The Revolting Masses

In fact they were quite appalled by ordinary people
The casual arrogance of our self-imagined betters, their condescension and contempt, has been noted here once or twice.

What I find fascinating from the other side of the world is the number of people mad that David Cameron even deigned to have a vote about it. Essentially, they are charging the British public for being too stupid to know what they are voting for, only tinged by the fact that so many of these Leave voters seem to be poor, and therefore easily tricked by false promises. And so why on earth would they ever actually ask the people what they thought about it?
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/sep/16/david-cameron-brexit
And the media class also seem to be cranky about the fact that so many of the middle class and poor seem so easily swayed, apart from by them. It is as if they believe their ongoing contempt will cause people to turn around and reconsider, or that talking about how Doncaster or wherever got an EU grant so why would they vote leave will get people to miss the tide of pounds leaving the country to prop up Southern and Eastern Europe.

It doesn’t seem to me coincidental that the left’s great volte face on Europe coincided with the fall of the Soviet Union and the tacit acceptance that the post-war ‘consensus’ was gone forever. There is a real tendency amongst even educated left-wingers to be taken in by Utopian fantasies.
I don’t think the EU is remotely as bad as the USSR, but the treatment it’s afforded by its partisans is very similar. They project a vision of happy, forward-thinking internationalism onto a flawed and undemocratic behemoth. They treat criticism of it as at best vulgar and at worst “regressive”.
They also adopt a little syllogism, I think, that runs “Nigel Farage is racist. Nigel Farage hates the EU. Therefore the EU is the paragon of anti-racism”.
There are other tribes of Remoaners – people who only care about their house prices, Tory Wets who think they’re Benjamin Disraeli. At least these people are intellectually consistent. The left that’s bleated about so-called austerity for years has strikingly little to say on the Fiscal Compact..

Interesting (long) video here by Gearoid Murphy, about the playbook for nipping in the bud any deplorable local opposition in the small Irish towns which have asylum seeker centres imposed on them.
The pattern that emerges from the towns he’s visited – the secret preparations; the public meeting to give a facade of local democracy, but which is really the presentation of a fait accompli; the unrepresentative “friends of the refugees” group given funding, advance notice, and privileged access to speak for the town in the media; the local hotelier who likes the idea of government-backed rents and not having to listen to the guests complain about their shabby accommodations; the safe channel for opposition, where the simple folk are allowed to say that they have some concerns, but we can all agree that asylum seekers should be given more generous allowances and not asked such hard questions; and the unsafe channel for opposition, where some local politician is Alinsky’d pour encourager les autres.

It is as if they believe their ongoing contempt will cause people to turn around and reconsider
Yep, that seems to be how the Democrats are running for 2020 “Vote for me, you damn Nazi!”

Margaret: Death of a Revolutionary
One of the Left’s most spittle-inducing figures of hate next to Ronald Reagan. Look how they reacted when actress Gillian Anderson was announced as being cast to play Thatcher in Netflix’s The Crown.

It’s dark and I smell gas. Where is my cigarette lighter?
As a colonial with few pretensions, I don’t understand Brexit and I think that is important. I have this idea that England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland are suffering from some policies favored by the continentals, there was a vote and the British public chose to leave the EU. I imagine that this is really complicated but is there a “Brexit for dummies” or “Brexit in 2,000 words” version?
I am particularly ignorant of this question about the hard border with the Irish Republic. I don’t get the issue there.
I tend to favor Mr. Churchill’s summary, “One people divided by a common language” so I care and I want a better understanding. I know that there is a lighter around here somewhere …

[But with the EU,] we haven’t elected them; we don’t know who did elect them; we don’t know how the machine works. We have no control over it. It is not democratic
That is what was so eye-opening for me when I first watched Brexit:the Movie. I really had no prior information on how invasive Brussels was and that the whole Ruling Class there was unaccountable to the ruled and shielded by a vast, anonymous bureaucracy.

We’ve all noticed the mask slipping and in some cases falling right off of the left recently, but the brazen lying about the EU Army still shocks me. A resurgent Germany once again threatening world peace – this time using other nations’ tax dollars – is bad enough, but to do it in an era of ample video evidence of their schemes is downright demoralizing.
Related Anecdote: about 15 years ago I purchased a firearm from a small hardware store who’s owner was a stereotypical rightwing gun nut prepper type. Nice enough guy but I laughed at all the paranoid paraphernalia adorning his shop, and specifically remember his posters decrying the UN and EU wanting to create a “New World Order”. Looking back and recognizing that this nutjob was right has been a tough pill to swallow.

