Various names who support the 'Remain' campaign, including the bully-boys of the United States, tell us that voting to leave the European Union would be a huge 'risk' for the UK. They tell us that there 'could be' all manner of terrible repercussions without saying that there 'would be'; the difference between 'could be' and 'would be' is vast and being used purely to frighten British voters into doing what we're told.
In truth, risk has been a central plank of human development and the advance of civilisation and knowledge. The first proto-humans who left Africa some 2 million years ago and ventured into Europe and Asia took an enormous risk, without which we wouldn't be here today. The first humans who returned to our islands after the last ice age took a huge risk, as did the first who took to the seas. Those like Bartolomeu Dias, Ferdinand Magellan, Christopher Columbus, Sir Francis Drake, James Cook and many more took huge risks, sailing enormous distances across the seas without knowing anything about what lay ahead. The explorers who first ventured into Africa, 'The Dark Continent', men such as Mungo Park, David Livingstone, Richard Burton and John Hanning Speke, took risks without which Africa might still be an unknown wilderness.
Many and more mundane things have also been seen as 'risks' at the first time of offering. Riding on a steam train was considered to be so dangerous that one might die, as the human body simply wouldn't be able to survive the enormous speed. The first motor cars were considered so dangerous that their speed was restricted to 4 miles per hour and were required to have a man waving a flag walking ahead to warn pedestrians of their approach. The Wright brothers took a huge risk in daring to fly, as did Louis Bleriot in crossing the Channel, Charles Lindbergh in crossing the Atlantic, Amy Johnson and Amelia Earhart in flying thousands of miles across the globe at a time when flight was far from a safe option. Those who first flew into space, Yuri Gagarin, Alan Shepard, Valentina Tereshkova, John Glenn and all of the rest took their lives in their hands, as did, in an even greater way, those who have flown to the Moon.
Every medical advance is a risk, from the first inoculations by Edward Jenner, through the work of Pasteur, Lister, Koch, Fleming, Chain, Florey and many more. The first X-rays, first attempts at combatting diabetes, the first anti-cancer treatments and the first faltering steps at 'gene therapy; the first heart transplant by Christian Barnard which has led to astonishing advances in transplant surgery and our understanding of the human immune system, was, to say the least, risky, and the recipient died only 18 days later, but what a legacy !
Going to war in 1914 and again in 1939 were 'risks' but we took the decisions to stand up for our principles and on our own two feet. On both occasions, we could have stood by and taken the course of least resistance, but we didn't. We took risks.
Human life and progress is all about risks. Without taking risks there would be no progress, only stagnation such as we are seeing today within the European Union. Leaving the EU will be a risk, but so will staying within it. If we leave, we free ourselves to take the decisions which suit us, to make our own choices and determine our own future, unencumbered by bureaucratic sloth. Indeed, we may even signal a new way forward to the rest of the world, a way which does not rely on evermore subservience to the will of the political classes.
Leaving the European Union is not a risk, it is an opportunity to break new ground. VOTE LEAVE.
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