I think people underestimate Brexiteer fears of foreigners. Unless you live as a person with an accent like myself in this country you have no idea how many people look away or call you love in a patronising way. English are v adept at the double entente and overt hostility.
20 yrs ago it used to be open curiosity or just acceptance. In France I was constantly interrogated where I was coming from. Here no one batted an eyelid, maybe out of politeness. But I felt I could blend in, people didn’t care who I was, where my accent was from.
Now one can see and most importantly feel a change. Often impossible to exactly point it out but there is a market change in the temperature in the air.
At a till a cashier made a remark and happily chatted to me until I replied. He face dropped and she stopped talking to me. I could see my breath the atmosphere got so cold suddenly. These are the kind of subtle ways that ppl let u know u stick out like that sore thumb.
And that they are uncomfortable by your presence. Something is broken between EU migrants and the UK population. Others suffer racism and worse. But Brexit made us undesirable too, and legitimised the open abuse of all sorts of foreign.
Not sure it can ever be mended. What could help is that people give voice to migrants. That they are visible in the media. But we have no say in this process. We are to endure this or leave if we don’t like it. We have no representation so ppl could see we are not a threat.
I have articipated in a thread about movies in which EU characters were normalised as part of the UK fabric. There are v few in fact. Invariably Eastern Europeans are portrayed as victims of crime, poor, downtrodden and speak with a badly imitated Russian accent.
No wonder the priest in my church cannot remember whether I was from Bulgaria or Hungary. We are not present and accepted at the big table of the society as equals. We are designated the place of the Other against which the national ego can be propped up in a colonialist way.
By the way I sing in the church choir since 10 yrs now. Yet he had a bet that I was a Bulgarian. I am not.
That is why I think chipping away one at a time prejudices will not be enough. Ppl need to see we successfully integrated. I love the UK but there is so much I & others can take. My husband applied for a job back in France. Still not sure if we’ll leave but there is a chance.
Simply telling ppl we are ok, welcome or needed isn’t enough anymore. We need to be made visible, audible to be accepted. This is missing entirely from the discussion about Brexit. Media fill in the blanks with Benefit Britain where Romanian Travellers come here &claim benefits.
Or the Daily Mail. It may be a rag but it forms ppl’s perceptions of us in absentia of any other imagery.
Just listen to Farage & the government talking about FoM and controlling immigration “that the EU prevented us from doing” when they think public ferver for Brexit is perceived to be flailing a bit.
You cannot fight deep seated emotions and negative tropes with reason. There needs to be a more concerted campaign to accept EU migrants as part of society and lower the tone of xenophobia and racism.
You see and hear Irish and Scottish accents in mainstream media all the time because it is accepted. You never hear Eastern European accents. English actors are trying to bend their tongues to imitate us, more often than not it comes out as Russian somehow.
What is interesting is that it is impossible to know how many voted for Brexit bcs of immigrants. I think UK remainers grossly underestimate it bcs they don’t have the insights of migrants’ experiences of #everydayxenophobia. And bcs we are not asked&heard it will remain hidden.
That is why there was a huge ignorance and chasm between the expectation of the Ref result & reality. That is why I knew Brexit will be voted for.
