Faces In Sand
Ladies and gentlemen, the next leader of the SNP.
To be scrupulously fair to the huffing dolt-child, we suppose in grey, chilly Aberdeen there could be some confusion on the matter. But remarkably, the above isn’t even nearly the dumbest thing that’s happened (so far) at this year’s SNP conference.
It’s probably not even this.
Though the “debate” (not a single person spoke against the motion) on reviving the SNP’s insanely dangerous “conversion practices” bill was undoubtedly moronic. (Don’t forget, the party controls the conference agenda and it wouldn’t let members debate independence strategy, but gave this stage time.)
Nor was it the embarrassing AI drivel the party used to front its farcical new idea of a “survey” of 1.5m voters. (Translation: some leaflets.)
“Choose Scotland” as opposed to what? Both of those paths are plainly in the same country, and neither of them visibly lead anywhere. What a metaphor.
(At this stage we should probably be happy that they can still at least remember the name of the country, even if they have to read it off a phone.)
No, the single most cretinous moment was probably the passing of this resolution.
It is now official SNP – and Scottish Government – policy.
Even for the party it’s a move of jaw-slackening stupidity, based solely on the Twitler Youth having been engaged in a(nother) screaming foot-stamping tantrum ever since Elon Musk took over the platform in 2022 and decided to allow a range of political viewpoints on it, not just theirs.
(Although their incandescent, petulant fury did lead to us coming out of retirement, so it did accidentally contribute to a widening of Scottish political commentary.)
Their preferred alternative, the paedophile-infested BlueSky, reaches a tiny fraction as many Scots as Twitter.
(By way of illustration, the party’s self-styled social media champion Pete “Comfy Feet” Wishart is already on both platforms, and has been for almost two years. He has almost 30 times as many followers on X as on Bluesky. We had to scroll 11 months down his feed to find a post of his on the latter with double-digit replies.)
But because the party chose to put it on the agenda and a couple of hundred woke activists at conference voted for it, every single government-controlled public body in Scotland will now be removed from the platform where they can be most easily held accountable and answerable to the public.
Meanwhile, a party that haemorrhaged 800,000 votes at the last election and has lost more than 60% of its own membership since 2021 will lock itself tighter into the airtight echo chamber in which it increasingly lives, simply refusing to hear the voices of voters at all and telling itself that if you can’t HEAR any criticism, everyone must love you.
Perhaps the most startling thing about this week’s YouGov poll was the finding that just 41% of Scots were clear about what the SNP stood for. Just a few years ago, that figure would surely have been close to 100%. Even people who disagreed with the party knew that its purpose was independence.
But this year’s conference, denying members the chance to discuss its supposed goal and instead obsessing over identity politics and censorship of dissent – let’s take a moment here to raise an eyebrow at the fact that the resolution demanded Twitter/X be banned in the whole UK, not just Scotland – shows that voters are right to be mystified about what the SNP’s purpose is in 2026.
The truth is simple: the SNP exists for power’s sake alone. As long as it can keep funnelling fat salaries into the pockets of incompetent imbeciles and providing the increasingly bloated First Minister with lavish first-class jollies, nothing else matters.
The SNP of 2026 has two faces: one buried in the trough, the other in the sand.
We can only hope that the Alex Salmond trial and the EXPOSURE of the vile , despicable actions of Sturgeon and her cabal of grossly incompetent deviants and perverts lead to the DESTRUCTION of these LUNATICS
I see the fuckwit Jasus Kelly is engaging in his usual grovelling prostrated actions again trying to ingratiate himself in the trough of Scum Nonce Party politics
The smugness emanating from that FAT BALDHEADED TWAT is almost bile inducing
Nothing about this surprises me except that Facebook has a 70% reach.
I suppose we should look on the bright side.
1. If everyone who still thinks independence is coming via the SNP leaves X/Twitter, the average IQ on the platform will rise.
2. If the SNP are moving off popular platforms, it may speed up their demise because they can’t communicate with as many people.
‘The truth is simple: the SNP exists for power’s sake alone. As long as it can keep funnelling fat salaries into the pockets of incompetent imbeciles ‘; very true-sadly, true also of the Westminster ‘government’ and the ludicrous Cardiff assembly: designed and operated to remove their refreshing salaries and perks before distributing anything left over to the sweating proletariat
Hmmm.
Listening to the BBC tonight, I got the impression that Swinney has just announced that Indy is as good as done.
“Wind in the sails of Indy” and all that.
They’ve obviously never heard of VPNs.
“Choose Scotland”, our reframing group developed that slogan way back in 2013 and have had banners made for, and used at, a wide range of rallies and events. They can’t even think of their own slogans any more. And, as for that wishy washy “Hope” thing … GAH!
In other news –
“A Ministry of Defence analyst has been elected rector of the University of St Andrews.
Dr Arthur Bernhoff seen off US Office actor Brian Baumgartner – who finished second – and Scottish Green MSP Q Manivannan, who came third.”
I’d apologise for the grammar but, hey, it’s the BBC and their high standards of employee education.
Q Manivannan, did he ever get a visa extension?
The illegality of that seems to have gone quiet.
I believe Q got this his visa extended for the lifetime of him serving as a MSP.
50 years then, unless he does something daft like stating men are men and women are women.
How long before “Q” starts creeping up the charts of Scotland’s most popular baby’s names?
Was glad to see QWERTY Millivanilli vanquished. No doubt he’ll put it down to homophobia, transphobia, racism, sexism, monotheism, any amount of pathetic excuses except for the truth…
…He’s a pretend-impoverished, trendy, grifting wee poser slug (any evidence he even is what he says his sexuality is?), and should not ever have been allowed anywhere near the position he is in. John Cleese, ex St Andrews rector, will be laughing his head off today. Maybe if they nominate Poverty Pornboy for Rectum of the university he would win it. He’s certainly an absolute arsehole anyway.
Looking at the SNP conference now, they’re just human biotrash. The least intelligent, the least honest, the least courageous and the most disgustingly self serving and perverted people you’ll ever see in Scotland outside a Green Party orgy.
You can’t get anywhere with such people, they’re beyond useless devourers of oxygen.
We’re ruled by our inferiors for some reason. John Swinney is an empty scrotum of a ‘man’ who would be out of his depth organising the office Christmas party. Most MSP’s are thick as shit. Why do we put up with this? 16th century Scots would have driven them all into the sea by now.
Being a member of the SNP in 2026 should be treated like membership of some noncey criminal gang, because it is. It’s not Twitter we need to ban, the SNP is a cancerous, criminal, antisocial influence on Scottish life that deserves to be excised.
There’s nothing there that can be saved or is worth saving.
You’re not wrong, Red. Not wrong at all.
Mind you, the idea of a Green Party orgy has put me clean off my muesli and left me in need of mind bleach and/or extensive psychotherapy. I mean, the idea of that shower of weirdos stripping off and…ugh…feck, no…
Also, I’m convinced that humanity is on a decline and that our ancestors were smarter, more resourceful and more ballsy that we their descendents – they had to be simply to survive at all. So aye, God only knows what the old-school Scots would do to the SNP…but I can’t imagine it being pretty. 😐
Is it “just” the SNP though? The Greens have (rightly) also been cited, but what about the moronic Lib Dumbs and Labour? The worry here has got to be that it isn’t an “SNP problem” but actually an “entire Political Class problem”?
The “system” has “selected” the featherweight (metaphorically, certainly not literally in many cases), the intellectually challenged, vapid, grifter whilst weeding out anyone with something actually to say, having a bit of backbone. In effect, people unlikely to get gainful employment anywhere else. Are these the type of people you want running the country?
All the severed body parts are put into a big hat. Then the attendees draw lots to see who gets which body part, then pair off with somebody holding a complementary body part.
Or so I’ve heard!
Hope that hasn’t spoiled yer Sunday denner for you too!
It’s not the “system” though, is it, CC?
Democracy can’t and won’t outlast the majority conviction that you can just vote yourself stuff you’re not prepared to work for or fight for.
Once that conviction takes hold, any politician advocating policies that denies the voters with outstretched hands their “entitlements” is on a hiding to nothing. It’s only the politicians happy to tell voters what they want to hear who can succeed.
Possibly you’re right, Hatey.
As a child of the much hated (in Scotland) Thatcher, we working class kids were taught to believe the “old” barriers of social class were gone and the only thing stopping us was ourselves and our lack of ambition and/or application. I literally quit my job at 19 and started my own business – which ended as a damp squib (although not owing anyone any money, just with none left for me), but this taught me vital life lessons. I went back into full time employment immediately (having worked hard and obtained highly marketable qualifications very early in life), vowing to get back on the horse later in life and with a few more years on me, which I did (and still do).
The point of this little tale? The Right teaches self reliance, ambition, and promotes meritocracy – genuine merit no matter who you are – and achievement. The so called “Far Right” are building starships to the Moon and Mars, mighty rockets, awesome tech, rocket powered flying electric cars.
The Left, on the other hand, comprises of people literally sterilising themselves, burning things down, demanding ever MOR FREEEE STUFFF. Just take a look at France, as we speak.
Scotland should wake up and smell the coffee. Serious question: what good has the Left ever done for it? Scotland has gone from an enterprising nation full of successful industrialists and financiers to a bunch of public sector office dwellers.
That didn’t take long eh?
One day in and the usual suspects are posting shite trying to convince ony gullible Scotch to love their Tory friends. As usual bleating ‘tax cuts for the rich; benefit cuts for the poor’.
The tired old ‘what did the left ever do for you’ trope. Social care, National Health service and public transport spring to mind. Minimum wage, trade unions, free bus passes for pensioners anyone?
Now, any Scot knows that one London registered Unionist party is much the same as another, but they call themselves “Scotch Labour”, “Scotch Lib Dem” or whatever; but the Site Pricks on here gallantly and repeatedly defend their Tory Heroes and heroines [sorry, but despite your ‘all day, every day’ efforts we Scotch still hate the twats] …. so lets just run through a few of the Tory crooks and twisters over the years, although the complete list would no doubt run to complete volumes;
let’s first go back to the man who first wrecked the national railway system [not Tory PM Major – he came later];
Ernest Marples;
accused of massive conflict of interest; While Marples was actively using his government power to downsize the rail network, ‘Marples Ridgway’ was being awarded lucrative government contracts to build the infrastructure replacing it—including the M1 motorway and the Hammersmith Flyover.
In early 1975, facing economic ruin, numerous business lawsuits, and an Inland Revenue order to pay nearly 30 years of unpaid taxes on his London properties, Marples panicked. He engineered a sudden “moonlight flit”, fleeing the UK for Monaco just before the tax year ended. The British government froze his assets, and he spent the remainder of his life in exile as a fugitive from the taxman.
The Poulson scandal;
Architect John Poulson was convicted of corruption after bribing public officials, including Conservative MP Reginald Maudling, who resigned from his position as Home Secretary.
Who can forget ‘Cash for Questions’ (1990s): In the mid-1990s under John Major, several Tory MPs were accused of accepting money from businessman Mohamed Al-Fayed to table parliamentary questions in the House of Commons, leading to the creation of the Committee on Standards in Public Life.
Chris Grayling;
hapless Transport Secretary Chris Grayling awarded a controversial £13.8 million ‘no-deal Brexit’ ferry contract to Seaborne Freight—a start-up company that had no ships, no financial backing, and no history of running ferry services.
Partygate (2020–2022): During the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns, gatherings held at 10 Downing Street under Baw Jaws violated government rules. Johnson and numerous others received fixed penalty notices from police, leading to widespread public outcry.
And it continues;
Lobbying and Standard Scandals (2019–2024): Successive resignations and scandals—such as Owen Paterson’s paid lobbying breach, Chris Pincher’s misconduct allegations, and Scott Benton offering to lobby for money—contributed to a perception of declining standards in public office.The 2022 Mini-Budget: Under Liz Truss, unfunded tax cuts caused a sharp spike in mortgage rates and turmoil in the financial markets, forcing her resignation after just 49 days.
But the assorted misfit Tory/Reform Site Pricks, continuously posting on this Scottish independence website [why, I wonder?] claim ignorance, and praise the “hard work, enterprise, trying to get on in life, earning a crust, law and order and traditional values” of the Tories.
“Tory Scum Out” ? Suits me.
Prick.
Surely “pricks”, CC?
James didn’t write that on his own. He lacks the attention span, even for a copy-and-paste that long.
He’s getting help from his maw.
To be fair to James, that was a pretty good post of his with good points, a by no means extensive list of catastrophic UniParty bungling over the years by the omniclusterfuckpermashambles on the banks of the Thames.
Capt.Caveman: you make an excellent point. There has been little to choose between the parties in recent years.
James: you also make excellent points. The hard left is not the left/centre left.
What is ruining us is not strictly right or left, but actually ‘wokerie’ – post modernism/post structuralism/neoMarxism/nihilism, an alliance made in hell, which draws the very worst elements of society together to undermine it and, ultimately, to destroy it. The West, especially, the Anglosphere (of which Scotland, paradoxically, is a part) is too white, too colonialist, too everything to survive, according to this alliance. Self-hatred is mandatory. Marry all that to unrestricted legal and illegal migration and the resulting conflagration is just beginning to play out for all to see.
One by one, the Western nations will be attacked. An entire generation has been born in which many have never heard the wee word, no, in their lives. They call it ‘gentle parenting’ which, in translation, means “do as you like, when you like, wherever you like and think as you like”. What, of course, will happen is that the pendulum will swing back with a vengeance and an over-correction will take place because while the little darlings of the ‘gentle parenting’ receive no rebuke from their parents, other adults see things differently and a swift kick in the rear end, long overdue, is coming. Over-reach inevitably leads to over-correction and, not infrequently, totalitarianism. What adults always fail to understand is that children and young people are natural totalitarians who revel in destruction, authoritarianism and, often, cruelty. Russia, China, Cambodia all stand testament to that.
Modern ‘woke’ thinking is destroying our societies. Whether the West, and, particularly, the Anglosphere, can stand up to what is coming and overcome it is debatable. In Scotland, it would appear that there is not even a debate.
THIS IS BEYOND AWAFUL
DOOMED AH TELL YE DOOMED
Proof if any were needed that the SNP is utterly owned by the british security sevices. They allow no prospect of supporting debate or progress towards independence, but, riddled the party with weirdos to sabotage and discredit it! How times have changed!
Just did something i rarely do an looked at whingy scot goes pop mealy mouth. Interesting he says nothing about the factual points made here by Stu and instead focuses on crap snp polls, claiming its some sort of positive thing!
Wake up sunshine!!! …. the SNP OPPOSE independence!
Quos Deus vult perdere, prius dementat.
Or- to mark the end of the Mòd, in the tongue of those called SCOTI by Latin speakers:
Na daoine a tha Dia ag iarraidh a sgrios, bheir air falbh an ciall an toiseach.
Fearghas, of this parish, might improve the translation.
“16th century Scots would have driven them all into the sea by now.”
Scots had real spines in those days.
Absolutely incredible that the SNP are going to ban all government and government agencies from using the media platform Twitter now renamed X.
Denying communication is an act of extreme authoritarianism.
But that is exactly what this fascist party are about. And in the background sleaze, corruption, malfeasance and thoroughly rotten administration at every level.
The SNP needs to be routed.
Totally agree Willie but remember they commenced the Sturgeon era with a Westminster group insisting on voting as a block and look what happened to any single MP such as Joanna Cherry who would not comply.
In addition their tentacles extend to institutions such as COPFS , Police Scotland and the Prison Service who they steadfastly claim have operational independence but who just happen to be lockstep with government pet projects and outright dogma.
Not forgetting the SNP rule changes which Stu has documented forensically on this site which obliterated the structure for introducing or challenging ideas and policies by those other than anointed by the Party.
Authoritarian doesn’t begin to cover it.
Here are two photographs from journalist Cris Mullin’s X account.
One shows an apparently bursting full SNP Conference. The other photograph taken from a different angle show an entirely different picture of a half empty hall where attendees gave been squeezed into a restricted number of seats to mask the lack of attendance.
A hollow sham party its not difficult to see why they want to ban mass media communication. And thanks to Chris Musson for posting this on his X account.
link to facebook.com
It’s all doom and gloom here.
I’m gonna repeat what I’ve said before. All over the democratic world, and in the UK, people are arising from nowhere to become powerful in the service of the voters. To lead their people in the direction their people want to go.
Take the byelection of just 2 weeks ago. Sagal Abdi-Wali, a former child refugee from Somalia, became a WM MP.
Let me repeat this. Somebody who was not even born in the UK, and is only 42 years old, is now representing her constituents and promoting their beliefs and policies in parliament.
It is completely beyond credible belief that Scotland lacks people who can do the same. They simply need to get off their fecking arses.
Just as the rest of us, content to remain comfortably on our arses sniping from the sidelines, need to be prepared to get behind them with our votes.
It’s not colonialism holding Scotland down. It’s laziness, apathy and bigoted, ignorant tribalism.
it’s england that brought Scotland down, ya fuckin tit
Well done, Confused.
A perfect example of Hatey’s last sentence.
Part of Britian’s soft power throughout the world is tolerance, playing fair and playing by the rules.
That newly elected MP got her position by playing fairly by the rules. If the UK tried to discriminate in any way about how people progress in civic life, then the UK’s soft power will be dented.
It isn’t only about bigoted, ignorant tribalism, to use your words. Its the way the UK is run. You need to change our cultural attitudes and yes, the attitude of the political establishment but that isn’t going to happen in the Westminster system.
You might even find this out at the next election where Reform UK gets a hold of power and realises the reality of governing rather than shouting from the sidelines.
I hear what you say but Candidate selection in all political parties is obviously gerrymandered to the profile they want. I often try to find an Independent candidate with ties and preferably community work on his/her CV. Quite often (in my area at least ) candidates increasingly publish very little about themselves ( bit of a red flag ?) . I have written to the Electoral Commission to ask if there is a minimum information requirement . They responded that this is a matter for Parties and Candidates and that they produce guidance on for example leaflets.
The other problem is that unfortunately with small numbers of Independent candidate you are likely to have little or no say on bigger picture issues ( you may not even know their position on key issues as they don’t have a Manifesto ) which will be determined by the election winning party. New party start ups eg Alba have also failed to gain traction.
I believe that the Scottish government stopped all advertising on X/Twitter a few years ago. If correct, that action hasn’t brought the company to it’s knees.
I don’t use social media so not really in a position to voice an argument but I can understand how some people might want to boycott that platform.
However, as a government where one of it’s roles is to provide information to the people it serves, it doesn’t have any right to dictate how that information is presented to the public, as long as there is enough demand to make it economically feasible.
Given the popularity of X/Twitter, there is enough demand and this total ban is just going to alienate people. It would be funny if someone brings some sort of legal action against Holyrood about this.
Above all it’s is pointless. Twitter/X will not be harmed in any way without the participation of the Scottish government on it’s platform. If it does go ahead, it wouldn’t surprise me that the policy is ditched after a few years.
France
I thought there on last nites 10pm news I was going to enjoy the live spectacle of a bbc journalist being vibrantly diversifed by a young gentleman of black colour, potentially a brain surgeon and GDP enhancer, who was mostly-peacefully expressing his political concerns … he stood at the journo’s shoulder, thinking, like a dog looking at meat
something smells all wrong about this
– “its the kids protesting about the education system” … uh huh … so – you burn down the fucking school because the PISA scores aint too good and its hard to get into the ecole normale superieur?
– so, why you burning down historic buildings?
– this legit protest, now about “the cost of living” and – french debt levels (?! – I am sure that is a BIG discussion topic among all the ‘yout) – involves looting shops for new trainers and new smartphones; it is starting to look highly organised to me. Part of me quite admires the french for getting on the streets at times, but, we seem to be missing something. Stirring up the students is, historically, quite an easy thing to do – it’s what the brits/CIA did in persia in 53.
If the shooting starts, then it has to be shocking, for the psychological value. What I would do : tell the muslims the far right are burning korans inside a football stadium. Then tell the blacks there is a consignment of iphones and nike trainers at another. With that lot kettled you can beat up the remnants till they go home. Then there are 2 tragic accidents which happen to burn down the football stadiums “by accident”, within minutes of each other.
– secretly we had planted a number of thermobaric weapons in the stadia. Crispy. Greatest good for the greatest number, omelettes and eggs – many dead, but really NHI – “no humans involved”. We can also make a few bob by claiming on the insurance. Nice.
The french TV will talk of “electrical faults” and I will appear on television in tears, telling of how the french state will now wage “a war on dodgy electricians” and a commitment to more community centres and ping pong, for da bredren
– all hold hands and sing the marsellaise
link to x.com
yeah, well, reap/sow, all that shite. France was an amazing country, it had it all, now its been ruined.
this looks like the definition of an investment that never paid off –
link to rmx.news
“The €400 billion figure does not include education, police, court, prison, and healthcare costs”
– fuck.
this shit is everywhere, it’s almost like it is being coordinated by a globe spanning international force of malign intelligence and massive wealth
link to archive.ph
– badradeen, the mad stabber of george sq (we need to put a plaque up for him), was from the Sudan.
Meh. Well, Confused, this particular “Rosbif” was watching with not inconsiderable schadenfreude those pesky “schoolchildren” in France burning the place to the ground.
You reap what you sow, eh.
Apologies if the previous comment gets repeated posted. I had got a Back-end error when posting a few times so wasn’t sure if my post went through.
Good ideas are often simple, though difficult.
link to archive.ph
FARAGE in the telegraph : deport them all immediately
… I like your thinkin bro … you need to rid your country of PARASITICAL INGRATES who scour the land like locusts and swagger around with a sense of entitlement, disrespecting us, treating us like shite – anyone with any pride : wants them gone
ANGLOS OUT OF SCOTLAND
ANGLO-RAUS
ANGLO-FREI
starting with the rats dens of Edinburgh, St Andrews, the highlands and also overlooked places like orkney.
I’d rather see you deported just for being an ignorant, bigoted, hate-spewing fud. That’s assuming you don’t drink yourself into an early grave first.
Arsehole.
Oh no confused now you’ve upset spartan 007, another one who knows what everyone in Scotland wants and thinks, does he remind you of someone else who spoke for the whole of Scotland
I find it amazing that these middle class yoonionists are so upset by words maybe they should go to France or Easterhouse or Castlemilk and experience reality
I grew up in a rough as fuck area of SE Edinburgh in an ex-Cooncil Hoose during the Major/Blair years, one of many ex-mining communities left to ruin by decades of UniParty enshittification. Black Wednesday and double-digit interest rates in mortgages combined with crap wages. Many of those I went to school with ended up on the dole or in the clink. One was in the national news 20 years ago for murder and another has regularly featured in the tabloids over the past two decades running a drugs empire within his cell at BarL.
Not being a Weegie I’ve never been to Easterhouse but it sounds pretty similar to Niddrie, Moredun, The Inch, Gilmerton and Gracemount, places in a previous life long ago I was very well acquainted with. Unlike my peers I actually paid attention to the teachers, stuck in, used my noodle, worked hard and got well away from all that. *Well* away, i.e. getting on the A9 and keeping going.
I always chuckle to myself when I’m accused here of being a middle class unionist who doesn’t understand poverty etc when I literally grew up in poverty. Also I’m pro-indy, how that makes me “unionist” I have no idea but its pointless trying to find logic with the illogical.
I do find it entertaining as I am another of those “middle class unionist” that seem to draw ire from some.
I stated in a council house in Pollock in the middle of 3 million unemployed. I did whatever work was available no matter what it was at home, and abroad, if necessary.
I worked my ass of for 45 years to become one of those “middle class unionists” and frankly proud to have worked my way to a decent lifestyle.
As for “unionist”, well I voted yes in the referendum but the last thing I want now is another. This is mainly because the SP and its contents are now a bad joke and unfortunately this is not because of the union but a self inflicted would, the populkace voted these morons in.
“disrespecting us”
Never! Surely not you, Confused?
Interesting how a Somalian migrant who came to the UK as a child is now an MP. People democratically voted for her on her merits and she may prove to be, within our so called democratic system, a very good elected representative.
But to take a side step, how many Ukrainian members of Parliament do we think we might have in future parliaments. The UK is already in lockstep with Ukraine. Politically and militarily they are to coin a phrase our blood brothers.
Recent reports in Politico are suggesting that some 20 million Ukrainian want to leave. That I suspect will mean a huge number coming to the UK.
It’s a discussion that no one is talking about and maybe it’s time we should.
Well, the pedophile SNP finally have what they always wanted – a legal mechanism whereby they can turn kids into biological Fleshlights for the wealthy and well-connected, and the power to remove them from their parents, placing them into the hands of their most loyal court eunuchs.
I forsee that soon we will see a push for “MAP rights” (Minor-Attracted Person – a term that has already bern used by a certain section of the Scottish Police to present these scum in an inoffensive light).
“Everybody KNOWS what is right – but only the Spartans DO what is right”.
Take heed, Scotland. Is this what you are going to allow?
SSRG conference is now talking about the media problem. The youtube is very clear and the talk knowledgeable. Are Wingers listening to it?
Alf Baird spoke and provided the data on the wreck that is currently Scotland’s economic and social state compared with where it could and should be.
Alf, like Robin MacAlpine, and any of us who have any contact with Scotland’s civil administration, pointed out that it is the lack of Scotland’s assets value remaining in Scotland that is the reason why nothing can be done to get things running properly.
The only answer is to escape the Union.
I urge you all to listen to Alf’s brief, and excellent, talk.
Odd, sarah.
All the other countries in Europe, and indeed the west, who are maxed out on debt, at least partly because they are sending all their dosh to China, aren’t in “the Union”.
Yet they’re just as broke and their prospects aren’t much better.
The EU, for example, has a trade deficit with China currently running at one billion Euros per day.
Does Alf have any plausible plans for dumping Net Zero, banning Chinese imports of goods we need to be self sufficient in, and fast tracking the establishment of manufacturing industries in Scotland?
Sorry to see that Stu will not be on the SSRG panel today due to technical issues. This is a great pity. I had hoped that he would go in person but sadly not.
80s Russ ‘C U Jimmy’ Abbot, scum of the earth:
link to whorattledyourcage.blogspot.com
I expected him to be deid, but he’s nae.
Which rather spoils my post, because I was gonna say you’ll enjoy digging up his corpse and putting it on posthumous trial.
But now you’re just gonna have to wait. On the plus side, you’ve got time to assess the charges and list the prosecution witnesses you’ll want to call.
Time to mull over the biggie, too. The sentence when he’s found guilty.
Presumably you also take extreme offence to Rab C Nesbitt, Chewin’ The Fat and Still Game for their tropes.
Those programmes are all Scottish, and none of them was done out of pure hatred and bigotry and cheap laughs. There is a MASSIVE difference.
Right. So there is. Rab wisnae offensive then, or Pete The Jakey, cos it was Scottish. Best not mention Navid then…
Meanwhile, Europe is undergoing significant social unrest allegedly driven by “a certain demographic” known for its violent disposition and questionable intelligence and further up the thread there’s some inebriated low-IQ radge talking about “deporting” “Anglos”, both of which personally I find a lot more offensive, concerning and worthy of discussion and comment than some corny comedian doing a cringey sketch fae 40 years ago that is clearly old hat (pardon the pun) and finding offense in insignificant things.
What next, the Scottish bloke in It Ain’t Half Hot Mum? Chrisst A’michty.
Rab C Nesbitt wouldn’t have been so popular south of the border if it wasn’t for the drunken Scotch stereotype. Same with Trainspotting although that’s the Scotch druggie stereotype.
Also both hasn’t aged well.
@Spartan 117
There was a Scottish black bloke in Porridge. The mind boggles!
There y’are, Hatey. Woke before it was even a thing.
Then there’s was that Scottish engineer fae Lithgae on the USS Enterprise way back in the 60s. Could drink even the hardiest alien under the table and afterwards still rebuild a warp core under fire from a Klingon battlecruiser using only a £3.99 B&M mini toolkit whilst reprogramming the main computer, all without any manuals and in half the time he quoted to Jimmy T Kirk.
The best thing about the view that somehow it was “offensive” is that Rab C was based on a real person, although that person was not the amateur philosopher that the character was in the show.
Personally it was not my type of humour but I could see the funny side of it.
I do like Navid in still Game, I am old enough to find proper Glaswegian asians raise a smile. Since Navid is a proper intergrated Asian I can’t see what the problem is?
That’s the point Rob. None of it is offensive, but selective outrage is an absurd self-defeating fallacy.
Thing is the article spends the first half slagging off a panel of three women, white, brown and black for attacking the bigoted stuff in some Kenny Everett’s shows way back when, i.e. those kinds of people who supposedly were showed prejudice by Everett. His is tone dripping with his own prejudices against them (though that is by the by) but points out they lack historical perspective (yes, maybe), then does exactly the same thing when he attacks Russ Abbot. Like the Everett panel who had their own vested interests, he is a Scot with his own and thus attacks Abbot’s shitty caricatures of Scots.
He then later says: ‘I am not particularly somebody who cares to dig up something to take offence to [really?], in a modern world so boring and frightening and grim at the same time. It hardly matters, and all this bigoted idiocy was decades ago now. Except it still has a real-world legacy, to this day.’
So there is no racism or misogyny to this day then and those women attacking Everett just need to get a life because his real world legacy is really real and theirs is not? Maybe should try and put himself in others’ shoes once in a while.
For the record I hated Abbot and his crass caricatures and liked Everett little more.
Claiming the character was conceived in “pure hatred and bigotry” requires evidence.
As for being sniffy about “cheap laughs”, that’s the preferred laughs of most.
My own take on humour is influenced by Steinbeck:
Either everything is funny, or nothing is. The moment you allow one taboo subject, because somebody is going to take offence, is when you surrender all humour. Because there is no humourous subject or event that somebody somewhere won’t take offence at.
As for taking offence at the stereotypical drunken, garrulous, incomprehensible Scot, it’s a stereotype because it’s all too common.
Found this article about Gen Z woman revisting classic British comedies where on one comedy they found The show’s physical comedy and gentle ribbing at its male characters were regarded as “harmless and light” with “timeless gags” yet found the same involving female characters misogynist.
link to noah-news.com
Funny though, how younger generations of men are never asked in these types of article to give their views on older films/TV?
I’ll write about what I feel like writing about. It’s not important, I did say that. I am bigoted against PC arseholes, yes. Laughing here. There you go, you have avenged the ladies fair. And not fair. What a chivalrous, morally upstanding person (female, I suspect) you are.
I am beyond fucking sick of hearing the words ‘racism’ and ‘misogyny’. They are often a shield for the terminally inept – i.e. the people covered in this article – to use to try and excuse lack of ability, and avoid criticism. Nicola Sturgeon was always bleating on about ‘misogyny’, even as she flushed the country down the toilet and hated men with impunity.
And Kenny Everett was genuinely funny. Abbot never was.
Anyway. Glad you liked it. Thanks for your input. Keep on truckin’. 🙂
Still laughing.
What’s going on in France right now is quite concerning.
Just when it looked as if WM was making inroads into the flood of fake refugees and bogus asylum seekers, we may be about to see a surge of genuine ones.
At least they’ll be mostly white and Christian heritage. I wonder how many of them will want to settle in Scotland. Auld Alliance and that.
It is indeed concerning as it appears to be spreading. The demographic *allegedly* driving the unrest, if true, is noteworthy and of particular concern due to the implications if things really kick off elsewhere.
A lot of troublemakers on all sides just waiting for an excuse to kick off. What started as a genuine protest against valid grievances with the French education system has been hijacked entirely by the assorted hate-mongering groups on all sides; all colossally mishandled by the French state, of course.
@ Spartan 117
This talk of certain demographics need to be taken in context.
I haven’t been following the protests and I doubt even you don’t have the full picture of going on there. It could be down to the authorities afraid to tackle the protests before it got out of control for fear of being accused of racism.
Contrast that with the Yellow vest protests a few years ago with for example allegations that (white) protesters were being deliberately shot at by police with rubber bullets to try and blind them.
