By hook or by Cook
This is an interesting one. Almost 40 years on from the event, Scottish politics is still plagued by micro-brained Labour types insisting that the SNP “ushered in” Margaret Thatcher after the devolution referendum of 1979 was sabotaged by a Labour MP.
SNP supporters counter that this is complete bollocks, largely because it’s complete bollocks. James Callaghan, the Labour PM at the time, blamed 34 of his own MPs for bringing his government down, by supporting an amendment from Islington South and Finsbury Labour MP George Cunningham which blocked the creation of a Scottish Assembly even though it won the referendum by a narrow margin.
(Cunningham resigned from Labour two years later and subsequently joined the SDP, but in 2012 the Daily Express dragged him out to demand that the same “40% rule” be applied to the indyref.)
History, though, has forgotten someone else who was apparently the true architect of the fix, to the extent that we’d never heard about it until now.
Let’s find out more, shall we?
Stu has made his views quite clear.
Don’t engage with trolls
Don’t discuss trolls
If you think someone is trolling email Stu (see CONTACT tab at top of page) and say so.
I’ve already done this so if more people do the same Stu may take action. Meantime, I just scroll on by the comments which have any connection to trolls or go off to other sites or Stu’s twitter.
“Lenny Hartley says:
I cant believe people are saying they dont come to Wos anymore because of the BTL comments.”
Just for accuracy, when I decided to leave Wings (in the post ‘lost’ in the ether!), I clearly said that I will still read all the Rev’s articles – just abandoned BTL commenting.
Very sad for the ‘regular’ Wingers who are being disrupted, they have over the years helped me understand many Indy issues, however I’m fed up wading through nonsense.
Will Sarah Smith be replying for the lassies tonight at a Burns Supper near you? “Fair fa yer honest sonsie face!”
Limiting posts would be self defeating. Sometimes a poster will put something on site that gives you food for thought and leads to other ideas to share.
If you really cannot stand a poster then scroll on by.
Robert Peffers 10.16
So, so, so you actually read my comments, that’s nice.
——————
““Don’t feed the trolls,”
Opps! Sorry! I’ll not feed you again.
“… if you do, they breed and get bigger.”
Yeah! We noticed that too. You’re just the latest of the trolls to post on that subject.”
Nice to know that if you say something about curbing the trolls, or whatever your little pedantic heart wants to call them, you turn into a troll… 🙂
Call them whatever you want, trolls, agents of the Union, 77th brigade, black arts or whatever, they ALL do the same thing and that is disrupt the threads with rinse an’ wash stuff that is mostly lies and distortion.
That’s the honey used to attract the suckers into answering the nonsense and C&A is very good at it – even you’re attracted to it as we’ve seen.
Many roads lead to (Indy) Rome, you’re just one of them.
From the advice page on commenting on this site, see link above comment box:
The Herald front page today leading with a story about a secret plan to change the recipe for whisky.
Bottom of barrel duly scraped.
A couple of things I came across this morning that may be of interest.
If you thought Tories were bad, and of course they are, but the Libdems can be bad too, sometimes worse.
link to thecanary.co
How the mail online can get away with this, I do not know.
link to thecanary.co
I actually find the trolls re-assuring and they make me laugh every time I see another post from them. The amount of posts and time they spend on here prove that they know we are winning and they must fight to save their precious union. I will start getting worried when they do not appear on here.
Cappella The Usual suspects & there back up team Trolls & or 77th Brigands don’t fly solo . I,ll be treating everybody with the same contempt that raise to the bait .
@Petra
You are welcome Petra, good to know some wingers are reading the links.
Have a few more
link to news.gov.scot
Indycar Gordon Ross 25 01 18 More Fluffy Goings On
link to youtube.com
link to propublica.org
@ Galamcennalath at 10:25am …… “WoS attacks.”
