2016 Referendum on reflection.

It was an odd affair. On the one side understated confidence that we’re a natural fit in Europe and we’d be mad to leave, and on the other a full on marketing campaign. Leave became its sexy sister, Brexit, battle buses roamed the country with misleading slogans, reportedly call centres were re-purposed to influence voters, Facebook’s personal  data was mined by Cambridge Analytica to target influence-able voters and millions were spent over the legal limits. It’s even conceivable Russia in its own self-interest weighed in to destabilise Europe. Bookies whose livelihood depends on getting the odds right were wildly out. 6:1 Leave and 1:10 on for Remain suggesting they were very confident in a Remain win. But they were watching the polling results where the margin for Remain appeared solid. They didn’t notice the surprising dip just prior to the referendum. It appeared something was happening outside everyone’s gaze, a covert influencing campaign. But being easily influenced, just like bad driving, is what no one thinks they are. Branding anyone as such would be considered an insult, even though it’s the sole purpose of our billion pound advertising industry. Then the results, labelled as ‘advisory’ suddenly became the unchallengeable ‘will of the people’ as if there was an overwhelming majority for Leave, not the marginal +/-2%. Skilful re-branding labelled any opposing voice as ‘Re-moaners.’ In fact only 37.4% of voters voted Leave, leaving 62.6% who didn’t. Strangely these numbers are rarely if ever mentioned, also the possible effects of Leave’s and possibly Russia’s jiggery-pokery. I suggest this was a referendum of sorts but not about the UK’s position within Europe. It was between our common man’s democracy and the holders and abusers of big data, and our common man’s democracy lost. Throughout this ongoing process Remain has consistently come up with the factual repercussions of leaving where Leave has offered rosy advertising dream-scapes of a brighter future like Thomas Cook selling a foreign holiday. Any reduction in immigration, even if it’s possible, will leave us with skill shortages, WTO rules won’t be advantageous and in the EU we can trade worldwide anyway. We are currently in the EU and with our own currency! What more could we ask for? But the will of the 37.4% must be obeyed. (even if it was based on a well sold fantasy) Really, well what about the well-used quote, “Follow the money”? Why would certain wealthy individuals lose out if we stayed in the EU? Maybe because the EU is, in 2019, introducing new laws to expose tax evasion and nefarious investment schemes. On reflection it all makes sense.