This echoes my thoughts. When I first heard about the referendum (as a non-Brit) I felt it would be an interesting thing. At the time I was not aware of the pr

This echoes my thoughts. When I first heard about the referendum (as a non-Brit) I felt it would be an interesting thing. At the time I was not aware of the propaganda around Brexit, and thought it was a decision for more political and economic control. Which sounded like something that might be good for the country; but as someone not aware of the details, I wasn't sure. Then I realized one of the main reasons was immigration. Which was my first inkling that something is wrong, and that it can be harmful. Stopping free movement could end up destroying tons of lives and probably affecting the economy in the process. Before I had read about this I thought Britain wanted a Switzerlandesque deal, where you still have free movement and whatnot; just a different trade/politics situation. And then I saw the full extent of the racism fuelling this. And then I was convinced it was a bad idea. From the article: > Jingoism, xenophobia, and Trump-like obnoxiousness have led to an obviously wrong conclusion, so the story goes. This has things backwards. It might be indeed that leaving the EU was the right decision. The fact that it was caused by xenophobes is the main issue. Because xenophobes will want to move forward on this in a xenophobic way. They are not fuelled by a desire to make the right decision[1]. They are fuelled by xenophobia, with getting the immigrants out being the primary concern. If leaving the EU turns out to be the right thing for Britain, that will be by accident, even a broken clock is on time twice a day. (This sort of echoes larger issues with our system. Being fuelled by a desire to gain votes is not the same as being fuelled by a desire to make the country better. But it at least is an approximation.) [1]: They may think they are, but in this situation I mean making that desire foremost and doing the necessary research to make it true. AFAICT this campaign was in part about ignoring the experts, which disqualifies it from being foremost concerned about making the right decision.