Stu’s articles are most definitely the main attraction in relation to people visiting this site Galamcennalath, no doubt about that, but they also become a catalyst for many ordinary people to post enlightening data relating to the article’s subject matter, on any other given subject in fact, or just give us a laugh. To my mind it’s the combination of both that make this site not only totally unique but more than anything an education in its own right. Nana’s links being a great example. One man can’t cover a multitude of subjects on a daily basis nor it would seem that there’s anyone out there, one man (or woman), with Stu’s talents.
You reckon that some people stating that the current situation is putting them off visiting Wings is actually an attack on Wings. Well that might be the case, in some instances, but I know for a fact that every solitary person that I’d previously ‘sent’ to Wings wasn’t impressed and none as far as I know returned. This had nothing to do with Stu’s articles, but rather poster comments which I won’t bother to elaborate on as I’ve done so previously. All I will say is that these people didn’t have an axe to grind, a hidden agenda, and didn’t know Tom from Dick or Harriet. Nor were they fervent No supporters rather just ordinary people, from all walks of life, who were sitting on the fence or didn’t have much of a clue about politics.
This is a crucial time in our history, absolutely critical, and it stands to reason that Wings will be under attack more than anything now. Maybe it’s time for us all to be more vigilant and clean up our act?
@Heed 10.41: hope you weren’t listening to Pravdasound 4 between 7 and 8 a.m. yesterday:
“Will we have to rename Henman Hill Edmund Embankment?” rabbits nice lady presenter.
And what Capella said @10.52 re disruptors/77 brigade/whatever. My wee scroller’s getting rid het avoiding the bacon rolls now.
*Looks approvingly at profile in mirror*
Looking forward to Kelly and his articulate debating skills
in calling for rescinding the Offensive Behaviour at Football and Threatening Communications (Scotland) Act 2012.
Murdo will no doubt at some point say “I agree with James” 🙁
PS: Google celebrating a birthday today.
Virginia Woolf that’s alright then. 🙂
There’s far too much tennis on WOS lately it takes two to play.
But some like it so we’ll have to endure or watch some golf instead.
I see my WOS favourite site indicator has slipped into second place on my screen for the first time in about 5 years…hmm!
As Flanagan & Allen used to say I’m ‘Scrolling just scrolling’
I think the trolls on here are quite useful.They establish how completely thin the unionist case is and it’s quite good exercise to knock them down. That their posts are getting longer is merely indication that their arguments are floundering.
The BBC is getting desperate also with its Scottish exports distortion of yesterday. It’s almost like the argument that was trailed for years “You’ll have to use the Euro if you stay in the EU” that was being used by people sitting with pounds sterling in their wallets and purses who had been in the EU for forty years.
Yesterday’s attempt by the BPC (British Propaganda Corporation) in its news where we are to undermine the case for Scotland staying in the EU is in its complicated illogicality almost impossible to explain. Scotland’s exports have increased. Good news, good news. Ah, but they have increased to the rest of the world but not to the EU. So f*ck the EU was the intended implication. We don’t need the EU. We’ll sell Scottish salmon to Donald Trump. But…… we have increased our exports to the rest of the world while also trading very successfully into the EU at the same time. So how does that in any way support the proposition that leaving the huge EU single market is any thing other than a very bad idea?
Misinformation truly for half-wits.
(And of course our published export figures to the EU are seriously inaccurate as they do not take full account of the amount of Scottish export that goes to the EU through English avenues)
Now there you are. I was going to put Colin to right over the history of Catalonia and now I face the dilemma of annoying people for doing so . Sad face
Englands South Africans tennis player Kyle Edmund is out of the Australian open is this another Tim Henman nearly champion player , ma hearts pure pumping pish at Englands loss .
I’m sure Colin is well aware of the history of Catalonia,
Ive been trawling thr
ough photos of English City Center’s looking for Union Jacks. Sadly more can be found in Edinburgh than down south.
