The EU didn't cause the problems so rejoining won't fix them
The majority vote for Leave was in response to a significant proportion of Britons – mostly in England - feeling forgotten, poorer, with diminished prospects and lower pay in real terms and feeling the pain of savage austerity cuts.
The ten most deprived towns in England voted for Brexit. That’s no coincidence.?
Leave voters considered that an ‘elite’ in power were getting too powerful, and that they cared less about those on the bottom rungs of society, who felt trapped with no means of escape.?
The so-called elite, on the other hand, were not affected by austerity measures; on the contrary, they seemed to thrive and get richer on them.
(I will be posting an article soon to show that ‘the elite’ are not really an elite at all - and certainly not the brightest nor the best to be running the country).
The slogan ‘Take Back Control’ strongly appealed to those Leave voters because that’s exactly what they considered was lacking in their lives: control.?
Their lives were going nowhere, they were stuck, and they felt unrepresented with their deep concerns.
Neither the Tories nor Labour reached out or offered remedies to these concerns. Nor did the Remain campaigns.
But Brexiters knew how to exploit them.?
The EU was not the cause of any of the problems facing the deprived and forgotten areas of Britain.?
But Leave campaigners, unlawfully, stole millions of the personal data of those who fitted the right profile, targeting them with powerful messages, suggesting to them that EU membership was the cause of their lives feeling stagnant, and that Brexit would provide the answers.
? ADDRESSING THE REAL CAUSES OF BREXIT
Leaving the EU has caused us severe economic pain, but simply rejoining won't fix all that pain - because a lot of the pain was already there when we were a member.
The Leave side wrongly accused the EU and migrants, but they were not the cause.
We will need deep reforms in the UK before we could become a welcome candidate for EU membership again.
There is a huge amount to achieve. But it would be wrong to claim that rejoining would fix all the country's problems - they won't. It's an issue worthy of discussing, which the main parties are not doing.
Cause and effect are very difficult to prove, but populism thrives on offering simplistic solutions to complicated issues.?
You can’t get promotion, your pay hasn’t risen, you’re finding it difficult to find a better job? You feel poor and you just don’t see a bright future ahead?
Just look at those migrants here taking jobs. They must be the reason for your decline. And look, it’s because of the EU that those migrants can come here in unlimited numbers.
That’s an entirely inaccurate ‘real’ cause for the despondency and despair felt by many in the last ten years or so. But the message was powerful and compelling.
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The Remain side, and the two main political parties, didn’t address this despondency. They had no vision to offer of a brighter future for forgotten Britain and Britons.?
But Brexit did, however false.
Since being in the EU caused none of the problems for which people voted for Brexit, it stands to reason that rejoining the EU won't fix those problems either - although of course Brexit has made the problems much worse.?
This may explain why a Rejoin message cannot work until the real causes of Brexit are addressed: a chronic inequality experienced by a significant stratum of Britons, who live in forgotten and less developed areas of Britain.
In other words: A party offering Rejoin won’t win until they can remedy the problems affecting poor Britain and Britons that weren’t caused by EU membership, and so can’t be put right by EU membership.?
So, no Rejoin until broken Britain is fixed first.
? HARD VERSUS SOFT BREXIT
Why have Tories pursued a hard Brexit? That’s more difficult to answer.?
A softer Brexit would have hurt Leave voters less, but maybe our political masters felt that only a hard Brexit could justify the vote for Leave. A soft Brexit might show up too easily that Brexit offered no benefits.
A soft Brexit wouldn’t allow that, because it would entail the EU retaining some control (such as if we stayed in the EU’s Single Market or customs union).
And here’s another scenario: the powerbase behind Brexit is really Putin’s Russia, the only true beneficiary of Brexit.
Putin is said to be on an imperialistic course to establish a new kind of Soviet Union, for which the European Union is a barrier to his goals.
Russia’s game plan would be a Brexit that effectively severed Britain’s ties with the EU, to weaken the bloc.
? THE 10 MOST DEPRIVED TOWNS IN ENGLAND VOTED FOR BREXIT
Further reading:
Founder at Reasons2Rejoin
2 年Someone commented of Leave voters: ‘Until I get a serious explanation from them I will find it difficult to understand their behaviour in voting for Brexit.’ This was my reply: You and many may fail to understand why voters voted the way they did, but it is vital that our side does understand if we ever want to turn this mess around. You may not get 'a serious explanation from them' and frankly I am not sure you should expect that as a condition of trying to win them back to our side. It's complicated, but clearly voters believed the Brexit hype, and then continued to believe it when Boris Johnson promised to get Brexit done - a Brexit that many voters were misled to believe would improve their lot. The lies were convincing. Our side failed to get our message across - and for that failure, the entire country is and will suffer deeply. The pro-Remain campaign was abysmal, and Labour's 2019 promises were unconvincing, unclear, and their Brexit policies confusing, and alienating, for both Leave and Remain supporters alike. We can take some comfort that most voters didn't vote for the Tories or indeed for Brexit. The fact that both Brexit and the Tories won is a product of our abysmal system of voting, but our side has to win next time despite that, and not lose because of it.
Snorkeller, Superrecogniser, Modelmaker, INFJ, Punster, Retired Civil Servant. Purveyor of 'Dad Jokes'
2 年Brexit was the solution to the wrong problem, the biggest Dead Cat of all time
Founder at Reasons2Rejoin
2 年To comment you need to be connected. If you'd like to comment and you're not connected, just reach out. Polite debate only please, and any contentious claims do need to be substantiated with evidence. Thank you.