Even More SNP Nonsense

[Who_put_the_ball_in...]

An independent Scotland would need to reduce its deficit to 3% or less to join the eu. The figures released this week by the Scottish government demonstrate that we will have a lengthy period of harsh spending cuts and increased taxes. I await the Nats telling me it’s all lies and wings over Scotland says otherwise we all know they don’t like facts. 

[XB52]

34 minutes ago, Who_put_the_ball_in... said:

An independent Scotland would need to reduce its deficit to 3% or less to join the eu. The figures released this week by the Scottish government demonstrate that we will have a lengthy period of harsh spending cuts and increased taxes. I await the Nats telling me it’s all lies and wings over Scotland says otherwise we all know they don’t like facts. 

I know it's a waste of time discussing anything to do with independence with you but here we go. Gers is not in any way facts. It is a series of best guesses and these guesses are based on what is happening while Scotland is part of the uk. It has nothing to say about what will happen once we are independent

[Who_put_the_ball_in...]

14 minutes ago, XB52 said:

I know it's a waste of time discussing anything to do with independence with you but here we go. Gers is not in any way facts. It is a series of best guesses and these guesses are based on what is happening while Scotland is part of the uk. It has nothing to say about what will happen once we are independent

So Scotland will change so dramatically we will see a 12billion swing in our national deficit 

[Roxy Hearts]

15 minutes ago, Who_put_the_ball_in... said:

So Scotland will change so dramatically we will see a 12billion swing in our national deficit 

What deficit? We don't know our finances. Only idiots believe Westminster and the SNP use the GERs garbage as a tool to prove that WM can't run our country properly and they are correct. 

[AlimOzturk]

Couldn't we just sell one of our nuclear subs we will own after the divorce proceedings? That will cover the 12 billion deficiet and more 

[Who_put_the_ball_in...]

1 hour ago, Roxy Hearts said:

What deficit? We don't know our finances. Only idiots believe Westminster and the SNP use the GERs garbage as a tool to prove that WM can't run our country properly and they are correct. 

GERS is compiled by statisticians and economists in the Office of the Chief Economic Adviser of the ScottishGovernment. The ScottishGovernment's Chief Statistician takes responsibility for this publication. 

 

They are pulled together by the Scottish government. Typical nat attitude anything that doesn’t fall in line with your own wee fantasy is lies. Worse than brexiteers. 

[Justin Z]

4 hours ago, Hunky Dory said:

 

I think that one of most interesting aspects of this thread is this yank, an alternative and new international perspective on Scottish independence.  From an initial neutral perspective (presumably), he has evaluated the situation on a non-participatory basis and ultimately deduced that Scottish independence is preferable to anything else on offer.

 

The rest of the world remains astounded that a (slimming) majority of the population of Scotland still believes that we're better ruled by a Boris led English Brexit supporting, small-minded nationalistic bunch of toe rags.

 

Least there's hope with this guy that people can normalize, identify, and realize that the current system within the UK is shite.

 

Well cheers. As for my initial perspective, if anything, before I even visited the UK I thought that the movement might be a bit Bravehearty and unrealistic. Once I visited and got to reading more, and then came over more permanently, learning even further, I realised that was a mistaken impression.

 

What I'm constantly amazed by is the endless parade of people who call Indy supporters unrealistic, or head-in-the-sand, or, to wit, worse than brexiteers, when the ones thin on facts and big on fear have always been unionists by my reckoning. It's why I cringe at the minority of Yes supporters who behave similarly trollishly. It doesn't help anything.

 

Anyway, thanks again for your kind appraisal.

[Unknown user]

57 minutes ago, Who_put_the_ball_in... said:

GERS is compiled by statisticians and economists in the Office of the Chief Economic Adviser of the ScottishGovernment. The ScottishGovernment's Chief Statistician takes responsibility for this publication. 

 

They are pulled together by the Scottish government. Typical nat attitude anything that doesn’t fall in line with your own wee fantasy is lies. Worse than brexiteers. 

 

I filled in my last tax return, that doesnt mean I made up the rules or that they're fair.

[jake]

1 hour ago, Who_put_the_ball_in... said:

GERS is compiled by statisticians and economists in the Office of the Chief Economic Adviser of the ScottishGovernment. The ScottishGovernment's Chief Statistician takes responsibility for this publication. 

 

They are pulled together by the Scottish government. Typical nat attitude anything that doesn’t fall in line with your own wee fantasy is lies. Worse than brexiteers. 

Eh?

 

[jake]

5 hours ago, Hunky Dory said:

 

I think that one of most interesting aspects of this thread is this yank, an alternative and new international perspective on Scottish independence.  From an initial neutral perspective (presumably), he has evaluated the situation on a non-participatory basis and ultimately deduced that Scottish independence is preferable to anything else on offer.

 

The rest of the world remains astounded that a (slimming) majority of the population of Scotland still believes that we're better ruled by a Boris led English Brexit supporting, small-minded nationalistic bunch of toe rags.

 

Least there's hope with this guy that people can normalize, identify, and realize that the current system within the UK is shite.

One of the most interesting aspects of this thread is whaaaaaattttttt ?

 

That'll be right.

🙄

 

😄 

 

 

[jake]

Dont know why those who want independence are not holding up these GERS figures up and saying this is one of the reasons we should govern ourselves.

 

[jack D and coke]

1 hour ago, Who_put_the_ball_in... said:

GERS is compiled by statisticians and economists in the Office of the Chief Economic Adviser of the ScottishGovernment. The ScottishGovernment's Chief Statistician takes responsibility for this publication. 

 

They are pulled together by the Scottish government. Typical nat attitude anything that doesn’t fall in line with your own wee fantasy is lies. Worse than brexiteers. 

I’m not saying GERS is completely wrong but watch this. 

 

[Hasselhoff]

1 hour ago, jack D and coke said:

I’m not saying GERS is completely wrong but watch this. 

 

 

 

[coconut doug]

22 hours ago, jambos are go! said:

No . I'm miffed about folk on both sides of the debate on here who make claims without references and expect others to find them for them. I've been aware that India and the rest of the British Empire was shafted by the  UK since I was  a schoolboy in the 60s. IIRC we are still paying reparations to India and Pakistan at least. I'll check that out and report back.

 

Somebody claimed the Sick Kids was overspent by £100 million and when asked to provide their source did not link it. I suspect that was because their source did not back up their accusation. They have not even replied to that issue despite a promise that they would.

      Same person persisted in an argument that drug deaths and police numbers in Scotland were linked and despite being shown evidence to the contrary  refused to accept it and also failed to produce any evidence to support his claim.

 

  That was you.

