The abolish the Scottish Parliament party.

[LongTimeLurker]

10 minutes ago, Gordon EF said:

Well aye, it you view it entirely through the prism of language. Multiple countries have chosen independence from the UK which were English speaking. I don't think language is a determining factor.

No arguments on that. My original point was that Westminster and the parties that still support Scotland's ongoing post-devolution partipation in the Westminster system had to be deeply off-putting to vast swathes of the population and generally Jack McConnell and Henry McLeish levels of inept to get to where we are now, because in the absence of a language issue Aragon or Andalucia style politics would be the normal destination post-devolution.

Edited August 21, 2020 by LongTimeLurker

[Gordon EF]

1 minute ago, LongTimeLurker said:

No arguments on that. My original point was that Westminster and the parties that still support Scotland's ongoing post-devolution partipation in the Westminster system had to be deeply off-putting to vast swathes of the population and generally Jack McConnell and Henry McLeish levels of inept to get to where we are now, because in the absence of a language issue Aragon or Andalucia style politics would be the normal destination post-devolution.

Possibly. It's one of these things where we'll never be able to compare alternate realities unfortunately. i'm no expert on Aragon or Andalucia but I'd guess that Scottish identity may have generally been more prominent vs British than Andalucian vs Spanish, for example.

I was always in the camp that devolution itself would lead to a rise in support for independence, rather than dampen it, regardless of other factors. George Robertson's claim that it'd kill independence stone dead always seemed to be utterly foolish even before the benefit of hindsight.

Labour's ineptitude has clearly played a part. I think it's not quite as foundational as devolution itself.

[git-intae-thum]

32 minutes ago, LongTimeLurker said:

What gets spoken in Methil isn't fluent Scots, but a jumbled up mix of Scots and English. Transianka (?) is the Belarus phrase for that sort of thing. Lukashenko sometimes goes full Buchan fermer mode on television in addresses to the nation. No SNP politician has ever done that because Scots is way too far gone to be the rocket fuel for nationalism. Belarus still has some Belarusian language newspapers and schools alongside Russian ones. We have nothing like that even with the SNP in power. Our elite ditched Scots 400 years ago, so Gaelic gets latched onto instead even though it had a status similar to Saami in medieval Norway in a Scottish context pre-Union of the Crowns. 

You are confusing the use of modern Scots with that of middle Scots which died out after the union of the crown's.

It is simply untrue to deny there is such a thing as a Scots language still very much in vocal use throughout modern Scotland. Less so in written form, but from Burns to Welsh it has also provided a platform for literary giants.

It should be embraced.......and by and large is by the majority.

[D Angelo Barksdale]

The language thing seems a bit of a red herring. Scots Gaelic isn't even the same family as English, whilst the Spanish regions are practically just different dialects. (I appreciate that native speakers would disagree massively and I'm doing a bit hand waving here)

Outside of Catalonia and the Basque country, isn't support for the autonomous regions independence rather low ? I'm sure the likes of Aragon and Andulusia poll less than 15-20 %. Even at it's low point Scottish independence never fell that low.

I don't think the role of having our own distinct institutions to maintain a semblance of national identity and as a counterbalance to colonialism (this is the wrong word to use, but I can't think of the more suitable one) should be underestimated. The likes of Aragon lost this centuries ago.

 

[vikingTON]

Just now, Henderson to deliver ..... said:

The language thing seems a bit of a red herring. Scots Gaelic isn't even the same family as English, whilst the Spanish regions are practically just different dialects. (I appreciate that native speakers would disagree massively and I'm doing a bit hand waving here)

Outside of Catalonia and the Basque country, isn't support for the autonomous regions independence rather low ? I'm sure the likes of Aragon and Andulusia poll less than 15-20 %. Even at it's low point Scottish independence never fell that low.

I don't think the role of having our own distinct institutions to maintain a semblance of national identity and as a counterbalance to colonialism (this is the wrong word to use, but I can't think of the more suitable one) should be underestimated. The likes of Aragon lost this centuries ago.

