I’m following a few recent posts we’ve made on Facebook with regard to Brexit and I have seen a lot of chatter regarding divisions created between leavers and remainers on the Brexit referendum.
Has this been the case in your family?
Yes very much so. We live in a European country, our children in the UK so we are firm remainers, they are the total opposite and want a hard Brexit. I speak to them because they are my family but our relationship has changed and time will not heal.
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No. My family mean more to me than anything. I don’t care how they voted and I don’t know although I suspect my parents voted to leave. I would never let politics come between us-why would you?.
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Hi Jennie
" We live in a European country, our children in the UK so we are firm remainers!"… As I understand it for the moment we are still (ex pats, how I hate that term) regardless of what European country we reside in Europeans. Your children live, and I suppose work in the UK so they voted as they saw fit. YOU chose to leave the UK and live ‘your dream,’ why should your children not be entitled to live their lives as they wish. This really is a form of emotional blackmail, if you love your family you will respect that they have the right to vote as they please, their future is not yours, their dreams are not yours. Stop trying to impose your will on them. “Time will not heal” oh la ,try living in the real world where many people struggle just to survive, stop being a drama queen and an egoist, live and let live ! If you really love your family then think of them too !
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Me, I’m unlucky but lucky at the same time. Unlucky because having lived and worked in Europe since 1986 I think that Britain’s decision to leave the EU is stupid beyond belief; lucky because my three children who live and work in England all voted remain. Two of the three were devastated as their career plans had included working in the EU and although they will still be able to fulfil their ambitions life will be a lot less straightforward. My third child is currently in the Southern Hemisphere, loving it, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he decides to settle there. Perhaps as they were born and lived in Germany for several years, had a French home for most of their lives and finished their education in the British Isles Little Britain and the concept of sovereignty is less important to them than the less worldly wise.
My immediate family all share my feelings on Brexit so no conflict there but I have been amazed and shocked by posts on social media by some life long friends who seem to believe that it is now acceptable to make racist comments in public in a way that I cannot believe them capable of. It’s a strange old world and I will be sending out a few fewer Christmas cards this December!
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Ann Coe If only it was that simple. The fact is if UK leaves EU those Brits living there will see only minimal changes in their day to day lives whereas those of us who chose legally to exercise our rights as citizens of Europe could potential have a number if not all our rights stripped away overnight as Britain in EU terms becommes a third world country. Pretty worrying and potentially life changing so that is why my christmas card list is much shorter this year.
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That’s a bit alarmist isn’t it, given everything the EU has said.
But surely that’s why they voted Brexit? Because they felt their lives were changing and they wanted to stop those changes? I think all the farce since the referendum has pushed out of everybody’s minds that one of the reasons there was so much support for Brexit was nothing to do with the money, it was because a lot of British citizens had very real concerns over the way the country was changing. In some places they were feeling literally outnumbered by immigrants, they were the only English speaking family left in their street and they didn’t recognise the culture that had grown up all around them. And they thought the only way to reverse the trend was to get out of the EU - which in itself was probably correct, since the within the EU the UK government has proved itself incapable of managing immigration. I can understand that, and given a choice between something that would improve life for Brits in the UK but complicate it for Brits abroad, and vice versa, then even as a Brit abroad I think Brits in the UK should be given priority; because if they don’t even have the voice in their own referendum, what voice do they have.
Obviously the rest is history, but up to that point it seemed clear enough - the referendum was supposed to be about Great Britain and the British citizens who live there and the problems they felt they were facing, not about Brits who have chosen to leave Britain’s problems behind and live elsewhere.
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Partly because they didn’t apply EU laws when they had every opportunity to. Who didn’t do that as Home Secretary? That will be one Theresa May… 
Let’s face it, those who want to live in the past voted Brexit, those who realised that time travel isn’t an option voted remain for a better future.
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Hello
It’s like the panic buying of butter because the media reports there will be a shortage, thereby causing a shortage and a future hike in prices of dairy products!
Don’t panic, we will not be thrown out of France, no doubt there will be changes but we chose to come here and as such I will abide by any changes. As for snubbing friends and family because they didn’t vote as you thought they should, well maybe they too will be pleased to have a shorter card list.
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I suppose you’re right but I do have sympathy for those who no longer recognise and don’t much like the country they live in.
