The Dictatorship of the Etonariat

[ahinton]

Which just goes to prove the danger inherent in getting what ewe've wished for. Even Norman Lamb has decided not to stand again.

Avoiding the slaughter, that's shear common sense on his part, no doubt...

[Conchis]

Avoiding the slaughter, that's shear common sense on his part, no doubt...

Lamb would almost certainly be re-elected, as he is popular locally, even among voters who despise his party.

[muzzer]

But it really isn't necessary to view "polarisation" as an inherently bad thing, when in fact positive changes in society, like the abolition of slavery, votes for women, workers' rights and so on have all come about as a result of "polarisation" around these issues. What we are seeing now, as a result of the processes that led to the Brexit vote, is a laying bare of the class structure of British society, which the Johnsons and Camerons of the country (if not the Moggs) have generally tried to paper over in the interests of retaining their position of power and making the situation look "democratic". As soon as that position is seriously under threat their true colours begin to show.

I don’t disagree, though I would say that the class structure of this country is plain enough for anyone to see. Where does it end though?

[teamsaint]

I don’t disagree, though I would say that the class structure of this country is plain enough for anyone to see. Where does it end though?

It doesn't end. But the power of the real elites is thoroughly propped up by the affluent ( upper) middle classes, (and those who aspire to that status) who enabled so many of the policies that led to much of the discontent that revealed itself in the 2016 vote.

[ahinton]

Lamb would almost certainly be re-elected, as he is popular locally, even among voters who despise his party.

If so, that would tend to illustrate the inherent conflict of interest that inevitably risks besetting MPs between their rôles in the party at Westminster and their conduct as constituency MPs; my own MP, for example, is a Conservative whose majority is as large as it is because he attracts the votes of some otherwise traditional Labour supporters because of the regard in which he is held as a constituency MP.

[ahinton]

But it really isn't necessary to view "polarisation" as an inherently bad thing, when in fact positive changes in society, like the abolition of slavery, votes for women, workers' rights and so on have all come about as a result of "polarisation" around these issues. What we are seeing now, as a result of the processes that led to the Brexit vote, is a laying bare of the class structure of British society, which the Johnsons and Camerons of the country (if not the Moggs) have generally tried to paper over in the interests of retaining their position of power and making the situation look "democratic". As soon as that position is seriously under threat their true colours begin to show.

Can't argue with that - and those colours certainly seem to be showing ever more clearly since the replacement of the former unelected PM with the present one (and, of course, by "unelected" here I mean unelected by the electorate as a whole).

[Richard Barrett]

I would say that the class structure of this country is plain enough for anyone to see

One might say that if it really were plain enough for anyone to see, you wouldn't have the phenomenon of the "working class Tory" - like my own parents - who votes against his/her interests having been sold an illusion of social mobility, which of course has become ever more illusory as inequality has risen.

[Conchis]

One might say that if it really were plain enough for anyone to see, you wouldn't have the phenomenon of the "working class Tory" - like my own parents - who votes against his/her interests having been sold an illusion of social mobility, which of course has become ever more illusory as inequality has risen.

There is also social deference - I recently spoke to a woman in her late seventies, whose background was (as she described it) working-class. She said she had always voted Conservative, since ‘the people in the Conservative Party are actually brought up to run the country, so obviously they’ll make a better job of it than anyone else.’

[muzzer]

I think there’s a lot of “I know my place”, per the famous sketch, that resists enabling/enlightening - in the sense of being given opportunity for material and spiritual development. I also think this mentality exists at both ends of the political spectrum. I wish it weren’t the case, but I observe that a lot of people aren’t interested in anything other than their own four walls and immediate family, be they working, lower middle, upper middle or whatever. Those who do not think for themselves habitually are prey for totalitarians.

