French Frank - You asked about the psychology:
For the record, the longer term position was this : Very pro Britain's membership in 1975. Reason? "We must never go to war in Europe again". I hadn't the slightest interest in the economic aspects. Totally indifferent to money then, just as I am today, unless I sense a need to oppose overt greed. Very pro ongoing membership until the fall of the Berlin Wall. Minor qualms then - barely assessed - before remaining very pro membership throughout the 1990s. Maastricht seemed like a lot of fuss about nothing. I should have scrutinized it more but didn't, not least because I was professionally focussed on and at the UN. But had I done so, I think my position would still have been the same. These were the Ashdown-by-default years given that Steel had gone and the SDP had imploded in civil war. Briefly, John Smith made Labour look like a viable alternative but I was never a full Labour man.
The expansion east - with the incorporation of many more countries - in the early 2000s again brought minor qualms, briefly. Again, I didn't assess it as much as I could have done. One has to bear in mind that the entire mainstream was for our membership for decades. Opponents seemed out on a limb. And, of course, the Social Democrat Charles Kennedy had become the leader of the centre party - an individual who I felt especially able to endorse and he was very clear on his position. I trusted him at the time just as I agreed with him on Iraq. The wheels fell off the bus with the Orange Book and the emergence of Laws, Browne and Clegg. I just didn't agree with the economic direction, especially following recession.
Before the 2010 General Election, I switched fully to voting for the Green Party with whom I had dabbled in minor elections. Their pro EU stance wasn't obvious then to me. Certainly I didn't know that it was rampant. Nor did it seem to matter at the time. But between 2010 and 2015 I increasingly drew links between the EU and the financial crash, seeing the latter as partially symptomatic of the EU's unhealthy relationship with bankers etc. People were also talking about the need for huge housing programmes to accommodate the additional numbers here. This led to the stronger development in my mind of a link between population size and the fragility of our environment. In parallel, I was concerned - and shocked - about the pace of social change in my borough which houses Lunar House. What it felt like, ironically, was an extension of America. Since the 1980s, I had always argued strongly in favour of immigration but only at a rate which was manageable and fair to everyone, existing citizens and immigrants alike. Of course, the terrorism concerns also weaved in and out.
Perhaps about a year before the referendum, maybe a little longer, I took to Farage - before not taking at all to Farage - and then taking to him again. I remember the documentary with him taking viewers around the Brussels buildings and explaining the elaborate processes. Quite a lot of what he said rang true although that ringing was met with resistance. By then, I had been made redundant and while university educated the current elites were not me and in many ways I felt I was one of their victims. And that was not the easiest conclusion to make of one's identity. The thinking was very mixed. I also recall around that time a leaflet being put in my letterbox by one of his party and it was focussed on the constituency next door. Gleefully I ran out to tell them that they were on the wrong side of the border. The response was very offish. I was told it all amounted to the same thing.
Then maybe about eight months before the referendum I decided to leap towards a position of us being better off leaving the EU. I know that the EU position on Ukraine which I had disagreed with vehemently was then uppermost in my thinking. The feeling was - and I was with Gerhard Schroeder on this matter although Peter Hitchens and George Galloway were also influential - that the institution when in cahoots with the United States had become too belligerent. Geopolitics suddenly seemed to mean a lot given that a policy of regime change ran counter to "we must never go to war in Europe again". About three months later, I was once again for our EU membership. It had been some time since Ukraine was regularly in the news. The racist elements among the genuine people for Brexit were making me very uneasy. And actually a lot of sentiment crept in. "This is crazy.....I am instinctively for Europe.....that is who I have always been". And that is the way in which I went into the campaign while knowing deep down that the way I felt about the arguments was not quite in line with my long-term identity. That identity just about survived until the referendum but after the result it went in favour of acceptance of a 21st Century reality.
For the record, the longer term position was this : Very pro Britain's membership in 1975. Reason? "We must never go to war in Europe again". I hadn't the slightest interest in the economic aspects. Totally indifferent to money then, just as I am today, unless I sense a need to oppose overt greed. Very pro ongoing membership until the fall of the Berlin Wall. Minor qualms then - barely assessed - before remaining very pro membership throughout the 1990s. Maastricht seemed like a lot of fuss about nothing. I should have scrutinized it more but didn't, not least because I was professionally focussed on and at the UN. But had I done so, I think my position would still have been the same. These were the Ashdown-by-default years given that Steel had gone and the SDP had imploded in civil war. Briefly, John Smith made Labour look like a viable alternative but I was never a full Labour man.
The expansion east - with the incorporation of many more countries - in the early 2000s again brought minor qualms, briefly. Again, I didn't assess it as much as I could have done. One has to bear in mind that the entire mainstream was for our membership for decades. Opponents seemed out on a limb. And, of course, the Social Democrat Charles Kennedy had become the leader of the centre party - an individual who I felt especially able to endorse and he was very clear on his position. I trusted him at the time just as I agreed with him on Iraq. The wheels fell off the bus with the Orange Book and the emergence of Laws, Browne and Clegg. I just didn't agree with the economic direction, especially following recession.
Before the 2010 General Election, I switched fully to voting for the Green Party with whom I had dabbled in minor elections. Their pro EU stance wasn't obvious then to me. Certainly I didn't know that it was rampant. Nor did it seem to matter at the time. But between 2010 and 2015 I increasingly drew links between the EU and the financial crash, seeing the latter as partially symptomatic of the EU's unhealthy relationship with bankers etc. People were also talking about the need for huge housing programmes to accommodate the additional numbers here. This led to the stronger development in my mind of a link between population size and the fragility of our environment. In parallel, I was concerned - and shocked - about the pace of social change in my borough which houses Lunar House. What it felt like, ironically, was an extension of America. Since the 1980s, I had always argued strongly in favour of immigration but only at a rate which was manageable and fair to everyone, existing citizens and immigrants alike. Of course, the terrorism concerns also weaved in and out.
Perhaps about a year before the referendum, maybe a little longer, I took to Farage - before not taking at all to Farage - and then taking to him again. I remember the documentary with him taking viewers around the Brussels buildings and explaining the elaborate processes. Quite a lot of what he said rang true although that ringing was met with resistance. By then, I had been made redundant and while university educated the current elites were not me and in many ways I felt I was one of their victims. And that was not the easiest conclusion to make of one's identity. The thinking was very mixed. I also recall around that time a leaflet being put in my letterbox by one of his party and it was focussed on the constituency next door. Gleefully I ran out to tell them that they were on the wrong side of the border. The response was very offish. I was told it all amounted to the same thing.
Then maybe about eight months before the referendum I decided to leap towards a position of us being better off leaving the EU. I know that the EU position on Ukraine which I had disagreed with vehemently was then uppermost in my thinking. The feeling was - and I was with Gerhard Schroeder on this matter although Peter Hitchens and George Galloway were also influential - that the institution when in cahoots with the United States had become too belligerent. Geopolitics suddenly seemed to mean a lot given that a policy of regime change ran counter to "we must never go to war in Europe again". About three months later, I was once again for our EU membership. It had been some time since Ukraine was regularly in the news. The racist elements among the genuine people for Brexit were making me very uneasy. And actually a lot of sentiment crept in. "This is crazy.....I am instinctively for Europe.....that is who I have always been". And that is the way in which I went into the campaign while knowing deep down that the way I felt about the arguments was not quite in line with my long-term identity. That identity just about survived until the referendum but after the result it went in favour of acceptance of a 21st Century reality.
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