“colossally mishandled by the French state, of course”
No “of course” about it here. You should back up your claim with a description of what you would have done better.
To me, the injury figures, for protesters, rioters, police and emergency services, show that so far, the French state has been remarkably restrained. That can’t last.
As with all European countries harbouring a large, hostile, expansionist minority, the French state may be wondering if it has sufficient resources to win, should it seriously kick off.
You can be certain that keeps the occupants of Whitehall awake nights when they consider the UK.
I doubt there will be any white asylum seekers coming over on the channel in a dinghy. Most of the French thinks it’s a great thing, tearing down the system of centuries old colonialist racism and all that postmodernist nonsense.
“Most of the French think it’s a great thing”
Michty!
My BS meter has shorted out again. But we can wait until the French election to discover what most of the French really think.
@ Hatey
My comment was meant to be criticism as too many people have no critical thinking nowadays due to social media addiction. Their opinions are only only going to change when it affects them directly like that silly (white) lassie who tried to stop the thugs from looting a shop only for her to be pushed aside.
As to French election time, we’ll see how that plays out as the media narrative will always go back to keeping the ‘far right’ out of political power.
20 million Ukr##nans are wanting to leave. With Britain in lockstep political alignment, if not blood brothers, the UK might soon be accepting huge numbers of white refugees on a scale never before imagined
The French have a tradition of using street protest to get political change (I won’t comment on whether that is a good ‘system’ or not). Sometimes this might involve minor violence and destruction but not the full scale riots burning buildings down the ground and widespread looting we are now seeing. Some have described the level of violence as the worst seen in modern times in France. It reminds me of the riots in England and especially London some years back. I do not think the French support this level of unrest at all, which clearly looks semi-organised and is a mix of anarchists, the ‘black block’ far left and disgruntled N. African minorities from the suburbs – a potent cocktail (and who knows what other extremists).
As for the police, I also have some sympathy with them but the French cops have long had a rep for violence themselves – turning to more drastic measures too quickly and this can spark trouble of itself. I saw them tear-gassing ordinary protestors for no obvious reason other than general frustration. There is definitely a way to police this sort of thing and not escalate them and UK police do generally seem to be a bit better at that. Having said that the violent groups are not really part of the demos and come in later, hell-bent on destruction so are not obviously linked to police (mis)management.
It is hard to understand what is really going on in France from a distance, why things have become so chaotically violent, why the incredible anger, but I thought the same about those riots in England – there is a kind of contagion of violence that can go on which can become attached to any grievance – personal or organised, or simply done for the fun of it like what motivates football hooligans.
”Most of the French thinks it’s a great thing, tearing down the system of centuries old colonialist racism and all that postmodernist nonsense.”
😀 😀 😀
“ROTFLMAO” as the saying goes.
So, “most French” think it’s “great” that their historic buildings are being razed to the ground before their eyes, there are mass hostile mobs on the streets wrecking and burning and who intend great harm to them, literally thousands of businesses left ruined or very badly impacted, do they?
” John Swinney compared to dictator as bus plans branded ‘business confiscation’
John Swinney has been compared to dictators as McGill’s Group threatens legal action over plans to bring buses in Scotland under public control.”
———————-
It’s strange the Swinney is under fire for being “progressive” by bringing back control by 2031.
In fact all he is doing is copying England with it’s New era of better buses:The Landmark Bus Bill became law in 2025.
Let’s try again to get through moderation.
The potential for huge white immigration from a European country looms large.
They wouldn’t of course come by dinghy Bilbo. Folks need to wake up and consider the reality of maybe 20 million folks fleeing a war torn with whom we are lockstep aligned.
Is this migration coming from that war torn country that was serving conscription papers on beaches?
That is just another scare tactic from the cokehead to get more money.
If only Scotland could find a Scottish coke heid of his calibre to lead us.
Not that you’ll agree. You have the inbred Scottish determination to tear down and destroy anybody who has the effrontery to show above average qualities in any sphere. Arising, I suspect, from your own certainty of your own mediocrity.
Why don’t you accuse him of being a Nazi and a Jew?
The man has inspired and doggedly fought for 5 years now to keep his country free from a tyrannical, imperial, military annexation, in what is the most bloody European war of our lifetimes. Yet, instead of acknowledging that reality, the instinctive reaction of a solid stratum of Indy support is to do him down.
Whilst simultaneously greeting that Salmond was brought low by his own, and bewailing that nobody will step up to replace him.
It’s got to be the case that those instinctively siding with the colonialist empire can never free Scotland, however much they like to pretend to themselves they value freedom and independence.
20 million people must be wrong, eh? It’s Willie and Bilbo together who can show them the error of their ways.
I have been appreciating the regular updates from the Francis Dearnley and Dominic Nicholls duo:
link to youtube.com
How odd that 20 million people would want to flee from the same people who are helping out Scotland at the UN.
Somebody should wake up Alf and ask him where the truth lies. Maybe he could get “Mr” Lavrov to explain.
Its you and your hypocritical imperialistic kind who aye advocate bombing other countries Hatey, for which there are always consequences, many unintended.
I do agree Alf, albeit with the almighty caveat that Ru**ia is currently the poster boy of imperialism and warmongering. Big Don and his mates in the Shite House and the omniclusterfuckpermashambles-on-Thames are also on board with it.
I’m of the view that those who thirst for conflict should be default be the first to be sent to the front lines. Politicians and their supporters especially.
I find Bill Browder’s personal story rather compelling…
link to youtube.com
I wasn’t aware that it was “U” that kicked this whole thing off by bombing “R”, Alf.
Anything else you’d like to enlighten us with in your alternative reality? Probably best for you to lay off the nitrazepam, I’d say.
Mr Lavrov is about as popular in the free world as the coronavirus. Quite why any political campaign would want to have any association with him is beyond me.
One can often gauge the measure of a person by the company they keep.
Flies are attracted to shite and digs return to their own vomit.
Caveman
You should stick to the day job that earns millions for the UK treasury.
You quite clearly don’t know the history or context of that conflict but besides, Trump is buying diesel from “R” and “R” is going to the G20 summit next year in Edinburgh.
This is the problem with allying with such an unreliable country like America. When the lackey apes the voice of his master, his master inevitably changes his tune and the lackey ends up with egg on his face.
“Its you and your hypocritical imperialistic kind who aye advocate bombing other countries”
You’re sae richt, Alf.
But to be fair, Rev Stu does provide me with a platform from which I can call for other countries to be bombed.
Day after day after day.
Hey! If what Bilbo says above is right aboot the G20 summit in Edinburgh, let’s hope some enterprising sowel arranges a few surprise drones for that too.
Why should Slough get all the urban improvement?
“Trump is buying diesel from “R” and “R” is going to the G20 summit next year in Edinburgh.”
What has this got to do with the price of fish? Your mate Alf accused Hatey of being of a “hypocritical imperialistic kind who aye [sic] advocate bombing other countries” in response to his observation that millions of “U” refugees will want to flee – thereby implying somehow “U” started it by “bombing other countries”. This shouldn’t be hard, even for you.
Oh, I’m sure you and your ilk lefties can barely conceal your unalloyed delight at the sight of Trump’s buying “R” diesel, but that’s neither here nor there in terms of my comment that you’re now (supposedly) replying to. Mind, you’re the guy who thinks the French are loving the riots, so y’know, expectations have to be low, right?
Bilbo Baggins? I think not. More “blockheaded Bracegirdle from Hardbottle” methinks. 🙂
“I’m of the view that those who thirst for conflict should [by] default be the first to be sent to the front lines”
That has to be an original first. I don’t believe any cant has ever expressed that opinion before.
And it’s so sensible too. One volunteer being worth ten pressed men, etc.
I subscribe to a similar POV. Those who thirst for peace, up to and including when their country is overrun by invading, massacring, assailants, should have their wives, daughters and mothers taken away and conscripted into the front lines.
Let the virtue signalers stay at home, loudly proclaiming their ideological purity from under the blankets, while their womenfolk fight and die on their behalf.
In all probability, their womenfolk will be of far more use.
*David Brent voice* Oooh, you’re hard.
No virtue signalling here, I just don’t get a stiffy for violence and war, unlike many armchair Space Marines who’d likely (understandably) shite themselves if a call up actually happened and they got to live out their fantasies of being The Big Hero charging towards *them* (whatever “enemy” our politicians have brainwashed us with being supposed to hate for, er, “reasons”) clutching an SA80 and being mown down by a hail of 7.62mm in a futile waste of their lives achieving precisely zero for their country and left to rot in an open grave.
Not for me thanks; unlike many of your ilk, I have the balls to be honest and say that.
“brainwashed us with being supposed to hate for, er, “reasons””
Check out Vinted. They’ll have plenty of pedestals to sell, if you don’t mind the P&P from France. Get yourself two and you could really own the moral high ground.
You just can’t bear to acknowledge that when hostile, armed aggressors are hundreds of miles into your country and heading your way, that your kind of self serving ideological purity is inevitably shown to be the worthless trash it always was.
“unlike many of your ilk, I have the balls to be honest”
Naw, Ye divnae. Your entire world view relies on believing the lie that bad things only ever happen to bad people.
Sorry, you’re talking absolute pish, as per.
Have a nice day.
“talking absolute pish”
Naw.
You just can’t bear to acknowledge that when hostile, armed aggressors are hundreds of miles into your country and heading your way, that your kind of self serving ideological purity is inevitably shown to be the worthless trash it always was.
The title of Faces in Sand would be more appropriate as Faeces in Sand. How anyone with a brain, a conscience and a love of their country could vote for any of this cabal is beyond me.
Alex Salmond gave everything for this country and ultimately paid with his life. She did not physically stab him but Sturgeon did everything else. When she realised he was contemplating a return to politics to force the SNP to honour its election pledge to pursue independence she and others fabricated “evidence” to discredit him and ensure he could not come back, She enlisted Police Scotland and the corrupt COPFS to help her, both organisations having been stuffed with her appointees and the Lord Advocate of Scotland having a seat on her government. In court the case against him was thrown out with clear evidence of lies and perjury by the complainants, none of whom were charged with perjury and their names were withheld with the threat of a contempt of court charge being raised against anyone who revealed those names. In the meantime the name of the innocent victim in this, Alex Salmond, was plastered over every newspaper and news outlet whereas the false accusers walked free in the cloak of anonymity. Job done.
So far Sturgeon and others have not been brought to account. There is a civil case brought by the Salmond estate pending against the Scottish Government which should come to court before the end of this year and would require Sturgeon and others to answer questions rather than be able to turn their chairs to the wall and refuse to answer which has been their modus operandi to date. Much will depend of course on the judiciary appointed to hear the case and, in particular, who put them in those positions. The stench may continue.
We live in a very corrupt society. Some shreds of decency and individual rights remain but these will be extinguished unless the cancer at the root of Scottish government is exposed and eradicated. We are in no fit state to assume independence whilst the party of Sturgeon, Yousaf and Honest (hahaha) John Swinney are in control. The SNP and all the nonsense and lies they have been associated with need to be eradicated from our lives. A new credible independence vehicle must arise to achieve that. You can be sure that Westminster and the B(iased) Broadcasting Corporation will continue to promulgate their lies and propaganda on our (British) air waves to ensure that does not happen.
Life under the union Jack stinks and associates us with the crimes against humanity they have committed over many hundreds of years. We need to be free, we are better than this.
“Life under the union Jack stinks and associates us with the crimes against humanity they have committed over many hundreds of years. We need to be free, we are better than this.”
Who are the ‘they’?
If you are referring to those involved in the expansion of the British Empire, please remember that Scots played a significant role at all levels in that expansion. Indeed, at the time slavery was abolished, Scots owned more slaves per capita than English. (source – National Museum of Scotland).
We are no better or worse.
Yeh but no but yeh but no but yeh it’s ok because we’re Scottish, which absolves us of anything apparently, like comedy skits using tropes. Hilarious if done by Scots but when done by an Englishman it immediately becomes “offensive”.
Or something.
The empire colonies you refer to were never ever ‘Scotland’s’ colonies at all; many pre-dated the 1707 English annexation of Scotland and all were made subject to English Law and the English Crown, exactly the same domination Scotland remains subject to today.
History tells us that colonialism is always ‘a co-operative venture’ (Fanon) with native elites who are prepared to sell their own people and sovereignty to a dominant colonial power. Scots elites were and remain today no different from co-opted native elites in colonial Ireland, India, Kenya, and elsewhere.
Nope, no get out of jail card for you I’m afraid. Historical facts are facts, deal with them.
It goes without saying, of course, my last comment above was directed at Alf, not Factchecker….
Crimes against humanity? Plenty of those, historical and modern.
Kincora boys home and the many r4pes (a crime against humanity) is a modern example. Files not to be released until 2065.
link to irishtimes.com
“Who are the ‘they’?”
If you are talking about “crimes against humanity” “they” could be the clan chiefs who harmed Highlanders and made them poor in order to afford huge castles and ape the English aristocracy.
“They” singular could be Charles Trevelyan, English civil servant and his “roads to nowhere” and his wish to drive Highlanders from their land and replace them with Germans.
“They” could also be the butcher Cumberland, intent on extinguishing a culture.
I’m sure there are other examples as well as England’s and Scotland’s participation in slavery
“I’m sure there are other examples”
Of course, sam, why not spend a happy Monday trawling your eighteenth and nineteenth century history books for a few more?
Meantime, if it’s OK with you, sane, rational Scots like me are going to continue to refuse to get exercised over some cants long since deid being vicious and nasty to some other cants also long since deid.
I’d recommend it to you too – the idea that guilt doesn’t get passed down the generations to the far removed descendants of the guilty. But TBQFH, the likes of you are probably happier continually greeting over your interpretations of the Ancient Guff.
Another thing. Despite the well established industry of grift and grievance that surrounds it, victimhood doesn’t get passed down the generations to the far removed descendants of the victims either. Sane, rational Scots like me can all see why the grifting grievance mongers would like some free dosh, but that doesn’t mean we’re all about to dig deep.
Plenty of us can find some unfortunate cants in our ancestry too. But we see no reason why that should be allowed to define our lives.
Collette Stevenson’s mistake is quite understandable, given the SNP’s total obsession with transgender issues over the past decade or so. She presumably thought that the organisation being mentioned was Trans Sport Scotland. I wonder whether she thought that the committee she was participating in was the Trans Sport Committee at the Scottish Parliament?
By weird synchronicity, the film “children of men” was on last night (really good, well acted, interesting script, dystopian sci fi) – which is a bit of a ripoff of “camp of the saints” (without being too close to get it cancelled – there are concessions like some black girl is the new immaculate conception … )
More fillums of quality for yizall –
link to x.com
– hate to say I told you so …
after freeing the slaves, lincoln tried to “send them back” to africa, a country they called liberia
link to youtube.com
– the ex-slaves immediately enslaved the locals
Slavery always makes me think of that crack : “it was worse than a crime, it was a mistake” (slavery does get wound up, but only once the economists work out that buying and selling labour on free markets was more “efficient”; even in ancient rome, slavery destroyed the economy, and along with patrician greed saw it all fall)
this is quite fascinating
link to youtube.com
– there is a massacre of arabs (involved in the slave trade) about the 1hour mark 1.04 I think
One massive problem for africa was that its real nations are the tribes, but colonial boundaries did not respect this; a pragmatic decision (after the mess of india) was made to “leave them as they are” thus consigning africa to the hell of “multiculturalism” (no, they don’t all look the same, ya raciss); corporate led neo-colonialism and the predations of the IMF/world bank don’t help either, along with largely underhand economic practices (africa becomes a dumping ground for US agricultural over production, destroying local farmers – the way to help africa and its people is by trading with it, fairly.)
Everyone wants to be a “good guy” but – arithmetic – is a cruel bastard; africa is currently 1B pop. (with nigeria alone 200M), europe is about 500M people, england 70M, Scotland 5.5M. Population estimates for 2100 are – 500M for europe (flatline), and 4B for africa. But this fails to take in reality – will all these africans want to stay there? I think not. Being a “good guy” in a sustainable way would mean taking in a few thousand a year (in Scotland), which is nothing. Beyond a point the economy, welfare, education systems all collapse and … you end up with a new liberia, in vienna, berlin, paris etc. Appeals to emotion and for sympathy cannot override logic and maths. In the past few years Scotland has gotten a lot of nigerians – they are very noticeable, mainly for their fucking attitude.
There is a deeper conspiracy theory that mass immigration leads to a balkanized society with lots of groups all furiously fighting one another in a zero sum game – with those levels of violence, everyone will be calling out for a police state, which will be provided; which was the plan all along. But this is happening anyway, and I don’t see any additional need to just wreck everything.
Greens, aren’t green anymore – more of a perverts self help group, but back in the day when they were “environmentalists” one of the big things for them was “the numbers” and they would go on and on about “carrying capacity” (and various neo-malthusian arguments); they have never applied these carrying capacity arguments to africa though … because that would be “racist” and gets you drummed out of the brownies, the respectable peoples gang. They will though – tell the natives to stop having kids and promote “abortion rights” while agitating for open borders for women who have on average 6 of them.
– no more environmentalism, just plenty mentalism. The new fascism will be painted green and carry a rainbow flag. The green movement is now a death cult.
I think “wir aw jock tamsons bairns” needs to be retired, permanently. My people are the Scots, and they should take precedence, in Scotland. And for us – England remains the principal problem.
Alf Baird says:
19 October, 2026 at 3:20 pm
“The empire colonies you refer to were never ever ‘Scotland’s’ colonies at all; many pre-dated the 1707 English annexation of Scotland”
Obviously not. They were not England’s either. Post 1707 neither country were sovereign states.
I do not know any Scottish historian who does not accept the significant role the people of Scotland had in the expansion of the British Empire. The National Museum of Scotland is also in no doubt. Our resident learned professor obviously knows better.
“…the people of Scotland…”
Which people would that be?
Oh aye, the anglophone elite or ‘unionists’ if you prefer.
Fine, James, have it your way.
All the Scots who colonised and exploited foreign lands all over the globe, often commemorating their home towns and cities by naming their new homes after them, were the Anglophone elite or Unionists. I’m sure they didn’t realise they were, but if you say so…
Please contact the National Museum of Scotland and share your insight.
Goanay no dae that, FC.
If James makes himself known to the The National Museum of Scotland they’ll have him stuffed, mounted, and displayed centre stage in a trice.
Homo Scoticus Ignoratus – a prime specimen – 300 pounds of rancid, gurning blubber.
Not quite up there with the Bayeux Tapestry for drawing the crowds, but still a wonder to behold.
As usual yir wrang fuckchecker it was NOT the British empire it was and still is the BRUTISH empire , and you and yours can fuck right of with yir blaming of ORDINARY people , but don’t worry the decendents of all these oppressed poor peoples have come to GREAT BRITAIN to get REVENGE
Thank you for your polite and insightful comment, twathater.
It was indeed sometimes brutish. And I didn’t blame anybody. People did what they did.
And I’m not worried about the descendants you refer to – I’ve worked with them. Most simply want a better life, have never thought of ‘revenge’, and many are making very valuable contributions to our society in every walk of life, including government.
Have a nice day.
Factchecker – as I said further up the thread, it’s pointless trying to apply logic to the hopelessly illogical.
I was accused of being a middle class unionist, despite growing up without a pot to pish in and wanting independence.
There are those who seek division, hatred, grievance and just lash out like animals acting out of base instinct. Some of the bizarre posts BTL here are testimony to that, as are the events unfolding on the streets of France. Such cases are largely lost in any functioning society and are best left to wither as their own terminal ignorance and stupidity will inevitably be their undoing. The sad thing is, the suffering they inflict on the rest of us as they go down.
Scotland did not have colonies.
Scottish elites participated in the British Empire – ordinary Scots did not benefit from it.
Therefore, unlike England, Scotland was not an imperial actor — a small Scottish elite aligned with imperial England and its values was.
This little comment thread contains one valid point, a point made by James — that Scottish participation in empire was limited to elites, not “the people of Scotland.”
But the conversation collapses because each participant is arguing in a different category: factchecker argues nation, James argues class, and Hatey argues nothing at all.
factchecker’s initial point: “Scotland played a significant role in the British Empire.”
This is broadly true at the level of elites, not “the people of Scotland.”
He’s gesturing toward mainstream historiography, but he phrases it sloppily.
His mistake: He treats “Scotland” as a unified agent rather than a stratified society.
It isn’t malicious — just imprecise, and a category error.
James’s correction: “Which people would that be? Oh aye, the anglophone elite or ‘unionists’.”
This is actually the correct structural point.
James is saying:
– empire participation was class-bound
– the beneficiaries were elites
– ordinary Scots were not imperial actors
– “Scotland” did not colonise anything…
… Scottish elites aligned with an imperial actor did.
Ordinary Scots did not benefit from “the empire” and were often exploited by the same elite.
This is historically accurate.
factchecker’s reply: “Fine, have it your way… All the Scots who colonised were the Anglophone elite or Unionists.”
He thinks he’s being sarcastic, but he accidentally reinforces James’s point.
He’s trying to say: “You’re being ridiculous — obviously lots of Scots were involved.”
But he doesn’t understand the category distinction:
– individual Scots do not equal Scotland as a nation
– elite participation does not equal national participation
– benefit to elites does not equal benefit to the population
factchecker collapses class into nation.
The confusion arises because “Scotland” is treated as a single actor, when in reality only a small elite aligned with English imperial power exercised agency.
James’ point, albeit it somewhat lost in a mix of sarcasm, grievance, and performative disdain, is the only valid point.
@Northcode – it wasn’t just the Scottish elites that participated in colonialism, but also your argument above is generally true of England as well. It was the English elites who led the creation of the empire and often ordinary English people did not benefit.
Aidan, yes — that’s broadly correct.
The same class distinction applies in England: imperial agency sat with elites, not with “the English people” as a collective.
Ordinary English citizens didn’t design imperial policy, didn’t direct colonial expansion, and often didn’t benefit from it either.
The only point I was making in my post is that when we talk about “Scotland’s role in empire,” it’s important to separate national identity from elite agency.
Scotland wasn’t an imperial actor in its own right; a small Scottish elite aligned itself with English imperial power and participated through that structure.
The same logic applies to England, but England was the sovereign imperial centre, so the national/elite distinction plays out differently.
So yes — elite-driven empire, not popular empire.
That’s the category distinction I was highlighting.
Absolutely Northcode – but a more succinct way of putting it is that English and Scottish elites both working together and separately set out on a whole range of colonial exploitations. However, these exploitations did not necessarily involve or benefit people from across a cross-section of either Scottish or English society in the same ways.
Aidan, yes — elites on both sides participated in imperial expansion, and the effects weren’t evenly distributed across either society.
That part is uncontroversial.
The only distinction I was making is that England was the sovereign imperial centre, whereas Scotland wasn’t.
So when we talk about “Scotland’s role in empire,” it’s important to separate elite participation from national agency.
Scottish elites acted through English imperial structures; Scotland as a nation didn’t exercise independent imperial power.
That’s why the class/nation distinction matters in this context.
I think the germane point is that Scotland – in conjunction with England – was a very willing, highly effective in their own right and avid co-participant in colonisation and the British Empire from 1707 onwards (and was, in fact, an active coloniser well prior, too, e.g. Nova Scotia, East New Jersey and the ill-fated “Darien Scheme” to name but some). That being the case, it really does stick in the craw when people like Alf tries in vain to airbrush out these inconvenient facts from his (highly revisionist and oft-stated) views.
I think everyone gets that the main benefactors were the landed gentry and merchant class, and as per usual the rank and file got very little out of it – in both Scotland and England alike. So what though? How does this in any way absolve either country, or render Scotland’s contribution (as a country) any less factual as a result?
As smokescreens go, a pretty piss poor effort IMO.
Caveman, the point isn’t whether some Scots participated — they clearly did.
The distinction I’m making is between elite participation and national agency.
England was the sovereign imperial centre: it designed imperial policy, controlled colonial administration, and exercised imperial power – Scotland wasn’t an imperial actor in its own right.
Scottish elites aligned themselves with English imperial structures and participated through those channels, but Scotland as a nation didn’t exercise independent colonial authority.
Darien doesn’t contradict that — it actually illustrates it.
It was a private venture by a small elite, not a sovereign Scottish colonial project, and its failure (some say engineered by England) is part of why Scotland entered the Union on such unfavourable terms.
Darien is not evidence of Scottish imperial agency — it is evidence of its absence.
So yes, elites on both sides were involved.
But involvement by elites doesn’t automatically translate into national agency.
Nova Scotia and East New Jersey weren’t Scottish colonies. They were private ventures by small groups of Scottish elites operating under English royal patents and within English colonial administration.
Scotland never exercised sovereign authority over either territory.
Darien is the same pattern: a private elite venture, not a Scottish colonial possession — and as I’ve already stated, its failure actually illustrates Scotland’s lack of imperial capacity.
Private participation by elites doesn’t equal national colonial agency. England was the sovereign imperial centre; Scotland wasn’t.
Participation is not the same as sovereignty – that’s the distinction I’m highlighting.
It’s also worth noting that imperial England recruited elites from many places — Ireland, Wales, India, Africa, the Caribbean, Canada, Australia, and more.
Scottish elites were just one part of a much wider pattern of elite co-option into English imperial structures.
Elite participation doesn’t make those countries imperial actors, and it doesn’t make Scotland one either. It simply shows how England expanded its reach by integrating local elites into its system.
That’s why the distinction between elite participation and national agency matters.
As I said, participation is not the same as sovereignty.
Sorry, Northy, but “only following orders” was debunked decades ago.
I hope you’re not about to be indicted for something bad and planning using that defense. You’re gonna be in deep doodoo if you are.
You’re applying a clear double standard here to absolve pre-1707 Scotland while holding England to a completely different metric.
First off, framing Darien as merely a “private elite venture” is historically inaccurate:
(1) It was established by an Act of the Parliament of Scotland (1695) with royal assent.
(2) It mobilized between 20% to 50% of Scotland’s total circulating wealth, attracting subscriptions from merchants, burghs, landholders, and everyday citizens across the country. It was a chartered, state-backed national enterprise aimed at building a Scottish territorial empire.
Second, if imperial policy and colonial expansion were driven almost entirely by landed gentry, royal chartered companies, and wealthy merchant class – as was overwhelmingly the case for both nations – why does England not get the exact same “free pass” that you so graciously grant to Scotland? A total double standard.
If ordinary English commoners (who had no vote, no say in parliament, and derived little benefit from colonial ventures) don’t absolve England of national imperial agency, you can’t then selectively use the same class dynamics to supposedly shield Scotland.
Scotland’s colonial failures prior to 1707 demonstrate a lack of economic and naval capacity to sustain an empire – not a lack of national intent or the will to become a colonial power. In fact, quite the reverse, which is rather problematic when trying to take the moral high ground as in this instance.
I’m not talking about absolution or moral judgement. I’m talking about the structural difference between elite participation and national sovereignty.
Darien was authorised by the Scottish Parliament, but it wasn’t a sovereign Scottish colony.
It was a chartered company funded by private capital, lacking naval protection, diplomatic recognition, military support, or any of the institutional structures that define imperial agency.
Permission and investment don’t create sovereignty.
England was the imperial centre because it exercised sovereign colonial authority — it designed imperial policy, administered colonies, projected naval power, and governed overseas territories.
Scotland didn’t.
Scottish elites participated through English structures, just as elites from Ireland, Wales, India, Africa, the Caribbean and many other places did. Intent or participation by elites doesn’t make those countries imperial actors, and it doesn’t make Scotland one either.
If elite involvement equals national sovereignty, then the British Empire wasn’t British at all — it was the combined sovereign agency of dozens of countries acting in concert… which is an absurdity
And that is why the distinction between elite participation and national agency matters.
Again, participation is not the same as sovereignty.
Sir John Wedderburn fought at Culloden for the Jacobites, was captured and executed. His two sons who had fought with him were captured and sent to the Caribbean as bondagers where the laboured- for seven years.
After serving their time they became slave owners. In Jamaica they had a sugar plantation, run by slaves, and they became enormously wealthy. At one point, they owned ten percent of Jamaica’s land.
The son John returned to Scotland in 1769. He reclaimed the title of Baronet of Blackness, which had been lost due to his father’s execution for treason.
He was involved with the London Society of West India Planters and Merchants, advocating for the interests of slave owners.
Not for the first time, Northy, you’re (disingenuously) trying to hide behind a dictionary definition of “sovereignty” to dodge the historical reality.
You claim Darien wasn’t a “sovereign colonial project” because it failed and lacked a global navy, but as you should know, that’s confusing capability with intent. As I’ve said, it was authorized by an Act of the Scottish Parliament with royal assent and backed by up to half of Scotland’s total wealth. That isn’t just “some elites” – this was a national, state-backed enterprise.
More importantly, as I’ve said, your entire framework collapses on its own double standard. If ordinary English peasants and commoners (who had zero vote and zero say) don’t absolve England of national imperial agency, you cannot turn around and use that exact same class divide to give Scotland a free pass.
You can split hairs all you like about “participation versus sovereignty,” but Scotland was a willing co-architect and financial stakeholder in the Empire post-1707 – not some occupied colony like 19th-century India. Own the history instead of trying to airbrush it.
In 1778 Scots law rejected slavery. The Court of Session ruled in the case of Joseph Knight that Scotland could not support the institution of slavery, thus establishing that no person could be held as a slave under Scots law.
link to blackhistorymonth.org.uk
Robert Wedderburn was the illegitimate child of James Wedderburn and a black slave, Rosanna. His early life shaped his attitudes as he saw the brutality towards his mother.
James Wedderburn sold Rosanna, then five months pregnant with his third child, back to her previous owner.
James Wedderburn later returned to live in Britain. His legitimate son and heir, Andrew Colville, defending his father after the details were made public in the British press, denied the paternity.
James Wedderburn stipulated,that Rosanna’s child (Robert) when born should be legally free, and he officially registered both Robert and an elder brother, James, as free. Although born free, Wedderburn was raised in a harsh environment, as his mother was often flogged due to her “violent and rebellious temper”.
Eventually he came to England, became literate and an advocate against slavery. In 1824 he published a book. “The Horrors of Slavery”.
“thus establishing that no person could be held as a slave under Scots law”
Fascinating.
Take the underage Scottish lassies, being trafficked for sex right now.
Is that because Scots law overlooked adding them into the categories of prohibited slavery, or because criminals have never been too bothered about what is or isn’t against the law?
It surely can’t be that Scotland’s authorities choose to look the other way for “complex reasons we wouldn’t understand”, could it?
Passing laws has always been the easy bit. It’s the enforcing them that separates the men from the progressive, virtue signalling snowflakes.
I’m not debating intent or moral responsibility.
My point throughout has been purely structural: participation by elites is not the same as national sovereignty, and Scotland did not exercise sovereign imperial power. Nor did Ireland, Wales, India, Africa, the Caribbean or the many other places whose elites were co-opted into English imperial structures.
England was the imperial centre; Scotland wasn’t. Darien, Nova Scotia and similar ventures were private or chartered projects that lacked the institutional, diplomatic and military structures that define colonial sovereignty.
Permission, investment or aspiration don’t create sovereign imperial agency.
Again, if elite involvement equals national sovereignty, then the British Empire wasn’t British at all — it was the combined sovereign agency of dozens of countries acting in concert, which is an obvious absurdity.
You’re framing this as absolution or moral judgement, but I’m only describing the mechanics of imperial agency, not assigning blame or virtue.
We’re obviously operating in different analytical categories, so there’s no real basis for further debate here.
“private or chartered projects that lacked the institutional, diplomatic and military structures that define colonial sovereignty”
I’m sure that fine distinction must have been of great comfort to the indigenous inhabitants killed or ethnically cleansed. No doubt still is if they were permitted to have offspring. Somebody should ask them.
Northy is making a point of some wider applicability. Should you be unfortunate to be mugged for your moby, be sure to ask the mugger if he’s working for himself, or is part of an organised gang. The former response will go a long way towards making you feel better.
