My passport was maroon

[dolorosa_12]

Tonight, at 11pm, I will lose rights which I currently hold. These are not some fuzzy, nebulous thing: they are concrete rights which have improved my life in concrete ways. And their loss also closes off certain choices and possibilities to me — choices about where and how and with whom I live, possibilities of certain future plans which will no longer be possible. My non-UK EU citizen friends at home here in the UK have it worse. Whether their Settled Status applications were straightforward or not, the rights they are losing are immense, and certain future choices are closed off to them.

These things are not the result of some unstoppable, inexorable force of nature. They are the consequence of choices made actively by human beings. I will grieve the loss of those rights — and the things they said about us, as a country (or, to be more correct, as four nations) and a community of people — forever, because I know how difficult it can be, how materially difficult, to live without them. As I say, the loss of these rights is not due to some unpredictable natural disaster — a fire, an earthquake, a wave of water sweeping all away — but rather caused by the choices of human beings. I know who is responsible for what is being taken from me without my consent. I will always remember, and I will not forgive them.

Comments

[gingicat]

"My sympathies" seems too weak a response to such a gigantic thing, but I can't think how else to say it. What a strange and terrible age we live in.

[dolorosa_12]

Strange, terrible, and devastating. I know exactly what you mean, and your sympathies are understood, and welcome.

[goodbyebird]

❤️❤️❤️

I'm so sorry, and angry, for your behalf.

[dolorosa_12]

Thank you. There's a certain grim, cold clarity in knowing that I am right to feel this way, right to have fought against this happening, and that history will prove me right as well. But it's cold comfort.

[gingerschnapps]

This is a conversation occurring in my household as well, though our situation is obviously less immediate than yours. My father-in-law was born in Scotland. My partner holds dual citizenship. Both of them are equal parts sorrowful and furious today.

[dolorosa_12]

I was opposed to Scottish independence before the EU referendum — apart from anything else, the loss of Scottish votes would highly likely doom those of us in England to eternal Conservative government. But the way they have been treated since the referendum — with high handed contempt — has changed my mind, and in my opinion Scotland has the political and moral right to independence and an immediate attempt to rejoin the EU. I'm so sorry for your partner and father-in-law.

[worlds_of_smoke]

♥

[dolorosa_12]

<3

[regshoe]

<3

Well said. Thank you.

[dolorosa_12]

<3

One thing this political catastrophe seems to have done is improve my ability to write with eloquent fury.

[rachelmanija]

This is so wrong.

[dolorosa_12]

It is wrong, and I will never be reconciled to it.

[trepkos]

Me neither.

[dolorosa_12]

In Australia we have an expression, 'maintain your rage,' (for context, see here), and although I suppose it's not very healthy to go on carrying the degree of anger I feel right now, I wonder if it might be somewhat productive. People chose to do this to me — to us, to the country — and I cannot forgive them.