Dull, bitter horror of watching Javid stand up to confirm the end of free movement in the immigration white paper. He praises immigration, while preparing to cut it to the bone.
What he is confirming is the end of arguably the greatest liberal accomplishment of the post-war era. We will no longer be able to go to Europe to start new lives, to create a career, to fall in love, to make new friends.
We are inviting the state to once again grip in its dead hand the most basic of all human freedoms: Where we go, where we live, where we work. Our liberty in space.
If free movement dies - and we're done yet fighting this shit, not by a long shot - it'll be because both right and left sacrificed it.
The right betrayed its supposed commitment to a small state. The left allowed capital to move but denied labour the ability to enjoy the same freedom. When it came to it, neither side had the bravery to stand by their convictions.
Our society will be so much smaller, narrower, greyer. More boring, less vital. More ignorant, less wealthy. More inward-looking, less powerful.
It is a sabotage of ourselves and our own better nature. But if any one thing has come from this, it is that believers in an open society now know they must fight for it, and cannot rely on courts and bureaucrats to provide it.
There are thousands out there who tell them to shut up. Who tell them to respect the will of the people, or brand them elitists, or insist that liberals can only win by sacrificing their own values.
Fuck them. We fight for a world with no borders. Where people can go where they like. Where lovers do not have to sleep in separate beds. Where children do not grow up without their mum or dad. Where adults can be with their parents as they grow infirm.
So we fight to stop the eradication of free movement now. And if we fail, we fight to bring it back in future. And then, in the long term, there is the struggle to establish across the world. Small minds never win.
