in International Situations 303 Words

What The Hell is “Brexit”?

This will be better described by my readers from Europe….but I will offer my take and feel free to correct anything that I get wrong….no offense will be taken…..

Most Americans have NO idea what the term “Brexit” actually means….it is a movement (basically).

The Brexit, an abbreviation of “British exit” that mirrors the term Grexit, refers to the possibility of Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union. A number of British political parties support a referendum on EU membership; the most prominent are the Conservative Party, which has promised a 2017 in/out referendum if it wins the May 2015 General Election, and the UK Independence Party (UKIP), which was founded in 1991 (under a different name) to oppose Britain’s membership in the EU. A surge in the UKIP’s popularity in 2013 probably prompted the Conservatives to announce support for a referendum in that year.

Supporters of the Brexit base their opinion on a variety of factors from the global competitiveness of British businesses to concerns about immigration. Britain has already opted out of the EU’s monetary union, meaning that it uses the pound sterling (GBP) instead of the euro, and the Schengen Area, meaning that it does not share open borders with a number of other European states. Popular support for an in/out referendum has varied over time, as has support for an “out” vote.
The reason I bring this up is that it could have wide ranging effects if the movement is successful…….will it change foreign policy?  Personally, I think it will…….
In a recent poll it shows that there is a growing support among the citizens in the UK for an exit from the EU……
My question is……will the UK truly be better off going it on their own?  Who would benefit from the exit, if it occurs?

31 thoughts on “What The Hell is “Brexit”?”

  1. Now, that is a good question!
    It depends on who you listen to…
    A large amount of people would rather stay in the E.U…..however, (there is always a however…grin) I hear that people are starting to change their minds……why?
    You got it…. immigration!
    Terrorist attacks……and a feeling that the parent country is no longer as British as it was…. There is a sizeable Muslim population in the north……and there is a lack of integration… mosques are being built…churches are not….in my opinion the burka does not help and neither does sharia law.
    The truth about Sharia courts in the UK http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/sharia-in-the-uk-the-courts-in-the-shadow-of-british-law-offering-rough-justice-for-muslim-women-a6761221.html
    ‘They’ say that the economy will suffer if we leave….
    I don’t know….but what I do know is that the population will decide because of immigration/terrorists.
    This may clarify…or not.
    More than half of the British public now wants to leave the EU http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/eu-referendum-majority-of-public-now-wants-a-brexit-poll-reveals-a6745561.html

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  2. Britain hasn’t been on their own for quite awhile now and when they don’t have the EU they will always have the good old Lend-Lease-Minded U.S.A. I am beginning to think or own public broadcasting is more or less and extension of the BBC and I am ready to chuck it because I find it irritating. I know I am going to raise eyebrows with this one but I think I would prefer Al-Arabia as a co-sponsore of our public broadcasting — being snarky of course …. LOL …. maybe …

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    1. The BBC is very provincial….dull,safe,and not to be taken seriously.
      Channel 4 News is much better.
      I do at times watch Al Jazeera and R.T.
      as well as picking up info online…
      Bias is every where…

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      2. No worries John,I do a good ozzie accent…would that do? grin

  3. I used to support the principle of a ‘European Union’ based on what it was made out to be back in 1992, a ‘Federal Europe’ (when we could and should have had a referendum on the issue). However I no longer do as it is clear that we are now trapped in an increasingly centralised superstate run by unelected commissioners, a European Soviet Union. The Lisbon Treaty (again on which there should have been, but wasn’t, a referendum) commits us to ‘Ever Closer Union’, with the intention of reducing the national parliaments within Europe to the status of nothing more than inconsequential regional assemblies; which is why I shall be voting for Brexit.