@ Bob Mack 11.32
Instead of addressing (no names), why not give us all the history info about Catalonia. Maybe we already know some of it but maybe there is something which we don’t know which helps us all to be better informed.. 😉
galamcennalath @ 10:37,
My own technical fix (not ever likely to be implemented, alas) would be to have a “blackball” button for each btl message that you could click on if you thought it reflected unacceptable behaviour. Each click would increment an “offence count” for that individual poster.
Once a particular quota was reached for anyone, they would get an automatic timeout of (say) a week or so. No posting allowed. This would also reset their offence count. Persistent offenders would have their quota steadily reduced, only recovering after a sufficient time had elapsed without further timeouts.
Offence counts would also slowly diminish with time automatically, so the occasional “blip” would eventually disappear. Only those with non-zero counts would need to be tracked, so it would only apply to relatively few people at any one time.
The beauty of this is that it would be largely self-policing. I believe most people here are mature enough to see the difference between genuine discussion, even if at times expressed rather forcibly, and intended disruption or rampant egoism.
Just a thought, anyway…
Beware the anger of a man who has just lost one of his musical heroes –
and whose football team bottled it like Barr’s new irn bru!
Just leave quietly if you don’t like btl. Why the constant need for some to lecture and announce their disapproval of others.
I’m pretty sure we’ll all still be voting Yes.
It’s the Rev’s blog. End of discussion.
Hahaha
@Grafmidgehunter.
I was simply going to point out that Catalonia since 800ad has never been a Kingdom. It was first a vassal state of the Franks then incorporated into The Kingdom of Aragon as a principality.
You know who’s point about King Fernando and Queen Isabella therefore does not stand. I can only assume therefore he is trying to deliberately obfuscate for the benefit of readers on the site.
For the avoidance of doubt that is why Scotland has a vastly different situation than Catalonia.
Well, I don’t feel bullied off the site by folks who don’t like my comments, but I do feel despondent that grievances about the media, our Constitution, and pedestrian manner we tolerate and react to the endless recycling of the same reheated issues year, after year, after year… It feels like Groundhog Day. We’re going around the same luggage carousel as the Labour Parties schedule for the BBC news agenda. They program the agenda, and they program our reaction to the agenda, and we dutifully contribute to the merry-go-round.
The issues which I “bang on” about like a broken record are the issues which I consider to be game changers. Issues, which pursued to their conclusion, would break this cycle of monotony, disrupt the Unionist programming of the whole political narrative, and revitalise the Constitutional debate and put the crosshairs directly over the essential issues of Scotland’s Independent Constitutional Sovereignty.
That’s what I want. My country free, enjoying the liberty of justice and the justice of liberty. No more BritNat propaganda, no more cynical charlatans going though the motions to manipulate public opinion just to line their own pockets and further their own interests, and sell out the interests of Scotland for the self centred benefit of this cursed United Kingdom.
The Scotland I dream about is a Nation where corruption, nepotism, and crooked abuses of power and position are simply not tolerated, and the crook in the machine, the rogue in every office, whom everybody regards as untouchable, is the first creep to get his arse booted all the way out the door and to the car park, and an immediate audit is carried out to repair the damage done to the innocents and to cauterise every discernible trace of residual corruption.
Yes, the Tories are in a super league of their own when it comes to corrupt self interest, but Labour are just as repulsive in their own right, but I warn you, don’t be too complacent when it comes to your SNP either. Wherever there’s a quango, there’s a stink.
There is a time and a place for democracy, but democracy is just the tiller on the boat that steers us. It is meaningless however without propulsion, and ALL propulsion comes from our Sovereignty and our Sovereignty alone. I’ve pulled myself inside out trying to explain that concept to people too blind, stupid, stubborn, or misled to see it, but all they see is heresy, and an assault on the SNP or faith in their democratic deity.
