Q: I thought that this blog was dead?
A: It is, but this is a one-off as the matter deserves comment.
Q: So what is your opinion of the vote?
A: Pretty much what I expected (figures based upon the last time I saw them) - 48% intelligent, 52% stupid. I actually thought that 45% intelligent, 55% stupid was more likely. Reading the opinion polls occasionally over the past few weeks this has seemed the probable outcome.
Q: But you don't live in the UK any more so you are not affected ....
A:
1. My British pension rights make up 40% of my income. They are paid in Sterling. The pound has plunged this morning, and its future recovery cannot be guaranteed, which cuts my already limited income even further. The amount of work I get for the translation work has been 20% down this year as well (sounds like a recession is setting in possibly).
2. Long-term my residence rights in an EU country are open to review which was not previously the case.
3. My wife's residential status as a non-EU national is also open to review as she has been able to live here as the spouse of an EU national.
4. When the exit is complete, my pension would become a non-EU pension and hence subject to higher tax rates. This isn't just me. If the same happens in Spain imagine the lot of British pensioners who moved there as the climate is better for their health, imagine the problems.
Q: So what do you make of the vote?
A: Do I make the comment that it is a victory for parochial, insular xenophobia, over a more open-minded, liberal culture? And people obviously do not care that much about unemployment any more, as it is bound to rise, sharply, according to any orthodox economic model. If you don't believe that check out the opinion of the Reuters economic correspondent a few months ago and the article in the Münchner Merkur a couple of weeks ago.
And for those who think that Britain can negotiate a favourable package with the EU (like the Norwegians and Swiss have - for which they pay substantial sums of money incidentally), think again. The German Finance Minister, Wolfgang Schäuble (the man who stared down the Greeks during the Euro crisis and did not blink), said quite clearly last week that if the UK leaves there will be no special privileges. You had them, you abandoned them, you don't get them back. And as Nigel Farage's UKIP is seen in Germany as being similar to the bumptious (and often very nasty) upstart AfD (who are loathed in Berlin), Farage would be advised to keep away.
The UK will become its own market with 60 million people, rather than part of a market of 450 million people. Companies like HBSC, BT, Hitachi and Nissan have already made noises about potential job cuts, many more will likely follow. The figure could, at a worst estimate be over a million job losses. I saw the mass unemployment in the North of England in the 1980s, I wouldn't wish that upon anyone.
Q: Nigel Farage doesn't think that it will happen ....
A: Snake oil salesman who doesn't live in the real world. All I heard from him was something along the lines of "we're British, we'll find a way". Sorry but blind, foolish, empty, immature, insubstantial patriotism does not pay the bills!
Q: You don't sound very patriotic ....
A: You have read this blog and what I said about patriotism. Go and read Al Franken's recent comment about American patriotism for another interesting answer to that question.
The fact remains that I have more in common with German, Dutch and French IT specialists than I have with stockbrokers or traders or property speculators or even accountants and lawyers from the English Home Counties. I belong in Europe, most of my contacts have come from my professional surroundings and not because people share a certain passport.
I doubt whether there is a single place on this planet where I could live happily alongside the likes of Nigel Farage and Boris Johnson - we think along totally different lines. And having to live a certain way because they are the elite and I am just one of their serfs, no thank you.
The UK will become like a large jail and you cannot leave anymore as they have removed your rights to work as an EU citizen, so heading off to find work in Holland or Germany is out of the question. So even if there is mass unemployment in the aftermath of their attack of grotesque nationalism, you will be stuck!
You are here to be slaves to the mega-rich speculators and the ultranationalist elitist morons and live in near poverty (and huge amounts of unpayable debt), now stop complaining, and no, you can’t leave!
Q: But they will tell you that British people don’t go and work in other EU countries.
A: Total BS! I have met dozens working in IT in Germany and Holland over the years, met several engineers and construction workers on planes between Manchester and Munich and between Humberside and Amsterdam going to their jobs in Germany and Holland, and in a couple of cases Denmark and Austria.
Anyway, the advantages are obvious.
The opportunity to go and work in countries like Germany and the Netherlands has been an enriching experience for me – not in terms of income, but definitely in terms of experience. It opens your mind to see how others think, operate, work, and pass their leisure hours. I wouldn’t have missed it for the world. The chance to live and work in Paris and Amsterdam, Munich and Cologne, and, of course Frankfurt – some of the world’s great cities, all rich and worthwhile experiences. Compare the likes of Stoke Poges or Henley on Thames? No thanks! Fascinating and thriving major city or massively overpriced, utterly boring backwater – the choice for me is obvious!
Like it or not, the generation coming through in the UK better prepare themselves for working in the South-East of England with all its parochial insular attitudes and outrageously high accommodation prices. Not much else will be available (well you can always flip burgers in Burnley or Halifax maybe), and the door to the opportunity of working in the rest of Europe will be shut! Time for most UK universities to close down their Modern Language departments? Yet more unemployment .... But who needs to learn French and German if your chances to use them are going to be extremely restricted?
