These are people I talk to one on one about all kinds of different issues - mostly philisophocal, rarely political - and they all had a few small things in common with the EU debate:
* a certainty that the UK is dying. There is less and less value here, and continuing with the current setup spells for a long slow death.
* an outright distrust of the political class and the media class. Most can cite cases where they have been outright knowingly lied to in ways most wouldn't realise.
* a feeling of betrayal by those screaming remain and insulting anyone who disagrees. These are people who were often close friends who just weren't the kind to get into the discussions we enjoyed.
So the obvious thing for these people to do? Vote leave. We can start the fight now and possibly survive, or delay it and definitely die. Why didn't they talk about it? They did. Just in places where there is no audience, only participants.
Isn't it interesting how many forms of public forums are not providing a greater venue for the exchange of ideas? As you implied, because of the one sided vitriol and group think on many public social media platforms, it tends to lead to suppression of dialogue.
As a professional, I am very worried about a ill-advised comment on social media having lasting consequences for my career. So I tend to avoid anything controversial.
For brexit, I've certainly held my tongue for fear of being permanently branded a racist by my colleagues. Chilling, when you think about it.
I can assure you, the vitriol was two-sided. Remain campaigners against Leave voters, Leave campaigners against non-British EU citizens.
From what you say I'm guessing you don't see the service sector as a viable form of "value" in the UK's economy, and maybe you also don't think of culture (creativity in the arts, or heritage and museums) as a form of renewable and intangible value? Whether that can support the UK entirely is another matter.
It's also a matter of socialization in the sociological sense. This is a fascinating concept for the slightly alienated among us to consider(!), even if you disregard what sociologists do with it:
Unfortunately the growth and sustenance of British culture is largely hamstrung by the London centric governance of the last forty years. In many ways the entire brexit can be seen as an anti-London situation (everywhere but London and Scotland vote out, Scotland are on the SNP line who are anti-London).
Know this. The best and the brightest all left the county I grew up in. They are told by their new peers that they should look down upon the places they came from.
There should be no surprise that when my peers write verse it doesn't dream of home or that when they colour canvas it doesn't reveal our fells.
But they will accompany to the local great garden, and sit upon the grass, and talk of love, confusion, hope, and futures.
Get a grip.
Has the UK economy been destroyed? No, the FTSE 100 dropped 3.15% on Friday, reacting to temporary uncertainty, and is up 1% on last week.
European markets fell far more, reflecting the fact they have more to lose from an acrimonious Brexit than the UK does.
What is narrow minded about voting to leave an anachronistic, sclerotic, anti-democratic political union, to which the UK contributes more money than it receives back, and from which the UK imports more than it exports to?
In all likelihood, the UK will leave the EU, but retain access to the single market through the EEA. This will enable us to enter into free trade deals with the rest of the world, which we are not able to do as EU members. There is nothing narrow minded about that.
See this paper [1] from the ASI which sets out the benefits of EEA membership over being a full member of the EU.
Sensationalist nonsense. Banks are considering long-term options for the worst case scenario if the UK leaves the single market. That is unlikely to happen.
> Even worse the uk won't secure any trade deal with Europe because the will want to discourage other nations to follow the same path.
The EU needs free trade with the UK more than UK needs it with the EU. The EU cannot afford to freeze the UK out.
You realize that most of the trade deals for the UK will not be favorable at all, right? As you mentioned, the UK has a negative trade balance.
If you voted for leave, you voted for the balkanization of Europe, and possibly the UK itself. History has proven time and time again that this is a bad and short-sighted idea (India/Pakistan partition, former Yugoslavian republics, Middle East, etc). It wouldn't surprise me if Canary Wharf suddenly relocated to Germany.
Parent is on topic and gives a slightly different perspective. I assume each of his friend had at least additional argument that probably align with one the messages of the Leave campaign as with the argument he listed most people would just stay home and not vote.
What is done is done, you better understand what those guys think because you will need their vote.
We must respect our democratic outcome and turn it to the best advantage of everyone.
