For anyone who voted leave in the UK referendum, the month of March was a tough one to swallow.
Instead of leaving the EU on the 29th as planned, MPs instead shot down Theresa May’s eleventh hour attempt to lock in a short extension of Article 50, which she said would “guarantee Brexit”.
Now, after a string of failed attempts by MPs to take control of anything, Brexit Day has been shunted back to Halloween.
In response, someone, apparently an aggrieved Leave voter spent 87 British pounds on an obituary in The Times.
Who died? UK democracy, apparently.
It reads:
UK Democracy on 29th March 2019, aged 312.
It was with sad regret that Democracy died quietly in her sleep at 11pm, on the 29th March 2019. The cause of death was by foul play and the culprits have yet to be brought to justice. Democracy campaigned for the rule of law, human rights and free elections. She listened to everyone and favoured the majority in all her decisions. She will be sorely missed. God have mercy on her soul.
Sobering stuff.
The obit is reminiscent of the infamous entry in the now-defunct The Sporting Times, which lamented the death of British cricket on 29 August 1882 when Australia beat England for the first time.
When England next toured Australia the bails were indeed burned and placed in an urn and thus the Ashes was born.
But if you think it’s a bit over the top to pen an ode in The Times’ renowned births and deaths column, then just take a look at the other dramatic proclamations currently dominating British politics.
This weekend, Labour MP David Lammy sparked a row after claiming that comparing the pro-Brexit European Research Group to the Nazis is not “strong enough”.
In a highly-charged interview, the MP for Tottenham suggested that the group of ardent Tory Brexiteers – led by Jacob Rees-Mogg – was offering cover for “thugs on the ground”.
His comments led to outrage online, with Tory MP Conor Burns describing the comparison as “batshit”.
Faced with footage of himself at a rally comparing the ERG to the Nazis and racists in South Africa during Apartheid – which BBC’s Andrew Marr said was “unacceptable” – Lammy replied: “I would say that wasn’t strong enough.”