Brexit: How We Found Ourselves Outside the Tent, Getting Pissed On

I’ve been doing several metric shit tonnes of reading about the EU over the past week, all in the interest of debunking the 75 Brexit Benefits (benefit four is debunked and will be published sometime this week). Photo byLeo_VisionsonUnsplash What I’ve found is that our relationship with the EU was never as straightforward as we were led to believe . A benefit of this deep dive, however, is that it’s putting our relationship with other countries in sharp contrast - especially what could reasonably be considered our closest relative, the now peri-apocalyptic hellhole that is the United States of America, and two stories over the past week or so have thrown this into a pretty stark relief: The president of the United States is suing the BBC for $5bn over a documentary. A £31bn investment deal has been placed on hold over a 2% digital services tax . And yes, by framing this in terms of our relationship with the European Union I can already hear all those Brexit True Believers go “So bloody what? This is just Trump being Trump - it has nothing to do with the EU”. Sure - the US is just doing what it knows best, swinging its weight around like your drunk uncle at Chrimbo dinner who has decided that his opinions are facts and every else should just adjust their furniture accordingly. But, the reason why these three stories are so useful as a lens for Brexit is specifically because it shows us exactly what it looks like when power starts leaning, and almost perfectly illustrates the difference between being part of one of the largest trading blocs in the world versus being a mid-sized country trying to go things alone while belting out “Rule Britannia” and insisting that it’s actually still a great power because once upon a time it owned a quarter of the globe. Because there’s something that gets skimmed over in our conversations with the BTBs specifically, and an issue that the balls-to-the-wall rhetoric never really prepared us for - that sovereignty isn’t a standalone line item, it’s leverage. And pretty important, that leverage doesn’t mean terribly much when you don’t have scale, alternatives, alliances and the ability to say “no” to another power without immediately having to have the treasury do a quick calculation about which industries will collapse if one of your trading partners throws an epic fannywobble at you refusing to comply. In terms of our three highlighted stories, the BBC lawsuit feels like the most natural place to start, because it’s so insanely and grotesquely disproportionate as a scenario that it almost loops back into what increasingly feels like a pantomime that no one asked for. Just say this with me to understand the absurdity of the situation - Donald J. Trump, the geriatric orange gameshow host, insurrectionist and felon who is currently strutting as the President of the United States is suing the British Broadcasting Company for five billion dollars because they cut a...

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