"Are the British crazy? How can they leave Europe? It's mad!"
This was the unusually forthright response of one of my students in our first post-EU-referendum class. From the nods and murmurs of assent, it seemed to represent the general feeling of the group.
Somewhat taken aback, but in the interests of fairness and critical thinking skills, I played devil's advocate and posed the class a hypothetical: Would the Japanese people be happy to cede sovereignty to unelected bureaucrats abroad, accept the authority of a pan-Asian supreme court and allow unlimited immigration from across Asia? Oh, and pay handsomely for the privilege?