We’ve already posted a shorter and snappier soundbite from this video on our Twitter, but it’s really worth watching the full version here:
Because the body language is remarkable. For three and a half minutes, Neil Gray is completely unable to look his former colleague – an SNP MSP until a few months ago, a fellow government minister until 2022 – in the eye.
He sits stiff as a board, his teeth gritted, his face like thunder, staring directly ahead at the back wall of the studio as Ash Regan patiently and calmly outlines the extremely modest requirements Alba had set out in return for supporting Humza Yousaf and the SNP government in Parliamentary votes of confidence.
And when host Stephen Jardine asks him what exactly was so unreasonable about them, he can’t help himself, and blurts out that it was really all about preventing Alex Salmond from regaining any sort of influence on Scottish politics and insisting that his “rehabilitation” could not be permitted, even if the result of blocking it was the loss of an SNP First Minister and the potential bringing down of an SNP government.
And at this point a fair-minded person might ask: rehabilitation from what, precisely?
So, it being Good Friday, we’re definitely not going to receive our legal opinion before Monday now, so Wings Over Scotland will be shutting down, at least temporarily, on Sunday evening. No posts will be visible on the site and our Twitter account will be either locked down or deactivated while we await advice on whether either can return.
In the meantime you can hear of any developments, or get in touch, on my personal account @RevStu or on @TheGhostOfWings, both of which have had, or are about to have, all their old tweets wiped.
We’re not going to overdramatise, because we hope this is only for a few days. We’re optimistic that the Scottish Government’s abysmal, sinister and totalitarian Hate Crime Act, opposed across every sector of Scottish society and even by the police charged with implementing it, will not put an end to 12 and a half years of political journalism.
There’s a Calvin And Hobbes cartoon we like to post on social media when someone’s got themselves in such a pickle that they’re just flailing around desperately firing off every slogan, argument or insult they can think of to get themselves out of it.
More than three months have passed since Alex Salmond launched a lawsuit against the Scottish Government for its grotesquely botched handling of false allegations of sexual misconduct against him.
With Scottish politics currently in a completely moribund state, as the party of government disintegrates shambolically and the main opposition party keeps its mouth shut and its head down in an attempt to not destroy its newfound and extremely fragile status as a credible alternative, one might imagine that the political media would be desperate for the case to get under way and provide them with some juicy content.
So it’s slightly surprising that none of them has noticed the latest development.
As Twitter followers will have noticed, we’ve been busy this week with an extensive remodelling of Wings HQ, which involved the main computer being out of commission for several days while the office was basically torn down and rebuilt from scratch. (It seemed a good time to do it, given that there’s nothing remotely of interest happening in Scottish politics.)
Unfortunately the lack of activity on the site caused the comments on the last post to degenerate into the most wretched playground shrieking match, so let’s see if we can’t distract the children and talk about something else for a bit.
Particularly alert observers will have noted that Kezia Dugdale, the most spectacularly inept and unsuccessful Scottish political leader in history, this week demitted her role as Director of the John Smith Centre, which she was handed as an incentive to quit Scottish Labour after dragging it to 14% in the opinion polls.
We long ago ran out of words to express the magnitude of the contempt in which the SNP now hold the people of Scotland. Which is unfortunate, because this probably calls for the invention of a whole new scale.
Shall we go through just a few of the more crassly insulting holes in this pitiful excuse for a cover story, just to pass the time while we wait for the former First Minister to appear before the COVID inquiry? We don’t know about you, but we’ve got nothing better to do.
Nicola Sturgeon is due to give her evidence to the COVID inquiry tomorrow – if, of course, she remembers anything. We’re awaiting, open-mouthed in genuine shock, her explanation for this.
Because try as hard as we might, we cannot for the lives of us bring to mind a single possible legitimate justification for a First Minister to do such a thing.
Alert readers may however note that 19 March 2020 was just four days before Alex Salmond was cleared of all charges, and might find themselves pondering the reasons why she might want to be in possession of a cheap disposable text-capable phone at that particular point in time.
The Scottish Government’s website about its controversial and extremely disturbing new “conversion practices” legislation assures citizens that the proposal was formed after consultation with an “Expert Advisory Group”.
But all of a sudden it doesn’t seem to want you to know who they were.
It’s from a 2018 BBC3 documentary called Becoming A Trans Man – Leo. The 15-year-old child in the video plays with a Rubik’s Cube as Wolton, who was 31 at the time, enthusiastically grooms her into transitioning into a “man”, advocating chest binders, a double mastectomy and the irreversible mutilation of her genitalia (“Lower surgery – you want that”) that will, Wolton confirms, lead to her permanent sterilisation, as well as the destruction of her future adult sexual function.
The BBC presents it as a heartwarming tale of friendship.