I am seriously sad for the young people in the UK who are now at an age where they want to travel, learn languages and try out living somewhere else (as was the case with me when I was 18). Given the way that doors are being closed upon them, the opportunities will be scarce. But never mind, you can always do a Farage and wave your passport at people and feel superior. That is what the majority (well 52% at the last count) of the people in the UK obviously want, so it is that or be a pariah!
After all, it’s always the fault of the foreigners! The British never ever do or get anything wrong, do they????
Q: You don't sound very patriotic!
A: I was thinking the other day of the British nationals whom I admire. People like Sir Isaac Newton in his day, the brilliant Stephen Hawking in ours. There are a lot of them. I also have a lot of time for every one of the 48% of the British nationals who voted sensibly for the UK to stay in the EU.
There are many good people out there.
What though is notable about Newton and Hawking is that their innovative thinking has produced solutions that are universal in application. They are not restricted by national boundaries and can be applied anywhere on the globe. Their thinking also assists research carried out everywhere which helps all to progress and is not subject to polemical constraints that can hold us back - among them nationalism and dogmatic religion.
Hawking has worked with scientists from other countries, and so have many other leading British scientists. The concern has arisen that if the UK left the EU scientific progress in the country could be hindered (see the adverts in the media in recent weeks from members of the scientific community). These concerns are very real and should have been heeded.
Q: But isn't immigration a serious concern?
A: You shouldn't go to another country and claim benefits. Cameron had already agreed upon action to stop that.
I think though that many people here are confusing two different types of immigration. Economic (non-Muslim) immigration from countries like Poland and Romania. And Muslim immigration.
My opinion with regard to the economic migration from Eastern Europe dates back to my longstanding criticism of the way that matters were handled following the fall of Communism.
Whereas in the aftermath of World War Two Western Europe had the Marshall Plan, and we got rapid growth and nearly full employment - and a substantial rise in prosperity across the board - following the events of 1989 Eastern Europe got neoliberalism, a few wealthy oligarchs, mass unemployment and widescale poverty! I visited Hungary myself in 1996 and saw some wretched examples of what people's lives had become. Young married women working on the streets as prostitutes as there was little work available for them and their husbands. Sad!
So with regard to these economic migrants:
Can you blame anybody for leaving somewhere where there is mass unemployment and few prospects of things ever getting better? Some people in the UK obviously have short memories. In both 1991 and 1996 I moved to the Netherlands in the hope of finding a job in line with my experience and my qualifications. Go back to the UK and the mass unemployment and the total lack of prospects in the North of England (the Thatcher years and those following them were devastating for highly qualified people like myself)? Moving to the South of England was financially out of the question, and anyway it was a cultural wilderness.
I wasn't alone in moving to Europe to find work either. The problem is not the economic migration, it is the scourge of unemployment and underemployment across vast swathes of Europe, even including parts of the UK which took a battering when the City of London gamblers lost fortunes in the 2008 crash! Meanwhile does anyone want to persuade me that it is impossible to manufacture electric razors anywhere in Europe? Try finding one made in Europe for sale in Germany as I did a couple of years ago. You don't want something made in China? Grow a beard!
And back to Farage again. As for his telling people that being British "we will find a way" ...
Like we did under his beloved Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s? Unemployment was standing at 18% in Manchester when I left in 1988, and higher than that in Liverpool, Newcastle and Middlesbrough. While all Farage's buddies were gambling huge sums of money in order to make fortunes on the London Stock Exchange (and often surrepetitiously hiding their losses!) .... that he didn't hear about such numbers shouldn't be so surprising! Some of us had to look elsewhere for work - see above!
And if this sharp rise in unemployment should (and probably will!) happen again following the departure from the EU???? Where are people supposed to go then? We have heard a lot of promises about jobs not disappearing, but nothing but vague comments about how they will be created!
Meanwhile there are the often loathed Muslim immigrants. The radicals are of course a problem (well I agree, Islam is a diabolical load of pre-medieval nonsense based upon a warmongering prophet and a non-existent deity, of this there is no doubt, but if they keep their beliefs to themselves within their own homes and do not disturb anyone else, where would the problem be?).
Take a quick look at Britain's Muslim immigrants. Where do they come from? Particularly the terrorist fringe.
Will closing the door on the EU mean an end to Muslim immigration?
It wouldn't have kept the Emwazis out and their murderous son (aka "Jihadi John") - from Kuwait, a British Commonwealth country, not in the EU!
It would have not kept the thugs who murdered Lee Rigby out - from Nigeria, a British Commonwealth country, not in the EU!
It would not have kept out the well-known rabble-rousing imam and alleged terrorist supporter, Anjem Choudary, out - born in the UK to a father from Pakistan, a British Commonwealth country, not in the EU!
In fact the overwhelming majority of Muslims in the UK have only ever known 1 EU country, and that is the UK!
Britain did not sign the Schengen Agreement and guards its own borders, so it is down to British security personnel to keep any dubious individuals out. It has banned the likes of white ultraconservative politicians like Geert Wilders, it should be perfectly capable of keeping out foreign Muslim terrorists even from the EU.
