DH voted leave but can't articulate why

[DifferentViews]

Sorry if this has been done before, but i need to get this off my chest and perhaps get new insight or come to a better understanding, so i can discharge some of the anger i feel.
So, i voted remain and he voted leave. Up to a point, i am prepared to accept we have different political views and can move on.
Talking to him last night, i asked, knowing what he knows now, would he still have voted leave and he said yes.
Cue a long discussion as to why and really he has no real idea what he was voting for, or what he wanted. Its just so woolly...he wanted change, but can't articulate what that would be.
It was just a knee jerk reaction to not liking the current situation and wanting things to be 'different'.
Its just made me so angry that he would still vote that way again in spite of all the evidence that things wont be 'better' out the EU.
His argument is that we don't know whether it might be better, so that gamble is worth it, but i am really struggling to see his point of view.
Please, can someone give me some idea how i can come to terms with this, so i am not consumed with impotent anger at him? Thank you.
Ps this is not meant to be a goady post against those that voted leave, if you have a well thought out argument and honestly believe it, that's great.

Dong - completely agree. We watch the way the politicians behave, bickering like children and mud slinging all the time, whilst unable to work together in any coherent way , and it disgusts me. I think it disgusts a lot of people. At the same time it seems to me that the electorate are very much the same. I really am beginning to despair of this country .

I’m not sure how you could live with somebody who had completely different political views-wouldn’t that mean that you had completely different outlooks on life? I don’t think, for example, that I could live with someone who wholeheartedly believed in completely privatizing the NHS, or that food banks are a good idea because they give people the opportunity for charitable giving. (I know people who believe both these things)

Mumsnet is a very weird place in which it is vital that partners should submit to dictated procedures around towel cleansing and chicken-washing. On the other hand mild concern or curiosity about a partner's political views is seen as controlling and abusive.

Jesus Christ someone quoting a much disproved meme about the Lisbon treaty really is a low.

I could live with someone who had totally different political views because politics is only one small part of life. You can have similar outlooks on many other key things that IMO are far more crucial to a compatible marriage than similar politics - like career ambitions, where you want to live, whether you want DC etc.

I don't see why having different views on politics is seen as a bad thing. If anything it opens the mind to other ways of thinking and encourages compromise and that can only be a positive. Living in an echo chamber would not be for me.

So if older UK leave voters are resident in an EU country and realise that their pensions will be frozen and that their health care costs will no longer be paid and that their right to stay in that country is no longer secure, then there is a kind of justice about that...

Essentially it's what they chose.

Statistically VERY few expats voted to leave, they are suffering as the result of votes of their peers back home

I don't think of politics as a small part of life.

Views about the kind of world you want to live in shape the kinds of work you do, the way in which you want to bring your children up, the kinds of close relationships you strive for, the way in which you live with/interact with your community.

I believe in the old feminist slogan that 'the personal is political.'

It doesn't mean that I don't enjoy having friends with a range of opinions. But I think I do need to feel that there is a decent amount of common ground/shared values with a life partner.

To me it's important to bring up my DC to be kind, respectful, tolerant of other people's opinions, keen to educate themselves and have the confidence to feel that they can achieve anything they want. My partner would agree and yet we have completely different opinions on politics.

Likewise we're both very involved in our local community in various ways and see that as an important aspect of our lives. Again, our political views don't come into that either.

Perhaps we don't fit neatly into one stereotype or another, but contrary to how some people seem to think on Mumsnet, in real life I find that people rarely do.

Dongdingdong I agree with your post.

Living in a echo chamber wouldn't be for me, either. But there are some fundamental philosophies that I could not have in a life partner that I could have in a friend. I have some very right wing friends- I wouldn’t want to come home to one!

I think that our ambitions for our children are very tied up with our social and political views.

So we may feel they should be keen to educate themselves and have the confidence to feel that they can achieve anything they want.

But that can't be separated from how education provision is structured and funded, and from a sense of how society does - or does not - empower young people.

The extent to which society empowers them will depend on sex, class, race, the funding of the NHS .

Then there's the question of the availability of support services, safe play spaces, etc etc..

This isn't to say that the way in which a couple goes about the business of parenting isn't hugely influential.

But we don't just live in a little house. (And again housing provision/availabilty is hugely political.) We live in a big wide world.

Absolutely, plurabelle. I want my children to grow up conscious of how public spending affects their lives and the lives of their friends. I couldn’t have as a life partner the sort of person who says-as some people I know do “Well, life’s not fair and the sooner they find that out the better”

I think it's a Right / Left thing. Left by definition sees society as an interconnected thing that is actively created by the legal, social and economic structures it operates within , Right sees it as a collection of individuals that may be enabled or constrained by the structures but are broadly unchanged by them. (In other words, Left thinks if you drop a person into a different society you get a different person, Right thinks you get the same person but they might have a nicer or worse life.

Blibby
Corbyn is anti EU and anti NATO
Heseltine is pro both
how does that fit your view?

Many of the people on the march were better off, better educated, centre right - they want an outward looking country that engages with the rest of the world.
Brexit is about cutting ourselves off from the biggest trading bloc in the world - hence why the Economist and the FT and the Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg are dead against it.

I'm not suggesting Brexit is left / right. I am saying whether or nor shared politics is an important part of a couple's shared values is left / right.

