Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Child-safe in minutes.

Meet the Other Phone.
Child-safe in minutes.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

... for those who are devastated about Brexit, how are you dealing with the fear and depression and anxiety?

775 replies

testytesting · 29/03/2017 09:58

Has anyone got any strategies? I am genuinely not one for melodrama, but I am devastated, angry, terrified, depressed, and I feel so utterly helpless. Nothing in my lifetime has made me feel like this, and I just can't imagine feeling like this for the next two years and beyond. I can hardly bear to listen to the news, but I feel compelled to anyway. How are other remainers dealing with this, what are your coping strategies? And what, if anything, can we DO?

OP posts:
BillSykesDog · 05/04/2017 19:33

poor, my family are Irish. I really don't know what you're trying to say other than that you prefer that everyone suffers rather than just a few. I'm not really sure why it's relevant either because as you say the law has changed. But just because you are not allowed to offer someone lower pay because they are a migrant doesn't mean you can't offer a migrant lower pay because they will accept it.

Elvira, for a start that is all hypothetical for your friend and not actually particularly likely to happen. So, yeah, that is kind of the thing I mean. Having hysterics over a very unlikely worst case scenario when I doubt the same person gave two stuffs when bad shit happened to some other family.

The EU is all about market forces anyway. A democratic reaction against a laissez faire economic model and it's negative effect on the poor is just about the left wingest thing that's happened in Europe since the Iron Curtain fell. Only today's left wing wouldn't actually know left wing politics if it hit them in the face. It's a middle class globalist movement.

Imjustapoorboy · 05/04/2017 19:34

I don't get the feeling that it couldn't be worse. But I guess as a decendant of immigrants I have actually seen how bad it really can be in this country. Scrape the surface and it really is much worse than wages being reduced due to business mal practice

Imjustapoorboy · 05/04/2017 19:35

If your family are irish and where here in the 60s and before they will be able to tell you how badly they were paid and treated

If your family are irish. Then shame on you. You should know what it us like to be an immigrant and not turning on others who are.

user1491323019 · 05/04/2017 19:39

Bill clearly said her husband was an immigrant!

OhtoblazeswithElvira · 05/04/2017 19:41

I doubt the same person gave two stuffs when bad shit happened to some other family

Why assume that? Most people in this thread have shown sympathy even if some disagree with your political views.

My friend's husband is in a trade not dissimilar to the one you've been talking about. Through the years his business has gone through some really shitty rough patches. Nothing to do with immigration (we have very very little in our area) - it's just that we live in a poor area. They were lucky she could earn good money with a highly skilled job.

Imjustapoorboy · 05/04/2017 19:44

Well if it's your husband who is Irish when did being an irish immigrant make you superior and have any more right to a job than any other?

If that is the case I've heard it all.

From an irish citizen

user1491323019 · 05/04/2017 19:44

Think you might have to break it down for poorboy here, Bill

Imjustapoorboy · 05/04/2017 19:45

Yes you will

Imjustapoorboy · 05/04/2017 19:50

I'm sorry but I don't see the difference between a 'settled' migrant or any other.....why is your partner more deserving of a job than transient migrants?

It's a bit like the ...I don't like the xyz ...but youre ok. You aren't like them

What if brexit had happened before you met your husband? Then what?

user1491323019 · 05/04/2017 19:52

Ok poorboy

Let's say you own a company. You want to extend your hours so the business stays open until seven o clock every evening.

Your existing workers express unease with this. They have families, and the long working hours aren't for them.

In a situation where you know you'd struggle to replace your existing staff, you would have to concede to knock the opening till seven on the head for a bit.

But let's say you know you can easily replace your existing staff.

Your staff are then in a position where, despite the inconvenience to their day, they have to accept it without a murmur because otherwise they will lose their position.

As the business owner, you are the high earner and, with a surplus of available labour, you can pay your staff minimum wage, demand anti social working hours, anything you want really.

It isn't anything personal about immigrants at all. It's a recognition of the fact that surplus labour creates poor working conditions because employers can rightly turn around and say 'well if YOU don't want this job Mr Sykes there are ten others who do.'

