General Politics Thread
- Thread starter Watanabe Ken
- Start date
RadFemHedonist
Railgun
The complete absence of a party with views that even meet my half-baked progressive ideals is the most depressing thing for me. My area didn't have any elections so I'm only watching from the sidelines but it feels more than ever as though all of the parties are converging on some issues, with almost nobody speaking out to present something different. Something genuinely hopeful. And when that happens and people have been told to be dissatisfied with the status quo, the party which people see as the most different is the only one with a strong unique selling point. No matter how rubbish a job Reform do, it will never be their fault as long as there is someone else without a voice who they can blame.
R
R
ayase
State Alchemist
The dividing line between the affluent areas that have gone to the Lib Dems and the deprived ones that have gone to Reform is pretty stark. Labour managed to pull these voters together in 2024, regardless of class or socioeconomic status, because they all wanted change from the Tories. Now Labour have failed miserably to provide any, both groups are abandoning them as well, pulling in different directions as they do so.
Rather than trying to reconcile their affluent pro European socially progressive voters with their Brexit voting socially conservative poor ones, Labour seem intent on pissing them both off with social policy that upsets the former and economic policy that harms the latter. Both of which the Tories were already doing. Good job, guys. You forgot to weigh down your big tent with any actual principles and now it’s blowing away.
Rather than trying to reconcile their affluent pro European socially progressive voters with their Brexit voting socially conservative poor ones, Labour seem intent on pissing them both off with social policy that upsets the former and economic policy that harms the latter. Both of which the Tories were already doing. Good job, guys. You forgot to weigh down your big tent with any actual principles and now it’s blowing away.
Dave1988
Death Scythe
Reform take staffordshire, to easy for them, 16 years of tofies took its toll, we are in debt and they decide spaff £55 million on a carpark in the city center with no shops only europeon markets and turkish barbers, then have the audacity to put council tax up 10%,glad to say we have reform in charge, just my opinion those, instead of the 2 party corruption, about time fresh faces stepped up and not spaff money on, cant be any worse than what we have had
RadFemHedonist
Railgun
I feel like disapproving Shinji is needed (not to direct at you, rather as part of some sort of clever meme about how principles are weighty but important). I'm pretty devastated by all of this, though trying to keep on hoping for a better future (and keep on signing petitions, filling in surveys from campaigning groups and emailing my MP, even though I know it might not do much I also know it's important to try). So many vulnerable groups are getting a kicking atm - trans people, disabled people, immigrants and refugees, the working classes... would also add that while I get the point you're making I think it's important to remember that some poor people are very socially left/liberal and some affluent people are very socially conservative (they're some of the most terrifying ones cuz they can buy the judgments they want from judges in some cases, if you've got enough money you can just throw it around until you get the horrible things you want in terms of demolishing human rights, social and economic equality, sadly)
ayase
State Alchemist
Certainly true, while it's something of a simplification I think when you're dealing with party politics and voting blocks such generalisations are somewhat unavoidable. Reform are unlikely to do anything to actually benefit the poor but these results show the poorest people are voting for them anyway, probably as much as a big "screw you" to the big two parties and career politicians who have ignored their interests for the last 40 years as anything else. This is much the same mindset as a lot of the Trump electorate, a desire to just see the whole rotten system burn, and I can't entirely blame them. It didn't have to be this way, politicians could have used their powers to improve their people's lives so they didn't want to burn it all down, but here we are. It isn't going to matter how frantically Reeves and Starmer sacrifice goats on the altar of GDP growth unless people see some real meaningful improvement in their stagnating (if not declining) living standards.
It is genuinely baffling to me that with all the focus grouping and polling that goes on in modern politics the Labour Party so badly misunderstand their own electorate. If ever there was a time to convince me there really is an NWO/Illuminati orchestrating politics as theatre behind the scenes now would be the time, because it's hard to look at Labour today and conclude anything other than that they are purposely throwing to Reform. Starmer says he's listening, who the hell is he listening to? Not anyone I can walk out of the door in my northern town and hear saying he's no different from a Tory, that the cost of their rent and bills and shopping and council tax keeps on rising while their wages don't.