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  4. Reading the article about Ms.Zee dissertation some issues struck me as untrue.
    Quote: ‘Ms Zee, who describes herself as “an atheist – like 70 per cent of the Dutch”
    Tuis a statement that isn’t correct and colours the objectivity of the statements she makes. I must take in account however that this might have been added by the newspaper.
    Yes, a percentage of Dutch say they are atheists but in no way 70 percentage. It would be more correct to say that this 70 percentage consists of atheists, agnostics, Christians,Muslims, Jews, Hindoes, Boedhists and several more. From these groups, excluding the atheist, you have a percentage that are active participants others are not. That does not make non-participants atheists
    Some religions was introduced in the Netherlands by people coming to the Netherlands as Dutch nationals of former Dutch colonies. By ASKED to the Netherlands to work here, and the family reunions that came in their path. Than you have those seeking asylum here. For instance 1956: Hungarians. Bosnians in the nineties.Some of them because of religious prosecution and/or political prosecution.
    In short the Netherlands is rather diverse in religion and atheists and everything in between.
    I don’t have the time to comment some remarks on the courts mentioned. I will add that as soon as possible.

    Reading

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  5. Follow the money to find who will benefit from an exit…. The entire issue is NOT political, at all; it’s a corporate issue. The major players in the money markets are all vying for dominance, with the IMF being challenged by BRICS, among other pressures, from Russia and the Middle East, adding factors…. It’s all a big play with countries as the actors, and the directors out of sight, behind closed executive doors…..

    None of it will matter fairly soon; the illusion of money’s existence in reality is about to have its bubble burst, and we’ll be back to barter, ffolkes. Count on it; a house of cards cannot stand in a wind, and the winds of change are blowing….

    gigoid, the dubious….

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  6. I get rather annoyed by the British I must say. They made a lot of fuzz entering the EU, and when they did on some of their own conditions. Over the years they enjoyed the pro’s of being an EU member, on the con’s they aren’t very constructive participants to change that. And now they try to leave.

    I think by living in the Netherlands, one of the founding members of the BeNeLux, a predecessor of the EEG and later the EU, living in the Province Limburg, in what is called the Euroregion, a region on the west Germany, on the East you find Belgium,Province Limburg in between gives me the right to say this.
    The British have an island mentality that is not always visible but when on issues concerning Europe as a whole this mentality comes to service. The don’t really accept that they are part of the European continent, never have.

    What many opposing the EU tend to forget is:
    In this part of the world where over centuries many wars were fought, in the 20th century experienced 2 world wars, was able to come to co-operation between former enemies, and didn’t start and waged war on each other.

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    3. I am not a lover of the E.U.
      It badly needs restructuring….I am a follower of Yanis Varoufakis and I happen to agree with him.
      It is not democratic.
      Since most of my early life was not spent on this island I do not suffer Little Englanders gladly.
      I loathe corporations and the IMF to boot…the Troika can go to hell…..
      As for sharia law that can go to hell as well….(in this country)
      In the meant time I am thankful I am not 100% English…..
      A good mongrel I am!
      Oh, and a suffragette to boot!
      🙂

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      1. I agree that the EU needs changes being amore a democratic organisation. Being a small country compared to Great- Brittian corporations an most important co-operations are bad in principle

      2. Answering by smartphone is not always correct.
        What I mean being a small country, the Netherlands, corporations and most important co-operations are not in principal seen as negative.

    4. I guess that we island monkeys are less susceptible to swallowing EU propaganda. In 1992 I might have voted for the EU, but that was half my lifetime ago and I certainly wouldn’t do so now. Oh and I have visted Maastricht, where the Eurocrats had their jolly, as well as Liege and Aachen, so I am familiar with your ‘Euro-region’. As for our island mentality, it is ironic that Britain opened the doors to large-scale immigration from Eastern Europe in 2004, when no-where in your ‘Euro-region’ did.

      The EU has had nothing do with preventing warfare; in fact the increasing centralisation of power in Brussels is exacerbating nationalism, most obviously right on the EU’s doorstep in Flanders. Belgium is only tenuously held together. The notion that a political union of more than two dozen countries, many with no common language, culture or history, can be held together in the long-term is farcical, it is already falling apart.

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      1. I re-read your answer several times, pondering if I should answer or not.
        Because of haughtiness underlining your answer I will answer.

        You say you visit Maastricht, Liege and Aachen. You are familiar with the term Euroregion, still you don’t understand. Did you do some research on this region?