Northcode: you are right up to a point. We would have had Darien had it been successful and we would probably have branched out from there. Many of the overseers in the Caribbean plantations were Scottish which is why so many Caribbean people have Scottish surnames.
We did support the English overseas in India and other colonies as administrators, so our record is not a clean one. Slowly, we have come to understand and realise that, on top of coming to understand our own subservience to British rule. That, too, will end. I wouldn’t like to predict when, but I shouldn’t think it’s too far off.
The point is that we are in the same trap as the rest of the UK, the rest of Europe and the rest of the West in that our overarching culture (Western) is being destroyed. Independence will not do anything to alleviate that unless we act to unearth the real roots of the problems we are facing and I see no appetite for that in the wider population – yet. We witter on about how wonderful Ireland is. It’s not; it’s a basket case just like us and the rest of the UK. If we can’t identify the source of the issues because we are blind by ideology, we have no hope of confronting them and overcoming them.
“Scotland did not have colonies.”
Wrong. Plainly and factually wrong. Examples have been provided.
Northy, you’re still hiding behind an impossibly narrow definition of “sovereignty” just to avoid admitting that pre-1707 Scotland acted as an independent nation with its own colonial intent and State backing, as easily proven here, as elsewhere. Your continuing to swear black is white to avoid inconvenient truths just looks most desperate every time you do it. It is time to face up to historical facts, which are immutable. Neither you, nor anyone else can change them.
Comparing Scotland – a sovereign Kingdom with its own parliament, legal system, royal assent, and State-chartered enterprises like Darien funded by up to half its national wealth and explicitly supported by, and directed by Scots Parliament – to colonized, occupied nations like 19th-century India or Ireland is a complete false equivalence, as you doubtless realise. “Scottish elites” weren’t just “co-opted” into an existing foreign machine; they were directing their own sovereign institutions (e.g. Scots Parliament itself) to stake a claim, and they were by no means the only contributing party.
If passing a colonial enterprise via an Act of Parliament, as backed by national subscription and royal assent to boot somehow doesn’t count as national agency, then your “structural” framework is just an arbitrary “rule” you have plucked from the air, rather feebly and impotently designed to supposedly keep you from ever being wrong about this (at least in the World of Northcode exclusively). You aren’t describing the mechanics of history, you’re rewriting them. Badly and ineffectually.
Of course, all of this begs the question: why does any of this “ancient guff” even matter day to day? The answer, of course, is that it does not. Our friend TURABDIN came on here the other day and hilariously suggested, in absolute seriousness, that your average Brit thinks twice about objecting to waves of boat people invading our shores daily, because we ourselves were subjected to the Norman Conquest of the 11th century…! 😀 I think a good dose of reality is needed in discussions such as these. Whilst there may be abstract academic interest and merit, these things matter not one jot in today’s world, in 2026, with its manifold problems and dangers. Perhaps we should refocus on these.
“Perhaps we should refocus on these”
Perhaps you have lost sight of the purpose of a place like this one! 🙂
Well quite frankly Hatey, whilst the Editor’s purpose seems clear enough to me, I’m less sure about the BTL posse’s, which would seem “eclectic”, “eccentric” and rather varied in nature… 🙂
Check out the big brain on CC.
“Nuts” covers them all.
Nope, you’ve lost me there I’m afraid. 😀
Sorry, CC, I meant that ““eclectic”, “eccentric” and rather varied in nature…” = “nuts”.
So it seems to me at any rate.
I try to apply the standard “stranger at a bus stop” test.
Imagine throwing into a conversation with a stranger at a bus stop, after discussing the weather and the strange smells off bus seats these days, a statement to the effect “You do realise that the UK doesn’t exist?”.
Or “Did you know they’re eating and shagging babies, or maybe shagging and eating them, we don’t know the correct order?”.
Naw. I can’t see it happening.
Your listener, however polite, agreeable and attentive, would consider you to be nuts. And be desperate for the bus to arrive so she could make her escape.
Possible good news about John Swinney – according to Robin McAlpine, JS wants out of the leadership.
Of course there is a downside. Who is there in the party who would be any better?
Answer is no one and to be honest Sarah I wouldn’t call the SNP a party certainly not one that believes in democracy.
The weather in Fife can be quite unpredictable.
Robert Hardman reporting from Paris for the Mail Online this morning:
“Most of the looters are, indeed, from ethnic minorities but they are certainly not the asylum-seeking small-boat crowd heading for Britain.
They are French-born, French-speaking French nationals: the children of second or third-generation migrants who came to build a better life here. And they are not going away”
Back in the days of the “Butcher’s Apron”, wasn’t it usually the rule that looters would be shot on sight? I’d like to see the French adopt that, and TBH, I’m surprised they haven’t already done so.
It might stiffen Andeh’s resolve for when the same carnage breaks out here. After all, it will be much the same people doing the looting.
Remember this epitaph to be written on Europe’s gravestone, before that too gets smashed down.
“They are not going away”.
H McH: It is a strange thing that those of us, from previous generations, who emigrated to far-flung places perhaps did take our culture with us, but once we put down roots, we became loyal whatevers. By the third or fourth generation, no eulogising our past remained, so deeply did we become part of our environment.
This was true of most races, not just white people. Jews, Muslims, HIndus, Sikhs, Africans, Carribeans were all integrated because the first generation wanted to integrate and passed that on to their offspring. Now, we have fourth and fifth generation immigrants into the UK who hate the UK and refuse to integrate. That is not just a perception but patently obvious to anyone who has been paying attention. It is not far-right to say so.
Something has happened to the last two generations, in particular, and it is not racism because most people are not overtly racist. They might want the boats stopped and they might want restrictions on legal immigration because of the adverse effects on infrastructure and resources, but they – the vast majority – express no deep-seated hatred for other races.
Our children – and the children of generations of immigrants who have integrated successfully – have been fed a diet of post modernism/neoMarxism/oppressor-oppressed nonsense that, if they had one critical braincell, they would question and refute. However, so powerful a hold has there hard left had on the UK that few leave school these days with any sense of belonging, simply a sense off victimhood that stands up to non scrutiny at all. Destruction of all societal norms is the post modernist trope and we are seeing that play out now.
What can we do? Well, for starters, we can stop looking at this as if it affects others and start looking at Scotland as – for the moment – a part of the UK, a part of Europe and a part of the West. Much as we would like to see ourselves as exceptional, we are not and we will go down with the rest of the West unless we understand that. The introduction to the UK and, therefore, to Scotland, of American-style modern ‘woke’ has ensured our downfall.
Yet, we still see people out on the streets – even older people who should know better – wearing keffiyehs, flying Hamas and Palestinian flags. We see people out on the streets shouting about the right to bodily autonomy that trespasses on all female hard-won rights to privacy, dignity and safety without even as much as a nod to irony.
We are in deep, deep trouble all over the West. We are in deep, deep trouble in Scotland. Independence will not save us from this because it is too deeply embedded and too widespread. We should be digging it out and exposing it for what it is. France is the example we should take our cue from – and cut the legs off this post modernist monster now while there is still some chance. It is a slim one, but it’s there.
“Something has happened to the last two generations”
There’s a world of difference between destitute people who emigrate to make a new start in a wilderness, to thrive by their own labours and intelligence, or perish.
And destitute people who emigrate to a first-world welfare state, who have but to stretch out their hands, and everything will be given to them for free.
I’m reading today that there’s a tsunami of around 2 million immigrants who will be gifted Indefinite Leave To Remain in the UK over the next few years. Many of them have never worked and never will. Farcically, many of them have been allowed to fetch economically defunct dependents too.
Once their rights come through, they will be entitled to exactly the same freebies as a Brit with ancestral roots going back centuries.
It stinks to high heaven.
”… modernism/neoMarxism/oppressor-oppressed nonsense that, if they had one critical braincell, they would question and refute. However, so powerful a hold has there hard left had on the UK that few leave school these days with any sense of belonging, simply a sense off victimhood that stands up to non scrutiny at all. Destruction of all societal norms is the post modernist trope and we are seeing that play out now“
Agreed. The youth have been indoctrinated with this shite, but at least some of them should know better, as opposed to this grievance-hunting groupthink herd (a lot of older people included too).
Still, that’s the Left for you.
H McH: yes, I agree that the circumstances were a bit different in the past, but even in the relatively recent past, most people still adopted the ethos and rules of their country of choice. That is what choice means. The point I am trying to make is that so many now choose not to integrate, and these include many of our own children and grandchildren. My point is this: it is always a choice, whether you receive benefits or otherwise.
I can see how people might become alienated if there is no work, no prospects, nothing but unending poverty, but, in those circumstances, you have to take what you can get. I’m educated but I have done bar work, cleaning, worked on a factory floor and cared for the elderly when other jobs were not available. Most people did that, and do that.
If young people are being brainwashed into believing that our entire history amounts to little more than colonialism, brutish slavery, racism and oppression of one kind or another, and this ridiculous viewpoint, with no counter viewpoint, is supported by misguided adults out on the streets, then I cannot see how we are going to avoid a France-like conflagration.
To cut off benefits at a stroke or to refuse immigrants benefits of any kind, will only stoke greater ill-feeling. Reducing benefits would have to be a longer-term aim, immigration will have to be managed in countries of origin and a strict, manageable, numbers allocation would have to be put in place. This is precisely what Denmark has done and it is working. Anyone who comes uninvited is sent back and, now, the numbers have dwindled to a low scale.
That obviously would never work with our own children and young people who are the ‘wokest’ generation in the history of the planet. We were all a bit blinkered and rebellious when we were young – it is in the nature of thing – but nothing like this. It is as if a large section – certainly not all, but far too many – of the young population has decided it will repudiate everything that went before, especially if it is traditional and linked to our culture. That includes Scottish culture, not just English, European or Western culture. Even the ancient Greeks berated their young generations, but this CHOOSING (emphasis, not shouting) alienation over belonging is new. We are witnessing a coalescing of various strands of anti Westernism that can only end in tears.
@Lorncal
In “No Country For Old Men” the author writes that back in the fifties of the last century, the ordinary folk of ordinary towns would never have believed that in 60 years time, heavily tattooed, drugged up pagans would be walking their High Streets, festooned with rings through their noses, ears and cheeks.
That these people would be their own grandchildren would have been incomprehensible!
So yes, things change. The crunch point is coming from many different directions, not the least of which is the potential for AI to destroy many of the remaining jobs.
I do actually understand why so many immigrant communities are sidestepping integration. They have the perfect opportunity to avoid much of the over-regulation and overwhelming government interference that is bleeding us dry for little tangible benefit. Plus a bit of grifting on top.
The fact that they are able to do this only breeds further resentment and hostility when the indigenous twig how they are managing to succeed when we can’t.
Parallel economic systems, parallel banks and lenders, parallel legal systems, parallel educational provision. Increasing subversion of the NHS to prioritise treatment of “their” communities. Just today, I was reading yet again how the benefits system needs to be reformed so that ethnic polygamy isn’t subsidised by the UK taxpayer.
How many more times are they gonna promise to sort that one out?
H McH: it was noted post WW II that few people in any of the affected countries expressed pre war or post war, a hatred of the Jews, but that did not save them. People do not need to hate you to kill you. In Latvia, for example, many otherwise rational people enriched themselves at the expense of murdered Jews; many got what could be called a ‘hard-on’ at the thought of denouncing and betraying Jews; and many were happy to fire the bullets and wield the knives because all moral sense had fled. Others were Bolsheviks who hid amongst the killers in order to save their own skins when the Germans invaded.
There were people who took huge risks to hide Jews, to warn Jews of ‘Aktions’ (roubd-ups and mass killings), to treat wounded and ill Jews. That’s the thing: until unrest erupts, there is no way of really knowing who will do what in times of crisis and stress. The vast majority in most occupied countries went along with it all and bent to the prevailing wind. There are few heroes and heroines, but they exist in every nation and just as bad times bring out the worst in most people, so they can bring out the best, too, in others.
WW II is the best example, in modern times, of how bestial people can be when they are given a free rein and fear no retribution. Compared with WW II, France is a small conflagration, but it is spreading to other countries and, if those countries do not stand up to it now, it has the potential to consume us all. Churchill, however you view him, warned in the early 1930s that, if the German thugs were not stopped then, they would engulf the world in flames.
Good post, Lorncal.
As I’ve often observed, we should never underestimate the popularity of a government policy that enables people to dob in their neighbours and then help themselves to their stuff once the vans have come to take them away.
A recent poll in France revealed that many immigrants are seriously considering leaving if Le Pen wins the next election. Many of them will likely come here!
We need to have similar policies put in place here to not only deter new migrants, but help shift some of the ones we already have.
That means voting for Reform.
I’m still very much in favour of the carrot, rather than the stick. That means greatly tightening enforcement of our laws. Deporting frauds and criminals. No benefits without ten year’s contributions. No dependents. No citizenship unless you’re squeaky clean while you’re here. No more ambiguity over Sharia, polygamy, misogyny, blasphemy, no go areas, etc.
It’s our country. Anybody who doesn’t want to live like us can get tae. They’ll be happier elsewhere and we’ll be happier once they’ve gone.
Insider humour is affection; outsider humour is judgement.
When someone mocks their own culture the audience hears:
– affection
– familiarity
– shared experience
– “we’re laughing at ourselves”
– “this is part of who we are”
It’s a form of in-group bonding.
But when an outsider mocks the same thing the audience hears:
– judgement
– condescension
– stereotyping
– misunderstanding
– historical baggage
– power imbalance
It becomes outside-of-group commentary, which carries a completely different emotional weight.
Insiders have earned the right to tease their own culture – outsiders haven’t.
It’s about legitimacy.
If you grew up inside a culture, you:
– know its rhythms
– know its flaws
– know its strengths
– know its history
– know its pain
– know its humour
So when you tease or mock it, people recognise that you’re doing it from within.
Outsiders haven’t earned that legitimacy.
They haven’t lived the culture.
They haven’t carried its burdens.
They haven’t earned the right to poke fun.
This is why Scottish comedians, for example, can joke about Scots, but English comedians doing the same thing often hit a nerve.
One is affectionate self-portraiture. The other judgemental put-down.
Historical power dynamics also matter.
People often forget that mockery between groups is never just about humour — it’s about history.
If one group has historically:
– dominated
– colonised
– suppressed
– mocked
– erased
– or belittled
another group, then jokes from the dominant group carry the weight of that history.
Even if the joke is mild and, on the surface, innocuous, the context isn’t.
This is why:
– English mockery of Scots
– American mockery of Indigenous peoples
– French mockery of Bretons
– English mockery of Irish
– English mockery of Welsh
often feels like a continuation of historical disrespect.
Insider humour doesn’t carry that baggage.
Insider humour punches sideways; outsider humour always punches down — even when the outsider might not intend it.
“Old” Northy used to reject “insider” humour by claiming that the “insider” must be an outsider in disguise.
Even if “New” Northy no longer does so, most chippy Scots will still do so immediately. It’s exactly the same mechanism that causes the regulars on here to pigeonhole somebody critical of the SNP or the regulars themselves, as a Yoon.
Humour is humour. It works or bombs irrespective of sour, finger wagging prude’s efforts to attach ideological baggage to it.
As the great man himself wrote:
“Tae see oorsels, as ithers see us”
He was appealing to the fresh eye and perspective of the outsider.
I’ve never understood this fragility and undue sensitivity to a bit of affectionate piss-taking. As Essex Man, myself and my kin are very frequently the butt of everyone’s jokes – the white socked nobhead with dollybird Essex Girl riding shotgun in a Ford Capri festooned with tasteless Halfords “accessories” and fog lamps, sounding like a bear farting despite 1.3L engine; a penchant for pissweak lager, holidays to the Costa del Sol and about as much cultural depth as a Wetherspoons. Like all humour, more than a kernel of truth. Guilty as charged, pretty much (I’ve had 3 Capris, all with Janspeeds 😀 )
People need to lighten up. Truefact: I’ve met Russ Abbott very recently and he’s a lovely, quiet, very modest and thoughtful man. (Not like me).
Humour is humour. You dish it out and you get it back in spades, and everyone laughs. That’s the point.
Correct Captain. Humour however is lost on the professionally offended puritans who can’t think for themselves and are *told* to *be* offended at whatever. And if course, if you don’t like something – and believe me, there are plenty of supposed “comedians” I cannot stand – then don’t watch/read/listen. It’s not an excuse to cancel them.
P.S. Nothing wrong with Capris. And my father in law is an Essex lad.
Awesome Spartan! 🙂
Truth be told, a Capri is a Cortina in drag and all mouth, no trousers. But it does cut a certain dash, and it has charm. Especially the 2.8i, though I never reached such automotive heights. Had to make do with bunging a 2.0 pinto into my early 1.6GL and swapping out the interior at the scrapyard lol.
You’re not engaging with the point I made — you’re engaging with a version of “Old Northy”, perhaps nostalgically, that exists only in your memory – that version no longer exists.
My post wasn’t about personal sensitivity; it was about the structural difference between insider humour and outsider humour, which is well-established in cultural theory.
The distinction isn’t ideological. It’s contextual:
– insider humour comes from shared experience
– outsider humour comes from external judgement
– and historical power dynamics shape how the audience receives both
That’s not prudishness — it’s just how cultural legitimacy works.
Burns’ line about “seeing ourselves as others see us” is about perspective, not about erasing the difference between in-group and out-group humour.
Outsider perspective can be valuable, but it doesn’t erase the emotional weight carried by historical relationships between groups.
Humour isn’t just the joke itself — it’s the direction it travels and the context it lands in.
I get your argument Northcode, however selective outrage ends up eating itself.
In my view, nothing is beyond critique or outright mockery, whether self-depreciating or from external sources. That means idiots can say what they like, and be ruthlessly ridiculed accordingly. Sunlight is the best disinfectant.
What’s our national motto? “Nemo me impune lacessit”. You shall not strike me with impunity. In other words, say what you like, but be prepared for a kick up the arse afterwards.
Just to clarify — none of what I wrote was about fragility, offence, or “lightening up.”
I’m not arguing that people shouldn’t make jokes, or that anyone should be offended by them. I’m describing why insider humour and outsider humour land differently, which is a well-established point in cultural theory.
It’s not about sensitivity. It’s about context.
Humour isn’t only the joke itself — it’s the relationship between speaker and audience, the shared experience (or lack of it), and the historical dynamics between groups. Those factors shape how humour is received, even when everyone involved is perfectly capable of laughing at themselves.
So the point wasn’t “don’t joke.”
It was simply: insider humour and outsider humour are not the same phenomenon, because they travel through different social and historical channels.
That’s all.
Captain Caveman’s Essex-man story is charming, but irrelevant.
He’s saying: “I can take a joke about Essex, therefore Scots should take jokes about Scotland.”
But:
– Essex has no colonial relationship with Scotland
– Essex is not a historically dominated group
– Essex stereotypes do not come from a power imbalance
– Essex humour is not tied to national identity
– Essex humour is not used to justify political subordination
He’s comparing intra-English class humour with inter-national historical humour.
It’s a category mismatch.
The comments in relation to my post do not engage with my argument.
They misread structural analysis as emotional fragility, collapse insider/outsider humour into “people are too sensitive,” and respond with personal anecdotes and tribal reflexes rather than conceptual reasoning.
They are reacting to a fictional emotional claim I never made.
“Essex humour is not tied to national identity”
And there we see the core of the matter exposed.
Northy is just deploying the tired old special pleading call for subjects close to the heart of the pleader to be exempted from humour.
In this case, he wants an exemption for some of our stereotypical national characteristics.
It makes sense in a way. The image of the dour, miserable Scot, tut tutting at anybody daring to have fun and enjoy themselves is a well established stereotype.
I suspect Northy will be unable to comprehend that by himself donning the mantle of the stereotypical Scottish humour hater, he’s actually disproving his own claims.
It’s got nothing to do with punching down or sideways, and everything to do with insecure, immature snowflakes insisting that they should have a veto over what others can laugh at.
But then we are now living in the Scotland where even the world’s funniest, most loved, and most successful comedians have to watch their step.
There are valid points here. It is interesting that in my experience jokes about (against) the English by non-English people are pretty commonplace (listen to R4 comedies) and mostly are not seen as some great offence in England (some exceptions obvs. when the humour seems too nasty, wide of the mark and one-dimensional), quite the contrary, they can elicit genuinely appreciative laughter, and maybe that is because as a powerful (ex) colonial country, there is an acceptance of that – what goes around comes around. And laughing with others laughing at you, pointing out stuff you may not see, has its own enjoyment.
There is also still a fair bit of lazy humour from English comedians about Scotland and the Scots that makes me cringe.
One thing though – an outsider’s joshing is not always invalid or unenlightening, or indeed unfunny as we can learn from outsiders, even naive ones, so I don’t think it always helpful to view everything through the lens of ‘structure’ and context.
One thing about hardline nationalism (of any hue) I have noticed for a long time is that is can be quite humourless and dour and unable to ‘take a joke’. I was at the Fringe watching a good English comedian a few years ago, popular in Scotland (the audience was majority Scots) and his routine covered many of the political topics of the day, attacking the Tory government of the time and was generally of the progressive humour type. But he made one negative joke about the SNP and Sturgeon’s hold on power for so long, almost in passing, and at the end several SNP supporters held him to task about it. They laughed along to most everything else but one hint of a critique of Scottish politics and the SNP (from an Englishman) was beyond the pale.
It seems you both are responding to an emotional claim I didn’t make.
I’m not arguing that Scots should be exempt from humour, or that outsiders shouldn’t joke, or that anyone should be offended. I’m describing why insider humour and outsider humour land differently — which is a descriptive point, not a moral one.
I repeat – it’s not about sensitivity. It’s about context:
– insider humour comes from shared experience
– outsider humour comes from external judgement
– historical relationships shape how jokes are received
That’s not a plea for exemption. It’s just how cultural legitimacy works.
You are translating a structural explanation into an emotional position (“Northy is offended”), and then arguing with the emotional position instead of the structure.
But the structure is all I’m talking about.
As I’ve already said, humour isn’t only the joke itself — it’s the direction it travels and the context it lands in.
“I’m describing why insider humour and outsider humour land differently — which is a descriptive point, not a moral one”
Naw, Northy. It’s a subjective point.
If the same, precise, word-for-word joke can be deemed funny if repeated by one person, and offensive if repeated by another, then that’s not an objective discrimination.
To be consistent with your own beliefs, you can never agree to find something funny until you have settled whether it initiated in an “insider” or “outsider” context.
And for those contexts where you could never know, you would have to default to always finding jokes not funny. Just in case.
So by your own logic, you’re right back at deeming some subjects for humour to be taboo. The subjects you care about.
For bloody certain, if some boy tells you a joke about the Andalusian who goes into a tapas bar and asks for chips, you’re not going to be quizzing the joker about his “insider” or “outsider” credentials. If the joke is funny you’ll laugh. If it isn’t you won’t.
End of.
Sure and I didn’t mean to do that but at the end of the day is not your analysis suggesting that that ‘landing differently’ implies that difference is not a good one that ‘differently’ is a weasel word for badly?
Maybe not, yours is a more academic analysis but at the sharper end of practical comedy the question of whether it is legitimate to do it or not remains.
FWIW I think it is about how you do it.
You’re tying yourself into knots again, aren’t you Northy? A right old cul-de-sac there.
I daresay, this is actually quite amusing in its own right. 🙂
“I daresay, this is actually quite amusing in its own right”
Hmmm.
Aren’t you an “outsider” though?
This requires prior clarification before anybody can dare laugh.
Northcode,
For your information. Posted earlier further up the thread.
In 1778 Scots law rejected slavery. The Court of Session ruled in the case of Joseph Knight that Scotland could not support the institution of slavery, thus establishing that no person could be held as a slave under Scots law.
link to blackhistorymonth.org.uk
Sam, yes — the Knight case is an important moment in Scots legal history. It’s just not related to the point I was making, which was about the structural distinction between elite participation and national sovereignty in the context of imperial agency.
The Scottish people, outside the elite, participated in slavery as sailors,dockworkers and plantation overseers. Doctors worked on plantations.
Many in Scotland purchased sugar and tobacco produced by slavery. Industries, schools and churches benefitted from slavery
The Knight case which ended in 1778 was important. It contributed to a growing sentiment in Scotland towards the abolition of slavery. By 1782 Scottish people were participating in mass protests against slavery.This took the form of petitions, economic boycotts and circulation of propaganda against slavery.
The Churches took part in these activities despite having tried to justify chattel slavery.
The Wedderburns are interesting. The brothers travel from being indentured servants to very wealthy slave owners and, in later generations, wealth secured, to abolitionists.
The structure of slavery you refer to would not have been sustained as it was without the participation of Scots at all levels of society.Neither would it have been abolished without the widespread support of the people of England and Scotland
“Neither would it have been abolished”
Let me just fix that for you, sam:
“Neither would it have been made illegal”
If slavery in the UK and in Scotland has been abolished, i.e. eradicated, why is it that just about every online entity one deals with has a commitment to abolishing Modern Slavery on its website?
We’re not still promising to abolish things that have really been abolished, such as the death penalty, or sending kids up lums.
But we’re still promising to abolish slavery, because so far, it hasn’t been.
Or if it perhaps was at one time, it has been re-started.
Sam, none of my comments referred to slavery — my point was about co-opted elites, imperial agency, and national sovereignty.
Sam was this case not related to holding slaves in Scotland i.e Knight himself who had been brought here by a Scots slave owner? I don’t think it outlawed slavery outwith Scotland as that was not the case brought by Knight who was challenging the continuation of his slave status in Scotland. It was a landmark case for that indeed and was followed shorty by one in England deciding the same thing. But slavery run by all Brit traders and owners carried on elsewhere until Abolition in 1807.
If you want a full detail of this case refer to Boswell’s Life of Johnson as Boswell was part of the legal team on Knight’s side and he got Johnson to write a letter to help his cause. Boswell of course privately did not much support him and was a strong defender of the slave trade (unlike Johnson).
It’s not such a bad idea to self delete themselves fae social media until the adults are back in room. They’re a fucking embarrassment to Scotland & we really, really don’t need it advertised around the globe that the SNP has been infiltrated with the empires latest band of fuckwits, inbreds & the downright fucking demonic to derail indy. It’s an English administration & just look at the keech. Three cheers, I say!
It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt as they say.
Should’ve put that to 1.5 million ppl. I’ll bet that would’ve been a resounding YES! I would vote Elon to just delete them now & save us all the drama.
I’ve never seen any of them ‘being held to account’ on social media either. They either ignored questions or just blocked people. The only account on X that was informative regards Indy was yer own Stu! SNP did jack shit social media Comms during indy & even after winning 59 seats at Westminster= tumbleweed across all FREE platforms. Just Imelda, her latest book club & her harpies of misfits.
Woohoo, Geri’s back!
I guess this means the Ir@nian medievalists have restored some internet connectivity to the citizens of that shithole.
We’ll see it confirmed in the MSM soon enough.
They’re well & truly kicking yer arse eh? That’s what you call gubbed. It’s delicious that it’s on all three fronts too! Hahaha…
Who’d have thunk it eh! Those backward, goat herding peasants can make weapons a gid yin or twa bigger than yours!?
Of course, the intelligent amongst us always knew that. This wasn’t going to end well. Why else would blighty & its other thieving philly mates keep assassinating their leading scientists? Keep watching yer racist GBullshit news, sunshine. There’s a pet.
How do you know what size mine is? Or how effective a weapon it is?
“Why else would blighty & its other thieving philly mates keep assassinating their leading scientists?”
It’s the leading scientist’s families they’re assassinating. Nobody cares much about the leading scientists themselves. They’re just collateral damage.
Rev, David Henry suggests at 3.28 hours in the Sunday 18th October youtube of the SSRG conference that MI5 blocked your connection to the conference. Well, I wouldn’t be surprised, would you?
David went on to point out that the Yes campaign in 2014 only got moving in popularity when the Wee Blue Book was issued. He also mentions the shenanigans whereby SNP members were told to remove the WBB from the Yes hubs.
We all need to remember such things. There’s been people in the SNP working against independence for years and years.
“Rev, David Henry suggests at 3.28 hours in the Sunday 18th October youtube of the SSRG conference that MI5 blocked your connection to the conference”
Perhaps the Loch Ness Monster took a bite out of the fibre cable?
Honestly some of the stuff that gets posted on here. Total madness.
Well known that the LNM supports the SNP. Her pic is all over some of the merchandise.
So yes, as sarah says some people in the SNP have been working against Indy for years and years, perhaps they put the LNM up to taking a bite out of the cable.
I hope she’s gonna be OK. She belongs to all of Scotland, not just to the SNP.
And maybe she’s a monster mammie to some weans down in the Stygian depths too.
Those shite stirring bastards are in every single country, fae the Balkans tae the Middle East, noising up the locals, arming militants & conducting their wee terrorist activities around the globe in-between eating & shagging weans in their spare time.
All to keep their filthy mitts on other countries resources, trade & energy to maintain their hegemony. Thieving, coveting bastards. But don’t worry, Scotland. According to AI- Dan there, they don’t fear Scottish independence & losing Scotland’s oil & gas wealth. Nah, they don’t bother with us – just everyone else. They’re not interested in little ol’ us.
They’re part of the five eyes, ya eejit. It’s their job. They’re as paranoid & freakish as the Yanks are about National security & what they consider their own back yard. Even more so now that they’ve created an energy crisis on all fronts & it has backfired spectacularly.
Stu basically ran the YES campaign during indy ref. Of course they’d sabotage any Indy platform that’d gather a larger audience.
Away & sit the fuck down & shut up.
I second that.
“eating & shagging weans in their spare time”
That’s what Indy’s been missing since the female hating medievalists cut of the net.
Anybody want to place bets on how long Geri can go before accusing somebody of being a nonce?
The West is dripping with nonces. Why else would they give them immunity from prosecution & give them a wee place tae stay on the Med instead? Go look it up. They’re all shuffled about.
You’re in no position tae clutch yer pearls with moral outrage about women haters or anything else for that matter. It’s pervy demanding women tae take off their clothes – even what some consider their modest headscarf. Fuck off, perv. The English just can’t make their mind up if they’re all belly dancing jezebelles or to kill a few million people to help save some poor downtrodden women wearing a fucking headscarf in a hunner degrees heat a million miles away from them. Keep swallowing the bullshine. They haven’t resorted to mowing down weans on an industrial scale either. So there’s that. & They don’t prowl around Eastern European orphanages either looking for some kids to snatch.
One of the main drivers for them cleansing the middle east & eastern Europe of Western influence is Nonces & Nazis everywhere. The attack on family values & promoting demonic debauchery. If they’re not eating & shagging weans they’re brainwashing them to mutilate themselves instead. Saudi & UAE coats are on shoogly pegs exactly for that reason. You should read the eppy files, ya wee nonce apologist. Blighty is right there in the thick of it, as usual with a starring role, & there’s zero chance that’ll be tolerated in Mecca.
The ‘medievalists’ even made a catchy wee tune about it..
Yer government is run by pedophiles..
Got that right.
Thinking back on it over the years – the English have always resorted to sex scandals & sex pests when they want to jettison someone from power. Might have known it was pure projection on their part.
‘cut of the net’ did you mean ‘off’ – ya fud.
“Nonces & Nazis everywhere”
Of course, Geri.
Look out behind you! Crivens, Geri, that ane might be a Nazi AND a nonce. A Nonzi perhaps.
Genuinely, I’ve missed your kind of ultimate lunacy. Nobody does it better than you, Geri.
What need for MI5 to sabotage Indy and cut the legs out from under it when they have you doing it for them?
“It’s pervy demanding women tae take off their clothes – even what some consider their modest headscarf”
So true when it’s you under consideration. We’re all so much happier when you’re hidden away in your letter box.
“If they’re not eating & shagging weans”
Ah, c’moan noo, Geri. Surely you mean “shagging & eating”? Doing if the other way around seems quite infeasible.
Nonzi – I like it!
