Rubbishing Brexit: post-referendum malevolence in action

The platoons of condescending commentators and pro-remain agitators continued to emote through the course of the next twenty-four hours following the vote. An article in The Washington Post suggested that Britons had gotten busy searching the EU on Google "hours after voting to leave it."

Fung's hardly remarkable piece uses the ever unreliable vox pops technique in the hope of identifying the fickle and the feckless. "Even though I voted to leave," he cites an interview of a Brexit voter with ITV news, "this morning I woke up and I just – the reality did actually hit me. If I'd had the opportunity to vote again, it would be to stay."

The obvious point to make about the spike in search terms is that the entire British populace, from both the Remain and Leave camps, were wondering about the implications, hence feeding the figures in post-electoral agitation.

But the sting in the tail of the Post piece was the condescension. Britons may well have been "mystified" by what would happen in an exit scenario, but "many seemed not even to know what the European Union is."

Within, and without Britain, Europe is fracturing. Over thirty three million people expressed their views. Within Britain, the votes went along lines of disunion. A silent Britain, one hidden from the political discussion, roared its disapproval. Scotland went to remain; Wales did not. Northern Ireland, in wishing to remain, will be seeking options for closer collaboration with the Republic of Ireland.

All of these consequences may now be seen as disastrous, when they should be viewed as the logical manifestation of a people's will. Dislike it, but never rubbish it. That is a tyrant's prerogative, an instinctive response in refusing to reform. Gatekeepers of the European project will do at their peril.