Darwin’s Failures
The BBC ran a completely insane story this week about a transman (ie a mentally ill woman) who almost died of kidney failure because she didn’t tell her doctors what sex she really was. The standout paragraph was probably the one pictured below, in which the atom-brained narcissist imbecile explained to a startled nation that apparently having a mental disorder also changes your physical biology:
(Also, y’know, “cute and awesome!” is definitely how men talk.)
But anyway. When we commission opinion polls, we’ve often noted that in any given poll you can expect around 5-10% of respondents to vote for even the most seemingly ridiculous options – either as a “joke”, or because they’re too dim to have understood the question, or whatever.
And last week we thought we’d put that to the test.
So we got Panelbase to ask a sample of 1,011 voters (the same sample that returned the 55% Yes result) a series of controversial and not-so-controversial questions. The results, even allowing for the 5-10% rule, pretty much blew our minds.
We’re going to list the 12 propositions we put to voters in order of least popular to most popular. Buckle up, readers, this one’s going to get crazy.
12. “Sometimes it’s okay for an adult to have sex with a child.”
Agree: 2%
Disagree: 98%
Well, that’s a relief. Despite “MAPs” (Minor-Attracted Persons, or paedophiles in the old money) being a protected category on Twitter and agitating for admission into the ever-expanding LGBTQIA+ “community”, even the 16-34 age group was unsupportive of paedophilic rape, with only 3% of them willing to accept it.
The biggest agreement overall came from Labour voters (5%), followed by Lib Dems (3%) and SNP (1%), with the Tories in last at less than 1%.
11. “Sometimes men can be lesbians.”
Agree: 5%
Disagree: 95%
Much lower than we were expecting, to be honest, given how many institutions have been captured by transgender ideology and how many “brave and stunning” heavily-bearded and bepenised men like Alex Drummond (below) are walking around loudly demanding that lesbians have sex with them or be cast out as disgusting bigots.
Unsurprisingly the youth demographic was keenest on this idea, with 9% of 16-34s agreeing, compared to just 4% of 35-54s and 3% of over-55s. And again Labour voters were most supportive (8%), followed by SNP (5%), Lib Dems (4%) and Tories (1%).
10. “Sometimes it’s possible to stop the tides of the ocean from coming in or going out”
Agree: 5%
Disagree: 95%
Famously, of course, even King Canute himself didn’t believe this, and conducted his famous experiment in an attempt to demonstrate that it WASN’T possible. But 5% of Scots do, and once again it’s young people and Labour voters in the lead. The three age groups went 7%-5%-2%, youngest to oldest, while party voters were Lab 7%, Lib Dem/Con 4%, SNP 3%.
9. “Sometimes 2+2=5”
Agree: 7%
Disagree: 93%
Erk. Alert readers will be aware that this is a debate that’s been raging implausibly for the last couple of weeks on social media, triggered again by transgender activists. So it was a bit of a surprise when over-55s were the most likely age group to agree with the proposition (9%), compared to 7% of younger voters and 6% of the middle-aged.
Labour voters (perhaps desperately hoping it was a route to more votes) led overall with 11% agreement, vs 8% from Lib Dems, 7% from SNP and 5% of Tories.
8. “Sometimes it’s better for dictators to rule countries, not democracy”
Agree: 7%
Disagree: 93%
This is actually a relatively mainstream political viewpoint, mainly on the right, usually used to defend “strong leaders” in foreign regimes who are friendly with the West. And sure enough Tory voters (12%) were most likely to agree, followed by Labour (9%), SNP (5%) and Lib Dem (4%) voters.
Young people were most likely to lust after a bit of authoritarianism, with 10% agreeing compared to 8% and 5% respectively among the middle-aged and old.
7. “Sometimes white people can become black people, or vice versa”
Agree: 7%
Disagree: 93%
Rather weirdly, while trans activists insist that human beings can change their sex just by announcing it, they get extremely irate at the idea that they could also change their race in the same way, such as in the case of Rachel Dolezal (below).
But the youth were still the most supportive here, with 10% agreeing compared to 8% of the middle-aged and 3% of the old. Politically the split was Labour 7%, SNP 6%, Lib Dem/Tory 4%.
6. “Sometimes it’s acceptable to steal”
Agree: 12%
Disagree: 88%
We thought this might score a little higher in these troubled times, with so many people in desperate need and hunger, but the voters of Scotland were pretty firm, perhaps believing that (eg) foodbanks were picking up the slack.
A hefty 23% of the youth demographic did agree, though – dramatically higher than the 10% and 8% of the middle-aged and old respectively. Labour voters recorded 18%, SNP 14%, Lib Dems 7% and Tories 6%.
(We should perhaps point out here that there were no really big differences for any of the questions between Yes and No voters, or Remainers and Leavers.)
5. “Sometimes the law should be different for different groups of people”
Agree: 13%
Disagree: 87%
No big deal here, just the core principle of criminal justice – that the law should be the same for everyone – being casually tossed aside by almost one in seven Scots.
Rather unexpectedly, Lib Dem voters (16%) were keenest to have the law altered by demographics, with Labour and SNP supporters tied on 12% and Tories on 9%. Once more young people were also the most supportive age group (17%) compared to 12% and 10% for middle and older ages.
And while it’s traditionally Lady Justice who’s blindfolded, women (14%) were keener on the prospect of seeing the defendant before making the rules than men (11%).
4. “Sometimes it’s safe to drive significantly faster than the speed limit”
Agree: 20%
Disagree: 80%
While it’s one of the highest scores in the poll, we also thought more people would agree with this proposition because it’s so manifestly true. The UK’s current speed limits were introduced in 1965, when cars were incredibly primitive and dangerous machines compared to today’s models equipped with power steering, anti-lock brakes, crumple zones, airbags and whatnot, so the idea that you can’t safely do 80mph on an empty motorway at 3am seems absurd.
But only one in five Scots concurred with that opinion. Tories and Labour voters (both on 25%) were most likely to regard the limits as over-restrictive, followed by Lib Dems at 22%, with SNP supporters on just 16%. The middle-aged (23%) were the biggest speed-freaks, followed by the young (20%) and the elderly (19%).
3. “Sometimes women have penises”
Agree: 22%
Disagree: 78%
This is a strange one, because while only 5% of Scots think that men can be lesbians, more than four times as many think women can have penises. How does THAT work?
To nobody’s surprise young voters (34%) were most likely to accept this proposition, way ahead of the middle-aged (20%) and old (14%). Labour voters backed ladydique by 25%, just ahead of the SNP’s on 23%, Lib Dems on 18% and Tories on 12%.
There was almost no difference between men (21%) and women (22%), ironically.
2. “Sometimes it’s possible to communicate with the dead”
Agree: 22%
Disagree: 78%
While technically a tie with the female-penises question, marginally more people (222 vs 220) agreed that you can have the occasional chinwag with the deceased. Unexpectedly, the over-55s were the LEAST likely to agree (18%), with the middle-aged group the most seance-friendly (20%) and the young in the middle (23%).
27% of Labour voters thought they could talk to the toddled-off, plus 23% of the SNP’s, 16% of Tories and 12% of Lib Dems. Curiously, people who rented their home were almost twice as likely (31%) to believe in supernatural dialogue as homeowners (16%).
(This was the only question in which those two groups differed so dramatically.)
Even religious people tend to only think you get to talk to your deceased relatives once you too shuffle from this mortal coil. What could possibly be more doolally than this?
1. “Sometimes the Sun revolves around the Earth”
Agree: 27%
Disagree: 73%
Wait, WHAT?
[checks data tables]
Seriously?
Okay, we’re going to need a minute.
[lengthy pause]
Scotland, you need to have a word with yourself. MORE THAN A QUARTER of people WHO ARE ALLOWED TO VOTE IN ELECTIONS apparently still aren’t too sure about that dodgy Galileo bloke. But that’s even not the maddest bit.
The maddest bit is the “sometimes”. Apparently one in four of our fellow Scots think that not only is several centuries of established astronomy a load of old cobblers, but that it VARIES according to unspecified circumstances. We’ve never wanted to go back and pose follow-up questions more. Like, WHEN do people think it flips? Leap years? Full moons? We… we can’t even.
A mind-boggling 35% of voters aged 35-54 believe this gibbering lunacy to be the truth, as do 24% of over-55s and 22% of the young. Fully 33% of Labour voters are STARK STARING MAD, like 27% of SNP voters and 24% of Lib Dems and Tories.
Help.
So in amongst some relatively sane propositions like being able to drive a little fast sometimes and thinking maybe we shouldn’t come down too hard on hungry people stealing food, by far the most popular ideas of the ones we put to Scottish voters were that you can communicate with the dead, that women can have penises and that the Sun SOMETIMES revolves around the Earth.
Though these are perhaps the three most fundamental concepts of human existence – the Earth revolves around the Sun, men aren’t women and the dead don’t come back to life – around a million of us don’t believe in them.
Suddenly, readers, it feels like what the country needs is a lot more kidney disease.
Last line had me chortling – thanks Rev Stu.
2. “Sometimes it’s possible to communicate with the dead”
Agree: 22%
Disagree: 78%
The ‘Really/Quest’ channels will be pleased.
This is scary – almost as scary as the thought of a perpetual Tory govt. What the hell has gone wrong? Maybe you should have had the flat earth question in there too?
*laughs hysterically*
I’m now not sure if we should let everyone living in Scotland have a vote, never mind letting anyone outwith ibe included
I would agree with the 5% of people in question 10. Sometimes it is possible to stop the tide coming in or going out. The thames barrier is just one example of this, others include La Rance in France, New Orleans and huge parts of the Netherlands. Just goes to shown that high percentages can be wrong as well as right. As for the others number 5, there are a lot of people happy for 5 year olds to drive cars or fly planes. 6 a lot of people who have never picked a bramble. As for the others well, there are some weird folk out there.
Sometimes the SNP leaders want independence.
Agree = 20%
Disagree = 80%
Sometimes the Sun revolves around the Earth.
Dumb.
I am however, reminded of the example of relative motion.
A man comes upon a tree.
There is a squirrel on the tree trunk which tries to keep the trunk between itself and the man.
The man circles the tree and the squirrel does likewise (keeping on the opposite side of the tree trunk).
If you are the tree….man and squirrel revolve around you.
If you are the man…the squirrel and tree revolve around you.
If you are the squirrel…the tree and man revolve around you.
All motion is relative.
On the other hand, there could just be a lot of really dumb people out there.
‘Young people were most likely to lust after a bit of authoritarianism…’ Well, they have that in Ms. Sturgeon, the benevolent, accepting, wacky surrogate aunt who allows them their quirks and foibles and chortles at and encourages them…but still politically rules with as much of an iron fist as her ostensible nemesis, Maggie Thatcher.
You can understand wanting a bit of leadership and authoritarianism in uncertain times even when, ironically, it’s your age group who are helping to create a lot of the uprooting uncertainty, seemingly content to tear your country away from tradition, selective history, and even consensus reality. The madness of the net age shows very clearly in these results.
Which does make me wonder aboot something. There are a minority of people who dwell solely on the net, in their wee online cabals, far down rabbit holes, swimming in sludgy torpid underground electronic caverns measureless to man of madness and stupidity. They’re trying desperately to stitch together some sort of meaning to their lives from random bits of trivia and gossip and propaganda on the net. They remind me of a line from William S Burroughs: “So I am a public agent and don’t know who I work for, get my instructions from street signs, newspapers and pieces of conversation…”
It seems to me that the more time a person spends online, without being self-aware and knowing when to pull back, the more detached from reality they become. These answers reflect that. Only – what – one in five or something people have Twitter, which, to me, is a cyberplace where the mentally ill can hang out, chasing people out of their sandpit when they don’t like what they can say.
So whilst online polls may be useful, to a degree, in giving a vague approximation of views on any one subject, I would be wary of giving them too much credence, in some ways. They’re done by people who would be predisposed to do them online, on social media, and there seems to me to be a lot of mental illness there. I wonder how much these answers would differ if you just asked them of the general public in the street.
Or maybe I’m just too damned optimistic and generous, and we’re in large part a nation of reality-detached nutters now. Judging by recent events, it’s entirely possible. Shrug.
Could it be that some people, when asked a manifestly silly question, will choose a silly answer?
Mike Dillon says
“Sometimes it is possible to stop the tide coming in or going out”
Sorry Mike what your examples actually do is block the progress of the water in one direction or the other. The tide still comes in and goes out.
Tree’s have roots Bill, they’re not going anywhere.
🙂
Relative velocity is a real heed feck!.
Sitting on a moving train, on a rotating planet, which is orbiting a star, which in turn is spiraling around the galaxy, which itself is hurtling through expanding space at a fair fraction of light speed!
How fast are you moving?
0 mph is a valid shout, sitting.
I am just going outside.
I may be sometime.
jings
Oh ffs… what?
When considering age profiles factor in that every generation thinks they invented sex. They grow out of that view..eventually.
I just saw the breakdown of the recent 55/45 poll. 38/62 for over 55’s Yes/No. Not much change from 2014. Is it still the same stated reasons as in 2014 for being a No or just a general bias against change in general as folk get older?
link to pbs.twimg.com
In amongst the reasons people answer questions like this, such as ‘for a joke’ is the idea that the question is somehow a clever trick that’ll leave them embarrassed, I think they take a gamble and go for the least likely choice because they don’t trust their own common sense. That’s not a ‘let off’, but just as dangerous when people are left to put a mark on a box to determine the future of everyone in the country.
“Is there anybody there?…..is there anybody there?”
Opening of the Scottish Labour conference.
One wonders how humanity made it this far
Has the SNP youth group been taken over by wallopers?
Agree = 99%
Disagree = 1%
Has Alex- Cole – Hamilton got an English accent , despite allegedly being brought up in Scotland?
Agree = 100%
Disagree = 0%
There’s no agreed spelling of King Canute. Alternatives include Kanute and my favourite Cnut.
So, there’s a baseline of 1 in 20 folk that shouldn’t be given access to sharp objects, specifically pencils in polling booths. As someone who remembers the days before Thatcher brought in “care in the community” this is not a surprise.
Power steering is only really useful at low speed when applying significant angular steering lock to overcome the friction of the tyres on the road surface as they scrub whilst not rolling.
It effectively does nothing when small steering wheel angles are applied at 30mph or above, and arguably it reduces the “feel / connection” a driver gets as to road conditions. Many power steering systems are actually speed sensitive these days for that reason.
If you are having to apply huge corrective steering lock at speed you have already effectively lost proper control of the car.
Braking distances whether with or without ABS are determined by grip levels applicable to the tyre. Those levels can vary significantly with some budget brands being absolutely shit even when new, and tread depth in wet conditions on all tyres is a factor.
The laws of physics come into play, double the speed and the vehicle has 4 times the kinetic energy needing to be controlled.
Of course women can have a penis. Many go out on a Saturday night fully intending to have one.
I needed a laugh this morning!
We really are just a Virus in shoes….
How many of these people react to daft questions in the way that I do to those who phone me about my Bosch service plan,my Amazon account or having had a road accident?
I take the piss. Do a survey on how many are taking the piss? Well that is a problem too.