There's a view I see quite a bit on social media which is: saying you're not interested in 'politics' demonstrates, to an extent, that you are a fairly fortunate person. You're not interested in 'politics' because what you see as 'politics' doesn't really affect you. You're probably white and therefore more likely to view the police as there to protect you rather than to harass or control you. You're probably comfortably off, and have some savings, so you can't see yourself as someone who might need to claim benefits (and have to jump through a billion hoops and live under the ever-present threat of sanctions). You probably don't live in social housing, so you don't have to worry that your home will be sold to a property developer and you will be shunted to another rental miles away from your family and friends.

OK, there is a tribal element in party politics, which means that a left-side of the party Tory and a right-side-of-the-party Labour individual can get along well enough as their ideas of how things should work are probably not that far apart. but it's harder to imagine a Corbynite shacked up with a UKipper.

ReanimatedSGB

I would be more interested in an actual social study on those not interested in politics than opinions from social media.

He does know why. Maybe he just can't articulate the thousands of tiny irritations that make proud Britons want to get the hell out. Maybe he doesn't want to row with you about it.

Why do you not respect his right to hold an opinion different to your own? I don't understand remainers but I respect your right to be a remainer.

@kennehora

As a very basic example, it might mean that two people are not able to live in the same country as each other, or to be able to pursue their career ambitions.

Really? If you really think that, you must realise you've been fed a line. In fact, you've fallen for it hook, line and sinker.

I feel that our present way of life - rampant consumerism, capitalism, encouraged by trade deals with other countries and exploiting third world workers is wrong on several levels and is destroying the planet with pollution and unwanted goods (plastic in oceans, landfill etc). The fact that we can't leave the EU because we must have all these trade deals to sell more stuff and to buy more stuff from other countries is not the way we should be going. But the people at the top have an interest in maintaining this arrangement to secure their 'very important person's job'.By staying in the EU we won't change anything. On our own we might be able to start improving things.

DH is from a very MC background, Conservative, voted to leave.
I'm from a WC family, Labour voter, would have voted to leave.

We respect each other's viewpoints.
DM voted remain for very spurious reasons. I wouldn't dream of falling out with her or anyone else close to me because they had a different political outlook to me.

Part of the problem is that Remainers simply proved to be inadequate to the task of explainng why we should stay, or too patronising, too something and not enough something else anyway. I say this as a natural remainer (self-serving as I have many relatives living in Europe though can't affor to visit them), and am also remain for many other reasons, none of which were enough to persuade anyone I know to vote remain. I am surrounded by lovely, educated, level-headed Brexiteers who are not ignorant, stupid or racist.

Jux I think you are spot on here.

I think many Remainers probably voted for self serving reasons. I don't necessarily blame them. It was inevitable that would happen in the same way that it's inevitable that anyone working in a 'big state' public sector area is probably not going to vote for the 'small state' Conservatives whose first priority is always to trim what they see as an overblown public sector. Turkeys for Christmas and all that.

Leave was always more of an ideology; a sense that things should be better and indeed could be, for the country and our society as a whole, if we left the EU - in spite of the inevitable short and medium term challenges we would need to overcome.

Even if any Remain voters might have accepted parts of that ideology in principle, if leaving stood to impact on them as individuals in ways they'd rather not have to deal with, then it's understandable that they'd vote Remain.

Not everyone had the luxury of being able to choose how to vote without having to consider the potential implications for their job, their business, their family set up, their lack of citizenship in their country of residence, the fact that their child had just applied for a cheap university place in the Netherlands, etc. etc.

It's difficult to get accurate and up to date figures but I believe there are around 3.7 million EU citizens living in the UK. I've no idea whether those figures include children but even if they do, that's a very large chunk of people eligible to have voted in the Referendum. I think it's a no-brainer to assume many of those people were very motivated to vote Remain.

Likewise the 1.2 million or so British citizens living elsewhere in the EU. Especially those in very financially precarious positions trying to 'live the dream' in the sunshine while being dependent on a continued reciprocal healthcare agreement with the UK.

Then you have all the British citizens in marriages and partnerships with EU citizens living in the UK. Then the people who have invested in second homes in France/Spain/Portugal who just want to continue going back and forth as often as they like with no hassle. All those people might have voted Remain for knee-jerk, self-serving reasons rather than voting with a genuine and considered conviction that it was in the best interests of the UK .

In contrast, while Leave voters were probably much more motivated to vote than the average complacent Remainer, I don't think it's quite as easy to accuse them of being self-serving. It's pretty hard to think of a purely self serving reason to have voted Leave actually. Many people I know who voted Leave (me included) stand to take a substantial financial hit as a result, (I'm not going to explain how/why - that's my business) but that did not impact on the belief that it was still the right thing to do, taking all things into account and looking at the bigger, long term picture for the country and not just for us as individuals.

By staying in the EU we won't change anything. On our own we might be able to start improving things

That strikes me as total crap btw. I feel that on sustainability issues the EU would have been a good influence. They tend to lead the way on things like this. If you actually think that Johnson, Mogg and co are going to lead the vanguard in a greener future you’re totally deluded.

Also, what are you actually suggesting, that we become self sufficient? The ground work just hasn’t been laid for that as I’m sure you know. So the consequence of less trade with the EU is more tradevwith further flung counties. A spectacular own goal if increased environmental responsibility was your aim.

Yes a race to the bottom is much more likely when you go it alone. That's why countries get together and agree international treaties on things like the climate and sustainable fishing. The EU could do this to a much greater and deeper extent so was well placed to address some of the big challenges.

It's a bit odd to call wanting to continue to have some of the opportunities afforded by the EU self serving rather than thinking of the country as a whole. I want the opportunities to continue for me and for others. I especially want scientists to work together with the least friction possible for the good of humanity.