 

       I'd also be very interested to see some evidence to support your claim that the UK ever paid reparations to India or Pakistan. 

[coconut doug]

On 22/08/2019 at 18:27, SE16 3LN said:

This is total bollocks and its the thing that worries you most😂

 

Are you able to explain this view?  Are you telling us that the revenues the UK treasury currently receives from the city of London are sure to persist?

 

If you take the view that Scotland runs at deficit can you explain why that is the case?

[coconut doug]

On 22/08/2019 at 18:16, Hasselhoff said:

 

Explain please why I would need to apologise?

 

I said originally:

--------

Funny how many nationalists are completely devoid of any basic maths skills as a result of yesterday.

 

"How can Wales and Scotland make up 110% of the UK's deficit" - that's impossible! 

 

 Pretty obvious that when London and the South East run a surplus that cancels out some of the deficit.

 

-----

 

The stupidity I was highlighting was that not all amounts were negative. So it isn't a case of saying 110% of anything. All surpluses and deficits across the UK add up to give the combined UK deficit. 

 

Btw, not my revised statement but one from the subject matter experts on the link provided.

 

 

 

You accuse nationalists being devoid of maths skills and yet offer a figure for Scotland 

"Scotland makes up 13% of the total deficit contributed by the 9 regions of the UK who raise less in taxes than they spend on public services." 

  The figure is correct but it has no context or relevance. How can this be relevant when we are comparing Scotland to other U.K. regions without knowing the population or unique circumstances of any particular region.

  Does Scotland have more than or less than 13% of the population of these 9 regions. If it has more then Scotland is doing better than the rest of the country on average apart from the south and east obviously.

 What the figures really show is a massive imbalance between the south east of England and the rest of the Uk. There must be some reasons for that, perhaps you can tell us why there is such regional inequality in the U.K. It would likely be a more nuanced answer than the Scotland is crap and full of wasters type explanation offered by so many on here.

[coconut doug]

On 22/08/2019 at 18:33, Seymour M Hersh said:

One thing this thread has done is identify (via confession) that most here are not economic or government experts. It explains a lot. 

 

Could you give an example?

[coconut doug]

On 22/08/2019 at 15:53, jambos are go! said:

 Scotland enjoys a much higher spend on Defence on things like Nuclear Submarines, Massive Aircraft Carriers  and other Naval Vessels than other parts of the UK. Spending that would be transferred out of Scotland to the rest of the UK if we voted for independence' At a cost of many thousand jobs. IMO.

 

Not according to Gers it doesn't but perhaps you could provide a link to back up your claim.

[Seymour M Hersh]

1 hour ago, coconut doug said:

 

Could you give an example?

 

You're kidding right?

[Roxy Hearts]

7 hours ago, Who_put_the_ball_in... said:

GERS is compiled by statisticians and economists in the Office of the Chief Economic Adviser of the ScottishGovernment. The ScottishGovernment's Chief Statistician takes responsibility for this publication. 

 

They are pulled together by the Scottish government. Typical nat attitude anything that doesn’t fall in line with your own wee fantasy is lies. Worse than brexiteers. 

Telks me nowt. 

[jake]

23 minutes ago, Seymour M Hersh said:

 

You're kidding right?

😄

[ri Alban]

9 hours ago, Who_put_the_ball_in... said:

So Scotland will change so dramatically we will see a 12billion swing in our national deficit 

Well our defence budget and debt repayment will be reduced for a start.

[Francis Albert]

On ‎23‎/‎08‎/‎2019 at 11:04, Justin Z said:

Anybody have any idea what sort of surpluses or deficits were reported in Ireland when under British rule? India? Any of the other colonies the Empire extracted trillions of pounds from?

Are you seriously suggesting Scotland's position in the UK is equivalent to colonies in Britain's colonial past?

Scotland and the Scots played a disproportionate part in British colonialist exploitation.

Perhaps reparation to former colonies might be top of the "internationalist" SNP's priorities after independence.

[ri Alban]

7 minutes ago, Francis Albert said:

Are you seriously suggesting Scotland's position in the UK is equivalent to colonies in Britain's colonial past?

Scotland and the Scots played a disproportionate part in British colonialist exploitation.

Perhaps reparation to former colonies might be top of the "internationalist" SNP's priorities after independence.

The common Scots didn't. Get yer facts right. The Fuds who lost their wealth couldn't wait to drag us into English colonisation. The Brit collective. Scots had no part in it. Just like Scots voted Yes and Brits voted no.

[Francis Albert]

18 minutes ago, ri Alban said:

The common Scots didn't. Get yer facts right. The Fuds who lost their wealth couldn't wait to drag us into English colonisation. The Brit collective. Scots had no part in it. Just like Scots voted Yes and Brits voted no.

Scots had no part in the British Empire's colonisation?

 

An interesting if totally delusionary take on history.

 

It would be pretty shameful of a new independent Scotland to take that line. But consistent with the Scotland as a hapless victim mythology.

 

[Hasselhoff]

4 hours ago, coconut doug said:

 

You accuse nationalists being devoid of maths skills and yet offer a figure for Scotland 

"Scotland makes up 13% of the total deficit contributed by the 9 regions of the UK who raise less in taxes than they spend on public services." 

  The figure is correct but it has no context or relevance. How can this be relevant when we are comparing Scotland to other U.K. regions without knowing the population or unique circumstances of any particular region.

  Does Scotland have more than or less than 13% of the population of these 9 regions. If it has more then Scotland is doing better than the rest of the country on average apart from the south and east obviously.

 What the figures really show is a massive imbalance between the south east of England and the rest of the Uk. There must be some reasons for that, perhaps you can tell us why there is such regional inequality in the U.K. It would likely be a more nuanced answer than the Scotland is crap and full of wasters type explanation offered by so many on here.

 

It is the whole point of pooling and sharing and can be likened to Aberdeen and Edinburgh making the vast majority of Scotland's money compared to a less productive area like Perth or Kilmarnock. Are the latter crap and full of wasters because the majority of money raised for Scotland comes via the former? There must be some reasons for that?

 

Scotland performs well compared to other areas of the UK as far as revenue is concerned but we spend a lot more than we can afford, essentially using UK money to buy votes. 

[coconut doug]

47 minutes ago, Hasselhoff said:

 

It is the whole point of pooling and sharing and can be likened to Aberdeen and Edinburgh making the vast majority of Scotland's money compared to a less productive area like Perth or Kilmarnock. Are the latter crap and full of wasters because the majority of money raised for Scotland comes via the former? There must be some reasons for that?

 

Scotland performs well compared to other areas of the UK as far as revenue is concerned but we spend a lot more than we can afford, essentially using UK money to buy votes. 

