Election Hangover: Snap Labour post-mortem

Where did it all go wrong?


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Jark

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Sorry if it's too soon but in this era of passing judgment on everything immediately, let's pass judgment on where it all went so horribly wrong for Labour this time around.

I don't want to talk about the Tories here (or anywhere tbh). I just want to know how people see the Labour campaign in very fresh hindsight.
 
Hindsight is a beautiful thing but I guess there should have been more focus on the fact that he didn't beat Theresa May when she was so weak. The "bounce" was overstated and the media were not going to make the same mistake twice.
 
I realise now I was in complete denial of just how much people hate Corbyn. I genuinely thought after the last election that he was winning people over, or at least people were just going to lump him, but I was clearly incredibly wrong. :D
 
It's funny - he is genuinely absolutely loathed among older voters. In my liberal Facebook bubble he's beloved among 20-somethings, but we're a vocal minority. Everybody of my parents' generation and particularly the generation above them seems to have a lot of negative sentiment.

My dad refused to vote Labour because of Corbyn, preferring to vote Lib Dem, even though I aggressively gave him shit about that choice. He didn't have much of a defense either - only that he couldn't consider a vote for Corbyn.
 
I guess in the way there is a cult of personality, it also works the opposite way.
 
I mean, Brexit Party standing down from over 100 seats handed the election on a plate - this combined with the public loathing of Corbyn and stubborn resistance to making an electoral pact with the Lib Dem’s (resulting in VERY clear vote splits) sealed the deal.

I don’t think a Lib Dem pact would have changed too much either for what it’s worth.
 
There are a whole range of issues that cost us this election.

Jeremy - he was extremely unpopular with the public and an ineffective leader. He lacked pragmatism and trust and his history counted against him. In Scotland and the North of England he was seen as part of the out of touch lefty London elite.

The manifesto - too many promises to deliver on in one term of government. The free broadband thing went down quite poorly.

Brexit - It took us far too long to come to a position that balanced the views of both leave and remain supporters. The position itself was just confusing and pleased no one. It was hard to convey in a way that voters could understand.

Anti-semitism - The party should have been far more prompt and robust in dealing with this. The lack of leadership exacerbated the issue.

Momentum/Len McCluskey & Unite - They hold far too much influence over Jeremy and the party as a whole. Their attempts to deselect MPs and install their own candidates made us look divided and rife with infighting. Unite tried it in my constituency days before the election was called on the basis our MP had been critical of Jeremy. There was no support for it and it backfired. It caused a lot of ill feeling and division.

Scotland - The independence referendum sunk Labour in Scotland and they’ve never recovered. The SNP have moulded themselves as the centre-left party up here while the Tories are the party to keep Scotland in the UK. Labour have struggled to carve out a clear role for themselves meaning there’s no chance of reclaiming the 30-40 seats they held for decades.

Labour is effectively splitting from a broad church into several parties representing different groups with different aims and priorities:
- the liberal, middle-class degree holding voters
- younger voters, students and ethnic minorities
- traditional left working class and socially conservative blue collar workers.
 
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I realise now I was in complete denial of just how much people hate Corbyn. I genuinely thought after the last election that he was winning people over, or at least people were just going to lump him, but I was clearly incredibly wrong. :D
I think that election was less Corbyn more May.
 
It was a total disaster but also predictable. He didn't play the game. If he wanted to keep those votes he should have focused on Brexit and clarified his stance. Even Theresa May said we're all Brexiteers now and we all thought she was a disaster but he's turned out to be even worse.
 
All of the above in terms of where the blame lies.

- Corbyn was simply never a widely popular or trusted leader outside the momentum bubble. Yes, that's a big bubble and the movement he inspired is not to be dismissed, but it was never a credible opposition.

- Two years of fence sitting on Brexit really came home to roost. It was right to try to move the conversation away from that, but ultimately people just wanted certainty, one way or another.

- Antisemitism. Fair or not, he handled it dreadfully and it just never went away.

- Over promising. Yes, it's really sad that we couldn't vote for hope because God knows the Tory manifesto is filled with lies and fantasies, but it just didn't wash. People have been conditioned to expect less, and a campaign that promised free broadband felt lightweight and undeliverable.
 
One thing that really needs to be digested is that this is a resounding failure for Corbyn's brand of socialism. It's not 'something to build on', it's not 'better than it could have been'. It's a bottoming-out moment. There needs to be a complete re-evaluation of what Labour stands for and how it's going to connect with working people.

As I've said throughout this election, that doesn't mean lurching back to Blairism. But I'm terrified that the membership will double down and learn nothing from this.
 
Ms Game is on the money. There's so much shit here:

- Years of the media telling us that Corbyn is loathsome - shock horror, people think he's loathsome
- The centrist demand that they are the point of unity - why couldn't they get behind him and his policies?
- Antisemitism. Some racisms clearly outweigh others, so fuck the racism and Islamophobia of the Tories, fuck the acknowledgement that this is a racist country, the racism that got all the attention was in Labour.
- Brexit. The simplicity of the slogan. The continued desire that people have to self-harm through this. Labour's second referendum offer. Brexit Party. Again, the media has been blaming Labour for blocking Brexit, so is it any surprise that the Leavers refused to vote for them?
- The BBC and media essentially amount to state propaganda

I feel more than ever that Brexit is something that this country has to get out of its system. People don't care for the warnings, they don't care about the racism. They want this nationalist project to come to fruition so that they can have their moment of glory. So have it. Let's do the Brexit purge. When it fails, maybe then people will start to take inclusion and healing seriously.
 