Remember the story of the two tribes at either side of the road junction and one tribe always lies and the other only tells the truth and you have to ask one question to get directions but you do not know which tribe you are asking.etc.
Ask in your preamble, how many sexes does this tribe have F15?
I must have missed when evolution started to make a u turn..
If you’re being asked questions in a poll then your answers are going to be influenced by what the other people polled are likely to say – it’s just human nature. The questions on speeding and stealing are the giveaways on this. It’s also a quick bit of rationalising on my part at my initial reaction of – WTF!
Pretty interesting all the same to see the levels of influence younger members of the population. It should be a good measure of the amount of bullshit they are exposed to.
It would be useful to see the effects of leading by the questioner. If you asked all the science/reality denying questions first then asked the hot-topic progressive ones would you get different results than if you reversed the order.
Next time, for fun, ask questions on whether you’d sleep with a member of the same sex if they identified as the opposite. I’d rather see that than the child sex question with the rather shocking result – WTF!
Given that many drugs have different effects depending on a person’s sex I look forward to a spate of medical drama stories where doctors are imprisoned for hate crimes or patients are poisoned because of overdoes or have been given the wrong drugs entirely.
I find myself speaking to the dead (brain that is) very often!
Sorry Alastair, But when you stand anywhere upstream from the barrier the tide has been stopped, the cycle may remain elsewhere but the tide relative to you has ben well and truly stopped.
Alastair says:
20 August, 2020 at 9:53 am
Mike Dillon says
“Sometimes it is possible to stop the tide coming in or going out”
Sorry Mike what your examples actually do is block the progress of the water in one direction or the other. The tide still comes in and goes out.
Stuart, my admiration for your intelligence, skill and invaluable output is endless. That’s possibly why your latent sexism, when it slips through, disturbs me so much.
“Also, y’know, “cute and awesome!” is definitely how men talk.”
Maybe so. But definitely NOT how women talk.
“Sometimes it’s safe to drive significantly faster than the speed limit”
The sad thing about the people who agree with this is that these wankers think it’s ok to do it in town centres and housing schemes as well as ’empty motorways’. Shame pedestrians don’t have airbags or crumple zones…
I suspect that the rise of modern fantasy has replaced religion as a matter of faith and belief.
I always liked Kierkegard’s assessment of truth
“There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.”
And it’s the human understanding of the word ‘belief’ which confuses the issue. So many people believe that ‘believe’ and ‘know’ are synonymous in meaning: a misunderstanding which comes directly from (ALL) religion teaching and learning
An of course we have to remember that the AVERAGE IQ is, in fact, VERY LOW 🙂
@Alice Timmons,
My wife disagrees. She said that to me often before shopping trips!!
I must say, the one about the sun gave me a good laugh especially your reaction to it. I could almost hear you!
I think I’ve spotted the deliberate mistake: 23% is not between 18% and 20%, even if you’re talking about seances…
“Sometimes it’s possible to communicate with the dead”
I think that is a prerequisite for membership of the House of Lords.
A friend told me the other day that some of her grandson’s friends have now started to identify as homosexual on job application forms, for fear that otherwise their application will be binned. Political correctness gone mad.
[…] Wings Over Scotland Darwin’s Failures The BBC ran a completely insane story this week about a transman (ie a woman) who […]
BTW thanks for this post – it is enlightening and I have to say I had a good chortle from time to time.
I’m enamoured of the writings of Richard Adams and when I read your stuff I often consider that you seem to think like he did sometimes.
One of my favourite literary quotation of all time, which I used to offer to my students to finish
“The ships hung in the sky in much the same way ………………”
How much do these minorities overlap? Is it the same people each time who have the delusions?
well some of the results would make sense especially the small percentage that would agree and fall for anything however looney it is , remember these flakey nut jobs are not confined for their and our safety they are walking about and mixing with everyone it’s scary to think some of them might be in a position to alter other people’s lives,We have all come across them
This Polling lark I am registered on all of the major ones as to be open to taking part in further surveys , I really should have kept a note of who i was on each organisation in short people tell lies so if you are bored and watching a dull movie it passes the time , Polls a load of guff .
you gorra laff
in this multimedia info age, stupid is endemic
i would suggest that most of darwins failures are wokey twitterers
but i’ve been wrong once before
Alice Timmons
If the Rev. was quoting a man then how can that be sexist? Seems to me that you don’t really accept Whitley’s gender.
“Also, y’know, “cute and awesome!” is definitely how men talk.”
Now, now, Rev, don’t be falling for the culturally constructed gender stereotype bs – that’s the sort of sh*te the TRAs come out with: “She uses words like cute and awesome, therefore she must be a woman…”
With quality writing like this, you have to ask yourself why Rev hasn’t been invited to write for the MSM, or to be on TV or radio politics programmes. I mean so many other pro-indy (supposedly) voices get paid gigs, even with minimal talent. Something to ponder.
We know that we are blessed with some particularly dumb
members of society.
Especially those who think it’s acceptable to end up
With the government you voted against but the aggressor next
Door say that you are getting it.
I blame the teachers. 🙂
The thing with a lot of these is the authority fallacy. Some people think that if someone in a paid capacity asks about something then it must be possible. So the fact that you asked about the sun orbiting the earth will suggest to these that it might even happen. Why else would you ask?
Ditto to stopping the tides. I get some of them think of things like the Thames barrier which technically speaking does stop the tides. There will also be some tech hopers who expect such technological marvels so are happy to agree that it’s possible so as not to seem not bleeding edge. Of course they are also not scientifically literate.
You only have to look at attitudes to GM foods where transgenes are treated like viruses in ignorance of how that stuff actually works. If genes in our foods could affect us then eating anything would alter us. DNA in our food is just, food. It gets chopped up into individual bases (letters) and there are specialist transport proteins in the walls of gut cells which bind them and import them into cells where they can be passed to the blood or used by those cells (gut cells divide constantly).
Sadly scientific illiteracy, often driven by polemics, Greens in the case of GM, is not universal.
Yes, when FlavrSavr tomato paste was briefly on sale we bought & ate it. I put my words where my mouth is. Because I understand.
The Scottish Unionist over 55 seem to have
Swallowed Gordon Brown’s blatant lie that their
Pension might be vulnerable in an independent Scotland.
Our pension was always guaranteed but the Westminster pension
Is the 4th worst in the 28 Country EU.
Smaller countries than Scotland in the EU have better pensions.
Westminster increased all pension qualification ages- by 7 years for women.
Tory group headed up by Ian Duncan Smith proposed to make the UK pension at 75.
And you people in your 50’s think these are situations you want to vote for and keep?
Insane!
2+2 can never equal 5?
Obviously you’ve forgotten that old chestnut.
Three friends go for lunch.
The bill comes to £30 so they each give the waiter £10.
The cashier however realises that he’s made a mistake and the total cost should have been £25.
He instructs the waiter to give the diners £5 back.
Alas and alack the waiter is a tad disreputable and decided to half inch £2 and only return £3.
He apologises profusely and hands the diners £1 each
Thus instead of paying £10 per Capita, the diners got £1 returned so only paid £9 each.
3 meals @ £9 = £27
The waiter’s pilfering = £2
Total = £29
What happened to the other £1
3. “Sometimes women have penises”
Agree: 22%
Disagree: 78%
Given that intersex disorders are a whole new and developing specialty in medical science those numbers look reasonably informed compared to the others.
Humans,like other species do sometimes have external genetalia which do not match their chromosomes.
Next time you could ask,
“Is Adam and Eve a true story?”
You malign ‘Joe Public’. Other people have invested in his stupidity. It is a pity that your questionnaire did not include.
Sometimes the legal establishment is biased.
Sometimes the BBC is discriminatory.
Thanks to Cuilean for this quote from the previous topic:
Basically in Scotland Joe Public is at the mercy of legal system bias against it and one’s ability to fight any legal establishment bias depends entirely on how deep one’s pockets are.
There is current draft legislation to remove the Law Society’s self-regulatory power away from it which the High Heid Yins within the Law Society of Scotland are fighting, tooth and nail.
This is the toxic, undemocratic, anti-public, entitled mentality that the COPFS inhabits.
It acts as it does because it knows it is unaccountable. This is the biggest scandal in Scotland and the MSM is complicit in its cover-up.
Can we transfer these people to the Isle of Shiteforbrains?
Acht well.Remember it used to be wizards,witches,goblins and leprechauns, fairies and the like.
It’s only us human beings that think their the most intelligent. The rest of the animal kingdom think we’re nuts.
There should be a short simple intelligence test before allowing someone to vote.
eg. Let me see you tie your shoelaces. 5 points
Explain William of Orange. 10 points
Who would you prefer to be on a desert island with? – George Galloway, 1 point. Rupert Leopard, 2 points
Etc.
Failure would bar you for ten years.
Is it sometimes safe to break the speed limit?
This in reality means “is it sometimes safe to break the law”
Ok define “safe”, in some specific circumstances it could be argued yes, as in getting out of the way of an emergency service, but, but, but.
As for the sun sometimes rotating round the earth?
Jesus H! And these people can vote!!
As a (yet unpaid)pensioner for independence I can’t understand older people not voting Yes. Once you get to a certain age, what the hell have you got to lose. As for the strange answers from the young in the survey, could they be influenced by American TV, with which they get bombarded. Seems like, in some parts of the US, history and science books are being discarded in favour of biblical texts and creationism. I wonder what sort of answer a question about zombies would have got?
proving that there is nothing too ridiculous that the credulous wont believe
Only 15 days left to raise £20,000 and hit the £155,000 target
To take Scotland’s Sovereignty to Court.
Every Fiver Counts!
The pic of the 3 folk on the steps. Is that an SNP prospective candidates photocall?
@Capella says:
20 August, 2020 at 11:11 am
“I blame the teachers.”
Tsk, tsk, they are not teachers, they are information and educational transformation specialists 🙂
leither says:
20 August, 2020 at 11:53 am
“proving that there is nothing too ridiculous that the credulous wont believe” – like Scotland is economically dependent on England.
holymacmoses says:
Richard Adams ?
would that be Dougie’s younger brother?
re the movement of the sun
i’m prepared to accept the world is round but happier the bit i live on is flat(tish)
Cunning stunt Rev.
When polls come out and we all go apeshit with excitement that we’ve won, you normally give a sober contrast of polls over time etc.
The “as part of the poll which produced the 55%” you give us an “insight?” to the responders.
Hilarious. Laugh out loud stuff.
Nope that’s it where’s the asteroid we’re beyond help
A lot of people that speak to me believe they must communicating with the dead, well from the look on their faces anyway.
Don’t forget to read the ‘insane’ story with which the Rev started the article.
Thinking the doctor doesn’t need to know you’re a woman does have consequences.
Later, he listened in amazement as a doctor gravely informed him that he had a uterus – a fact that Whitley was, naturally, already aware of. “They said, ‘I think we understand the problem – you have a uterus and so that may be contributing to your kidney failure.’ I was like, ‘what are you talking about?’”
link to archive.is
@katherine hamilton
Do you have any evidence of an increase/decrease in the mean IQ of Scotland since 2014?
All I can say about the above survey is thank goodness that I had my education before the internet became a “ THING “ and also that I started going to the library from 10 years old and reading plenty of fiction and non fiction books .
This is the danger nowadays that people have immediate access to the internet and so many people just believe everything that they see and read on it . There are plenty of good educational sites but there are so many sites that just fill young people’s head with a lot of misinformation and that is a worry for future generations .
Maybe because i grew up before the internet and it was learning from older family generations and hearing their stories that we had a good grounding in lessons for life which you don’t forget as you become older . My worry is that younger people now have so much and some times too much information thrown at them and it’s all too much for them to process and understand and learn from as they are growing up .
“Sun SOMETIMES revolves around the Earth. Agree 27%”
I’d like to see the Venn diagram of that group with those who seem to think the world revolves around them!
leither says:
20 August, 2020 at 12:15 pm
holymacmoses says:
Richard Adams ?
You obviously read the right one:-)
My excuse is that I’ve been doing research on ‘books that have been banned’ in the past few days , and of course Watership Down was one of them.
It doesn’t change the quality of the metaphor though does it?
I suppose I’d better correct ther spelling of Kierkegaard now too:-)
Sometimes real life resembles a roman classical comedy. Bring on the actors with the masks and big schlongs. Oops, they’re already on stage, we call them politicians and other ‘concerned’ citizens.
Some thoughts on questions.
Is democracy and freedom important to you?
Do you believe governments capable of misusing authority?
Is authority fallible?
Do you value your personal autonomy?
Should sentiment ever overrule reason?
Might the presumption of the public good ever outweigh the principles of democracy?
Do you agree with the worldwide measures to contain Covid-19 disease?
Should such measures entail the loss of individual freedoms would that concern you?
‘Alice Timmons says:
20 August, 2020 at 10:36 am
Stuart, my admiration for your intelligence, skill and invaluable output is endless. That’s possibly why your latent sexism, when it slips through, disturbs me so much.
“Also, y’know, “cute and awesome!” is definitely how men talk.”
Maybe so. But definitely NOT how women talk.’
I think young women – AND men – do talk a lot like this these days, because of American social media and cultural influence on the way they speak. And please, give the ‘looking to be offended’ nonsense a miss, Miss. 🙂
Watership Down has been banned?
Some of this is hilarious. ‘Nowt so queer as folk’. The trans man in the article caused his own problem and the push to stop recording biological sex and trans status will cause a lot more problems down the line. I’d say rather than complain about his medical care or supposed misdiagnosis, the doctors and hospitals should think of charging for waste of time and resources for people not disclosing necessary information.
‘This is a strange one, because while only 5% of Scots think that men can be lesbians, more than four times as many think women can have penises. How does THAT work?’
Perhaps because they are willing to think of trans women as women even if they have a penis but with any thought of trans women having sex they have to confront that male organ and some sense prevails.
‘Curiously, people who rented their home were almost twice as likely (31%) to believe in supernatural dialogue as homeowners (16%)’
That’s the funniest of all. Maybe deceased relatives like a bit of travel and prefer to keep on the move, keeps them on their toes but they go to sleep on you if you settle down in one place. People are weird. And labour voters show up less well than others here.
‘Also, y’know, “cute and awesome!” is definitely how men talk.”
Maybe so. But definitely NOT how women talk.’
Some youth of both sexes do speak like that nowadays though. It’s there with americanisms and fake phoney conversation fillers.
Re the mong amongst us.
It’s meant to be like that!
WtF do you think grammar schools are all about? Churning out useful idiots,aka the professional.
Peeps are edumacated to the level of use the elites require, and no more.
T’internet spoiled that arrangement.
“ The BBC has confirmed it pulled The Trial of Alex Salmond from iPlayer to make a “small change” to the programme, but hasn’t disclosed what change it made.”
‘Polly says:
20 August, 2020 at 12:59 pm
Some of this is hilarious.
Some youth of both sexes do speak like that nowadays though. It’s
there with americanisms and fake phoney conversation fillers.’
I hadn’t read the story before I commented. I see that the man, woman, whatever, in question is American. From personal experience, I can absolutely tell you 100% that this is how young Americans, especially female (though this person identifies as male) DO speak, trust me. Living in a country for over a decade gives you an idea of linguistics. American dialect is weird, childish, hyperbolic, immature, stunted, even in older people. Kind of pathetically hilarious, really.