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I wonder how how my daughter would feel if my vote had caused her to lose 15% of her income almost overnight?
I wonder how she would feel if she were forced to change her nationality as her sister will have to do. She lives and works in Germany which does not offer dual citizenship?
I wonder how she would feel if she did not know if she would have her healthcare paid for any more and she might have to be forced to leave her home?
Whilst we all have the right to our opinions, if they have not taken into consideration how the results might affect their families it is not surprising that they cannot understand our anger at the result of their votes.
Perhaps it will hit home when then they cannot buy bagged salads or the cost of their weekly shop becomes even more expensive?
Ann,
We left the UK in the nineties, not to “live the dream” but to work in Europe, our children as young adults chose to stay behind, their free choice. We would never impose our views on them and as they both “know it all” we never advise or tell them how to manage their lives or their families.We certainly do not impose our will on them, it is more the opposite scenario and what really hurts is they were raised in an environment of every person being equal regardless of race, gender, colour and sexual orientation. Values they do not uphold.
Nothing to do with being an egoist or drama queen or trying to run their lives for them, nothing could be further from the truth and debates like this are not the place to analyse or criticize fellow contributors.
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You cannot blame your daughter for any changes that may occur after Brexit. All she did was to express her right to vote as she chose to do in a referendum. Perhaps she feels that the immigrants to her country should integrate fully, converse in English and become British citizens not merely foreign residents. If so she would probably expect her sister to do the same in her chosen home in Germany. Perhaps she is concerned about the plight of the NHS in Britain. In which case she would be right to question those who have moved abroad who still want everything to continue as before, to have an S1 and the right to have treatment forever in the UK instead of having some hangup about intergrating into their new country and taking advantage of what PUMA has to offer. Using her as a scapegoat is the coward’s way out, facing up to change would be so much more positive.
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So from what you’re saying, the problem is not simply how they voted in the referendum, it’s their whole attitude and their view of the world that you don’t agree with. Makes sense to me. But I don’t think it’s actually much to do with Brexit…Brexit brought it all to a head but the views they hold that you don’t like, were formed irrespective of the referendum.
As they say - you can choose your friends but you can’t choose your family. It’s a shame but it does happen that family members simply don’t like each other much.
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Anna, if our daughter had such little consideration for her parents and sister it is not surprising that we are angry.
Well… she might feel that her parents and her sister aren’t showing much consideration or respect for how she feels.
The referendum wasn’t asking people what they thought would be best for their parents and their sister. It was about what they thought would be best for Britain in the long term. It’s going to affect millions of people in the UK for many decades and possibly centuries to come. If she genuinely believed that millions of people would benefit from Brexit, she had to vote as she did. “The greater good” and all that…
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Anna, she told me that she didn’t want to be asked the question posed by the Referendum.
If that was so why didn’t she abstain?
I have just been looking at a badge I have that says March for Liberty and Livelihood.
We walked through London on the 22nd September 2002 and now the UK government is pulling the rug from under our feet in a way we could never have believed possible.
Helped by our daughter.
Anna Watson Do you not seee any correlation between leaving EU 30th March 2019 and the coming into law of declaring off shore accounts Because I certainly do. Yes the ordinary people were and have been fed lies regarding the laws that supposedly come from the EU. British children are the worst informed about Europe and how it works the curriculum concentrating on how they won both World Wars all on their own!. Checks on immigration have always been available to the UK Govt. they just chose not to impliment them. As to your comment I think a lot of people bought into the idea that post Brexit all the brown black faces would disappear when the truth is immigration from Asia India etc will increase as part of Mayhems trade deal s with these countries. Your last paragraph seem to reflect the small mindness of the UK at this time.
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To be honest I’m not sure what law you’re referring to here?
I agree that it’s gobsmacking how little understanding there is in the UK of what the EU is all about, but that’s basically due to the goverment and the media and the way they’ve been happy to let the EU get a negative image.
I wasn’t more specific because I didn’t want to offend, but I have talked to inoffensive people who didn’t wish anyone harm but who felt severely outnumbered by the Polish community, and who felt uncomfortable to find themselves living in a culture where loud parties and robust behaviour at the weeked are a popular of life.
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It will be this one. Not enough is being said about it but, in my view, it’s the real reason so many Tories want out of the EU.
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