 

There are bound to be inequalities in any country and i don't dispute that according to Gers Scotland Scotland produces more than average and consumes more than average. Nevertheless there are serious and credible criticisms of the Gers methodology and it's interpretation.

        On here the figures are presented by some as proof that Scotland is an economic basket case when the truth shows that we are roughly average performers when you exclude London and the SE from the calculations. This surely must raise questions as to how  London and the SE has become so economically  powerful and whether or not this economic performance is sustainable. I would contend that a lot of the wealth and so called fiscal surplus in London and SE has come at the expense of the rest of the country. What does Gers measure and what is it that London produces to give it those favourable figures that cannot be transferred to an independent Scotland? Is it healthy for a country to have such imbalance? Is the centralisation of power and wealth a good thing? I think not. What does Gers say on exports and imports? how does Scotland stand on that?

[Boris]

11 hours ago, Francis Albert said:

Scots had no part in the British Empire's colonisation?

 

An interesting if totally delusionary take on history.

 

It would be pretty shameful of a new independent Scotland to take that line. But consistent with the Scotland as a hapless victim mythology.

 

 

I think Scotland is waking up to its exploitative part in the British Empire. Glasgow University's recent announcement is a good thing, IMO.

 

I suppose that it requires individuals/institutions to take responsibility, like Glasgow Uni have. 

 

[Trapper John McIntyre]

Scotland’s Empire of denial

Posted bystephenjdaisleyAugust 24, 2019

‘O wad some Pow’r the giftie gie us/To see oursels as ithers see us,’ a rumination by the national poet, has become cherished folk wisdom for generations of Scots.

It is a counsel in humility: we don’t know half of what we don’t know. Sometimes, an outsider is needed to hold up a mirror to our assumptions.

This week, the modern makar imparted a fresh lesson: sometimes, one of our own has to thrust that mirror in front of us. Jackie Kay, Scotland’s most celebrated living poet, revealed an ugly experience she was put through at an annual celebration of her forebear. It was the Edinburgh Burns Society’s Burns’ Supper and she had been invited as a guest speaker.

She recounted: ‘I was asked to do the Toast to the Laddies. I asked to do the Toast to the Lassies, but they said no. I decided I would write quite a radical speech, a #MeToo generation Toast to the Laddies, which was done with a lot of affection and humour.

‘As soon as I started up, one of the men who had actually invited me started heckling me and kept going throughout my address. He later told me: “This is our club. You don’t belong here. Get out.” It was deeply shocking and upsetting.’

This was more than one nasty man and one nasty incident. As Kay averred: ‘I don’t think Scotland has changed enough as far as race goes. I don’t think we reflect that in our culture, in our television or news programmes, how we think of ourselves and in what we teach about history in schools.

‘The average Scottish child won’t know that Glasgow was founded on money from the slave trade, that a slave owner put the Gallery of Modern Art building there, why Jamaica Street is called Jamaica Street and why Virginia Street is called Virginia Street. They won’t know any of these things in the way that Liverpool, Bristol, Manchester and London have all started to come to terms with their histories. We just don’t talk about it.’

And with that, a long, defensive silence was shattered. Scotland does not like to talk about race. It’s hardly a comfortable conversation in the best of circumstances but especially unsettling for a country that sustains itself on myths of victimhood and moral probity.

However, Kay compounded her offence by adding that: ‘It seems acceptable to keep on asking people where they are from in the way that you just don’t do with a black Liverpudlian, a black Brummie or a black Londoner. You can’t accept that now, in 2019… I think Scotland is behind.

‘Any Scottish city is at least 30 or 40 years behind Manchester, Bristol, Liverpool and London. That’s just the truth. We need to find ways of changing that. It’s not just about people being there and a diverse population, it’s about how we actually change our image of ourselves when we think of what it means to be Scottish.’

Anyone familiar with the poisonous nature of online debate in Scotland can probably guess what happened next. The suggestion that Scotland was behind England — indeed, that there is anything we could learn from our friends in the south — brought out the cybernats to defend the nation’s honour.

One wrote of Kay, who was born in Edinburgh: ‘I would say you are completely wrong, being born here and travelling Scotland extensively I see no racism in large cities or rural communities, travelling in England and even […] parts of Europe, it’s far more common.’

Another wittered: ‘Looks to me like she’s basing much of this on one drunk man at a Burns Supper…& as much as we should know our history, I refuse to bear guilt of Scottish Unionists from our past who benefited from the proceeds of slavery.’

When Nicola Sturgeon stepped in to say Kay ‘mustn’t be ignored’ and that there was no place for ‘complacency on racism’, one of her digital foot soldiers snapped: ‘It is very disappointing to see you agreeing with Scotland being rubbished like that, I don’t care who says it. I wonder why she took the position of Makar if she hates Scotland so much.’

As one disenchanted nationalist columnist later noted: ‘[W]ith depressing predictability, comments by a woman of colour were written off by white people who won’t accept any criticism of Scotland’.

Reasonable people can disagree about how to address the issues of racial prejudice and identity. Some believe we should work towards a post-racial society that emphasises what we have in common rather than the characteristics that divide us. Others say this is running away from the problem of racism instead of confronting it head-on. What is unreasonable is to believe that Scotland is immune from the problem, untainted by prejudice by dint of a superior national ethic.

The country Jackie Kay describes might be unrecognisable to those whose love for Scotland is like that of a teenager for their first crush but the poet has more than anecdote on her side. She has the numbers. At the most recent census, Scotland was 96 per cent white, compared to 85 per cent for England. All but two members of the Scottish Parliament are white; the House of Commons, only five times the size of Holyrood, has 26 times the number of ethnic minority parliamentarians. None of them, however, represents seats north of the Border: every single Scottish MP is white.

Two in every three hate crimes in Scotland are racial in nature and a 2018 Glasgow University study of murders committed between 2000 and 2013 found race-related homicides were higher per head of the population in Scotland than across the rest of the UK. The same researchers also discovered that white applicants for jobs in large public sector bodies had an 8.1 per cent chance of landing the role compared to just 1.1 per cent for black and minority ethnic candidates.

A report published this week by Strathclyde University found 77 per cent of young eastern Europeans living in England and Scotland had been subjected to racism. While opposition to certain immigration policies should not be construed as racism, the latest polling shows 45 per cent of Scots think migration is too high and only six per cent think it should be higher. These attitudes cut across familiar political divides: roughly half of both Yes and No voters from 2014 think immigration into Scotland is too high.

Moreover, while hostility to immigration has fallen since the EU referendum in the rest of the UK, it has grown in Scotland. The fiction of open Scotland and fortress England is just that.

