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We have a dinner the other night, with a couple we haven’t seen since Covid. Brexit comes up for some reason; when I say that I was in favour, the guy -- let’s call him Alex -- is shocked. He grills me, seeming to suggest that a Brexit vote is the vote of a rube and a racist.... a “right-winger”!
Before the referendum in June 2016, being Remainer was bipartisan in the UK. Brexit party aside, the politariat, the media, the civil service, the academy, all the bien pensants, were anti-Brexit. It was only after the vote, that it became partisan with the Tories pro and the Labour party against (kind of). That made it all very divisive.
Earlier, the Left in the UK had been very much against the EU. The more Left, the more Marxist, the more anti-EU. So calling someone today “right wing” for being pro-Brexit has to explain how it was that it’s been a thing of the Left until about five minutes ago.
Someone mentioned that China would like a divided Europe. And someone else that the US would too. The latter not true, as the US, via Obama, was very anti-Brexit. Which, By the way, it ironic, given the US did its own Brexit in 1776 -- fought a revolution to separate from Britain. And that no way would it today countenance its Central Bank in Bogota, its Legislature in Mexico City and its court of Justice in Caracas. That’s what a EU for the Americas would involve.
But mainly it’s that I don’t like the idea that one gets labelled this or that on the basis of one view. Can’t we be heterodox? I have different views on different things. Some liberal some conservative. Overall, there’s my score with the Political Compass, above, which puts me as a bit libertarian and a bit to the left of centre. That’s pretty much where I think I am, so I feel it’s pretty accurate. It puts me next to Nelson Mandela!
But the “Right wing” thing kept getting fired at me -- Alex was a bit drunk, so there’s that. It was wielded as ad hominem, attacking the man not the ball. Ad hominem being used when you don’t have an argument.
Why it bugs me? Why don’t I just accept it? Because the next step from “right wing” is “far-right” and then “nazi” and then anything you say, anything you say you think, is invalid. You’re done. I don’t want to be done.
Besides, it’s wrong.
