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thisbluespiritWe just left the EU. I didn't think it would really happen when it came to it. The thing is, regardless of what rational reasons there might be to vote Leave (because life and politics is always complex, regardless of where I stand in them), this campaign wasn't run on them; we didn't hear any of them - it was run from start to finish on pure hate for all 'foreigners'. And 72% of Britons came out and voted, 48% Remain, 52% Leave. And a good portion of the Remain vote was Scotland alone, so England (and sadly even Wales) is even more proportionally to blame.
My country is a xenophobic, racist country. It's official. We voted Leave because we have an island mentality and we hate the rest of Europe and all immigrants. It would be lovely to think it was at least for other reasons, but that's not what the Leave campaign was about, so I don't have the luxury of clinging to illusions . I'd really, really have liked to believe that the Leave people were a noisy unpleasant minority, but they're not. They're at least half of us and so we'd risk economic collapse, all for hate, misplaced blame and flag-waving. (But, Europe, nearly half of us don't hate you. What can we say?)
What the practical fall-out will be, who knows. It looks like we're set for more recession at least in the short term and possibly Boris Johnson as PM by October. I just hope, the political climate being what it is, none of the rest of these right-wingers in Europe feel inclined to follow our example. The world needs the other countries to at least try and be better than us. It shouldn't be too difficult right now.
My country is a xenophobic, racist country. It's official. We voted Leave because we have an island mentality and we hate the rest of Europe and all immigrants. It would be lovely to think it was at least for other reasons, but that's not what the Leave campaign was about, so I don't have the luxury of clinging to illusions . I'd really, really have liked to believe that the Leave people were a noisy unpleasant minority, but they're not. They're at least half of us and so we'd risk economic collapse, all for hate, misplaced blame and flag-waving. (But, Europe, nearly half of us don't hate you. What can we say?)
What the practical fall-out will be, who knows. It looks like we're set for more recession at least in the short term and possibly Boris Johnson as PM by October. I just hope, the political climate being what it is, none of the rest of these right-wingers in Europe feel inclined to follow our example. The world needs the other countries to at least try and be better than us. It shouldn't be too difficult right now.
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 11:11 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 24 Jun 2016 11:20 am (UTC)And, to be fair, we are an island, but our massive shared delusion that we are thus not part of Europe and wishing to constantly recreate the moment in WWII where we stood alone is not a thing that should get in the way of just being part of the EU!
But, yeah, it's an eye-opener - a single-issue vote like this, campaigned as this one has been on the strength of xenophobia. Scary. But one must never underestimate teh STUPID and how many people will now be going, "Oh, but I didn't realise it meant x..." But yeah. Now we know. This is what we have to change!
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 08:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 25 Jun 2016 11:49 am (UTC)I mean, I wrote this in my first shocked reaction and I'll have to hope that we can all make some good come of it, but I'm still sitting here in useless horror at what just happened. For the moment, everything is up in the air and there's no telling what next. But, as I said, we'd all better hope and work for good if we can. :-/
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Date: 25 Jun 2016 01:17 am (UTC)This. So much this. The EU is not perfect and there may indeed be some sensible reasons to consider leaving the EU, but that's not the basis on which this referendum was fought. I never heard those arguments, all I heard was bigotry and xenophobia that made me cling tighter to my conviction that the EU was something worth keeping.
I was nearly vibrating with rage earlier. Unspeakably sad right now.
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Date: 25 Jun 2016 12:07 pm (UTC)I keep alternating between horror and anger and grief now. I know things can and hopefully will still all work out, maybe even for better than we had, but to needlessly do even the damage we've done so far is just awful, let alone the potential for what could follow if we're all unlucky.
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 09:21 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 24 Jun 2016 09:23 am (UTC)ETA: Just Googled; the other sites have "a huge turnout of 72%" too, so that 27% must be a typo. 72% is enough to give a suggestion, given that the remainder would be undecideds/don't cares/people who failed to make it for some reason and who probably would fall (if pushed) into a similar divide. We are a racist country. We just went to the polls and proved it.
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 09:26 am (UTC)Just... Why? WHY? :(
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 09:29 am (UTC)Just... Why? WHY?
