Lyn wrote this yesterday and I think it’s definitely worth linking to. It’s about her time living in a Scope home in the eighties, and the institutionalisation she witnessed in the residents there. She writes of how they were used to the routine of ”basket weaving, art, woodwork and so on.” and how it was intended ”To keep the. residents busy [and] to make them more alive but the opposite was true.” She then describes how she tried to break them out of that state and to shake things up, but was resisted. ”They had been Institutionalized by the rules and the routine and this is now the norm. Trying to change that comfortable state leads to fear. If you tell people that have been living in a way that is wrong, you are demeaning their lives. So if you are that one person in the room that is saying, then it’s you that is the problem.”

I think I know what Lyn is getting at. She and I disagree on the EU; she is saying people have been institutionalised by it, and so will stick with what they know. It’s a very good point: change is always resisted, and the advocates of change fought against. People will want to stick with what they know, so Lyn fears people will vote to stay in the EU simply because of that instinct. But I would, in reply, like to point out that this is not about resistance to change: things must change, or else stagnate and rot. Indeed, I see this issue as about changing the way we see ourselves: we should no longer think of ourselves in terms of belonging to a certain nation state, but as citizens of the world, working together and respecting one another. I see organisations like the EU, and indeed the UN, as a step towards that goal. Thus this is not about sticking with what one knows because it is comforting, but just the opposite: it’s about shaking off the old nation-state paradigm and seeing ourselves as part of something bigger and better. Lyn’s allusion applies equally to the state – that is the institution we must break free of. Lyn tells us how the residents of her old home did not talk to one another, but communication would be even harder if we withdraw from the community and shut ourselves away in our room.