The old word is treason… A large part of the British political elite has deliberately gone and negotiated against their own country…. They regard [the electorate] with absolute contempt.

Somewhat related, this interview with David Starkey.
Via Samizdata.

A European Parliament session reminds me of a Canadian (or British) Parliament Question Period. Much bluster, sound and fury, but at the end of the day whatever the government has proposed will be legislated. The saving grace being that the Canadian and British Governments were democratically elected whereas the real governing and legislative bodies in the EU–the European Commission and the European Council–were appointed.

Here in the US, they are known as “the deplorables”, and they made their presence known in 2016, with the election of Trump. The Trump Derangement Syndrome set in before election night was over, and has only intensified.
It is interesting that this same phenomenon showed up in two common law/English-law systems at the same time. And the great fear among the moderate observers is that the derangement will not go away, and that the next election, in both countries, will result in extreme dissatisfaction by whichever side loses and great unpleasantness. Here in the USA, the deplorables are much better armed than the progressives, but the police are all on the side of “more government power”. The military will likely just stand by. I was in the military when Nixon resigned, and there was no talk whatsoever about any military involvement in politics, so I think that mindset still exists.
As a former US government official, a former resident of France (twice), and now a dual national (US and Italy) I think that the UK will lose more than it will gain from Brexit, but I fully understand the argument about accountability, and I sympathise with the desire for freedom. The EU bureaucracy is beholden to no one, and doesn’t care what the people or their elected representatives, at any level, want. In the US, the deplorables do not want to be ruled by an unaccountable UN bureaucracy, which is the ultimate aim of the progressives.
First, though, they have to get rid of the guns. (Full disclosure – I don’t own any guns, yet)

The EU bureaucracy is beholden to no one…
True, but it’s actually much worse than that. The governing bodies themselves are accountable to no one. The only elected body is the European Parliament and it has no power. It’s very much an elitist European tradition to make the masses think they have a say when in fact they don’t.

I think that the UK will lose more than it will gain from Brexit
Brexit will certainly be disruptive, as trading relationships will have to be reconsidered and renegotiated, but the EU will also feel the pain if it tries to punish Britain. 1n 2018, Britain imported 345-billion-pounds worth of goods from the EU while exporting 289-billion-pounds to the EU.
Britain has historically had a trade deficit with the EU. Britain is one of only two countries that export more goods outside the EU than within it. In addition, EU policy more often than not has gone against Britain–Fisheries are a good example of that.
The greatest gain for Britain is it regains political control of all things and its politics become more accountable to individual voters. It seems that’s something the US fought a revolutionary war over.

Here in the US, they are known as “the deplorables”, and they made their presence known in 2016, with the election of Trump.
I will add that the rise of the Tea Party a few years earlier was met with disbelief until they were able to derail a few long-serving Republicans during the primaries (which 99 percent of the incumbents win).
Thereafter, they were declared Racist White Supremacists, and a Threat to democracy until Obama weaponized the IRS to attack their organizations by denying them non-profit status. Fighting the IRS drained resources that could have been used to grow the moment, and many of them folded in response.
Then, during the 2012 House midterms, the GOP ran on the promise of getting rid of Obamacare if they were given the majority. The voters did just that, and the day after, turned around and said, “Nah, you #$%#&^ up. You trusted us.”
This, among another dozen reasons, was why we got Trump.

I think that the UK will lose more than it will gain from Brexit
Three years ago, when the referendum was held, the EU Commission and the French and Germans (perhaps I am repeating myself) were far more circumspect about their aims of full federal integration.
Britain always acted as a brake when the EU vehicle steered in that direction.
With Britain on the way out, the mask has been thrown away, and the EU Federalists are quite open about their aims which include an integrated EU army.
There is no going back to the status quo of 4 years ago.