 

Our resident 'secular humanist*' read a book that said language = nationalism one time though so we can't possibly introduce even this modest degree of nuance to the debate.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

*permaraging loyalist

[Genuine Hibs Fan]

1 hour ago, LongTimeLurker said:

Really? The Andalusian/Aragonese scenario of mainstream parties of the larger state still dominant with nationalist/regionalist parties in the 10-30% range was where Scotland was politically as recently as 20 years ago and where Donald Dewar and co very much expected it to remain post-devolution. The d'Hondt system was supposed to make an SNP majority impossible.

Scotland doesn't have a language issue to fuel nationalism the way Catalonia does. Even anti-nationalist and all around Soviet nostalgist Alexander Lukashenko sometimes makes speeches in Belarusian (his mother tongue given he grew up on a collective farm) whenever Vlad is pissing him off over oil and gas prices. How often does Nicola S make speeches in Scots and would she even be able to string a complete sentence together if she tried?

Scotland is like Aragon in having its medieval era state language almost extinct bar a few fermers in remote areas in terms of being spoken fluently and habitually and in having it completely marginalised as the language of instruction in schools rather than normalised and co-official like Catalan. 

I think you're right that the Unionist parties have made an arse of implementing and following independence if their goal was to weaken the nationalist cause, but feeling the need to do so would somewhat contradict your implication that nationalism was a fringe political belief as it is in the regions of Spain you've mentioned.

But you're comparing apples and oranges. A country with devolved/federal government across all autonomous communities, some of which are cultural "nations" like Catalunya and the Basque Country, and some of which are more well integrated into the Spanish system so to speak, bears little in common with one which hands out devolution only to recognised countries while maintaining centralised control for the rest. 

The language issue is an interesting one but it's overstated in Catalunya's. There are, I believe, an almost equivalent numbers of Galician speakers in Galicia and there is no major independence movement there.

The overall point being that Spain/Catalunya and UK/Scotland are good comparisons in some ways but very different in others, language of which is only one.

[D Angelo Barksdale]

The cruel bigotry against my man continues I see.

[O'Kelly Isley III]

Great to see them hamming up Project Fear in response to the changing polls.  

 

Nationalists love to point to Scandinavia as their vision of sunny, snow-capped uplands, and of joining their dream team of small economies as part of a ‘Northern Arc of Prosperity,’ as Salmond used to call it. 

However, we are never told how the journey will happen. Everything is sunny. There’s never any possibility of long detours, dangerous events, and dreich weather. Comparing Scotland to Nordic countries is simply a cheap trick that deflects from the reality of where we are now.

What if we didn’t get to Norway or Denmark at all. Given the reasons below I think it’s more likely we will end up, at the end of a long or short road, in Belarus or Ukraine: A divided satellite with no voice in the world, on the periphery of Europe, with an intolerant angry government, based on grudge and victimhood. 

Independence

There is no such thing as ‘independence in Europe’.

Professor Mark Blyth makes it clear that, regarding Europe, you cannot be independent without your own currency. It is that simple. Norway, Sweden, Iceland and Denmark all have their own currencies. Some chose to join the German-dominated EU (with opt outs), others didn’t. 

The United Kingdom chose to leave Europe despite Nationalist wishful thinking that Scotland voted against Brexit. Over one million Scottish Leavers, many of them SNP members, would say otherwise.

The EU Commision requires its member countries to follow the same rulebook for trade policy, and increasingly coordinates many of functions best carried out by sovereign states. No one in the EU votes for the Commission, or Council. You can argue for the EU on many grounds, but certainly not on political and economic independence. 

Personal Freedom

Alongside its main aim to break up the UK, the SNP has made repeated inroads into our private lives. Whether it be the Named Person Scheme, or the upcoming Hate Crime Bill, or the failed Offensive Behaviour at Football Act, or the ban on buying alcohol after 10pm, or recently, the arbitrary imposition of lockdowns with minimal evidence of value, Nationalists have always, throughout history, made every effort to nationalise people. 