The Nonzis are off to Saudi to get their arse kicked. Imagine having the front to be proud to defend the man child & his expansionist sidekick who have the biggest rap sheets between them for human rights abuses in the region whilst crying about the injustice of the poor downtrodden women wearing headscarves in the next neighborhood. Have you heard yersel?Do you seriously buy this shit? Thicko.
Do you not have trouble sleeping at night? There’s poor Z too. Abandoned & no doubt his days are numbered. A sudden illness no doubt, or ole reliable, poisoned by P. Killed an independent country & emptied the population for generations on behalf of Nonzis on a rare earth mission. Who knew! Oh deary. I almost feel sorry for the midget. Should’ve stuck to drag. Oh never mind. He’ll always have his tralalaa ‘siblings’ to console him I suppose in swanky London pad until the English can fleece him of his bank accounts.
“Ah, c’moan noo, Geri. Surely you mean “shagging & eating”? Doing if the other way around seems quite infeasible.”
Shagging, eating, torturing & organ harvesting. They don’t seem to mind in what order. Or if its dead or alive, as an English Lord once said whilst describing the shenanigans of Westminster. Allegedly, tortured children are pumped full of adrenaline through fear & that gets them all intae a frenzy doon at the Nonzi club. Big bucks in that stem cell research malarkey. Who knew “Death Becomes Her” is a real thing LOL. Greedy elites can’t take it with them so they’ll try live forever instead in their wee bunkers whilst they try convince the rest of us that wee tactical nukes are kitten safe & down with the head scarf wearers.
I think MI5 has rather more serious issues on its caseload then turning off the internet at a tiny gathering in Scotland.
However, if they did want to damage the cause of independence, they could always arrange for content like the above to be posted on Scotland’s most-read political blog.
“Do you not have trouble sleeping at night?”
You’re the one posting at 1:11 am, Geri.
Got to say, your posts improved over the course of the evening. Why not stay up even later tonight, see what spews forth from that fertile heid of yours?
“Shagging, eating, torturing & organ harvesting”
Aye. Your vigilance will pay off. Thanks to you, Scotland can be rid of all that malarkey, once and for all.
Meantime though, my favourite’s liver, if it’s not too fatty. Fits yours?
You’d think that wouldn’t you, AI- dan. But you’d be wrong. Even out in deepest, darkest Puru there’d be an English wanker trying to steal the beads fae a tribesmen to add to their priceless collection back home & to tell the ancient tribe where they were going wrong & to start a war.
The English are nosy bastards & have to meddle in everything. They’re as welcome as a dose of the clap – which they also spread. Oh joy!
Whether it is the country right next door or one a million miles away from their shores – it doesn’t matter. They thrive on conflict & where there is none they’ll soon land & start some. They’re a parasite at home & abroad. Demonic even. The minions of the Nephilim. There they are now, all over Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe & the Balkans, the middle east & even the EU that we all thought they left LOL! Drumming for war with everyone & with fuck all might behind it other than their usual sly terrorist activities & a happy mouth.
Just look at yersel, shit face & Cavedweller, on a Scottish politics/Independence site that has absolutely nothing to do with any of you, meddling in matters that don’t concern you & on topics/an administration you don’t even have a vote on. Who even does that?! Who joins other countries political commentary sites? Weirdos, sad bastards & paid trolls – that’s who. Trying desperately to tell us all it isn’t fucking raining outside & the Union isn’t absolute pish.
I rest my case, M’Lord.
“The English spread the clap.
I rest my case, M’Lord.”
Cheers, Geri.
You’re off to a flying start today. Maybe too early to rest your case though. Please tell us you’ll be back with further installments. There was nowt aboot nonces, biolabs, gas chambers or F16s in your entire post. You can do so much better.
With a nod to Spartan, who needs a TV license when we have Geri?
Geri – I can’t imagine what demons you’re fighting (or actively embracing) which would cause you to write something like that. Safe to say it’s obviously mad and irrational and not something any normal person would want to engage with.
Does it not dawn on you, Geri, that it IS possible to have a legitimate concern for, and indeed “a dog in the fight” for the UK as an entity (of which both Scotland and England are part). Being English doesn’t mean you can’t be a genuine stakeholder. Also: I like Scotland. A lot. I’d really much prefer it if she didn’t leave the UK, and not just for financial reasons. You’ll not hear me quipping “too wee and too poor”.
People are welcome to take on what I say and debate. I have never presented myself as some all-seeing fucking eye here (unlike numerous others). My scalp is up for the taking, and there’s plenty I don’t claim to know about, especially concerning Scottish affairs. But this is a free forum, people can (within reason) say what they like.
This whole “paid troll” stuff is such bollocks and you must know it. Apart from anything else, disagreeing with someone isn’t “trolling” – and neither is treating others as you find ‘em. If someone tells me to fuck off I am more than happy to return the compliment, thanks.
Careful, Aidan.
The servants of the Nephilim may have been summoned to this thread.
Watching the Covid enquiry report on C4 news.
I’m reminded that Nicola behaved similarly to England and the care homes and their patients suffered terribly.
Enough of that Mary.
This is Wings BTL. Do you honestly think anybody cares?
To be fair though, we’re much like all the rest of the Scots, the Brits and the Europeans.
We know China engineered a new plague, carelessly let it escape, then suppressed news and lied about it until it had spread around the world. We know China was ultimately responsible for the deaths of tens of millions of innocent people, the permanent physical and mental injury of millions more, and trillions of dollars worth of damage to the world’s economy.
We know that thanks to China, our countries, our societies, and our personal lives can never be quite the same again as they were before Covid. The impoverishment brought about by Covid and the responses to it won’t be fixed in our lifetimes.
But we also know that we’re completely dependent on China for just about everything material in our lives. There’s very little we can buy, outside of food, that doesn’t come to us from China. Even the energy we need to survive, thanks to electrification and Net Zero, can only be ours through the use of Chinese tech.
So we also know that it’s necessary for each and every one of us to act as if Covid never happened.
So please, don’t mention it again. It’s too awkward for us to deal with.
As for Nicola, we worshiped the ground she walked on during the Covid Years. How could we not, when we believed absolutely she was all that stood between us and a hideous, miserable, certain death? We certainly don’t want to be reminded now that we were all so many gullible, clueless, infantilised fools.
Give it a rest, Mary. It’s just too painful for us to accept our total dependency on China now, and the gulf between our image of ourselves as free, independent adults, and the reality of the craven, cowering fearties we were during the Covid Years.
We don’t want to be reminded of any of it.
MaryB: they also infected people already in hospitals by placing them in wards with uninfected patients. I remember the huge army tents at the beginning where, we were told, army doctors would be seconded to help treat isolated Covid sufferers in quarantine. No one was isolated and placed in quarantine in these tents.
There was no quarantine except later, in the hospitals, once Covid had taken hold although that had been the original plan. In Italy, I recall a woman stating that her village had been all but wiped out by Covid infection although many are now saying that it was all exaggerated. It wasn’t, although the lock-down could have been handled differently.
The inquiry found that decent and workable PPP was being made in the UK, but some who made a fortune from it imported it from abroad – and much of it was faulty. Yet to see anyone nailed for that.
What was outstanding was the response of medical staff, retail staff, the schools’ and teachers’ output for children to be taught at home and all the others who worked through the pandemic.
“Much of it was faulty”
An oft-repeated statement, but I have yet to identify what it means.
My best guess is that millions of pounds worth of perfectly usable PPE was junked because some pen pushers refused to authorise its use, due to the legislated conformity certificates, kitemarks, ISO numbers, etc being missing. Nothing more, nothing less.
Meantime, in the rest of the world, the same kit was used and the same kit saved thousands of lives.
Compare and contrast the fear of issuing PPE that would always have been better than nothing at all, against the decision to mandate that perfectly healthy people should be injected with fundamentally untested vaccines. A decision still injuring and killing healthy people now.
Anyhoo, that’s my take. If you have information about the way in which the PPE was “faulty”, please provide.
We’re talking about rubber gloves, surgical gowns, disposable face masks and perspex gear from the same people making most of the high tech we buy and use. The same people with a flourishing space program and credible plans to exploit the Moon.
The idea they can’t make half-decent disposable PPE doesn’t stack up.
Hmmmmm… You may be right, H McH. I did read somewhere that some of the masks for medical staff were faulty and did not keep out the infection. There is a question to be answered as to how medical staff were infected whilst wearing protective gear. You may also be right about the vaccines which did not receive the usual testing breadth and time, but people were dying – and not just older people. If any lesson is to be learned, it should be to isolate people immediately and keep them in quarantine. We should have known that from the plague of medieval times. The spreading of the infection to uninfected people in care homes and hospitals was completely avoidable and unnecessary.
“The same people with a flourishing space program and credible plans to exploit the Moon.”
Oh aye, have they fired up GERTY and recloned Sam Bell again and got him mining cheese this time.
Be interesting to be “shown the money” stats on how the astronomical transport costs of space freighting produce back to earth actually stacks up against using more terrestrial based resources.
Show me the detailed credible stats and explain what interplanetary trade agreement has been signed to allow this folly. And as you already hate foriegners and folk wearing face coverings, how the fuck are you gonna cope with a load of spacesuit wearing martians rocking up in any trade deals agreements with the denizens of the moon. Till then stick yer moon cheese up yer arse ya rocket.
And jist what was wrong with chomping a nice bit of Chesire cheese and keeping a load of Cestrians in jobs and wages anyway. Are you saying we aren’t #bettertogether now? All those Range Rovers need paying for afterall…
Space suits can be fun…
PUBLIC SERVICE BROADCASTING – GAGARIN
link to youtube.com
“stick yer moon cheese up yer arse ya rocket”
Good to see you having a relaxed Saturday night, Dan.
Sad to see you appear to be on your tod.
Whether or not the various interested parties get to the moon and begin to exploit its obviously valuable resources is entirely independent of your ignorant ramblings. Frankly, it doesn’t concern us here in Scotland. As Alf would say, we’re out of that game.
Space is already a multi-billion dollar industry, employing highly educated, motivated individuals, its exploitation changing our world every bit as much as AI.
It will happen even if you don’t believe, Dan. It’s already happening.
@Lorncal
There is no protective gear providing 100% effectiveness. The best that can be said is that some may be more effective than others.
As for the disposable face masks so beloved by many, their effectiveness against infection spread is so low that any surgeon operating with one of these on would, in normal times, be disciplined for misconduct.
Almost right from the start of Covid, the correlation between age and risk was clear. Covid was and still is a viral infection disproportionately more serious for the elderly and those with pre-existing serious health conditions than for the young and healthy. As you say, government policies that denied that reality persisted for far too long.
I believe the fatality rate among healthy children, teenagers and young adults was close to zero. That was a cohort for which the vaccine risk very clearly exceeded the infection risk, particularly as that was and still is the cohort to which long-term vaccine damage will most apply.
Vaccinating healthy members of that cohort was a crime.
REAL WORLD: The latest poll (More in Common, Oct. 13) has only 38% of Scots voting “yes” if a 2nd “Indy” referendum were held. 39% would vote “No.” with the rest undecided. Not exactly a groundswell of support for Indy….
And meanwhile you have to laugh the laugh of the luckless sucker BBC licence payers.
Here we have in Scotland the Great British broadcaster cutting the BBC Scotland on alleged cost saving grounds. But meanwhile.the very same Great British Broadcasting Corporation is providing a Pidgin English news service to Africa and the Carribean.
Think I jest. Well here’s a link to the Pidgin English news service –
link to bbc.com
Jus sayeen like man..
.
And for those Scots licence payers complsining about.thei BBC Scotland being cut here’s a headline from BBC Pidgin news piece about deaths through drinking
” We bin tink say na just monkey tail’ – Di local alcoholic drink wey bring death to a community ”
Check it and other news coverage out. Your licence fee is well spent is it not on coverage.like this. And there’s plenty more like it.
Amazed that anyone bothers with the Telly Tax anymore. I binned it years ago, having given up on terrestrial TV and the agitprop activism laughably named “the news”, not to mention the funding of noncey “personalities”.
You must be qualified to rule on whether ignorance truly is bliss then.
TBQH, you don’t come across as particularly blissful in most of your posts. But let’s hear it from the horse’s mouth.
I can now see why you are labelled “the site prick”.
Cheers, Spartan.
I feel vindicated you’ve taken some time out from your blissful existence to demonstrate your own ignorance.
What is it with you boys anyway? You always revert back to the kind of exchange you would overhear in the primary school playground when the remedial kids are on their break. I understand why it works for them, but for grown adults? Just how intellectually stunted do you have to be to have retained that as your default level of debate?
You should have kept up with the TV License, Spartan. You might have learned something.
Fud McFudface
I really don’t care what some internet random like you thinks, to be honest. I come here now and again for Stu’s valuable investigative journalism, post my opinion (for what little it’s worth), occasionally respond to other commenters and that’s about it.
You on the other hand sit on here all day, every day, arguing with anyone and everyone for the sake of arguing. Half of the comments on any thread are by you. You’d cause bother in an empty hoose.
Feel free to respond with some pithy retort. For what it’s worth, I’ll treat it like the dump I just laid in the bog; flushed away, never to be thought of again.
Spartan out…
Cheers, Spartan, a whole three paras to say you don’t care.
And a new primary school playground insult too. Top bragging rights for you when the bell goes to summon you back to class.
I enjoy highlighting the hypocrisy and the cognitive dissonance of preachy virtue signalers like yourself, Spartan. Your inability to justify any of your moral posturing when challenged, coupled with your immediate recourse to childish insults, serves to illuminate the vacuum behind your plausible facade.
But hey, no hard feelings.
You’re no worse than most. Again, Burns had it covered when he penned “Holy Willie’s Prayer”.
I gave it up too. It’s a government mouth piece & state propaganda channel – & they’ve the cheek to demand we pay for that shit beamed into our living room or go to jail. Not even in R – where we’re indoctrinated into believing everything is censored – demands it’s citizens pay for the privilege.
They’re currently trying to divise ways to licence the internet.
They really are the pits. Even to their own citizens who need to be half blind or at deaths door to be given a lousy free BBC channel FFS.
It is surprising how much sh@t is fed to Scots, and we are expected to believe it.
Reading Stu’s previous post the woke unions tell us that the SNP will be the ones that would negotiating leaving the Union,
But Scotland has to ask Why would a party and governance sent up to Scotland from and under English law of Westminster parliaments legislation and Statues with reserved matters to England be negotiating on our behalf at all?
That would be Englands parliaments negotiating team negotiating with – Englands sub Branch office (Scotland Act team )
Who is sitting here thinking that that independence for Scotland will be in favourable done deal Scotland,
A done deal it is for Westminster prior to any negotiations even taken place if both sides negotiation are from the parliament of Westminster.
Yes James, and when “leaving the Union” which never existed, we are no longer dealing with the annexing power nor are we constrained by ‘English Law’, we are dealing with international law:
link to youtube.com
How do sane, rational people leave something that never existed, Alf?
Why do sane, rational people carry around things like driving licenses and passports issued by political entities that supposedly don’t exist?
I bet you’ve got at least one of these in your wallet right now. Don’t you find that just a little bit odd?
Maybe even crazy!
There you are. Going about your daily life. Driving here, flying there. All made possible by authorisations issued by a political construct that according to you doesn’t exist.
Do you find yourself plagued by migraines, Alf? I think I could help.
There is no doubt that state documentation and (colonial) procedures support the cultural illusion, Hatey.
Hundreds of millions of people around the world were led to believe they were ‘British’, or ‘French’, or some other imposed and manufactured imperial identity.
Which brings us back to the fact that ‘colonialism is based on psychology’ (Cesaire).
Is it no aboot time ye feegured that oot:
link to yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com
Perhaps you could answer a question for me, Alf.
If you take yourself off into an empty room with your UK passport, open it, then slap yourself across the face with it, does it make a sound?
And does it sting?
If perhaps you want to find out, please wear eye protection.
Just in case your UK passport is a thing that actually exists, like the UK itself.
I wouldn’t place too much trust in deid Froggy racists like Cesaire. It’s his descendants that are hopefully about to be run out of France once and for all at gunpoint.
“Pour encourager les autres” as they like to say over there.
“Scotland has to ask Why”
Naw, James. Perhaps you really do have to ask Why.
But Scotland doesn’t.
As always, no hard feelings. If it will help, I’ll lobby for you to be put in charge of negotiating leaving the Union. But I don’t expect that will make any difference.
The Scottish Government of the day will negotiate for Scotland. On present form, that will be an SNP-led administration. Perhaps still under Swinney. Maybe under Q Vanni Man Nan.
The Westminster Government of the day will negotiate for rUK. At its head, Andeh or Nige, or maybe some Somali ex child refugee.
And I expect you will be the only one asking Why.
Of course, it is theoretically possible for we Scots to found a brand new political party, with all new, fresh people in it, with popular, practical, plausible policies, that we could majority vote into power at HR to lead Scotland to independence.
Ruthlessly purged of all the old useless troughers. The SNP, their hangers on, the trannys, the third world grifters, the greeters aboot Culloden, the poot admirers, the brain deid who get voted back in for decade after decade by brain deid voters – all the dross that has steered Scotland to the dead end it now finds itself in.
But you and I both know that’s not gonna happen in our lifetimes.
So we’re stuck with the SNP. If they fuck up and/or betray Scotland in the negotiations, we can never say we were surprised.
But hey, on the bright side, think of the years of online greeting and gurning to enjoy afterwards!
MaryB ,
I have been watching the Covid enquiry going through the Congress in America with Fauci suddenly turning backward mentally ill neanderthal.
Unable to think or comprehend a question,
It just goes to show how a bully and big mouth paid all over the media during covid, suddenly becomes a Whimp when the tables are turned.
And in a likewise manner the same applies to the Scotland act and the SNP’s authority when under the interrogation lights.
Validity lasts until only until it is directly questioned by the people.
The same with all of them James. Twatt Handoncock is now copping it over here for his blatant lies regarding the Coof being deliberately spread in care homes. They don’t like it up them now the tables are turned.
Will never forget nor forgive what the bastards did to us in the name of “protection”. Saving the village by burning it down.
“Will never forget nor forgive what the bastards did to us”
Zat right?
As always, not a peep of blame for the cants who cooked it up in the lab, let it escape, then lied and obfuscated until it had infected the world.
The usual performative, online, synthetic outrage, delivered from the self-declared moral high ground.
Swearing a solemn vow that from this day onwards, not one fecking penny will be voluntarily spent on the cants ultimately responsible would be just too fecking awkward and difficult. Boycott China? Make them pay? Haud oan, where am I gonna get ma Xmas baubles frae?
So, as always, ignore the really guilty. And blast the politicians whose policies the vast majority couldn’t get enough of at the time.
Oh, I have nothing but contempt for the Communist dictatorship that cooked it up, be assured of that.
Our “leaders”, who seemingly seek to ape the CCP in many policies, including imposition of draconian lockdowns and unprecedented restrictions on our freedom, painted themselves on a corner as we are so reliant on that nation for pretty much everything. They’ve got us by the curlies.
Again, starting an argument where none exists, all in the name of, er, whatever it is you stand for.
Fud.
FFS Spartan.
You said you were done. Why can’t you keep your word, you being so self-identified morally superior?
Hook, line, sinker. Knew you wouldn’t resist. Imagine being so sad as to be hanging about all day posting comments.
Me, morally superior? That’s a fecking laugh.
Goodnight.
Fud.
Aw, partan, I didn’t ken ye cared.
You’ll have been expecting this one and all.
And yes, conscientious objectors do generally cite moral superiority as a justification of their position.
It’s preferable to the other explanations.
How often Scotland has to be reminded that there is no Scottish parliament since 28April, 1606,
That the devolved parliament at present in Scotland is actually a sub branch of Westminster parliament officially. Under the legislation and Statues passed in the parliament of Westminster.
Not passed or made legit by a parliament of Scotland that has not existed for over three hundred years.
The devolved regional parliament sent to Scotland via Westminster parliaments laws is the Colonial parliament itself in Scotland.
Would any of us trust a Colonial parliament, a parliament that is not Scotlands, to negotiate a fair outcome for Scotland?
Again this is the problem that Stu always has to contend with when chasing justice in Scotland and those that should be held accountable to and in Scotland.
The laws, statues and legislation of Westminster parliament run with reserved matters to themselves over the devolved Colonial governance in Scotland under their Scotland act.
Scotland could not pass the Scotland Act in Scotland as it had no parliament then or now.
Alf Baird,
Indeed alf, there never was a completed union between the two parliaments ofScotland and England,
But then there never was a shared Bank of Great Britain either, [ just the Bank of England ] , the mint in England, and the receivers being the treasury in England as Scotland has no treasury or mint,
Which raises reasonable questions over shared national debt in the future,
“raises reasonable questions over shared national debt in the future”
Ah, James, that “reasonable” there is doing a lot of heavy lifting.
While we have Alf in the conversation though, ask him whether if WM’s definition of “reasonable” differs from yours, could Mr Lavrov perhaps help us out?
I know you tend towards the “with one bound, Scotland was free” concept. It has a certain superficial plausibility about it, immune to all experiences from, e.g. the recent EU “divorce” difficulties, that it’s pie in the sky.
Not the least of the difficulties is that if one side doesn’t agree, it’s gonna be the side with ten times the population, ten times the economic heft, most of the remaining international treaties, and nearly all of the advanced weaponry. Oh, and Scotland’s biggest trading partner, controlling the real estate over which most of our imports and exports are transported.
But that’s where Mr Lavrov could be our saviour. We just need to get an indication up front of what the price will be for support from the Orcs.
Scotland’s treasury was of course dismantled by the England-as-UK parliament in another violation of the inoperable Treaty.
Disregarding ‘shared national debt’ which is not applicable in the case of an annexed territory, the Scottish agenda post-liberation would also need to focus on ‘reparation and compensation’ under internal law as remedy for ‘territorial alienation’, as explained in my SSRG presentation noted above.
Aha!
So “with one bound, Scotland was free”, morphs into “with one (encumbered, hence smaller) bound, Scotland was away, laden down with compo”.
Why not, eh?
Perhaps you’re not bothered about how this new take might affect the willingness of WM to play ball on Indy. Maybe Mr Lavrov has already given you the nod.
Anyhoo, why don’t you boys hire a bus and paint on the side how much each Scot will immediately receive on voting for Indy. You know that works. Mind and specify which currency!
Have a word with Trump’s election team too. He’s trying something similar for the mid-terms.
Alf Baird,
I have often wondered how Westminster parliament and Government would or could explain away, Why they have never adhered to the Articles, terms and conditions of that so called treaty, to the other Countries World Wide which are not only restlessbut protesting over Colonial Global governance uptake.
I also have often thought how the government in Westminster and its parliament could voice a protest or Challenge to Scotland becoming independent voluntary, as it would…not breach a treaty, that never was in force.
Nor could it be assumed that Scotland had preformed UDI from a treaty, as the Westminster parliament and government would have great difficulty in challenging a Scottish parliament that does not actually exist.
Westminster government have opted in and out of that supposed 1706 treaty of union at will many times.
On the 28th April 1706,
When other Countries gained their independence from Westminster the treaty was suspended,
when England voluntary left the 1706 treaty in 1752,
when England parliament and Ireland joined parliaments in 1801/02.
The so called 1706 treaty has been extremely flexible for England and yet used to compel Scotland to follow it to a letter.
But there is always a turning point, and many Countries and nations right now would find Scotlands independence to great advantage against globalism that is destroying their nations and Countries, whilst them paying through the nose to globalism and having to put in with mass invasion and riots.
Breaking up So called Britain and its grasping treaties control over many other Countries is not to be ignored or laughed at anymore.
Scotland actually becomes the pinwheel world wide.
So, James Che, no Scottish Commissioners, no Scottish Jurists drafting the Scottish Treaty, no Queen Anne as titular head of Scotland as well as of England (in her own words), no signing of the Treaty by the Scottish representatives of the Scottish parliament? None of those things happened? None of those people existed?
The reasons why England and England-as-the-UK tramples us into the ground on every conceivable occasion – and, crucially, get away with it – is because we acquiesce in everything. We do not protest, challenge or contest any action taken by Westminster, at least, not seriously.
So, we have letter writers to the Scottish press delighting in the end of BBC Scotland. They are usually Unionists, of course, but who will be next? BBC Alba, the only channel for Gaelic? Well, there won’t be much challenge to that either because, as we all know, Gaelic road signs and on government and institution vehicles is such a wearying reality that we would much rather dispense with it all altogether. Who needs Gaelic, after all? Or Scots either, for that matter, or Scottish culture or heritage? It can all go. We’ll celebrate our own end as a nation. Who needs Scottishness? Who needs independence? Oh, but we’ll get it – when there’s nothing left! I wonder how many will celebrate then?
“We do not protest, challenge or contest any action taken by WM”
Ah, c’moan noo, Lorncal, you’re ignoring the tea towel wearers. They were out every week. Might still be too, as far as I know.
And during Covid, tens of thousands of deeply concerned Scots braved infection and risk of death over that boy who couldn’t breath in Minneapolis.
So we can protest, challenge and contest. It’s just you who’s confused about what Scots actually care about.
The Myth They All Rely On
The foundational myth in certain Scottish nationalist circles is:
Scotland is a sovereign state trapped inside another state, and the Union never existed.
From this myth, every subsequent claim follows:
– Scotland can “assert sovereignty”
– Scotland can “withdraw consent”
– Scotland can “dissolve the Union”
– Scotland can “appeal to the UN”
– Scotland can “invoke decolonisation mechanisms”
– Scotland can “ignore Westminster”
– Scotland can “act as a state-in-waiting”
These claims only make sense if Scotland is already a sovereign state.
The myth collapses instantly when confronted with constitutional and international reality:
– The UK is the sovereign state.
– Scotland is a country within that state.
– International law recognises the UK, not Scotland, as the sovereign entity.
This is not a matter of opinion.
It is the legal position recognised by:
– the UN
– the EU
– NATO
– every foreign government
– every treaty partner
– every court
– and every international organisation
There is no ambiguity.
Logically, if Scotland were already sovereign, independence would be unnecessary.
The very fact independence must be achieved proves sovereignty does not already exist – ergo, Scotland is a constituent part of the Untied Kingdom.
Correction:
“Untied Kingdom”
Should read:
“United Kingdom”
A Freudian slip, perhaps.
No, it should read ‘United Kingdoms’
As in United States; United Arab Emirates etc.
“Logically”
There you go, Northy, I’ve pinpointed the flaw in your post.
No other cant is prepared to use logic. They can’t, because then their entire houses of cards collapse.
Logic is powerless against people whose denial that the UK exists is the only foundation on which they can build their exotic, complex, intellectual follies.
It is, when you stop to consider it, a remarkable side effect of our new online world. People can, if they are prepared to shut themselves away sufficiently, deny the fundamental reality of our world.
Thank you Northcode – that is exactly right!
Hatey,
It is very likely to do some heavy lifting,
but I suspect as time goes forward in the near future, Scotland will not have to do the heavy lifting by itself. As other Countries recognise that Scotland is a pinwheel to Great Britain,
So called Great Britain is the pinwheel to mass migrations,
That Great Britain holds many Countries to Globalisation behind the Scenes. And in its dealings with the EU, and even its control of the UN.
Remove the pinwheels and mass invasions of nations and Countries ends, globalisation and one world governance is halted,
If you think for one moment that Scotland is to Small to be relevant then think again.
For you would need to explain why Westminster parliament and governance panics at the thought of that happening , and why they constantly refuse Scotland to go independent.
Westminster parliament and governance of GB wish to remain a big player and contributor in Globalisation and one world government,
Could it have such power or voice on the world stage as just England?
Hatey,
Your eyes seem to be closed to what is happening with protests, riots and objections to the wrong direction of all world governments.
Your vision is limited if you think Scotland would be lifting on its own, maybe a few years back it was on its own,
However multiple Countries and peoples nations now want independence from one world governance and dictatorship,
And Scotland is one of the major pinwheels for Ireland, Wales and Englands nations, and when that GB falls other Countries are automatically released from restricting treaties.
OK.
If anything, I think my eyes are out on stalks.
I have to go out now. I’ll keep my eyes open and peeled for some indications that your claims are aligned with reality.
Scotland is no longer a minor player, it has become a Catalyst Country.
North code.
Scotland remains a sovereign country signed up to a voluntary union with and as does England if you want the 1706 treaty of union to exist.
Other wise just England is in a treaty of union,
Which is more or less what Alf Baird and I have been stating, one or, neither Scotland or England are able to Colonise a voluntary international treaty to its self.
Our findings have already been confirmed by expert legal opinion too, James.
Scotland’s unlawful annexation and takeover (i.e. colonization) by England since 1707 – Professor Robert Black KC (October 2026):
link to youtube.com
Legal establishment issues: see caltonjock’s piece today about Lady Dorrian.
propaganda conduit, BBC Scotchland-shire, is being gutted – I hope all those journos have been made aware of their options concerning universal credit; first meeting with “work coach” – so, what skills do you have … reading it off an autocue … uh huh …
amy irons on the shopping channel
the rest of them doing youtube, walking aboot the toon talking into their smartphones – but can they compete with the big guns, craig houston, billy moore, glasgow live, and that guy who just drives around in his car?
shows just how far the ideology of the middle class – “I’ve got a good job, the system works” – will take you.
Judas never got his silver, boo fucking hoo.
The axewoman was on scotcast last night with geissler – why did you take our jobs – she smoothly gave it – we’ve done so many great things, but its time to move on … her job will survive, I expect.
For many of these wankers – “made it to the BBC” – was the prize in life – “made it” – the big one, the big gig, and a “job for life”, doing the news, the weather, daft wee cookery shows. And shovelling yoon propaganda as – unbiased, fact checked propaganda – like there was no tomorrow. Or the hatchet job on Salmond, never forget that one.
– all I remember of BBC Scotland was the re-runs of “still game”
“shovelling yoon propaganda”
Calm, mature reflection would lead one to consider that if that is true, and it is also true that the theft of Scotland’s immense wealth is what is keeping the UK afloat, and it is also true that Scotland is on the cusp of breaking free, then the pressing need to shovel yoon propaganda would be greater than ever.
And hence BBC Scotland would be “miraculously” preserved by our London masters as the mouthpiece of Project Fear north of the border.
But as I said, that’s a conclusion only supported by calm, mature reflection.
Hysterical, infantile, fantastical rants, the stock in trade of Confused, will obviously arrive at a different conclusion.
with the SNP in charge of “independence”, why would you need propaganda anymore
– they are winding up the operation, no longer needed.
I would have some sympathy for the channel if they made anything worthy of memory, but they didn’t.
Meanwhile, hollywood is filming alasdair gray books.
Nobody has much to say about Alberta’s thumping rejection of Indy.
All that oil, King Charles on their banknotes, and even the very place itself named after Auld Queen Vic’s squeeze.
The entire place hoaching wi Scottish placenames and surnames as well.
Yet still they voted Naw. Makes you think, eh?
give us your insights about alberta then, arse-piece.
Looking further ahead, due to climate change cold northern lands will become valuable, and it is likely the whole of canada will be annexed by the US within 30 years.
I’ll tell you what’s likely within the next 30 years.
You’ll be deid and forgotten.
As for Canada being annexed by the US, is Wednesday one of the days when you forget the claims the US is about to be toppled?
Let’s stop pretending that anybody with a clear idea of what’s about to happen would be wanting to waste their time on here. They’d be far too busy getting filthy rich.
without even doing the slightest research, there are any number of possible reasons why the albertans voted that way
– maybe they already get a decent wodge of the oil/gas revenue, off the top
– maybe they are all raving I luv the kween little englanders
– maybe they fear as an independent state getting gobbled up by the USA in short order; canada might be a wokist shithole, but its not as bad/crazy as the USA
– whatever else is important locally
this is why these comparisons I avoid – Scotland should be an independent country for reasons that are not dependent on any slackminded comparisons with other places – not alberta, not quebec, not catalonia, not even ireland; it’s all different, but it stands on its own.
