As I type our MPs are debating the latest Meaningless Vote to be put to them by Dictator May. I would say the government, but it seems that even they can’t agree with each other, with the latest Brexit Secretary standing up to commend a motion to the House one minute and then marching through the door to vote against it the next. Asked what was going on, one Cabinet Minister has been reported in the Press as saying “Fuck knows. I’m past caring. It’s like the living dead in here.” Of course, whilst I suspect we all may have some sympathy with that position, I have been observing our politicians for the past few weeks, for observe it seems is all we are permitted to do.
I commenced my observation from the comfort of my sofa with a cup of tea and some biscuits, shouting at the television. I then moved a cushion in front of me and stopped shouting. I muted the sound at one point – it made no difference to my understanding of what was going on with an endless stream of (mainly) male (mainly) white politicians standing up to speak. The Speaker had confined each of them to seven minutes – seven whole minutes– of talking each. Geez. I put my cushion over my face for the really scary bits. That was insufficient and I eventually got behind the sofa because I couldn’t watch anymore. I am now frantically trying to exit the cinema but all of the doors are currently locked.
So as the government, whoever the hell they are at the moment, try to browbeat their agreement through Parliament for the third time, but Parliament is making them comply with the constitution to do so, I cannot help but wonder what is unconstitutional about following the constitution. I would also like someone to explain to me, in short words if necessary, why the Meaningless Vote being put forward three times and the Conservative Party doing some sort of dodgy deal as to who will be the next (unelected) Prime Minister of this country is apparently entirely democratic, and yet it is undemocratic to ask what we, the Electorate, think of any of it now the cards are on the table.
Those of you who read my blog regularly know that I voted Remain. I am deeply upset at the prospect of leaving the European Union. Some of you hold entirely the opposite view as is your democratic right in a free country, and I respect that, even if I don’t understand it. However, I was not sure why I was so very upset, and this morning as I stomped through the fields with the Hound, I finally worked out why.
Since the result of the referendum, the daughter of a friend has been shouted at in the street to “Fuck off back to Poland.” She’s British. She happens to have dark skin and hair. I am sure that Poland is a beautiful country but as of yet she hasn’t visited. Another European posted on Facebook apologising for taking jobs from British people – they were doing a job that very few British people would get out of bed for. Another woman I spoke to said that her mother took extreme offence at a group of students speaking (within her earshot, not in a conversation she was part of) in their own language which is why she voted to Leave. She has since met a boy and moved to Germany. One man interviewed on the news had a holiday home in Spain. When he voted Leave he didn’t realise that by voting to end free movement it meant that it would also apply to him. It is this sort of crap that is really bothering me. I am extremely worried that Brexit is the start of the ball rolling towards the Third World War.
It is said that people come into your life when you have the most need of them; I have a friend who voted to Leave. My friend is an intelligent, kind and loving person. They are not sexist, they are not racist and they are not homophobic. They don’t care one jot what job you do, the language you speak or where you were born. I am so grateful to have this person in my life. With Mr Farage being the most horrific and self-promoting of poster boys (asked the Electorate eight times for their view and eight times rejected – why can he not accept the Will of the People and stumble into obscurity where be belongs?) one could believe to be surrounded by people like that odious twerp. My friend reminds me constantly by their presence alone, that he is the minority and we are not. So whilst the Grand Wazzocks think it acceptable to change their minds based on self rather than national interest, refer to burkas as letterboxes, people who go to State Schools as thick as “potted plants” and that it is an hilarious jape to give themselves a name that harks back to the KKK, I know that I am far from being alone in thinking it is not. Now is the time for all of us, whichever way we voted, and whatever the hell happens over the next few weeks, to raise our hands, together, and say to these people: “You don’t speak for us. You have never spoken for us. And you never will.”
Natalie Gist 