... environment view may be different and so the issues which move them and what the choice is for them, is very different to what you see as the choice.
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Well the truth is that they would have been influenced by a myriad of reasons and it would be hard to generalize the reasons, just as the same with brexit.
 
sullydnl said:
Explain this to me.

I don't just mean "people are stupid" or "people are racist". People have always been stupid and racist. So where has this regressive surge come from? Also, what the hell comes next?

Btw, if you don't think Brexit and Trump are part of the same thing, just stop. Seriously.
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The pc (politically correct) era is finished

Dust of history would say Hegel

I can predict Kayne West for president in 2020

#Kayne2020
 
Swaters16 said:
The fact that people like you automatically assume and label people that disagree with you are stupid or racist.
That's a huge part of your answer. People are sick of being told what to think and who they should be by people who believe they're better than them.
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Maybe they should stop saying racist things and voting for racist candidates then?

I'm fed up with this line of argument. It's the very fact that racism has become acceptable political discourse that's the real problem.
 
Cassidy said:
I don't think the OP is talking about not having free will. I believe its talking about how people in a certain social/economic/cultural/... environment view may be different and so the issues which move them and what the choice is for them, is very different to what you see as the choice.
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I was being a bit glib tbf. Mainly because I'm a fan of Sam Harris's theory. And @Werewolf 's point was reasonable. I still think it's a cop out to imply that anyone was "forced" to vote for Trump, no matter how dire their circumstances.
 
Why am I not surprised by this outcome

The same type of voters voted for Trump as for Brexit.
A large portion of which are white, older generation, poorly educated and/or xenophobic who feel disenfranchised, there are also idealists and those that reject the status quo and think for some reason the grass is greener on the other side.

2017 will show if these advocates of "change" will start to fulfil what they promised, The Brexiters have not started very well, see how far Trump gets.
Of course when things start to go wrong it will be someone else's fault.

When things don't go the way those who voted for Trump or Brexit expect, what happens then?
 
Pogue Mahone said:
I was being a bit glib tbf. Mainly because I'm a fan of Sam Harris's theory. And @Werewolf 's point was reasonable. I still think it's a cop out to imply that anyone was "forced" to vote for Trump, no matter how dire their circumstances.
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Yes I agree.
I just think that if people keep dismissing it instead of trying to understand it, its only going to get worse.
 
Paul the Wolf said:
Why am I not surprised by this outcome

The same type of voters voted for Trump as for Brexit.
A large portion of which are white, older generation, poorly educated and/or xenophobic who feel disenfranchised, there are also idealists and those that reject the status quo and think for some reason the grass is greener on the other side.

2017 will show if these advocates of "change" will start to fulfil what they promised, The Brexiters have not started very well, see how far Trump gets.
Of course when things start to go wrong it will be someone else's fault.

When things don't go the way those who voted for Trump or Brexit expect, what happens then?
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That's the million dollar question. And it's inevitable we'll find out because both campaigns were won with a whole clatter of empty promises, that will never be delivered upon.

My bet is that external forces will be blamed, yet again. Most likely other countries. And we all know where that ends...
 
NinjaFletch said:
Maybe they should stop saying racist things and voting for racist candidates then?

I'm fed up with this line of argument. It's the very fact that racism has become acceptable political discourse that's the real problem.
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I think this is part of the problem though.
For instance if you have a negative view on mass immigration then you are labelled a racist, even though you may not have said anything racist, or even be racists, you are still seen as racist.
In politics people just don't want to have proper debates around certain issues, and it leaves space for the racists to take over
 
Cassidy said:
I think this is part of the problem though.
For instance if you have a negative view on mass immigration then you are labelled a racist, even though you may not have said anything racist, or even be racists, you are still seen as racist.
In politics people just don't want to have proper debates around certain issues, and it leaves space for the racists to take over
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Which would be all fine and dandy if Trump had proposed a 'proper debate' on immigration but everything he said on the topic is demonstrably racist.

FWIW I think the 'can't talk about immigration without being seen as racist' line of thinking is terribly overstated.
 
Failure to make a positive case for the other option leading to the 'extreme' position's base being far more energised than the moderate one
 
Pogue Mahone said:
That's the million dollar question. And it's inevitable we'll find out because both campaigns were won with a whole clatter of empty promises, that will never be delivered upon.

My bet is that external forces will be blamed, yet again. Most likely other countries. And we all know where that ends...
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Yes, feels like we've been taken back in time, think we're around 1927 at the moment.
 
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