Similar to at the end of World War One when a lack of available fit young men to work meant suddenly (who knew) everyone realised women could do "men's work." Funny, that.

Havanaclub · 05/04/2017 19:53

The horrible divide that Brexit caused is just getting worse by the day.

So very sad and so unnecessary.

woman12345 · 05/04/2017 20:01

I've learnt more today. My trade union experience is decades out of date, but was still not welcomed by bosses. Which is why I did and do give:
two stuffs when bad shit happened to some other family.

Brexit, as I suspected, is more to do with the working classes getting screwed, starting with the miners' strike. Unions being destroyed and working conditions decimated. I've read and know from a friend's husband how construction has been affected. It's the Farages and Banks who were promoting the racism, and still are.

I understand the leave vote more now, and am even more convinced that the voters were not the racists.

The horrible divide that Brexit caused, I think Brexit was caused by the horrible divide.

OhtoblazeswithElvira · 05/04/2017 20:08

Hang on, oversupply of labour was only one of the issues mentioned by Bill:

There's no training, everybody is self employed, you can hardly ever take a day off, have to work 12 hour days six days a week or you're off the job.

I thought there were laws against most of the above... why are they not being enforced? That cannot be blamed on "a Romanian guy". It's not about reporting your employer and losing your job - it's about having a decent country that cares for its people and makes sure you come back home from work alive, and you are not being exploited. The Romanian guy is as much of a human being as you and is probably being exploited. IMO your anger is misplaced.

The employer chose to break the law and knew he would get away with it. We are where we are because of choices made by UK governments.

optionalrationale · 05/04/2017 20:12

Look if anyone wants a pissing contest to see who is more DEVASTATED, DEPRESSED, ANGRY, UPSET AND ANXIOUS... I must warn you that

I WILL WIN.

I have not been able to eat, sleep or wipe my own bum.

dangermouseisace · 05/04/2017 20:15

hmm…I would have thought that people with Irish family would have been concerned about the possible political and social repercussions of having an even more divided Ireland with Brexit.

I know I am.

woman12345 · 05/04/2017 20:25

We are where we are because of choices made by UK governments.
And particularly the labour party for not repealing the 1992 Trade Union act which depleted union power, which has meant that millions of workers are effectively 'self employed', with the poor conditions and pay that that means.

optionalrationale · 05/04/2017 20:39

^It's been seven hours and fifteen days
since EU took your love away^

Imjustapoorboy · 05/04/2017 20:45

Well optional. Let's just see

BromptonOratory · 05/04/2017 20:51

The EU is all about market forces anyway. A democratic reaction against a laissez faire economic model and it's negative effect on the poor is just about the left wingest thing that's happened in Europe since the Iron Curtain fell. Only today's left wing wouldn't actually know left wing politics if it hit them in the face. It's a middle class globalist movement

I want BillSykesDog to write a book.

Imjustapoorboy · 05/04/2017 20:55

Ok user we agree then. It's not the immigrants. It's the system.

So why do some blame the immigrants? Immigration has happened in this country since before any if us were alive. Back in the 1800s there were chinese, eastern European, french etc. Every time there is an influx thete has been discrimination and antagonism. That maybe human nature maybe some would say it is the progress and evolution of economic models

However, this time people finally had the opportunity to vote. I firmly believe if the UK public had had the chance in the 1950s or 60s or 70s or 80s specfically regarding immigration. They would have voted to stop it. And how would that have effected our economy? How would we be today?

Imjustapoorboy · 05/04/2017 20:58

Brimpton it may not get past the turnitin test. But I'm sure you wold enjoy it

optionalrationale · 05/04/2017 20:59

Nothing
I said NOTHING can take away these blues
Cos nothing compares
Nothing compares to EU

Imjustapoorboy · 05/04/2017 21:01

Meanwhile optional. This poor lady had serious concerns regarding brexit. It seems she had other issues but brexit concerned her dearly

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/apr/05/woman-found-dead-in-bristol-feared-deportation-after-brexit-vote

Imjustapoorboy · 05/04/2017 21:02

But carry on with your flaccid jokes

optionalrationale · 05/04/2017 21:11

"No conclusive evidence she intended to take her own life"

Read your own fucking references before posting