At school in Glasgow we had a Canadian teacher who taught us all about the Clearances and how we were all brainwashed by the British Government This guy had been a fighter pilot in the war and we all thought he had sustained a brain injury and was recuperating before returning home He just loved to show illogical puzzles and how peoples beliefs could be easily altered .One of his favourites was to challenge us to disprove that a circle was a straight line if it had infinite radius or something like that.
Long story short,he taught us to question common sense as he viewed that as distilled from social prejudice.
Yes we lived in interesting times in Glasgow post war when they were short of teachers and now I forget the relevance of my contribution!
Oneliner says:
20 August, 2020 at 12:44 pm
@katherine hamilton
Do you have any evidence of an increase/decrease in the mean IQ of Scotland since 2014?
Since it is now become common knowledge that we only use 1/9th of out brain capacity, social media across Scotland is full of people arguing about what we use the other third for
I’m afraid I simply can’t find anything positive to say about these results. No wonder the Tories are able to take the piss so easily.
Rationality Analysis in Constitutional Law
link to core.ac.uk
@leither.
Thank you for your insight, I am not on twitbook so probably using even less than 1/9th of what little I have. LOL
The one about the sun is a good example of why all governments have a legal duty of care towards the public’s well-being. So it’s just a pity the Scottish government is part of British constitutionalism, so is unable to discharge its legal duty of care towards the protection of Scotland’s civic society.
link to cadmus.eui.eu
I blame Stirling University
Terry says:
20 August, 2020 at 1:02 pm
“ The BBC has confirmed it pulled The Trial of Alex Salmond from iPlayer to make a “small change” to the programme, but hasn’t disclosed what change it made.”
Is there a prize for guessing which bit?
Hi All
I haven’t shared my knowledge, wisdom and insight for a while … the threads have been predominantly about internal Scottish matters that are for you folks to resolve.
Stuart’s post above reminds us that in any crowd of people, there are so few that are somewhat “out of step” with the rest. Our own personal experiences probably bears this out when we discover, after knowing them for a long while, that a friend or someone we like and admire has “odd” views on a particular topic.
I recall one particular chap that was an occasional member of the pub quiz team for over 3 years, that he was going to a talk being given by David Icke … who was, he said, one of very few people that understood the degree of infiltration by extra terrestrial aliens into society. After sharing his views on the Royal Family being some sort of lizard people, the next question was announced and the subject matter was never raised again or referred to! Still see him occasionally.
‘Scozzie says:
20 August, 2020 at 1:40 pm
I blame Stirling University’
Stirling is a hoity-toity Tory town. Which, in the context of the braindead sub-American idiocy pouring out of its university, and the squalid SNP MSP sexual rumours swirling round the areas round the city…is interesting.
So it’s abundantly clear now you’re transphobic
Any chance you could get on with the day job of getting Scotland independence rather than this vendetta against trans people?
Also through your transphobic prism Cameron, if ever sent to prison should go to a female prison and if ever attacked by his partner would (as by all your previous asertations) go to a women’s shelter
Also what on earth is wrong with a man – or anyone for that matter using the term “cute and awesome”
Of course all us who played Sorcery+ in the 1980’s would know the necromancer exists.
@Mike Lothian,
What’s wrong with a man using the term cute and awesome?
That depends if your sharing a prison cel! With him!!
As a retired science teacher, not very surprised. But what is more disturbing are the complaints from parents asserting their right to instruct their children any old way they please, and even more disturbing that a deputy head teacher in a mainstream Aberdeen secondary school felt the need to defend the parents right to impart any old bollocks.The church-going deputy head was about as bright as a crusie lamp, and as thick as a victorian bible, and was the Child Protection Officer.And yes I do have a grudge against the foul old halfwit
Greetings from Raleigh, North Carolina, USA. Yes, that’s relevant to the discussion. Some have observed that women would not use the term “cute and awesome.” However, the linked story is about a person from the US, where women use “cute” on a regular basis, more so than men do. I think Stu’s point is valid.
Ted 2
‘there are no chix with dicks, only guys with tits’
@Mike Lothian
Nothing, I believe Jimmy Saville used to ask his fans if they wanted to see something ‘cute and awesome’ and if they did come along to his dressing room.
A “constitutional moment” is a social event that underpins the constitution, as a special unifying moment of shared emotional responses to a fundamental political experience.
Brexit is certainly a constitutional moment, as it relegates Scots to the legal position of sub-English.
Here’s a view from England any, though I think it somewhat fanciful to think England will accept constitutional law that conflicts with their cultural traditions. So that’s Scotland on to plumbs then.
link to blogs.lse.ac.uk
Here’s a fun fact I heard recently, regarding the earth going around the sun. The planet jupiter actually doesn’t revolve exactly around the sun. Due to jupiter being so incredibly maaaaassive, it exerts such a gravitational effect, that the point of rotation, is just above the surface of the sun (kind of like between the two, but very close to the sun).
Of course, the caveat to all this, is that I am not an astronomer or physicist, and have no specialist knowledge whatsoever of planets or gravity, and in true internet p*sh style, I ‘read this somewhere, or saw it on the telly’.
This will no doubt be corrected by an actual astronomer or some such like.
Mind you, thinking about the poll data above, some of it does not surprise me, given the utter nonsense being spouted at young folk about ‘female’ penises, and such like. That so many young people have been taken in by such nonsense, is actually quite worrying. Do the same young folk also believe in pixies and the bogeyman?? Maybe I shouldn’t ask.
The mind boggles.
‘I blame the teachers’
One of my favourite scenes from The Simpsons was the Headie, standing on the steps of the school in preparation for parent/teachers night. Above him was a welcoming banner stating,
‘Parent/Teachers Night – Lets Share The Blame’.
I see Galloway, Gove & Neil are proposing some plan to pockle any referendum, just waiting for Pete Wishart to come out in support.
All this interminable pish is just demoralising.
It’s like trying to start a car that’s been sitting in a garage five years, and the battery hasn’t the juice to turn it over, and the brakes are seized so you can’t even bump start it.
We’re all expecting so much from this Salmond Inquiry, but look at it. It’s Jackie Baillie, Murdo Fraser, Alex Cole Hamilton?? Half of it is team Better Together, who couldn’t tie their own shoelaces. If these people re-wired a plug, I’d check it myself before switching anything on. I just cannot see them delivering any fireworks that’s going to kick start the revolution.
People are commenting how Jackie Baillie was great and had Leslie Evans rattled, but I just didn’t see it. I didn’t think she was rattled in the slightest. I actually fear it’s “our” people who are beginning to clutch at straws and see things that aren’t there.
I just feel a mighty curse building at the back of my throat that this stifling ‘nothingness’ we have to endure instead of getting on with the business of freeing our Country and protecting ourselves from Brexit is all fault of Nicola Sturgeon and her lame inability to think strategically. What a fkg mess she’s stood back and created, but ‘we’re’ all bonkers for pointing it out?
Without a resurrected Alex Salmond firing on all cylinders, or a Joanna Cherry with her phasers set to kill, all the precious time we have left before December to form ourselves into some kind of anti-Brexit rearguard is just going to evaporate while we’re all distracted trying to inflate the punctured tyres of the SNP.
They’ve taken down Alex Salmond. They’ve taken down Joanna Cherry. They’ve taken down Craig Murray. There people are the leaders of our resurrection in waiting, but suddenly they’ve all got a pile of guff in their in-tray to deal with before they can cut loose. Alex Salmond has to clear his name, Joanna Cherry has the Wokist Wreckers in her own back yard to purge, and Craig Murray has to try to keep himself out of jail.
See the big picture Scotland… we are being shepherded to accept that the SNP under Sturgeon, the body which capitulated before Scotland’s Brexit and colonial subjugation, is our only viable option. God help us all if that’s true.
We are going nowhere. We are contained like sheep inside a stock proof fence.
We need something radical to happen. Something radical like Alex Salmond body swerving the whole constitutional mess of Holyrood, even impeaching Holyrood for it’s unconstitutional misconduct, and reconvening a sovereign Scottish Parliament to lead the impeachment proceedings against Holyrood and call for true Scottish elections which owe nothing of their franchise to either Westminster or Holyrood’s cosy wee hegemony, but becomes a democratic covenant between the sovereign citizens of Scotland and the constitutional government they alone have appointed.
We can show the UN they are denying us democracy, denying us impartial media, trumping up charges to jail some of us and disrupt our co-ordination, while all the time enriching themselves at our expense by usurping our natural resources and wealth for themselves.
If Holyrood won’t stand up for Scotland, and worse, is party to enshrining Westminster’s colonialism into our political society, then Holyrood is no longer fit for purpose, and part of the problem, not part of the solution. It isn’t our Parliament but theirs. My advice is don’t get too attached to it. The chances of Westminster closing down Holyrood are a million to one. Holyrood is the massive pup they sold us in 1998.
If Holyrood is content for the sovereign Nation of Scotland to be the prisoner of Section 30 of the Scotland Act, then we need a trump card that is bigger than Holyrood, and that my friends, as I have been saying for such a long time, is Scotland’s Sovereign Constitution… that wee scrap of parchment which says the people of Scotland can depose their leader and choose another, and thus enjoy popular sovereignty in the Kingdom of Scotland which nobody can overrule.
If the poll had asked ‘were the Apollo moon landings real?’ ,the result would have been around 70% no. It is truly astonishing the number of seemingly rational, sane folk, who simply think it was all faked.
According to such people, NASA was so successful in pulling off the greatest hoax in history (fooling the entire world’s media, people and the USSR), they decided to repeat it another five times, on live TV.
“So it was a bit of a surprise when over-55s were the most likely age group to agree with the proposition [2+2=5] (9%)”
You know, don’t you, that 2 plus 2 does indeed equal 5 for sufficiently large values of 2?
Also strictly speaking the sun does revolve around the earth. That is, they revolve around each other. Centre of mass, and all that.
It really is too much to expect the public to be able to judge how best to act in terms of our constitutional future, given the diet of partisan parochialism fed to them on a daily basis by Scottish-focused ‘journalism’. So it is all the more disappointing that the SNP appear to be fully paid-up supporters if British constitutionalism. Otherwise, Scotland would not be getting removed further from the international legal order, without recourse to international law, e.g. with regards to our fundamental rights as EU citizens, or Global Health Law.
Webinar: COVID-19 as a ‘Constitutional Moment’ for Europe? The Perspective of EU Civil Society
link to reconnect-europe.eu
Mike Lothian @ 1.58pm
What vendetta against trans people?
I think it’s a legitimate question to ask in a poll amongst other questions given the politics and societal mores of today.
I don’t hear you say he has a vendetta against thiefs, peodos, speeders, dictators, science-deniers all of which there was a corresponding question to test the temperature of people’s opinion.
…but as usual one question such as ‘can women have penises’ and it’s automatically transphobic!
Has is crossed your mind as to how ‘phobic’ it comes across to women to insist that women can have penises, given that biology does not back up that statement?
***And don’t hijack people with DSD conditions in your response as they don’t want to be brought into the trans debate.
Well there’s seven science questions in there with a definite result, and they could form the simple voter intelligence test, requiring 4/7 to qualify. If you know one of the questions, you’ve got a 50/50 chance of passing on the rest.
So naturally, I’m changing my vote on:
“Sometimes the law should be different for different groups of people”
Of course, then along comes a Lib Dem lifting the bar for voting in 10-20 years time to possessing an honours degree, cos graduates are always sensible etc. And the so-called ‘Liberals’ want a different law for them (guessing tax avoidance laws for the most part).
Talking about legal rights. You need to have a legally defensible identity to be able to hope for anything as fancy as those. We don’t have rights in Brexitania, only allowances and privileges that can be removed at the stroke of a pen. Also, the common law does not extend to Scotland, apparently.
link to publiclawforeveryone.com
“Sometimes the law should be different for different groups of people”, for example, children, prisoners, or tory politicians.
@Mike Lothian @1.58 pm
Re your use of “transphobic” – define “trans”. In common parlance it is used as a prefix yet you use it as a standalone descriptor. So please enlighten us all as to whether the Rev has a fear or loathing of transsexuals, transvestites, transistors, Transformers, transatlantic travel (or indeed, any form of transport) or the good citizens of Transylvania.
Please be clear and precise so we all know what to get outraged/ offended/fit-of-the-vapourised by. Thanks.
The law is certainly not universally applied in Brexitania, and will only get more arbitrary the further Scotland is removed from the international legal order (see Treaty law), and the longer Scots law is subourdinate to English legal culture (see Parliamentary sovereignty).
link to publiclawforeveryone.com
Caught a snippet in the Guardian that ‘bored’ ravens were leaving the tower of London – isn’t there a wee theory about that?
Anyone know if they have had their wings clipped?
I would say that you definitely cannot stop the tides going in or out with a barrier. You may be able to slow the progress of the water displaced by tidal action and redirect its course but you cannot stop the actual physical action which causes the tides to ebb and flow.
Scotland needs to drink more alcohol.
‘Sweep says:
20 August, 2020 at 3:22 pm
@Mike Lothian @1.58 pm
Please be clear and precise so we all know what to get outraged/ offended/fit-of-the-vapourised by. Thanks.’
You never mentioned a sweet transvestite from transsexual Transylvania. 😉
Tides don’t really go in and out – they go up and down.
“The process of globalization is the biggest change to the world order for 350 years….
The process of change is called “globalization”. This means the erosion of national boundaries and the reduced significance of national governments. We are moving from a world with borders to one without.
…….no one knows for sure what the future world order will look like. But we do know that it will be in many respects different from today. Alongside the continued – but declining ? power of nation?states and national governments, there are now inter?governmental organizations, transnational corporations and non?governmental organizations. Globalization is reshaping the world’s system of governance.”
from link to global-directions.com
Does the SNP have a view on globalization? A trend which ultimately would reduce even large nation states to a condition of dependency, unelected agents of transnational corporations, NGOs and billionaire ‘philanthropists’ setting the political, social and cultural agenda.
Reply from BBC regarding my complaint:
“Thank you for contacting us about the Trial of Alex Salmond and we are sorry to hear of your concerns. However we don’t agree that this programme was biased or unfair.
Alex Salmond has been a senior political figure for many years and his trial and subsequent acquittal was a major news story, which received extensive coverage at the time. The outcome was fairly reflected in the programme and would have been known to everyone watching. Within that context, the film aimed to examine what impact the trial had had in terms of the ‘me too’ movement and Scottish politics. A range of different views were heard, including authoritative contributors who made points in support of Alex Salmond, such as Jim Sillars and Kenny MacAskill. Mr Salmond himself was invited to take part but declined to do so, as the film made clear. The BBC’s Editorial Guidelines require us to be duly impartial and accurate in our reporting and we believe this was the case here.
We appreciate not everyone agrees with the decisions we take but we welcome feedback and have passed your comments to senior editors of the programme.”
Is that is what the BBC calls ‘duly immpartial’.
I think it was a stitch up by at least 3 bitter, angry and deluded so called journalists who not only defamed AS but also defamed the justice system, the women who spoke for the defense and the members of the jury. This was not the verdict they wanted.