In May, there was comment about polling indicating that 40 per cent of Leave voters believe ‘that having both parents born in Britain is a core part of Britishness’. However, according to research from 2016, most Scots believe only those born and raised here are truly Scottish. Fifty-nine per cent said considering yourself Scottish was not enough, nor was having lived here for more than ten years for 58 per cent. Only half said having one Scottish parent qualified you and more than a quarter insisted having grown up in the country still did not make you Scottish.

As if all this wasn’t enough, it has been reported that Sir Geoff Palmer, Jamaica’s honorary consul in Edinburgh, was last week denied entry to an unnamed ‘Scottish institution’ after the doorman assumed he was someone’s driver.

Why are so many, in particular Scottish nationalists who boast endlessly of their progressivism, so deeply in denial? The culprit is the inflated sense of virtue that too many carry around with them, one that is intimately linked to the politics of independence. The strain of nationalism unleashed during the 2014 referendum was not, however much its hosts insisted, ‘civic’ or ‘joyous’; it was a belligerent victimhood whipped up by politicians who grasped that when people feel aggrieved they become angry and angry people are always looking for someone or something to vent at. Tell people often enough that there’s a boot on their neck and they will be willing to believe the most benign institution is the owner of the foot.

The myth of Scotland being done down by the English is hardly new, though the nationalists are careful to substitute terms like ‘Westminster’ and ‘London’ these days. In its current, referendum-era incarnation, this legend turned the Union from a partnership largely shaped by the Scots (and whose financial benefits accrue to Scotland more than anywhere other than Northern Ireland) into a mechanism for Tory domination, exploitation and callous disregard. Voters were told ‘Westminster’ held them in contempt and that Unionists regarded Scots as ‘too wee, too poor, too stupid’, a characterisation devised by nationalists to verbal their opponents.

Predictably, this demagoguery kindled a self-pitying chauvinism in which nationalists lashed out at the ghosts they dreamt up to torment themselves. During the referendum, slogans like ‘it’s time to get above ourselves’ and ‘big enough, rich enough, smart enough’ abounded. Flags, once restricted to football stadiums and royal visits, turned ubiquitous and scepticism became a sort of treason. Those who dissented from this politics of the pep rally were declaimed as ‘self-loathing’ and accused of giving voice to the ‘Scottish cringe’.

The Scottish cringe is real, at times silly (who among us hasn’t winced at a broad Weegie accent on TV?) and at other times justified (those with saltires out the window are for the watching). But these days Scotland doesn’t cringe half as much as it preens, radiating self-satisfaction about a progressive spirit that owes much to the imagination.

The Scottish superiority complex — the conviction that we’re just as good as everyone else and even more so than the English — was not born in 2014 and is by no means limited to nationalists. It has a long pedigree and is Scotland’s way of sublimating a dual resentment: that it has been extraordinarily successful as part of the Union and the fear that it would no longer be if it went its own way. It is Scotland’s way of having its cake and blaming the English for eating it.

The rub is that, once you convince yourself that your country is a victim, you become hostile towards competing claims. When your politics rests wholly on Scotland’s victimhood, there is no space for other victims, real victims, Scotland’s victims.

First, you blot out Scotland’s past misdeeds and for Scottish nationalists this means denying, distorting or downplaying Scotland’s role in the British Empire. As one celebrated commentator has previously told us: ‘Across the world Scotland’s progressive values are recognised for the genuine attributes that they are. We are a nation, too, that carries less of the colonial baggage so associated with a British imperialism of the past.’

If you want to understand why Scotland cannot face up to its racism problem, you must get to grips with this mentality that wills away a thousand volumes of history in one sentence. In fact, Scotland was at the forefront of the British Empire, represented in the ranks of officers, settlers, administrators and mercenaries to a degree all out of proportion with the nation’s population. Glasgow was the second city of the Empire.

Scotland was also an unabashed slave-trading nation, including before its entry into the Union, and both Greenock and Port Glasgow served as the primary docks for importing tobacco, sugar, cotton and other goods produced by slaves. Far from expressing shame, Scotland has until very recently tended to celebrate the men responsible. Glasgow’s Buchanan Street was named after Andrew Buchanan, one of the Tobacco Lords who profited from slave labour, while Glassford Street pays tribute to John Glassford, the Paisley-born slave-owner who ran plantations in Maryland and Virginia.

The historian Neil Oliver, who happens to support the Union, was decried by nationalists when he documented the Scottish roots of the Ku Klux Klan. As Jackie Kay now knows, attempts to challenge Scotland’s culpability in racism are often met with furious backlash.

But Scotland is not special, then or now, and it is not untainted by the universal virus of racism. The Scottish barons who traded in people did so of their own volition. The working class Scots who sung hymns to the Empire and freely echoed its prejudices towards the people it ruled did not do so at the barrel of a gun. Scots who engage in racism today have not been conditioned by the Union or the Westminster bogeyman. Moral consciences are not issued on one side of the Border only, and wickedness is not to be found solely on the other.

Race is the most sensitive of conversations. No one person or group has all the answers and the discussion requires respect and understanding. The ultimate goal must be to bring people together and work towards equality and justice. But that work can only begin once Scotland, and its self-appointed advocates, acknowledge the sins of the country’s past and the realities of its present. We might begin by listening to people like Jackie Kay with a note of introspection, rather than lashing out in vain denial.

*****

Published by stephenjdaisley

Political journalist and commentator.

[SE16 3LN]

1 hour ago, Trapper John McIntyre said:

Scotland’s Empire of denial

Posted bystephenjdaisleyAugust 24, 2019

‘O wad some Pow’r the giftie gie us/To see oursels as ithers see us,’ a rumination by the national poet, has become cherished folk wisdom for generations of Scots.

It is a counsel in humility: we don’t know half of what we don’t know. Sometimes, an outsider is needed to hold up a mirror to our assumptions.

This week, the modern makar imparted a fresh lesson: sometimes, one of our own has to thrust that mirror in front of us. Jackie Kay, Scotland’s most celebrated living poet, revealed an ugly experience she was put through at an annual celebration of her forebear. It was the Edinburgh Burns Society’s Burns’ Supper and she had been invited as a guest speaker.

She recounted: ‘I was asked to do the Toast to the Laddies. I asked to do the Toast to the Lassies, but they said no. I decided I would write quite a radical speech, a #MeToo generation Toast to the Laddies, which was done with a lot of affection and humour.

‘As soon as I started up, one of the men who had actually invited me started heckling me and kept going throughout my address. He later told me: “This is our club. You don’t belong here. Get out.” It was deeply shocking and upsetting.’

