Brexit and (Im)possible Question: Can Leftwingers Be Friends With Conservatives?

[damirUSBiH + 327]

Brexit is an opening everlasting question, not just in UK, but in all world democracy. English "The Guardian" in their column is trying to find this answer. Generally, history knows about such examples, but this kind of unprincipled coalition is ending up as a bad marriage.

 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/nov/22/john-mcdonnell-leftwing-conservatives-tory-labour?CMP=twt_gu

 

 

 

[Pavel + 384]

Yes when either go to the extreme their polices, methods and goals become the same...that is why Hitler and Stalin were able to divide Poland to start World War 2...

[pinto + 293]

All politics is about self interest.

[rainman + 263]

Agreeing to disagree on something is easy. It's just that now this perpetual argument mode we live in via social media means people can't let things lie.

[ThunderBlade + 231]

Good question/dilemma... Can christians, muslims, atheists, etc, etc ever be friends? I think so, so long as they/we respect boundaries and accept that others believe differently. This would include the ridicule of personal beliefs, if an atheist is expected to accept religious friends believing that the atheist will be punished because they're an unbeliever, then it's only fair to accept the criticism of those beliefs.

[50 shades of black + 254]

I have conservative friends - and even Conservative friends - but I try not to discuss politics with them or we'd end up not being friends for much longer. Sometimes arguments become an obstacle for those who are too rigid

[Petar + 76]

It's not 'only' politics. It's hospital, school, library and social care cuts. It's atos assessing terminally ill people as 'fit for work'. It's demonising homeless and poor people as sub-human...so, if you have disagrees on this points, how can you be in coalition 

[damirUSBiH + 327]

Trouble is that many leftists radicals in UK dislike the EU nearly as much as Tory boys. Leftist think it's a capitalist conspiracy, loony right wingers think it's a commie plot.

[Guillaume Albasini + 851]

If you have a country where the political spectrum is always divided on the same axis you will have a growing polarization and two group of people that will be less and less talking to the other group. Imagine for instance a country where the north  is rural, conservative, catholic, nationalist and poor and the south is urban, liberal, protestant, globalist and rich. You will always have this north-south divide. And if one side is more powerful than the other, the political winners will always be on the same side heading to a growing discontent from the minority.

But if you have instead fracture lines that are not overlapping, you will have shifting majorities that will depend on the nature of the political confrontation. Is it mainly a fight on a left-right axis, or a urban-countryside, or nationalist-globalist, or rich-poor axis ? You will sometimes be on the winning majority and sometimes on the losing side but you have to maintain the links with your political adversaries because today's opponents can be part of a future alliance.

This is why a country like Switzerland successfully maintained together 26 cantons having different languages, religions, levels of wealth or urbanization. You have german-speaking cantons, french-speaking cantons and even an italian-speaking canton.  Sometimes you can have a referendum where the german speaking cantons vote no and the french and Italian  cantons vote yes and the referendum is rejected,  the majority of the population and  cantons being german-speaking. If this was always the case the minorities would have been tempted to secede from the country. But in some other referendums the divide is more between urban and rural cantons or between catholic and protestant cantons. or relates to level of wealth or political orientation. And these divisions are not overlapping the language divide. You will find rural cantons or catholic cantons on the german side as well as on the french side. So each canton can from time to time be part of a winning political majority.

Coming back to our Brexit main topic, its interesting to see that on this topic the divide is not the usual one between Tories and Labour but crosses the party lines. You have Tories brexiters as well as Labour brexiters and on the remain side you will also find Tories and Labour members. So on both sides of the political spectrum it's a good opportunity to work with some of your usual opponents. And it can be a good way to avoid a growing polarization.