@ WhoRattledYourCage
Yes indeed. I’ve not lived in America or even visited but have known a few Americans and encountered many more online over the years of course who do have those habits of speech. Scottish kids are picking it up more now though, which seems odd since the internet has been around and accessible for over twenty years. Even before then there were American teen tv shows which became fads but didn’t have the same reach. Maybe it’s the multimedia aspect of it now? Watch American tv shows, interact with Americans online where they predominate, through twitter even sometimes with their heroes? More saturation. I remember an article from years ago saying USA is the land of small talk, they don’t like silences, they like things upbeat and positive, all friendly on the surface, bright and breezy. Seems to be the case for most.
And to your previous post about people on the street who might answer more intelligently, yes, you’re too optimistic. I’d also argue social media is what you can make it. Twitter has many real experts of all kinds and links to sites very worthwhile or interesting. Really all human life is there even if it is sometimes overrun with Texas chainsaw horrors.
@ leither
‘Since it is now become common knowledge that we only use 1/9th of out brain capacity, social media across Scotland is full of people arguing about what we use the other third for’
🙂
Dorothy 3.31 –
Lets hope it’s an Omen!
A group of at least six captive ravens are resident at the Tower of London. Their presence is traditionally believed to protect The Crown and the Tower; a superstition holds that “if the Tower of London ravens are lost or fly away, the Crown will fall and Britain with it.”
At FMQ’s Jackie Baillie quizzes the FM about the evidence presented to the AS inquiry being heavily redacted.
Wants many of the redacted sections to be restored as to be legible.
FM: Maybees Aye …maybees No was the reply. 🙁
Murder Fraser not so lucky, got his ear chewed for asking at the AS inquiry committee the question whether woman were working late at Bute house and the FM chewed his other ear today at FMQ’s for repeating it. 🙂
‘Polly says:
20 August, 2020 at 3:48 pm
@ WhoRattledYourCage
Scottish kids are picking it up more now though, which seems odd since the internet has been around and accessible for over twenty years.’
It’s not odd at all. Scottish kids are subjected to such a tsunami of Americanised shite (a pet peeve of mine, to a boring degree) that they assimilate and replicate it without even thinking aboot it, cos they think America is (sneer) ‘cool’. If they tried living there, their naive views would rapidly change. They watch shit American telly, shit American films, are all over shit American social media constantly.I would say it’s cultural colonisation, but colonisation implies something that people don’t want, and taking by force.
Sadly, it seems that young Scots are quite happy to gulp down American-atrocity-disguising soft power, in the form of their superhero-obsessed popular culture and shit fast food, and get as fat and stupid as some of the Americans I encountered over there. It’s just a crap ‘cultural’ continuum now round the world. Least non-English-speaking countries have a wee bit of shielding from it all.
I lived in the Land Of The Free (TM) from 2005-2016. I left America and came back to America Lite (TM). It was depressing hearing (“awesome, dude!”) and seeing how much this country had assimilated the American madness (as in our current political top tiers and their arsehole ‘woke’ nonsense) and vocab and such. Oh well. Cliche sera sera. Let them get on with it, except psychotic-politically, when it affects the future of this country negatively, with all this intersectionalist pish for and from morons. Fuck it.
OT but important Recd this email from Forward As One , Martin Keatings, hope Rev doesn’t mind full posting but I am fucking livid that the SG are WASTING my taxes AGAIN, it is long grab a cuppa and be angry
Update on Peoples Action on Section 30
By way of an update on the Peoples Action on Section 30, we have hit a small roadblock.
Be advised that this roadblock will not cause any delay to the first hearing on the 30th of September as scheduled.
As you are all aware, there were originally three “defenders” in the case. The first is the UK Government who the dispute exists concerning Section 30 being necessary.
The second is the Lord Advocate who represents the Scottish Parliament and the third was the Scottish Ministers AKA the Scottish Government.
Both the Lord Advocate (Scottish Parliament) and the Scottish Government were convened (that is to say named on the summons) for any interest that they might have in the case. To invite them into the court proceedings for anything they might want to say. This is an established procedure as regards previous cases of this nature.
Also, let me be abundantly clear on this important point (because several politicians have said otherwise) that neither the Scottish Parliament nor the Scottish Government had to participate in the case if they did not want to. They chose to participate. They were not dragged into it.
Let me also make another thing clear. This process we are using is not “incorrect” nor is it a “flawed approach”. The process we are using is the only proper procedure for cases of this nature. We know this for several reasons. Firstly, it was the same process used in two previous cases. And secondly, our senior legal counsel and solicitors pretty much wrote the book on this type of public law in Scotland. Not least cases like the Wightman Article 50 case and Joanna Cherry’s unlawful prorogation case. Check the records and you will find that their counsel is, for the most part, the same as ours.
To also respond to a comment made by a politician the other day, I would like to say that the defenders, that is to say, the Lord Advocate, the Advocate General or the Scottish ministers have not framed anything in these proceedings “by accident”. These are some of the most highly trained lawyers and legal professionals in the country and they do not put anything in a document “by accident”. Such language is designed only to cover certain people politically. Politics has no place in the courtroom. No law professional drafts a response in any serious constitutional argument that they did not intend to be there.
These are just matters of politics which I wished to address before addressing the little roadblock we have.
I had intended to seek to have the closed record made public. To re-iterate, the closed record is the combined record with our submissions to the court and the responses from all of the defenders in the case, then our responses to them and their responses to ours….etc. These responses and adjustments back and forth are collated in one massive record and laid out in a very organised fashion during the 8 week adjustment period we just went through. This “record” is called the “open record”.
When you get to the end of the 8 weeks and everyone has said what they want to say, that record is sent to the court as a finalised document and the court writes an order called an “interlocutor” which says that they have taken possession of that record and at that point, it becomes a “closed record”. The case is then put on the court roll. For us, that occurred a few days ago and the first date which was set was the 30th of September for us.
At this point the Scottish Government suddenly decided that it wanted to withdraw from the proceedings and filed a motion to seek the court’s permission to do so, we did not object. At that point, we simply thought that it was a simple case of removing entries from the Scottish Government from the document. However, because both the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Government were represented by the Lord Advocate, as we read the record, we can see that it is more interwoven than we thought. Remember! This “record” has both our submissions and their responses. But it also has our responses to their responses and their responses to ours. That means that if we remove a chunk of information from the submissions from the Scottish Government (which we have to do), we also have to then look at our responses to what they said and modify them so they don’t refer to what the Scottish Government said. After all, that means that when the record is made public we’d be referencing something which we are no longer allowed to reference (their defences) because they are no longer a party to the case.
I understand that sounds extremely complicated, but I would like you to imagine it this way.
Imagine a thread on Facebook. Someone makes a post and the angry person in the group goes on a tirade. Of course, all the members then respond to that person angrily and a huge thread balloons in size. Now imagine that what that angry person had said was private information and the court orders all references of what he says to be removed from social media and so all his angry comments are removed. Now you look at the thread and all you see is the responses to him with no context. Which makes the thread non-sensical! But still, you might be able to get the gist of what he was going on a tirade about by reading all the replies to him. So! The court orders that any comments which could reasonably identify what he has said are all re-written.
It’s kind of like that, but the court doesn’t need to order it, it is simply done as a matter of course. What we thought would be a simple case of just deleting the words “third defender” has turned into having to effectively re-write large chunks of the closed record to make it compliant.
This will not mean a delay to the proceedings on 30th September, but it will, unfortunately, mean that it will be quite a bit of time before we can publicly release the case arguments because it has to be re-written and checked and re-checked to ensure that it doesn’t act in bad faith towards the Scottish Government.
As soon as we know it can be made public, I shall inform you further.
I just thought I would let you know.
If you are wondering who foots the bill for re-writing this collective work of Shakespeare, the Scottish Government. It would have been much better, much less time consuming and a lot less expensive for the taxpayer if they’d just chosen not to join the case. They’re motivations for joining and then dropping out are a mystery, but ce la ve. If you are looking to work out how the mind of politicians work, it’s going to be a life long pursuit.
As always, I will update you as we move forward.
Sincerely
Martin Keatings
‘twathater says:
20 August, 2020 at 4:00 pm
OT but important Recd this email from Forward As One’
I just came to post that exact same thing.
What this series of answers show is that between 10% and 22% of our people are not very bright or rational.
13.7 million people voted Tory in the UK. The stupid are certainly around.
I think I’d go back and query those results. It seems at least possible that someone has misreported the results, probably unintentionally, at some point in the process. Human errors occur.
Martin Keatings – FFS . Why are the Scottish government acting like the enemy here. Are they the enemy?
I just don’t know what to think anymore!
Oneliner
Sheesh, of course not. Some folks don’t get satire and irony, though. Go to the top of the class.
@ WhoRattledYourCage
But still odd that even ten years ago it wasn’t nearly as prevalent here – still had American tv, internet, fast food etc. then. How much has changed in those ten years or what has caused that change. Tsunami now maybe, but not much less then though impact worse now. Saturation or the longer it goes on the worse it will become? I’m interested in trends like that but, like you, would prefer to have a buffer of a European civilisation/language between us and them.
@ twathater
‘be angry’
Not necessarily. We don’t yet know how this will play out. There could be very good reasons for the actions they’ve taken and doing this might be more cost effective longer term.
Genuine query – Not having much experience with polls, does it make a difference which order you ask these questions in? Are the short attention span individuals pretty bored by the time they get to the last couple of questions, and so any scientific capability goes ‘right oot the windae’? I just wonder if the penis question would have the same result had it been question number 2?
O/T
Blowing a gale at Troon in Woman’s Open on my computer stream.
Catriona Matthews in with a 71 ( level par) one off the lead. 🙂
Not too shabby for one of the older competitors in the field.
Well done her!
It was Aristarchus that came up with the heliocentric model a couple millenia before that thicko Galileo but, y’know, as you were……
Aye, the phrase ‘too stupid’ certainly comes to mind.
Big Jock says:
20 August, 2020 at 3:49 pm
Dorothy 3.31 –
The ravens wings are clipped.So very difficult for them to go far.This am sure they know.So unless they get a wee hand along the way,they ain’t going far.
To turn that into “the ravens are bored” because of lockdown is just another pile of raven poo.
Regarding the Sun rotating around the Earth I note that technically they both rotate around the Handy Point. In the case of the Earth and Moon it is the resultant centrifugal force which gives us our second tide in a day.
Winifred, I had exactly the same reply from the BBC, word for word. I shall follow,it up.
Re Martin Keatings from Forward As Ones email:
Is that the Elected Scottish Government or the UK Civil Service of the Scottish Government that is being referenced?
‘Polly says:
20 August, 2020 at 4:27 pm
@ WhoRattledYourCage
Saturation or the longer it goes on the worse it will become?’
Yep. Exactly. It becomes more normalized – sorry, normalised – the longer it goes on. We have ‘highway maintenance’ now instead of ‘motorway maintenance,’ ‘pharmacies’ instead of ‘chemists,’ etc etc. Scottish slanguage is being systematically eroded and consigned to the dustbin of history by a constantly flowing river of ad-and-fad-sculpted linguistic dross from America. It’s just the way things are going, and there is no stopping it. And mea culpa, because I wrote the first ever Scottish novel with all-American spellings, to make a pointed point aboot cultural colonisation…and to fuck with Scottish literary linguistics purists. 🙂
It is hard to determine what exactly is going on, apart from Scotland’s constitutional subjugation, of course. You know a constitutional order has come to pass, when it turns towards populist majoritarianism without the legal Establishment so much as blinking an eye.
link to researchgate.net
Big jock yep wtf ,
Twathater thanks for the info because we ain’t going to get it from Scot gov by the looks of it makes you kinda wonder if Scot gov are following the Pete Wishart suggestion of do f all in case the boogie man gets cross ,
Aye made a good career out of do f all eh Pete ? along with yer pal ” Scotland won’t be dragged out of Europe against our will ” Blackford .
For months now it’s been 1step forward 2 back just when a lot of people well just me probably are starting to give Scot gov a bit of leeway and support another wee WTF pops up bloody confusing who is on one side or the other side if it was Whack a Mole you would be bleedn exhausted , all this going on while the most useless Tory government in history are wrecking the joint and nobody’s stopping them , aye it’s ok us stupid Jocks like being kicked in the nuts don’t worry we don’t fight back .
Daisy Walker says:
20 August, 2020 at 2:18 pm
‘I blame the teachers’
One of my favourite scenes from The Simpsons was the Headie, standing on the steps of the school in preparation for parent/teachers night. Above him was a welcoming banner stating,
‘Parent/Teachers Night – Lets Share The Blame’.
Quite.
In my own case, I blame my parents. 🙂
The Scottish Parliament object to the Forward as One case. Not just the Scottish Govt .
Just let that sink in for a moment. Now try and convince me the SNP are not deliberately hindering Independence.
Important to note, however, since Darwin is being used, that his book On the Origin of Species (which I have read – not easy btw) is, in fact, still theory.
the Theory of Evolution is exactly that, a theory, not unlike the theory of the big bang.
Difficulty we have is that some people accept this as fact (as opposed to stating they simply believe it to be correct, which is fine) and if they hear someone state the correct position that they are both in fact, theories, react in a manner which is quite troubling.
Interestingly plenty of people – who may even come across as perfectly sane and reasonable – when asked if the Apollo mission ‘evidence’ would be accepted in a court of law suddenly find themselves floundering because all they have is hearsay
Save for some dodgy second hand video footage, there is exactly, zero evidence. No telemetery, no verifiable data, no samples, no technology, no computers, no equipment – in fact, even the original tapes have been ‘lost’.
They also struggle to explain, when asked (my personal favourite) why space men helmet visors are concave and not convex – particularly if they understand anything about pressure.
It all makes you wonder doesn’t it. Who would’ve thought science would become a cult.
got my concaves and convexes mixed up in my dinner time haste, didn’t I!
point remains
@ Angela at 4.37
The order in which questions are asked in a poll can affect how people answer, which is why sometimes pollsters split their panel and present the questions in different orders to different people (eg I’ve often had “none of the above” or “for another reason” part-way down a list of potential answers!).
Here, however, the 12 answers are presented in order of popularity, which may or may not have been the order in which the questions were asked of some/all respondents.
Can we not just try to keep our feet on the ground and our eyes on the prize?
Human Development, 2016, Vol.59, No. 5
Moving beyond the Relational Worldview: Exploring the Next Steps Premised on Agency and a Commitment to Social Change
link to karger.com
Robert Louis says:
20 August, 2020 at 2:17 pm
“Here’s a fun fact I heard recently, regarding the earth going around the sun. The planet jupiter actually doesn’t revolve exactly around the sun. Due to jupiter being so incredibly maaaaassive, it exerts such a gravitational effect, that the point of rotation, is just above the surface of the sun”
It’s called the baricentre. I’m just being a smartarse as I know that one!
Every object has a gravitational effect on another one. The greater the mass, the greater the effect. So imagine you are dancing the Dashing White Sergeant and your two partners are Ms Baillie and Boris Johnson, and the opposite three are Ian Blackford, Ruth Davidson and Alistair Carmichael.