This was more than one nasty man and one nasty incident. As Kay averred: ‘I don’t think Scotland has changed enough as far as race goes. I don’t think we reflect that in our culture, in our television or news programmes, how we think of ourselves and in what we teach about history in schools.

‘The average Scottish child won’t know that Glasgow was founded on money from the slave trade, that a slave owner put the Gallery of Modern Art building there, why Jamaica Street is called Jamaica Street and why Virginia Street is called Virginia Street. They won’t know any of these things in the way that Liverpool, Bristol, Manchester and London have all started to come to terms with their histories. We just don’t talk about it.’

And with that, a long, defensive silence was shattered. Scotland does not like to talk about race. It’s hardly a comfortable conversation in the best of circumstances but especially unsettling for a country that sustains itself on myths of victimhood and moral probity.

However, Kay compounded her offence by adding that: ‘It seems acceptable to keep on asking people where they are from in the way that you just don’t do with a black Liverpudlian, a black Brummie or a black Londoner. You can’t accept that now, in 2019… I think Scotland is behind.

‘Any Scottish city is at least 30 or 40 years behind Manchester, Bristol, Liverpool and London. That’s just the truth. We need to find ways of changing that. It’s not just about people being there and a diverse population, it’s about how we actually change our image of ourselves when we think of what it means to be Scottish.’

Anyone familiar with the poisonous nature of online debate in Scotland can probably guess what happened next. The suggestion that Scotland was behind England — indeed, that there is anything we could learn from our friends in the south — brought out the cybernats to defend the nation’s honour.

One wrote of Kay, who was born in Edinburgh: ‘I would say you are completely wrong, being born here and travelling Scotland extensively I see no racism in large cities or rural communities, travelling in England and even […] parts of Europe, it’s far more common.’

Another wittered: ‘Looks to me like she’s basing much of this on one drunk man at a Burns Supper…& as much as we should know our history, I refuse to bear guilt of Scottish Unionists from our past who benefited from the proceeds of slavery.’

When Nicola Sturgeon stepped in to say Kay ‘mustn’t be ignored’ and that there was no place for ‘complacency on racism’, one of her digital foot soldiers snapped: ‘It is very disappointing to see you agreeing with Scotland being rubbished like that, I don’t care who says it. I wonder why she took the position of Makar if she hates Scotland so much.’

As one disenchanted nationalist columnist later noted: ‘[W]ith depressing predictability, comments by a woman of colour were written off by white people who won’t accept any criticism of Scotland’.

Reasonable people can disagree about how to address the issues of racial prejudice and identity. Some believe we should work towards a post-racial society that emphasises what we have in common rather than the characteristics that divide us. Others say this is running away from the problem of racism instead of confronting it head-on. What is unreasonable is to believe that Scotland is immune from the problem, untainted by prejudice by dint of a superior national ethic.

The country Jackie Kay describes might be unrecognisable to those whose love for Scotland is like that of a teenager for their first crush but the poet has more than anecdote on her side. She has the numbers. At the most recent census, Scotland was 96 per cent white, compared to 85 per cent for England. All but two members of the Scottish Parliament are white; the House of Commons, only five times the size of Holyrood, has 26 times the number of ethnic minority parliamentarians. None of them, however, represents seats north of the Border: every single Scottish MP is white.

Two in every three hate crimes in Scotland are racial in nature and a 2018 Glasgow University study of murders committed between 2000 and 2013 found race-related homicides were higher per head of the population in Scotland than across the rest of the UK. The same researchers also discovered that white applicants for jobs in large public sector bodies had an 8.1 per cent chance of landing the role compared to just 1.1 per cent for black and minority ethnic candidates.

A report published this week by Strathclyde University found 77 per cent of young eastern Europeans living in England and Scotland had been subjected to racism. While opposition to certain immigration policies should not be construed as racism, the latest polling shows 45 per cent of Scots think migration is too high and only six per cent think it should be higher. These attitudes cut across familiar political divides: roughly half of both Yes and No voters from 2014 think immigration into Scotland is too high.

Moreover, while hostility to immigration has fallen since the EU referendum in the rest of the UK, it has grown in Scotland. The fiction of open Scotland and fortress England is just that.

In May, there was comment about polling indicating that 40 per cent of Leave voters believe ‘that having both parents born in Britain is a core part of Britishness’. However, according to research from 2016, most Scots believe only those born and raised here are truly Scottish. Fifty-nine per cent said considering yourself Scottish was not enough, nor was having lived here for more than ten years for 58 per cent. Only half said having one Scottish parent qualified you and more than a quarter insisted having grown up in the country still did not make you Scottish.

As if all this wasn’t enough, it has been reported that Sir Geoff Palmer, Jamaica’s honorary consul in Edinburgh, was last week denied entry to an unnamed ‘Scottish institution’ after the doorman assumed he was someone’s driver.

Why are so many, in particular Scottish nationalists who boast endlessly of their progressivism, so deeply in denial? The culprit is the inflated sense of virtue that too many carry around with them, one that is intimately linked to the politics of independence. The strain of nationalism unleashed during the 2014 referendum was not, however much its hosts insisted, ‘civic’ or ‘joyous’; it was a belligerent victimhood whipped up by politicians who grasped that when people feel aggrieved they become angry and angry people are always looking for someone or something to vent at. Tell people often enough that there’s a boot on their neck and they will be willing to believe the most benign institution is the owner of the foot.

The myth of Scotland being done down by the English is hardly new, though the nationalists are careful to substitute terms like ‘Westminster’ and ‘London’ these days. In its current, referendum-era incarnation, this legend turned the Union from a partnership largely shaped by the Scots (and whose financial benefits accrue to Scotland more than anywhere other than Northern Ireland) into a mechanism for Tory domination, exploitation and callous disregard. Voters were told ‘Westminster’ held them in contempt and that Unionists regarded Scots as ‘too wee, too poor, too stupid’, a characterisation devised by nationalists to verbal their opponents.

Predictably, this demagoguery kindled a self-pitying chauvinism in which nationalists lashed out at the ghosts they dreamt up to torment themselves. During the referendum, slogans like ‘it’s time to get above ourselves’ and ‘big enough, rich enough, smart enough’ abounded. Flags, once restricted to football stadiums and royal visits, turned ubiquitous and scepticism became a sort of treason. Those who dissented from this politics of the pep rally were declaimed as ‘self-loathing’ and accused of giving voice to the ‘Scottish cringe’.

