Deeply alarmed to see righteous anger about the state of our society misdirected (in my view) into a desire to leave the EU. In order to back what feels like a regressive, almost fantasist view of sovereignty and pseudo Churchillian British ‘pluck’, one would need to have extraordinary faith in what an unrestrained British government would look like.
We’d have to believe that all the obvious economic damage wrought by Brexit – from macroeconomic trade deals to phone roaming charges to the flexible labour force enshrined in the free movement of people – is worth sacrificing to concentrate power in the hands of Mr B Johnson, Mr M Gove and the rest of the swivel eyed populists whipping up a very British form of nationalism in a very Thatcherite teacup.
The EU has done more to temper the tendencies of respective British governments in their attitudes to human rights, war, and the worst excesses of capitalism than the British voter has seemingly managed. Which is a dangerously undemocratic dynamic in itself, but I’ll take sense where I find it. Just because major corporations support the Remain camp doesn’t make it inherently wrong. Just because we can stick it to one bureaucratic power structure doesn’t mean we’ve picked the right battle.On so many levels, leaving feels like a short sighted move born of shaky facts and a refusal to pragmatically engage with globalisation.
The status quo is far from perfect – but fuck me – tear out all the economic benefits, grow more culturally introverted and leave the likes of Tony Blair and David Cameron answerable to no-one but a right wing, neo-liberal press and the opinions they shape? Seems like madness to me.
Cyrus Bozorgmehr 