An article by A A Gill...

“It was the woman on Question Time that really did it for me. She was so
familiar. There is someone like her in every queue, every coffee shop,
outside every school in every parish council in the country. Middle-aged,
middle-class, middle-brow, over-made-up, with her National Health face and
weatherproof English expression of hurt righteousness, she’s Britannia’s
mother-in-law. The camera closed in on her and she shouted: “All I want is
my country back. Give me my country back.”
It was a heartfelt cry of real distress and the rest of the audience
erupted in sympathetic applause, but I thought: “Back from what? Back from
where?”
Wanting the country back is the constant mantra of all the outies. Farage
slurs it, Gove insinuates it. Of course I know what they mean. We all know
what they mean. They mean back from Johnny Foreigner, back from the brink,
back from the future, back-to-back, back to box hedges and dry stone walls
and country lanes and church bells and warm beer and skittles and football
rattles and cheery banter and clogs on cobbles. Back to vicars-and-tarts
parties and Carry On fart jokes, back to Elgar and fudge and proper
weather and herbaceous borders and cars called Morris. Back to victoria
sponge and 22 yards to a wicket and 15 hands to a horse and 3ft to a yard
and four fingers in a Kit Kat, back to gooseberries not avocados, back to
deference and respect, to make do and mend and smiling bravely and biting
your lip and suffering in silence and patronising foreigners with pity.
We all know what “getting our country back” means. It’s snorting a line of
the most pernicious and debilitating Little English drug, nostalgia. The
warm, crumbly, honey-coloured, collective “yesterday” with its fond belief
that everything was better back then, that Britain (England, really) is a
worse place now than it was at some foggy point in the past where we
achieved peak Blighty. It’s the knowledge that the best of us have been
and gone, that nothing we can build will be as lovely as a National Trust
Georgian country house, no art will be as good as a Turner, no poem as
wonderful as If, no writer a touch on Shakespeare or Dickens, nothing will
grow as lovely as a cottage garden, no hero greater than Nelson, no
politician better than Churchill, no view more throat-catching than the
White Cliffs and that we will never manufacture anything as great as a
Rolls-Royce or Flying Scotsman again.
The dream of Brexit isn’t that we might be able to make a brighter, new,
energetic tomorrow, it’s a desire to shuffle back to a regret-curdled
inward-looking yesterday. In the Brexit fantasy, the best we can hope for
is to kick out all the work-all-hours foreigners and become caretakers to
our own past in this self-congratulatory island of moaning and pomposity.
And if you think that’s an exaggeration of the Brexit position, then just
listen to the language they use: “We are a nation of inventors and
entrepreneurs, we want to put the great back in Britain, the great
engineers, the great manufacturers.” This is all the expression of a
sentimental nostalgia. In the Brexiteer’s mind’s eye is the old Pathé
newsreel of Donald Campbell, of John Logie Baird with his television,
Barnes Wallis and his bouncing bomb, and Robert Baden-Powell inventing boy
scouts in his shed.
All we need, their argument goes, is to be free of the humourless Germans
and spoilsport French and all their collective liberalism and reality.
There is a concomitant hope that if we manage to back out of Europe, then
we’ll get back to the bowler-hatted 1950s and the Commonwealth will hold
pageants, fireworks displays and beg to be back in the Queen Empress’s
good books again. Then New Zealand will sacrifice a thousand lambs, Ghana
will ask if it can go back to being called the Gold Coast and Britain will
resume hand-making Land Rovers and top hats and Sheffield plate teapots.
There is a reason that most of the people who want to leave the EU are old
while those who want to remain are young: it’s because the young aren’t
infected with Bisto nostalgia. They don’t recognise half the stuff I’ve
mentioned here. They’ve grown up in the EU and at worst it’s been neutral
for them.
The under-thirties want to be part of things, not aloof from them. They’re
about being joined-up and counted. I imagine a phrase most outies identify
with is “women’s liberation has gone too far”. Everything has gone too far
for them, from political correctness — well, that’s gone mad, hasn’t it? —
to health and safety and gender-neutral lavatories. Those oldies, they
don’t know if they’re coming or going, what with those newfangled mobile
phones and kids on Tinder and Grindr. What happened to meeting Miss Joan
Hunter Dunn at the tennis club? And don’t get them started on electric
hand dryers, or something unrecognised in the bagging area, or Indian call
centres , or the impertinent computer asking for a password that has both
capitals and little letters and numbers and more than eight digits.
Brexit is the fond belief that Britain is worse now than at some point in
the foggy past where we achieved peak Blighty
We listen to the Brexit lot talk about the trade deals they’re going to
make with Europe after we leave, and the blithe insouciance that what
they’re offering instead of EU membership is a divorce where you can still
have sex with your ex. They reckon they can get out of the marriage, keep
the house, not pay alimony, take the kids out of school, stop the in-laws