That´s where we are now unfortunately(it´s been clear for a while to be fair).

We need to let people have "their Brexit" and their Johnson government, and see it for what it is. Even if it means the destruction of public services, a slump in living standards across the boards and Scottish independence etc.

To beat an old horse, things will inevitably have to get worse before they get better.
 
Let Brexit happen right now. Burst that cyst. The 52% will never let it go if not.

We have to go through all this to even think about getting better.
 
Also the ruthless Tory propaganda machine is almost unbeatable at the moment.
 
Yeah, anyone still clinging to the idea that we can remain in the EU is delusional at this point. That fight has been lost.
 
Yeah, anyone still clinging to the idea that we can remain in the EU is delusional at this point. That fight has been lost.

Why the hell would the EU want us? We've just elected an openly-racist, misogynist, islamophobic, transphobic, homophobic, blubbering privileged imbicile as Prime Minister by a fucking landslide. They#ll be delighted when we fuck off and take Farage, Widdicombe and co with us.
 
Did I read that Widdecombe lost to a gay remainer?
 
It seems like we've entered the time for ironic punishments.

"Oh, you want Brexit, do you? Here, have all the Brexit in the world."

I'm not sure how to respond to that. But when people have consistently voted for something that we believe will harm the nation, there's not much option left than to realise that they ARE going to get it and we should stop holding onto the hope that it can be salvaged now. The leave-remain conversation is, for now, dead.
 
Why the hell would the EU want us? We've just elected an openly-racist, misogynist, islamophobic, transphobic, homophobic, blubbering privileged imbicile as Prime Minister by a fucking landslide. They#ll be delighted when we fuck off and take Farage, Widdicombe and co with us.

It's no secret that Brexit will hurt the EU too, but for a while now they've been prioritising stability and damage control. So yes, they'll be keen on a smooth transition now.
 
Yeah, anyone still clinging to the idea that we can remain in the EU is delusional at this point. That fight has been lost.

True. It has to happen now and has horrible as it will be for many id say it´s extremely important that it DOES happen.
 
It seems like we've entered the time for ironic punishments.

"Oh, you want Brexit, do you? Here, have all the Brexit in the world."

I mean, where else is there to go with the argument? It´s dead.

It might sound spiteful but you are literally left with "Have it and see how you like it.."
 
I really can't wait for it to dawn on all those Brits abroad who voted Leave from their Spanish holiday homes...
 
It was Brexit. Labour failed to spot that the dial moved after May's struggles and the European elections. Doubling down on another referendum to block the Lib Dems in more fashionable seats, even as Swinson turned out to be a complete paper tiger, is why Labour have lost so badly. The obvious place for "sensible pragmatism" was on Brexit. I've been saying that for months. It might not have won an election but it would've stemmed the blood.

Of course, Labour had a few other problems, here are some black-pills and spicy takes.

The manifesto was confused and way too long. The platform should have focused on a few key goals, with the more ambitious stuff like free broadband and decarbonisation by 2030 (I'm sorry, but most voters see radical environmental policy as regressive and unfair, even if we're all going to die) saved for when Corbyn was firmly in office. Too many of these promises were geared towards the middle-class, coated in this mildly creepy paternalism towards the worker. Localism and restoring the money cut from local government by the Tories should have been the main focus, apart from leaving the EU.

The movement has failed to break out of London and a couple of other strongholds. As well as in the North, Labour have been decimated here in the Midlands. My constituency was a 20-vote majority for Labour last time, it's now 11,500 for the Tories. That isn't coming back for a while. Electing Starmer, Thornberry or any other Remainer London MP like those two as leader, would be absolutely suicidal here and tantamount to abandoning these seats for good.

Corbyn is a good man, I'm gutted for him and John McDonnell on a personal basis, but he's weak. His lack of leadership experience, or alternatively a ruthless streak, ended up with a party out of control. He was pulled in two different directions, between centrist moderation on Brexit and grating faux-radicalism on other issues, by wings of the party that honestly now seem equally reviled by the electorate. It's worth mentioning that every MP deselected by Johnson lost their seat, as did every former and current member of Change UK. Again, deselections are not election-winners, but it would've been a direct route to a more unified message.

I'm sceptical about the impact of the debates and other TV appearances, they're very secondary and Johnson barely bothered with them. If it was a narrow defeat, then I'd be more inclined to blame the media, but this is an absolute blow-out. Navel-gazing about BBC bias and demanding socialism via Andrew Neil will always be a fruitless waste of time and energy.

I don't know where to go from here, really. Suggesting random MPs names like bingo numbers isn't the solution though. The failures were mostly on policy and praying the wishes of half the base on Europe would disappear. Win back the traditional base and the rest will follow, I suppose.
 
