I agree with the sentiment.
Imagine you are an external shareholder in a very large multinational business. You are interested in profits and the continuation of successful business such that it remains profitable for you. You don't particularly care about how the end result is achieved within the business down to the individual details (management structure, hierarchy, who is employed where, what individual jobs are carried out by each person in the business, what someone does day to day etc) - that is left to people who actually run the business and understand their employees, the markets, the nature of the business itself.
However, you do have influence by way of owning a share. Major decisions on the company's direction and it's core business operation can be down to the vote by shareholders. However, the information upon which you base your decision as a shareholder is derived from facts, figures and information provided by a board of directors - yes, with some bias perhaps over which direction they might want to go but on the whole, it's your decision. Oversimplified a little, (business is never simple!) but to make a point, I draw this comparison.
Now imagine that all the information has been provided to you via tabloid and broadsheet media instead. There's suddenly no concrete information upon which to base your decision - and people are shouting at you from both sides with equally demoralising and negative statistics should you decide to go the way which is contrary to what they think. Are you getting the same understanding of the impact of your decision? Are you able to rely on the facts and figures? I'd suggest not; and what would happen is what is happening in most cases: you would be likely to pick one issue that is most important to you and focus on that thus basing your decision on a much bigger issue when that something that actually might not be as relevant as you think.
The opinion that people should not be voting on this matter is quite a popular one because we generally do not understand what the impact of our decision either way is going to be on this matter. The lack of information and the way it has been presented is mainly to blame and the way people's emotions are being played on is quite an underhand tactic in what should be a decision based on logic - not feelings, in my opinion. It's not possible to assess the situation logically without the proper information and the general public shouldn't have the responsibility because they are not accountable - that's why we have people who are paid to know what's what and elected to make big decisions for the economy for us.
