EU friends of Britain say: we want you to stay

I totally agree with Timothy Garton Ash’s article (My message to Europe: tell us you want us to stay, 13 December) and have told our numerous British friends again and again that we owe them and the whole country so much and will never accept their departure. I would like to add that it is incomprehensible that a whole nation allows a bunch of cynical ex-Eton boys to push the country to the brink of disaster. If it is true that only eight British schools deliver more students to Oxbridge than three-quarters of all others, one should not be surprised by the Brexit madness.

It would be wonderful if positive forces could cooperate to prevent the catastrophe. European citizens in many countries would like to criticise and improve the EU together with their British friends. We know it is not perfect, but it is precious.
Guenther Thoene
Tuebingen, Germany

• There is no doubt about it: the people in Europe want you to stay! In a recent German opinion poll, almost 80% of the people asked were against Brexit and would be more than happy if you remained. I am writing to you as a German citizen with a daughter who has grandparents in England and Germany. Although she is too young to fully understand the unprecedented destruction by Germany that Europe suffered, she does know about Britain’s important role in reinstating civilisation and humanity. My daughter is growing up with a deep belief in peace and freedom in Europe. Equal rights, solidarity with the vulnerable and a lively democracy are important to her.

The EU is grounded on these values, which developed out of the horror of the second world war. They are not the cause of the world’s problems but the solution. We need a united Europe, and a united Europe needs Britain.

Dear friends in Britain: maybe you are not aware of what Europe will miss when you leave. We will miss your refreshing views, as living on the continent can give a blinkered viewpoint. We will miss your international experience and networks. We will miss your calmness and pragmatism in an overheated world. We will miss your standing side by side against populists and anti-democrats. We will miss your long democratic experience in developing the future EU. Together we are strong! Please stay. We are waiting for you with open arms. Merry Christmas.
Susanne Kopp
Munich, Germany

• I grew up in Germany, Sweden and Spain. My sister lived, studied and worked in London, in the NHS. She quit this year. Today she is happily enjoying the nicer climate in southern France, thanks to her EU passport.

The EU has provided Europe with peace for the longest stretch of time in history. Though instrumental in seeing the EU becoming a rules-based institution, the UK has always confused the means with the end, and has ended up living in dreamland. I have come to think that the UK isn’t worth the rebate it is getting. It might have been once; today its arrogance towards Europe is mind-boggling. UK membership isn’t worth it for me to endure the UK’s constant insults towards Europeans.

Dear Mr Garton Ash, dear British fellow Europeans: grow up. Get a grip. Wake up to reality. Once you have, we will happily welcome you back. But for now you will simply have to go.
Jens Harrendorf
Nieder-Olm, Germany

• As a Frenchman, I have long admired and cherished Britain, its history, its wonderful culture and creativity. You, my British friends, are the perfect antidote to Gallic Cartesianism. Better than any other nation, you know how to point to our national defects. You have discovered the theories of evolution and gravity. As undisputed champions in cultural disruption, you have given the world rugby, Jane Austen and the Beatles. You saved our country twice in the last century.

How things have changed. These days Britain has turned into a self-obsessed country, unable to deal properly with its European partners. Even to Anglophiles like me, the UK has become a source of contempt, disappointment and embarrassment. Worst of all, it has become Europe’s laughing stock. As the French saying goes, “le ridicule ne tue pas”. Indeed, it doesn’t kill, but for as great a nation as yours, it is a mistake your friends will long struggle to forgive. There is still time to stop the Brexit nonsense and come back to where you belong.
Laurent Michard
Versailles, France

• Brexit reminds me of a line from WB Yeats’ poem The Second Coming: “Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold”. Surely, Brexit has been a mistake from the beginning? Did no one see that the extremely narrow margin with which the leavers won did not justify sweeping proclamations such as “the people have spoken” and “we are carrying out the will of the people”?

In a mature democracy, a responsible government would recognise that such a precarious result, indicative of a huge division in the populace, did not warrant triggering article 50. The whole project was not well thought out and has left the UK in limbo. It is saddening to see the country that I have always admired and loved so much – for its rich history and culture, its revered institutions, its outstanding natural beauty, its great language and literature and its friendly people with their unique sense of humour – reduced to a shambles. If the British government attaches so much value to what the people think and want, it should now go back to the people – who are hopefully better informed now than they were in 2016 – and ask them to voice their opinion in a second referendum.
Vikas Sonak
The Hague, Netherlands

• Never in the field of EU politics was so much damage inflicted by so few to so many. The few are your irresponsible demagogues who gambled away more than 40 years of successful British leadership of Europe and the whole idea of a strong UK in a united Europe. The many are not only the British electorate, who now feel deceived. The many also includes all of us disappointed fellow Europeans, who have looked to Britain for partnership and leadership.

As an Anglophile European living in Denmark, it is with great sadness that I now witness a weakened, disunited kingdom leading the way to a weaker and more disunited Europe. From a Danish perspective Brexit is a foreign policy catastrophe. It forces us to choose between national interests and political and historic loyalties within the framework of the EU.

You still have many friends in Europe, and some of us sincerely hope that you will reconsider.
David Munis Zepernick
EP candidate for the Danish Social-Liberal Party, Frederiksberg, Denmark

• Send the old Brexit Trumpeters Nigel Farage and Boris Johnson to Planet Utopia, leaving a livable earth to the rest of us. I believe that the English will return to the EU, when the youths grow up and get the majority. So why leave now?
Søren Skadhede
Horsens, Denmark

• I can’t bear the destruction of the country of my birth any more. I now live in Australia while witnessing the dismantling of the UK and its gradual shift towards a real possibility of civil war. Even Greece didn’t suffer with such foolish ideological idiots. Where is David Cameron, the initiator of the so-called advisory referendum now? Where are the political leaders with the honesty and courage to stop Brexit? From Australia it looks as if there is no one to save the UK from an economic and social disaster. For the sake of our country, wake up and stop sleepingwalking into a nightmare.
Dr Kipps Horn
Melbourne, Australia

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