Nationalists might say they want their Nation’s independence, but they do not trust the people of their nation with personal independence. All they seek is power for themselves.

Nationalists also do not respect our political decisions. Instead they waterboard us with constant threats to rerun a referendum they lost, and meaninglessly parrot that ‘Scotland voted Leave’.

They do not respect that most ancient right for a Scot to be left in peace when they say no? “Are You Yes Yet?” is not an inspiration. It is the desperate pitch of the fanatic, who won’t shut up and won’t change the subject.

Political Freedom

SNP Bravehearts never miss a chance to wave plastic swords and scream ‘Freeedooom!!’  but the political reality is far, far different. And oppressive.

No sooner had Westminster granted Holyrood emergency powers to deal with COVID-19, then the Nationalists abused that power to delay the flow of information to the public. Despite multiple attempts, I have still not been able to access NHS data over delays in treating those with blood cancers during the pandemic.

Humza Yousaf will not waste five minutes in attacking an opponent on social media, but if you want data that would show Holyrood is failing cancer patients, you’ll have to wait over two months.

This week’s inquiry on the dangers to women of sexual predation in Parliament itself is yet another example where Murrell Central appears to have reached out, and touched Linda Fabiani inappropriately, shutting down legitimate inquiry questions. Is this the freedom we want?

Press Freedom

Like many failed republics, The Scottish Government likes to threaten and harass journalists and broadcasters. David Torrance was attacked in party political broadcasts; Stephen Daisley chased out of STV by personal attacks; Sarah Smith forced to repeatedly apologise; and Neil Oliver was constantly attacked by The National newspaper, for the crime of having a Scottish accent and sense of British history.

Add to that, Sturgeon’s stage-managed spin on a pandemic she has handled disastrously. A daily free party-political broadcast, worthy of a dictatorship, with no follow-up questions allowed. 

Our levels of press restrictions and control are far from the open society of Denmark, Sweden or Norway who consistently rank high in press freedom indices. 

If all these freedoms are being eroded now, one can only imagine how much more we would lose in a one-party Scottish Republic that had no internal or external opposition.

Watch out! We are not heading for dreamy Scandinavia, but to restrictive Belarus, where your cries of ‘Freedom!’ will not be heard.

And not a mention of the violent Unionist vermin who invaded George Square on September 15th 2014.

[LongTimeLurker]

35 minutes ago, git-intae-thum said:

...It is simply untrue to deny there is such a thing as a Scots language still very much in vocal use throughout modern Scotland....

You could make the same statement about Neapolitan or Bavarian and they aren't leaving Italy or Germany any time soon. Having a spoken vernacular in working class circles that deviates significanty from the prevailing literary language is nothing hugely out of the ordinary in many parts of Europe.

You only get taken seriously as a language once you move beyond the realm of vernacular speech and it gets normalised, people get taught in it at school and actually use it in newspapers, books, TV programmes and internet messageboards like this one. None of that is happening with Scots under the SNP. Only Gaelic gets pushed to that sort of extent but only a wee bit because it's only spoken in real life by a couple of geriatric crofters called Calum and Dougal.

That's why I stated that there is no language issue driving Scottish nationalism. 

[git-intae-thum]

42 minutes ago, LongTimeLurker said:

You could make the same statement about Neapolitan or Bavarian and they aren't leaving Italy or Germany any time soon. Having a spoken vernacular in working class circles that deviates significanty from the prevailing literary language is nothing hugely out of the ordinary in many parts of Europe.

You only get taken seriously as a language once you move beyond the realm of vernacular speech and it gets normalised, people get taught in it at school and actually use it in newspapers, books, TV programmes and internet messageboards like this one. None of that is happening with Scots under the SNP. Only Gaelic gets pushed to that sort of extent but only a wee bit because it's only spoken in real life by a couple of geriatric crofters called Calum and Dougal.

That's why I stated that there is no language issue driving Scottish nationalism. 

I do not argue with the sentiment that there is no language issue driving Scottish "nationalism." Why would there be? Most Scots desire for independence has little to do with a cultural or linguistic "nationalism."