I know. ♥
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 10:42 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 24 Jun 2016 11:22 am (UTC)Anyway, now we know what we have to change from this point onwards. Somehow!
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 11:12 am (UTC)And Cameron, who let this evil genie out, has resigned; run away and left other people to clean up his shitstorm. Pah!
Sorry //end rant\\
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 11:25 am (UTC)And as to Cameron, much as I do blame him for a lot of this, if we get Boris instead, I'm now sorry to see him go!
And don't worry. It's the sort of day for rants. I don't get political very often.
I'm going to look at this way: Now we know exactly how bad things are, we know what we have to change. Somehow, someway...
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Date: 25 Jun 2016 06:25 am (UTC)Anyways, thanks for letting me rant on your LJ!
Onwards and upwards!
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 11:33 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 24 Jun 2016 11:38 am (UTC)Things are rarely the end! I'm not sure whether, right now, it's more or less dispiriting to think that. But I'm going to, and I'm going to do any little bit I can to change this toxic atmosphere, tiny as that truly will be.
I sincerely hope you people can manage to keep Trump out, though! Because, hey, you can't come to England to escape; we're just busy pulling up the drawbridge.
It's not certain about Scotland yet, but it looks as though, given how solidly Remain Scotland was, there will be another Referendum and they will probably leave us. It takes time to leave, though, apparently - maybe something will save us yet...
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 12:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 24 Jun 2016 12:41 pm (UTC)*hugs you hard*
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 12:55 pm (UTC)But, yeah, last night I hoped come this morning it'd all be over and done with & we could get on with things, and now we're quite seriously contemplating not only leaving the EU but the break-up of the UK.
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 01:13 pm (UTC)I am hoping beyond hope that the problems with the EU work themselves out. That this truly is a turning point for everyone involved and that it comes out better than it could ever be expected. But then, we're dealing with human beings...and sometimes, it has to get worse before it gets better. Let's hope this is the 'worse'. :(
Heard Cameron resigned...which should be a bright point, but it just feels like he put the tempest in the teapot, let the UK release it then ran away like a little bitty bug that he is. *is disgusted*
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 01:34 pm (UTC)There is a huge amount of xenophobia and bigotry involved, but I think also it's partly a huge anger from the working classes at being shafted. Maybe aimed at the wrong gov't, because they stand to lose most now - but it does show how broken things are. Until now, people have been pretending they weren't - so maybe, in the end, it will be a wake up call. I think we all need to hope so and do what we can. We can't hate half the country back - it won't help anything.
And the murder was tragic, but Jo Cox's husband didn't lash out at today's victory: he tweeted this.
The scary thing is about whether we inspire anyone else to leave the EU - but let's hope not!
ETA: And, yes, Cameron does seem to have run quite fast, but I don't know what to think about that, right now. If only Nigel Farage and Boris Johnson had run away instead!
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 01:47 pm (UTC)True. The working classes all over have been angry for a long time. Having to pick between paying bills and eating will do that. Especially when you bust your hump for (most of the time) 60+ hours with nothing to show for it. And yeah, hate never solves anything. Hoping a lot of people will realize that.
What a marvelous man. He does his wife (and his country) credit. Blessings to him and his small ones.
Gosh, I hope not!! I really, really do...
Right?!?! OMG...
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 01:41 pm (UTC)If Scotland wanted to stay, does that mean that Scottish independence will be voted on again, and could win this time?
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 05:25 pm (UTC)And, yes. Scotland are now talking about a second INdepdence Referendum, while Northern Ireland is discussing joining the Republic of Ireland, and Spain wants joint ownership of Gibraltar (it also voted Remain). I wish it was a joke. It's not. (For some reason, Wales went with England on the Leave vote, which is baffling. But they are already wanting to make their own arrangements with the EU regardless.)
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Date: 25 Jun 2016 03:24 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 24 Jun 2016 01:55 pm (UTC)And the only comfort I can give you is cold: you're now, like us, living in what some excellent writer, referenced by
This will change the world. And that's the frightening thing.