Once in a while a criminal like Mohamed Abrini might get into the country on a forged passport - that could happen coming from anywhere, not just the EU!
The problem with Britain's Muslim problem though is primarily a British issue. There are according to one poll 30% of young British Muslims who think that these terrorist attacks are justified. So what do you do with them? As their grandparents came from Pakistan some 50 years ago (in many instances), you simply send them back to Pakistan?
I can just see the Pakistanis falling over themselves to accept thousands of people who have never even set foot in the country, because of whom their grandfathers were. People who may never even have heard of Peshawar or Lahore and speak English with an East End, West Midlands, or Yorkshire accent.
And they are potentially a load of terrorists or at least supporters? Pakistan has its hands full with these already. You seriously expect them to agree to accept these individuals?
The fact remains that the only place on earth where such people are welcome is the so-called Islamic State, and that is gradually being destroyed (thankfully!).
So any other ideas what you do with them?
This isn't a strictly British problem either. The Dutch and Belgians have groups who would just love to throw out their ethnic "Moroccan" population. Many people in France want to do the same to their "Algerian" population. The fact that Morocco and Algeria do not want them back isn't a problem?
One of the questions with the UK though seems to be "Europe" stopping them kicking people out. The first question that arises is how did Qattada, and the well-known Al-Qaeda terrorist, Bary, ever get asylum in the UK in the first place?
There are then the questions of exactly who stopped the extradition (in Qattada's case it was actually the British High Court!). The European body blocking the extraditions in most instances is the European Court of Human Rights, a product of the European Council, not the European Union. The UK having left the EU will still actually be subject to the European Court of Human Rights as it will not have not left the European Council.
In other words, the issue has been confused, whether through ignorance or deceit.
Then finally there is the question of the refugees from Syria and Iraq.
For some reason (possibly anxiety, possibly malicious propaganda), the fate of the refugees evokes a different response in Europe from what it does in the UK. In Germany they are mainly seen as unfortunate people fleeing a gruesome war and suffering many travails (even drowning in the Mediterranean) in order to escape.
In the UK they seem to be all pictured as potential terrorists! Which is nonsense.
Germany now is keeping out any Algerians and Moroccans who tried to slip in with the refugees (as not genuine refugees), which is sensible. There are occasional flashpoints in the accommodation provided for these unfortunate people between young men, but more of a criminal than a terrorist nature.
The idea is eventually, when the war in Syria and Iraq comes to an end (which could be a few years), they will all go home. It is a pity that the UK is so antagonistic to people in such need, but hardly surprising given the leadership of movements like the UKIP, who love to bend the facts for their own advantage.
Q: So you see no positives in the situation, allowng for a difference of opinion maybe?
A: It is always an intelligent response to listen to points of view and then respond with reason, not with emotion or excess zeal. But how do you respond to the unreasonable using propaganda as a tool?
I will throw two quotes at you. One from the great British writer and reasoner, Dr Samuel Johnson, a man who carefully analysed issues (with reason - you wish you could say the same was the case for his namesake in the past few weeks):
"Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel".
Not the only comment that he made on the subject incidentally, and some in-depth reading of his opinions on the subject (google "Samuel Johnson" "Patriotism") is well worth the effort given the current circumstances.
And also very relevant to the current situation is a quote from the German writer and journalist (and often a man of considerable wit, though that does not apply here), Kurt Tucholsky in 1931 when the dark shadows were gradually emerging over his country:
"Denn nichts ist schwerer und nichts erfordert mehr Charakter, als sich in offenen Gegensatz zu seiner Zeit zu befinden und laut zu sagen: "Nein"!
("For nothing is more difficult and nothing requires more character than to find oneself in open opposition to one's time and to say loudly: "No!").
Tucholsky died in difficult circumstances in exile. I can see the same happening to me (though I am not even half the person that Tucholsky was). Here though he was undoubtedly right. Better a minority of one (or many for that matter) and be right than to submit to the herd mentality which is undoubtedly mistaken (as that vote was on Thursday!). And remember that eventually Tucholsky was on the right side of history, even though sadly he did not live to see that!
Q: So what happens to you now? Becoming a German national?
A: I started down that road, but it is expensive given my limited income, and despite working as a translator, I still need to pass a language test. That requires 6 hours on a Saturday on a specified date, and I am not 22 years old any more, so keeping my concentration going for all that time would be a problem. There is the possibility that tiredness might set in and I might not do myself justice.
Q: So?
A: Things look pretty bleak. My wife has ideas upon buying a property in her home country (Thailand) and moving there, but it would be out in the back and beyond (a bit like the UK will be when it finally leaves the EU). She also needs to find a job out there in line with her qualifications (degrees in Botany don't seem to get you much these days though) as I cannot guarantee to be around forever. Taking out a mortgage is risky IMHO.
I wish that I could look at life with more certaintly, but as stupid is winning out over intelligent, and parochial is defeating open-minded in much of the world at the moment, there isn't a lot of reason to be optimistic.
Q: Well thanks for your time and good luck anyway.
A: Thanks, I could do with some.
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