Dave1988
Death Scythe
Thats not reforms fault, labour got in, and put energy bills up which they promised they wouldnt, labour cut payments for old people for winter fuel allowance, labour went through the trans rights and blocked them they were just following on from tories, but i guess its easier to blame a party that has never governed? Or been in any sort of power to make all them changes above?I feel like disapproving Shinji is needed (not to direct at you, rather as part of some sort of clever meme about how principles are weighty but important). I'm pretty devastated by all of this, though trying to keep on hoping for a better future (and keep on signing petitions, filling in surveys from campaigning groups and emailing my MP, even though I know it might not do much I also know it's important to try). So many vulnerable groups are getting a kicking atm - trans people, disabled people, immigrants and refugees, the working classes... would also add that while I get the point you're making I think it's important to remember that some poor people are very socially left/liberal and some affluent people are very socially conservative (they're some of the most terrifying ones cuz they can buy the judgments they want from judges in some cases, if you've got enough money you can just throw it around until you get the horrible things you want in terms of demolishing human rights, social and economic equality, sadly)
And @Rui is right, all the poor areas, reform have wiped the floorwith labour and tories in most cases if you put labour votes and tory votes together they still wouldnt of got more than reform, people getting poorer, bills year on yeat getting out of control, reform now have to prove what they can do for their cities before the next general election to make people believer they can govern the country
The vote share is always a bit more complicated to look at than a simple breakdown of numbers. If you've always been told that Labour or Conservatives will be the only sane way to not waste your vote, a certain portion of anyone who is even the slightest bit upset with both of them (not that there's a discernible difference at this point) will look to vote tactically - and Reform have undeniably dominated the headlines for years now. Even though some of the coverage is negative they're in the media all the time, far more so than any of the more liberal alternatives, and consequently they seem (and have become) far more relevant. Everyone knows what they stand for, for better or worse, though some people can look past the dogwhistles while others welcome them.
There's no such clear path to change for anyone who likes European markets and Turkish barbers. There's no coverage and all of the other parties have trouble agreeing on their own stances about anything, let alone communicating those stances to ordinary people. I think there's a certain number of people voting for Reform who would genuinely have gone for basically anyone if they thought they had a chance to stick it to the establishment - and as long as Reform continue to be the only party which plays to the media and promotes the message that they will stick to their guns, they'll keep building up momentum.
While I do genuinely despise them and despair at the future of this country, part of me is hopeful that at the very least this might be the end of the two party system. The more momentum that other parties pick up, the greater the chance - maybe? - that other people will take some risks too, and the nonsense of having two functionally identical parties which stand for nothing other than obvious self-interest might eventually pass.
Can confirm living down south that we have no idea who the heck he's listening to either. I think he just asks ChatGPT for the safest position on any given stance each morning and then fiercely defends that, never daring to actually have principles or thoughts of his own that he won't forget about five minutes later. A total people pleaser - and like all people pleasers, the sad result is that he ends up pleasing absolutely nobody.
R
There's no such clear path to change for anyone who likes European markets and Turkish barbers. There's no coverage and all of the other parties have trouble agreeing on their own stances about anything, let alone communicating those stances to ordinary people. I think there's a certain number of people voting for Reform who would genuinely have gone for basically anyone if they thought they had a chance to stick it to the establishment - and as long as Reform continue to be the only party which plays to the media and promotes the message that they will stick to their guns, they'll keep building up momentum.
While I do genuinely despise them and despair at the future of this country, part of me is hopeful that at the very least this might be the end of the two party system. The more momentum that other parties pick up, the greater the chance - maybe? - that other people will take some risks too, and the nonsense of having two functionally identical parties which stand for nothing other than obvious self-interest might eventually pass.
Can confirm living down south that we have no idea who the heck he's listening to either. I think he just asks ChatGPT for the safest position on any given stance each morning and then fiercely defends that, never daring to actually have principles or thoughts of his own that he won't forget about five minutes later. A total people pleaser - and like all people pleasers, the sad result is that he ends up pleasing absolutely nobody.
