CommonSpace columnist Siobhan Tolland outlines her post-Brexit fears
I COULD barely stammer a coherent thought after the small hours of Friday morning. I just couldn’t get my mind to process it.
Jeff Wayne’s musical version of War of the Worlds was swinging in my ears. "It seems totally incredible to me now that everyone spent that evening though it was just like any other." When the world collapses around your ears a bit of denial never hurt anyone … well, except maybe David Cameron.
After the Scottish independence referendum I never gave up hope. I re-assured myself that, you know, British life wouldn’t be that bad and we would get independence eventually.
Remember the days when the SNP white paper for independence – you know, that 670-page plan – was lambasted by Better Together for being too wishy-washy and not saying much? I bet Leave wish they had about 20 pages of that type of plan now.
Then Jeremy Corbyn came along with his socialist ways and we looked tentatively on to see how he would fare. But he appeared to be just another British imperialist, so we moved on.
And this weird blonde Etonian Mayor of London bloke, along with an ex-merchant banker funny man, started getting loads of air time. Question Time almost salivated when Nigel Farage came on and the BBC did love a bit of bungling Boris.
And then this Brexit thing came along. How seriously stupid is David Cameron? I mean, come on. He grants a referendum in Scotland because he thinks it’ll shut us up, and he not only just won by a whisker (after starting about three gazillion points ahead), it set off a whole new mass, radical movement seeking self-determination for Scotland.
It’s like only just escaping with your life in a pub fight but wanting to go back in there and give them what for. Cameron nearly loses Scotland so what does he do? He gives another referendum, this time on leaving Europe, to appease the ultra-right.
What? It turned into a complete car crash? Never.
I feel ashamed. A campaign won on fantasy promises and blatant lies, an undercurrent of racism and a couple of loveable oafs.
So, power struggles between a dozen or so ultra-rich rightwingers arguing over how rightwing they should actually be sent the UK into chaos; a fight that the ultra-ultra-right never ever expected to win and so didn’t even formulate a plan.
Remember the days when the SNP white paper for independence – you know, that 670-page plan – was lambasted by Better Together for being too wishy-washy and not saying much? The one ripped apart for its lack of thought, etc? I bet Leave wish they had about 20 pages of that type of plan now.
The plan is to 'calm down, calm down', according to George Osborne, 'all we need is more austerity' as the pound crashed two minutes later and lost its triple credit rating for the first time ever. It’s still playing the violin as the titanic sinks. Keep going because there is bugger all else to do in the circumstances.
I feel ashamed. A campaign won on fantasy promises and blatant lies, an undercurrent of racism and a couple of loveable oafs. The Lexiteers, on the other hand, also won on complete fantasy but on even larger delusions that they were in a position to put those fantasies into action.
You had the ultra-right working on the assumption that they would never win and sections of the left assuming a socialist revolution was definitely, absolutely going to happen any day now, if only we could come out of the EU.
You had the ultra-right working on the assumption that they would never win and sections of the left assuming a socialist revolution was definitely, absolutely going to happen any day now, if only we could come out of the EU.
So Brexit beckons and the Westminster government has descended into a powerless vacuum after Cameron resigned and the arguments started over what a 'true' Brexit means. Overshadowed, of course, by the long promised Blairite Coup of Jeremy Corbyn.
Meanwhile, here in Scotland we have a big consensus among the voters and parliament (except Ruth Davidson and her Scottish Tory pack) that the government should do all it can to keep us in the EU.
How the fuck did we get here? I mean. I know we were shifting that little bit more to the right on a daily basis, but it’s like the ground has just split apart beneath us and the social contract we have known has just fallen into a deep Hollywood-style earthquake crevice, screaming dramatically as it disappears in the distance.
Everything we have known is up for question. Everything we have known will be challenged and changed and twisted into a far-right neo-fascist xenophobic morality, and the new social contract will be brutal and it will be hideous.
Meanwhile, here in Scotland, we are the man with the plan. That plan is to remain part of the EU, but it’s more than that: the plan is to retain our social contract. This is not just about stopping us being dragged out of Europe. It is about stopping us being dragged into the gutter by the ultra-right Westminsterian policies.
Meanwhile, here in Scotland, we are the man with the plan. That plan is to remain part of the EU, but it’s more than that: the plan is to retain our social contract.
It is about preserving the political, social and cultural ideals we have tried to foster since the end of the Second World War. A slow dripping away of those rights has suddenly become a Brexitian avalanche.
It feels like the rest of the UK is birling away into a dark political vortex while we are desperately trying to peg ourselves to the ground. I don’t know what will happen now. All I know is that I will not – I cannot – allow my son to grow up in the neo-fascist society that is developing before our eyes.
Independence is on. Damn right it is.
Picture courtesy of Scottish Government
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