[Conchis]

If someone felt it necessary to pigeonhole me politically then I imagine 'liberal' would be the slot chosen. However it has nothing to do with expecting others to play fair, but rather trying to live in a way I think right. From the very earliest childhood I was told, often forcefully, that 'two wrongs don't make a right', and it stuck. The fact that within my family my siblings often didn't take any notice of that principle, and didn't play fair, taught me not to have expectations of others' behaviour - but the basic idea seemed to me to be a good one and so I stuck with it. No doubt if I didn't also have the unfortunate wish to try and see more than one side of an issue life would have been somewhat easier - I can certainly see the attraction of aligning with particular political, or indeed religious, tribes.
And if that makes me an ineffectual and indecisive waste of space then so be it - heaven knows it's a charge I level at myself often enough - but a liberal? I'm not convinced.

I might have agreed with you at one point — but I don’t see the validity of trying to understand someone else’s point of view when they are determined to ignore yours.

[Serial_Apologist]

I think there’s a lot of “I know my place”, per the famous sketch, that resists enabling/enlightening - in the sense of being given opportunity for material and spiritual development. I also think this mentality exists at both ends of the political spectrum. I wish it weren’t the case, but I observe that a lot of people aren’t interested in anything other than their own four walls and immediate family, be they working, lower middle, upper middle or whatever. Those who do not think for themselves habitually are prey for totalitarians.

It could be the very privileges conferred by geography that empowered Britain's forefronting in the advances of the Industrial Revolution, enabling the parliamentary reforms avoiding revolutions occurring elsewhere in the 18th and 19th centuries - with a lot of additional help from slavery and slavery's early abolition here - that forged the alliance between classes that was destined to foster the abovedescribed attitutes in Britain.

[jayne lee wilson]

Behind this wildness is a shadowy, unelected fanatic, expert at manipulating narcissists.
You may be thinking I am talking about John Bolton pulling Trump's strings.
But look at Westminster, and you will see another such.

Absolutely - this guy, in contempt of Parliament and who led the leave campaign referred to the Police & found guilty of electoral cheating...

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/jul/25/dominic-cummings-role-provokes-alarm-inside-civil-service

Cummings is behind most, if not all, of Johnson's recent manoeuvres...

Rightwing power & privilege (mis-)leading an inevitably ill-informed plebiscite-mandate is a terrible, poisonous combination...

[teamsaint]

Absolutely - this guy, in contempt of Parliament and who led the leave campaign referred to the Police & found guilty of electoral cheating...

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/jul/25/dominic-cummings-role-provokes-alarm-inside-civil-service

Cummings is behind most, if not all, of Johnson's recent manoeuvres...

Rightwing power & privilege (mis-)leading an inevitably ill-informed plebiscite-mandate is a terrible, poisonous combination...

But just pinning the blame on one flawed aspect of a system that is,also inevitably, flawed to a greater or lesser degree at every level, doesn’t move things on.
Those who favour remain would no doubt grab another “plebiscite “with both hands right now.
And the liberal left ,( as well as the lunatic right) has a hell of a lot of questions to answer, I’m sorry to say.
A8 accession issues, the ruthless undermining of the Labour party since Corbyn won the leadership, loss of trust post Iraq and so on and so on.........

[CGR]

You could sign the petition against proroguing:

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/269157

From The Spectator

Far from being an expression of national fury with Boris’s proroguing plans, the petition strikingly confirms the massive class-based and geographical divides over Brexit. So where, at the time of writing, 7.4 per cent of voters in Caroline Lucas’s Brighton Pavilion constituency have signed this anti-Boris, anti-proroguing petition, just 0.6 per cent of constituents in Doncaster North have signed it.

So far, in Islington 6.3 per cent of constituents have signed; in Dulwich, it’s 6.1 per cent; in Richmond, it’s five per cent. But in Rochdale, it’s 0.7 per cent; in Boston and Skegness, it’s 0.5 per cent; in Merthyr Tydfil it’s 0.8 per cent; in Dagenham it’s 0.5 per cent.

[Serial_Apologist]

It doesn't end. But the power of the real elites is thoroughly propped up by the affluent ( upper) middle classes, (and those who aspire to that status) who enabled so many of the policies that led to much of the discontent that revealed itself in the 2016 vote.

It could end - but only if and when the old means the ruling classes and their media friends are presently regurgitating to keep up their game of divide and rule, including religion and nationalism, are confronted and questioned as part of the ongoing battles to keep and improve on the best of what capitalist society has had to offer.