Which was exactly the same in the first referendum. So?
Besides, the immutable law of nature: everyone alive will become old. That’s the stage when most who had at least two brain cells to begin with will become wiser.
There has only been one referendum on this, Slobodan.
The old, in this case, are from a generation (mine) that didn't always know its ass from its elbow. That many subsequent ones don't either isn't the point. The point is that those with any worthwhile prospects i.e. the better educated or just naturally bright, instantly recognised the massive advantages to having a wider space in which to travel and work
if they felt like it, as of right. Consider your own position in the US of A: you need to get green cards etc. if you come from another nation and want to settle and work. In Europe, the status quo of Brits was far different and we could come and go as we saw fit. You don't think that was a better deal for us?
Regarding the mindset of many of the older people: even the unions were against leaving because the guys who run them are, whatever else they may be, not unaware of which side of the bread lies the butter. If they back leaving and in a few years jobs vanish, who gets blamed, whose factory and job closes? I think the rabid commies who held some of those key jobs a few decades ago have mostly died off; instead, a few fossils are now in full-time politics. Not all old people are fortunate enough to carry on playing the game of life with a full deck of cards; and that problem doesn't discriminate between left, right, dumb or brilliant. Anyway, you can't expect the old guys who spend all day and their pensions in workingmen's clubs in some depressing old town in northern England either to know or care about job opportunities for young Brits in Europe, nor of the job prospects being torn up and chucked abroad for those in the money businesses in the hated and far more rich south of England and, especially, the City. According to some people in northern Engand, as with many Scot Nats, the south "stole our wealth" which usually turns out to mean that the "stolen" northern companies sold out to conglomeratesi in England and abroad. That's not theft: that's business, and often the result of having to deal with local bloodymindedness that couldn't see the wood for the trees.
As for the reverse migratory movements, we depend on them at both high and lower levels: the poor folks coming in do work our "proud" bunch won't touch, and the catering industry and the health services depend on them to fill gaps both in the supply of nurses and hotel/restaurant gigs. Farmers, too, depend on such migrant workers and for much the same reasons as everywhere else. At the other end of the telescope, the health industry makes huge use of trained specialists from abroad. So do our engineering and science industries. Yes, our universities produce thousands of highly educated folks, but many say thanks, and sod off to better-paying work abroad, and who can really blame them? Or so my doctor granddaughter tells me from her experiences in employment in hospitals. As for business, it's become more multicoloured than ever before with the world living in London and making and spending lots. So, once we throw out the French and the Italians, the Arabs and the Asians, do we turn upon the Americans too because they are foreigners eating our lunch?
It was a movement built upon ignorance, hatred and lies, and the deadly sickness of apathy. That's why we face this shit today.
