We have, it seems, reached the final circle of Brexit hell. After years of living with extreme Brexiters, we now face the depressing phenomenon of masses of rabid Remainers. Brexit has taken us to a place where the moderates have become militant, the liberals illiberal and the sensible rendered senseless by rage.
Once there were Leavers and Remainers. Then Regrexiters, Re-Leavers and Remoaners. There were hard Brexiters and soft Brexiters and now, in the final tragic twist of societal division, we have hard Remainers. Hard Remainers have become every bit as obsessive as the Leavers they despise as fanatics. I have more sympathy for their views since they start from a place of reason, but the intensity of their belief is every bit as disconcerting. For every Brexiter ready to bore on about the vassalage implied in paragraph six of the Chequers agreement, there is now a maniacal Remainer to explain why the Electoral Commission report renders the entire Brexit referendum null and void and how in any case it was only advisory.
No weekend seems complete without at least one furious friend, fresh from a rally in town, berating us about the lies of Vote Leave (regardless of the fact we voted Remain). This is always related as if they had just discovered this fact. “Boris Johnson wasn’t telling the truth. People need to know.”
There was always a core who could not accept the outcome; it has swelled. You may be a remainer, you may have “Ode to Joy” as your ringtone, but one false word of compromise and you are at serious risk from friendly fire. We are talking blue on blue here.
To be fair, many of the hard Remainers have been driven to this by the intolerance and dishonesty of the hard Brexiters. Many might once have settled for Efta status or a customs union, but the resolution of their opponents to drive through the most extreme of Brexits has driven them off the proverbial cliff.
Like anyone who talks Brexit with friends — I know, I’m a real party animal — I have seen the Remainer rage but always distilled through the filter of social civility and generally directed at an absent guest, like the prime minister. I’m sure it’s why she doesn’t pop round. Lunches and dinners are spent on tenterhooks wondering whether you can get to dessert without discussing Cambridge Analytica or the imagined bias of the BBC.
Not being a Leaver, I had never really experienced the venom — until last week when I wrote a piece, which I won’t rehash here, doubting the case for a second referendum. As a liberal metropolitan media Remainer, I have got used to being regarded as an enemy of the people by Arron Banks, Nigel Farage and the Daily Mail. But it came as a shock to find I am also an enemy of the people to people I would until recently have regarded as friends. My enemy’s enemy has turned out to be my enemy too. By not supporting a second referendum, I am apparently transformed into Jacob Rees-Mogg.
I’m not complaining. Well, obviously I am, but I was not upset by the criticism — that’s the price of being allowed to give your opinions — just surprised by its vituperation. Some decided I was a secret Leaver all along; to others I was obviously parroting a briefing from Conservative Central Office. The only impossible explanation was that I might just have a different opinion. This is because once you become truly obsessed, you cannot accept that a dissenting view might have been rationally reached. There must be a base motive. I know there are arguments the other way but this, too, makes me suspect. Accepting that reasonable people may disagree with me is my first mistake. There is no room in this world for phrases like “on balance”.
This is Brexit’s other victory. It has turned the tolerant into the intolerant. Polarising politics has silenced the middle ground. The only choice many MPs will now countenance is ultra-hard Brexit or a rerun. Given that most MPs — and I suspect most people — fall in between those extremes, it is staggering that parliament has failed to assert itself. The country continues to be ill served by its politicians. In Brexit, the first casualty is moderation.
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