Brexit rage

[holeinyourhead]

What's happened in the last 10 days has really affected me. It's all I think about tbh and I feel so enraged at seeing the politicians lie to us so lavishly then bail on us so swiftly, yet I'm completely powerless to do anything. I marched, I wrote to my MP, I've signed petitions. I'm obviously one of the 48% who wanted to remain. I can't find fault with the 52% who voted to leave, it's not their fault. It's a democratic process, I understand that of course. Everyone's entitled to their view and it's not that I'm a sore loser. But the catastrophic fallout isn't what even the most hardline leave voter would have wished for, there's no Brexit plan, and the future looks very bleak. I was at a conference today and a Conservative MP and a Brussels Eurocrats both agreed a recession in the medium term is now inevitable. People around me seem to be getting on with things - I wish I could too - but I've been very tearful and sleepless and worried sick. I run a European business just out of start up phase, employing a handful of people who by chance are not British born and who are now very nervous themselves about the future. The more I read the more hopeless I feel with each passing resignation. AIBU to feel like this? Does anyone else feel the same? Am I going nuts?!! I feel very alone.

Following the same logic, EU citizens who have lived in the UK for 15+ years should have been allowed to vote on their own futures.

Agreed. Its baffeling they didn't fix the vote to get the result they wanted. Unless they did want to leave?

sandrabedminster does that mean if you live anywhere for more than 15 years you automatically have to change nationality? Brits who live abroad (but who want to stay British) end up not getting a vote anywhere. The outcome has profoundly affected the rights of British citizens abroad yet we had no say in it. And like Scotland, voting age should have been lowered.

Its a difficult one and you will never please everyone.

Totally get it. I'm angry at:

• the Leave camp who told lies
• the Remain camp who made such a poor effort to put their case across
• those who voted irresponsibly (but not at those who voted to Leave who informed themselves and thought it through - that's legitimate even if I don't agree)
• those who didn't vote (young people, I'm looking at some of you. Don't moan about being victims of the decision if you didn't do your bit by voting).

For all its flaws, I believe in the European project, and I'm sorry it's come to this for such stupid reasons.

Shame on you all.

Shame on you for thinking that an unfettered neo-liberal government will do anything for the oppressed.

OP I feel exactly the same. I go to bed anxious and I wake up angry. I didn't agree with leaving the EU, but I respected the result and was naive enough to assume that the politicians who led out of there would a) have a plan and b) stay to see it through. Wrong on both counts.
People are saying 'it'll be fine' without having any arguments that make sense. One example, 'It'll be fine, we're the world's fifth largest economy'. No. We WERE the world's 5th largest, when part of the world's biggest trade market. Now two weeks post referendum, we're already 6th after France, and that will fall further.

But forget the economy; what about the peace process in Northern Ireland? What about Scotland? Are we really willing to break the union in order to have Brexit? I want answers on these things, and Andrea Leadsom doesn't seem to have any so far.

It's made me think more ordinary people, not crazies to the far left or far right, need to be part of politics. I've joined a political party and I'm going to stay much more informed from now on. Hope you can channel that anger too

I feel very similar Rebecca and you've described many of the issues that have been keeping me awake at night.

One of the things that infuriates me, which thankfully has subsided somewhat here on MN but still going full-steam on other social media is the Let's All Pull Together and Stop Talking Britain Down thing. I mean, there are people (unless they're all satirists) who are seriously saying that the £ tanking, the economy in ruins and the political chaos are all the fault of Remain voters' negative thoughts. Lots of demands to All Work Together but with no suggestion of what we must all be "working" on. Slogans slogans slogans.

I suspect in the privacy of the voting booth, Cameron put his X against Leave...

I agree Joff. That's why the Remain campaign was so unconvincing and poor.

Someone somewhere else mentioned how the EU is beaching ever more tough on money laundering and employment protection as well as sustainability and that some British politicians and individuals will come to benefit financially from a tory led neo liberal economy.

It won't be the poor Brits living in deprived parts of the country who will benefit from this. That was a spin.

You seriously think Cameron voted Leave? Why?

I agree Corbyn may have voted Leave. Staunch, old school left-wingers like him and Tony Benn were against the EU at the time we joined.

Because of the reasons I stated

Before the fiasco even happened, my husband was saying he reckoned Cameron was secretly Leave. It does look possible, in the light of what transpired - the limp Remain campaign, the fact he's loaded and has no personal reason to give a stuff, etc etc. I suspect being pro-Europe was always more of a 'pose', with him and Osborne - something they did to look progressive (and electable) when the zeitgeist was blowing that way...

I don't know if this is 100% correct but my college told me that just after we heard that we had left the EU apparently the most Googled question was 'What is the EU?'. Shocking that a lot of people voted to leave but didn't even know what the EU was.