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 05:38 pm (UTC)I don't always have the spoons, so I'm not sure about being linked to. I thought this person also put it well and maybe they wouldn't mind? I wrote this in my initial shock and while I still think it's true; it's also true that a lot of the xenophobia and Leave voting was whipped up out of anger and powerlessness from the working classes - who now stand to suffer even more in consequence. Stuff never is simple. But the xenophobia and the validation it has given people to be racist here today is appalling. Thank you for the compliment though! ♥
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Date: 25 Jun 2016 08:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 25 Jun 2016 08:12 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 24 Jun 2016 03:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 24 Jun 2016 05:30 pm (UTC)*hugs*
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 06:08 pm (UTC)Yep, we've basically screwed the country, and potentially half the world, by accident. Sorry everyone. What's worse is that the majority of young people - ie, those who will really be affected by all this - voted to stay. So we've screwed them over too. Sorry kids.
At this rate, Cameron is going to be remembered as the bloke who did a Pontius Pilate on a whole country. "Don't look at me! All I did was ask a lot of unqualified people to make a complicated economic decision for me. Not my fault they didn't know what they were doing. Bye!"
*headdesk* doesn't begin to cover it.
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 07:36 pm (UTC)(Although I'd take that Googling thing with a pinch of salt - I mean, the easiest way to get at news this morning would be to Google "EU"!)
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 08:13 pm (UTC)I guess the reason I'm a little more optimistic is that I'm aware of the reasons why people around here voted out, and it's not (predominately) xenophobic, but admittedly that's hardly a nationwide sample. But yeah, I'm seeing comments from good people today who are afraid now in a way that they haven't been before, just because they weren't born in this country, or because they aren't white. And I don't know what to say to them.
Mind you, within twelve hours of the result being announced, the Leave lot were saying "Whoops! Mistake!" about the £350M thing, and saying that immigration won't go down. So goodness knows what all the Leave voters are thinking right now.
PS: Saw this on Twitter, and it amused me. Good to have something to smile about: https://twitter.com/NicholasPegg/status/746061996089577472
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 06:35 pm (UTC)With you in that dreadful sense of shock and loss, darling. I’ll keep my fingers crossed so that you guys don’t suffer too heavily from the parting… and obviously, for the future of the whole of the EU itself.
If you want an outsider’s perspective though—I don’t fully agree with the way you’re perceiving the implications of this vote about the British people. What I mean is, I don’t believe it means the British are a xenophobic country at the core, and I don’t believe this is a British problem, either. Maybe people in your comments brought up Donald Trump as the most glaring example, but I’m having chills at how close the National Front will probably come to office in my country next year, and populism and nationalism are on the rise all throughout Europe. (Even Germany, deeply traumatized as it was by its history—although I’m not saying at all that the AfD are anything like the nazis, obviously! But only a few years back I was noticing that Germany seemed to be one of a few exceptions when it came to the rise of the extreme right. That doesn’t appear to be so clearly the case.)
We all have two major challenges on our hands—the economic crisis and the migrant crisis—and the EU is an easy target to blame for the two. Easy targets have always been hit hard, in all of human history. The EU also has its own shortcomings and difficulties, which makes it all the more difficult to argue its case. The UK went first, because your country is somewhat specific in its history and identity. It is an island, and without meaning to be too simplistic, the island feeling is something we clearly perceive from a mainland-Europe POV. You already had some distance with the EU (not being in the Eurozone and a few other things). You were one step back, and that was one step closer to getting out. Unfortunately, your politicians took that step. But again you are not alone; this very morning we hear the National Front coining the word “Frexit” and the very idea makes me want to scream. The anti-Europe feeling is everywhere and it’s up to every of its 28 (damn it, still counting you) people to fight it, because Europe is a wonderful idea that deserves so much better than what it’s getting.