Analogies are useful to make your point to the dimwitted, but in the real world it’s all just different and trying to say X means Y therefore A means B, does not follow
Poor fuckwit main, even when he tries to “be clever” he just makes a fool of himself.
Look on the bright side, man.
I mean, would you really want to see what kind of an ultraclusterfuck this island will have become by the mid-2050s? 😐
C’moan noo, MH.
Within a small number of years of being Independent, we’ll be rich beyond the wildest dreams of avarice. So what will the rest matter?
Confused will keep you right. Between him, Alf, Geri, James and James, the plan’s all in place.
Just a few suggestions of why ..
24/7 pumped propaganda.
CIA NGOs littering the place pretending to be charitee.
CIA National Endowment for Dictatorship & theft. Ooops! I meant Democracy & trade.
That other CIA group of astro turffing activists that I forget the name of now. Bussed in usually. Even better if they’re confused about their sexuality. TRA FIRST – THEN INDY! Aye, those droning fuckwits. Soros backed.
The English, obvs! Why not? They’re fucking everywhere else! Immigrants that don’t believe they’re immigrants. They’ve a fancier name. Ex- pats. Fucking immigrants to you & me..
Crawlers. We know the kind. “I will gie ye a pad in Miami/London, Fam passes intae Harvard or Eaton, a yacht on the Med & a gazillion in yer bank account. I’ll even throw in a life time pass tae Eppy isle – NADA convictions – ever – if ye throw the game.
IMF Blackmail/ Ransom. They were made an offer they couldn’t refuse.
Vote rigging. If the vote was a Yes they’d have ignored it anyway or declared it null & void & chalked it down to ‘Orc’ interference – that one is always a winner with the brain-dead phobes who lap that shit up.
Five Eyes. Don’t piss outside the tent.
Every single country on the planet is Americas back yard.
They will be annexed. Forced out of the ME, the beast will be looking closer to home & there’s Gold in them there untapped hills. They destroyed U looking for $37b of rare earth & the cash pot payout that would’ve been breaking up R. That went tits up. Now they’ll be on the prowl. In fact, they’ve already stated that is their intention in their documents for government. Brian Berletic is well versed on the topic & all their tactics.
That’ll be why they’ve nancied the population. Who is gonnie lead the charge against the US hoards when they might break a nail or be on their period that week?
Both Scotland and England supposedly remain as the Sovereign Countries that lend to the foundation of the State of Great Britain,
Great Britain, if the Treaty of union is to be believed is not a Country in its own Right, it is a State, like America.
The Constitution therefore cannot belong or derive from only England, but must include and uphold Scotlands Constitution as active also.
The fact that England ignores the Scottish Constitution, the fact on record that “the treaty was avoided officially” from being completed or correctly bought into force legally without the dissolved 28th April 1606 parliament of Scotland prior to 1707.
There is no completed treaty of union.
And if Scotland were to Act out its Sovereignty, Englands parliament if it wished to challenge Scotland on the world stage would require to give evidence to the Contrary.
1:
That Scotlands parliament had not entered the the Great Britain parliament on the 1st May 1707, as it had been dissolved on the 28April 1606:by the monarch of England under laws passed in the parliament of England,
2: that the Westminster parliament and government had not abandoned or disrupted a international treaty in by leaving the treaty for 11 days 1752.
3: That it ( England ) had not changed or altered the original dates of a international treaty in 1752,
4: that it ( Englands ) parliament of England and Wales had ceased to Exist or be active in 1606. Because England ratified the treaty in 1606.
5: that the Westminster Parliament for England and Wales had dissolved the parliament of Westminsters Great Britain in 1800 ceasing and making void the Treaty of union.
I would love Westminster and its governance to be officially be on the global Stage trying to prove that Scotland is in a treaty of union with England while Westminster government has breached, ignored, repealed and not followed the terms, conditions and articles of that said treaty of union that never was able to politically Unite the parliament of Scotland to the parliament of England in two different years and dates,
After all the Parliament of England ratified the treaty of union in 1606 prior to Scotlands dissolved parliaments ( in England ) agreement in 1707.
Shame the years didnt match between Scotland and England for Westminster and England had to leave the treaty of union for 11 days in 1752.
Trying to Correct its error years later by altering the dates to a, and on a international treaty,
Who would have thought that would be legal?
And of corse they could not communicate this change of and to an international treaty to a 28th April 1606 dissolved parliament of Scotland.
Prick.
Attaboy, James.
Don’t you let Geri and Confused steal all the glory.
Alf Baird,
It is true that we are able to hold legal witness to the annexation of Scotland in 1707.
What goes past most of Scotland radar is that Westminster parliament and governance are presently active and up to date in persistence of modern timelines in applying the “Scotland Act ” as a Colony Controlling act.
For the devolved government in Scotland is passed by the parliament of England and Wales,
As there is no Scottish parliament in the GB parliament for over the past three hundred years.
That bit of important and recent Colonial action is missed by many in Scotland.
John Swinney has today commented “Successive UK Governments have failed to establish a dedicated sovereign wealth fund using North Sea oil and gas revenues.”
Evidently he accepts that the UK is a sovereign state.
Evidently, by the same token, he believes that Scotland and England are not.
Nah. He’s just wanting the wealth fund to be banked in Sovereigns.
Makes a lot of sense actually, price of gold being what it is.
Facts about:
1. the economic drain from Scotland because of the “Union”;
2. the legal proof that the “Union” is not a union but annexation so our cause is for restoration to statehood
are on the SSRG conference youtube of 18th October from 42 minutes in to 1.05 [Douglas Chapman], 1.06 – 1.25 [A Baird], and Sara Salyers reading Prof Robert Black’s statement from 5.02 hours in. Sara has posted the text of Robert Black’s speech on her twitter.
All those readers of Wings who have asked questions on these subjects will find their questions answered.
Available on ‘IndyScotNews’ site:
link to youtube.com
Thanks for the link, Fearghas.
Who’s the idiot looking smug and pleased with herself as she babbles on about the name of Scotland being the “clue?” Where do they find these decorticated tollie tamperers?
Where did they find you?
That dippy wifie is apparently Hannah Mary Goodlad, the MSP for Shetland. Here’s a link to her speech, should you care:
youtu.be/b8c7vVe2RaQ?t=670
I think it has been 4 or 5 weeks since I last visited the comments section on Wings. After all, you can only take so much shite.
Looking at who has commentated on this article the same names appear, posting exactly the same mince that they post after every article Stu produces. Common sense is rarely apparent. The same bitter, twisted, historically ignorant posts time after time from the same bitter, twisted, historically ignorant posters.
Che, Baird, Confused, Geri all in evidence. I did not notice The Twat but, in all honesty, I did not get too far. I always start at the bottom.
There are a few brave brave souls who respond to the waves of crap produced by the above named and they have my respect for their endurance and tenacity. Sadly, they are fighting a losing battle as it is impossible to debate with the terminally thick. Hatey rather enjoys pricking a few egos I suspect.
How slow are the UN? I thought Scotland would be Independent by now-governed by the hard working, competent geniuses within the SNP. It is all so unfair.
It is not all bad-Spring is just round the corner!
Seemingly I’m here 24/7, Chas.
Geri is only just back. If she went private for her treatment, I hope she kept the receipt as a refund is due. From the evidence so far, compo too.
If it’s 4-5 weeks since you were last here, you won’t know that Mr Lavrov is now on our side. It’s too early to call how that’s gonna work out, but the smart money is on the Orcs divesting themselves of their twenty or so colonies – long established plus the ongoing 5-year work in progress – so they can credibly tell WM to divest themselves of Scotland.
Pop back in a month for an update.
“…Poor fuckwit main, even when he tries to “be clever” he just makes a fool of himself….”
“….on a Scottish politics/Independence site that has absolutely nothing to do with any of you, meddling in matters that don’t concern you & on topics/an administration you don’t even have a vote on. Who even does that?! Who joins other countries political commentary sites? Weirdos, sad bastards & paid trolls – that’s who. Trying desperately to tell us all it isn’t fucking raining outside & the Union isn’t absolute pish….”
Pished again, fatso ?
He’s learnt how to copy and paste and now he thinks a letter is on its way from Mensa. Generally best to ignore him if possible.
He gets on tae the laptop when his maw gangs oot.
I guess she has no alternative to leaving him “home alone”, so one can’t but feel sorry for the poor, benighted woman.
I haven’t the heart to report her to Social Services and besides, after a few minutes posting insults on here, James will be right onto his “special” sites for the duration. Probably the only exercise he ever gets!
3 in a row. Bingo!
One ponders where Robin thinks the jet fuel for his foreign holidays comes from if he is such a fan of reducing “our” fossil fuel usage.
link to robinmcalpine.org
And let’s not forget that so many modern cars (be they internal combustion engined, hybrid, or leccy) just keep getting bigger and heavier and are packed with fossil fuel derived plastics and other ridiculous amounts of over the top tech shite made with highly refined mineral resources.
I’m in a garage regulalry and see firsthand the absolute shiteness of modern vehicles. And all makes of car have become an absolute bastard to work on which means so many more hours of labour (therefore cost to consumer) are required to carry out even basic servicing and maintenance.
What sort of braindead twat thinks basic stuff like locating the engine oil filler cap under a huge fixed scuttle tray so you can’t pour oil into the engine easily is a good idea. Likewise same car made it needlessly difficult to remove the airbox lid to check and change out the filter, even though the car is huge.
Plus standard to have dozens of wiring and hose connections all over the engine bay using different types of delicate connectors so it’s like an episode of the Kypton Factor trying to remove stuff to gain access when working on the car.
Some Mini diesel models made the wiring loom connectors so sealed that if the fuel pressure regulator fails and leaks, the pressure of the fuel actually travels up the copper wire strands inside the insulation and fills the entire engine wiring loom and ecu with diesel which sets off loads of fault codes and car stops running, and basically means it ain’t worth fixing.
Other wank designs are fitting electric servo motors in brake calipers for the handbrake, so you need to connect vehicle to a diagnostic machine to put it into service motor to retract pistons to service or change the brake pads.
French cars are particulalry shite, but most other makes can give the French a good run for the money in the incorporating a high degree of utter shitness into their vehicles league table.
You can’t use your phone whilst driving because it is a distraction, but cars often now have a mahoosif touch screen control and infotainment setup slapped into the dash to distarct the utter fuck out of folk who should be concentrating on their driving.
All this needless over-complexity and poor designs prone to failure mean the cars become uneconomical to repair much earlier in their lives so the carbon footprint of the build is spread over a shorter duration. Regularly seeing cars in an aquaintence’s scrap yard at 10 years old now when a vehicle used to make 20 fairly easily.
And the joke of end of life recyling vehicles continues with them just getting cubed for transportation then dropped into a fragmenter which shreds everything making it extremely difficult to properly separate out all the different types of metals and plastics.
But then we make fuck all in the UK these days anyways and little use for saving highly refined resources, so we just ship that shit out on huge bunker fuel burning cargo ships to be dealt with elsewhere on the planet, whilst importing more new disposable shite products to continue the cycle.
Still, I’m certain the chronically online filling servers with their endless yak day in day out have all the answers to these practical problems.
“Regularly seeing cars in an aquaintence’s scrap yard at 10 years old now when a vehicle used to make 20 fairly easily”
Likely crashed if they’re being scrapped or are very higher milers at ten years. I’m going to call bollocks on vehicles usually making it to 20 “fairly easily”. SOME older vehicles (e.g. 6-cylinder Mercedes or Toyota Land Cruisers) used to still be going strong at 20-years if they were looked after well, most of your average vehicles built in the 90’s would be hanging on for dear life or rusted through by 12 to 15 years. About 25% of the cars advertised on the autotrader are over 10 years old, about 1.7% are over 20 years old. . .
You can call bollocks all you want, but the reality is I have worked in and around the automotive industry for the decades of my young and adult life and therefore have firsthand experience of what I am talking about, unlike some young internet troll using AI to try to score a small point whilst ignoring the main focus of my post.
Plenty other cars are made on strong long lasting basic platforms other than Merc and Toyota, but then AI would suggest what you’ve stated… EG. Ford Mondeo mk3 was renowned for being a strong platform. Mine did well over 300k miles and was still on the original front wishbones and bushes even with the hammering they get on our chronic road surfaces. That’s inpressive and down to sensible design speccing components to endure and not fail. The MTX 5 speed gearbox was also renowned for being a robust unit too. That model wasn’t perfect though and did still have other issues with some suffering injector issues, and they had dual mass flywheels so expensive if clutch fails due to length of job and component costs to replace.
I only put mine off the road because the road tax was getting silly for that model and I moved to a smaller petrol car which is only 35 quid a year to tax.
I regulalry see cars of around ten years getting scrapped because they are economically unviable to repair due to their flawed designs and cost of components, and not because they were crashed or high mileages.
I just scrapped a pal’s otherwise solid 13 year old Audi A3 because the weak 02T MQ200 gearbox Audi chose to install in that model shat itself like they do.
Now Audi could have chosen to install the significantly more robust 02J / 0A4 MQ250 gearbox in that model to gain strength and longevity, but they didn’t, so an otherwise “decent” vehicle becomes unviable to repair. I say decent as it was structurally sound but it is also packed with utter shite overcomplexity.
I could have converted the car to use the stronger gearbox but then it becomes modified and insurance gets arsey with such things.
But that car is still a twat of a thing really. You need to take the entire front bumper and grill assembly off to change a headlight… FFS, Ford and Volvo had a simple design that you just pulled two pins up and the entire headlight unit slid out making it easy to change a bulb, instead of needing fingers with 4 knuckles and super strength to try to change a bulb with headlight in place.
The bonus for me in helping him out was that I got to keep the low mileage 1.6 engine which once you throw away all the superflous junk clagged onto it, actually makes a great base engine for other applications.
I build / rebuild gearboxes and engines for motorsport applications and can tell you it just isn’t finacially viable to spend lots of time removing, stripping, buying all necessary parts, then rebuilding and reinstalling a gearbox to keep a relatively low value road car going.
You just can’t drop that sort of coin when some other part may fail a bit down the line requiring another dose of silly money to repair.
My 03 plate Mondeo 2.0D Ghia X was easily the worst car I have ever owned. Absolute piece of shit.
The TDCI engine gave constant problems; the Ford main dealer (allegedly) replaced the injectors and all manner of other stuff and I had some shitebox poverty spec Fiesta courtesy car for weeks/months, and in the end they just gave up and walked away, leaving me with a car that was even worse than I’d started with. Ford customer service point blank told me to my face they were going to do fuck all about it and invited me to instruct a solicitor. Last Ford I ever bought.
Look at Ford Europe now, compared to the 80s or even 90s. With such contempt for their customer base (and crap, shoddy products), the outcome was assured.
People love to moan about Land Rover stuff, possibly with justification, but whenever anything’s gone wrong they’ve always looked after me and they give me great deals when it’s time to change. Unlike Ford.
Except I haven’t used AI in any of what I wrote above, I’ve simply used the autotrader app to do some basic calculations. Not everything involving the function of a computer is AI.
That’s a lovely series of anecdotes Dan, but does nothing to evidence your point that modern cars are barely lasting ten years whilst older vehicles would easily make it past 20. As it happens – I did have a Mondeo MK3 (the 3.0V6 ST) and the clutch went, it wasn’t cheap to sort out. Anyway, that’s by the by.
Modern cars are more complex and aren’t always designed well, and come with the risk of very difficult to remedy electrical issues. I’m not denying any of that. But equally the generation that came before used to rot, often seriously, at ten years old, and the engines would blow head gaskets. Those kind of normally fatal issues aren’t as common these days.
But let’s have a look at some facts;
– the average age of a vehicle on the road has gone from 6.6 years in 2003 to around 10-years today
– the average age of a car being scrapped was 13.7 years in 2014 and it’s 17.3 years today
So we can see that your hypothesis is wrong, and least in respect of cars produced between say 5 and 30 years ago. It remains to be seen how durable these new generation of Chinese EV’s will be. Your perception will undoubtedly be influenced by your own workload, but it isn’t born out when we look at the data spanning tens of millions of cars over decades.
“…I haven’t used AI in any of what I wrote above…”
LOLZ.
AIDan says:
“Modern cars are more complex and aren’t always designed well, and come with the risk of very difficult to remedy electrical issues. I’m not denying any of that. But equally the generation that came before used to rot, often seriously, at ten years old, and the engines would blow head gaskets. Those kind of normally fatal issues aren’t as common these days.”
Clealry you haven’t spent much time working in garages have you?
So with regard to the first point of your post, both you and CC are actually in agreement with me when I said that modern cars are overly complex and difficult / costly to repair.
And it isn’t just electrical issues, there are serious mechanical design flaws in many modern vehicles. EG. Wet belts, and just downright shite engine designs resulting in costly failures in various makes.
Oddly you’ve both had Mondeo mk3s and both suffered the exact faults I pointed out could be an issue with some of them.
I stated that platform was generally robust, but the over-complexity of some of the designs of certain components created the issues you both had in an otherwise strong and well built structure of a vehicle.
Injection issues in some common rail diesels are pretty common. Ask someone with a VW 1.6 TDI… Or high and low pressure fuel pump issues in numerous makes costing a fortune to try to sort.
Back in the day you could do a clutch change in a Datsun or Vauxhall in about an hour without even taking the gearbox out and disturbing all the suspension / steering geometry. Now, best put aside about a grand for a clutch in a medium sized car.
Re. Your later point. You obviously haven’t seen the likes of Citroen or Toyota cars dissolve into a crusty rusty mess. And as for Toyota, best not mention the Hilux chassis recall debackle.
And have you not heard of Vauxhall Mokka headgasket issues, or VW Crafter / Amarok oilpumps, or Ranger or Ingenium engines, or… I could go on.
You are always far too desparate to find fault and try to develop an issue when anybody post about pretty much anything.
You’ve posted figures on car ages and how long they last. But you you can’t just look at that in isolation putting it all on the vehicle, and should factor in other aspects that created those different figures, such as austerity meaning folk don’t have the money to keep their vehicles properly serviced and maintained which results in a serious failure and scrapping. Or deals incentivising scrappage schemes, or strictness of the likes of MOT tests, all playing a part in the bigger picture.
The initial point in my first post has been lost, in that it is ridiculous for folk in positions of power and influence to try to force / guilt / tax folk into living more sustainable existences when there is no kerb on big corporates producing crap compromised products that by design are inherently overly energy and mineral resource hungry, and especially so with no state of the art way to properly recycle the products after their short lives.
CC says:
“People love to moan about Land Rover stuff, possibly with justification, but whenever anything’s gone wrong they’ve always looked after me and they give me great deals when it’s time to change.”
Of course they looked after you. That’s how the long con business plan works. Can’t expect folk to keep returning and pissing away loads of dosh on overpriced junk Landrover products if they treated you the same as Ford did.
Ford’s business model is to hump you quick for a lower amount of cash on their products. That’s so the anger and ripped off feeling of buying crap dissipates sooner and folk forget and drop the grudge; And later return for another relatively small humping because where else you going to go because all the medium range car makers run similar startegies.
At garage again today to see more Landrover design comedy.
Wheel bearing and ABS sensor change… Wheel bearing was the actual fault but you nearly always have to replace the ABS sensor too on the job because it will be siezed in place and can’t replace wheel bearing with it in place, so extra cost and time.
This LR model has a ridiculous alloy suspension hub upright design using a long steel bolt through it. Perfect setup for dissimillar metal corrosion when used in shitey damp UK weather with added salted grit on the roads. So whole lot siezed solid and induction heater or gas torch no use on critical structural aluminium components for various reasons.
So it’s extra time wrestling with removing and refitting the entire wishbone assembly. Joy.
I can only speak from personal experience. I (or the missus) has had Evoques, Range Rover Sports and a full sizer, every single one of them has been a lovely car to be in, drive and own. Not one of them has missed a beat (and one of them saved me from a serious bind and flooding whilst on holiday in Devon years back). Always fun to blasting down snow-laden A-roads at 70mph leaving RWD beemers struggling in my wake, and what’s not to like about 550bhp?
You say it’s “junk” and that’s your opinion, but they’ve done everything I’ve ever asked of them and made me feel good whilst doing it. Sure, they are not driver’s cars but they were never intended to be and nor could they be. Horses for courses.
They must be doing something right. Here in rural Cheshire they are EVERYWHERE.
Dan,
I’ve worked on vehicles with electric handbrakes from 2 manufacturers, Vauxhall and VAG.
In both cases, the calliper motor is 12V, the connection is 2-wire. Connect a 12V source one way and the motor will turn, winding the calliper piston either in or out. Reverse the polarity and the piston will wind either out or in.
I use a battery charger with 100mm screws in the clamps as probes to accurately touch the terminals in the calliper connector. I’m sure there are better ways, but then I’m not fitting rear brake pads every day.
From being initially wary of electric hand brakes, I’ve come to prefer them over the older manual type. It’s a hell of a lot easier to retract the piston using the inbuilt calliper motor than it is using force and one of these tools that tries to manually rotate the piston. At least, that’s what I find.
That’s a bit of a bodge and a great way to potentially fuck up an expensive ABS unit by back pressuring the sensitive hydraulic circuits when the unit isn’t in service mode.
But fuck it, crack on as it’s only brakes and what do they matter.
I understand Landrover are still tweaking the ABS related software for some of their models that are already on the road due to issues with the brake system. But they have previous for that… Original Freelander had traction control that was basically just ABS in reverse. It applied the brake on any spinning wheel so drive went to wheels with grip.
Only issue with that was the rear used drum brakes, and if the vehicle had significantly worn down rear brake shoes, the wheel cylinder pistons could travel too far out their bores and the seal would be lost losing hydraulic pressure.
Bad design that as the brake shoes and drum should have been sized so the piston couldn’t travel that far out of the wheel cylinder bore, even when there was no brake shoe lining left, thus retaining hydraulic pressure in the brake circuit.
The retards at Peugeot somehow managed to run the wiring to their leccy calipers on certin models in a way that the suspension rubs through the wires… That car was only a few years old with low miles, and and rear shocks were blown and front cv boots fucked with minging cv grease splattered everywhere.
It was in for a brake fault and customer didn’t want to spend much money on it, so my mate just drove the car back out the workshop and told the customer to take it back to Peugeot.
Test. There’s a post for you waiting in moderation…
Aye Dan..
You’ve just reminded me why I gave up on here.
It’s a mystery why so many fucking fuds can post disruptive pish 24/7 & seem to go under the radar.
Over & out. Keep well xx
If you’re upset with the company Geri – you could always post the same stuff under your own name on LinkedIn?
@Geri 1:04
I absolutely love your posts and so I’d like to help you out.
Teach yourself what 24/7 actually means.
Once you’ve cracked that concept, teach yourself the meanings of all the other words you use before you use them.
Yay, for post responding to Hatey’s brake hack released from moderation.
To add a bit more info. Brake fluid has a service life as it is hygroscopic, so in a well designed vehicle braking system it would be good practice when retracting caliper pistons during a brake service to lightly clamp the flexi hose to the caliper and open the bleed nipple(s) so the old heat cycled fluid is displaced from the system and saves pushing old often contaminated fluid back into the expensive and complex ABS unit.
But of course modern designs now make the flexi hoses more rigid meaning clamping them isn’t such a good idea, plus with alloy calipers there is the dissimilar metal issue causing corrosion and risks the chance the steel bleed nipple will not unscrew without galling the threads thus wrecking the ability to reseal the bleed nipple.
So more cost to replace caliper if replacing brake fluid at service intervals.
SANDIE PEGGIE URGES NHS SCOT TO ENFORCE SINGLE-SEX SPACES
Nurse Sandie Peggie has urged NHS Scotland to follow NHS England in implementing the law on single-sex spaces.
New guidance from NHS England states that all of its healthcare settings must provide services on the basis of biological sex. This is to comply with the UK Supreme Court ruling that the definition of a woman is determined by biology not ideology under the Equality Act.
Last year, Peggie was found to have been harassed by her employer, NHS Fife, which suspended her for objecting to a biologically male doctor changing in the female changing rooms.
PRIVACY AND DIGNITY
Peggie said: “I welcome this common sense guidance from NHS England which makes clear that patients’ biological sex will determine which hospital wards they will be accommodated in.
“The safety, privacy and dignity of female patients shouldn’t depend on where they are hospitalised in Great Britain.”
She continued: “The rights of female hospital patients in Scotland must no longer be sacrificed because of gender ideology and NHS Scotland must now urgently commit to implementing similar guidance.”
‘DRAGGING ITS HEELS’
The co-director of women’s rights group For Women Scotland, Marion Calder, said NHS Scotland is “dragging its heels” over releasing similar guidance on single-sex spaces.
She accused NHS Scotland of still allowing biologically male patients on female psychiatric wards, and added: “We are aware of male nurses who identify as women providing intimate care.”
The Scottish Government has previously said: “We have already written to health boards to reinforce the importance of ensuring that the law is followed and the Supreme Court judgment implemented.”
(The Christian Institute, 20 Oct 2026)
link to christian.org.uk
It’s not a matter of the Scottish Government just saying that they’ve written to the health boards to ‘ reinforce the importance of ensuring that the law is followed and the Supreme Court judgment implemented’
The government need to follow up if the law is not being implemented.
This utterly rotten and corrupt SNP government is absolutely steeped in saying one thing and doing another. In fact, and as will be emerge, their malfeasance is much much worse than simply saying one thing and doing another.
On the plus side, we now know ScotGov can write.
Maybe they’re already harnessing the power of AI.
The SNP pretending it is Sovereign In Scotland regarding laws to do as it pleases is a laugh, whilst it sits in a devolved parliament under Westminster parliaments laws, legislation and Statues.with reserved matters.
As Billy Connely said it is a ” wee pretendy parliament.”
Pretendy in Scotland,
And Scotland cannot change the laws, legislation or Statues of the parliament in England any more than England can pass the Scotland act from of the Westminster parliament to Scotland
And most people in Scotland have not realised this yet, politicians that act in Scotland cannot convert English laws and legislation and Statues by declaring that the Scottish parliament has reconvened,
It is still a sub branch of Englands laws,
However why the need is even there for the Westminster parliament to produce a ” Scotland Act ” from Englands parliament to Scotland if Scotland is supposedly joined in a parliamentary union with England in the first instance of ONE AND THE SAME PARLIAMENT OF GREAT BRITAIN.
When joining the EU it was noted that Scotland had no representation,
And why would the EU suggest Scotland had no representation?
The EU realised there was no Scottish parliament in the Great Britain parliament.
And Westminster parliament for England and Wales had to remedy the situation, even if with a pretend parliament on the face of it.
It appeared Scotland was part of the union of Great Britain Westminster parliament even if belatedly by three hundred years,
However this did not have an effect or affect on Westminster parliament as Englands previous Great Britain parliament could continue to pass laws for just England and Wales separately as they had always done since the parliament of England had not ceased, but simply transferred into the new rebrand parliament of Englands Great Britain.
Scotland needs it own parliament.
I watched Professor Alf Baird’s speech on territorial alienation at the recent SSRG Conference. He makes some valid sociological points, but in my view he destroys their credibility by embedding them in a legally incoherent narrative of annexation, colonisation, occupation, and sovereignty recovery.
Scotland isn’t a colony, and the UN can’t declare it one. Only the administering power can nominate a territory to the NSGT list — the UK won’t, and the UN can’t override a sovereign state.
The ICJ can’t dissolve the UK, declare Scotland independent, or “recover” sovereignty — it has no jurisdiction over internal constitutional arrangements. If the UN or ICJ could do any of this, Catalonia, Quebec, Kurdistan and Kashmir would already be independent.
The UN route is a fantasy — the only real path to independence is democratic legitimacy. Every modern independence case succeeded through democratic choice, not historical grievance or international intervention.
Even if Scotland were unlawfully annexed three centuries ago, annexation before 1945 is not actionable. International bodies can’t change a state’s internal constitutional arrangements — they only respond to what the people decide through recognised democratic processes.
Diplomatic friendliness isn’t diplomatic support — states won’t intervene in another country’s internal constitutional arrangements. Any goodwill Scotland receives before independence is polite courtesy, not actionable backing. Real support comes after independence, when recognition and cooperation actually matter.
The Scots must choose and make their own future through peaceful, recognised democratic processes.
This is the only route to Scottish independence.
“the only real path to independence is democratic legitimacy”
There is no democracy possible for a people whose territory has been alienated, as the presentation makes clear.
You might want to go and study the presentation again.
Alf — I understand the argument you’re making, but the point I’m raising sits at a different level.
Territorial alienation, as you describe it, is a sociological and historical critique. It doesn’t change how international law actually functions today.
Whatever the historical grievances, Scotland currently has:
– full civil rights
– full political representation
– devolved institutions
– and recognised democratic processes
And because of that, every international body — the UN, the ICJ, the EU, NATO, and every foreign government — treats Scotland’s constitutional status as a matter for the people of Scotland and the UK to resolve through democratic choice.
That’s why modern independence movements succeed through democratic legitimacy rather than historical claims.
It’s not a judgement on Scotland’s past — it’s simply how sovereignty works in the present international system.
If Scotland chooses independence through recognised democratic processes, the international community will respond.
But no external body can make that choice for us.
” There is no democracy possible for a people whose territory has been alienated”
World history is littered with clear examples of where independence has been achieved through “democratic means”: Czech Republic, Slovakia, Montenegro, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania are recent examples, together with Iceland and Norway in the last century (see also New Zealand and Australia too).
Whereas, as Northcode, Aidan and others have repeatedly pointed out – with valid citations and evidence that you steadfastly refuse to engage with – the very notion that the UN can effect independence form Scotland within international law and protocol is utter folly. An absolute absurdity.
“Project Hee Haw” is well named.
“Scotland currently has: – full civil rights”
Dinna be daft.
Liberation Scotland has been visiting the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva to present violations to our human rights, including “examining Scotland’s right to self-determination under international law”.
link to jpti.ch
Alf — human rights concerns can and should be raised wherever people feel they’re not being heard.
But even when groups present issues to the UN Human Rights Council, it doesn’t change how state sovereignty is handled in international law.
The UNHRC can examine allegations, make recommendations, and highlight areas where governments should improve.
What it cannot do is alter a state’s constitutional arrangements or declare a region independent. That authority simply doesn’t exist within the UN system.
This is why every independence movement that succeeded in recent decades — from Montenegro to the Baltic states to Slovakia — did so through recognised democratic processes.
Human rights discussions may highlight political frustrations, but they don’t replace the need for democratic legitimacy.
If Scotland chooses independence through a lawful, recognised democratic route, the international community will respond.
But I repeat — no UN body, including the Human Rights Council, can make that constitutional decision on Scotland’s behalf.
The JPTi page you linked to doesn’t allege human rights violations. It simply restates Scotland’s universal right to self-determination — a right all peoples already have under international law.
“Liberation Scotland has been visiting the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva to present violations to our human rights, including “examining Scotland’s right to self-determination under international law”.
The right to self determination does not proscribe the right to an independent state.
The fact that:
– at least at an officer level, the UN has been aware of these arguments for some time; and
– has declined to act on them or even acknowledge them.
Would in the minds of most people be pretty conclusive evidence that the UN isn’t interested in this.
The United Nations is America & we’re all well aware of what they think about Human Rights & civil liberties. Zilch.
They continually vote against it regardless of a majority vote. Democracy deniers. They’re perpetual Vito & violators to it unless it has $$$ signs. Palestine is a perfect example. Another is their ‘reservations’ on their own turf. They’re the biggest liars of all. Interference in every other country, thieving & pillaging, pretending to be liberating ppl from oppression. Aye, they liberated Irq. Killed 1 million people, & liberated them of all the oil revenues that now funnel into a New York bank account & installed a puppet regime who has to literally write a letter to America asking for some pocket money. They were liberated of electricity too. They’re given a lights out curfew – alongside Leb, Lib & Syria. I can’t think why Iran doesn’t just lay down & do as it’s telt either . It’s a mystery!
