Yesterday I gave my pencilled cross to a corrupt institution that only last year condemned millions of Greeks to a poverty they’d done nothing to deserve, and has plotted and connived behind our backs to subvert popular will in the name of TTIP. I voted RemaIN despite the self serving case made for it by the bulk of the British and international ruling class, and despite finding the arguments of most on the centre left lacking depth and factual knowledge, and frequently illogical with it.
I found the principled case against the EU made by Lexit (socialists for exit) more closely argued and knowledgeable than Remain arguments set out in corporate media and relayed across Facebook and Twitter. What Lexit did not persuade me of, however, was that it had a convincing answer on how, at this particular juncture, leaving the EU will better the conditions of working people. The situation we awoke to this morning was arrived at by a debate whose terms have been framed entirely by atavistic elements and instincts that have nothing to do with workers’ rights or protection of living standards.
There is an internationalist case for leaving the EU but we’ve barely heard it. We’ve left in the worst possible circumstances – if you doubt this, look to the rapturous welcome this morning’s news has triggered across Europe’s far right – and for all the wrong reasons.