Anyone thinking of leaving the UK following the referendum vote?

[crazyhead]

Just curious really. Me and my husband believe quite passionately in the EU project and it feels as though we don't want to sit here and watch the UK leave. I watched my Mum die last year and I just can't bear the slow motion grief of seeing this as well.

So we're thinking of leaving the UK for a while. DH has an interview on Friday for a US job for starters (we'd prefer EU but fewer relevant jobs - and we've not got the ancestry for EU passports sadly).

Anyone else thinking of leaving?

the UK is one of the very best nations on the planet

Setting aside deluded and bombastic nationalism, the UK is in a good place now due to its position in the EU.

It's a gateway to Europe for the rest of the world, with lower taxes and less red tape. We have benefited enormously since joining in 1973, before which we were the 'sick man of Europe'.

I'm considering not returning precisely because I don't want to live in a 'poorer, less democratic, less tolerant nation', which 10-20 years of economic decline and xenophobia will inevitably produce.

Manon The change since 1973 was not the EU, but Thatcher.

Every 'crazy EU' headline

I think this is the problem. All the things you mention (with the exception of firecrackers and giving work to foreign companies over our own, neither of which I had heard of) are those tabloid front pagers.

They seem to be either things which our government has merrily done without EU intervention (making a mess of the fisheries), are things we can veto (EU army), or have no practical benefit I can see (control of borders in excess of the full control we have at the moment).

There's a good article here on how our press came to give this idea that the EU were controlling overlords [spoiler, one B Johnson].
www.nytimes.com/2016/06/22/opinion/who-is-to-blame-for-brexits-appeal-british-newspapers.html

I don't read the tabloids so my life is free from 'crazy EU' law headlines. Tories and the right wing press disseminate anti-EU propaganda for their own agenda - an utopia of low tax, low workers' rights, democracy in thrall to big business interests. They don't like the socialist, humanitarian aspect of the EU and the public are pawns in their game.

Fishing stock don't respect national boundaries, 20% of UK catches come from outside our own waters, quotas are an inevitable consequence of overfishing, and if we wanted to police our waters we'd have to fork out a huge sum on marine policing.

It's Westminster not Brussels in charge of allocating the EU fishing quota, it chose to prioritise large corporations (giving nearly nearly two thirds of the entire E&W fishing quota to just three companies) over small-scale fishermen who have most to lose.

Our government chooses to give work to foreign companies over UK, because it favours the free market and is not as protectionist as other European governments. Thus our utilities were sold off to French and German companies, our car firms were sold off to Japanese and Germans etc.

As regards fireworks, in some cases the EU legislation is less restrictive, in other cases the UK legislation is. There's been a fuss about the new safety measures, and having to sell off old stock without the CE mark, but I can't get worked up about it personally. ln the UK you can still buy fireworks all year round, whereas other EU states such as Holland and Germany you can only buy them around NYE. The UK often chooses to enforce EU rules more stringently than other EU countries.

the UK is one of the very best nations on the planet

Setting aside deluded and bombastic nationalism, the UK is in a good place now due to its position in the EU.

It seems to me that its only English (and German) nationalism that's frowned upon. I'm a proud nationalist. I happen to think that the UK is the greatest country on the planet I'm probably wrong but lately I came to the conclusion that this was despite the EU not because of it.

The things which make this country great (Language, Time zone, links to former colonies, legal system, etc.) are nothing to do with the EU.

carol

The turnaround in UK's fortunes was a combination of Thatcher and membership of what was then called the EEC). When it comes to the EU there is, in the words of Margaret Thatcher and Geoffrey Howe "No Alternative". We are or were the gateway to Europe for the rest of the world in terms of investment and power-broking. Global business interests come to us as we combine access to the EU market with lower tax and regulations.

But Thatcher's economic policies created wealth for the middle classes and the south at expense of the rest of the country.

Financial services grew and deregulated while manufacturing industry was decimated to the detriment of northern industrial areas. 80% of our exports are now services. In addition, individual, business and government debt skyrocketed over the last 30 years. Those economic policies contributed our comparative vulnerability to the financial crisis (other EU countries with larger manufacturing bases such as France and Germany were less exposed), and to this Leave vote - high in areas of the country that have been ignored for 30 years.

You know....people are using the divorce comparison to talk about brexit, in my opinion being in the Eu was like a bad polygamous marriage. Controlling husband, who took our wages and told us how to spend them, took away our voice (veto) unless his other wives agreed with what i wanted, made threats if i mentioned divorce. Now we have decided to leave him, he is trying to punish us so his other wives don't think about bolting! Maybe I'll be a bit worse of in some ways, but not for long.

Malice

All nationalism should be frowned on by intelligent people. It's just macro form of ego-mongering. It led not only to Hitler but Mussolini and Franco and two world wars. Who hears someone waxing about their country being the greatest on earth without stifling a giggle?

But then the UK wife' children, who actually really liked their stepmothers and half siblings find their parents' refusal to work things out tears their lives apart. maybe one child sides with mum and Br wants to see dad again, but the other who loved both parents ends up fucked up with no home or job because Mum lost them in the divorce and Dad has his othe kids to think of.

The things which make this country great (Language, Time zone, links to former colonies, legal system, etc.)

Our time zone makes us great ? And CET (a whole ^60 minutes difference) is presumably inferior in some way?

I don't have the languages or desire to live elsewhere in the EU and have lived in the US and disliked it: right wing politics, undemocratic politics and media and guns for a start.