        The Meuse–Rhine Euregion comprises:
        The western part of the Region of Cologne in Germany including the city of Aachen, the District of Aachen, the District of Düren, the District of Euskirchen and the District of Heinsberg, collectively referred to as the Region of Aachen.
        The German-speaking Community of Belgium;
        the seat of the Euroregion is located in its capital Eupen.
        The Belgian Province of Liège.
        The Belgian Province of Limburg.
        The southern part of the Dutch Province of Limburg,
        with the northern point of the Meuse–Rhine Euroregion being the city of Roermond (my hometown)

        The Meuse–Rhine Euroregion includes the provincial capital city of Maastricht as well as the co-operative region Parkstad Limburg surrounding the city of Heerlen.

        The official languages of the three countries involved in the Euregion are Dutch (in Belgium and the Netherlands), French (in Belgium) and German (in Belgium and Germany).

        Regional languages are also spoken namely Limburgish (which is recognised as a regional language in Dutch Limburg), Ripuarian and Walloon. The intra-cultural aspect of the Limburgish and Ripuarian is that they are spoken on both sides of the border.
        Limburgish, although only recognised as such in The Netherlands, is also spoken in Belgian Limburg and North Rhine-Westphalia.
        Ripuarian is also spoken on both sides of the Dutch/German-border, but with the extra trait of having the same variant spoken on both sides of the border.

        For centuries, the strategic location of the current province Limburg made it a much-coveted region among Europe’s major powers. Romans, Habsburg Spaniards, Prussians, Habsburg Austrians and French have all ruled parts of Limburg. For long periods of history the region was not united under the same rule.
        Following the Napoleonic Era, the great powers (England, Prussia, the Austrian Empire, the Russian Empire and France) united the region with the new Kingdom of the Netherlands in 1815.
        A new province was formed which was to receive the name Limburg.
        When the Catholic and French-speaking Belgians split away from the mainly Calvinist northern Netherlands in the Belgian Revolution of 1830, the Province of Limburg was at first almost entirely under Belgian rule.
        However, by the 1839 Treaty of London, the province was divided in two, with the eastern part going to the Netherlands and the western part to Belgium, a division that remains today.

        You see, in this part of the world, borders have for centuries been lines drawn by rulers. Those lines could change at any moment. They however had nothing to do with the people that lived there. They married, raised their children, worked, traded etc.

        You should know that any of the members and one pont of time will accept more or less other nationalities on their soil.You argument on that holds no ground.

        That Belgium is divided in a French region, Flemish region is because of treaties made by other nations that decided to draw lines on the map. Thoses lines weren’t that what the people in this region wanted. I f the people had their own way the map would have had different borders.

        EU nothing to do with preventing war?
        I beg to differ!

  7. Basically I never hear from anybody in the EU so for the time being I really don’t give a rat’s a** about Brexit! And besides, isn’t that the name of some kind of shampoo or something? “Make all your dandruff Exit with Brexit?” I used to have a friend in The Netherlands who used to comment for me but I guess I scared him off the last time we spoke … ah well… Kay Serah as they say.

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    1. Yes John you are right…it is the name of a shampoo….emphasis on the pooo…;)

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  8. Looking for ten-foot pole. The Br in the exit would not make all that much difference – grin – the sun sets on it before you get to the next time zone now, as opposed to the past. The EU was the answer for politicians in is member states for not having to work out detailed plans for anything – and just leave it to un-elected bureaucrats. Give the EU parliament real power to govern over the EU institutions and things would change or they would all exit and die on the vine. Gotta find that pole!

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  9. Seriously I got annoyed along with my wife this morning .When Channel nine morning news reported on Brexit.. Both of us looked at each other and said we just wasted 5 minutes of our life’s watching reporters in Australia and Great Britain talking about Brexit with absolutely no explanation as to “what the Hell Brexit was” ..So I Looked it up in the dictionary and there’s no such word ..So thankyou for explaining the meaning of a made up word that doesn’t exist . And frankly being an Aussie couldn’t gift a flying rats ass about or hearing about it again. Next time someone says the word on the Tube it gets turned off or channel changed. Cheers .

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