I’ll leave the rest to your imagination, but you might achieve escape velocity…
@ Polly 4.27pm be angry , yes Polly I am angry , as Martin stated the SG didn’t need to become involved NO ONE forced them , at the beginning of the sect30 action there was a delay CAUSED by the SG indecision whether to take part , the SG having made up its mind to do so then asked for a further delay which Martin opposed in agreement with contributors , then the RECORDS for ALL proposers and objectors had to be ratified and collated to forward the motion
Recently the SG then decided to STEP BACK, now all the responses to the SG’S submissions will have to be deleted and rewritten to form any semblance of sense which Martin has covered admirably
Throughout all this, crowdfunding has had to be sought from people who are suffering from the financial impacts of austerity and covid, people who maybe feel that this additional drain on their finances is worrying but also feel that this case is extremely important and maybe a milestone in our quest for independence so feel unable to NOT DONATE
Many people MYSELF included believe that this case should have been brought by the SNP SG as NS alluded to, BUT NO a private individual has HAD to step into the breech and DO what OUR SG should be doing , now they are CREATING more unnecessary obstacles (is it by accident or deliberately)
I understand from Martin’s email that the SG will have to pay for the rewriting of the submissions, if that is indeed the case then it is MORE OF MINE AND YOUR TAXES spaffed into lawyers pockets with NO discernible advantage to the case
So YES Polly I am not just angry I am f***ING incendiary
Beaker: “I’ll leave the rest to your imagination,”
Um, no thanks, I’m in the middle of lunch.
@ JWT 5.12PM Big Jock , Robert Graham , this is the quandary we find ourselves being subjected too this confusion is it deliberate
The SNP SG , THE SG , THE (WESTMINSTER) SCOTTISH GOVT CIVIL SERVICE , OR THE SCOTTISH PARLIAMENT
Reminds me of the opinion poll a few years back that revealed that 2% of Labour voters in Scotland are horses.
“Also, y’know, “cute and awesome!” is definitely how men talk.”
Yes you’re right – I used that very phrase the other day.
More on the unaccountable and the unelected and their ‘great reset’.
link to spiked-online.com
Something for which masks, social distancing and the fabled vaccine offer zero protection.
Putting up barriers, being authentic, developing and promoting your national culture, defying the gobbledegook global English and not taking one world bullshit from rich American guys could.
I did credit the future king of England with rather more sense.
Ça ira! Ça ira!
For those worried about the Americanisation of English
That’s nothing new.
Though be aware that any individual objection might turn out not to be an Americanism after all!
link to languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu
As a current and very relevant example.
The OED has this as for ‘woke’
to wake to: to become conscious or aware of; to become ‘alive’ to
1836 E. Bulwer-Lytton Athens (1837) II. 129 When the Greeks first woke to the certainty, that the vast preparations of Xerxes menaced Greece as the earliest victim
100thidiot
From wikipedia:
A scientific theory is an explanation of an aspect of the natural world that can be repeatedly tested and verified in accordance with the scientific method, using accepted protocols of observation, measurement, and evaluation of results.
Notice the repeatedly tested and verified part? So either you’re trying to be “cute and awesome” or we need to add you to the list of Darwin’s Failures.
The article about Whitley is worth a minute of your time (first link). I was introduced to the non-term ‘transgender medicine”. Apparently, it was all the doctors’ faults that he was treated as a man and nearly died. Live as you wish, but there comes a time when reality will bite.
Ottomanboi
That you wanting us to believe the right-wing are in some way committed to a human-rights narrative, or are you simply having a pop at social justice? Do you have a critical argument against the woke perspective and inclusive teaching practices, or are you simply a bit of a reactionary?
Does the United Kingdom
still have a constitution?
By
Anthony King
Essex County Council Millennium Professor of British Government,
Essex University
This new work, based on the 52nd series of Hamlyn Lectures delivered by Anthony King, one of the UK’s leading political commentators, examines the British constitutional tradition and explores where it is now heading.
Contents
I Describes no fewer than a dozen major constitutional changes that have taken place over the past thirty years
I Maintains that, although no one seems to have noticed the fact, the traditional British constitution no longer exists
I Insists that there is, as yet, no constitutional settlement and that the constitution is still in flux
link to socialsciences.exeter.ac.uk
Sorry for the bold throughout.
Stuart MacKay
When a Theory is proven it becomes a Law.
And you’re quoting wikipedia.
Fuck me. The Theory of both Evolution and Big Bang have been verified by ‘consensus’ only – that is NOT science.
Here’s another Fact. ‘Professor’ Brian Cox got a D for A Level Maths and once said, on camera, that the curve shadow on the moon was a result of the shadow being cast from the Earth – proving Earth to be round.
Holy mother fucking fuck, is what I say to that one.
And before you default to derangement syndrome by calling me a Flat -Earther, I believe that the Milankovitch Cycle should be taught in secondary schools – but then that wouldn’t do the global warming/climate change scam any good now, would it.
Stuart Mackay
and for the avoidance of doubt, one of the main problems for science is the Law of Bio-Genesis.
Life must come from life.
Go figure, right now, in 2020, the bloody Bible is more accurate than modern day science – one of the reasons I have such little faith in modern day science.
Now, I am not denying human evolution from sludge, but in the words of one of the scientists mapping human DNA (and I paraphrase here) its a bit like a tornado ripping through a scrap yard and leaving a perfectly formed Ferrari behind – which should make any intelligent person think a wee bit harder about the Party line.
If only the SNP had not embraced genderwoowoo, they might then have twigged to calling on the protective power of international law. Unfortunately, they appear determined to avoid rational law all costs, preferring Westminster’s assumed constitutional authority instead, apparently.
link to ejil.org
I took this article at face value which was intended to be a humorous take on social values, perceptions and norms. So the words cute and awesome didn’t register with me as controversial. From my viewpoint I hear the word awesome a lot usually by the younger members of the extended family. Cute is a word I seldom hear usually used in the context of my pet cat. I sometimes hear that expression used by clients to describe their colleagues eg they are playing it cute. For me word usage it’s always about the intent. Stu gets a pass from me. The words were used to illustrate a perspective rather than give offence.
Oh my goodness that whole article had me in fits of giggles. I know the fact so many of my fellow Scots are thick as mince and clearly wired to the moon ( which only sometimes revolves round the Earth) should have me in despair, I did laugh. Never has the phrase ‘they walk amongst us’ been more apt. AND THEY HAVE THE VOTE AND SERVE ON JURIES.
You appear like BoJo to be a big fan of the output of former members of The Radical Communist Party @Ottomanboi says at 6:36 pm
link to web.archive.org
“Other RCP veterans, such as Frank Furedi, Mick Hume and Brendan O’Neill, are fixtures in the Tory press and its associated journal, the Spectator. For decades they’ve also organised a profusion of post-RCP organisations, including the magazine Living Marxism (later LM), the website Spiked, and the Institute of Ideas”
Re that trans identifying female who became very ill: I have no sympathy, it was her own fault, she withheld vital info from the doctors. Fruit loop.
Unless the Scottish government starts following better legal advice, I simply can’t see how they can hope to defend Scotland’s constitutional identity from authoritarian English nationalism.
Scientific Objects and Legal Objectivity
link to bruno-latour.fr
“Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.”
? George Carlin
anyhoo,
Gravity , fundamentally why do objects attract other objects, from the molecule to the star system,
is the belief in gravity an act of faith.
Language fads…
Back in the 80s, I was subjected to my first long term exposure to the Australian accent, courtesy of Neighbours.
I soon realised that Australians treat every sentence as a question, even if it’s declarative, by the use of the upward inflection.
Within a few years, I became aware that many young people (young teens onwards) had adopted this style of language. I have found out that it’s termed “upspeak”. It’s still on the go today.
Neighbours has a lot to answer for…
link to youtube.com
link to youtube.com
Stuart Mackay
Given the nature of the article above
I would have normally given ahundredthidiot top marks for trolling with his viewpoints.
But he’s punted this guff on here before
So instead its best just to think of him as bearing a close resemblance to Saul Goodman’s brother, Chuck.
link to archive.is
@ahundredthidiot says:
20 August, 2020 at 7:11 pm
“Go figure, right now, in 2020, the bloody Bible is more accurate than modern day science”
David Icke, come on down!!
Nicola Sturgeon back at it again with the fear mongering. Apparently cases are at “an all time high”. Remind us again nicola how many people in the past month have died of covid, how many have been hospitalized? And how many people have died of the summer flu in the past month (spoiler its more than covid)? Everyone can see through your painfully obvious pivot from talking about deaths and hospitalizations to irrelevant cases.
And why this false choice between schools and offices? What evidence does she or her extreme doom mongering advisors have that shows that it is a choice between one or the other? It was only a few weeks ago that she was saying that it was a choice between schools and pubs, but the pubs are still open I guess it was either or after all.
13. ”Sometimes there are trolls on Wings Over Scotland”
Agree: 100%
Disagree: 0
@bipod-
My dear maw-in-law lives in a spanking new sheltered housing complex. Soo-perb.
A lot of the residents already knew each other from a previous place which had to be demolished. For years they’ve got together twice a week to play cards and dominos in the common room.
The common room in this new place was shut months ago and the managers still refuse to open it. So, my maw-in-law and her pals can go across the road to the local pub for a pint if they want, they can go to Morrison’s Cafe if they want, but they can’t be trusted to socially distance in their own pad?
Bonkers.
Poor Geordie pordi pudding in pie.
Doesn’t seem to pick his mates very well.
link to twitter.com
What surprised me most about that poll is that overall Tories came out the least stupid. hmm.
Has anyone read this. Explosive, gobsmacked!!
link to threadreaderapp.com
3.html
link to threadreaderapp.com
Why is a interjection on a section 30 a surprise? We have had an interjection on a man’s innocence. Vested interest I ask you to stand back and consider what’s happening. Some people think they are untouchable. I am now going to watch the Nine. Will it advance my understanding of the developing situation. I live in hope..
Oneliner-
One of trolls might be Wishy Washy.(AKA something you burn in Scotland)
Agree 85%
Disagree 15%
@Big Jock (8.46) –
Here it is without the breaks.
“1. “Sometimes the Sun revolves around the Earth”
Agree: 27%
Disagree: 73%”
What? Seriously. What the actual fuck?
That’s it, no more internet for me. Bloody well surrounded by morons 🙁
Ian. To me it’s one of the best angry blogs I have read. Martin is expressing every little aspect of our grievance against our leaders.
He certainly didn’t miss. Direct hit. The people are revolting as someone said!
The Nine did it advance my understanding? Well their Russian report. To quote, I am for Russia but I want I different Russia Touche!
I want an Independent Scotland but not this pish where it is ok to incarcerate an innocent man and incorporate ridiculous policies. An Indy Scotland needs to take everyone with them. Scotland is a socially conservative country. Deal with it!
Ps Stu jammy Aberdeen win but I hope it cheers the City up.
Yes indeed Big Jock – he certainly didn’t miss and hit the wall.
I’m so pissed off with the SNP that I’m tempted to spend another £25!
A barrel of snakes, the lot of ‘em.
They think that if Martin loses it will have negative consequences. The SNP don’t want to challenge Boris because they are feart!
Pete Wishart has admitted that. Better to do nothing , than find out the truth. When did the SNP become so spineless.
On the Ning Nang Nong
Where the Cows go Bong!
and the monkeys all say BOO!
There’s a Nong Nang Ning
Where the trees go Ping!
And the tea pots jibber jabber joo
For the science deniers.
@Big Jock says:
20 August, 2020 at 9:56 pm
They think that if Martin loses it will have negative consequences. The SNP don’t want to challenge Boris because they are feart!
Pete Wishart has admitted that. Better to do nothing , than find out the truth. When did the SNP become so spineless.
When the prospect of a nice number at the UN cropped up.
Cynical- Which is why we need to take our party back from Sturgeon.
As one of the Irish Freedom fighters advised-
“Get off your knees and your enemy doesn’t look so big”.
@ bipod
nrs have now stopped giving death data on a weekly basis because deaths are below average but, according to their other records from 1974 onwards, it is worth highlighting that the total deaths to week 32 exceeded those in 2020 (when adjusted for population) in years 1999, 1997 and every year before 1994.
Without adjusting for population, the total deaths to week 32 exceeded those in 2020 in 1976, 78, 79, 82 & 86.
Unfortunately this means that my own claim for covid related academic upgrades might be futile since, despite being able to corroborate a contemporaneously dispassionate political environment, the population adjustments might be skewed depending on how many of the 225000 EEA citizens, who provided a significant population boost between 2005 – 2014, are in the at risk or postal voting category.
@Big Jock
Problem is the NEC and who is on it as they have all the power now, starvation of funds is the only way that will remove the greed at the top. They have become worse than Blair and the only war they have started is with Yessers.
@WhoRattledYourCage (1.11pm on previous thread) –
No sah, I did not. And I never will.
PS Can you give us more detail about your novel please?
The SNP don’t want Martin Keatings to succeed because it destroys the SNP’s fake excuses for doing nothing.
So, they have done whatever they can to play “dog in a manger”.
For the SNP: link to youtube.com
Ian Brotherhood says:
PS Can you give us more detail about your novel please?
Is it coloured in ?
All of the above discussion on CrowdJustice
Has augured well with funds nearing £140K
From 4,638 individuals.
£15,000 still required to hit the target and bolster Mark.
Be good if it all came in from 5,000 supporters within the
14 days remaining.
link to crowdjustice.com
Colin – Very apt.
Could also be applied to their vote SNP 1 and 2 strategy. They know they can’t win any seats, but they can’t stand anyone else in the Indy movement getting them.
Maybe they should rename. The Selfish National Party!
Bipod
Shut up you boring git.
Accept the things YOU cannot change.
Martin Keatings better watch who he mixes with these days.
Sturgeon will have ten willing female stooges set up, all willing to swear in court that he molested them when they weren’t looking.
This is how low Scottish politics has become.
Sturgeon will have Keatings on her evil little radar.
robbo
You shut up,
You boring git.
Shall we all do a ‘wings crowdfund’ magic trick and see if we can get Michael over the line in the shortest time possible? Thanks for posting link Effijy:
link to crowdjustice.com
@ twathater
I understand what would be involved as far as the withdrawal and changes of submissions go. I understand too some of the emotion involved. I agree the SNP should have acted sooner to ensure we should never have been placed in this situation where time is ticking down and the fate of Scotland seems desparate, I agonise over that myself.
However I always had doubts about this legal action and how effective, or even how damaging, it might be. There was also the concern that it was raising people’s hope far too high with too little reason for such hope, and that the outcome, even if it went his way, could be inconclusive. I also had concerns about some of the information Martin was putting out, such as the wording on original crowdfunder and it’s subsequent changes, and perhaps also with this information now. Recently reading Aileen McHarg and Peatworrier makes me believe my own natural caution and scepticism might be correct. His initial ideas/objectives were changed by counsel into something more legitimate to be able to be justiciable. We don’t know yet why the Scottish government withdrew or what any of their submissions said. There’s also the cost aspect to this and the timescale, for there may well be appeals and further delay.