I don’t claim to be especially expert or knowledgeable about these issues, though yes, I try to be, but that’s the whole point. Our struggle for Scottish Independence is not about the vilification of the Tories or Labour, nor is it about the sanctification of the SNP – even where those accolades are appropriate or not. Independence is a matter of dull and perfunctory Constitutional definition, who is in command, and who makes the decisions. It is not an issue of democracy, that comes later. The primary exercise is disentanglement of 310 years of Constitutional impropriety, contrived laws, imprudent reforms, reworded treaties and ordinances, many of which have been wilfully contrived to confound the Constitutional absolutes of English and Scottish respective sovereignties. The truth and the law, our law, is the our key to freedom.
Independence is not about a good Brexit or a bad one. It’s not whether Brexit is acceptable or not, it is whether Brexit is our decision to make or somebody else’s.
Independence is whether Scotland is defined as a country which international protocols acknowledge and respect, or whether Scotland waits outside in the cloakroom while our roll, our interests, and our place in the world are decided by proxy, by others for their best interests on our behalf. That’s what is unacceptable to me, the principle at work, not the deal on the day.
If folks here find this discussion difficult or tiresome, then so do I. Not because it isn’t important, but because it never progresses or evolves into a progressive discussion or firm resolve to break the mould and end the cycle of constant repetition and revisiting the same place over, and over, and over again. We are stuck in a rut. Sterile and stagnant. There is no initiative.
The only perceptible change in tone and content I have seen in recent dialogues versus the same dialogues that were happening back in 2013-2014 has been the very welcome exponential growth in cynicism of the BBC and mainstream media. That barely existed back in 2013. We now have a wider and much healthier state of awareness than we did in 2014, but beyond that, there isn’t really a great deal else that has materially evolved to our advantage.
There is Brexit yes, but Brexit was an opportunity for contesting the will of Westminster over the will of Scotland. But here we sit, barely over a year until the axe falls, mere passengers in the process where Westminster negotiates our fate. Westminster must be at least content to have “contained” us troublesome Scots so well… so far.
I’m done here on Wings. My life, my business, my well being we’re for a long time strung out needing a fix, hoping against hope that Constitutional reform, the inevitability Independence, and a timely restructuring of how Scotland operates would have made a material difference to my own circumstances. But there has been too little, much too little, much too late. My lifelong plans and ambitions are no longer about a business or career. That is all gone now. I’m not blaming anybody, no axe to grind, it just is. I am now just focussed on finding a job. I was desperate back in 2014. Hope still sprung eternal. As the weeks, months, years have rolled by, nothing has changed and you just can’t run on empty forever.
It isn’t my will to support Independence, that’s a given, always, but there’s nothing else left. I am a mute passenger in a campaign that I have no confidence in. But hey. Take your time. You obviously don’t want to rush a thing like this.
No doubt to the joy of many here, this is Breeks signing out. Cya at the vote.
Rev ( I’m going to start shutting threads down without warning if people keep getting into this bollocks ) .
Should that statement not come under the heading That’s what the Usual Suspects want . I have no doubt You will be constantly reminded of this , don’t make a rod for your own back, pull the plug on the disrupters & deceivers .
Bella’s commissariat will be having a right good laugh that their biggest rival blog is fracturing .
The Labour government lost the confidence vote by 311 to 310 and this precipitated the general election which Labour lost.
The figures provided by John Golding in his book ‘Hammer of the Left’ indicate, although he does not make the point himself, that 6 Labour MPs did not vote. Golding says that Callaghan was not too bothered about winning the vote anyway.
At least one N.I MP, Gerry Fitt, refused to vote with the Labour government because of the use of torture in Northern Ireland.
We now know that Kinnock was probably never the opponent of nuclear weapons that he claimed to be. He was helped in his goal of changing the Labour Party’s position on this issue by people like Robin Cook.
@Nana
Very interesting list for that President’s dinner. There are some on there on the TV who will need to come out fighting against the sexism, or they’re ruined as far as they’re concerned. I’ll name some:
Gino D’Acampo
Peter Jones
Vernon Kay
Theo Paphitis
Trolls
It can take me a quarter hour, half hour to put together a posting, only to see it ignored. Perhaps some people think I’m a troll and “skip past my postings”, so why bother? In that resepct the trolls are winning because they’re getting everybody to suspect everybody and call everybody a “troll”.