The Scottish cringe is real, at times silly (who among us hasn’t winced at a broad Weegie accent on TV?) and at other times justified (those with saltires out the window are for the watching). But these days Scotland doesn’t cringe half as much as it preens, radiating self-satisfaction about a progressive spirit that owes much to the imagination.

The Scottish superiority complex — the conviction that we’re just as good as everyone else and even more so than the English — was not born in 2014 and is by no means limited to nationalists. It has a long pedigree and is Scotland’s way of sublimating a dual resentment: that it has been extraordinarily successful as part of the Union and the fear that it would no longer be if it went its own way. It is Scotland’s way of having its cake and blaming the English for eating it.

The rub is that, once you convince yourself that your country is a victim, you become hostile towards competing claims. When your politics rests wholly on Scotland’s victimhood, there is no space for other victims, real victims, Scotland’s victims.

First, you blot out Scotland’s past misdeeds and for Scottish nationalists this means denying, distorting or downplaying Scotland’s role in the British Empire. As one celebrated commentator has previously told us: ‘Across the world Scotland’s progressive values are recognised for the genuine attributes that they are. We are a nation, too, that carries less of the colonial baggage so associated with a British imperialism of the past.’

If you want to understand why Scotland cannot face up to its racism problem, you must get to grips with this mentality that wills away a thousand volumes of history in one sentence. In fact, Scotland was at the forefront of the British Empire, represented in the ranks of officers, settlers, administrators and mercenaries to a degree all out of proportion with the nation’s population. Glasgow was the second city of the Empire.

Scotland was also an unabashed slave-trading nation, including before its entry into the Union, and both Greenock and Port Glasgow served as the primary docks for importing tobacco, sugar, cotton and other goods produced by slaves. Far from expressing shame, Scotland has until very recently tended to celebrate the men responsible. Glasgow’s Buchanan Street was named after Andrew Buchanan, one of the Tobacco Lords who profited from slave labour, while Glassford Street pays tribute to John Glassford, the Paisley-born slave-owner who ran plantations in Maryland and Virginia.

The historian Neil Oliver, who happens to support the Union, was decried by nationalists when he documented the Scottish roots of the Ku Klux Klan. As Jackie Kay now knows, attempts to challenge Scotland’s culpability in racism are often met with furious backlash.

But Scotland is not special, then or now, and it is not untainted by the universal virus of racism. The Scottish barons who traded in people did so of their own volition. The working class Scots who sung hymns to the Empire and freely echoed its prejudices towards the people it ruled did not do so at the barrel of a gun. Scots who engage in racism today have not been conditioned by the Union or the Westminster bogeyman. Moral consciences are not issued on one side of the Border only, and wickedness is not to be found solely on the other.

Race is the most sensitive of conversations. No one person or group has all the answers and the discussion requires respect and understanding. The ultimate goal must be to bring people together and work towards equality and justice. But that work can only begin once Scotland, and its self-appointed advocates, acknowledge the sins of the country’s past and the realities of its present. We might begin by listening to people like Jackie Kay with a note of introspection, rather than lashing out in vain denial.

*****

Published by stephenjdaisley

Political journalist and commentator.

Read and learn. 

[Francis Albert]

You can of course pick a few holes in it. For example "Too wee, too poor and too stupid" was a reasonable characterisation of one strand of the 2014 version of Project Fear. But the basic thrust of the article is spot on. And in a nation where even fellow white Christians have for long struggled to get along surely it doesn't come as a surprise to anyone.

[jack D and coke]

Not disagreeing with the content of the article but what’s it got to do with the SNP?

Its the britnats that are the intolerant bigots and racists. 

Edited August 25, 2019 by jack D and coke

[jake]

12 minutes ago, jack D and coke said:

Not disagreeing with the content of the article but what’s it got to do with the SNP?

Its the britnats that are the intolerant bigots and racists. 

🤣

[Francis Albert]

Wrong thread.

Edited August 25, 2019 by Francis Albert

[ri Alban]

6 hours ago, SE16 3LN said:

Read and learn. 

Your fellow Brits.

[Francis Albert]

Our Nationalist posters in Denial with a capital D when their shite about how different Scots are from the racist xenophobic English runs into some facts.

 

But of course racist xenophobic Scots aren't really Scots, they are Brits so that's all right then.

[coconut doug]

4 hours ago, Francis Albert said:

Our Nationalist posters in Denial with a capital D when their shite about how different Scots are from the racist xenophobic English runs into some facts.

 

But of course racist xenophobic Scots aren't really Scots, they are Brits so that's all right then.

 

Nobody is in denial about facts, mainly because there are few, if any, facts on offer in this appalling article but also because we have seen many acts of racism, xenophobia bigotry and other prejudice carried out in our country (Scotland). We all remember the Nazi salutes in George square, most of us have encountered Orange walks and hostile Rangers fans by the thousands. We know what the agenda is and we know that most of these people are Scottish even if many would rather they were not. Those of us who have followed this site for some time have witnessed posters being abused because they are supporters of independence. Usually they are derided for being thick, having difficulty reading, being part of a cult, being a paedo and often having themselves compared to Nazis. Being a supporter of Indy seems to leave you open to something akin to  racist attacks.

 

 Personal attacks on the FM in particular abound but those who make these assertions rarely if ever venture beyond this into areas of meaningful discourse. I believe that all of these people are Scottish. With a background like this why would anybody claim that Scotland is immune from racism? That’s the claim but who is it that thinks that?

 

      People on here frequently claim they are being abused by the other side but when asked to provide evidence very little appears. Sometimes there are robust comments by indy supporters but very rarely are they of a racist nature. That’s the point missed by those on the other side who judge us by their standards. They are wrong. It’s just not feasible to be a racist, a homophobe, sectarian or any other form of bigot and support an independent Scotland.  You would be found out straight away. The critical mass of these people lies on the other side of the argument but that is not to say that all of them fall into that category, just all those I am aware of.

 

The notion that we are all Jock Tamson’s bairns and knowing the meaning of “a man’s a man for a that” may be a cliché but it has been instilled in many of us and is seen as being part of our values despite the right wing press trying deny it. These are fundamental principles in defining who we Scots are. We are always hearing about British values but never this element of them. We are British after all. Our vision of an indy Scotland is one that better accommodates these principles of tolerance and equality at least to a greater degree than that on offer from the UK. What this article seeks to do is taint all Scots with the same brush. That in itself is an act of racism or xenophobia, the assertion being that all Scots possess these traits. We don’t and those of us who don’t are not guilty of these crimes by association just because we share a space with people who are racist.

