Two from Scotland
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2014-09-02 12:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-09-02 02:02 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-09-02 04:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-09-03 12:41 am (UTC)I never even thought about the idea of redesigning the UK flag if Scotland becomes independent. I don't have an opinion on Scottish independence (don't know nearly enough about all the issues involved to even feel entitled to have one, really), but as an American with mostly British ancestry, I'm very attached to the Union Jack I understand about the history behind it, but all that aside, it's just such a beautiful flag, visually stunning, really. If it was replaced with something else, I would miss it greatly.
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Date: 2014-09-03 12:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-09-02 11:27 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-09-02 12:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-09-02 12:14 pm (UTC)And
"Democracies .... when a region doesn't want to be part of the whole any more, they can often peacefully secede..."
Tell that to the CSA or Orange Republic or Rhodesia or Montana Militia.
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Date: 2014-09-02 12:48 pm (UTC)(Interesting trivia: The Queen of England and the Queen of Canada are not the same person. Oh, sure, they're both currently Elizabeth Windsor, but they don't HAVE to be. The fact that the rules of succession are currently the same for both means that they'll continue to be the same person for a while yet, but there's no particular reason why one set of rules or the other could change, resulting in the title splitting. And they're LEGALLY two different people in a bunch of fun ways.)
the CSA
The Slavers' problem was that in addition to attempting to secede, they demanded a bunch of shit from the North, then attacked the North *first* for failing to give them the shit they wanted fast enough. And in the end, their entire state was built on atrocity - even if they hadn't attacked first, conquering them would have eventually been realised to be a moral imperative on the level of "stop Nazi Germany".
(Also? Not a modern democracy. There's a ton of imperial colonialism *pervading* the 19th century that hadn't yet been beaten out of Western society by the 20th century.)
Orange Republic
Successful free state, eventually peacefully absorbed into a neighbour. Pissed off the British somewhat fierce, of course, but *1850s*. Same pre-modern objection.
Rhodesia
White supremacist state attempting to enforce slavery against majority of own inhabitants. Their problem was *not* that Britain objected to them leaving, nor was that a failure of a peaceful attempt at democratic secession.
Montana Militia
Paranoid racist conspiracy theorists who went straight to armed resistance against a nonexistent existential threat, and at no time had any credibility. No peaceful democratic secession was ever attempted.
For examples of it working, contrast with the remnants of the British Empire. in the 18th century the US rebelled and the French kept the British from suppressing it, resulting in US independence: this is our baseline. Fast forward, India made itself really annoying until the British gave up, without open war. Even more recently, Australia and Canada took a vote, sent a letter, and were happily waved on our way.
(Even more recently: Quebec took a vote about peacefully seceding from Canada. And failed: they voted to stay. But there were no credible threats or expectations of invasion-if-vote-succeeds or rebellion-if-vote-fails.)
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Date: 2014-09-02 01:05 pm (UTC)Yes, that makes sense.
When I referred to Orange Republic I was actually thinking more about Boer Wars, 1877-1904, not 1850.
Rhodesia did attempt to seceed peacefully (at least there was at no time an armed rebellion of Rhodesians against UK).
And really what do you expect is going to happen nowadays if some backwood county in Montana or Arizona held a local referendum and voted to be an independent Republic? It's not THAT impossible given some money to buy enough land and move enough people into some small county to get such a vote.
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Date: 2014-09-02 01:13 pm (UTC)Yes, but the *failure* of Rhodesia had nothing to do with the peacefulness of their secession, and everything to do with their attempt to make slaves of people who objected to that.
And really what do you expect is going to happen nowadays if some backwood county in Montana or Arizona held a local referendum and voted to be an independent Republic?
The USA is a weird case. Extreme-right-wing violent societies like the USA tend not to deal well with this kind of thing, and the smaller your group, the less viable it is as a country..
But if you had a middling-sized province like Texas deciding to secede, holding an honest verified referendum, and having a peaceful plan to leave? I honestly don't know how the USA would handle it, but I would expect a civilised country to let it happen. With the US, flip a coin.
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Date: 2014-09-03 12:30 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-09-02 05:30 pm (UTC)Wat? (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCxFf8rOwpw)
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Date: 2014-09-02 07:07 pm (UTC)Although, as others have explained, that's not what is being proposed anyway.
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Date: 2014-09-03 01:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-09-03 10:33 pm (UTC)The UK is a modern western democracy with a liberal political tradition and which is signed up to the European Convention of Human Rights. It's no liberal utopia, but people are not prosecuted for being opposed to the monarchy or for republican campaigns.
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Date: 2014-09-04 09:06 am (UTC)What amazed me about ECHR is how it didn't stop courts in UK from forcing people to testify against themselves.
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Date: 2014-09-04 06:39 pm (UTC)The ECHR is currently in the process of forcing the UK into universal suffrage, which is surprisingly controversial... but not as surprising as it seemingly not being part of the US constitution.
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Date: 2014-09-02 05:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-09-03 08:25 pm (UTC)<img src="http://i.imgur.com/VQFK0Hv.jpg">
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