I am very worried for my husband's business. The last recession nearly finished us off. We were nearly bankrupt. I wonder if we can fair better this time but he is self-employed and works alone. I am mighty annoyed that Scotland and Ireland might part terms with us because of this (they may have anyway but of course right now it just adds to the fall out of this vote). The end of the UK as we know it. The end of the flag. The end of 'Great Britain'. We will simply be England. A tiny place left to stand alone. I am so sad about this and so powerless.

There's enough real crap going down without having to resort to conspiracy theories.

I suspect being pro-Europe was always more of a 'pose', with him and Osborne - something they did to look progressive (and electable) when the zeitgeist was blowing that way...

Being pro-Europe probably harmed more than helped in the 2015 election - hence the referendum promise (which Cameron did not think he would have to keep).

How about a much simpler theory: Cameron and Osborne wanted to stay in the EU because they think staying in the EU is best for the country and that leaving the EU will be disastrous for our economy?

I always thought the UKIP project was nothing but a bunch of right-wing nutters who along with the Monster Raving Loonies etc would be hanging about but never credible. But now the lunatics (if AL gets in) are about to take over the asylum.

I agree conspiracy theories are not helpful but taking into account the spin and lies of both campaigns, I would no be surprised at all if not all is as seems.

the one sure thing now is that we have a several years maybe up to a decade or more of uncertainty, lack of direction with potentially significant macro level changes ahead of us in Britain as well as the rest of the EU. I don't think that this will be a time when the British disenfrenchised will be empowered, economically or politically. The winners will be lawyers, and shrewd business men and women as well as ultra conservative politicians. Those who have assets and are already relatively privileged will probably rise it out with a few bumps and bruises. The NHS as a free for all will cease in the next 5 years and there will be less funding for schools and FE / HE. Also HE fees will go up so that within the next ten years fees for home students will rise to around 18K££ per study year. IMO.

just after we heard that we had left the EU apparently the most Googled question was 'What is the EU?'. Shocking that a lot of people voted to leave but didn't even know what the EU was.

It's wrong to suggest that only "leave" voters were asking the question. It could just as easily have been "remain" voters, people who didn't vote, people from outside the UK, people who know what the EU is but wanted to compare definitions from different sources, or students completing projects.

How about a much simpler theory: Cameron and Osborne wanted to stay in the EU because they think staying in the EU is best for the country and that leaving the EU will be disastrous for our economy?

Well quite. Or you'd have to argue that he secretly wanted to resign too, and was just looking for an excuse

Cameron and Osbourne couldn't campaign very well because they've been using it a as an excuse for their poor government and to scare us about 'swarms' of refugees for years. They knew it was better to stay in, I'm sure of that. How could they campaign saying to people it isn't the EU's fault hospitals are failing, it's our chronic, politically motivated underfunding? It isn't the EU's fault you feel poor and powerless, it's ours. EU gave grants for developing poorer areas, human rights, maternity leave pay, workers rights. They would have had to admit fault. Instead their campaign was a piss poor list of financial statistics of doom that were too boring to listen to.

I suspect being pro-Europe was always more of a 'pose', with him and Osborne - something they did to look progressive (and electable)

Or to save face in front of the world leaders, large banks and corporations who wanted a "remain" vote to win, as they benefit from the UK being in the EU? Not only EU leaders who benefit from Britain's strength and finances, but the USA who have regarded Britain as their doorway to the EU and find it more convenient to deal with a "bloc" rather than individual countries.

JassyRadlett exactly. This:

'Actually, the choice not to set out what Leave were aiming for was a conscious strategic one and one that won the referendum (alongside some good old-fashioned hatemongering).

If people had known what kind of model the Leave advocates were advocating - or if we'd got into a proper debate of what was evenpossible, the result would have been a massively splintered Leave vote as those not getting their desired model - EEA, EFTA, Canada, pull up the drawbridge, whatever - would have been less likely to vote leave (or vote at all). I know a significant number of people who thought they were voting 'to be like Norway', which was always incompatible with the end to free movement promise made to others.

Instead they left it to people's imaginations and dissembled just enough about the options that were out there without pointing out that some were mutually exclusive or impossible or awful for Britain's circumstances that everyone got to feel they were voting fortheirBrexit model.'

Glad to see this:

www.politicshome.com/news/europe/eu-policy-agenda/brexit/news/77078/vote-leave-watch-set-hold-brexit-campaigners-their

awful Helmet.

The people who voted leave have been promised and indeed given nothing except abuse by parties supposed to represent them.

But leave promised them the earth?

No they promised extraction from the EU. Which funnily enough is what leave voters want, nothing more and nothing less.

We dont want to be part of what the EU has become, we do not want to be part of this political union.

What surprises me, in all this vitriol we are seeing over the boards, we are still not seeing any positive EU messages. Not a thing...wonder why