 

Daisley’s writing is deliberately inflammatory and in my view directed at those who already have a low opinion of Scotland and wish to add to it. He offers no proper referencing for his “facts” and gives many statistics that are meaningless but designed to empower the Daily Mail reader. An example of his facts are that “Two in every three hate crimes in Scotland are racial in nature” this is true, I checked the figures but what he doesn’t tell you is that the figures for E+W are 76%. https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/652136/hate-crime-1617-hosb1717.pdf  Not very good when he is telling us Scotland is every bit as bad if not worse than the rest of the country.

 

            The whole article is a master class in misrepresentation. With unnamed people attending events at unknown venues with anonymous comments all embellished with statistics that are wrong  (the % of white people in Scotland) or meaningless (45% of Scots think migration is too high). There is a statistic that is correct though which is  “murders committed between 2000 and 2013 found race-related homicides were higher per head of the population in Scotland than across the rest of the UK.”. Although this is true on the face of it  there were 10 murders committed in Scotland with a racial element. One of these was Chris Donald in Glasgow and another Scot was killed in Tranent. One took place in Stenhouse where a Lybian killed a Pakistani and in one other case the judge ruled that there was no racial motive. Despite that the murder was recorded as being racially motivated. http://www.irr.org.uk/news/deaths-with-a-known-or-suspected-racial-element-2000-onwards/

Small numbers and differing circumstances make the Daisley’s conclusion incorrect if he is trying to imply that Scots are more likely to murder for racial reasons.

 

  This one is not meaningless though 

 

 

     I’ve never seen a similar graph for Scotland. I don’t think many if any Scots are stupid enough or bigoted enough to see the EU referendum as an opportunity to express our Scottishness by attacking foreigners. It’s almost as if they think differently in England. I’m not attributing this to English people in general though because I know that the vast majority are not racist bigots. The racist bigots inhabit the right wing parties everywhere imo and they command much bigger support in England than they do in Scotland. I know this because Scotland has never voted Tory in my lifetime and England nearly always has.

[ri Alban]

12 hours ago, Francis Albert said:

Our Nationalist posters in Denial with a capital D when their shite about how different Scots are from the racist xenophobic English runs into some facts.

 

But of course racist xenophobic Scots aren't really Scots, they are Brits so that's all right then.

What facts? British propaganda facts? But I'll agree with you on one thing, your last Sentence, that's a matter of FACT!!!

Edited August 26, 2019 by ri Alban

[Francis Albert]

As I said in my first response to the article you can pick holes in it but the thrust is spot on. It is a polemic not an academic treatise but it seems to me to convincingly demolish the myths that the Scots somehow were less responsible for the evils of Empire than the English (or Brits as some seem to term them) and that Scots in general are less racist or xenophobic than the English. Having  spent decades north and south of the border and knowing a bit about the history of Empire I never bought into either myth. (As one example all football fans should recognise, the reaction to the first black players in Scotland was certainly no better than that in England)

 

The defensive knee jerk reaction  reaction to the  article by some is I think telling. Myths, especially nationalist myths, are tough to let go of. See Brexit.

 

[Justin Z]

Not being from either place my focus is pretty firmly on the present, and at present, I see a great difference in the contrition for the atrocity of empire north of the border versus the south. Beneficiaries or not, myths or not, that to me is the telling thing.

 

I'm envious of those 45% of you who voted Yes in the first referendum. You had a way, politically, to reject the horrible things that had been done in your nation's name and say no, no matter the past, this is not what we are now and we will strive to do better. As an American I have no such choice as regards my own country's cruelties--at least, not through direct democracy.

 

Edited August 26, 2019 by Justin Z

[Francis Albert]

1 hour ago, Justin Z said:

Not being from either place my focus is pretty firmly on the present, and at present, I see a great difference in the contrition for the atrocity of empire north of the border versus the south. Beneficiaries or not, myths or not, that to me is the telling thing.

 

I'm envious of those 45% of you who voted Yes in the first referendum. You had a way, politically, to reject the horrible things that had been done in your nation's name and say no, no matter the past, this is not what we are now and we will strive to do better. As an American I have no such choice as regards my own country's cruelties--at least, not through direct democracy.

 

We must move in different circles. I haven't heard much contrition on either side of the border. As Boris refers to above, there is perhaps a  growing awareness of the reality of Empire and Scots role in it in academic and civic circles, a little belatedly in Scotland.

 

I am not sure contrition is the right response anyway. None of us bear direct responsibility and even at the height of colonialism ordinary people were hardly reaping much by way of benefits in the dark satanic mills which slavery fed. But awareness and avoiding myths are good.

 

Also maybe, to cross threads, those oh so liberal "internationalists" might contemplate the fact that all the major former colonial powers are now grouped in their cosy cartel maintaining protectionist tariff barriers against their former colonies and other poorer parts of the world, while largely failing to meet modest Foreign Aid targets (nasty racist isolationist Britain being one of very few exceptions).

 

 

Edited August 26, 2019 by Francis Albert

[SE16 3LN]

18 hours ago, ri Alban said:

Your fellow Brits.

your fellow master racers

[Boris]

28 minutes ago, Francis Albert said:

 As Boris refers to above, there is perhaps a  growing awareness of the reality of Empire and Scots role in it in academic and civic circles, a little belatedly in Scotland.

 

Although the example of Glasgow Uni is a first anywhere in the UK, so leading the way!

 

Regards the article by the reactionary Stephen Daisley  posted above, I don't doubt that there are those who want independence that are bigoted loons.  Do they speak for all who want independence?  Of course not.

 

Just as equally those Union Jack waving, Nazi-saluting, pseudo-fascist thugs we saw in George Square the day after the referendum aren't representative of those who wish to remain in the Union.

 

What doesn't get mentioned in the article, and I'm not sure how it could be extrapolated, is who actually commits these race hate crimes.  Are the perpetrators pro indy or not?  Does it matter?  Yes it does if you are trying to smear wanting independence as being racist, which is the way i interpreted what Daisley was saying.

[SE16 3LN]

8 minutes ago, Boris said:

 

Although the example of Glasgow Uni is a first anywhere in the UK, so leading the way!

 

Regards the article by the reactionary Stephen Daisley  posted above, I don't doubt that there are those who want independence that are bigoted loons.  Do they speak for all who want independence?  Of course not.

 

Just as equally those Union Jack waving, Nazi-saluting, pseudo-fascist thugs we saw in George Square the day after the referendum aren't representative of those who wish to remain in the Union.

 

What doesn't get mentioned in the article, and I'm not sure how it could be extrapolated, is who actually commits these race hate crimes.  Are the perpetrators pro indy or not?  Does it matter?  Yes it does if you are trying to smear wanting independence as being racist, which is the way i interpreted what Daisley was saying.