I wonder why we no longer have an empire, if the former colonies are so great? Do you think they didn't agree with us?

Language - we are jolly lucky that the Americans became pre-eminent, otherwise this wouldn't be a particular advantage.

Legal system - other countries don't have any laws of course.

Time zone!!! What can you say about this? An accident of history.

I have thought about it, but it is unlikely to happen. Ironically I have been offered a transfer to the US within the past weeks, but it isn't an option - kids schooling, DH's job and mostly elderly parents. I also don't want to have the kids grow up in a country when you have to think about what the household policy on guns is when considering play dates (yes - seriously an originally English colleague does this in the Midwest).

England is my home although I am half Irish and have a passport. But I have fallen well and truly out of love with it. I work in a global company and love the diversity of my colleagues - the number of nasty small minded incidents that many of them have experienced since the referendum is awful.

I would encourage anyone who has a good opportunity to live and work in another country to do so. Life is short and it's good to experience as much as you can. But I would only go for positive reasons. There is indeed lots of racism in parts of the UK. ( I encountered some on holiday in Great Yarmouth with my mixed race nephews last summer. ) However, there is worse racism in most other countries as far as I can tell. At least it is illegal here and openly discussed and condemned by the main political parties. (I actually prefer our first past the post voting system to the EU's proportional representation because PR seems to benefit far right groups.)

Rage

In reality, the UK is much more like the narcissistic partner who never fully commits, wants to be treated as special, selfishly cherry-picks the good bits of the relationship discarding the chores, tantrums when he doesn't get entirely his own way, never stops flirting with other people, undermines their partner with jibes, has a tendency to drunkenly throw himself at the US, finally leaves to pursue his own affairs (US, China, global trade generally), playing the victim when things don't go exactly his way, astonished that the divorce laws actually apply to him.

Interesting discussion about nationalism. I wouldn't say I am a nationalist but I would say I was very patriotic. But I am Scottish and I really think that this means different things in England compared to other parts of the UK where it is quite acceptable but in England patriotism is associated with the far right which is a shame.

Scotland got a lot of flack from some expat Scots for not making the vote based on blood but on being located in Scotland.

As an adopted Scot who was born in one former colony (South Africa) and who emigrated to another (NZ) in my teens (and emigrated back ), I can assure you that there is no inclination in the "colonies" to go back to the "great" UK.

Indeed, I can remember lots of complaints in NZ about "bloody Poms" who came to NZ and then caused problems.

And there was definitely no love lost between South Africa and the UK.

My neighbour is a GP from Malta (who studied here), one of the most recent "Independent" countries. She just laughs at the idea of Malta returning to the UK-fold - and that's despite having had to suffer the "bad" years of the Mintoff regime.

I think a lot of the UK's problems, and its overinflated sense of self-importance comes from a continued belief that it still has an Empire and the influence that goes with it.

It doesn't.

I haven't seen any leavers suggest we do any Empire building or are harping back to having colonies. The only mention of the commonwealth and previous colonies I have seen are to do with who we could, perhaps, more easily do trade deals than others as we have similar law and financial structures.

Not Empire building as such, but I think some Leavers are of the opinion that the ties to the Commonwealth are greater than they are in practice e.g. see the post immediately above yours.

I voted leave because of the immigration and undermining of our democracy. The EU makes a eunuch of our Parliament.
But my arguments are not economic. I don't mind paying more for things or even going without.
What I mind is the destruction of communities by excessive East European immigration. We are losing our sense of "us" and our shared values. We are no longer "we", we are now "them" and "us". People feel ill at ease when many people around them, in the supermarkets and parks and streets do not their common values and language.
I do not care if our universities receive less funding for research ( and I worked in one), I do not care if we lose the banking passport.
I want my kids ( or rather grandkids) in a school where most of the kids speak English, not Polish or Romanian. I want to live in a British environment. I want British kids to get the places at our universities, not the European kids. I was horrified to hear that these foreign kids actually get UK Government loans.
So, yes I am a nationalist.
I also hope that many of the EU nationals who have come here will leave. It will take the pressure off our child benefit system, our schools, our medical facilities, housing benefits, housing etc..

I want to live in a British environment.
Does this extend to British citizens whose first language is Urdu or Bangladeshi?

I couldn't disagree with trying more!

Jesus

I'm an adopted Scot - been here since I was 3.

I love the fact that at ds' secondary school there are over 26 other languages spoken. It takes great pride in being an International School.

I love the fact that at ds' primary, there were many Urdu speakers (60% ethnic minorities) and that he learnt about a variety of religions (we're atheists but dh comes from a Catholic family).

I love the fact that I live in a multi-ethnic part of Glasgow.

Doesn't make me feel any less Scottish.

Bloody hell. tryings version of the Little England dream is what I'm terrified of moving back to.

I want DS to grow up surrounded by cultures and languages that open his mind and give him adventure and opportunity. English kids are dire at foreign languages, it would do them good to have more exposure to them, not less.

And what are these values that we have as Brits that do not exist in Eastern Europe? I keep reading that line, but having many friends from Eastern Europe am baffled as to what values they are supposedly lacking. A disdain for foreign languages, perhaps?

And what about the British immigrants, on say, the Costa Del Sol. Do you find their behaviour as abhorrent as you do the Romanians? And are you not a little concerned about the pressure they will put on the health system on their return? And about the lack of Spanish or Polish nurses to staff it?