I’m still smarting over the Brexit referendum. It will be a long time before I get over it, if indeed I ever will.
It is not the result particularly that bothers me. I still think it is wrong that we have left the union, despite its many flaws and problems. The future of Europe lies in peaceful collaboration and co-creation yet the last few yeast have been filled with rancour not harmony. I am also of the firm conviction that the electorate was lied to during the process. It is clear from what has happened that even politicians were not aware of what they were voting for let alone the general public. Indeed many of the MPs didn’t even read the withdrawal agreement.
This has been a shameful period in the ‘democratic’ process of this country. Any claim that somehow democracy has been restored is disingenuous in the least and panders to a false sense of British sovereignty. Perhaps that should read English.
It is this that still riles me. Back in June 2016 we were given a simple binary choice, to stay in the European Union or not. We could remain as is or go back. But back to what? Most of us who voted cannot remember what it was like before we joined the union, or the reasons why. No explanation was given as to what the going back would look like.
Were we really content to go back to a political model abandoned in the early 1970s? Life has moved on, the world is a very different place and politics will have reflected those changes. Throughout the campaign there was no vision of the future of the country, other than slogans of global Britain and an amorphous concept of sovereignty. At the time I didn’t know what these meant. I still don’t. If you do, please enlighten me.
The decision to leave the European Union was a huge opportunity to transform the democracy of this country (these countries) yet it was spectacularly missed.
A binary choice to leave one thing and dive into the abyss was no choice at all.
Thoughts from a Guerrilla Worker 