going to the doctor, get strict with the visiting rights, but, you know,
still get a shag at the weekend and, obviously, see other people on the
side.
Really, that’s their best offer? That’s the plan? To swagger into Brussels
with Union Jack pants on and say: “ ’Ello luv, you’re looking nice today.
Would you like some?”
When the rest of us ask how that’s really going to work, leavers reply,
with Terry-Thomas smirks, that “they’re going to still really fancy us,
honest, they’re gagging for us. Possibly not Merkel, but the bosses of
Mercedes and those French vintners and cheesemakers, they can’t get enough
of old John Bull. Of course they’re going to want to go on making the free
market with two backs after we’ve got the decree nisi. Makes sense,
doesn’t it?”
Have no doubt, this is a divorce. It’s not just business, it’s not going
to be all reason and goodwill. Like all divorces, leaving Europe would be
ugly and mean and hurtful, and it would lead to a great deal of poisonous
xenophobia and racism, all the niggling personal prejudice that dumped,
betrayed and thwarted people are prey to. And the racism and prejudice
are, of course, weak points for us. The tortuous renegotiation with
lawyers and courts will be bitter and vengeful, because divorces always
are and, just in passing, this sovereignty thing we’re supposed to want
back so badly, like Frodo’s ring, has nothing to do with you or me. We
won’t notice it coming back, because we didn’t notice not having it in the
first place.
Nine out of 10 economists say ‘remain in the EU’. You won’t wake up on
June 24 and think: “Oh my word, my arthritis has gone! My teeth are
suddenly whiter! Magically, I seem to know how to make a soufflé and I’m
buff with the power of sovereignty.” This is something only politicians
care about; it makes not a jot of difference to you or me if the Supreme
Court is a bunch of strangely out-of-touch old gits in wigs in Westminster
or a load of strangely out-of-touch old gits without wigs in Luxembourg.
What matters is that we have as many judges as possible on the side of
personal freedom.
Personally, I see nothing about our legislators in the UK that makes me
feel I can confidently give them more power. The more checks and balances
politicians have, the better for the rest of us. You can’t have too many
wise heads and different opinions. If you’re really worried about red
tape, by the way, it’s not just a European problem. We’re perfectly
capable of coming up with our own rules and regulations and we have no
shortage of jobsworths. Red tape may be annoying, but it is also there to
protect your and my family from being lied to, poisoned and cheated.
The first “X” I ever put on a voting slip was to say yes to the EU. The
first referendum was when I was 20 years old. This one will be in the week
of my 62nd birthday. For nearly all my adult life, there hasn’t been a day
when I haven’t been pleased and proud to be part of this great collective.
If you ask me for my nationality, the truth is I feel more European than
anything else. I am part of this culture, this European civilisation. I
can walk into any gallery on our continent and completely understand the
images and the stories on the walls. These people are my people and they
have been for thousands of years. I can read books on subjects from
Ancient Greece to Dark Ages Scandinavia, from Renaissance Italy to
19th-century France, and I don’t need the context or the landscape
explained to me. The music of Europe, from its scales and its instruments
to its rhythms and religion, is my music. The Renaissance, the rococo, the
Romantics, the impressionists, gothic, baroque, neoclassicism, realism,
expressionism, futurism, fauvism, cubism, dada, surrealism, postmodernism
and kitsch were all European movements and none of them belongs to a
single nation.
No time for walls: the best of Europe, from its music and food to IM Pei’s
pyramid at the Louvre, depends on an easy collision of cultures.
There is a reason why the Chinese are making fake Italian handbags and the
Italians aren’t making fake Chinese ones. This European culture, without
question or argument, is the greatest, most inventive, subtle, profound,
beautiful and powerful genius that was ever contrived anywhere by anyone
and it belongs to us. Just look at my day job — food. The change in food
culture and pleasure has been enormous since we joined the EU, and that’s
no coincidence. What we eat, the ingredients, the recipes, may come from
around the world, but it is the collective to and fro of European
interests, expertise and imagination that has made it all so very
appetising and exciting.
The restaurant was a European invention, naturally. The first one in Paris
was called The London Bridge.
Culture works and grows through the constant warp and weft of creators,
producers, consumers, intellectuals and instinctive lovers. You can’t
dictate or legislate for it, you can just make a place that encourages it
and you can truncate it. You can make it harder and more grudging, you can
put up barriers and you can build walls, but why on earth would you? This
collective culture, this golden civilisation grown on this continent over
thousands of years, has made everything we have and everything we are, why
would you not want to be part of it?
I understand that if we leave we don’t have to hand back our library
ticket for European civilisation, but why would we even think about it? In
fact, the only ones who would are those old, philistine scared gits. Look
at them, too frightened to join in.”

