Remainers may be better educated but it’s Brexiteers who are wise
WHETHER to laugh or cry was my dilemma over the claim by Labour MP Barry Sheerman that Remainers are more educated than those who voted to Leave (Mail). Having been born in a small farming community just seven miles from Oxford, I grew up with the idea of Town and Gown. I have equally enjoyed harvest teas in the fields and punting on the Thames. I appreciate the instinctive knowledge of keeping a ditch flowing contrasts with the learned knowledge from books as perceived by a particular professor. In my mid-40s, I enrolled in a literature class run by an Oxford professor. After reading a book, we would discuss it and give our opinion. I listened as all the other women gave their educated views, but it soon became clear they were out to impress the professor. I was the last to offer my view, which was to say I had found the book to be very spiritual. There was a stunned silence and after what seemed a very long pause, the professor said: ‘Do you know, I have never thought of that.’ I knew that my job was done and did not go again. I have met people who are very knowledgeable, but lack wisdom. Education tells us that a tomato is a fruit; wisdom teaches us that we do not put it in a fruit salad! I suspect Remainers are more educated, but I would say they are blinkered. They have forgotten how to think for themselves. I truly hope that we Brexiteers are more wise.
CECILY HEDGES, Llangrannog, Ceredigion. WHETHER or not university lecturers favour remaining in the EU is not the point. They have no right to use their highly-paid positions to push their political views on their students. MAUREEN MATTHEWS, Shrewsbury, Shropshire.