However, the ridiculous opine that the modern Scots language does not exist and can be compared to "a spoken vernacular in working class circles," is hopefully just down to laughable faux snobbery or ignorance.

I suggest to you have a wee read over:

https://dsl.ac.uk/

for genuine academic research and opinion on modern Scots, its continued wide spoken and artistic use.... and its future.

Historically, Scots was the "prevailing literary language" of Scotland both in political,social, educational and cultural terms. The "kings Scottis" was used in Scotland to denote proper grammar and elocution in the same sense, as England's "queen's English."

This "middle Scots language" was encouraged to die off after the union of crown's, where the ruling classes of Scotland underwent a forced assimilation with English language and culture.

Should union not have occurred there is every reason to believe that Scots would have developed as a distinct recognised national language as much as Dutch, Portuguese or any of the Scandinavian tongues.

However, even though it does not enjoy the badge of officialdom or protection enjoyed by the aforesaid languages it does not make it any less of a "language." It is very much still around and used to varying degrees by the majority of Scots every day, at least in a spoken form.

That speaks to its strength as a language.......and it is actually a miracle that given its cultural and political oppression over the past 400 years, it has survived in any form.

We should treasure it.

[Antlion]

15 minutes ago, git-intae-thum said:

 

This "middle Scots language" was encouraged to die off after the union of crown's, where the ruling classes of Scotland underwent a forced assimilation with English language and culture.

Should union not have occurred there is every reason to believe that Scots would have developed as a distinct recognised national language as much as Dutch, Portuguese or any of the Scandinavian tongues.

However, even though it does not enjoy the badge of officialdom or protection enjoyed by the aforesaid languages it does not make it any less of a "language." It is very much still around and used to varying degrees by the majority of Scots every day, at least in a spoken form.

That speaks to its strength as a language.......and it is actually a miracle that given its cultural and political oppression over the past 400 years, it has survived in any form.

We should treasure it.

If I recall correctly, the arsehole (and unsurprisingly the chief beneficiary) behind the Union of the Crowns, James VI, was an ultra unionist who claimed that the Scots language didn’t exist, that Scottish people were barbarians compared to the English, that England and Scotland were already of one language, that the names “Scotland” and “England” should be abolished, and that the borders should be renamed “the middle shires” of Great Britain. Also designed the Union Jack, I believe.

I’ve no idea what kings and queens in Scotland before him said or thought about the language or their kingdom more generally, but he provides early evidence that the greatest enemies of Scottish independence were often self hating and self serving Scottish toffs, nobles and royals. Plus ça change.

[Gordon EF]

8 minutes ago, Antlion said:

If I recall correctly, the arsehole (and unsurprisingly the chief beneficiary) behind the Union of the Crowns, James VI, was an ultra unionist who claimed that the Scots language didn’t exist, that Scottish people were barbarians compared to the English, that England and Scotland were already of one language, that the names “Scotland” and “England” should be abolished, and that the borders should be renamed “the middle shires” of Great Britain. Also designed the Union Jack, I believe.

I’ve no idea what kings and queens in Scotland before him said or thought about the language or their kingdom more generally, but he provides early evidence that the greatest enemies of Scottish independence were often self hating and self serving Scottish toffs, nobles and royals. Plus ça change.

Self-loathing of your own identity is something I really struggle to understand from a rational viewpoint, no matter what your identity is. There's absolutely no doubt that there's a significant streak of self-loathing running through Scottish unionism. I'd say that is far more significant on the unionist side that blind 'ethno-patriotism' is on the Yes side.

Kincardine is a great example of this. Despite all the "I'm a proud Scot.... but" stuff you can just tell that he absolutely hates being Scottish. Which is bizarre.

[Antlion]

4 minutes ago, Gordon EF said:

Self-loathing of your own identity is something I really struggle to understand from a rational viewpoint, no matter what your identity is. There's absolutely no doubt that there's a significant streak of self-loathing running through Scottish unionism. I'd say that is far more significant on the unionist side that blind 'ethno-patriotism' is on the Yes side.

