In context of Brexit, the inevitable consequences of the UK's actions is quite often a "bombshell" to the UK. The denial is strong.
What's bizarre is that when challenged on how ridiculous that is, they'll immediately accept it as rational before saying "well we voted out anyway so it doesn't matter".
Still, nothing beats the cluelessness of pro-brexit British expats when they are faced with the consequences of what they demanded.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/03/brexit-voting-pats-sp...
I can believe that.
> Even many remain voters don’t realise all the downsides.
I can believe that, but what makes the confusion one-way? i.e. do leave voters realise all the upsides?
The upsides of Brexit are generally, at best, very subjective and ephemeral (‘sovereignty’ in the sense of passport colour change) or outright imaginary (the EU is banning kettles and jam).
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29607906-why-vote-leave was a good book for understanding some benefits of Leave.
Please don't discredit the positions or the book solely from my my hazy memory of the book, but here goes:
* EU is a weakening trade bloc, so we're better off out of the customs union, and making trade deals that work for UK, rather than that work for the EU (example: cheaper tomatoes from Africa, that the EU will not make, since it'll make Spain/Italy worse off)
* UK's voting patterns within EU was anomolous: UK voted against policies far more than other countries anyway.
* UK public seems to have a max acceptable rate of immigration, and we may prefer more selective immigration policies (e.g. target the high skilled workers in India, China, Australia)
Those are meant to pique your interest in the book. I don't think starting a debate on HN will be productive, at least because I barely remember the book.
By that I meant that the Brexiter conception of sovereignty is heavily based on surface symbolism; the archetypical Brexiter is fine with taking US rules on food safety, in which they have no voice in making, if it means they can change the colour of the passport (which, of course, they could do within the EU anyway, but never mind). That is, Brexit is not generally actually concerned with sovereignty in any real sense, and Brexit Britain will lose control, not gain it.