An example of that is the posting where I put together the UKSC ruling and the Annex A into a post, painfully reformatting the erlevant pdf parts which have strange characters so I have to painfully reformat it. It was in reply to a “troll” who, however, managed to create a “Holyrood is powerless” diminishing of the Scottish parliament. I replied to the point made, not the “troll”. But I’m losing the will to live (Irish expression), seems a waste of time posting on wings these days, who reads it?
The biggest “enemy” on Wings is not the trolls, it’s ourselves.
“who reads it” – my postings I mean, not the blogs.
Bob Mack
I’ve no desire to get any of us sidetracked into a debate about the history of Catalonia.
It was a mistake to make parallels and there is little point in arguing about the history of Catalonia.
It does nothing to help Scotland become independent.
I wish the people of Catalonia their heart’s desire and admire their courage and determination.
But
Scotland is not Catalonia, not Ireland, not Kosovo, not Slovakia.
Scotland is Scotland.
Nice one WOS.
Now sitting at 54,000 twitter followers
Does anyone remember when folk were calling for me to be banned from WOS? Some might still want that but only the Rev. decides who can or can’t contribute.
I’m not thinking of myself as something special when I post, though I am generally trying to influence opinion, even if my intentions aren’t immediately apparent.
So basically speaking while Mr Average has a voice on the Record, there are those who would deny Sturgeon one in balance.
It’s A Question of Balance, and if Sturgeon didn’t have a column there the Unionists would be On The Threshold of a Dream.
Oops, wrong thread!
I wrote to the Rev last year, about Rock, after a few conversations with him on here that were ‘disturbing’ ‘to me’. I asked him if not to directly ban him to ‘rap him across the baws’ at least. Got no reply from the Rev, and that was an answer in itself.
I then had to deal with my own frustration and get some perspective and a few wise words from good friends on here. I tend to scroll past his comments bar a wee dig here and there…to my mind no biggie.
I’m not bothered by his posts anymore. I had to take some responsibility for my own reactions and stop blaming others for how ‘I’ feel/think about whatever he or anyone is saying that I become animated about. In other words I had to be an adult about it. Just scroll past if I didn’t resonate with someone or their posts.
I now accept that he hasn’t banned Rock from commenting btl.
That is why I get a little exercised on the swearing issue, apart from the ‘illogical’ aspect of it, (conflating with independence et al) it is simply not other commenters place to come btl and lecture others and infer people are ‘less than’ because they use swear words in their posts. If Stu came btl and said, right you lot no more swearing and here is the reason why. I would accept that because it is his site.
But he hasn’t and he isn’t going to (tempting fate). Because swearing has nothing to do with independence voting intentions. Yes, yes, people don’t like it and it’s all about feedback. Can I just say, I was one of those ‘newly’ arrived to this site back in 2013 and I wasn’t put off by people swearing btl, because whatever it was being said was in context, whether directed in frustration or used in humour or specifically aimed at a particularly nasty commenter.
I was drawn to the substantive issues under discussion from the atl articles, I was immediately ‘at home’, I wasn’t looking out for swear words as some indicator of the ‘calibre’ of the people on this site. Which is what a lot of the comments surrounding this issue are ‘really’ about (imo), disguised by conflating this with our movement’s progress/non progress.
The way some are painting btl on Wings is fantastical in this regard, of the hundreds of comments posted per thread at times ye’d begin to believe it was nothing but a swearing fest taking place on here. That is simply not true.
Getting everyone to stop swearing on Wings btl is not going to increase the independence vote or draw people to our cause. I am having real difficulty in understanding why some cannot address that aspect of their insistence that it in any would?
The arguments for self determination is not, can never be, predicated upon ‘people not swearing on Wings btl’.