And xenophobia… Xenophobia is an easy, ugly human reflex. Again, I’m not sure it means a whole country is rotten at the core. But it is a matter of atmosphere, an atmosphere that’s nourished that the wrong politicians and the wrong media narratives and disruptive, misleading voices. It all plays not on hatred, not for the majority, but on fear—fear that, in turn, breeds hostility. One doesn’t hate foreigners, or care nothing at all for the Syrian children—simply, they’re frightened about their job, their security, their everyday life, their concerns and uncertainties. It’s not something to be proud of. But it’s an inherent part of human nature, a part we can overcome only by getting together instead of letting ourselves become more and more divided… and for that we also need solid, ethical, inspiring politicians with a vision. Those are all too scarce, unfortunately :(
That comment is rather bittersweet, I’m aware—I’m pretty much arguing “You know, the UK isn’t alone! We’re all on the same boat and it appears to be taking water!”. I don’t want to think it means doom… or else we may as well give up already, right? I want to hope this will be a wake-up call for the EU to reform itself, to become something stronger, more united, more inspiring. As long as it keeps feeling so remote and every people is only concerned with keeping its own tight control, it can’t work right. And I hope that if this better version of the EU is born someday, you guys can find your place back within it. The journey will be hard… but maybe we can get there eventually!
(I’m not looking to launch into an in-depth debate here, so please don’t feel the slightest obligation to respond if you’re feeling too tired! I just thought you might be interested to hear a continental-Europe perspective, and I really wanted to raise those points when I read your post. The British are a brilliant, flawed, human people. Like all of us. And politics and society seem to get scarier every day… but let’s not let that kill all of our hopes.)
♥
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Date: 24 Jun 2016 07:32 pm (UTC)So, yes, actually I agree with you. I was just disgusted initially - and I still think we have to take that in and work to discourage hate, but,no, I don't think we're specially awful, and no I don't think people weren't reacting out of fear and anger and worry over the situation as it was. But I didn't amend the post, because to a certain extent it is absolutely true and we can't pretend it isn't.
I am worried for all of us, with all this fascism on the rise everywhere! Us leaving the EU at any other time would probably still be terrible for us - but not shake up everyone else so much.
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Date: 27 Jun 2016 07:23 am (UTC)Yes, I get what you mean—the hate isn't rooted at the core of the people themselves, but fear and hate are what is used to drive them. Such political messages are just disgusting and it can be just terrifying to feel they're actually effective in convincing people, so I'm not surprised the outcome is so very painful for you :( Again, I also dread the way things are shaping up in France and we haven't had such a major event yet… Ugh.
That disgust and shock are perfectly legitimate, so there was no reason whatsoever to amend anything! There is the distance one can take to analyse things, and there is the gut reaction—and it's painful. That's normal and healthy—people everywhere reacting with their hearts and their anger are the proof that a good part of the UK is attached to Europe and doesn't want to close itself off…
Yeah, I just don't know how the consequences are going to turn out, what with the uncertainties about the whole process, and the EU's political leaders talking a lot about having to change things but apparently not having a clue how. We can only hope… ♥
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Date: 27 Jun 2016 08:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 29 Jun 2016 12:31 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 25 Jun 2016 03:55 am (UTC)What a mess.
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Date: 25 Jun 2016 11:41 am (UTC)I don't recognise my country any more, but I suppose it was always like this underneath. :-(
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Date: 25 Jun 2016 04:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 25 Jun 2016 11:47 am (UTC)Nigel Farage is despicable. And I am getting angry at all the people who are saying that it wasn't really about nationalism and xenophobia. I mean, lots of people voted leave for lots of reasons, including some very good ones, but they still had to feel it was worth the risk of getting into bed with UKIP, so it is about nationalism. It shouldn't have been, but thanks to Nigel Farage it was, and that won. I was still in shock when I wrote this & probably harsher than I should have been, but honestly, it's not untrue. The irony of people here celebrating with the Union Jack even as Scotland makes arrangements to try and leave is choking me.
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Date: 25 Jun 2016 03:02 pm (UTC)It's madness.
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Date: 25 Jun 2016 04:23 pm (UTC)*hugs you*
Still, I didn't expect leaving to produce such a reaction and I think we broke things hard enough to make everybody stop and think - and let's all hope that we can work together and make some good come of that. (And I know this post seems harsh; I was a bit in shock. I'm not blaming all the Leave voters, but I do think the underlying xenophobia is impossible to ignore.)