They also liberated Francesca Albanese of her right to travel & sanctioned her – those bastions of democracy & all that is good.
Until they disband & reform the United Nations it’ll just play talking shop. Hopefully that’ll be soon. It certainly can’t continue making up the rules as it goes along whilst other countries respect the rule of international laws.
Here we go again.
*sigh*
Today’s crossword clue
A country which has no control over its own borders, resources, broadcast media or defence, and which has to ask permission from the country next door to have a vote on its own future.
6 letters
C_L_NY.
Alf – I wrote that Scotland currently has full civil rights.
I didn’t mention human rights at all.
You shifted the discussion to “violations to our human rights”, but civil rights and human rights are not the same thing.
Nonetheless, I responded to your category shift in good faith.
The borders between England, Scotland, and Wales mark historic countries within a single sovereign state.
England, Scotland, and Wales are not sovereign states today — they are constituent countries of the United Kingdom, which is the sole sovereign state on mainland Britain.
That’s why international bodies treat Scotland’s constitutional status as a domestic democratic matter rather than an international border issue.
There are no colonies on mainland Britain.
“Scotland currently has full civil rights”
A colonized people are a subordinated people subject to cultural erasure and economic extraction, hence do not have ‘full civil rights’ at all.
Why is it @Alf – that you comment almost entirely in riddles and abstraction?
Rev Stu should post a copy of that on his site, with a permanent link to it at the top of this page.
The longer we have to wait for the Indy movement to get real, disbelieve in the magic beans, and stop prevaricating over starting to put in the hard miles, the longer we’re gonna have to wait for Indy.
Good post, Northy.
Credit where it’s due.
• Ultimate Competence: Under UN General Assembly Resolution 1541 (XV), the UNGA established the specific criteria for what constitutes a full measure of self-government. The UN maintains that it is the sole arbiter of when a territory is officially “de-listed” or added.
• Overriding Sovereign States: The UNGA has historically added territories to the NSGT list against the explicit wishes of the ruling power. For example, the UNGA reinscribed New Caledonia to the list in 1986 and added French Polynesia in 2013, despite strong opposition and non-cooperation from France
The Westminster parliament for England and Wales, the westminster parliament for Great Britain, and the Anglo Irish Westminster parliament of the UK, the devolved parliament from the Westminster England and Wales parliament, sent up to Scotland legally remain under the authority laws, legislation and Statues of the Westminster parliament for England and Wales.
Due to the old Westminster parliament for England and Wales being….transferred too… and becoming one and the same rebranded Westminster parliament of Great Britain, England and Wales.
The negotiations into the EU highlighted the Westminster parliament error over The matter of Scotland not having a parliament in union with the parliament for England and Wales.
Since the Old Scottish parliament had been Dissolved on the 28th April 1606 prior to the treaty of union date coming into force on the 1st May 1606 in England, or in Scotland on the 1st May 1707.
Hence the urgent requirement for Westminster parliament to produce a pretend Parliament for Scotland even if it was under the laws, legislation and Statues of the old transferred Westminster parliament for England and Wales acting separately from a non existent Scottish parliament not in a union,
The modern colonial theme was to make Scotlands people THINK that Westminster parliament for England and Wales had the authority to do this to Scotland. by pretending the Choice by vote was actually their own,
Westminster parliament Totally omitting the necessary FACT and legalise as to Why it was required in the first place.
Because Scotlands parliament was not in a union with the Westminster parliament for England and Wales.
Although Mr Black was eloquent in Stating that the Westminster parliament for England and Wales simply carried on as before with no interruptions.
He fails to highlight that the old Scottish parliament had ceased to Exist on the 28th April 1606 in England,
And a promise of a union of two Countries parliaments and union of Crowns could not be legally be completed to create The Great Britain One United Kingdom parliament also ceased to exist on the 28th April 1606.
North Code,
The UN cannot declare Scotland is a Colony,
It may be outside their remit,
But nor can they claim or suggest that Scotlands parliament is in a Union with Englands parliament to confirm it as a international treaty just because Westminster parliament makes a false claim.
What will be noted by all those involved ( Countries ) studying the UN review is that the parliaments of Scotland and England did not unite to Create the Westminster parliament of Great Britain State,
And due to that being bought to the worlds attention, it would be noted also that the Crown of Scotland and the Crown of England did not unite, plus the two constitutios of Scotland and England are not united.
As the UN would be trying to prove their is a Great Britain State,
Which it cannot do if Scotlands
1:
old parliament ceased to exist on the 28th April 1606 in England, prior to the treaty of union coming into force on the 1st May 1606 in England, or 1707 for Scotland,
2:
Thus evidence reviewed by the Countries in the UN would also show that the old Westminster parliament of England and Wales was….Transferred…. into of So called parliament of Great Britain, meaning the parliament for England and Wales did not cease to create the United kingdom parliament.
I think there is a lot more problems to come to light yet, and as you are implying that the UN cannot declare Scotland independent, equally so the UN cannot declare that the evidence is also there to enable them to say that the treaty of union is real as the two Countries parliaments joined in a union as promised.
North Code,
The UN and the law on treaties would have to consider Scotlands claim that there is no such treaty of union took place,
That England parliament left a international treaty for 11 days.
That England parliament altered its legal dates after they submitted them to a international treaty in 1752.
That England parliament has repealed articles of the Treaty of union that are stated as unalterable by the Great Britain Parliament.
And finally,
The Un and the Icj and ECHR would be required under the law on treaties to note and pay explicit attention to the legal procedure to the agreement, terms and conditions on wether both Scotlands parliaments and Englands parliament had ceased completely to create the State parliament of GB as promised.
The UN could not declare Scotland independent, but neither can it give full validation to a declaration or confirm that Scotlands old parliament is in a political parliamentary and monarchial union with the transferred parliament of England and Wales in 1606 or 1707.
Historical treaty grievances don’t change how sovereignty works today.
Modern international bodies don’t adjudicate 18th-century constitutional arrangements.
They respond to democratic legitimacy, not historical claims.
That’s why every successful independence movement in recent decades achieved statehood through recognised democratic processes, not through reinterpretations of centuries-old treaties.
Democracy can only exist once a colonized people are outside the firm grip of the oppressor and his colonial administrators serving a furrin croun:
link to x.com
The point you’re making would apply in situations where a people are actually colonised.
But Scotland isn’t a colony, and Scots aren’t a colonised people.
That’s why Scotland’s constitutional future is treated as a democratic matter rather than a decolonisation issue.
It is true that legally Scotland will not be recognised as a colony.
It is also true that it was the colonisers in the world that heavily influenced the current UN legislation on colonialism.
The UN legislation on colonisation needs to be decolonised. Hard to do with the power of veto of the Security Council.
How far will the democratic pursuit of independence get Scotland? Not far, I think.
In your posting you overlook what some have called the “colonial mindset”. This rears its ugly head at various times when the UK government needs it.
The best example is the power it retains to override devolved powers, the Sewel Convention having no legal status. The UK government asserted legislative control over all self governing colonial states in the Empire.
How do you see the UK government giving up control of Faslane and Coulport?
The UK government has managed for decades to be unaccountable for its policies in NI. It is beyond doubt that it was involved in crimes gainst humanity.
The UK government is likely to do everything it thinks is needed to keep ultimate control over all of the UK.
Thanks for all the rational analysis, NC.
Democratic legitimacy is indeed the key. Apart from anything else, the Claim of Right that so many contributors claim has validity in contemporary Scottish affairs would suggest that what the majority of Scots want should be the deciding factor. There has always been a majority of Scots in every plebiscite this century in favour of parties representing the status quo.
So our learned professor of ships et al have no mandate I can see to claim to represent Scotland. Simply arrogance – anyone who disagrees with us is wrong. They are certainly misrepresenting and arguably, per the CoR, betraying their country.
We need to persuade a majority of Scots that independence will give the best future for us all.
I would also add that the circumstances around the formation of a treaty 300 years ago is an issue that is non-justiciable, either at a domestic or an international level, for distinct but overlapping reasons. I’ve previously explained, at length, why this is the case.
Independence is, as Northcode said, a political objective to be pursued within the internal democratic mechanisms of the U.K. state. Decolonisation was an objective of its time and circumstance, and there is no political imputes anywhere to revive or expand it. More widely – I don’t see what is to be gained by advancing these novel legal theories that do not, and will not, enjoy any recognition by anyone in any kind of authority. It’s an obvious dead end, and would appear to be linked more to the obsessions and eccentricities of the proponents rather than any genuine strategy.
”… and would appear to be linked more to the obsessions and eccentricities of the proponents”
Not to mention self-delusion and, above all, vanity.
Aidan — yes, exactly.
That’s the core point I’ve been trying to make.
Whatever people believe about historical treaties or constitutional irregularities, none of it is justiciable today, and none of it changes how sovereignty is understood in the modern international system.
Independence is a political project, not a legal dispute.
And the only route that has ever succeeded — anywhere — is democratic legitimacy within the recognised constitutional framework.
That’s why focusing on present-day democratic consent is far more effective than advancing legal or colonisation theories that have no traction with any domestic or international authority.
As factchecker said, we ultimately need to persuade a majority of Scots that independence offers the best future for us all.
Rev, will the gathering that you attended in London last night that included Maya Forstater and other like-minded people, be food for an article on Wings? The only tweet I can access [not being on twitter] referred to you being of help, you hoped. Sounds good.
North code,
I like the phrasing you used,
So what would or could Westminster actually do or achieve if it made a complaint that Scotland is not abiding by its old supposed treaty,
Would Westminster require reparations from its own sub governance in Scotland?
And whom would Westminster whinge to, especially if Scotland, Ireland, Wales and parts of England joined forces politically.
Taking on board Alf Bairds comments on democracy,
Adding the right to self determination and all the other anomolies that crop up time again for Westminster Parliament,
Historically it is not a question of “treaty grievances” , but rather a question of was there ever a treaty between Scotland and England to grieve about, is there a treaty between Scotland and England for Scotland to leave, for Scotland to require a democratic vote on,
As you are suggesting that modern international bodies don’t adjudicate 18th century constitutional arrangements.
No one disputes Englands Sovereignty over Englands constitution in the parliament for England and Wales,
as lord Cooper commented on,
that takes a alternative route to Scotlands sovereignty and Constitution.
And that thought process you have taken can be looked at as a entirely a different topic and matter regarding as to wether there is actually a treaty of union between Scotland and England for England to endorse,
I suggest you are avoiding the topic,
It is well known in historical records that Scotland protested signed petitions and rioted against joining a union with England, that beening said, suggest that the monarch of England pulled a fast one on the parliament of England by dissolving the parliament of Scotland in England, prior to the Union date.
Avoiding a union of parliaments, avoiding a Union of kingdoms, avoiding sharing two crowns, and avoiding a war between the two Countries at a time when finances were needed from both Countries for her wars that had incurred debts
By keeping Scotland and England separate should she require to retreat or change sides,
What ever her reasons were politically, She withdrew Scotland and its parliament from joining in a treaty of union with the parliament of England. And prevented two crowns joining, along with two Constitutions not being jointly shared. By dissolving the parliament of Scotland on the 28th April 1606 before the treaty of union was to take force on the 1st May,
So the grievance is not over the supposed treaty of union that was due to take place on the 1st May in England but didn’t,
it is how it relates and is embodied in not enabling changing Scotlands Sovereignty and Constitution,
At the same time not changing Englands Sovereignty and Constitution.
Indeed if you are to debate Scotland claiming its Sovereignty rights and Scotlands Constitutional legal rights remaining in place today then the finger certinly points to a monarch of England that wanted the best of both worlds,
So withdrew Scotland from from the treaty of union in the last hour so to speak.
James — whatever people believe about 1606, 1707, treaties, petitions, parliaments, monarchs, or historical grievances, none of that changes how sovereignty works today.
I repeat: modern international bodies don’t adjudicate centuries-old treaty disputes.
They recognise the United Kingdom as the sovereign state, and Scotland — along with England and Wales — as non-sovereign constituent countries within it.
Today’s international bodies aren’t interested in whether Scotland was tricked or coerced into a treaty three centuries ago.
That’s why Scotland’s constitutional future is treated as an internal democratic matter, not a question of historical treaties or alleged irregularities.
The only viable route to independence today is democratic choice, not reinterpretations of events from the 17th or 18th century.
Northcode: although contemporary international law would back us up in most areas, the Treaty will almost certainly come into play in the negotiations, and if you and others believe that it won’t, God help us. Have you forgotten Crawford and Boyle so soon. No wonder we are in a mess; so few seem to learn anything from past experience. Westminster will use it to diddle us and blind us, and we will have few, if any, international constitutional experts to speak up for us and demand that the law be implemented properly instead of ultra vires decisions being taken unilaterally by Westminster.
In 2013/14, we had two very eminent constitutional (Public Law) lawyers speaking on our behalf, off their own bat, but the government did not engage them to strip the Treaty down to its basics and it did not refute the central plank of the C & B argument that Scotland had been subsumed. This is the very plank on which SALVO rests its case and James Che argues: that there is no Treaty because we are a colony (no question we are treated as one, but we are not a colony and there is a Treaty).
Okay, rely on those arguments and see where it gets us when push comes to shove because Westminster will argue that many in the movement actually agree with C & B and that Scotland was, in fact, subsumed. Then argue that Scotland, as a mere region of a Greater England, wants to secede from the Union and the UK (remember, the Treaty underpins both, constitutionally). The arguments are very different for regions and for nations.
North code.
If the Scots are not a Colonised people, and the monarch of England withdrew the parliament of Scotland , people and Country of Scotland on the 28th April in 1606 from the treaty of union, before it was was forcible as legal treaty ,where does your debate arising from,
Scotland has its democracy, Sovereignty, Constitution and is a republic Country, you’re just clarifying points that Scotland was not aware of.
“The SNP of 2026 has two faces”
Correct Rev, one face shows the saltire, on occasion, while the other face has the England-as-UK flag, reflecting a Manichean colonial society, as we can clearly see here:
link to x.com
it has been explained many times the nature and necessity of a multi-layered strategy for independence and the importance of “putting down markers” at the UN; also the necessity of external help in any liberation struggle – we have also covered the nature of “realpolitik” (the central role of the USA), the history of the UN, the history of C24, the pernicious ambiguity which lies at the crux of Scotland’s problem (if a colony we can decolonise, if an equal partner in a union we can just tear the fucking thing up) – and the basic observation that we can get a lot of help from the UN and its members because – everyone, everywhere, all around the world – absolutely fucking hate the english – the US treat them like shite, as does Oz. We are pushing at an open door – there is “Hauners” if you want it. We have also covered why Scotland is not – Catalonia, Quebec, New Caledonia, Kosovo, Freedonia, Essex or Rockall.
what part of this is not registering “NorthCode” – you repeat yourself like a parrot because if I say it N times and I was wrong, then maybe I will be right on N + 1
– in any case : what does it matter to you if someone’s strategy isn’t going to work? Why would you care?
another odd thing : how come all these RANDOM TITS ON THE FUCKING INTERWEBS who obviously don’t have any real paid employment are, somehow
EXPERTS ON INTERNATIONAL LAW
and sometimes
EXPERT LEVEL CONSTITUTIONAL HISTORIANS
– surely these dudes should be high level mandarins at the foreign office, or hold some professorship somewhere leafy. You could be on 100K a year for some place with a nice wine cellar.
Nah – its chugging up the pipes EVERY FUCKING DAY on the BTL of a defunct website the owner has given up on, been phoning it in and is now obsessed with trannies …
Interesting, Confused.
You say ” if an equal partner in a union we can just tear the fucking thing up”. Could you please let us know where in the provisions of the Act of Union Scotland (or England) is described s an equal partner.
It seems illogical – I can’t think of any Union anywhere in the world where a smaller, poorer and less powerful member of the Union has equality with a larger, richer and more powerful one. Certainly doesn’t happen in the USA or Germany. The English must have been really stupid if we got them to agree to that. Please help me out with another example.
clap clap fudgepacker
you just noticed the “bait and switch” that no one else seemed to (want to) at the time
– you cannot join a smaller to a larger nation under one man one vote as the smaller is swallowed up; when the US was expanding no one out west wanted ruled by “back east” which is why they have a senate.
“You could be on 100K a year for some place with a nice wine cellar” – I am thanks (more), minus the wine cellar. Cute that you think £100k is a lot of money though. .
Excellent questions, Confused. Well worth repetition.
How come you’re an EXPERT ON INTERNATIONAL LAW?
How come you’re an EXPERT LEVEL CONSTITUTIONAL HISTORIAN?
What does it matter to you if Northy (or anybody else) posts the same stuff N+1 times if you already know you are right?
Here’s the most important question of all. Given your cast iron certainty that you have all the answers, when are we gonna be independent?
Dinna be shy noo, Confused, we all need to save the date.
Northcode would tell us a turd is not a turd because he found a peanut in it.
Yeah great analogy, Confused.
Not.
Stay in lane with James, there’s a good lad. This is grown up talk.
Steven Bartlett (Diary of a CEO) extensive interview with VZ on 16 Oct 2026
link to youtube.com
Robin McAlpine claims Jackdaw will add 35 million tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere that wouldn’t otherwise have got there.
He also claims (rightly) Jackdaw will do nothing to reduce gas prices. It’s production volumes are too small.
So we have to believe that consumers will find extra money they otherwise wouldn’t have found to buy extra gas to burn.
“I’m putting the heating on more cos it’s North Sea gas now. I can’t afford it, but what the hell”.
RM also claims that because we’re reneging on our Net Zero promises, the rest of the world won’t keep to theirs either.
“We intended this country to go fully renewable but because Britain is substituting local gas for an equivalent volume of imported gas, now we’ve decided to fuck the climate instead”.
I can’t decide which is most dispiriting:
His manifest fuckwittery.
His stupendous sense of special that makes him believe the world is following where we lead.
The association of Scottish Indy with yet another “guru” who turns out to be a numpty.
He’s hoping “the kids” will burn down the conference centres. How very environmentally friendly of the hypocritical sad sack.
It’s taken me a long time to twig the truth of the watermelon jibes about these cants – green on the outside, red in the middle. But what with the riots in France, and reading the posts of people like RM, I finally got there.
Humza Yousaf has a new book out – just in time for Christmas – although it’s inconceivable that could ever have been a concern for him.
It seems to be about family getting caught in a war zone and how they didn’t get any preferential treatment, despite being special. Also about how difficult being leader of a country that isn’t yours is in the 21st century.
Not that I’ve read it. It’s reviewed in the Guardian Online for those interested.
I think, in the run up to Christmas and all, we all need to consider how we’ve behaved this year. Have we been sufficiently thoughtless, selfish, or just plain bad that some jokey cant might slip a copy into our stocking?
Unless you’re a saint, be very afraid.
North code,
Did not have time to respond fully to you yesterday,
Which and what Sovereignty works nowadays and where does todays Sovereignty derive from? It requires roots to hold true,
Whom owns the singular Sovereignty you refer to and how was it gained if not historically?
I’ve been thinking about why the “Scotland is a colony” argument is actually counter-productive.
A convincing case for independence doesn’t need the colonial frame, because Scotland isn’t treated as a colony by the UN and doesn’t behave like one.
The real case for independence is modern, democratic and forward-looking. Scotland already has internal self-determination: it can choose its constitutional future. The question is whether remaining in the UK continues to serve Scotland’s long-term interests.
A persuasive independence argument focuses on governance, not grievance. It asks whether Scotland’s political preferences, economic priorities and institutional choices align with the direction of the UK as a whole.
Scotland consistently votes for different governments, different social policies and different constitutional arrangements. Independence would allow Scotland to design institutions that match its own political culture and, crucially, reflect Scotland’s national identity — while shaping policy in areas such as energy strategy, industrial development, welfare, immigration, infrastructure and democratic reform.
It also asks whether Scotland’s economic potential is best realised inside or outside the UK. Independence isn’t about rejecting the UK; it’s about choosing the economic model that fits Scotland’s resources, demographics and long-term strategy. That includes control over energy, land use, taxation, investment, trade relationships and the ability to align with international frameworks that suit Scotland’s priorities.
A modern independence case is about accountability. Decisions that shape Scotland’s future should be made by the people who live in Scotland — not through a structurally limited devolved administration, but through a fully accountable, internationally recognised Scottish Government.
Independence would bring political responsibility closer to voters, strengthen democratic legitimacy and allow Scotland to adapt its institutions over time without relying on UK-wide consent.
None of this requires the language of colonisation. It requires a clear constitutional choice: whether Scotland’s long-term interests are better served by continuing within the UK or by governing itself as a normal, modern European democracy.
That’s the independence argument that speaks to undecided voters — and the one most likely to persuade a Scottish majority
“A convincing case for independence doesn’t need the colonial frame”
How else can we explain to Scots:
– the ‘union’ hoax;
– ongoing cultural and linguistic subordination/erasure;
– a colonial mindset and ‘condition’;
– demographic manipulation including population displacement;
– that Scotland has resources equal to or greater than Norway, and much greater than Ireland, but only half the GDP;
– a colonial (i.e. devolved) spending budget similar to less developed countries, e.g. Costa Rica;
– an under-developed zero-growth economy;
– half or more of the population living in or close to poverty levels;
– etc etc?
This is not ‘normal’!
“Half or more of the population living in or close to poverty levels”
Ah Alf, as an academic you’ll understand the power of defining poverty at the average of the nation’s wealth. You can pledge to eradicate it, or even settle for the lesser target of improving on it, confident you’ll have a job for life and a comfortable pension pot ready for when you retire early. No doubt still striving manfully to reduce poverty on your last day in the office.
How many of the people you attempt to fool with a statement like the one at the top have the wit to see what you’re up to?
Sadly, not enough.
To be honest I’m not sure many people *need* it explained to them, because the facts are blatantly obvious to all.
Great Replacement Theory is looking less “Theory” and more “Fact” with each passing day, cultural erasure and demographic displacement is proceeding at pace across the whole of the UK as official government policy.
Regarding poor budget and under-developed zero growth economy and poverty, again this is deliberate government policy; several decades of Socialism have seen to that, most employment in Scotland being of the state and hence unproductive. Cooncil or Civil Service jobs do not create any growth, leading to enterprise being stifled and any growth or progress stalled. We have a government and state apparatus geared explicitly towards self-preservation with all else – growth, democracy, accountability,improving life for the population – cast aside as irrelevant.
Scotland has vast potential in its skills, resources and knowledge yet government policy throttles it. Instead of going down the irrelevant “colonialism” rabbit hole, the argument needs to be made as to *how* this potential can be unchained and set loose to the benefit of us all. Naturally, I’d suggest independence concurrent with a complete dismantling of Socialist policy and thought and the current Scottish state as it stands as a starter for 10.
It’s easy to mistake a list of social, economic or cultural problems for proof of colonisation, but that isn’t how modern constitutional categories work.
Every country — independent or not — has grievances, inequalities, policy failures and areas of underperformance. These issues don’t define a constitutional status. They define political choices.
Colonisation is a specific legal and historical category recognised by the UN.
It involves external administration, dependency status, lack of internal self-determination and overwhelming liberation voting patterns. Scotland doesn’t meet those criteria. It has its own legal system, its own institutions, its own political culture and the ability to choose its constitutional future. That’s internal self-determination, not colonial status.
Grievances about culture, language, demographics, economic performance or resource management are real topics, but they’re not evidence of colonisation. They’re evidence of political decisions made within the current constitutional framework.
Independent states also experience cultural pressure, demographic change, economic inequality and policy failures. These issues don’t turn them into colonies; they reflect how their governments operate.
A modern independence argument doesn’t need to frame Scotland as colonised. It needs to ask whether Scotland’s political preferences, economic priorities and institutional choices align with the direction of the UK. If they don’t, independence becomes a constitutional option — not a liberation struggle.
Governance questions are not colonial questions.
Grievance lists can express frustration, but they don’t determine Scotland’s constitutional category.
Independence is a democratic choice about future governance, not a verdict on past grievances.
“Independence would bring political responsibility closer to voters, strengthen democratic legitimacy and allow Scotland to adapt its institutions over time without relying on UK-wide consent.”
This is very true, but that “political responsibility” you mention requires a coherent plan and prospectus for independence. “Wanting” it isn’t sufficient, and nor is endlessly (and embarrassingly) bleating on about supposed “colonisation” grievances.
For Indy supporters, the elephant in the room must surely be a complete absence of a CREDIBLE PLAN – fully 12 years after the last referendum. It’s embarrassing. WHY has this not been formulated years ago, let alone by now? This doesn’t necessarily have to come from the SNP?
I may well WANT a lot of things, but it’s all just pipedreams without a credible plan and corresponding route map, with milestones. If I wanted to set up a small business employing 3 people and get a modest start up loan from the bank, they would demand a business plan before considering lending me even so much as twenty grand. So why not an entire country of millions of stakeholders?
Truly, it is an absurd spectacle. The longer it goes on, the more people might be thinking about possible/likely reasons why such a plan can’t even be formulated.
What you write is all true, Northy, but where’s the fun in being all grown up when we can be wallowing in self pity instead?
Besides, not only is the latter more fun, but it’s a hell of a lot less work than the former.
Professor Baird will tell us we behave like this because we’re oppressed, colonised, or some other such chimera. But our National Bard had us bang to rights centuries ago when he wrote of “nursing her wrath, to keep it warm”.
That’s another stereotypical Scottish character trait. The inability to move on, motivated at least in part by the enjoyment we get from clinging on to ancient grudges.
Yawn at CC’s no credible plan bs…
If it’s a credible enough strategy for the UK to be run with, then why wouldn’t it be at least a credible start for a self-governing Scotland.
link to wingsoverscotland.com
Chuckle at site prick Main complaining that I counted coal in the resources list.
link to wingsoverscotland.com
A day later site prick Main apologising for having a go at me for including coal in my resources list.
link to wingsoverscotland.com
@Dan
That is not a manifesto for independence, it’s a collection of bullet point assertions and facts (the veracity of which I can’t vouch for, but personally I don’t doubt them).
No one, least of all me, is claiming that Scotland isn’t rich and blessed with natural resources- or even thah it can’t be independent. It clearly can, but someone credible on your side needs to set out a route so, strategy, policies and prospectus with outline costings, showing it can be done and does indeed make sense so to do.
What’s that you say, Sooty?
Why doesn’t Dan include soup on his list of Scotland’s resources?
Good question. It is, after all, his sole area of expertise.
Despite all his blowing and bragging to the contrary.
Fact checker.
You are entirely correct in stating that there is no equal union,
What you omitted by default through a lack of history knowledge is there is no Treaty of union at all.
due to the monarch of Englands Declaration by dissolving and withdrawing Scotland and its nations parliament on the 28th April 1606 – from a union with England parliament days before it was due to come into force legally,
England Sovereignty still exists in England as Scotlands does in Scotland,
Englands Constitution still exists in England as Scotlands Constitution still exists in Scotland.
The only difference historically on records beside monarchies is that Englands parliament for England and Wales, presumed the treaty of union had been Completed and come into force a few days later on the 1st May 1606 in England,
but failing to notice in their eagerness there was no longer a Scottish parliament union with Englands parliament so could not drag Scotlands along with it in later dealings or treaties.
Even if The parliament for England and Wales realised its error later on, and it undoubtably did, England altered its side of dates to what was supposed to be a International treaty of Union in 1752,
Causing England and Wales parliament to remove themselves from that so called treaty for 11 days,
Ending and breaching and going absent from their side of the treaty of union.
Very non- legal gung- ho actions to take towards a supposed International treaty,
Whatever way it is legally and historically looked at there is no treaty of union between Scotland and England from before 1st May 1606 and on multiple occasions since,
This is because the parliament for England and Wales presumed they would be able to Colonise the treaty of union itself and bespoke it to their requirements,
They have gone down this route over the Centuries, except they never succeeded in actually capturing Scotland into the treaty of Union due to the Monarch of Englands actions and declaration on the 28th April 1606. Dissolving a Scottish parliament from England.
I know there is not an equal union. It would be both stupid and undemocratic. More importantly, nobody has been able (including Confused – I’m still waiting…) to show me where any such union was promised under the terms of the Articles of Union.
NC has recently very ably and cogently laid out the timeline of constitutional events, so no need to repeat them. But I recommend you read them.
North code.
Thank you for your reply,
I will answer your points one by one if I may.
Firstly,
We have to be in the UK governance officially for Scotland to leave it.
It would also require for Scotland and its people to be in full knowledge of all the information to make the Choice of joining the treaty or not.
Historically with the little information they had at the time, Scotland still openly objected to joining.
A Tacit agreement could not even be claimed or considered here from Scotland under those circumstances
The Monarch of England kindly withdrew Scotland parliament from the treaty of Union on the 28th April 1606 via a official and legal public declaration in England.
And Scotland choose Sine die.
So the first requirement would be the evidence of the Scottish parliament in going forward and completing the union on the 1st of May 1706 in England and in 1707 the following year in Scotland,
As this decides the next points you make over Sovereignty.
That requires to be dealt with for anything else to take a legal hold in Scotland.
James, I haven’t replied to you.
My earlier comment was a general observation about the modern independence argument, not a response to your points.
I’ll leave your historical claims for others to judge — they don’t relate to Scotland’s constitutional position today, which is where my focus lies.
Alf Baird,
I suspect that the non – treaty of union issue and Colonisation issue will merge, for they become one and the same issue of legality of governance over Scotland.
North Code.
Again appreciate your response and keeping the debate polite and clean,
They are not actually my own personal historical records, these derive from the records in Westminster parliaments archives, committee meetings and Hansard. Etc,
The personal aspect comes from gathering all this public information together in one Chronological order of events on a understandable format. And only after that is achieved, can I or anyone else subject it to personal analysis or opinion.
North code,
Regards Scotlands Constitutional position in a modern democracy it is to realise there is no requirement for Scotland to follow the Constitution of England or the Supreme Court rulings of England if Stage one [ the treaty of union,] was never completed.
That is democracy,
and in of itself leads to forward future thinking in Scotland, for it is the governance of Westminster that refuses self determination democracy to the people of Scotland,
Whilst according to Westminster parliament records it has no authority to do so, having deleted and dissolved the Scottish parliament from a union to England parliament or its the Great Britain parliament.
More often than not the past creates the present and the present creates the future if following chronological linear time.
It may be convenient to Skip linear Centuries of history and records if it does not fit into ones debating ability to be in a correct position at the end.
However many others are aware of how it all transpires.
Ach, what does food self-sufficiency and being better insulated from outside events matter anyway…
link to bbc.co.uk
It’s recommended to have 3 days food stocked in case there’s an event like a war… At least it will be a quick short war which will keep the fiscal cost to taxpayer down then I guess (life is cheap and doesn’t really matter if it’s lost as it isn’t a commodity traded on the stock-markets).
Ach, on the extremely bright side of a thermonuclear strike, there will be a (very) short momentary period of enjoyable warmth felt without paying over the odds to power companies for that “luxury”, as we’ll all be getting turned into glass ornaments to stick on the mantelpieces of whomever or whatever dominant being evolves next on this rock in space.
link to robinmcalpine.org
Some previous attempted “quality” discourse btl on food self-sufficiency, which was basically jist a tragic comedy expo of why humanity is circling the pan.
link to wingsoverscotland.com
Yes Dan – humanity is off down the pan because we buy food from Spain rather than growing it in a greenhouse just off the Tay. You could always of course respond to the point I made telling me why I’m wrong?
I think a good exposition for prepping is shown in trainspotting, when renton is getting off the skag
link to youtube.com
note the importance of dead-tree old skool grumble mags when the internet is offline
I am sure the freemarket will provide ample shit-tainted food for inglund, just as the anglos like it.
– “just in time” logistics, thank God we invented that – corporate profit levels must be maintained.