I too hope things go well at the end of September, but even then there’s so many unknowns. I’d urge caution and constraint on anyone thinking this a panacea for all our ills even if he succeeds. And I fear there’s much worse emotional hurdles to come so best save some of that anger for later.
@ Effijy
‘“Get off your knees and your enemy doesn’t look so big”
Hadn’t heard that before but it’s a good one. Thanks for posting.
@ WhoRattledYourCage
‘And mea culpa, because I wrote the first ever Scottish novel with all-American spellings’
I won’t be taking any advice from you then about making points. 😉
K1 @ 11.33
Hi K1, can’t mind if you actually met him!
But you almost certainly spoke here…so I just thought you would want to know that Smallaxe passed away this morning..
Just heard of the passing of ‘Smallaxe’
A most grievous loss to us.
My condolences to his family.
May peace be upon him.
@ ahundredthidiot
‘got my concaves and convexes mixed up in my dinner time haste, didn’t I!
point remains’
Does it?
@smallaxe
rip
sad
🙁
So sorry to hear about Smallaxe. Never actually met him, but he appeared as a gentle soul from his postings in O/T in the past.
Condolences to his family.
Liz g
Just read your post about Smallaxe!
This is sad news. Sad for him that he didn’t live long enough to see Scotland Independent but glad he is beyond pain and sadness.
I will raise a glass to him and let us all work a bit harder to win the freedom that he wanted for Scotland.
Smallaxe I salute you- rest in peace.
Thanks for the info Liz g.
RIP Smallaxe, the Border Warrior
Sorry to hear about Smallaxe. He was a man of great strength.
A great Winger and gentle of nature. See you anon.
Hundredthidiot
You really are living up to your name tonight with your science denying nonsense.
Your first point that there is no evidence of the actual moon landings is childish “heard it on the Internet” rubbish. I worked for a large company in St Louis called Thermal Science who provided heat shields for the re-entry of the spacecraft. They were only one of thousands of companies and hundreds of thousands of scientists and skilled engineers who together built the Apollo project which flew, not once, but six times to the moon and brought back over a tonne of moon rock. Do you seriously think that the worldwide science community can be fooled.
In your second point you try, stupidly, to throw doubt on Darwin’s theory of evolution, using the ignorant phrase “just a theory”. Of course it is a Theory. All science is based on Theories which other scientists try to falsify or verify. In Darwin’s case it has never been falsified.
Then finally you mock Brian Cox for pointing out the curvature of the Earths shadow on the moon during eclipses. He is of course correct. What do you expect to see when a spherical body is between the sun and the moon?
i believe the original drafters of the treaty of Union inserted certain safeguards (ie) Legal system Education and probably many more because they really didn’t trust the English establishment ‘
Our useless politicians over the years have failed to defend what was bequeathed them and have allowed the slow erosion of these safeguards all out of sight maybe so as not to scare us and please their new pals in Westminster ,you listening Pete ? .
That i believe is why we are in this position just now having to crowd fund what Scot guv should be doing , the present lot are just perpetuating the rot and dont have the bottle to say to the English establishment fiddle off yah bunch of tossers or words to that effect probably in more measured polite language
Very sorry to hear the sad news about Small axe tonight.
Enjoyed his posts and short comments, they were always positive and without rancour.
Condolences to his family and friends.
So sorry to hear that Smallaxe has passed away. He was a wiity contributor to this blog and very kind too.
If you are a big tree,
We are a small axe
Coming to cut you down
Cut you down
Whosoever diggeth a pit
Shall fall in it.
Fall in it.
These are the words of my master,
No evil shall prosper.
(Bob Marley)
re Smallaxe sad to hear of his passing so used to seeing the name pop up like many others disappeared now and we are still going over the same ground with no real progress been made if anything we are going backwards , so give the old impatient ones a little leeway old men in a hurry haven’t got the time for the pleasantries so if a grumpy old git says duck off in reply to a comment made ,its probably because repeating the same stuff that shouldn’t need constant repetition gets bloody annoying ,and they say old folk have bad memories Christ
So sorry to hear about Smallaxe. I always enjoyed reading his posts on here. A brave and positive spirit.
It’s always sad to hear of somebody’s passing but from the posts I’ve read Smallaxe was a very decent kind of guy.
So very sorry to read of Smallaxes passing. Deepest condolences to his family and friends. A very decent man. RIP.
link to caltonjock.com
Fast-breeder reactors were conceived in the Fifties when uranium – the nuclear industry’s raw material – was scarce.
At the same time, the US was being uncooperative in sharing nuclear expertise, despite Britain’s role in developing the atom bomb.
So UK nuclear chiefs set up a fast breeder programme to ensure fuel independence and stationed it in remote Caithness, Scotland – because they feared their first test reactor might explode.
They even encased it in a giant sphere of steel, known as Fred the Golf Ball – Fred standing for Fast Reactor Experiment in Dounreay – to contain any blast. At least that is what the Scottish public was told
Daydreaming government officials also conjectured that it could be converted into a visitor centre after closure.
Liz g sorry to hear the sad news of SMALLAXE passing , I met him once at the WOS stall at the Bannockburn march I think it was , small in stature but a giant in belief and fortitude RIP smallaxe peace be with you
@Fireproofjim says:
21 August, 2020 at 12:08 am
Hundredthidiot
“What do you expect to see when a spherical body is between the sun and the moon?”
You are wasting your time with him. I’ll bet he wasn’t aware that the Babylonians had worked out the Earth was a sphere, and they made some astonishing accurate astronomical observations, some of which survive to this day.
@boris says:
21 August, 2020 at 1:17 am
“Dounreay – Daydreaming government officials also conjectured that it could be converted into a visitor centre after closure.”
Hey, it will be safe in 313 years, just in time for Indyref2…
There’s only one thing left to say this night.
PEACE ALWAYS…
goodbye smallaxe
RIP mon ami
Polly @ 11.42pm
I don’t share your concerns, I think Martin has brought forward a good case – but no it isn’t any kind of panacea, it’s just a very very small part of what we need to get moving forward again. It feels like a stuck record at the moment – the SNP insisting we need a s30 is a political choice, not necessarily the law, and this will be our and their answer. They are reluctant to find out, for whatever reason, but WE need to know – how can we have a worthwhile strategy otherwise?
Martin will have gone to solicitors and asked if there was a case to answer, and they would have said yes and proposed a crowdfunder – but you don’t get to know what the argument is until you pay the money! So it was a risk on the first crowdfunder, but the argument is sound (O’Neill was instructed to produce it), and the court agrees. This time we don’t get to know any of the arguments until the court releases them. It’s not Martin that isn’t being clear, it’s the way the law works.
Whether you think the result will be useful or not is a matter of opinion – PeatWorrier thinks not, I think it is – and if you think it isn’t that’s fine. Martin’s character seems a bit volatile, but if you read his Twitter feed you see that he has health problems and it on a cocktail of medication, and I think it’s good he hasn’t allowed it to affect his determination to keep pushing on with the case.
All I’m saying is, you should not focus on Martin as your reasons for supporting or not supporting the case – he’s coordinating it for us, but it is the legal team that say they have a legal argument and it is some of us paying for it.
I can’t advocate doing nothing and expecting anything to change! If there were lots of things happening to move us forward, to make change happen, this case would be a tiny thing – it has only reached prominence because it’s the only thing that’s being done.
Polly, to continue – I keep hearing this vague thing of the case being ‘damaging’ – I think it can’t be, but I’ve never seen the arguments that say why it would be – do you know any of them? I’m genuinely interested.
On a scale of 1 to 10, say 10 being the ‘most damaging’ e.g. Producing the Vow during purdah in 2014, and never even getting so much as a fine for it, how would you rate the damaging aspect (even if it’s just a feeling about it)?
I’m just trying to gauge how strongly people feel in general, I’m not trying to put pressure on you personally!
RIP Smallaxe: he was always kind, welcoming to new voices, funny and totally committed to restoring Scotland and our belief in ourselves.
Sorry to hear the news about Smallaxe. Enjoyed reading his posts. One of the good guys. Condolences to his family.
Sorry to hear about Smallaxe – a few years ago he said on here ‘Scotland the Brave v Scotland the Slave’, and I asked him if I could use that on a T-shirt. He very kindly said of course and I will remember him – he was one of the Brave ones.
BBC Scotland:
Douglas Ross: Scottish Conservative leader vows to ‘stand up’ to PM.
“The new Scottish Conservative leader has insisted he will not be afraid to criticise Boris Johnson if he believes the prime minister is not acting in Scotland’s best interests.”
“Mr Ross said he was not surprised at Nicola Sturgeon’s confirmation that there will an independence referendum pledge in the SNP’s election manifesto as the party’s raison d’etre is to “separate Scotland from the rest of the UK”.
He said: “Putting that front and foremost on her manifesto again shows her priorities are for the separatists rather than securing a positive future for Scotland”.
There has been speculation that Mr Carlaw was effectively forced out as leader to make way for Mr Ross – with former party leader Ruth Davidson being spotted visiting Mr Ross’s home days before Mr Carlaw quit.
But Mr Ross again insisted that he had not known in advance that Mr Carlaw was going to step down, and that Ms Davidson had visited him in a “personal capacity” rather than to discuss the leadership.
More here:
link to bbc.co.uk
Rest in peace Mr Smallaxe.
Smallaxe was one of the very, very few of you Wingers that I’ve actually met in the flesh. Memory is fickle, but I think it was Dumfries AUOB.
He was tolerant and accomodating of my own grumblings at a time when many commentators here were not. I couldn’t tell whether that was because he agreed with me to some degree, or whether it was a grandfatherly type of kindness, but somehow it didn’t matter.
It struck me Smallaxe’s inclusiveness and kindness was the perfect personification of the entire YES movement, at least as it was back then.
RIP Smallaxe.
Sadly never got to meet him came across as a decent type, will be missed.
Condolences to his family.
Douglas Ross says he will stand up against Boris if he doesn’t do well for Scotland?
Strange I didn’t hear anything from Mr Ross about how Scotland voted No
as his party said it was the only way we could stay in the EU.
Nothing from him when we voted 62% against Brexit, but it’s forced upon us.
Nothing from him as N Ireland gets stay in the EU trading block as requested
While Scotland is denied.
Nothing about the high speed railway for England that Scotland must contribute to.
The long standing rule applies. If you hear a Tory use the word Scotland, they are lying to you!
When you consider these answers maybe it makes sense of why some people think dictatorship might be better than democracy…..
Sad news this morning.
RIP Smallaxe.
He was the first to engage with me in conversation BTL on Wings when I stopped lurking all those years ago.
If anyone is in contact with his family could they please pass on my condolences.
I think martin keatings case is the reason the unionists are throwing the all scots in england should get to vote scenario.if we are to believe the boris will keep saying no to a referendum script and that would be enough.galloway Neil and Gove wouldn’t be kicking off as they are.when this is all over and is written in history books I think it will be people like martin auob bloggers and the thousands of people who gave what little time and money they had that brought about independence.the snp mps who took the coin yes pete you and your like.the top tier of the snp who prefer personel power to ridding scotland of food banks and nuclear weapons Mr Murrell and Mr Smith.there time will come at the ballot box and etched in the memory of the people they betrayed.
@Liz g,
Sorry, I too enjoyed Smallaxe postings and often found encouragement, as Capella highlights above, simply by reflecting on his choice of pen name (and its simile, the tomahawk).
Now feel a right shit for posting from abroad earlier about deaths being below average so again, sorry, and deepest condolences to all family & friends.
PS in spirit of firing tomahawks, one observation in respect of the lack of clarity on S30 is that whilst none of Pete Wishart’s arguments have roots in official SNP policy, any substantiation of 77 brigade (or similar) involvement in Scottish politics pursuant to the Edinburgh agreement probably means that the English/ UK side of that agreement remains unfulfilled in any event.
Message to P Diddy Wishart.
It’s not the people who are splitting the movement. It’s arrogant people like you and your leaders. Stop being so arrogant as to assume superiority.
You assume because yes is ahead in a few polls that it’s all down to your strategy. It’s not. It’s because Boris and the Tories are currently screwing up the economy, the pandemic and Brexit. The SNP and the indi vote is rising in exact proportion to the failure of our enemy.
We in the movement do not agree with your Section 30 strategy, your failure to use the mandates, the glacial pace of the process, your treatment of Salmond. We also don’t see any concrete action to protect Scotland from the power grab in December. Don’t tell us to trust you when you can’t communicate with the people. December is 4 months away. Any legislation you may have to prevent the power grab would need to have been through Holyrood by now. So it’s clear you intend to sit on your arse until May 2021!
You then hope for a stonking SNP majority. You then expect us to believe that Boris will hand you the Section 30 on a plate. So far that has failed abysmally. If you can’t prove to us you have an alternative strategy, then how can we trust you when your leader fails every time.
As for Martin Keatings. He is doing something you should have done 3 years ago. Except the SNP don’t have the balls to do it , because you are feart of failure.
You are out of step with the movement , not the other way around. You are splitting the movement. You don’t listen. When people stop listening they stop learning. Ultimately they lose all their friends.
Think about that Pete. Now get your arse off those green benches and feckin do something other than Twitter posts.
RIP Smallaxe
Regardless of how Martin Keatings’ court case goes – we can look forward to an all-out Unionist assault on the SNP in the 2021 Holyrood election.
They will throw every piece of dirt and misinformation they can dredge-up, and every lie they can think of, in defence of “our precious Union.”
A thumping SNP/pro-Independence majority may result in a Westminster-run referendum, but, I fear, never again will WEstminster allow a straight Yes or No vote – they know they will lose that.
Be prepared for lots more: “Let’s rewrite the Act of Union” and “Yes, it is time for a Federal UK.” They may even gamble on giving the many Anglo-Scots a vote – the question here would be: who qualifies?
Would it be restricted to Scots-born, or would it, as with sports teams, go as far back as grand-parents’ rights.
Whatever, they will, if we allow Westminster to run any referendum, look to them to muddy the waters sufficiently to make a Yes majority all but impossible.
Still, an SNP majority was supposedly impossible at Holyrood, and that has been done once. If they do make any referendum UK-wide and include that part of the Caledonian Diaspora living in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, someone high-up in the Tory Party, perhaps even BoJo himself, would have to go head-to-head with Nicola. Whoever they put up, would lose that one.
Never forget, when push coes to shove Britannia – who is to her core English, will waive the rules.
Socrates- I think the precedent was set with the voting Franchise in 2014.
I think that will have to remain the same or end up in court! However I could see them trying to go for a multi option referendum. Sturgeon to me is a federalist, so she might fall for that one! Albeit it would never be accepted by the movement.
The other one they might try is the super majority. Where any majority under 55% was not recognized as conclusive. Again I can’t see the people or the government accepting that.
Realistically it might be more of a trade off on the debt and Faslane. Where England could lease Faslane for a decade post independence.
If the SNP fall for any tricks then they are dafter than many of us think.
P.S Is it just me , or does Ruth Davidson look more like Hitler everyday! He was also fond of making frothing a the mouth speeches full of resentment, bitterness and hatred.
Socrates MacSporran 8.57am
So are you advocating an SNP 1 & 2 at the Holyrood elections next year?
One more push, one more Mandate.