Kincardine is a great example of this. Despite all the "I'm a proud Scot.... but" stuff you can just tell that he absolutely hates being Scottish. Which is bizarre.

I could understand it coming about as a result of the union - England being seen as the primary nation of that union and the de facto benchmark of “Britishness”. Undoubtedly the overt attempts to Anglicise Scotland in the 18th and 19th centuries can explain some of it; if Scotland had to be “improved” by being made more like England, then the perception must have been that being Scottish was wrong and inferior in the first place. It can then be seen to have got worse with the collapse of Scottish industry and the general presentation of Scotland as beggarly and populated by junkies, drunks, and clowns (an image today’s more self hating British nationalists seem keen to keep alive). 

However, it seems to predate all of this. Something I genuinely don’t know is when “unionism” began to gain traction, under whatever name. I mean, I assume James VI didn’t take time out from burning witches and banging young boys to invent the concept. At some point, the idea of Scots rejecting their hard-won national independence in favour of some king of union must have arisen. Reformation, possibly? I’m sure someone on here posted about the arrival of the Bible in English (not Scots) playing a role in the shift towards some kind of union.

[LongTimeLurker]

23 minutes ago, git-intae-thum said:

I do not argue with the sentiment that there is no language issue driving Scottish "nationalism." Why would there be? Most Scots desire for independence has little to do with a cultural or linguistic "nationalism."

However, the ridiculous opine that the modern Scots language does not exist and can be compared to "a spoken vernacular in working class circles," is hopefully just down to laughable faux snobbery or ignorance....

At no point have I suggested that Scots doesn't exist. I grew up speaking fairly broad Scots by central belt standards some of the time but only with certain people and only in certain social situations. My mother used quite a bit of Scots around the house and my grandfather even took the time to teach me how to count to ten in it when I was knee high to a grasshopper. No teacher ever did that and it's the lack of official support in that setting (fower and seevin would have went down like a lead balloon with the teacher and probably would have been ridiculed by the rest of the class) that makes it a working class vernacular rather than a standard literary language.

I have relatives in Shetland that still speak a form of Scots completely fluently although they'd prefer to call it Shetland. The full traditional vocabulary and grammar. Another few decades and the last fluent speakers like them will all be gone. You can call what's left in the central belt "modern Scots" at that point if you like but don't hold your breath on it ever getting standardised under the SNP like Bokmal Norwegian was to enable Danish speaking Norwegians to have a national language that could be taught in schools and used in the media post-independence.

The number of living fully functioning languages is going to drop drastically over the next couple of centuries and having standard English as the competitor is pretty much mission impossible no matter what happens on independence.

[git-intae-thum]

11 minutes ago, LongTimeLurker said:

No teacher ever did that and it's the lack of official support in that setting (fower and seevin would have went down like a lead balloon with the teacher and probably would have been ridiculed by the rest of the class) that makes it a working class vernacular rather than a standard literary language.

I am sorry to hear that. If I was you, I would feel very angry. Unfortunately generations of Scots in positions of authority were brainwashed into being self loathing cretins. This mentality was passed on to the children. Thankfully it never succeeded in making that big a dent in the common usage of our language.

The ignorance of your teacher (and those like them) does not mean that Scots is no longer a 'standard literary language." 

As I posted before, it is still spoken widely and there is a plethora of fantastic artistic and literary works in Scots. This is all the more remarkable given its obvious lack of official encouragement and definite suppression post union as you have evidenced.

As to the future, well all languages evolve and with globalisation, I agree, there is a clear trend towards language in official or business use becoming increasingly homogeneous. English is a classic example. It is definitely not the same language spoken or written in, to that of even a century ago. That which is now commonly used and understood should perhaps more correctly be known as Midatlantic.

However much the same as there will be room for standard queen's English, there will always be room for standard Scots. The language will continue to be used by ordinary people in everyday speech and it will be written down. 

In Scotland we find ourselves in the fortunate position that near 100% of us can understand the common Midatlantic tongue and a majority have a good grounding in the every day use of our own language.