--
*What happens when none of your bees wax? *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

On 24/01/2019 18:21, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
snip
and you can truncate it.

Thanks for the tip.

"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote in message
...
An article by A A Gill...

The first "X" I ever put on a voting slip was to say yes to the EU. The
first referendum was when I was 20 years old. This one will be in the week
of my 62nd birthday.

Poor old Gill died four months after the referendum.
Strong meat and not always to everyone's taste,
a sort of Jeremy Clarkson on steroids, a mate and
fellow hack behind the S.T. Paywall. God knows in
what state he'd be in by now, had he lived.

Paywall of not, paperbacks of Gill's stuff show up
fairly regularly second-hand.

But spot on in this instance, IMO.

Another more recent take on the situation and from outside the UK, and
thankfully not from behind a paywall* is by Fintan O'Toole

https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...it-for-purpose

" It was never about Europe. Brexit is Britain's reckoning with itself "

michael adams

....

* Not that this can last much longer, for most papers

In article ,
michael adams wrote:
"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote in message
...
An article by A A Gill...

The first "X" I ever put on a voting slip was to say yes to the EU. The
first referendum was when I was 20 years old. This one will be in the week
of my 62nd birthday.

Poor old Gill died four months after the referendum.
Strong meat and not always to everyone's taste,
a sort of Jeremy Clarkson on steroids, a mate and
fellow hack behind the S.T. Paywall. God knows in
what state he'd be in by now, had he lived.

Paywall of not, paperbacks of Gill's stuff show up
fairly regularly second-hand.

Did the article not get through some news feeds? Did wonder if I'd have
been better splitting it in two.

Arrived here OK, though.

What appealed here was it amused. Unlike most of the stuff harry etc posts.

--
Small asylum seeker wanted as mud flap, must be flexible and willing to travel

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote in message
...
In article ,
michael adams wrote:
"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote in message
...
An article by A A Gill...

The first "X" I ever put on a voting slip was to say yes to the EU. The
first referendum was when I was 20 years old. This one will be in the week
of my 62nd birthday.

Poor old Gill died four months after the referendum.
Strong meat and not always to everyone's taste,
a sort of Jeremy Clarkson on steroids, a mate and
fellow hack behind the S.T. Paywall. God knows in
what state he'd be in by now, had he lived.

Paywall of not, paperbacks of Gill's stuff show up
fairly regularly second-hand.

Did the article not get through some news feeds?

Eh ? I read a copy and pasted article.

I assumed the reason you did that, was because the
original article itself was behind a paywall.

Chasing up an article on something else entirely I notice
"The Sunday Times" are offering 3 months subs for something
like £1. I suppose there's going to come a time sooner or
later when I'll have to bite the bullet and buy
something from Murdoch.


What appealed here was it amused.

Amusing or not, it was a very accurate .

Gill got into a lot of trouble over calling Claire Balding
"A dyke on a bike" in an S.T. review of one of her TV
programmes. Which to be fair like Frankie Boyle's "back
of a spoon" remark concerning Rebecca Adlington's appearance
was a bit O.T.T


michael adams

....

In article ,
michael adams wrote:
Did the article not get through some news feeds?

Eh ? I read a copy and pasted article.

OK.

I assumed the reason you did that, was because the
original article itself was behind a paywall.

I lifted if from Facebook.

--
*Never miss a good chance to shut up *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.