To tell you why I voted to leave

[readingreadingreading]

I'm not brave enough to say this IRL and that is part of the problem.

I refuse to believe that I, or 52% of the British population are either thick or racist. I also think that such a pessimistic view of our population is leading to more divisions.

I have wanted to leave the EU since the Maastricht treaty was signed (I even sent off for a copy of it). I always said I'd campaign to leave as soon as I got the chance. I didn't campaign as it would have meant aligning with groups such as Farage which I do think are racist. But I still chose to vote leave.

I think the EU are getting too big and have always been too bureaucratic. The countries aligned to it are too varied for a common purpose to be right for everyone.

I don't know if we have an immigration problem or not. If we do we need to be able to restrict the number of nationals of other European countries moving here. If we don't we should be a lot more welcoming to people from other parts of the world, people who really need asylum. The current situation has desperate people turned away at borders and highly skilled workers having to jump through hoops for a job where they are wanted and needed.

No of course I didn't believe there would be extra money for the NHS. However I think currently we give money to the EU and we get money back whereas giving the same money directly to British needs would be a better use of it. Not to mention the savings from all the extra MPs.

I'm old enough to remember life before the EU. We managed to travel to Europe, live and work in different countries, eat food and not go to war. I'm reasonably sure we can continue to do so without them.

I don't think the EU can last much longer and I thought (wrongly) that coming out now in an orderly fashion would be better that having it all crash down around us. I'm nervous of new laws being enacted that we have no veto on and drifting into closer integration.

I hate to watch the current mess and no, this isn't what I voted for. But if we can't get out there shouldn't have been a vote and I don't think everything can be blamed on the leavers.

@wigornian - indeed - As an educated person I voted leave because I believe in the self-determination of this country and its people.
No-one could have predicted (although perhaps the past history of the EU should have led us to expect their intransigence) how the EU would expect us to give away so much or how unscrupulous and undemocratic the remain contingent in the media, the judiciary, the MSM, the HOC and the HOL would be.

Ultimately we didn’t vote to join a political structure, we voted to join a trading bloc, it has morphed into something so utterly different in the last ten years.
It is worth noting we would never have voted to join in the first place had we known then what we know now!
Fast forward another five years and I hate to think where we will be.

Anyone wanting to stay should say why.

Your freedoms are not remotely curtailed, you can still work and live in the EU. You can still travel and study.

I knew it was going to be a grim battle to leave, I was under no illusion that it would be difficult. My biggest disappointment has been Mays team wasting three whole years on the phoney WA.

I would be delighted if we remained in Europol, the Erasmus scheme for students, and Euratom, maintained freedom of movement for employees and light touch regulation of pensions and benefits

Yes. i'll cancel my St Mellion Leisure club membership because i don't like the smelly blokes in the weights room and sauna but still expect to use the pool and yoga classes.... its not how it works.

because no one predicted it would end up like this

48% of voters int he referendum did. Most of the news coverage at the time was full of experts predicting this exact situation.

YABU.

Because the European Council is a self-appointing set of functionaries who appoint each other on the basis of Buggins Turn in the chair.

I wouldn't call the democratically elected leaders of the member states "functionaries". Get your facts straight.

As an educated person I voted leave because I believe in the self-determination of this country and its people.

Abstract beliefs are no substitute for good judgement.

because no one predicted it would end up like this

You have got to be joking?!

The media was full of experts queuing up to tell you about how this would go down before the referendum. The Northern Ireland issues was mentioned countless times as a major issue in reaching an agreement with the EU.

Honestly...

Can someone answer
Why the eu is making it difficult for us to leave?

That question keeps being answered. The EU is not making it difficult for you to leave. The EU agreed a Withdrawal Agreement, which your representatives signed. It's been voted down again and again, but without alternative suggestions being put forward. The EU can't find out what you want - apart from everything, and to pretend the Good Friday Agreement doesn't exist.

Stop believing everything the pro-Leave press tells you. The problem is on the British side. For weeks BJ has been lying pretending he's negotiating and everyone in Europe is being brought round to his way of thinking on the Backstop. It didn't happen. He's lying.

How do you feel about that decision now?

While Brexit seems very difficult I find it hard to believe that remainers do not understand that some parts of EU bureaucracy are wasteful
constantly moving staff offices and MEP's from Brussels to Strasbourg then back again every few weeks is a huge unnecessary expense
The EU has not worked well for everyone in the EU ( forced austerity in Greece leading to youth unemployment rates of over 60%) nor does it work well for everyone in UK ( fishing industry) even if overall it is a good thing
I think leavers would be far less defensive if some remainers actually agreed that some things about the EU are crap and that a net contributor does actually mean we contribute more financially than what we get out of it financially that doesn't mean there are not benefits from being a member but neither can be pretend we are sort of net beneficiaries
Some MEPS and Brussels bureaucrats are solely interested in their own personal advancement and do not want any economies that stop there own personal gravy train just like these type also exist in Westminister Holyrood and in local councils up and down the country

while I do not necessarily agree with all OP's points I think this would have been better dealt with by everyone from PM and cabinet down if there had been acknowledgment that there were Pros and Cons of being in EU and potential Pros and Cons with leaving even if people thought that the balance tipped for them towards staying or leaving
I think there are a substantial number of people that are so fed up with brexit they no longer care whether we stay or go so long as it is over ( they are almost certainly misguided) but I kind of understand them especially if they listened to even 10 minutes of BBC parliament looking at the behavior and name calling the point scoring etc etc to many it looks like a "plague on both their houses" they're both as bad as each other they only care about getting elected/ winning the argument getting promoted and none of them even know or care what ordinary people think

No honourable person would use a crisis to manipulate people and opinion but the Government and the Opposition do both several times a day, Personally I have grave doubts that even 10% of our politicians whether in Westminster, Holyrood, Cardiff, Stormont Brussels are decent and honourable people with real principles, I would prefer people with principles even if I don't agree with them and they are consistent in how the enact these and vote for them

Just because it isn’t simple to escape the EU doesn’t mean we should stay under duress.

