AIBU to be seriously considering leaving the UK after Friday's result?

[Ladyonashortfuse]

Appalled at the outcome on Friday and not willing to give up for our DC the rights to live work and study in the EU we've enjoyed, we are looking to move to a friendly EU country in October with a view eventually to gaining back our EU citizenship. Don't think we can rely on anything better coming out of the Brexit negotiations. DH works on the internet and I have a TEFL qualification so think we'll manage financially. DC are all pre school age. Obviously however this is going to be a major upheaval and it'll be more difficult to stay in touch with family etc, who are likely to be upset. AIBU and/or mad to be going this far? Am in two minds at present.

[Maybebabybee]

I am upset with the results too but aren't you jumping the gun a bit - wait and see what actually happens!!

[OohMavis]

Yanbu for considering it. It's good to keep your options open.

[crossroads3]

YANBU at all. I feel the same but my dc see entrenched in the school system here so it would be much harder.

[CreepyPasta]

Oh fgs. Do you really think that free labour movement will be stopped? And even if it was, will we all not be allowed work or travel visas? How do you think all those UK migrants in Australia/Asia/US etc have got there? Major over reaction. I can't believe that people are actually considering emigrating due to this decision. We have left the EU, not Europe!

[RaeSkywalker]

Wait and see how it goes.

DH and I are giving it 2 years. Our qualifications- especially his- mean that we should be able to emigrate and qualify for whatever 'points' system we encounter. He's been approached about jobs in New Zealand and Canada already, so recruitment agencies are obviously taking advantage of Brexit.

I won't deprive my parents of their grandchild lightly though. 2 years is long enough to get an idea of how the land will lie, and then we will decide.

[Kimononono]

Bye then!

[RaeSkywalker]

My friend is a doctor and is looking at getting something lined up by Christmas. He has no family, and is not a home owner etc, so it will be 'easier' for him to cut and run.

[ProfessorPreciseaBug]

Our plan B was to leave if we stayed.
No point in being subject to Brusslls dictat and lousey roads, over crowded trains, pretty mediochre food, rip off attitude and crap weather...

[cannotlogin]

Yep....looking at my options too. Somewhat weirdly, if I go it will be to a third world country which just about says it all, doesn't it??!!

[AuntieStella]

No, it's never unreasonable for a family to relocate internationally.

And it doesn't matter what people think of your decision, as long as you know it's right for you.

[MissBattleaxe]

I think this may be a bit knee jerk. Wait and see. There are still negotiations to be had and it doesn't mean your children can never live abroad or travel there.

[Possibilityofanisland]

Yanbu.

We are considering it too. For us it's an ideological decision more than an economic one. I want my children to grow up as EU citizens and I'm devastated that may be stolen from them.

[Savemefromwine]

Yes off you go, because of course no other EU country has any problems at all.

Yawn.

[DerelictMyBalls]

YANBU but if half the people threatening to leave actually leave, I'll eat my hat. It's all knee-jerk hyperbole.

[Osolea]

I don't think Yabu to want to leave here, I feel the same, but I'm not sure the ideal society that I'd choose to live in exists anywhere else either, so it might be a case of better the devil you know.

My dc are old enough that they do need to finish their education here, and I've always thought I'd like to spend time living in another country, this has just made me more determind that I will at some point.

[georgetteheyersbonnet]

We are considering it too. Both of us have (rusty) continental languages and DH has been so panicked by this that he is thinking of changing his career path - he was planning to move into an area of law that will largely disappear if Scotland and NI leave and the Union breaks up. My job is quite international in the medium term, so we would have options for moving to North America, but we both feel European through and through so would prefer to stay on the continent. France or the Netherlands would be a possibility. I really want my daughter to grow up a European citizen.

Fundamentally, as a country we have voted to throw out the biggest peacetime Enlightenment political project in history, in favour of a ragbag bunch of racist liars and thugs. Already we have had the murder of a female MP, an upsurge in racist name-calling, political turmoil and vacuum, and a public discourse full of stupidity and bloody-mindedness. It's not a country I recognise, or see myself and my daughter's future in any more. I loved my country as it was, a union of four nations which was pragmatic and tolerant, not the hobbled remains of a Little England run by smug racist pensioners that it looks like it's going to become. This is not a country for young people.