Dunx on Just Good Friends: “The SNP might also like to consider whether sixteen year old children are mature enough to vote in any future…” Jul 11, 22:01
Alf Baird on Just Good Friends: “” I think that any kind of extreme dehumanizing and/or hatred of any group of people is a form of…” Jul 11, 20:31
Mark Beggan on Just Good Friends: “Craig Murray? wasn’t he one of the Merry Pranksters in the Koolaid Acid Test.” Jul 11, 19:26
Lorn on Just Good Friends: “I absolutely agree on the alignment. Both groups utilize the exact-same tactics and their aims are very similar. The official…” Jul 11, 18:31
Hatey McHateface on Just Good Friends: ““continually displayed abhorrent behaviour and used derogatory language to describe other fellow humans” Check out the synthetic outrage from Dan.…” Jul 11, 18:15
agent x on Just Good Friends: ““Scottish Government to consult on changing minimum marriage age THE Scottish Government has confirmed it will launch a consultation on…” Jul 11, 18:14
Alf Baird on Just Good Friends: “Manipulation, divide and rule, paternalistic colonialists, and finally partition when all else fails – all are part of the colonizer’s…” Jul 11, 18:12
Hatey McHateface on Just Good Friends: “That’s blethers, TH, even for you. If we have a People’s Assembly to sack politicians who don’t do as the…” Jul 11, 17:56
Dan on Just Good Friends: “@Lorn says : “I think that any kind of extreme dehumanizing and/or hatred of any group of people is a…” Jul 11, 17:50
twathater on Just Good Friends: “And THAT is where a REAL people’s assembly would EXPOSE and destroy the REAL purpose of these deviants and perverts…” Jul 11, 17:39
Hatey McHateface on Just Good Friends: “You still here, TH? I thought you were near the head of the queue for “assistance”.” Jul 11, 17:38
Hatey McHateface on Just Good Friends: ““partly to make the Scottish government look good (just being different even if that amounted to nothing at all)” Damned…” Jul 11, 17:35
twathater on Just Good Friends: “I very seldom agree with anything you post Mark unionist Beggan but that comment is right on the money” Jul 11, 17:27
twathater on Too Tight To Mention: “OH no someone else has unveiled Bastard Tax MOAN’s real agenda,undermine and deride everything about Scotland and Scots and beg…” Jul 11, 17:21
Hatey McHateface on Just Good Friends: “That’s a very fetching picture you conjure up there It’s 4-5 years until Chairman Murray returns from the UN…” Jul 11, 17:04
Lorn on Just Good Friends: “Hatey: you are absolutely correct. It was never about the women and girls. Always about the men in frocks. Personally,…” Jul 11, 17:03
Hatey McHateface on Just Good Friends: “@Lorn That’s another reasoned, eloquent and sane post from you. Beats me how you manage to post on here without…” Jul 11, 16:54
Mark Beggan on Just Good Friends: “The Royal Navy saves the Scottish government. Bastard English! Coming up here and saving the shipyard. I hope we don’t…” Jul 11, 15:24
Alf Baird on Just Good Friends: “The reality of a colonial society such as in the Scottish context provides for a more complex picture in regard…” Jul 11, 14:46
Mark Beggan on Just Good Friends: “Once the Yoons and the rest of the world stop laughing at your well planned strategy…. Let’s just recap shall…” Jul 11, 13:41
Lorn on Just Good Friends: “Hatey: It is because they believe that independence will come only via the SNP. They are entirely wrong. Independence will…” Jul 11, 12:53
Lorn on Just Good Friends: “David: why would so-called ‘trans’ identified people of either sex feel unsafe? They have been offered gender neutral toilets and…” Jul 11, 12:37
Duncan Strachan on Just Good Friends: “I agree Sarah. I think that we could have a check on the politicians by using a citizens assembly as…” Jul 11, 11:06
100%Yes on Just Good Friends: “I been stating this for months now that next years election isn’t going to be about Independence and even if…” Jul 11, 09:39
Alf Baird on Too Tight To Mention: ““The old Scottish parliament members entered the Westminster parliament of England” Aye James, lest they had no shame, I suspect…” Jul 11, 09:26
Callum on Just Good Friends: “People tend to gravitate towards those who share similar values, interests, and prejudices.. They choose to surround themselves and give…” Jul 11, 09:12
Young Lochinvar on Too Tight To Mention: “I reply to P3nisbreath @5.05pm “We” the “Scots”.. Yer having a laugh.. There’s no-one on this site that has put…” Jul 11, 03:42
Young Lochinvar on Too Tight To Mention: “In reply to Penisbreath @ 4.48pm Hmmmm.. At what point then, if not already, do you want Brown people to…” Jul 11, 02:43
Young Lochinvar on Just Good Friends: “The company some people keep.. The MSM has a lot to answer for in covering this up over all the…” Jul 11, 02:26