Or are you for a List Party that would hold the SNP to account?
big Jock
your voicing many many people’s thoughts
every single point is true most are sick to the back teeth of hanging around doing f all every single recommendation followed by reasons for not doing what they were entrusted to do bloody useless
Big Jock says:
21 August, 2020 at 9:07 am
Socrates- I think the precedent was set with the voting Franchise in 2014.
I think that will have to remain the same or end up in court! ….
A very timely reminder I’ve just lefted from Barrheadboy’s Twitter feed…
link to twitter.com
This is a poigniant reminder why Joanna Cherry is indispensible to us.
Rest in Peace Smallaxe,
met him at Bannockburn Wings stall,
good patriots dying before they see an independent Scotland is a travesty,
find it hard to forgive the No campaigners, be it political or media or business, that lied about their countries ability to be a successful nation for self advancement and cash,
Under the wide and starry sky,
Dig the grave and let me lie.
Glad did I live and gladly die,
And I laid me down with a will
This be the verse you grave for me:
Here he lies where he longed to be;
Home is the sailor, home from sea,
And the hunter home from the hill.
Big Jock
The famous Ruth Davidson Holyrood Frown,
Grrrrrrrrrrrr!!!
She looks ever so manly while frowning.
And are her arms shrinking?
Because the arms of those suit jackets she wears seem to be a good few inches too long.
And are we now meant to bow to her, now that she is one step away from being crowned Queen of Engerland?
Stuart Mctavish @8.45
You mustn’t feel bad at all my friend!
Smallaxe would not want you to.
His hurt would be the same as yours if anyone was needlessly dying here or abroad,and to point it out….Marks yer humanity on a level we all recognise as..his too.. because that’s the way he rolled.
Asking this question as I’ve never seen exactly where it is defined.
Commentators keep on referring to Westminster as the sovereign parliament but where does it actually state this, it’s not in the Treaty of Union, it merely states there will be a single parliament, it doesn’t say sovereign or ‘forever after’, it doesn’t even say it will be in London or London is the capital.
As far as I can see these things are so because England says so not because it was in any treaty.
o/t
I was listening to Grouse beater the other night on Indy Live Stream and was surprised to find out Broon has never crossed the threshold of Holyrood ,
Thats right never been in the place if true and i dont doubt for a moment Grouse beaters comment , most of us know he couldn’t bring himself to acknowledge Alex Salmond when he became First Minister but i never realized just how bitter that article realty is a really damaged twisted personality .
For those of you who don’t follow links, let me quote Joanna Cherry from March this year…
“…it’s worth remembering that the Devolution Settlement, which this Bill will undermine, was predicated on the idea expressed in the Claim of Right for Scotland, which asserts that it is the sovereign right of the Scottish People to determine the form of Government best suited to their needs…”
To paraphrase what Joanna is saying, “The Devolution Settlement”,, which is literally the Scotland Act, and the infamous Section 30 is Section 30 of the Scotland Act…was predicated on the Claim of Right; the Claim of Right which asserts the constitutional principle from the 1320 Declaration of Arbroath that Scottish people are sovereign.
Robert – The unionist Scot’s hatred of his own nation , knows absolutely no bounds.
They are the lowest of the low sometimes.
Hugsie @ 9.23
Whit on earth has Ruth Davisons Jackit tae dae wi the political position of Scotland under discussion?
Yev lost me here???
My thoughts on Gerrymandering the Indy ref 2.
There will be attempts to re frame the question . To play tricks with peoples minds. It will not succeed.
Remember this is all about money and personal gain for the Tories. So it’s more likely they will try and get a longer transition period post indy. They want as much of that oil as they can get. They want our taxes for as long as they can as well.
They may want rights to fish in our waters , access to Faslane , Scotland to share some of the deficit. Anything that involves bleeding more money out of Scotland.
Liz G – If the suit fits? Or in Ruth’s case doesn’t .
We were just having a bit of fun. It’s allowed now and again.
It has to be a List Party for our second vote.
Let’s hope things get moving after the Salmond enquiries at Holyrood are complete.
Because time is racing on and we are still no further forward regarding the makeup if any List Parties.
As at least thirteen SNP MP’s sign a letter in which they state that they’re not happy with the rules on SNP MP’s running for a seat at Holyrood whilst still a MP, a senior figure has told the National newspaper that there’s no chance of a U-turn on the election rule.
“The figure added that the selection contests for 2021 Scottish parliament elections are effectively under way under updated rules passed by the SNP’s NEC.”
Courtesy of the National newspaper.
Liz G
Who the fuck are you?
Some kind of gate keeper.
Why the fuck are you sticking up for that Unionist piece of shit Davidson anyway?
The Daily Mail is down the corridor LuzG, I think that is the site you were looking for.
Condolences to Smallaxe’s family on their loss.
We won’t let you down old friend, we’ll “Heave Awa” till we get there.
Ach no, not Smallaxe. I never met him but I enjoyed his posts and from those who knew him he will be sorely missed.
When Scotland is independent we’ll raise a glass to him and all those before who worked tirelessly with no thought of status or monetary reward.
There are five political Parties in Holyrood.
There are Three who are led by gay/bisexual leaders,
Another is led by a hen pecked moron who has been told by his wife to twiddle about with his wedding ring when addressing the Parliament,
And one furrinerr from South of the border who is still at the “learning to tie his own shoe laces” stage.
No wonder the GRA mob rule the roost.
Sad to hear about the death of Smallaxe.
RIP
Fireproofjim for a critique of Darwinism read ‘Earth in Upheaval ‘ by Immanuel Velikovski before repeating orthodoxies.
o/t but it’s BBC Scotland so stick with it
BBC Scotlands website on the iPad their PC website might be different anyway , A piece featuring Ross the new Tory punter a few things caught my eye , a pretty long piece probably put together by some Tory , Ross made a obviously false statement about his leadership bid he started he had no prior knowledge of Carlots resignation and said he had to move quickly when the post became vacant , oh really his move was made before Carlots resigned , yeh he had to move quickly that was the bloody speed of light and beyond belief , Then the obligatory family photo , Christ , on his FIFA reg shirt ha has a Specksavers logo ha ha maybe he should visit them after seeing that photo , Another photo just chosen at random just happens to show him at Ibrox in front of a giant Union Jack with Dundee Loyal yeh just a random photo we are believe that tosh , He also says in the promotional blurb he is one of Ten FIFA registered referees in Scotland , ok as far as I know he has never taken charge of a major game as the Referee and is only ever been a Linsman , a load of tosh assisted by the state broadcastier should we be surprised , Aye Right .
Someone on Twitter is saying that known racist Leeze Lawrence has passed the SNP getting to stand in Edinburgh Central. What on earth is going on inside that party? They try to de-select Joanna Cherry from standing last December but allow this piece of work to stand.
Robert – All Scottish Tories are Rangers fans (The bitter ones). Goes with the territory.
When Ross took over he was interviewed in a public park with his wife. In the background there were two flags on a building in the distance. A butchers apron and a saltire. The camera crew squeezed out the Saltire when they were panning in on him.
He obviously chose the spot to have the butchers necktie in the background. Then made sure the camera crew didn’t show the saltire.
This is the audience the Tories play to in Scotland. They want to attract the knuckle dragging Orange Order loonies. The Tory parliamentarians are just knuckle draggers wearing ties.
Harry mcaye @10:32 am
Surely not. there must be enough archived material out there that would make it impossible for it (don’t know which pronoun it prefers) to stand. Others thrown under the bus for perceived
anti-semitism while this thing is openly racist. If they are putting up candidates like that they must be wanting to lose.
@Breeks 9:32am
It do that Breeks.
Yet the Scotland Act is riddled with UK Parliamentary Sovereignty and Crown Prerogatives. In effect it’s the auld Suzereinty claim employed by the likes of Henry VIII and Longshanks. At least one clause nullifies the entire Act.
Beyond that (32) Removes the Scots Crown as does Schedule 5 (1) and others – That is to say, attempts to place the Scots Crown beyond her people.
It’s a big no-no and that’s why previously, I’ve suggested the S30 stuff is the wrong target for the wrong reasons – you have to go direct for the Crown (Scots) and have the Crown defend the right to Sovereignty over Scotland’s people – not for Scotland’s people to claim the right.
The right is not in dispute here, the Crown (Scots) right to claim Sovereignty is very much in dispute.
When that defence falls, as it must, then so does the rest of that invidious Act. The only way to maintain the powers claimed within the Scotland Act (and much else) is for the English Crown (in Parliament) to claim suzereinty over the Scots Crown – which effectively the Scotland Act does anyway, if not explicitly.
Explicitly claiming suzereinty really would be a proper constitutional crisis; because at a stroke it nullifies all treaties and Acts. It would codify the extinguishing of Scotland and the continuation of England as the State.
Which of course is how they always act and believe, but no-one wants to codify the ‘tenuous lie’; for the very reason that so much existing legislation would be nullified and the ‘unwritten constitution’ stressed to breaking point.
Harry mcaye @10:32
One of the SNP members reported to be interested in Edinburgh Central is Lee-Anne Menzies. Perhaps with the slight similarity in the names, it’s got about that Leeze Lawrence is trying for the nomination.
It would surely be the end for Sturgeon’s leadership if the likes of Lawrence got to Holyrood.
Another week finds me pushing Chris Grey’s Brexit Blog, link to archive.is once more. There is a hilarious section on the Museum of Brexit, which really is a thing, link to archive.is. However the most interesting part is this:
But there’s another strand, which is about recognition denied. For even if the EU really was every bit as oppressive as they claim, what kind of ‘liberation’ can it be when about half of your compatriots didn’t want it in the first place and more than half now think it mistaken?
Replace ‘EU’ with ‘UK’ and you can see that independence is going to be Brexit all over again but with the boot on the other foot. It’s worthwhile paying attention to the circus and shenanigans as there are lessons to be learned and pitfalls and traps to be avoided.
Robert Graham, I just looked at that article and it says he is one of ten assistant referees. That is correct. So either you misread the article (fair enough; we all do it) or we have strong evidence that the BBC reads Wings to keep up to date with goings on in the world. That would be the same BBC that insisted they were not making marketing calls to my home telephone, in violation of federal law, until I complained and pointed out the $11,000 per call penalty for doing so. They swore blind they weren’t making calls but they stopped pretty quickly after that.
See that Dross has changed the photie at the top of his twitter. He’s now looking past the camera and slightly upwards with a serious expression. His man of destiny pose presumably. Although we know he’s just a man of density.
Skip-NC
yeh probably missed that bit but as he has previous i just dont trust the ducker or his party , good to see someone is paying attention ha ha
I see the British ethnic nationalists (Still Together Dept) are playing their hand. They want a blood and soil referendum, with the exception to include those they think will vote no.
They really need to make up their mind it is either ethnic Scots across the world or civic Scots, they can’t have it both ways.
I have compromise for them any Scot living in England who has had a Scottish tax code since it was introduced can have a vote in the referendum. In fact even if you live in Scotland and don’t have a Scottish tax code then you shouldn’t get a vote, your loyalties lie elsewhere.
Harry mcaye @10:32 am
It’s not Miss Leaze, thankfully – it’s Leezie – someone called Leanne.
Hope everyone is having a laugh at this, poor old gorgeous George:
link to twitter.com
Any volunteers?
A wee bit i missed on the Ross promotion blurb on BBC Scotland , he says both Scotland and England are dealing with the Covid crisis in exactly the same way , eh Really ! Mr Ross
Question if both countries are in Lock step as you say
WHY THE DUCKING DIFFERENT OUTCOME PAL ?
just bleedn luck i guess
Trust a Tory i wouldnt piss on them .
jfngw @12:02
After many years of being a political maverick and lone wolf, George has at last become a team player.
He’s signed for Team Tory.
Galloway has a history of getting into bed with anyone!
He needs money for hats to wear in a blazing hot studio.
Bit of Botox and hair restorer doesn’t come cheap these days.
Indefatigable George always reminds me of the crap spouted
By Fundunumdily Jim Murphy.
Two unionists happy to sell out Scotland for personal gain!
Ooooh! sometimes? I’m supposed to look for unusual instances 🙂
Sometimes it’s OK for an Adult to have sex with a child?
Yes, absolutely, because sometimes “child” is associated with being an adult. Stu, you are surely your mothers child… are people allowed to have sex with you or is it an absolute no no?
Sometimes men can be lesbians
Lesbian is synonymous with women so, no, under no circumstances can this be true … unless… the man is dreaming that he is a woman having sex with another woman, but then he’d be a woman having sex with a woman not a man having sex with a woman, or a man dreaming he’s a woman having sex with a woman, he still wouldn’t be a man having sex with a woman and be a lesbian though.
Sometimes it is possible to stop the tides of the ocean from coming in or going out,
to stop the liquid coming onto land you’d need to stop it being forced out, to stop it going out you’d need to bring back the force that forces it out, jeez, to do that you’d need an ice age or something… !
sometimes 2+2=5?
if 5 is the answer to 2+2, then 2=2.5
Sometimes it is better for Dictators to rule countries, not democracy?
Said Jesus of Nazareth.
Sometimes white people can become black people?
Ingredient: white people
Method: place on a baking tray in the center of oven for 12-18 hours at 280C (260C for fan assisted ovens).
Sometimes it’s acceptable to steal?
yes, if you want to be somewhere and don’t want to be noticed, it’s the best approach.
sometimes the law should be different for different groups of people?
Well yes, a group of people living in Australia, lets call them Australians, shouldn’t be subject to laws that are applicable to Spain.
sometimes it’s safe to drive significantly faster than the speed limit?
On a motorway you can drive significantly faster than the speed limit around a school area, is it safe to do so … let me see the fatality numbers … hmm, no it isn’t safe, it is subject to fatal crashes, I d say driving is always safe, it’s the crashing that isn’t.
sometimes women have penis’s
It cant be just guys that are buying all those dildos!
Sometimes it is possible to communicate with the dead?
When they tour I suppose, but no chance of communicating with Jerry Garcia anymore.
Sometimes the sun revolves around the earth?
Yes, I really need to get this orreries fixed.
RIP Smallaxem and condolences to his family. I never got to meet him, but I got the impression he was one of the good guys.
sorry….Smallaxe
Big jock
I agree but the Conservatives are betraying their precious union by erecting a border up the Irish sea
How do you get the ibrox crowd to see that
I am afraid the only way we will win our freedom is to fight for it you can quote all the historical bills and rules but historical freedom was only won by fighting for it you must face the facts you are dealing with people who are determined to hold on to your wealth etc., and although I hate the very thought of violence it is being forced on us we are being left with no choice either remain captive or seek freedoom
Richard Leonard has given a keynote speech, apparently it was A flat.
Knickerless Sturgeon caught with her pants down.
She tells us Corona Virus cases are rising, and in the next breathe tells us that Gyms, Bingo halls, Casinos, soft play areas, swimming pools are all to open on Monday.
Am confused Nikla!!!
Sad news about Smallaxe. An independence fighter to the end and such a gentleman. Sincerest condolences to Sybil and the family.
It’s been announced that George Galloway has reached an agreement
With the English Tory Party.
If he can assist in keeping Scotland under England’s heel
He will be given an official title.
George will be the “Cat”.