Perhaps a more democratic Europe. It seems a goal we can get behind.
Edit: ok he did not say how he voted only "friends of his".
Of course I voted the same way as the friends I had been discussing this with for years.
Recall how EU/Merkel treated Greece, a country too entangled to leave, and note Brown's decision to keep the pound sterling was prescient. That creates plenty of skepticism of the value of the EU.
However, the main benefit of the EU is the single market, both in terms of goods locally as well as leverage for negotiating trade deals with other, non-European countries. That's going to be what hits them the hardest, because they won't get such a good deal, especially outside the EU
It's not "uncontrolled immigration" - an American reading this can't just turn up in the UK and start living and working there. It's free movement of labour between EU member states.
The irony, which politicians who were pro-leave are starting to hint at, is that even having left the UK will have to agree to free movement in order to have access to the EU market. People who voted leave because they were angry about internal EU migration are going to be disappointed.
That distinction is kind of meaningless when thousands of people can enter several EU member states pretty much unregulated, then disappear under the radar and go anywhere within the EU.
That may be possible in, let's say, Belgium. Someone enters through the Italian border, somehow tricks the border patrol, and then can go with no problem from Italy to Belgium.
That's not the case for UK. On enter, you need to cross a border with officers, customs, etc. You can't even cross the border unnoticed through Ireland, as Ireland is also not a Schengen country (there's no border between Ireland and Northern Ireland, though there are sometimes checks from Police in buses and so on). There's a border also in Gibraltar...
The Brexit campaign was mainly complaining about workers from Eastern Countries like Poland or Romania, where they have the legal right to move and work in the UK, due EU accords. Plus fear that Turkey may enter in the future.
I am certain that even the most compassionate proponent of diversity would find it difficult to call the tens of thousands (?) of individuals from Roma populations in for example Romania and Bulgaria who have arrived throughout West and Northern Europe the past couple of years in any way, shape or form, "labour" ("homeless" is more accurate). I don't blame these people; I blame the governments of Romania and Bulgaria who abandoned these people, thought of them as a "problem" and decided to punt that "problem" over to other member states.
So, I have trouble thinking this is your real issue?
We use strikingly similar scapegoating techniques in our political rhetoric.
My point is this. In the USA, there are less cultural and economic differences between the states, so there won't be as many mass immigrations from one state to another. Now think about if USA decided over night, that it would open it's southern borders to all of South America, I think we all know what would happen.
And the same thing could happen in EU, because you get to huge cultural and economic differences on the borders of EU. Just think about Turkey and negotiations (their demands) to become part of EU. That would be a total disaster.
What good is EU or USA, if it can't keep ILLEGAL immigrants away ?
It's not really an issue because our 11 million illegal immigrants don't just desired to move to Montana they do what other people do and arrive in waves. Only issue US has with internal migration has to do with Job openings which are fairly easily to predict if hard to deal with. EX: Boom towns from fracking.
Labour is a tradable good, and as such the labour market must be an open as for any other goods (or services).
There is a whole bunch of reasons to vote leave and the debates for the last 6 months have been very informative. These, you missed. But radio 4 had debates most days from smart people on both sides. Older people listen to the radio and watch debates on the TV.
I was often surprised that the 'vote remain' people often couldn't answer simple questions. The biggest being with uncontrolled immigration (no possible way of capping a maximum) how do you plan for schools, hospitals, teachers, nurses. So you hear from teachers, day after day on the radio with these arguments and it becomes easy to vote out.
Then you have the popular radio 1 and other 'younger generation' tv shows, twitter, facebook, reddit etc that are posing the debate in a different light. Farage is an idiot (true.) Immigration is good, the EU is great and has done so much for us, we can fix the broken bits. Then it's much better to vote in.
A lot of people who voted remain did so because they were terrified that if the Tories had more power they would strip workers of their rights, decimate the NHS, privatise schools, etc etc (a lot of these things have nothing to do with the EU - sigh) so they voted in because they fear our own government!
Other people voted out because they hate our government - a sort of protest vote.
It's been a crazy time.