R
RadFemHedonist
Railgun
Oh DGMW I despise the current labour lot as much as you do! I liked Jeremy Corbyn and he was consistently advocating for more economic equality, public ownership of utilities, and defending human rights generally, but Keir Starmer? spits on the floor. I'm aware we really disagree about many things, I would never vote reform, but as far as I'm concerned the current labour lot (particularly the higher ups) are just red tories, except they're making the horrible things happen faster than the tories did because they're 1. More "efficient" and 2. At least when the tories were in power Labour were calling out these ****** policies but now that Labour are in power they're hardly going to call themselves out and the tories are generally in favour of these things (as noted, they were their policies too even if they didn't manage to enact them!) so the ****'s really hit the fan. Also the tories were heartless but were also aware that some of their nastiest economic policies were unpopular with the elderly, who not to overly stereotype but do tend to make up a fairly large portion of tory voters. It's an interesting if depressing philosophical question really - do you get worse results from political parties who are callous but care about how they come off to voters in terms of long game PR, or from... tbh I'm not sure how to summarise the current Labour lot's approach... oh look there's a tent blowing away outside...
Last edited:
Dave1988
Death Scythe
Problem is, labour got in because the tories were down and out, they were at each others throats for weeks and backstabbing each other everyweek, i mean how many leaders did we have within a year? So they were never getting back in
People main concern is for the nhs, me personally despise the nhs and what it is, only used it once or twice and it was ghoulish, long waits, i mean first time i used it when i was around 22,only needed a back scan, and it took 3 years to do, just for a back scan
Or the scummiest nowadays is, im sorry theres no nhs appointments, but i can see you private for double the cost, hang on, i cant see you via nhs but i can see the same person via private? Wtf is that?
Ive since not bothered, id rather be in pain or seek private if i can afford it but again, thats just me, people love the nhs, i myself do not
RadFemHedonist
Railgun
I also wish to add that it really grinds my gears that so many people seem to forget that being in a social minority (woman, LGBTQUIA, racial or ethnic minority, disabled, and so on) does not exempt you from being poor or suffering horribly if you are, and in many cases makes the suffering of poverty at least somewhat more acutely horrible. None of that is to argue that a white working class cis straight man cannot suffer horribly, just to make the point that people from these social minority groups are not necessarily "affluent"/financially well off
RadFemHedonist
Railgun
I would be deaf (was prevented with early childhood surgery) and probably have lost at least one foot to diabetes, if it weren't for the NHS. I sincerely feel for you that the quality of treatment you received was so poor, but at least a publicly funded healthcare service can make improvements to patient waiting times without having to serve the interests of wealthy shareholders who think people's lives, health and wellbeing are a way of making themselves even richer.
ayase
State Alchemist
At the risk of sounding even slightly hopeful about UK politics at all (moi?) the other big winners of the night besides Reform were the Lib Dems, who also have the highest number of MPs they've had for a hundred years. Perhaps a realignment of UK politics along Brexit lines was always a slow moving but inevitable outcome of that vote.
Personally, I don't know why Starmer doesn't put the kibosh on this by simply coming out with the figures (maybe with a big handy chart like Trump) to show people that leaving the single market did nothing to cut immigration and has been bad for the economy, point out that the single market is not the EU (Norway, Iceland and Switzerland belong to it despite not being in the EU, the UK is now the only western European country that isn't) and declare a referendum on returning to it, given that hilariously even 7/10 Reform voters polled now believes there should be no trade barriers with the EU. That seems like an easy win.
Affluence is a difficult topic because there are people who are in poverty by clearly measurable objective criteria, which can affect people from all demographics (though tends to disproportionally affect some more than others). And then there's the weird fantasy that middle class people have where they have to pretend that they're struggling and barely coping all the time because it's unfashionable to acknowledge one's own privileges. I remember reading a series of articles about money management on the BBC quite a few years ago (sadly, I wasn't able to find it when I looked) and in one episode, a doctor couple on a combined salary of 150k or something were saying that they were in serious poverty and barely able to pay for essentials like Tesco Value toilet paper (of course, their kids went to expensive boarding schools etc. but that was seen as a basic humanitarian essential). But they weren't just a pair of oddballs, it's a wide trend and it makes it difficult for people to discuss affluence without emotion. I have a friend who buys into the 'I'm so poor!' fantasy. He is not poor. He bought his massive house in cash and could retire tomorrow if he changed his habits around. He is utterly, utterly convinced that he's on the verge of destitution though, even though he's far richer than I am (and I'm not poor). I tell him this every time I see him, because every time I see him it comes up when he refuses to be generous in some way. He cannot overcome his obsession with performative poverty and is the tightest person I've ever met.