You need to read it again Boris if that's your interpretation. Interestingly, the first minister would love to open up this debate, but I doubt she'll be allowed to. Scotland is unique in its position right now and could enter the next referendum campaign having faced up to its past and with a blueprint for an inclusive and diverse future for all  its citizens. I'll bet it doesn't happen though. 

 

I'm off to carnival 

[coconut doug]

4 hours ago, Francis Albert said:

As I said in my first response to the article you can pick holes in it but the thrust is spot on. It is a polemic not an academic treatise but it seems to me to convincingly demolish the myths that the Scots somehow were less responsible for the evils of Empire than the English (or Brits as some seem to term them) and that Scots in general are less racist or xenophobic than the English. Having  spent decades north and south of the border and knowing a bit about the history of Empire I never bought into either myth. (As one example all football fans should recognise, the reaction to the first black players in Scotland was certainly no better than that in England)

 

The defensive knee jerk reaction  reaction to the  article by some is I think telling. Myths, especially nationalist myths, are tough to let go of. See Brexit.

 

 

What Are you talking about? You said Nationalist (you really need to find a better word or phrase here) posters are in denial with a capital D when their shite about how different Scots are from the racist xenophobic English runs into some facts. What facts and what are we denying?

 

   Now you’re telling us it’s a polemic and not an academic treatise, well who knew Daisley would do that? So no facts then but you still support the general thrust of his polemic which is as far as I can see is that Scots are racists. No facts then just a general thrust that Scots are every bit as racist as the English or Brits or whatever.

  Who is it that says the Scots are less racist and less responsible for the evils of empire. As far as I can see that’s restricted to you and Daisley. You set up the straw man and then try to shoot him down.

 

 This article is about Scots portraying themselves as victims and blotting out Scotland’s misdeeds. This is absolutely not what is happening. We have to come to terms with our racism apparently well I don’t because I’m not a racist and it is most definitely my experience that nowadays most Scots and English are not racist either.

 

             Your description of the reaction to the article by Indy supporters as defensive and knee jerk makes no sense to me. This is not defensive, didn’t you understand the bit where I related, later repeated by another poster, many instances of racist and bigoted behaviour by Scots. I know they exist I encounter them frequently unfortunately it is becoming more frequent on my visits to Tynecastle. I actually thought a few years ago this type of thinking and behaviour was largely behind us. I think people like Daisley and institutions like the Daily Mail along with Brexit (popular in England) have given them a new lease of life. Not that I’m saying Brexit supporters are entirely racist and bigoted just that in the words of Will Self all the racists and bigots I know support Brexit.

    What “nationalist” myths are you talking about that we are finding so tough to get rid of? Is it the role of Scots in the empire as Daisley states? I went to school now and again and even after all these years I can still remember studying the Scots role in the empire and how it was disproportionately large. How it was that we excelled as merchants and soldiers in particular and how we were great explorers establishing settlements, many with Scottish names, in the most remote parts of the empire. It was mostly portrayed as something to be proud of but we were also told of slavery and how Scots, mainly Jacobites who were transported into indentured labour worked and lived alongside the slaves. We were informed that the reason so many black people had Scottish names was primarily because they married the Scots who lived with them and not always because they took the name of the plantation owner. I remember this reasonably well and consider that the experience enabled me to develop just a tad of empathy for those enslaved. Our teacher, even then was enlightened enough to allow us to reflect on the morality of slavery. This took place in an Edinburgh housing scheme the like of which I doubt Daisley attended. We were not and are not hiding from our colonial legacy, we were confronted with it and it’s about time those who profited most from it did the same.

 

   Daisley  tells us “Scotland was also an unabashed slave-trading nation, including before its entry into the Union,” I can’t find any evidence of this activity in Scotland before the Union. I think it might be a unionist myth. What I do know is that chattel slavery was an English concept established by the Barbados slave act of 1661. I also know that Scottish traders had extreme difficulty executing international trade during this time and that the union was to some extent at least predicated on a free trade agreement opening up the opportunities for all to profit from slavery. That’s what some people did then whether they were Scots or English it’s just that maybe the Scots didn’t have the opportunity and that doesn’t suit Daisley’s or your thrust.

 

  And your notion of the UKmeeting it’s aid targets – have a look at what we spend it on. https://www.independent.co.uk/topic/ForeignAid

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/department-for-international-development-dfid

 

I’m really interested to know which myths we are avoiding.

 

 

 

[ri Alban]

7 hours ago, Francis Albert said:

As I said in my first response to the article you can pick holes in it but the thrust is spot on. It is a polemic not an academic treatise but it seems to me to convincingly demolish the myths that the Scots somehow were less responsible for the evils of Empire than the English (or Brits as some seem to term them) and that Scots in general are less racist or xenophobic than the English. Having  spent decades north and south of the border and knowing a bit about the history of Empire I never bought into either myth. (As one example all football fans should recognise, the reaction to the first black players in Scotland was certainly no better than that in England)

 

The defensive knee jerk reaction  reaction to the  article by some is I think telling. Myths, especially nationalist myths, are tough to let go of. See Brexit.

 

I'm embarrassed about it, britnats are proud of it.

[ri Alban]

7 hours ago, Francis Albert said:

As I said in my first response to the article you can pick holes in it but the thrust is spot on. It is a polemic not an academic treatise but it seems to me to convincingly demolish the myths that the Scots somehow were less responsible for the evils of Empire than the English (or Brits as some seem to term them) and that Scots in general are less racist or xenophobic than the English. Having  spent decades north and south of the border and knowing a bit about the history of Empire I never bought into either myth. (As one example all football fans should recognise, the reaction to the first black players in Scotland was certainly no better than that in England)

 

The defensive knee jerk reaction  reaction to the  article by some is I think telling. Myths, especially nationalist myths, are tough to let go of. See Brexit.

 

You do know Scottish people were taken as slaves to the Caribbean?

[Francis Albert]

1 minute ago, ri Alban said:

You do know Scottish people were taken as slaves to the Caribbean?

No. Because they were not. Indentured labour yes. Not much better than being a slave but not a slave.

"Red Legs" in Barbados, their descendants still poor even by Barnadian standards.

[Francis Albert]

21 minutes ago, Francis Albert said:

No. Because they were not. Indentured labour yes. Not much better than being a slave but not a slave.

"Red Legs" in Barbados, their descendants still poor even by Barnadian standards.

Barbadian of course. Or Bajan.

[Francis Albert]

29 minutes ago, ri Alban said:

I'm embarrassed about it, britnats are proud of it.

No need to be embarrassed. Just don't deny it or pretend that Scots were mere victims of English/Brit colonialism. As you often have.