By all means be bothered, bother away but don’t expect others not to debate the ‘logic’ of these statements and challenge such assertions as ‘ye can’t be an independence supporter…’really’…if you use a swear word btl on Wings? Or, ‘Y’re turning people away from the cause…cause y’re swearing on Wings btl’.
If any of these assertions are ‘true’ then where is the evidence that supports these propositions?
I mean ’empirically’ true.
Rev occasionally puts the site’s stats up as an article or a tweet. Not one year has passed where the readership numbers have ‘decreased’. If these assertions about driving others away because of ‘swearing’ and ‘vulgarity’ are correct, would they not be showing up in the site traffic figures?
Not everyone reads btl. That’s obvious. It is the article’s themselves being read that make up the readership figures. We’re all a bunch of strangers on the internet and people are calling for censorship on ‘words I don’t like seeing on a screen’ btl as if our comments are that newsworthy and powerful enough to stop us gaining our independence.
Seriously, we sometimes need to step back and put things into a different perspective on this type of subject.
To the relief of a handful of people who even bothered reading this. This is my last comment on this matter. Let’s see if those of you who are determined to make this (swearing et al) into a much bigger issue than it really is, go forward with your aims.
Someone once commented that getting consensus with Wingers was like herding squirrels.
Good luck tae ye’s.
CameronB Brodie Yes I remember & Mr Brotherhood picked up on the reason behind Ur ramblings & alerted us U did heed the concerned Wingers & left the thread U are not one of the Usual Suspects then or now .
Keep posting .
A Block button like twitter has would come in handy, then you would have to ignore the posts from them that you don’t want to read. You simply wouldn’t see them in the first place.
Each individual making their own choice of posters to read. If only.
I’d only be reading yours then Thpnr 😉
@K1
Thanks 🙂 You’d be OK on my list, I know of at least 3 that wouldn’t.
@K1, indyref2, Thpnr, CamB, Ronnie A et al –
It’s like panning for gold, eh? Eventually you don’t even see the dross, just latch straight onto the wee good bits.
🙂
I don’t know what to say, really.
Just thought I’d say that!
yesindyref2 at 1.53
Rubbish
@Dave McEwan Hill
Which part or parts, specifically, at 1.53?
Breeks
Your words of wisdom have been a breath of fresh air.
You have my respect, not only for the wisdom of your words, but also the time given and sheer tenacity of trying to speak sense to the baying mob on the Wings btl.
Please start your own blog if you can. Collect your comments and put them on if you have had enough of writing. Maybe Stu would even link to it, if you ask nicely.
I, for starters, want to hear more of your thoughts.
Good luck to you Breeks and thank you.
yesindyref2 at 6.36
The notion that nobody reads the posts
@Dave McEwan Hill
Fair enough 🙂
I do wonder sometimes though, feedback is always welcome, even a one word “Interesting” (or boring I guess).
Breeks 12.51pm
hi breeks just to let you know I think you posted very good comments and information a lot of which I agreed with , however should a LCM be refused and the pirates continue unabated let’s hope the SNP SG will take it the whole legal road and constitutionally PROVE our sovereignty. I sincerely hope that you find employment and your luck improves as you say , cya at the vote
A BBC article I’ve read ways of if a LCM is refused, the EU Withdrawal Bill would only apply to England.
The government of Scotland says it has a EU Continuity Bill ready.
Also read the EU says the transition period should end on the 31st of December 2020.
If Article 50 is about the internal enlargement of the EU, the 1st January 2021 should be an interesting day for Scotland.
Sorry about my typos in the last comment..
The first line should read as..
“A BBC article I’ve read says, if a LCM is refused, the EU Withdrawal Bill would only apply to England.”
Emergency Motion Yes 86:27
So the Scottish Parliament has voted for the Bill
Been listening to the discussion – tories trying to push it towards scrutiny in the Supreme Court; banging on about it being illegal and Presiding Officer is correct.
At least ALL the other parties understand the threat to Devolution- and their own jobs and have backed the bill.
I wonder what schemes and plans will not now take place at the cancelled Tory conference.