Rudyard Kipling, nationalism and our children’s future

Many disappointed and resentful people who voted to Remain in the EU call those of us who voted to Leave stupid, uneducated, racists, fascists and bigots, traitors who have ruined this country’s and ”our children’s” future.

Emotional over-reactions, hysteria even, from self-declared broken-hearted people are common; attempts by such people to understand why rational people who are obviously not stupid or bigoted would vote to Leave are not. 

A prophetic poem by Rudyard Kipling helps to explain how people who support sovereignty and nationalism, people who think that enough is enough and prefer to live among their own kind, feel. He even mentions the influence of alien religions and the effect that too much diversity would have on children in the future: 

The Stranger within my Gate 

The Stranger within my gate, he may be true or kind,
But he does not talk my talk - I cannot feel his mind
I see the face and the eyes and mouth
But not the soul behind.

The men of my own stock, they may do ill or well,
But they tell the lies I am wonted to, they are used to the lies I tell;
And we do not need interpreters
When we go to buy and sell.

The stranger within my gates, he may be evil or good
But I cannot tell what powers control, what reasons sway his mood;
Nor when the Gods of his far-off land
Shall repossess his blood.

The men of my own stock, bitter bad they may be,
But at least they hear the things I hear, and see the things I see;
And whatever I think of them and their likes,
They think of the likes of me.

This was my father's belief, and this is also mine:
Let all the corn be one sheaf, and the grapes be all one vine
Ere our children's teeth are set on edge
By bitter bread and wine.

Rudyard Kipling