Engerlund imports 44% of its food, so in dark times, we will end up with a lot less of them; its all for the best in the best of all possible freemarket worlds – its like mounjaro, without the expense
What seems to be missing from these conversations of seasonality of our foodstuffs which is grown locally and doesn’t need to be imported from sometimes half way round the world and is only fresh for only a short period after hitting the supermarket shelves.
of course there is no such thing as “equal partner in the union” – that’s the BULLSHIT THE ENGLISH TELL YOU to calm you down, make you think you are part of the gang, that this is what you wanted, it was democratic, legal and you can “leave any time you want”; consider Thatcher’s old quote about a majority of nationalist MPs at westminster being the trigger for indy (there was no chance of this happening at the time) – they soon walked that one back. You get repeatedly told indy is a matter for the people of Scotland, yet find there is no “legal mechanism” to achieve it.
union – is “bait and switch”. Of course at the time no one was fooled and the people were rioting. Everyone knew it was going to be a takeover, just old England with a bit of new branding.
So, once you say if I am not -that- then what am I really? It’s like being in a room – someone tells you its a nice hotel room, with all amenities, but then you realise it gets locked from the outside, and you don’t have the key. It’s a prison cell, actually, doesn’t matter what they say it is. Use the c-word, go on, do it, you will feel a lot better once you admit it.
Stop listening to what the english say (or their agents and proxies) – they are the world’s champion liars who invented the propaganda techniques Goebbels used – they will try to bamboozle you with their sophistry.
On the technical side, there is no way to fairly join 2 differently sized nations on a one man one vote basis; the americans knew this when they were making new states – but the new states, sparsely populated, did not want to be ruled from “back east”; so they created a second chamber full of senators and where low pop arizona gets the same as new york or california.
– if the union was created not as a simple con job, there would be a second chamber (not a Lords) consisting of 100 senators, 50 from Scotland, 50 from England, and being the upper chamber would have veto power over the lower. Thus the Scots could avoid the repeated shaftings we tend to get whenever the south east of england wants something.
What does all that matter, Confused, when we’re gonna be independent real soon now?
BTW, still waiting for you to confirm the date.
I know that despite your usual blustering, big talking, and confident posturing, you always go all coy and retiring when I ask to know. But seriously, like every other Scot, I have to make plans.
Sae, c’moan noo, Confused, spill them fucking beans.
Hotpot.
HOTPOT
ENGLISH HotpotTttt!
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Andy (duck n dive, never a straight answer) Burnham thinks we all ought to stock up on food and, in rain sodden Ukania, water as you never know when he might decide to start a wee war. In such a circumstance something stronger than water might be more beneficial.
Do they make dart boards imprinted with his smug image?
Wee bit of the auld, colonised, cringe there, TURABDIN.
Aren’t you thousands of miles away in a foreign country?
You no longer have to do what the UK PM says.
“he might decide to start a wee war”
Looking far more likely to me that somebody will decide to start a big war with us.
If you intend to argue, take it up with the leaders of Germany, Poland, the Baltic countries, the Nordic countries, and all the modernising countries in the Middle East, all of whom agree with me.
“You get repeatedly told indy is a matter for the people of Scotland, yet find there is no “legal mechanism” to achieve it.”
Erm… I’d call the legal mechanism a referendum. Like 2014. When it was precisely a matter for the people of Scotland to decide. The one where the people of Scotland voted to remain part of the UK.
Simples.
“I’d call the legal mechanism a referendum. Like 2014.”
That was an opinion poll using a local government franchise not a national franchise.
Yes and a local authority opinion poll where the franchise allowed non Scot – blow ins to vote with a circa 75% sentiment against independence.
Like Ulster the plantation of Scotland is a tried and tested policy.
A referendum is a national opinion poll.
You didn’t like the franchise – Alex Salmond, a very shrewd and astute political operator, was satisfied that it was valid and would have international credibility. I respect his opinion.
Which people living in Scotland and paying taxes here would you want to exclude from a vote on their own future?
“Which people living in Scotland and paying taxes here would you want to exclude from a vote on their own future?”
I can’t believe any regular reader on here could be so naive as to not already know the answer to that.
Anybody who would vote No, of course.
I can’t wait for the day that it dawns on English that they’re colonised by the yanks & everyones favourite Jennycidal maniac. They can’t take a pish without permission. Americas bitch. They hand over everything & do as they’re telt. From the judiciary, to defence & free real estate.
Westminster is just pantomime for the masses. Elections are just musical chairs to pretend there is democracy. There isn’t.
The real shit happens in secret, between corporations & banks who have an army of think-tanks to conjure up dastardly plans & policy. Politicians are just the doff capping serfs to say yes master. That’s why it’s always the same shit no matter what colour rosette they wear.
Little England doesn’t have a pot to piss in. Ass whipped by IMF & huge corporations. There is no “special relationship” that was just another English phrase to make themselves feel important. They’re not. They don’t even have a fucking army & they’re not a superpower. They’re a nobody.
Unfortunately the UN is fully institutionalised. Even they don’t have democracy. How many times has there been a majority vote been scuppered by the Yanks & their proxies – those bastions of the free world my ass!
Fact checker not checking their facts again. Scotland voted YES in it’s wee “open to all” pretendy opinion poll. It didn’t go unnoticed the English didn’t use the same pretendy franchise for fucking Brexshit. Go sit down & change yer name.
“They’re a nobody”
Yet somehow they’ve got Scotland crushed, oppressed, asset stripped, robbed blind, colonised and doun hauden.
It’s so difficult to reconcile these two “facts” that it takes somebody very special, a Geri, to do so.
Quite a few references to your donkey in your post, Geri. Hope you’ve not been mistreating him.
Get says “Fact checker not checking their facts again. Scotland voted YES in it’s wee “open to all” pretendy opinion poll. It didn’t go unnoticed the English didn’t use the same pretendy franchise for fucking Brexshit. Go sit down & change yer name.”
Sorry, Geri, Scotland voted ‘No”. That is the fact.
But I’ll humour you and invite you to define the franchise you would like to use in the future.
I’d regard you being polite to the readership as a bonus.
“The one where the people of Scotland voted to remain part of the UK.”
That’s the one where the Scottish people voted 53% Yes to an Independent Scotland.
Facts, eh?
Sure, Bob, you and a few hundred other Scots have your very own special set of facts.
It’s great that you come on here from time to time to remind the other five and a half million or so of us about that.
Pop back again just before Christmas. Otherwise we might forget!
The fact is that a majority of people living in Scotland and qualified to vote voted to stay in the UK.
How you define a Scot is a matter of opinion, not fact.
The 53% you quote is therefore a matter of opinion, not fact.
And how would the EU vote have gone if it had utilised the same open to all franchise used for the IndyRef, rather than it excluding EU Nationals?
Don’t go preaching about fair democracy in the UK and claim it is a unitary State when there are not consistant franchises or voting systems utlised across its constituent parts for the elections held within it.
And jist where the fuck is the English Parliament, instead of England hijacking the UK Parliament for itself…
“EU citizens cannot vote or stand as a candidate in UK Parliament elections.
The changes do not apply to:
Scottish Parliament and council elections in Scotland
Senedd and local council elections in Wales
All EU citizens are still eligible to vote in these elections.”
link to electoralcommission.org.uk
Slippery falsefact sassanach.
The legal mechanism for Brexshit happened AFTER the Brexshit referendum. It was a glorified opinion poll that did not have to be implemented. Even the one who wrote Article 50 said in parliament/the Lords it didn’t need to be implemented. It was well documented in parliament. Go read Hansard.
That’s why they came up with term Brexshit means Brexshit & left. ‘The will of the people’ No, the will of England & English blow-ins in Wales. It wasn’t a democratic vote. You removed EU citizens & migrants from the vote & allowed ex-pat Betty, living in Spain, a vote.
Democracy my ass! Filthy Colonisers always make the rules up as they go along & brainwash everyone to believe they’re the good guys. Piss off.
@Dan
Electoral franchises and constitutional matters are hardly my area of expertise, but surely it’s obvious that EU nationals living in the UK couldn’t expect to have had the vote in the Brexit referendum? I mean, just a slight conflict of interest, don’t you think?
Of course, this doesn’t mean their right to vote in other UK elections, e.g. the Scottish Independence Ref, can’t be questioned. In my opinion, if someone has been living, working and contributing to the tax pot in the UK for years and has a formal right to remain, then they should be able to vote. I don’t subscribe to the blood-based “indigenous Scot” argument (or English for that matter), I reckon it’s a right can of worms. As long as the eligibility bar is relatively high (e.g. you’ve not been here 5 minutes) and sensible. Hey, does this make me a sassenach “Franchise Fanny”® 😀
@ Geri says: 24 October, 2026 at 9:35 am
Way to go, Geri.
Always educational and informative to read a reminder of how much of Scottish Independence support is grounded on enthusiasm for majority rule from Brussels. The evidence supporting the “too wee, too poor, too thick” jibes delivered straight from Indy supporters themselves.
No doubt you harbour the intention of fucking off somewhere warm and sunny at the first opportunity, there to colonise some foreign cant’s country and use the fiscal advantage you spent your time here denying to outbid a local for a nice apartment with a sea view. For so many, that’s what the EU is all about – plus cheap flights and moby roaming charges.
But here’s the thing, Geri. Andeh is making noises about getting back in. So why don’t you throw your “considerable intellectual weight” behind him?
You could still post on here from the Costas. Even pretend you’re in Scotland.
“Don’t go preaching about fair democracy in the UK and claim it is a unitary State when there are not consistant franchises or voting systems utlised across its constituent parts for the elections held within it”
Two words.
Q Vanni Man Man.
Like every other Scot, Dan, you acquiesced to that abortion of democratic legitimacy.
Like every other Scot, you need to put your own house in order and then build from there.
Hard work, eh, Dan? Years of graft and thankless toil.
What about instead if you post some primary school insults before you head off to prepare your soup of the day?
In any event there is no democracy for a people who continue to be made subject to territorial alienation and its impacts, which means elections and/or referendums held under such circumstances irrelevant where neither alters territorial alienation.
link to youtube.com
You’re as thick as ever, shit face.
Brussels is run by the yanks & the IMF.
NATO is run by the yanks.
Policy comes from the IMF or it’s austerity max for you & removed/blocked from loans & investment.
Shows how much you know eh? There’s yer ‘EU army” – it already had one = NATO. With only ONE country holding a veto = America. It rules it’s proxies.
&The “Rules Fae Brussels” = IMF where the yanks also hold a veto & a yank will always sit at it’s head, dictating policy, laws & the judiciary. Why do you think Orban was ousted & blocked from payments? He wouldn’t comply.
You always had the wrong bogeyman. Yer out the EU. What did you “win”? Fuck all cause yer still ruled by the IMF & NATO will do as it’s telt. Yer a useful eejit. A proxy. That’s yer station.
Wait until the fun begins over Greenland. NATO eating NATO with the yanks holding the winning seat.
They weren’t qualified to vote.
They were blow-ins, seasonal workers & second home owners & every other waif & stray they could bus in. Those would be banished from the vote under decolonisation rules. Along with the foreign media & political parties from a foreign country, ie: Colonisers, with no legal standing. This is already enshrined in international law but it isn’t practiced because filthy Colonisers own the UN & it’s veto.
In a proper referendum – England would have fuck all say. Banished completely from the media & from any interference at all. None of them care you like to holiday here inter spare time.
Thankfully – colonialism is over. The UN will be forced to reform or start again completely from scratch. The days of Empire are over & so is the world currency.
Hey, Mr Misnomer…
Just for you:
link to dailyrecord.co.uk
“Thankfully – colonialism is over”
Ah, c’moan noo, Geri, ye ken that’s a fib.
The coloniser in the east, the target of your unrequited urge to carry his love child, poot, is only 20% of the way into his next colony.
It’s not credible for you to claim you never noticed.
See Shit face, there exists this little thing called international treaties. Those treaties carry international clout. They’re, supposedly, upheld by all parties & rubber stamped at the United Nations. Break them at yer pearl.
The along comes filthy colonisers. Terrorising & persecuting the R neighbourhood. Setting up shop. Brandishing all sorts of new fangled American weapons & wondering just where to park the nukes as they erect 47 bio labs & park intel all along the border.
A strongly worded letter was issued. Cease & desist. Here’s FIVE peace agreements. Filthy Colonisers doubled down. Another strongly worded letter was issued, basically saying, ye ken, if you keep mincing up tae us we’ll just have tae keep expanding our buffer zone, ken? Filthy Colonisers just keep on doubling down. They’re unbothered. It’s not them being killed. Foreigners, that have no business there, have completely destroyed U but they don’t care. They’re only interested in what’s under the soil. Fck the ppl living there. No one wants U. It’s full of Nazis & corrupt as fuck. It’s ungovernable.
Now we all know the Britnats word isn’t worth a shit. Perfidious Albion is well recorded in history for being devious bastards & their holier than thou country cousins are just as demonic. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. They both ripped up not only Minsk but Us very own constitution & Independence before the ink was even dry on the ballot. I know it must be alien to you but other countries take their commitments & treaties very seriously & follow the rules of international law. R speaking regions had promised protection under Minsk 1&2 & like it or not, P was duty bound to honour them. They voted for autonomy & those treaties came with protections. Whether you believe those elections were legit or not is beside the point & fuck all to do with the wannabe world police. The Brits really do think everyone is as poisonous as they are. I know who has offered to hold them again under full UN oversight & who hasn’t accepted that offer tho. I can’t think why!
Moral of the story – fuck off out of a country that doesn’t concern little Englanders & don’t keep breaking international laws & treaties then cry like a fucking baby when it all goes tits up. That includes all the wars you start around the globe. You’re fooling no one. We know who the colonisers are. They really are the scum of the earth & personally responsible for killing millions world wide.
Whoops, Geri! Ye’ve dropped 10 biolabs there.
One of the many problems with making stuff up. You lose track.
“No one wants U”
Not even the one behind the invasion and bloody war? Maybe it’s gonna fall to you to tell him, eh?
“personally responsible for killing millions world wide”
Odd, isn’t it? Under the standard definition of ‘personal responsibility’ that would mean millions of people are being killed by individuals. Inherently unlikely. It would just take a few of the millions to fight back and it would stop.
“all the wars you start around the globe”
Wheesht, Geri. I’m shitting myself somebody might just perform a citizen’s arrest and put an end to my reign of terror.
During March 2022 Senate testimony, U.S. Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland stated that U possessed biological research facilities and that U.S. officials were working with U to prevent research materials from falling into R hands.
Key Facts and Context
The Testimony: On March 7, 2022, during a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing with Sen. Marco Rubio, Nuland was asked if U had chemical or biological weapons. She replied that U had biological research facilities and expressed concern that R forces might seek to control them.
Nuland and U.S. officials clarified that these facilities were civilian-focused public health and research laboratories— supported in part by the U.S. Department of Defense’s Biological Threat Reduction Program—aimed at pathogen safety and disease prevention, not biological weapons manufacturing.
First of all – what business is these facilities to the USA? None. The world already has mechanisms & treaties at the UN to investigate & assist in disposal & management of bio weapons.
Nuland, who spooking reminds me of the evil Nanny from the Omen with that glaikit satanic glare she has – has given countless interviews on the subject. Freely available on the web. She usually starts frothing at the senate with her begging bowl to send more $billions to Z so he can stop whatever shit they have cooking there falling into enemy hands.
The British terrorist regime also assassinated the lead author of the report logged at the UN.
What strange methods to go to over something that supposedly doesn’t exist eh?
Jeez, you really are a gullible eejit.
“reminds me of the evil Nanny from the Omen with that glaikit satanic glare she has”
Ah, the wondrous wittering of somebody who can’t disentangle fiction from reality.
“send more $billions to Z so he can stop whatever shit they have cooking there falling into enemy hands”
Odd, I’m sure Pickfords could shift the lot over a weekend for no more than a few tens of thousands.
Even odder that you should be so exercised about “pathogen safety and disease prevention” technology falling into the hands of the Orcs. Maybe the people at the sharp end have simply twigged that if the Orcs get their hands on the counter measures, then they’ll re-engineer their bio-weapons to render the counter measures useless.
It’s not as if the Orcs don’t have previous form when it comes to deploying bio-weapons. Ask the people of Salisbury.
Good deflection from your earlier claim about the 47 biolabs along the border. As that would be the border prior to the invasion, quite a few of these (20% ?) will now be in the hands of the invaders. For your next effort, why not tell us how many the Orcs have overrun, and what they found there.
Mind now, if you can’t find anything, just make something up.
WHAT AN AI GEN ASSISTANT has to say on the matter of referendums.
Reliability of Referendums
Referendums are often viewed as a democratic tool that allows citizens to engage directly in decision-making. However, their reliability can be contentious due to several factors.
Factors Affecting Reliability
Misinformation:
Campaigns may spread false information, leading voters to make decisions based on inaccurate beliefs.
Oversimplification:
Complex issues are often reduced to simple yes/no questions, which can misrepresent the nuances involved.
Public Engagement:
The level of voter turnout and engagement can significantly influence the outcome, potentially skewing results.
Campaign Strategies:
The effectiveness of campaign messaging can sway public opinion, impacting the perceived legitimacy of the vote.
Implications of Outcomes
Voter Disenfranchisement:
Some citizens may feel disconnected from the political process, making them more susceptible to manipulation during campaigns.
Turnout Issues:
Referendums often experience lower turnout compared to general elections, which can result in outcomes that do not accurately reflect the broader public opinion.
Conclusion
While referendums can enhance democratic participation, their reliability is often compromised by misinformation, oversimplification, and varying levels of public engagement. Therefore, careful consideration is necessary when using referendums as a decision-making tool.
Agreed.
But most of the same reservations apply to actual elections. The turnout for the Referendum was higher than for most elections, and thus arguably a better indicaorof opinion.
It’s all very well pointing out the obvious (in TURABDIN’s case) that “referenda have their limitations”. Like, no shit Sherlock, we here in the UK know that a lot better than most after Brexit…
If it is agreed that referenda are indeed imperfect and vulnerable to being skewed by misinformation, what are the (demonstrably better) alternative(s) supposed to be, and why? Answers on a postcard etc.
In a democracy, TURBADIN, the people should (and must) be consulted where huge decisions such as leaving the EU are required to be made. We’ve been doing it a long time here in Blighty, check out the Equal Franchise Act of 1928 on your sixth form common room computer. 🙂
Referenda & elections are only as good as the data fed into them, rather like AI training.
Corrupted or biased data, in particular that based on emotional conjecture, supposition & fear inducing threatening ( you’ll regret it and you will pay the price) rhetoric, ref.Osborne re use of the £.
In a democracy lying and underhand activities are part of the political fabric ergo, caveat emptor. The political class as the economic system seems content with that and yet they may exclaim «trust us».
>yuck.
@Alf Baird says: 24 October, 2026 at 12:05 am
“That was an opinion poll using a local government franchise not a national franchise”
Noted, Alf. Thanks for correcting the historical record.
So what’s the correct term to describe a handful of chancers with no franchise posturing in kilts at the UN?
“diversity stress: a kind of constant, low-grade anxiety associated with having to negotiate normative and linguistic differences, public-resource competition, and simple unfamiliarity. It challenges people’s expectation of order and familiarity”
A definition taken from this discussion of the turmoil in France and in the USA:
link to unherd.com
What has this to do with Scotland, I hear somebody ask.
Scotland is a colony of the USA, culturally, linguistically and through ties of blood. At one time, it could be fairly argued that parts of the US were colonies of Scotland. Millions of Scots still have US relatives, and vice versa. But nowadays, with the power and influence roles reversed, we Scots consume American culture, fashion, food and attitudes.
France is our old ally from back in the days when Scots were a martial people. France is also the source of many of our potential New Scots who will flee in this direction if law and order, along with the economy, really do break down there.
“Diversity stress” is, I believe, already the norm for the online world. Increasingly it is becoming the norm in our real world too.
Geri says
” It wasn’t a democratic vote. You removed EU citizens & migrants from the vote … Democracy my ass! Filthy Colonisers always make the rules up as they go along & brainwash everyone to believe they’re the good guys. Piss off.”
Discuss this with robertknight and Dan above, who apparently want to remove the vote from anybody they don’t consider to be true ‘Scots’, whatever that means. Presumably they are Filthy Colonisers as well?
@ “factchecker”
You can go fuck yourself with that assertion ya word twisting twat.
There’s plenty evidence posted btl over many years by me during the
Franchise Wars” Badger that I am not a blood and soil type if you actually bothered to check yer facts.I do however think some kind of restriction on voting rights along the long lines of what CC has stated are sensible.
I note site prick Main brings up QVancampermanvan or whatever its called in another post and how folk other than him for some reason should own that.
Hatey Main is another that tries desparately to twist things, and again if he bothered to absorb what I have said btl on that matter he might grasp why some kind of franchise restrictions were being suggested by some folks.
But trolls and even this site owner attempted to tar and denigrate those that wanted to properly discuss and close the loopholes that allowed such antics of blow-ins voting and even getting into our “Scottish” parliament to govern over us when they didn’t even have a suitable visa.
“Dan says:
24 October, 2026 at 11:02 am
@ “factchecker”
You can go fuck yourself with that assertion ya word twisting twat.”
Thanks for the kind and polite words, Dan. That’s the way to formulate an argument.
I haven’t had the pleasure of reading your posts ‘over many years’. Apologies if I misrepresented your views. I agree some restrictions are appropriate. But when I see people talking, as you do, about ‘blow ins’, I start to worry. How do you define that? What franchise would you approve? I asked Geri the same question, but no reply…
As you say, proper discussion is required. And I am unable to fuck myself.
Dan,
It’s pure projection on their part. It always is.
They’re hard wired racists. If “foreigners” were allowed a vote on their shit (which they aren’t) they’d have an absolute fit.
They replace their blood & soil shit with “patriotism” They’re not rabid racists, no sireee!
Different rules you see. Scotland should just be thankful it had a glorified opinion poll. Only Brexshit was legit even though it excluded half the population & allowed it’s own citizens living elsewhere a vote.
These ppl are nuts. Full of contradiction & full of shit. These are the same ppl who love a Jenny & pouring in foreign cettlers to another part of the world – but lose their shit when a dinghy is on the horizon in good old blighty.
They’re demonic. Their shit doesn’t stink.
fc says:
“Thanks for the kind and polite words, Dan. That’s the way to formulate an argument.”
Nae bother, treat it as a lesson in that if you post shite about somebody, then you can expect that to provoke a reaction and get robustly called out and corrected on it.
“I haven’t had the pleasure of reading your posts ‘over many years’. Apologies if I misrepresented your views.”
So not much factchecking going on before you started bumping yer gums then…
“I agree some restrictions are appropriate. But when I see people talking, as you do, about ‘blow ins’, I start to worry. How do you define that? What franchise would you approve?”
Go do some factchecking research back through btl archives and get yerself up the curve then.
I’m not wasting my time with an eejit that can’t be arsed doing any homework of their own and lazily asking me to repeat typing out the same thing over and over again.
“the same ppl who love a Jenny”
I think I get what you’re on about there, Geri. You’re insisting that the rest of the world accepts the new definition it suits you and a few like-minded anti-semites to assign to the word “genocide”.
Goannay nae dae that, Geri.
How?
Cos the ulterior motive of the anti-semites is crystal clear.
The Jews are always the canaries in the coal mine. Once the pogroms start, they’re always first up. But never, ever, are they the last.
15 year + is the acceptable measure by our colonising overlords.
Personally I’d make it much more because they’ve already flooded Scotland with blow-ins from 2014 & those 15+ years are already kaput. How handy was that eh? incase indyref2 happened & the colonisers clock runs out.
Born and raised here makes you a Scot.
Fruit pickers, retired pensioners & English property developers does not make a Scot. Neither do refugees & EU citizens who already have a homeland they can fuck off back to if they want asked questions/ make changes to their own constitution.
Englanders already have a motherland. Fuck off back to the ship & take yer Micky mouse franchise with you. Implement it on yer own consition. Why don’t you? Cause colonialism is fascism.
Geri, I note the impeccable logic of your position.
When it refers to England:
“They’re hard wired racists. If “foreigners” were allowed a vote on their shit (which they aren’t) they’d have an absolute fit.”
When it refers to Scotland
“Fruit pickers, retired pensioners & English property developers does not make a Scot. Neither do refugees & EU citizens who already have a homeland they can fuck off back to if they want asked questions/ make changes to their own constitution.”
Remarkable self-awareness.
I previously asked you for a coherent statement of which Scottish residents you would exclude a vote on their own future. I’m still interested. I did say a polite one would be preferable. Maybe that’s the problem?
Our learned professor of boats says
24 October, 2026 at 10:08 am
“In any event there is no democracy for a people who continue to be made subject to territorial alienation and its impacts, which means elections and/or referendums held under such circumstances irrelevant where neither alters territorial alienation.”
So, professor, democratic votes taken in this country are not really democratic or meaningful until we agree with your opinions about colonisation.
Fair enough.
Our learned misnomer talks about democracy. LOL.
If all were fair, equal, democratic and meaningful, then EU Citizens, in addition to those of the Republic of Ireland, who were resident in the UK would’ve had a vote in the Brexit referendum.
But guess what???
“But guess what???”
Hmmm, let’s see.
I guess that EU Citizens, in addition to those of the Republic of Ireland, weren’t allowed a Brexit vote, as is entirely right.
I guess you’re still greeting about that, as you believe it caused the result to go the “wrong” way. I mean, why would you mention it otherwise?
I guess that like so many self-identifying Scottish Indy supporters, you still yearn for Scotland to be governed from Brussels. Still in that sweet spot where grown ups get to make all the hard calls, and online posters get to greet and gurn interminably about them.
How am I doing, Bob? I guess I got full marks.
“Ex Injuria Jus Non Oritur” -Illegitimacy cannot create legitimacy.
A wrongful act cannot become a lawful one through time alone.
Precisely the same legal maxim applies to democracy; thieves cannot legitimise a theft by outvoting the victims.
Wheesht, Xaracen!
Dinna tell the Picts we Scots stole most of the country from.
Got to say, it does seem passing strange that you should be unaware that when it comes to real estate ownership, legitimacy is ultimately conferred through extreme violence.
You need to get out more, study history more, talk to the millions of people, even in the first world democracies of Europe, whose parents and grandparents were ethnically cleansed from the countries of their birth after 1945.
After you’ve done that, a few visits to the New World and the Antipodes would do wonders for your education.
The idea that inward migrants automatically vote No is one of the easiest fear-buttons to press, but it doesn’t survive contact with reality. People who move to Scotland aren’t a single voting bloc and they don’t behave like one. Many came here for a better life — which already makes them exactly the kind of voters who can be persuaded by a forward-looking independence case.
If independence is framed as a civic upgrade that improves governance, accountability and long-term prospects, it persuades everyone who lives and works here. That includes Scottish-born Scots and the people who chose Scotland as their home. Modern independence movements win with civic arguments, not ethnic ones.
And if independence were uppermost in the minds of Scottish-born voters alone, Yes would already be far higher than 45%. The issue isn’t identity — it’s persuasion.
A credible plan for Scotland’s future will win support across the whole population. A fear-based narrative about “demographic threat” won’t.
Independence should be a choice about Scotland’s future, not a test of who counts as “real Scots”.
2014 Referendum Study Demographics
Birth place:
oUK: 57.1% No, 42.9% Yes
rUK: 72.1% No, 27.9% Yes
SCO: 47.3% No, 52.7% Yes
Posted without comment…
Religion:
CofE: 80.6% No, 19.4% Yes
How odd, Bob.
My benchmark 30 seconds of internet research, which any eejit can repeat for herself, reveals that in 2014, followers of the Religion of Peace already outnumbered members of the Church Of England in Scotland by something like 2 to 1.
Yet you haven’t bothered with their numbers.
When it comes to the Religion of Peace, their numbers are increasing at what some might call flood speed. That is, after all, their MO. Again, easily confirmed through internet research, or just by observing the tea towel wearing, Arabic chanters on our streets.
In comparison, Church of England members, and indeed Episcopalians, are slowly dying out.
It would defo be fascinating to discover what role followers of the Religion of Peace plan for Scotland. They’ve already had a shot at FM, which is something none of the English variants of Christianity have managed, or are ever likely to.
I guess we will just have to observe how they continue to warp the governance and policies of England into evermore hostile and disadvantageous positions against the indigenous to see what lies in wait for us.
RUPERT LOWE is out-faraging the farage – farage will deport them all, but lowe will now deport the “second generation” migrants, so being “born here” now means fuck-all, as it should.
link to youtube.com
– there were also these daft rules, highly exploited, whereby if I come over on a student visa, my entire family can come too – to help me with my homework; then your sis gets knocked up while she is here – that is now a “Scot”. Anchor babies, chain migration – its a buy one get N free, in the worst way possible.
in many ways the 2nd/3rd gen are the real problem; their parents came in, likely a bit grateful (e.g. to be away from idi amin) and played the game. Their kids grew up without an identity, not knowing who they were; they know in their bones they aren’t french/german/swedish/english etc (and the pantone colour chart won’t let them fake it) – it is crushing to “not belong” to a place you were born into and have spent all your life. Your parents taught you the mother tongue, but you don’t speak it great and with an odd accent; one time your parents took you to your “homeland” and the locals did not accept you either – they called you a brit, thought you must be “rich” and tried to get money off you … when you told them to fuck off (badly, in urdu) they told you to “go back to where you came from … ”
– this makes you pissed off – enter radical islam and jihadist websites …
nigeria once booted out a load of ghanaians
link to youtube.com
– “but they all look the same to me …”
there have been anti nigerian – foreigners go home – riots in SA
in fact, the entire problem of africa is that it suffers the yoke of multiculturalism; the real nations are the tribes and the country boundaries reflect nothing of this. But there was no appetite to redraw boundaries after what happened in india in 47.
the pakistanis also booted out a load of afghans
– there’s a lot of it about and merely saying “dont be raciss … wir aw jock etc ” – doesn’t cut it
only idiots let foreigners vote in their elections, and only the insane would allow their enemies a de-facto veto in constitutional matters (all elections are about the swing voter)
Anglos vote 80:20 for the union.
– we need a “Rupert McLowe” to sort these shits out.
Meanwhile from BBC-Scotchland-OckAYETHENOO series “Landward” we have Dougie Vipond interviewing some fragrant english dude who is telling us about how he is rewilding his highland estate. Dougie tugs the forelock saying “gaffer, wid ye like a go at my sister an all … ”
Pol McPot, we need you in our hour of torment.
That rewinding prick should be forced onto the first bus out of here. Why isn’t he? He’ll be receiving government funding no doubt & will be rewilding so he & his gentry chuffs can come up here & fucking shoot them under the guise of land management & helping us poor, lowly peasants from becoming a scrubland – cause, ya know, we don’t know how to cut a fucking hedge & manage our own land.
“the real nations are the tribes and the country boundaries reflect nothing of this”
Check out the big brain on Confused!
Living proof that if you piss on here often enough, one day you will indeed get some of it in the urinal.
Of course, the application of his analogy to the white tribes uneasily co-existing within the geographical boundaries we call Scotland goes right over his head.
Like the pith helmeted, shirt lifting (according to Confused) empire builders of old, Confused draws his borders, calls the enclosed area Scotland, and believes the tribes locked within will henceforth dwell in blissful harmony and unity until the end of time.
Despite their different languages, religions, cultures, and historical affiliations. I’m talking, of course, about the people who were here (the white Scots) prior to the latest craze for flooding Scotland with even more languages, religions, cultures, and historical affiliations.
Across the world, when territories recognised by the UN as non-self-governing (NSGTs) have voted on independence, the results follow a very clear pattern.
These referendums are not close-run affairs. They are usually overwhelming expressions of national liberation, often 80-90% in favour.
Recent examples:
– Bougainville (2019) — 98.3% for independence
– East Timor (1999) — 78.5% for independence
– Comoros (1974) — 94.6% for independence
– Algeria (1962) — 99.7% for independence
– Eritrea (1993) — 99.8% for independence
The only partial exception is New Caledonia, which voted:
– 43.3% for independence in 2018
– 46.7% for independence in 2020
– 3.5% in 2021 (a vote boycotted by the Kanak independence movement)
New Caledonia’s lower figure reflects very specific circumstances: a long-running power-sharing agreement, decades of inward migration altering the demographic balance and a formally recognised boycott in 2021.