The best way to understand the remainer mentality is to go back to 2016 when a large group of people objected to the “Tampon Tax”. A tax of 5% was being imposed on female sanitary products because they were deemed luxury, non-essential items. Understandably, there was an outcry about this. It became a lead item on the BBC for a few days and the airwaves were filled with lefty “comedians” telling us, hilariously, that the Tories thought that having a period was exactly like taking a lovely luxury cruise.
Then it turned out that Westminster had no control over this tax. It was being imposed by Brussels.
Overnight it ceased to be a news story. The BBC dropped it. The angry feminists and the woke comedians all fell silent. Why? Surely, if a tax is immoral, it is just as immoral if imposed by Brussels, as if is if imposed by Westminster. But, not to remainers.
Honestly – and trust me I’ve tried – you’d do better having a reasonable discussion with Tom Cruise about Scientology than you would having an argument about Brexit with a remainer.

In the interest of open thread, here’s something revolting. Via Ace…
Notice how no one mentions the commonality between these three “robberies”. No. One. Not the mayor, not the high end restauranteur, not the city councilman, not the tv reporter, not the Blaze writer. No. One.
https://www.theblaze.com/news/minneapolis-police-beating-videos
Heh. And the link reads police-beating-videoes. I didn’t see no damn police. What did we see? Hmmm?

Our estimable bartender, rising star of the blogosphere.
Blimey. I’d forgotten about that.
[ Does best ‘blushing debutante’ face. ]

In fact they were quite appalled by ordinary people
Of the noticeably status-conscious people I’ve known – and by that, I mean status-anxious – most have been middle-class lefties. People who regard themselves, and declare themselves, as ‘progressive’ and sophisticated. In my experience, they’ve been the ones to do the most social signalling, often compulsively, and at times almost desperately. The idea of being seen to have opinions and preferences that are, as it were, common seems a cause of some discomfort – presumably, the prospect of losing in-group standing.
Such ‘common’ and therefore disreputable views include, it seems, almost any kind of national or patriotic sentiment, or just a preference for feeling good about one’s country, it’s history and culture – one’s wider tribe – rather than archly disdainful. Though I’m not sure how long a society can survive without some level of the attachment being ostentatiously disdained.
It seems to me we’ve gone beyond any realistic appraisal of a nation’s historical shortcomings or whatever and are now well into territory where the high-status posture is one of casual contempt, of practically wishing punishment and defeat on the, as it were, home team. Which is easier to do if you don’t have to live amid the demoralised social consequences and can flit elsewhere and sneer from afar.

Somewhat reminded of this:
Heh. That.

morally demented race-hustling parasite
LOL

[middle class lefties have] been the ones to do the most social signalling, often compulsively, and at times almost desperately
Is it simply people trying to be good Christians in a post-Christian culture? The Christian notions of anti-materialism and an emotional connection with the poor and downtrodden seem to still hold sway, but even the lip service paid to humility has vanished. If it’s still gaudy to show off one’s wealth and you’re unwilling to personally help the oppressed then the only avenue to show virtue is to enthusiastically express it in pantomime.

I think you may be too generous, Sam. Even if Christianity is out of vogue, anybody who feels the need to be charitable may contribute their time and money to any number of secular charities. I think our esteemed host understands the phenomenon just fine — we’re talking about insecure status-seekers who need to be seen caring about the right things, simply because they are the things that all the right people are seen caring about.
Actually caring, to say nothing of actually helping, isn’t important. Which is why so many of these people will do the bare minimum required to get the t-shirt, or the tote bag, or the sticker for their car. It’s just another aspect of Woke Fashion, along with knowing the correct names of all 237 genders this month.
To the extent that the behavior is post-Christian, I would say it’s only in the most negative and corrupt aspects of historical Christianity. One gets the sense that the Sierra Club sticker on the back of the Subaru is a kind of indulgence intended to protect the Wokeling wannabe from persecution when they are caught sipping a latte through a plastic straw, driving said Subaru to some errand that they could have reached via mass transit.
None of it is admirable, once you understand that it’s all just superficial signalling.

I would say it’s only in the most negative and corrupt aspects of historical Christianity.
That was my take as well, and I don’t mean it to excuse these wokelings, but rather to indict them.
I never quite agreed with the Hitchens that religion isn’t required for people to be/do “good”. Many humans seem incapable of exploring various outlooks and reasoning their way to the one that does the least harm. It’s much easier to go along with the zeitgeist, ignore any contradictions and not even attempt to justify any of its ills. Adhering to a set of norms and rules – enforced by a higher power to mitigate inherent fecklessness – seems to be the default for humans. Except, as you say, the beneficial tenets of Christianity have been diluted or corrupted, and the higher power enforcing the new dogma is the Opaque Hand of Twitter. Not an improvement.