Would You Vote For A British Republic?

[Al Bundy]

23 minutes ago, m williamson said:

I'm not bitter, why would I be? It's come to something if pointing out salient facts about a particular subject leads to personal remarks and cod psychology. Perhaps the particular subject is what led to that?

The people in the UK have the option to be or do whatever they want? You don't appear to be paying too much attention. In the UK parliament is sovereign, in a true republic  the people are sovereign and are protected against the power of the state by the constitution which cannot be altered without their permission. The current government is working on a way to curtail peaceful demonstrations https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/police-crime-bill-uk-what-to-know-protesting/ they haven't quite managed it yet but they'll keep at it.

Politicians in this country treat the public with contempt. When an alternative to FPTP was offered they took care not to offer PR even though PR has been used in part of the UK since 1973.

 

Now, I like to point out things like that but it doesn't effect my mood in any particular way, I'm old enough to know that whittling about something that you can't change is an otiose exercise.

I don't even worry about the performance of the Blades anymore.

What's that first sentence if not an insult?  You really should calm down and take a look in the mirror

But none of that is stopping you from doing what you want, regardless of how you may want to dress it up.

 

Cod psychology?   I've always found that to be just folk carping on about something extremely fishy.

[Dromedary]

4 minutes ago, m williamson said:

....In the UK parliament is sovereign, in a true republic  the people are sovereign and are protected against the power of the state by the constitution which cannot be altered without their permission.

In the UK we have a representative democracy whereby the people agree to delegate their responsibility to an elected representative. Only in a true or direct democracy, as you say, do the people actually hold power themselves but those types of democracies are almost non existent. Because of the logistics involved a modern democracy is normally a representative democracy. It also does not matter much whether we have a written constitution or not as decisions by government can still be challenged in a court of law and certain changes that fundamentally alter the constitution we already have (voting age, PR etc) need to be put to a referendum first, so cannot be altered without the peoples permission.

 

If the UK decides to get rid of Royal privilege then that would also need to go to the people in a referendum but I very much doubt any attempt to curtail Royalty would be successful as it is still too popular among the public at large and probably will be for many years to come.

 

[m williamson]

14 minutes ago, Al Bundy said:

But none of that is stopping you from doing what you want, regardless of how you may want to dress it up.

 

Cod psychology?   I've always found that to be just folk carping on about something extremely fishy.

So it's best to just get on with things, keep your head down, don't be critical of anything and let those in power do exactly as they please with no interference, even if it's only comments on an insignificant forum?

Fair enough,  those in power will appreciate it.

[Rockers rule]

45 minutes ago, m williamson said:

I'm not bitter, why would I be? It's come to something if pointing out salient facts about a particular subject leads to personal remarks and cod psychology. Perhaps the particular subject is what led to that?

The people in the UK have the option to be or do whatever they want? You don't appear to be paying too much attention. In the UK parliament is sovereign, in a true republic  the people are sovereign and are protected against the power of the state by the constitution which cannot be altered without their permission. The current government is working on a way to curtail peaceful demonstrations https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/police-crime-bill-uk-what-to-know-protesting/ they haven't quite managed it yet but they'll keep at it.

Politicians in this country treat the public with contempt. When an alternative to FPTP was offered they took care not to offer PR even though PR has been used in part of the UK since 1973.

 

Now, I like to point out things like that but it doesn't effect my mood in any particular way, I'm old enough to know that whittling about something that you can't change is an otiose exercise.

I don't even worry about the performance of the Blades anymore.

 

Quote

What's that first sentence if not an insult?  You really should calm down and take a look in the mirror

Come on lower case 'm' you really are going to have to do better than that.

Rocker 

[Al Bundy]

4 minutes ago, m williamson said:

So it's best to just get on with things, keep your head down, don't be critical of anything and let those in power do exactly as they please with no interference, even if it's only comments on an insignificant forum?

Fair enough,  those in power will appreciate it.

I said nothing of the sort.

 

Your comment is just cementing my notion that  for some reason you appear to be very bitter about things.

 

Apologies if I am incorrect.

[janie48]

I  certainly wouldn't vote for a British Republic. 

[crookesey]

3 hours ago, Al Bundy said:

In what way does the Royal family's reign over you affect your life?

 

Quick tip....

 

It doesn't.

Actually it prevents me from being elected the U.K President

[m williamson]

9 minutes ago, Dromedary said:

In the UK we have a representative democracy whereby the people agree to delegate their responsibility to an elected representative. Only in a true or direct democracy, as you say, do the people actually hold power themselves but those types of democracies are almost non existent. Because of the logistics involved a modern democracy is normally a representative democracy. It also does not matter much whether we have a written constitution or not as decisions by government can still be challenged in a court of law and certain changes that fundamentally alter the constitution we already have (voting age, PR etc) need to be put to a referendum first, so cannot be altered without the peoples permission.

 

If the UK decides to get rid of Royal privilege then that would also need to go to the people in a referendum but I very much doubt any attempt to curtail Royalty would be successful as it is still too popular among the public at large and probably will be for many years to come.

 

The problem with our version of representative democracy is the FPTP voting system. This has resulted in no government being formed in this countgry since 1945 by a party that achieved even 50% of votes cast. Which means that in every case more people voted for other party's rather than the one that went into government.  That isn't what I'd call representative.

 

Those types of democracies may not be common but there's one next door in the Irish Republic. That's why they had a vote in the Lisbon Treaty and despite the lying nonsense printed in our red top rags they did not " Have to vote again until they got it right " the second vote was on an amended Treaty that had been altered to address their concerns. https://www.politico.eu/article/irish-secure-concessions-on-lisbon-treaty/  Among other things they retained their EU commissioner, Mairead McGuiness holds the position at the moment.

So in Ireland a small country with less than six million people the electorate got to decide, whilst over here a less than truly democratic parliament decided for us.

The Irish Senate serves the same function as the House of Lords, it isn't directly elected and seats are appointed by different methods eleven by the Taoiseach and three each by two of the universitys plus various other organisations but it doesn't allow for the same  shenanigans we have to put up with over here.

As I said right at the beginning I don't think for a minute that royalty will be got rid of here. 

[m williamson]

27 minutes ago, Al Bundy said:

I said nothing of the sort.

 

Your comment is just cementing my notion that  for some reason you appear to be very bitter about things.

 

Apologies if I am incorrect.

You said that none of that was stopping me from doing what I wanted. The implication being that there was nothing to worry about, carry on, at least that was the inference I drew from it. I had previously explained the number of things refusing to take the oath of allegiance prevented me and anyone else with the same views doing. So your comment that none of it was stopping me ( or anyone else ) doing what I/they want isn't true is it?

What is your apparent obsession with commenting on the supposed feelings of someone you don't know? My 'notion ' as to your character is beginning to take a less than complimentary turn.

I'm on this forum simply to amuse myself, obviously you can't get that through your head and assume that I have some other reason, I don't.

[Al Bundy]

7 minutes ago, m williamson said:

You said that none of that was stopping me from doing what I wanted. The implication being that there was nothing to worry about, carry on, at least that was the inference I drew from it. I had previously explained the number of things refusing to take the oath of allegiance prevented me and anyone else with the same views doing. So your comment that none of it was stopping me ( or anyone else ) doing what I/they want isn't true is it?

What is your apparent obsession with commenting on the supposed feelings of someone you don't know? My 'notion ' as to your character is beginning to take a less than complimentary turn.

I'm on this forum simply to amuse myself, obviously you can't get that through your head and assume that I have some other reason, I don't.

Whatever makes you happy.

 

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