I understand the worry remainers have, that the last thing they need is unpredictability in their lives, the stress of a nasty split, and the worry what it will do to the economy/medicine if you are ill etc. Remain campaign knew that too, and capitalised on those fears. Of course things feel easy now, why change what isn’t broken.

Well, I will remind you of the boiling frog analogy - the heat was gradually increased so the frog had no idea he was dying until it was too late to jump.

This signifies the EU mechanism to me to perfection.

I remember my dad saying of Trump: shame he won't be assassinated, but literally all the people who would assassinate a president are Trump supporters.

Does it count when a Bernie Sanders campaigner shoots congressional representatives and a police officer?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Congressional_baseball_shooting

There are dangerous nutters on both sides.

Nobody is stopping ye from leaving but the UK have obligations that ye can't just walk away from ( border GFA). The EU have said they will consider any other option to the backstop but the UK government have not come up with one. What more do you want the EU to do?

Op you have had your reasons for voting to leave and that was your right. However I have read comments from many British news sites from the Daily express to the financial Times( and everything in between) the comments from most leavers are racists, xenophobic and homophobic. They don't give a shit about what happens afterwards or the concerns of remainers. They just want to leave, to hell with the consequences. They shout 'project fear and shut up we won'. They don't care about the British people living in NI and are trying to blame Ireland for this mess as they won't give in to UK demands. In fact most sound exactly like the republican posters on The Fox Facebook page, full of hate and disgust. You may have had valid reasons for voting leave Op but unfortunately those leavers who are racists have tarred ye all with the same brush. The anti Irish rhetoric is strong at the moment but I feel sorry for the remainers who are totally dismissed when they voice their concerns, for those living in the UK from other countries who have had to deal with racists comments and now fear that they may have to leave, for people who have lost their businesses or jobs. I blame your government for calling a referendum without giving the proper facts or realising the issues that would materialise.

For weeks BJ has been lying pretending he's negotiating and everyone in Europe is being brought round to his way of thinking on the Backstop. It didn't happen. He's lying.

Nobody is actually surprised at this turn of events surely ?

I had no thoughts on the Irish backstop, it never occurred to me that it would become the issue it has and I'm sure I'm not alone. I still think, that if we had goodwill on both sides it couldn't be sorted

If you remember "life before the EU" like you said then you must have lived through and therefore had awareness of the troubles? I appreciate you say you didn't consider it at the time of voting but now you surely understand it is a situation that cannot be solved by "goodwill" - it's not like telling two kids to stop bickering!

A boiling frog. Jesus Christ if that is not a classic example of why the public should never have been given the vote on this I don’t know what is.

Anyone wanting to stay should say why.

We will lose access to cooperative mechanisms for scientific research including medical research. These mechanisms have been massively beneficial for the UK scientific community including key areas like cancer research and have helped drive a thriving biotech sector in the UK worth a huge amount to the UK economy for example. Cutting off these cooperation mechanisms will cause a significant negative impact in UK science and comparable cooperation agreements with other major scientific blocs simply don't exist despite years and years of negotiations.

As a scientist I voted to remain because of this as well as the obvious xenophobic and racist elements associated with the leave campaign.

People didn’t want to listen to experts or detailed explanations or statistics. Anyone saying anything negative was accused of being a doomsayer, part of ‘project fear’ etc.

The facts are that since the vote the government has been unable to come to a favourable agreement with the EU and Brexit supporting Tory MPs wouldn’t support the only deal proposed by May’s Tory government. Boris suggested before the referendum that a leave vote would give Britain a stronger position to negotiate better terms with the EU. This didn’t happen. The interest in post-Brexit trade deals that Brexit backing politicians promised has failed to materialise.

@DarlingNikita

I do agree with almost all of your responses, however, the one argument I heard about immigration that made sense was, because we do have free movement, albeit with some caveats, EU immigration did reduce the number of people the government set for immigrants from outwith the EU. Of course it does belie the suggestion that immigration would decrease after Brexit because those numbers would increase but I can see that the argument that we were perhaps missing out on good candidates from non EU countries in favour of less qualified people.

I am still waiting for the positive reasons ( more than 5/6) to remain 8 pages in and not one answer.

I feel the same, I voted to remain but after all that’s happened and the fact there’s no room for negotiation for a deal to leave i would probably now vote to leave. I’m so sick of the whole Brexit thing and how long it’s taking, I just want it to be over.

This is one of the most illogical things I've ever read. So, after seeing that it's taken over three years to get nowhere, if there was another vote, you would vote leave because you want it to be over? Effectively, you would be voting to extend the same uncertainty and chaos, voting for years and years of trade negotiations, disruption etc.

I had no thoughts on the Irish backstop, it never occurred to me that it would become the issue it has and I'm sure I'm not alone.

This is part of the reason I don't think this referendum should ever have been held. I can't understand how anyone could have done more than five minutes of research on the implications of the Irish border and still think Brexit was a viable idea.

The members of the European Commision are appointed, not directly elected. Next, please.

I get what you say OP

But Brexit will never actually happen

The vast majority of MPs are remainers.

So they will never vote for a deal, any deal. Ever.

It just won’t happen. As you can see today.