And then around March time, Brexit was one of the topics in my Spanish oral class. And again, I didn't take it seriously. I guess I was naïve. University is a bubble, language studies is like a bubble, and the bubble I was in was a bubble of young, free, open minded, predominantly left-wing students and foreign teachers, all of whom are pro EU. My Facebook feed is full of this people. Double that on Twitter.
I was fortunate enough to not see many Leavers on my social media, and the ones I did I just deleted. I was not willing to have these people on my newsfeeds. I now see that as an error, because 51% of those who voted on Thursday chose to leave. All I can think of is, 'what if I'd campaigned a bit harder? If I'd shared more pro-EU articles? If I'd opened people's eyes to the benefits of the EU? Would that have changed things?'
Because I'm now seeing people who voted leave truly regretting it, being scared of the result they voted for, not believing it would happen. If I think just about the North East of England, we receive so much from being in the EU. Trading to the bloc creates 150,000 jobs. The Nissan factory, based in Sunderland, will probably move its base to somewhere else in Europe now. We receive so much extra funding per person compared to regions down south. So much incredible research happens in the North East, if we look at the Centre for Life and Newcastle University - they receive a lot of their research funding from guess where? The EU.
I know going over all these benefits now won't change anything. I know that this was a democratic decision and to override it would be a kick in the face to democracy but no, I will not stop talking about it. I will not calm down. I will not change my pro-EU stance.
I am allowed to be upset, to be angry, to be distraught. This is my future we're talking about. 75% of 18-24 year olds, my age bracket, wanted to stay. All the statistics show that the young are more likely to want to stay, and the older generations more likely to want to leave. We are the future, the next generation, and what we want was not listened to. There are people complaining that "too many young people won't shut up about the result" - NO. We need young people to be invested in their own future! My generation will be in charge one day and I tell you what, we will listen to the young people. Because we understand. We have gone through some shit. University tuition fees raised and we didn't have a say. We are under a government that makes it hard just to be a young person. And now all the benefits the EU brings have been snatched away from us. It hurts. It just hurts me.
Personally it hurts me. I am a Spanish speaker. I spent the last four years at university learning about this wonderful language, the innumerable rich cultures its millions of speakers have; from the southernmost tip of Chile, to the North of the peninsular, even over in the Philippines. I was fortunate enough to live and study on the continent, and will be moving back out there in a few months time. I have friends from all over the no longer United Kingdom, from throughout the EU, from beyond. I have been called a "social media wizard" - you know why? Because I use social media to connect with people from all over the world. Communication and intercultural diversity is so important and I value being European and a citizen of the planet Earth so much more than I do being British. That doesn't mean anything positive to me anymore.
I'm unbelievably upset. You just have to scroll down my Twitter to see that. I've mainly been retweeting other people because I've not been able to get any words out.
I'm going to stop now. Maybe write a post on something more positive. I hope to get back into blogging because writing soothes me a little bit. I'll leave you on this nugget of wisdom.
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