Don’t start an argument over Brexit this Christmas

Dec 24, 2019 by

by Niall Gooch, UnHerd:

[…]  Most people want their children to develop the same sort of loyalties, beliefs and attachments that they themselves consider important. Of course, life doesn’t always turn out that way. One thing I have realised as I get older, and have ever more experience of a wider range of people, is that my contented, relaxed upbringing in a cheerful home overseen by happily-married parents was quite a bit rarer than I had once imagined. I have always felt that I owe my parents a great debt of gratitude.

What exactly do we owe our families? It’s a thorny question, not least at this time of year when many people are visiting family, and girding their loins for a big row about Brexit, or Boris, or Extinction Rebellion. Recent years have seen the emergence of a genre of article that encourages people to pick fights with their families at the dinner table (in the US, at Thanksgiving as well as Christmas).

One widely circulated tweet this year contained a picture of a T-shirt that a woman was planning to wear to Thanksgiving dinner, declaring her support for abortion rights, transgender rights, gay marriage and the rest of the progressive sacraments. Presumably the plan was to throw these beliefs in the faces of her backward, bigoted relatives, and storm away from the table basking in the warm glow of self-righteous satisfaction. Another was from an academic who quite openly scorned and mocked the idea that he should feel any kind of affinity or attachment to his relations just because they shared some DNA.

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