[TheWindInThePillows]

It's not unreasonable to consider emigrating, either to EU or elsewhere but I think you are under-estimating how much the EU is going into a period of instability, and it's unclear whether it will look the same in 5 years time, let alone 20 years when your children are grown up and looking for work. Many people in Southern Europe have emigrated here recently as youth unemployment is high, so there would be no point going there and hoping to get a job.

I think it's better to wait til the dust settles. If you move just for an EU passport, and we retain freedom of movement through a trade deal, you will have moved for nothing. If you genuinely want to move there anyway, because the standard of living is higher (which it is in some EU countries) or because there's something else you like about the country, this could fit in well, but I don't see the need to rush about 'becoming European' just yet myself, and I am deeply upset by the result.

[ilovesooty]

If I could afford to I'd be off like a shot.

[Badders123]

I'm hedging my bets
I'm applying for eu passports for me and DC
Then whatever happens my kids still get chance to live and study in the eu
Canada is looking pretty good about now....

[georgetteheyersbonnet]

YANBU but if half the people threatening to leave actually leave, I'll eat my hat. It's all knee-jerk hyperbole.

You must not know how mobile some people are. I live in an area where there was one of the highest Remain votes. The vast majority of my friends - academics, journalists, doctors, lawyers, researchers, IT specialists and so on - regularly move jobs between countries, hold multiple citizenship and so on. Pretty much all of my friends are in partnerships or marriages with two different EU (or other) nationalities, speak multiple languages, and have lived and moved between several countries. These are the people who are the high earners, educated with several degrees each, who invent new software, run scientific research projects, are NHS consultants in desperately needed areas like oncology and paediatrics, and so on. These people can leave, and lots of them may do so. Are they the kind of immigrants you'd like to see the back of, like my Greek friend who works on new imaging techniques for breast cancer funded by EU money? I'm sure the Leave campaign response would be that he can F* off back to Greece and see if he likes it there - but I cannot see how that is a mindset for a forward-looking, prosperous economy and country.

[TheWindInThePillows]

France is a country with a very lovely countryside, but it has a huge right-wing vote in all national elections! You think the French love immigrants?!

Britain has been, in my opinion, a very nice and attractive place for EU immigrants precisely because in the main, people aren't aggressively racist or intolerant towards them and people move into the street and nothing is said (even if people privately have concerns about being 'taken over'). My family is half European and although we have had one or two 'go home' comments at school which were immediately dealt with, our experience, til these past few days, has been to feel at ease and like life is liveable here.

Now, perhaps you are the 'right' kind of immigrant (meant ironically, xenophobic people often distinguish between types of people they hate), in that people from well-recognized and identifiable minorities (Roma across much of Europe, North Africans in France) are often persecuted and white people left alone, so you think this won't apply to you.

But I honestly don't think though that you should move to most European countries right now, with the far right on the rise, to experience their tolerant and inclusive way of life! It is very very sad that the UK is losing what I think is unique in being very tolerant, but I wouldn't go flouncing off on the basis that this utopia exists elsewhere.

[AuntDotsie]

YANBU to consider it, we feel the same and, in fact, my continuing in my current profession may well become contingent on being in a EU country. I also don't want to bring my son up in a country that does this. But we don't want to jump the gun, we don't want this to be a knee-jerk reaction and we'll have to wait and see anyway. Our house would need to retain its current value, for starters. It's a tough one.

[Elledouble]

We're considering it too. My brother lives in Germany and is planning to take dual nationality once he's been there six years. We don't want to go anywhere without my parents, but they're open to the idea too, if we can find the right place for us all.

[FranHastings]

We are considering it too. I have no idea how likely we are to need to, but it seems stupid not to look into it. DH works for a European firm, who will most likely be off soon. No idea what other jobs will be available here, his is pretty specialised. We might have to.

[TheWindInThePillows]

georgette I have many friends like this too, and they may leave, but I think ultimately they are more likely to take British nationality if they haven't done so already. The economic prospects in many EU nations are poor and the youth there hard done by, especially in Southern Europe. I think a couple of academic ones may go to the States or Australia/NZ if they go anywhere, as these places pay higher salaries, they are not going to go back to being academics in Greece, really they are not.