Changing subjects, I do agree that the NHS kind of sucks on a day to day level. I finally had a birth defect that I've lived with all my life diagnosed - not treated, diagnosed - last year. I've effectively been on a waiting list for something else for twenty years, which is ridiculous, and I have experienced dismissal, local inequalities and - frankly - discrimination in the way I'm treated by several GPs. I could write a very long complaint post about the way I've been treated by NHS doctors after seeking help in good faith and I've heard the "oh, if you actually want treatment for that thing that lots of other people get treated every day, you should just go private" line as well. So I get that it's a frustrating service and a lot of things about it need fixing.
However, if we didn't have the NHS a lot of people would not be able to receive any care at all, and more people that you love and care about would be dead or struggling. Anyone* can roleplay not having the NHS any time they like by going private, except that paying your entire life savings out (or getting into levels of debt you'll never clear) every time you have an accident or necessary procedure doesn't sound like fun to me. So I very much hope we can keep the NHS, thank you!
R
* If they can afford it, obviously.
Changing subjects, I do agree that the NHS kind of sucks on a day to day level. I finally had a birth defect that I've lived with all my life diagnosed - not treated, diagnosed - last year. I've effectively been on a waiting list for something else for twenty years, which is ridiculous, and I have experienced dismissal, local inequalities and - frankly - discrimination in the way I'm treated by several GPs. I could write a very long complaint post about the way I've been treated by NHS doctors after seeking help in good faith and I've heard the "oh, if you actually want treatment for that thing that lots of other people get treated every day, you should just go private" line as well. So I get that it's a frustrating service and a lot of things about it need fixing.
However, if we didn't have the NHS a lot of people would not be able to receive any care at all, and more people that you love and care about would be dead or struggling. Anyone* can roleplay not having the NHS any time they like by going private, except that paying your entire life savings out (or getting into levels of debt you'll never clear) every time you have an accident or necessary procedure doesn't sound like fun to me. So I very much hope we can keep the NHS, thank you!
R
* If they can afford it, obviously.
Gemsy-chan
Shinigami
I'm afraid after what the Lib Dems have done to where I live after they won control of the council 2 elections ago (our election was postponed due to this talk of a mega council and mayor) I'll never vote for them.
zrdb
Straw Hat Pirate
You people in the UK have problems, hell-the world is awash with ultra conservative assholes who like nothing better then to degrade and persecute people who have different social, sexual, political and religious views than they do. At least two bright spots are Canada and Australia where the liberals have emerged victorious.
Last edited:
ayase
State Alchemist
I started wondering about this, so I decided to ask ChatGPT how to achieve my policy goals and how to manipulate the electorate into voting for them.
My assessment is that the singularity cannot come fast enough. AI art? AI politics is clearly already miles ahead of human politicians. Get them replaced instead.
Attachments
Last edited:
ayase
State Alchemist
I’ll say, the media has been strangely quiet on the matter of the UK erroneously dropping tactical nukes… Oh wait, they mean retired them from service.
On the subject of “defence” both the government and the media appears to have gone absolutely stark (Starm?) raving MAD (capitalisation intended). We need to be prepare for war, do we Kier? Who exactly are we going to be fighting? Surely not Russia, what good are soldiers, tanks and ships going to be against ICBMs? The media says nothing about this. Nothing. I can’t find a single article or journalist pointing out that a war between nuclear powers would be a nuclear war. That’s genuinely a bit concerning. During the Cold War this seemed fairly well understood and acknowledged by both politicians and the media. It’s one thing to be a Curtis LeMay style loon who thinks a nuclear war is winnable, but to just completely ignore the issue of your likely enemy having enough nukes to wipe out your country a hundred times over? What exactly is the thinking here? “Oh, nobody will actually use nukes, even as a last resort if they’re losing”? Maybe “It’s not actually Russia or China we’re talking about, we’re going to support the US invasion of Iran/Panama/Greenland/Canada”? We don’t know. Because nobody is asking. I don’t think I have ever seen the media fail so pathetically to ask such obvious questions of major government pronouncements.
Nothing much changes stateside, though I do find “Big Beautiful Bill” a hilariously homoerotic name. He sounds like quite a character, wonder how he’ll fare in a fight with Rand Paul, last sane Republican?