The movement has failed to break out of London and a couple of other strongholds. As well as in the North, Labour have been decimated here in the Midlands. My constituency was a 20-vote majority for Labour last time, it's now 11,500 for the Tories. That isn't coming back for a while. Electing Starmer, Thornberry or any other Remainer London MP like those two as leader, would be absolutely suicidal here and tantamount to abandoning these seats for good.

What makes you think electing a 'remainer' MP would be suicidal when the Brexit debate won't be a factor in 2024? I sincerely doubt there'll be a serious campaign to rejoin, if it were even feasible. That *would* be suicidal.

If anything, the Conservatives consistently do well because as much as they're seen as champagne swilling metropolitan elites, they also manage to convince people that they're 'sensible', economically speaking. They won in working class seats, but for the most part not by standing working class MPs.

Obviously I'm not saying we should field a bunch of private school Londoners across the country next time, just food for thought. I like Rayner because she comes across like an actual person, but I do slightly wonder if working class self-loathing would work against her against the slick Tory machine.
 
Corbyn didnt pull a blinder. The Brexit message was confused. These things are true and contributed.

But. And I don't say this lightly, but this election was lost in the northern, Midlands and Welsh heartlands. This election was lost because of working class fucking morons who read biased newspapers and what their mate John says. It was lost on the propaganda war where lying and cheating is absolutely acceptable and slandering your opponent is the only way to win. It was won by billionaire newspapers, Laura fucking Kuntsberg, bullshit and cuntery.
 
I agree. My uncle came home declaring that he 'had' to vote for the Tories cos his butcher friend insisted that it was the right thing to do. I totally understand the frustration that people have with the condescension cast at working class people, but I don't want to lose sight of the fact that this is all a product of the anti-intellectualisation of our communities and societies. It's really fucking hard for all of us to decipher what is right or wrong, true or false in the information war/noise being thrown our way constantly, coupled with the encouragement that we should play the morons who do nothing but dutifully consume.
 
That's the aspect that really makes me feel the most hopeless, because how on earth do you combat it?

As I said last night, the Labour party had the more motivated and engaged membership, by far. They were at the rallies, they were knocking on doors, working flat out to change hearts and minds. But they just couldn't compete with the media. It wasn't even close.

What I will say is, yes the Press threw a lot of shit at Corbyn, much of it unfair and untrue. But he was also an exceptionally easy target. Labour really do need somebody next time for whom the charges of communism and antisemitism dont stick so easily.
 
What makes you think electing a 'remainer' MP would be suicidal when the Brexit debate won't be a factor in 2024? I sincerely doubt there'll be a serious campaign to rejoin, if it were even feasible. That *would* be suicidal.

If anything, the Conservatives consistently do well because as much as they're seen as champagne swilling metropolitan elites, they also manage to convince people that they're 'sensible', economically speaking. They won in working class seats, but for the most part not by standing working class MPs.

Obviously I'm not saying we should field a bunch of private school Londoners across the country next time, just food for thought. I like Rayner because she comes across like an actual person, but I do slightly wonder if working class self-loathing would work against her against the slick Tory machine.

Because I don't think the public opinion on Europe will have shifted much by 2024, especially if the EU continues on the path towards federalisation.

We've seen with this election that the Tories will bullshit effectively and relentlessly about past statements and hypothetical future positions. Not only do Starmer and particularly Thornberry already come across as aloof elitists (the white van man scandal was stupid, but it was revealing and people still bring it up), but they'll be painted as wanting to rejoin the EU, adopt the Euro and become part of the Schengen area.

I'd be surprised if either of them genuinely changes their position on Brexit. Like many New New Labour MPs, they represent a different set of people and it's not in their class interests. We'll end up with a Rejoin message targeted at a group of people who aren't numerous or concentrated in area enough to win an election.

You can debate whether Brexit will be punitive for the working-class and I'm certain Johnson doesn't give a shit about our interests, but it's difficult to dismiss this election as not being a class revolt like people did with the original referendum.

Labour have got to meet the voters in these left-behind constituencies where they are on the issue now, because the alternative has been a spectacular failure. I knew it would bite them in the arse but I didn't think it would be this bad.
 
You can't compete with it. There are only two options - you take it down or you become complicit. The first can't happen and the second is a fucking outrage. It's entirely right that you should be sad about it. Fuck this country. :)
 
I agree with you that there should be no talk of 'rejoin' for at least a generation. I have faith that Labour will realise that, though. For what it's worth I'm not sure Thornberry is the unifying figure Labour needs either. I'd be more confident with Starmer. But I think they're both pragmatic enough to now accept the writing on the wall RE Brexit and keep the focus on what remains of the NHS and other social issues while rebuilding trust with the people they lost this time around.
 
the anti-intellectualisation of our communities and societies.
Going to Uni during this era and then going back to a very average office environment, highlighted this in such a saddening way.
 
I do wonder that once we leave the EU (:() how much Brexit will still play a part. The almost Orwellian Tory propaganda machine will keep working overdrive but their main weapon will be dulled. Obviously it will satisfy an itch, but the issues won't go.

I'm so sad today.
 

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