What’s you good folks going to spend the English money it on this week?
Am all fur thon motar
link to twitter.com
‘Polly says:
20 August, 2020 at 11:51 pm
@ @ WhoRattledYourCage
‘And mea culpa, because I wrote the first ever Scottish novel with all-American spellings’
I won’t be taking any advice from you then about making points.’
Don’t recall asking you to. You know nothing about the thing, but, having done it, and lived in America for over a decade, I do have a reasonable grasp of American lingo. Or did, because I now despise the modern shit they come up with. 🙂
iain mhor says:
21 August, 2020 at 11:11 am
…It’s a big no-no and that’s why previously, I’ve suggested the S30 stuff is the wrong target for the wrong reasons – you have to go direct for the Crown (Scots) and have the Crown defend the right to Sovereignty over Scotland’s people – not for Scotland’s people to claim the right.
I agree about Section 30, but at the same time, every display of fireworks has to start with a wee blue touch paper being lit somewhere. The dispute over Section 30 (always presuming it is disputed), has the potential to escalate into a full blown Constitutional stand-off, so why not start with Section 30?
Do we gain anything from being so timid and incremental? Well, No.
Frankly, I don’t think we really gain anything from pussyfooting around. Arguments about sovereignty are arguments about absolute and binary conditions, and ultimately, there are no shades of grey. Any talk of UK Sovereignty, or UK Parliamentary Sovereignty is a condition which did not exist before 1707, and it isn’t true sovereignty, it is sovereignty by convention. Although virtually it’s clone, it is NOT English Sovereignty.
Sovereignty by convention is one of those grey areas which shouldn’t even warrant consideration in a debate about Sovereignty. It’s the imposter which needs to have it’s credentials double checked.
But while we gain nothing but wasted time and squandered opportunity from constitutional timidity, I think we are also missing a trick by not making Constitutional Sovereignty a mainstream point of discussion for the simple reason I believe the discussion, debate and background reading about Scotland’s Constitution would have a very corrosive effect on Unionist’s morale and cohesion. The evidence, the provenance, the history, are ALL in Scotland’s favour, and I would serving that truth to the people of Scotland as their breakfast, dinner and tea.
‘leither says:
20 August, 2020 at 10:48 pm
Ian Brotherhood says:
PS Can you give us more detail about your novel please?
Is it coloured in ?’
Who shat in your cornflakes, goatboy? Laughing.
I put mu umbrella up and it immediately stopped raining.
“Brian Fleming says:
20 August, 2020 at 6:15 pm
Reminds me of the opinion poll a few years back that revealed that 2% of Labour voters in Scotland are horses.”
I would have thought that the percentage was much larger than that. But then again maybe there are problems getting them into the polling stations? And there is all the crapping in the streets too.
Ian Brotherhood says:
PS Can you give us more detail about your novel please?’
Ian, I sent you a Facebook message. Not having people spit on me for no clear reason here. I actually expect better of this site, but I suppose I should not be surprised.
Don’t let this fiasco be the end of anyone in Scotland who wants Independence and that may or may not include Nicola Sturgeon – we shall find out soon enough.
Whatever the outcome it mustn’t derail us – we mustn’t allow the Unionists to use anything to misdirect us.
WM is falling apart at the moment – Scotland must seize the day and take advantage of the disarray.
Whatever happens in 2021 as far as parties etc are concerned the ONLY important thing is, JUST FOR ONCE, WILL SCOTLAND STAND UP AND BE COUNTED. And regardless of how stupid, useless, criminal, ideological, murderous the Unionists claim the Independent people to be, it doesn’t matter: I don’t care if we are. But I don’t think we are and I think we have a vision of a better way of doing things and it’s time we had our own country to prove just how good we can be. Create a campaign that makes people feel good about themselves and stop doing ourselves down – just for a while eh!
@ Contrary
Hi, Contrary. I don’t mind being put on the spot for anything I’ve said though I realise you are not trying to do that. I say first I speak as someone with no legal training/special knowledge of this case/constitution or law in general. I’d also say that despite anything I say against it, I myself reluctantly felt why not support it since it might be all we have at this late stage and it might be better than nothing, so feel free to accuse me of hypocrisy. My feeling is that a lot of people are supporting it for that same reason, and that is definitely not the best motive for supporting a hugely expensive, late in the day, possibly politically inconvenient, probably legally inconclusive action which might drag on interminably to appeals, with yet more money, hopes and time spent on it when there could be better ways or legal routes which answer far wider questions of constituational law than this narrow one does. I also believe when it comes to it that though it might be good to have the law on our side, it’s ultimately a political question and only politics will answer it.
I believe the case Martin tried to bring was changed by Aidan O’Neill to the present one as Aileen McHarg put it ‘I think it’s quite clear from Aidan’s opinion that he answered a different question to the one he was asked, presumably because the one he was asked was daft.’ That’s what counsel is meant to do and seems Motion/O’Neill changed it to a place which could be argued on firmer ground. But in narrowing the remit it seems to me becomes pretty enfeebled so even if ‘won’ still relies on timescale to implement, assuming Scot gov want to, if they do and time available that no legislation is passed to its detriment by Westminster, that even if any referendum has yes majority that both sides agree it as binding (which is the real problem – indicative, advisory, respect the result, binding) and then that Westminster cooperate amicably in any split. But lots of politics must be placed between agreeing ‘binding’ and ‘cooperate’ which some of the behaviour from Martin recently might hamper.
As for your saying we should not focus on Martin, there I disagree with you since he is doing more than just being a straightforward go-between relaying factual information from legal team to us. He, and his personality/emotional statements, is intrinsically involved not just as a dry conduit but as a conductor, and seems to see it his business to conduct our feeling towards anyone he says is standing in the way of his court action. It’s hard to not see how someone in that way might cause ructions.
In saying this case is a very small part of what we need you are correct, but look at the money/hopes invested, I fear there could be burn out before a better case or the full fight comes along. Martin is continually firing people up, I think unnecessarily. As you say he seems a bit volatile/erratic, and though you say you’re glad his health issues (or his caring duties) haven’t stopped him from pushing this forward, I would say I’m not glad he pushes too many emotional buttons for the people following his case. His knowledge of the legal aspects seems limited, but not his opinions on them and yet he gives those opinions freely and some folk take it as gospel. When some are encouraged by it on Twitter to criticise peatworrier as being a downer on independence then they’re leading themselves astray or being led. With the latest outburst to MPs he is saying his action is not only Scottish people vs UK but Scottish people vs Scottish government, vs SNP and many SNP supporters too. That isn’t helpful either to the case, the next election or the wider Yes movement. By doing that the implication is also that his court case win will solve all and to hell with politics after when politics after will be left to pick up the pieces.
Cool heads are needed, especially at the front and if emotions are going to be stirred I’d rather it be by legitimate arguments not half understood legal processes or not yet revealed political motives. I’d have more confidence in the information we were getting if it came from someone prosaic, more business like. The various other campaigns he was concerned with via newspapers looked similarly emotional and litigious, that together with the statement he was thinking of standing as MSP (I understand he already stood as a council candidate) makes me question how much of this is actually ego driven. It also concerns me that of 8 companies, and two others before that, set up in which he was director, none lasted more than a couple of years and all seem dissolved by compulsory strike off, including the Forward As One Events Alliance ltd most recently. Also it’s odd that company, struck off in January, seems the only one registered in England not Scotland for some reason. I realise I don’t know this person, I have no wish to impugn his integrity or ascribe bad motives on him for any of that, and others do know him and might naturally have a different opinion on points I’ve raised but to me that all leaves a big question mark over suitability to lead a case or movement like this. Reliability and scrupulousness is essential.
Also you say we need to know the outcome of the case, I understand that feeling, especially in present circumstances, but lawyering folk who know better than us (Andrew, Aileen, McCorkindale, etc.) think there can be benefit in sometimes not knowing from a legal/constitutional point of view and I’d trust them over my own feeling on that matter. There are various constitutional blogs which would explain present/previous thinking but come September we all should know more. I fear it might end up as no more than opinion poll should we win and win or lose, it might complicate matters or stop other legal routes further down the line. As for my feeling on damaging percentage I wouldn’t like to guess.
Sorry for the length of this, it seems Andrew is not the only one guilty of prolixity. And the rider of course is this is just one woman in the street opinion – but you did ask. 🙂 sorry
@ WhoRattledYourCage
‘You know nothing about the thing, but, having done it, and lived in America for over a decade, I do’
But if, as you now dismissively say, I (or others here in UK) know nothing about American lingo because I didn’t live 10 years over there, then that rather invalidates the argument that its influence is so pervasive and has already permeated this country too much and we ‘assimilate and replicate it without even thinking aboot it’.
So I’d argue I (we) do have an inkling. I’m more than happy though to concede you’ve assimilated far more American lingo/culture than the rest of us.
@ Polly
Thanks for your very thorough reply! I had assumed my questions got lost in the stream on comments here, so I appreciate you even spotted them.
Yes, I can see your point of view on Martin when you explain it – I personally take his input with a pinch of salt, as I know the legal team is in charge and appear to be reliable, but yes, it’s likely a lot of people are bandwagon jumping and believe his viewpoint in it, and so his volatility (and ego, yes massive ego, but when wasn’t ego a big problem in any of our best campaigners,,,) could cause issues. Sometimes more extreme views are needed to push an issue forward – I’m thinking of suffragettes and women getting arrested for the cause etc – so I still can’t get too het up about it.
Yes, the consequences of whatever outcome of the case is uncertain – and I think the fear is, although people talk about ‘win’ and ‘lose’ I don’t see it as simple as that, once you clarify a (essentially political) clause in an Act it becomes a legal matter – so is justiciable – and if the case is ‘lost’ it opens up the legality of the entire Scotland Act and the incompatibility of English and Scottish constitutional ‘law’. Possibly the same can be said if the case is ‘won’! Constitutional law in the uk is a big complex confusing morass of stuck on bits and ancient decrees, and it’s like everyone dare not tread in those waters, because costs could spiral, and the limited number of constitutional lawyers, and who wants to open a can of worms?
So, it should have been settled politically, it never should have had to go to court, and would have been if the SNP had a backbone and actually supported Scotland, wanted to give us independence, supported our right to self determination etc. They are refusing to do what we voted for them to do, so it goes to court (what other recourse is there? On the specific matter of the s.30). The narrow remit of the question would hopefully not allow any can of worms to open, and it’s a judicial review so the answer will not be as clear cut as we think/hope it will be. Yes you are right, the legal team have altered the question a bit – they are asking the judges what they think, not asking for a ruling on the matter (the last I heard anyway! It might have changed,,,), and in that way I do think you are right that Martin is being somewhat misleading.
But, then, as with any crowdfunder, it is the choice of the people donating to do so – I put far too much money (for my budget) in to the initial crowdfunder to see it get off the ground, but I’m interested in it from an intellectual point of view, I would happily see all these things put to the question, because the judges give reasons and explain their thinking and I get an answer to the meaning of legal things – so educational. So, my interest may not be socially responsible either!
I think we saw on the Supreme Court cases, that mixing in law into the political (though, remember the remit of our elected representatives, they are legislators so make the law, and if they’ve done a bad job, who should they blame?) IS a can of worms, and may throw up any kind of unfortunate blinder – but, as I’ve said already, the SNP is closing down all political routes for us and that’s where I see the most harm coming from, so I reckon we really have nothing to lose on this one.
There may be a political revolution soon and many things change before May next year – but I have no evidence of that, so any push to bring about change is good in my book. Fear of ‘what might happen’ will keep us in this never ending circle of despair – people don’t need to support any one thing, but when the alternative strategy is ‘do nothing, just in case,,’, it is not actually going to get us anywhere except in he box we are meant to be in. There is no mysterious thing happening silently in the background that’ll save us all, there is no other country or institution riding to our rescue, we have to do it for ourselves and keep doing it, keep the pressure up, whether it’s ideal or not.
The peddling of fear from the MSM and our governments has a very specific purpose – it’s to keep us in our box. A wee bit of revolutionary thinking doesn’t prevent us from gaining independence ‘properly’ or politically, and nothing is black and white, none of it is either-or, there are nuances to any strategy.
(Whoops, a very long comment back! The short answer is, yes I see where you are coming from re:Martin specifically, and I wouldn’t argue against your view!)
Here is a video from David Allen Green on Judicial Review – it’s about English law and how the government there wants to reduce the effectiveness of judicial review, but it explains clearly the purpose of judicial review and what it is used for, the link is in his twitter post (you tube version one as well as a FT version one)
link to mobile.twitter.com
That the English government want to reduce our options on questioning their actions is another matter altogether…
@ Contrary
I meant to say sorry for the delayed reply but (like most folk I suppose) I’m not always online, or when I am might be unable to check here. I usually try to read through comments though even if days late, for though the argument moves on the links remain. 🙂
Not having given to original crowdfunder I’m less invested but seeing it going ahead regardless threw in my two cents ( there’s an Americanism) and my two cents opinion to boot, ha! I should be paid by the word. I agree with a lot of what you say here, Contrary, and it seems we agree on more than we disagree generally. Let’s hope for a good outcome. I wish you a good weekend.
“Sometimes the law should be different for different groups of people”
I think that question needs to be clearer for the analysis to work. The law isn’t the same for me and the Queen. I think she’s immune from prosecution isn’t she? Equally I don’t have access to maternity leave because I’m male.
Obviously there should be one *set* of rules that apply regardless of whose behaviour is being judged but respondents may well have thought you were asking if everyone’s legal situation should be the same.
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And THIS ARTICLE is an elegant and eloquent example of WHY Stuart Campbell has managed, single handedly and factually, to raise millions of pounds on his pure skill with a quill.
Rev Stuart Xavier Campbell, PLEASE get your best words out of that McTheasaurus, put them in the right order on those pages, and get your new…
Wee Blue Book Guaranteeing Scotland’s IndyRef2
… written. It is needed NOW more than ever.
Sadly, I believe Alex Salmond is intending to retire, nobody and no-one could blame him.
Joanna Cherry has gone underground.
There are few natural leaders with the X factor to replace Alex Salmond.
But if a new Wee Blue Book Guaranteeing Scotland’s IndyRef2 were written, then by the quality and substance of the words as evidenced in this article as an example, we would have a WBBGSI, getting Nicola Sturgeon gone and bring in a legal, decent, honest and truthful replacement.
My bet is on deploying an outrigger to come in to sort out the current LBQTWOKERATI+ political madness.
Possibly Kenny McAskill. Perhaps Joanna Cherry might come back in.
But a new WBBGSI is needed for the majority of the SNP members clueless of their Wokerati infestation to have their pantomime tea party made public and ordinary, decent SNP members put a stop to this Orwellian 1984 GRA and Hate Crime legislative madness.
This article was a pleasure to read. All the best talents of Scotland’s finest political blogger.
Stuart, as shur Sean Connery would have said: “Now ISH the time”.
The word is far mightier than the sword.
Stu., if you write that next book you can shureley (sic) get the world back on it’s axis, extinguish the flat earth society and help bring Scottish Independence to the front of every SNP MSP and MP’s mind.
Seriously Stu.
You could write a Tolstoy on the back of a fag packet and it would be a best seller.