With increased encouragement of Scots, will come an increased use.

[Tutankhamen]

I take it the latest ultra unionist outfit is a breakaway from the earlier one election,  A Better Britain party.

Let's use A as the first intial to be first on the list voting system. 

Edited August 22, 2020 by Tutankhamen
f**k the SFA

[Tutankhamen]

7 hours ago, SandyCromarty said:

When you read this verbal diarrhoea gushing from these fanatical unionists it makes me wonder what will happen to their world in our soon to be Independent Scotland.

They will be welcome as any minority will be but will they be comfortable with their new country? or will they emigrate to their beloved england and become just another sweaty sock as the english like to call us?

An interesting point.

It would depend a lot on what kind of leadership they had, i doubt anybody remotely mainstream would touch them. Plus what numbers would they really have in a post Indy Scotland? Would they be threatening violence to the new State?  Would they have support outside of Scotland?  

[itzdrk]

On 20/08/2020 at 21:36, Beth Paige-Black said:

Might as well give these lunatics a thread.   

"I'm a proud Scot.....but we must close our parliament"  

https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/new-political-party-aims-abolish-22541441

The founder is a Rangers fan called John Mortimer.   John's social media lets us know that he's a fan of the Mountbatten Flute Band, The Army, The Navy, Our Armed Forces, Buy British products, Scrap Hollyrood etc.  

Here's the first leaflet:  



 

How big a dent in that £100,000,000 would we be talking if we weren't sending MPs (salary, expenses etc) to England? 

 

[SandyCromarty]

Aside from Scottish Parliamentary business with MSP's, aides and researchers there are many Forums that meet at the Parliament, as I've mentioned before I am a member of one of them, it consists of a cross section of the Scottish public, we do not get paid nor do we get expenses and I fund my travel and accomm myself.

In our meetings we discuss many topics and in the early days we spent 18 months on Drugs and Alcohol problems and then Social Inequality for an extended period, since then we have looked at many topics some involving major Scottish Think Tanks and Charitable institutions in the discussions.

A lot of the meetings take place in the evening and we initially sign in and congregate in the main hall before sloping off to the various meeting rooms, at every event I can tell you that the main hall is packed prior to events taking place.

I write this to let you know that there is a helluva lot that goes on at the Scottish Parliament outwith MSP's and Government business, so much so that in all essence the Scottish Parlliament is a Peoples Parliament of which the public in the main are unaware. 

[LongTimeLurker]

13 hours ago, git-intae-thum said:

...However much the same as there will be room for standard queen's English, there will always be room for standard Scots. The language will continue to be used by ordinary people in everyday speech and it will be written down. 

In Scotland we find ourselves in the fortunate position that near 100% of us can understand the common Midatlantic tongue and a majority have a good grounding in the every day use of our own language.

With increased encouragement of Scots, will come an increased use.

Is that what is actually happening though? The Torcuil and Catriona types latch onto Gaelic instead and plaster it all over Scottish government websites in an empty token sort of way because they are almost completely anglicised linguistically.

Their forebears preferred being a junior partner in crime where imperialism was concerned to separate nationhood and were happy to embark on a project of making Scotland very similar to England culturally to fit into the whole imperial escapade. Now there is no empire left to pillage having a separate state with a leadership role for themselves is more appealing than being Scotlandshire in North Britain. 

Instead of normalising a watered down "modern Scots" in a Catalan sort of way to justify a separate nationalism, phony kilts and bagpipes nonsense that was originally promoted in the 19th century to rehabilitate Jacobitism to try to stop the proles having bolshy Presbyterian ideas about having the right to vote has been latched onto and started to get taken seriously by the sort of people that watched Braveheart and thought it was a documentary.

I find that only marginally more appealing culturally than Jacob Rees-Mogg, so would prefer to see an option that makes devolution work well in a federal sort of way. If the Westminster parties are completely incapable of providing that though and Little Englander Brexit mentalities are going to hold sway down south, the Union is like having a larger conjoined twin with special needs...

Edited August 22, 2020 by LongTimeLurker