To think this was selfish?

I don’t think it was that for everyone, but I think some people.

There were plenty who did it from racism (also wrongly thinking it would reduce immigration - from non EU countries!)

I do know some people who did it “just to shake things up a bit” - but of course it was the wrong referendum to put in any kind of protest vote!

Were the ones who voted leave actually expecting sympathy I wonder?

No but if her mum ever moans about passport queues or if she's not able to retire to an EU country then OP is within her rights to tell her to suck it up.

To talk back control. Obvs 🙄

My ils voted to leave. Their reasoning for voting leave, 'they keep hearing people speaking in their own languages in our nearby town'. Makes me sick. Two of their grandchildren have European partners. They didn't care about them. Blinded by their own bigotry.

Yes, on my FB and in the articles I read. A few were starting a campaign for compensation, which of course got nowhere.

Stupid is a more accurate word than selfish.
my mum voted for it too, heavily influenced by her racist twat of a husband. I think significantly less of everyone I know who voted for Brexit, including her. It makes no difference how long ago it was.

Came here to say this!

I know several people who at the time voted leave (without fully understanding the implications) who would now vote remain. Maybe it wasn’t communicated clearly enough at the time, maybe they didn’t or didn’t want to understand it, who knows!

But as others have said, it was a long time ago so what would be the point in dragging it up / getting worked up about it now? Can’t change what she voted at the time!

My Irish family who all moved to England as kids all voted to leave. I never considered how utterly stupid they all were till then. Of course they have never seen themselves as immigrants despite overwhelmingly telling everyone with ears they are Irish, born there, raised there for many years. I was actually surprised they were able to vote anyway.

Everytime I hear a MAGA supporter and think of brexiteers.

Time to get over it. We left and there’s no going back. What good will ruminating over it do?

I was shocked there was a vote in the first place and can't believe we left the EU. However, I also totally understand everyone has their own opinion and right to vote.

I have friends who live in the UK are from the continent who voted to leave. While disappointed, their choice, not going to feel angry about it.

You've also got to think about different generations and what they've been through so views different.

I don't think I know anyone who voted leave, or at least would admit to it! I like to think I'm fairly well educated and so are most people I know. Maybe there's a correlation.

My Belgian friend said if she had been allowed to vote then she would've also voted leave. And her sister actually worked for them in Brussels

Mind you she had one to the UK before theEU even existed

It would be really selfish to vote based on what suits you rather than for the good of the country.

Well, obviously it’s bloody selfish.

My MiL voted leave despite having retired to Spain herself. Her reason? ‘It was nicer in the olden days.’
I am still not over the stupidity of that and never will be - it def made me think less of her capacity for rational thought.
As for everyone else’s friends & relatives mentioned on this thread who chose to vote leave: let’s not get too comfortable assuming that this is a blip of the past. Farage is still here, empire building, and will exploit any opportunity to harness simplistic under thinking for his & his billionaire pals’ ends – usually under the: ‘everything is the fault of the boats’ banner.

Selfish isn’t the word I would use. I would use another word that questions her intelligence.

there are repeated stories of akin to this in the US where I live. Trump voters shocked their spouses or close family members are deported.

This. It never entered the tiny bigoted minds of the majority of the leave voters that ending freedom of movement works both ways.

Or that most of the brown people (or their parents/grandparents) are from outside the EU so irrelevant to whether we're in the EU.

In fact, now its not as easy for EU workers to come here, a lot of the jobs formerly done by EU workers such as hospitality and care work are now done by people from places like Ghana and the Philippines. I bet the average leave voters didn't see that coming.

I don’t think very many of the people who voted to leave really understood the complexity or potential consequences of it at all - and many of them swallowed all the egregious BS about ‘billions for the NHS’ and ‘regaining our freedom’. The disinformation was crazy, and Cameron just never bothered to mount even a half-arsed case for remaining. His arrogance in the face of such a future-defining decision was breathtaking. So I can understand why some Leavers thought they were doing the right thing, but it’s nevertheless difficult to forgive.

My whole family still hasn’t let my dad off the hook for not only voting leave, but for telling my late mum, who did not have full capacity at the time due to dementia, to do the same. (He only revealed he’d done this after the vote, not before.)

The difference is we were all vocal about it at the time. Voting for something that would conceivably affect life choices, income, educational opportunities and ability to travel for all his children and grandchildren was such a selfish, small-minded thing to do.

His rationale was that he’d voted to remain in the Common Market in 1975, but not for joining the EU, so he saw Brexit as an opportunity to reverse his earlier vote.

We don’t really touch on the subject now because it still feels raw even 10 years later, and though he would never admit it, I don’t think he’d vote the same way again if he had the choice.

That’s the great thing about British Democracy - we can vote for who we want.

I really dislike people who hold politics against others (unless it’s the Nazi party or similar very right wing or Sharia based or something) - if you want to manipulate others in the way they vote I’d probably choose a less Democratic country. There are plenty around….

Has it had a big impact on your life? You didn't think about it until your friend brought it up. It may not have occurred to your mother at the time any more than it occurred to you.

So every Brexit voter did not think it through.
Every remain voter did.
Give over.
There was a referendum and the votes decided it.

I am of the opinion that if the vote to remain had been successful then people would now be moaning that the people who voted to remain had not thought it through and were massively irresponsible for us still being in the EU with all its silly rules and regulations.

I don't think that's what either of us was saying.

In the immediate aftermath of the referendum, there were so many people saying they'd voted leave when they didn't mean it and since then there have been many Brits who voted leave, both expats and those who still live here, who have been shocked & upset at what brexit has meant for them. These are people shocked at fairly obvious consequences, which were publicly discussed during the campaigns.

There are plenty of people who voted leave who stand by there vote and knew what it meant, but there's plenty of evidence to say that the Referendum would have gone the other way if 1) voters took it more seriously and 2) voters understood what it would mean for them

Don’t deceive yourself. I’m fairly well educated and work with similarly educated people. None of them would admit to voting leave at the time, but statistically it would be nearly impossible that not a single person in my professional circle did. It made me question people’s true beliefs and feelings for a long time after that vote.