The general pattern remains clear: colonised territories vote like colonised territories — with overwhelming pro-independence majorities.
Scotland’s 2014 result (45% Yes, 55% No) fits the pattern of an internally self-determining country, not a UN-listed colonial dependency.
Some argue that Scotland’s result reflects demographic change. But Scots still considerably outnumber non-Scots. If independence were uppermost in the minds of Scottish-born voters, the Yes vote would already be dramatically higher. Because:
– Scottish-born Scots are ~80% of the population
– Scottish-only identity is ~65%
– Scottish-born voters lean Yes
– Scottish-only voters lean strongly Yes
If Scotland were behaving like a colonised territory, the Yes vote would be: 70-90%, not 45%.
Arguments framing Scotland as a colony don’t persuade Scots — mainly because Scots don’t think of themselves as colonised. A modern independence case has to persuade people (Scottish-born and those who chose Scotland as their home) that independence will improve their future.
Most people in Scotland don’t care about ancient treaties or events from three hundred years ago. They care about whether independence will make their lives better in the years ahead — and right now, they aren’t convinced it will.
The anti-independence vote in “Scotland’s 2014 result” reflects the fact that a colonial society comprises:
– culturally assimilated natives, and;
– a large colonial settler population.
Both groups exist as a consequence of colonialism.
You might read this?
link to justiceactionmaribyrnong.com
Or this?
link to tandfonline.com
“ABSTRACT
Scholarly disagreements over the applicability of a colonial framework to Ireland’s relationship with Britain have neglected how political actors perceived or used ideas about colonialism and imperialism. This article argues that how such ideas resonated and were used in the Northern Ireland ‘Troubles’ is as worthy of consideration as their validity. It examines how militant republicans conceived of Northern Ireland as having a colonial status and identified it as fitting into a broader pattern of decolonisation, seeking links with other anti-colonial forces outside Europe. It considers how a section of British politicians used the colonial framework to argue that British withdrawal was inevitable, viewing unionists as a settler community beyond the boundaries of Britishness. The dominant British discourse that opposed this framed self-determination differently, rejecting the utility of colonialism as an explanation of the dynamic of the conflict. When faced with charges of colonialism abroad, however, the rebuttal offered by those articulating this discourse had to be tailored to a suspicious international audience; the arguments available to British diplomats were narrowed by Britain’s colonial past. To overcome this, the unionist cause was omitted and select Irish voices within constitutional nationalism were promoted. Colonial analogies and comparisons shaped overall thinking on Northern Ireland, whether they were valid or not.”
I absolutely agree, Northcode, that we need to make a powerful case for independence across the board, but, after an election that gives us a majority, any confirmatory referendum should involve only born-Scots and those here with at least ten years’ uninterrupted residency.
The thing is that old treaties will matter substantially when it comes to the negotiating stage and people really need to understand at least some of the constitution. There is no way round the Treaty at the end of the day, and people need to comprehend that independence will come about because a majority can see that the Union has outlived any usefulness it ever had. Lies about everyone receiving X amount of extra whatever currency will not do the trick.
Scotland is no longer well-served by the Union, if, indeed, it ever was. That should be plain to anyone, but many Unionists are afraid to let go because they are, essentially, short-termists who are unwilling to see the longer-term benefits and advantages and to take the risk.
A forward-looking, inclusive case for independence can only persuade if it feels real. That means it must be grounded in institutions, economics, governance and practical detail — not slogans, not grievance, and not historical metaphors.
Modern electorates don’t respond to emotional narratives alone. They respond to believable plans.
The “Scotland is a colony” argument fails because it offers emotion without architecture. It explains frustration but not the future. It can’t describe what independence would build, only what it rejects. That’s why it persuades almost no undecided voters. It is a grievance frame, not a governance frame.
A civic-upgrade argument is the opposite. It treats independence as a democratic improvement — a chance to design institutions that fit Scotland’s needs, strengthen accountability, modernise governance and give people more control over their future.
But this argument only works if it is backed by real substance: clear economic modelling, constitutional pathways, regulatory frameworks, international positioning, and a believable transition plan.
People won’t choose independence because it sounds inspiring. They’ll choose it because it looks workable.
Scottish-born Scots and inward migrants alike need to see that independence is not a leap into the unknown, but a carefully designed upgrade to how Scotland is governed. They need to see that the institutions will function, the economy will stabilise, and the transition will be orderly. Without that, even the most inclusive argument becomes just words.
Independence will only succeed when it feels like a plan, not a protest.
Do they really? So a slogan on a bus & parroting ‘take back control ‘ didn’t work for Brexshit? Who knew!
Brexshit didn’t even have a plan either. So that kinda blows that theory eh?
‘They need to see that the institutions will function, the economy will stabilise, and the transition will be orderly.’
In effect what you’re saying is you can’t go swimming until you can swim…
“you can’t go swimming until you can swim”
Let’s see now. That thing you’re doing when you’re out of your depth in the water and you can’t swim isn’t actually swimming.
It may be floating, if you’re getting some help.
Otherwise, it’s drowning.
As Northy says, the “Scotland is a colony” argument fails for many reasons. Quite the most damning one is that we can all point at former colonies for which Independence has been an unmitigated disaster.
We find the ex-citizens of these former colonies, now independent shitholes, walking, swimming and paddling across the borders of most European and Northern American countries, so desperate they are to get away.
Interesting… #Ohm’sLaw content.
Noticed that Norway is currently exporting 1.45GW to UK, but UK is currently exporting 1.35GW to Denmark.
The small interconnect gauges can be viewed in the 2nd row down from top right of page.
link to gridwatch.templar.co.uk
Bit of a long way to go for a shortcut, but guess market forces are in play. So a wee search found some info on Norway / Denmark interconnects
link to en.wikipedia.org
It seems There is an issue with the Skagerrak 2 cable so it’s offline, but that would only transmit .25GW anyway.
But I also read that there is actually opposition to renewing interconnects between the two countries.
“Political Controversy and Future Outlook
Renewal Opposition: Norway’s ruling Labour Party and Centre Party, alongside the Progress Party and local officials in southern Norway (price area NO2), strongly oppose renewing or replacing the aging Skagerrak 1 and 2 cables.
Price Concerns: Norwegian politicians and local leaders argue that power interconnectors drive up domestic electricity prices in southern Norway by exporting cheap hydro power to neighboring markets.“
Having made the bulk of the transition to renewables (which I believe Norway has), it’s foolhardy to pull up the interconnector drawbridge, especially in an era of growing climate and political upheaval.
Hydro power reservoirs can be depleted by prolonged drought.
Wind generation near stops under stable high pressure weather systems.
Solar is curtailed in darkness (natch) and under overcast skies.
It’s a foolish country that decides it’s self sufficient in renewables and therefore doesn’t need help from any other country. In fact, the uncertainties around renewables mandate backup provision from geographically distant locations.
I’ve noticed that some on here like to claim that Scotland’s “self sufficiency” in wind means we should all be enjoying cheap or free leccy. Of course, given the need for any government to raise revenues to splurge on benefits and freebies, that would be a gross dereliction of duty. And lead, inexorably, to mahoosive waste and profligacy.
For Scotland, the correct course of action would be to sell any surplus for whatever the market could bring. That money would be needed to buy in power when our own generation faltered. It would be us paying market prices then.
The same arguments apply to the Norwegians. They will have to get real soon enough.
Sigh. Is it too much to ask for our aspiring politicians to take an IQ test? No need to raise the bar too high – we don’t need rocket scientists, but we do need our leaders to have at least some grey matter between their ears.
Mind you, some bright politician would probably pipe up:
“What’s an IQ test, is it some sort of Scottish Charity?”
I kid you not.
Scotland democratic vote for a referendum to leave the UK,
There is no democratic way or mechanism, Hatey is correct,
and North Code is excellent with apparent expert gobbledy gook on the legal process and restrictions that apply to Scotland, making Scotland a prison with bars.
The reason that here is no mechanism for Scotland to be independent from Westminster fabricated story line is that Scotland never voted or was never asked in any referendum to join the treaty of union,
This piece of information is omitted in North Codes version,
However it is a Boast on the Westminster parliament site,
[ That the Scots were not given a vote to join the Union as they would probably vote NO ]
The old parliament of Scotland dissolved and obsolete days before any parliamentary union between two Countries could officially create the parliament of Great Britain start date.
The Scots not in the treaty of Union with Westminsters England parliament due to NOT being required to join as they would in all likely hood have voted No.
Westminster parliament has published a Story Book, about a treaty of union that never happened, that the Scots need a democratic vote to leave the UK they never joined.
Scotlands prison without bars is just a story book that Westminster parliament made up to impress other Countries and officials at how mighty they were or are today,
They had to lie and deceive many Countries and officials Then, and today to maintain book Sales of how mighty the LYE of Great Britain was and is today.
If the Treaty for and with the kingdom of Scotland and its parliament and its people was ever discovered to be nought but a fairy tale book, by the UN or by the law on treaties then the Anglo – Irish parliament and annexed Wales would collapse.
There is no requirement for Scotland or the Scots to need a vote on leaving the rest of UK or Great Britain parliament it seriously avoided joining in the first instance,
And any other official body outside of Scotland or England for that matter would have to believe in a fairy tales books published in Westminster that have and hold a befuddled story line, .. similar to North Code, when he thinks that leaving a fabricated and hoax treaty must also have a befuddled set of fabricated rules for Scotland to become independent,
Scotland is independent, it was never initially captured into Englands created Westminster parliament for England and Wales Great Britain
And Westminster have a mighty State and power to lose on the world of politics stages should the real story ever come out into the public domain,
“Scotland is independent”
Great news, James.
What do you intend to do with your life now?
Does Scotland need a referendum to leave the rUK. If it is not legally in the rUK since the 28th April 1606.?.
For those whom are slightly late to historical and linear times and dates who think that Scotland had members of the Scottish parliament enter the new Great Britain parliament in 1707.
Let me make this point,
The Scottish parliament was dissolved on the 28th April 1606 from and in England by the Monarch of England by public Declaration.
So no legal or official members of a Scottish parliament existed in 1707.
“Does Scotland need a referendum to leave the rUK. If it is not legally in the rUK”
Yes James, the treaty was never implemented hence there is no ‘United Kingdom’, Scotland was annexed; the only remedy is recovery of sovereignty, not pleading for another dubious opinion poll run by the colonizer.
link to youtube.com
“there is no ‘United Kingdom’”
A recurring advert on TV has a comely young lady, the daughter of an Italian cafe owner, fixing a pizza oven with her mobile phone.
I find it a risible manifestation of the detachment from reality of the terminally online. Such a widespread world view these days among so many people, that advertisers can hijack it to sell us more stuff.
Seems to me, Alf, you’ll believe it’s gospel truth.
After all, if you intend to deny the reality of the country you live in, why allow reality to impinge on you at all?
“to deny the reality of the country you live in”
Which is essentially the intended effect of a colonial mindset, Hatey.
The unveiled reality enabling the colonized mind to recover is a clear picture of a Scotland annexed and a dominant England ‘rebranded as UK’; meantime within the colonized mind still lies the illusion of ‘union’ and its essential manufactured ‘British’ identity.
In time you will hopefully recover.
Good grief, it’s just relentless.
Truly, it doesn’t matter how many times Alf is shot to ribbons, up he pops next day with precisely the same old lines, no different. Utterly impervious to all reason, evidence or debate; he might as well be talking to himself in an empty room. (Which, metaphorically speaking, he largely is, of course).
It’s the sheer indefatigability and lack of self-awareness that shocks you.
I would rather read Alf posts than the sassenach yoons deliberate deflections and crap.
Keep on posting Alf, it rattles their cages no end.
“It’s the sheer indefatigability and lack of self-awareness that shocks you”
It’s of fascinating academic interest, certainly.
I’m of the opinion that outsiders might want to analyse to what extent Scotland’s inability to free itself from the morass it’s trapped in is predicated by defects in the national psyche. I mean, even if Alf’s premise is completely true, other nations have no issues throwing off the “colonialist yoke”.
Yet Scotland supposedly has.
As I’ve said to Alf before, fine, Scotland’s a colony, we’re all colonised, we happily and readily accept you’ve got the situation bang to rights.
What comes next?
Tumble weed, along with some kind of tautology that decolonisation means decolonisation.
Still, as AH says, the cages of the sassenach yoons must be near rattled to pieces by now.
Perhaps, if there are defects in the national psyche, that’s all that really matters.
Alf Baird is claiming exclusive access to “reality”.
He writes: “The unveiled reality enabling the colonized mind to recover…”
This is classic authoritarian framing:
– “I see reality.”
– “You are deluded.”
– “Your disagreement proves your delusion.”
– “Only my worldview is real.”
This is not analysis – it’s epistemic dominance.
It’s the same structure used in conspiracy movements, ideological cults, purity politics, and grievance nationalism.
It is not democratic.
It is not persuasive.
It is not credible.
He then implies that Scots who disagree with his “Scotland is colonised” argument are mentally impaired.
He writes: “In time you will hopefully recover.”
This isn’t metaphor – it’s literal pathologisation.
He is saying:
– “You are sick.”
– “Your disagreement is illness.”
– “Your identity is damaged.”
– “Your mind is colonised.”
– “You need psychological recovery.”
This is profoundly anti-social rhetoric. It’s also anti-democratic, because it removes the electorate from the equation: If disagreement = illness, then only the “healthy” (i.e. those who agree with Alf) are legitimate.
That is authoritarian logic.
“This isn’t metaphor – it’s literal pathologisation”
Good post, Northy. Alf’s attitude is straight out of the Bolshevik handbook as interpreted by Stalin.
Maybe he’s been taking lessons from Mr Lavrov.
On the contrary, “authoritarian logic” as you call it by implication emanates from oppressive state entities and its mouthpieces (i.e. you Northcode), not from individuals/radicals seeking to end a colonial status quo through liberation of a people.
So Northcode, were does the likes of Plato and his Allegory of the Cave fit in with your junk and rather one-sided assessment of a person’s perceived reality.
Have you ever questioned the nature of your reality?
Is all that we see or seem but a dream within a dream?
More interesting and influencing folk have pondered stuff like this long before your recent screeds btl on a dying site, suffocated by distraction along with the lack of any coherent long term strategy capable of unifying the cause of returning Scotland to self-governing status.
Scots are like mushrooms, kept in the dark and fed shite through the channels and organs of the the UK State.
All major powers such as broadcasting, energy, and immigration are reserved to London Rule.
The internet in general with the likes of Shitter and Facebook, and suggested read prompts on the likes of Chrome or Firefox browser pages is mainly just a load of divisive distractive low brow piss that dumbs folk down, but unfortunately it still plays far too significant a part in influencing folk.
It’s ADHD-like emotion stimulating of the moment and little to no bigger picture critical thinking getting done in communities and wider society these days.
So many folk have jist become passengers in life sitting on their arses doom-scrolling instead of getting themselves properly informed and up the curve on the matters that apparently bother them so much.
I’ve got a few acquaintances that just continually send me links to Arsebook junk about immigration. It consumes them and they rarely if ever message me about anything else. What a fucked up empty life for that to be such a dominant focus of so much of their limited time on this planet. Even though they have been told, they still don’t know the first thing about where the power lies, or the electoral voting systems. The latter I can understand because it is a load of utter shite.
Seriously, where would a decent person even begin to consider standing for office in the current Scottish setup?
Local Authority can basically do fuck all as funding is so limited through manufactured austerity and riven with Party politics.
Poundshop Parliament in Auld Reekie is a joke as all major powers are reserved to London Rule.
Going to Westminster for a term is rather pointless because Scotland gets outvoted by about ten to one by the much larger Kingdom of England’s political representation.
And remember that England doesn’t have its own devolved parliament so fewer decent politicians required from their society and a much simplified route to gaining influence and power.
Keep up your efforts Alf, you’ve done more out in the real world to try to improve Scotland’s lot than this bunch of ever-present btl trolling wazzocks.
I see I’m not the only one who raised an eyebrow at The Nutty Professor’s bizarre posts above. Well said Northcode.
That said, I’m a great believer in free speech and democracy, sunlight being the best disinfectant.
““authoritarian logic” as you call it by implication emanates from oppressive state entities and its mouthpieces (i.e. you Northcode), not from individuals/radicals seeking to end a colonial status quo through liberation of a people”
Aha! So you have been taking lessons from Mr Lavrov.
Is that what he’s all about then, Alf? Seeking to end a colonial status quo in Eastern Europe.
Michty! So easy to get mixed up with all of this. Glad we have academics to keep us right.
Well, this “sassenach yoon” cage is indeed freely rattling, I will readily concede.
Rattling with wry, incredulous laughter. 😀
The framework to End the power of the false mighty empires = is the diversity agenda.
Wether it is Gender debates, BLM, Oil or renewables, untold influx of migration of populations, indigenous population up against foreigners,the imposition of imports on electric vehicles, criminals being released against the law abiding people being incarcerated, Food becoming a Scarcity, excessive tax burdens etc.
These are all to disrupt the people and governments stability.
The Global leaders agenda was never to make many Countries Sovereign or independent again for that would create to many individual headaches and separate laws for them to deal with when one world power is the goal of ultimate control.
We need diversity, but not in the way that the global unelected have planned ,
We need to retain individual Sovereignty of nations, laws our own laws, Countries and people,
Scotland has been in a long political battle to become successful in this area,
What is required now as Ireland, England and Wales begin there political battle for Sovereignty of their Countries from diversity invasion, is to realise that should Scotland was not wrong in this aspect,
For now the tables have turned on England, Wales and Irelands Sovereignty,
Always aware that when Scotland is free from the the fabricated story of a 1707 union, then England, Ireland and Wales are free automatically. And like Scotland can act with their own laws and original cultures and languages, while still looking ahead to the modern world.
But for them to return to the Country they once recognise to remove the actors of planned repeated failed governance then it requires the people of Scotland, England, ireland and Wales to agree on equal Sovereignty of four Nations on these Isles as individual Countries.
Hatey,
I can see that understanding the situation politically or lack of, may be out of your line of view at the moment, it is no longer about just Scotlands independence it has become much bigger, about the diversity of difference world wide. To make it a weapon and create it as a weapon of war on people,
Quite clever in its application,
Because if you recognise your own Sovereign culture, through the diversity programme, then when other non indigenous nations are imported to your Country you are being asked to except them as your nation and new culture, under diversity.
When objecting to just Scots voting in Scotland,
under diversity is akin to saying the rising imported muslim population that are voting in England are all English and only English people voting. Does this still apply when you realise that the indigenous population of England is out numbered by immigration,
In a nutshell, what has been happening to Scotland for years is now happening across Britain and other Countries connected to the western world,
The diversity programmes delete and dilute all nations, not just Scotland if accepted.
Recognising indigenous populations rights in their own Country is something that cannot be thrown aside as rubbish politics toward Sovereignty of its people first and foremost.
Now you can ask England, how that feels to become discarded as second class people in their own Country. Just like in Scotland.
Recognising indigenous Scots is going to become the same legal issue in recognising whom are indigenous English people, Irish people, or Welsh people.
If this is not heeded, kiss goodby to England Scotland, Wales, Ireland, france, Germany, Belgiun Spain, Greece etc.
The diversty programme agenda is a weapon of war in its very conception, against the people of all nations not just Scotland being asked to believe that Scottish people do not exist as a nation, and have second class rights in Scotland.
As this diversity weapon is being applied across Britain and the other Countries around the world.
When indigenous populations starting with Scotland are dismissed So are other populations and nations,
The politics and records do indeed show that Scotland is not in a union with England as from the 28th April 1606, to dismiss this is dismissing the indigenous population of Scots people, which Starts the slippery road to enable Englands population to not be recognised as English, and so forth to every other nation and Country.
Alf Baird,
The question of referendums for Scotland to leave the rUK become legally obsolete as soon as the Scottish parliament was dissolved in England on the 28th April 1606,
For Scotland nor its old parliament, its bank or mint can any longer be held to account, any more than its territory or people.
For they were dissolved from anything that may have been legally binding.
You continue to post several times a day, that the Scottish Parliament was dissolved on the 28th of April 1606 – something that I, and a fair few others I’m sure, were unaware of!
The Union didn’t take place until 1707. What was going on in the intervening 101 years?
Maybe 1606 and 1707 are times, not dates?
Then it makes sense.
MODERN COLONIALISM IN ACTION
link to venezuelanalysis.com
USA, the country that supported Saddam Hussein in a proxy war against its neighbour then turned on him, simply cannot be trusted, period.
Scotland requires authentic statesmen more than parish pump politicians.
“Scotland requires authentic statesmen more than parish pump politicians”
You say that, TURABDIN, yet the decades come and the decades go and Scots keeps on voting the same people back into power over us.
The conclusion must be that Scots don’t agree with your analysis. There’s something about barely literate parish pump politicians, small time crims, and gurning, ugly wee wifies that resonates with us.
Maybe we just like to see people like ourselves moving up in the world.
«As democracy is perfected, the office of the president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day, the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron»
H L MENCKEN, US journalist, essayist, writer
“the White House will be adorned by a downright moron”
Haha, Scotland leads the world!
We’ve already had a string of morons in Bute House.
Plus, we can take half the credit for the moron in the White House too.
All those who thought the saying “Scotland made the modern world” was outdated need to apologise.
Since we’re all stuck indoors, there’s some crowdfunders to donate to, and youtube from SSRG conference to listen to.
1. link to chuffed.org
for Liberation Scotland and Salvo’s UN work. Target £100,000, raised to date £52,576.
2. The Alex Salmond Awards [alexsalmondawards.scot] – a charity formed by 5 of Alex’s schoolfriends with Moira as Patron.
this weather, eh?
– thank god for the aga, warms the whole house, cooks your dinner and dries out your boots.
I was thinking about rewilding my highland estate today, but I will just feed the horses instead.
I hope none of you jocks are being authoritarian now, we must respect civic nationalism and the liberal humanitarian democratic values, including the rule of law, and private property (of which I have a lot more than you); we can’t have any of that “marxist nonsense” now
by the way I am restricting access to the uplands due to essential maintenance and commercial operations taking place from Apr 1 to Nov 1 – you can read all about it on a detailed info sheet which I have screwed to that 20 ton boulder I blocked the public car park with.
– better together, you lucky, lucky people …
You do know all the estates up here are owned either by Arabs (their 737s arrive at Inverness regularly, one for the men and their concubines and a separate 737 for the wives) or yon stinkin rich Danish EcoNazi fud that didn’t want Orbex launching rockets and wants to keep the little folk in their place (think he might have owned the Dores Inn as well but can’t quite recall, tend to avoid it these days as they shut the beach car park and it’s hoaching with tourists anyway).
Quite difficult to see how any sane, rational person can be opposed to rewilding per se.
So I guess Confused’s beef is with the people doing the rewilding.
Lack of ideological purity and that? Naw, much simpler. The mirror image of the behaviour he is complaining about – one tribe hating the guts of another.
Twas ever so in Scotland, that fantastic, externally forced amalgam of multiple races, religions and creeds who all detest each other. What is notable though, is the forlorn attempts to build a majority for Indy from just one or two of those tribes.
Persuade the tribes who are out in the cold to hand over their future to the other tribes who still persist in regarding them as enemies? Those tribes who are wedded to the Marxist nonsense future for Scotland even if it drives their country into the ground?
No sane, rational person should be surprised that’s not working.
Northcode says of Alf Baird:
He then implies that Scots who disagree with his “Scotland is colonised” argument are mentally impaired.
He writes: “In time you will hopefully recover.”
This isn’t metaphor – it’s literal pathologisation.
He is saying:
– “You are sick.”
– “Your disagreement is illness.”
– “Your identity is damaged.”
– “Your mind is colonised.”
– “You need psychological recovery.”
Alf was talking only to Hatey. Not to all Scots. and it is you who is saying that Hatey is sick and has a damaged identity whatever that is.
Don’t take it lying down, Hatey. Northcode’s reality is surely deluded if he thinks your mind is colonised. And by what? It makes you mentally impaired he claims.
Stand up for yourself, man, against that abuse of your character who seems to suffer all the ailments he ascribes to you
Mental impairment is a badge of honour these days.
It brings loads of societal advantages too, not to mention free spondulicks, often on demand without any professional medical assessment.
One more post like that one, sam, and I’ll pursue you for discrimination. Christmas, or perhaps less offensively, Winter Holiday is coming. I could use a nice little lump sum.
OK, so I might have been joking.
There’s much about “being colonised” I like. A very widely understood and used language, for example. Customs, mores, laws and rights I enjoy and am reluctant to give up. When I look at minorities, such as women for example, I see that they are even more enthusiastic about the colonially enforced, alien mindsets that protect them.
Professor Baird makes it clear he needs to sweep all that away as part of his decolonisation drive. Right up to and including the language (English) spoken, written and comprehended by a majority of Scots.
If it’s mental impairment to state I don’t intend to learn a new language at my age, just so that I can hold down a job and be recognised as a genuine citizen of iScotland, then fine, I’m aff my heid.
My dear, departed mammie would have had something pithy to say about an academic, a professor no less, who travels to the UN to entreat the under-employed people there to help him dismantle a political and economic union that he claims doesn’t exist.
“..dismantle a political and economic union that he claims doesn’t exist”
The problem surely lies with those such as yersel who maintain that a UK ‘union’ exists when it becomes ever more evident that it does not exist.
“those such as yersel who maintain that a UK ‘union’ exists when it becomes ever more evident that it does not exist”
And so a new week begins with the same stale old.
Here’s the news from Real World, Alf.
Sane, rational Scots can wish the Union didn’t exist.
Sane, rational Scots can plan to end the Union.
Sane, rational Scots can form movements, canvas for votes, seek election, all on a commitment to dissolve the Union.
Sane, rational Scots can leverage their majority support from Scots to commence dissolving the Union, through negotiation (mediated by third parties if necessary), or even unilaterally, if they, and Scotland, are prepared to take the almost inevitable pushback.
All of the above is eminently feasible, grounded as it is in reality.
What sane, rational Scots can’t do, is pretend that most of the above is unnecessary because they have decided, in their heads, that the Union doesn’t exist.
Sorry, Alf. You’ve been surrounding yourself with yes-men, fantasists, sycophants and nutters for too long. You need to make the trip back to Real World.
Do you actually comprehend what’s been happening in Real World Scotland whilst you’ve been immersed in your fantasy?
By every practical measure that counts, the Union has been becoming more real, more actual, and more obvious.
Have you any idea how dispiriting it is to have somebody rock up and say “Dinna fash, boys, it’s all in your heids. The Union doesn’t exist”?
Hatey — that’s a very clear way of putting it. The distinction between wanting to end the Union and pretending it doesn’t exist is important, and you’ve expressed it well.
You can’t end something that never existed in the first place, Northcode.
So it’s a case of “Schrödinger’s Union” then, eh Alf? 😀
Alf, but the UK *does* exist, legally, politically and physically, not just within its territory but it is internationally recognised.
You might not like it and we both want to be independent of it, but those are the facts.
We can debate the extensive history behind it, the questionable deals done 319 years ago, the lack of a written constitution and why Scotland should be independent from it, all of which are valid and interesting points, but just because you deny it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist, which is an incredibly narcissistic world view and quite frankly a bizarre statement from a supposed Professor.
Have you any idea how stupid these statements make you look?
‘Unionist’ cheerleaders need to believe that a union exists, in fact their colonial ‘condition’ depends on maintaining the hoax at all times, despite mounting evidence to the contrary.
But, as Cesaire wrote, its like believing ‘the moon is made of cheese’.
”Have you any idea how stupid these statements make you look?”
I’m going with “no”.
Ach, all I’ve ever got have been funny looks, mildy hurty words and a ban from using certain power tools at my auld worldplace. Where’s my free money, man? 🙂
Sorry to hear that, MH.
It could be that I’ve been fraudulently enjoying mental feebleness benefits that should have gone to more deserving cases such as yourself. That knowledge may cause me a mild pang of discomfort when I’m next splurging on yet another 16 YO single malt. It will be horrible to think of you drinking an Aldi blended 3 YO.
Have you tried introducing into every conversation the non-existence of the union? What about stopping strangers on the street to tell them the Moon is made of cheese?
Some people swear by it.
Thinking about it now, maybe the horse food thing alone would be enough to get me labeled so I can cash in?
Aye, but now you’re over-egging the pudding. I want to cash in, nae get myself sectioned 🙂
Not stuck indoors for me today. Yesterday was mostly indoors though sitting out the gales and rain after spending the morning battening down the hatches and making sure as much of my and my neighbours’ property was as secure as possible for the storm blowing through.
Today was outside with chainsaws clearing fallen branches off the local roads.
Bonus was collecting loads of hazel and sweet chestnuts that had come down in the gusts. Nom nom, and the quids saved on buying imported nuts covered the cost of imported petrol for the chainsaw. Plus a few logs for the woodburner out of it too…
Dan, how come your hazel nuts actually contain nuts? I gathered some off the ground a few days ago and started opening them today – I found ONE with an actual nut! And our sweet chestnut, after about 20 years, is producing loads of fruit but again not with actual flesh. Do you know if it needs another tree to make it fruit properly?
Like you we battened down the hatches yesterday including bringing the boat up from the shore to the field – a good thing we did because it is a spell of high tides plus this gale has brought the sea much closer to the field edge. We would have lost it, for sure.
sarah @7:13
This is solely due to the vicious, heartless colonialism that we Scots suffer under.
But never fear…in Alf’s post-colonial paradise you will have nuts-a-plenty !
“Is is indisputable that our nuts are bigger and tastier in de post-colonial world” Fanon
@ Sarah
They are not my Hazel or Sweet Chestnut trees. They are just planted locally along a roadside.
I’m not that up the curve on trees, but after a quick search it would appear the chestnuts were planted without much knowledge of what the trees need to grow well and produce nuts…
Both Hazel and Sweet Chestnut it seems are self-sterile so need cross-pollination and require adjacent but genetically different strains nearby.
That may explain your predicament. I do have a couple of tree expert friends so can ask them for advice. But looks like you need to try to get as mature a compatible tree as possible planted nearby asap.
One area of Hazels I got nuts from are quite young and are in a group of 8 saplings that were left over from a much bigger planting job of hundreds for a commercial venture. I understand those young Hazel trees actually had their sapling root stocks laced with the fungi that grows truffles which were to be harvested.
It seems the Sweet Chestnuts only pollinated through luck, as various types of trees had been planted alongside a road and fortunately by fate rather than design there were three chestnuts planted just close enough for some pollination to occur.
I noticed that quite a lot of the spikey shells did not contain properly formed nuts, which could be down to lack of proper pollination, or that the trees are still quite young as info suggests 5 to 10 years old before mature enough to produce nuts.
There’s also other factors like frosts, sunlight, insects for pollination, and none ideal planting conditions that will affect crop too.
Lucky you saved the boat! Now that I know you have one I must try to find time for a road trip and some fishing. I didn’t put my motorbike on road this year as was busy with other motorsport projects so had little time spare.
Link to Barrheadboy article (and comments) posted today which shines some light on influencing aspects that are factors in shaping so many Scots’ perceptions.
link to barrheadboy.com
My benchmark 30 seconds of internet research reveals the budget of BBC Scotland TV to be £42 million PA.
The budget of the wee, pretendy parliament administration at Hollyrood is £68 billion PA.
This means, for those Scots capable of doing the math, that Hollyrood could fund BBC Scotland TV by spending something like one twentieth of 1 per cent of its budget.
Then there’s that old saying about paying pipers and calling the tunes. For a negligible investment, Hollyrood could end all that gurning about anglo-centric, London-based misrepresentation and bias, once and for all. Heck, by putting a positive slant on things, they could even maybe grow Indy support.
Another 30 seconds internet research tells me that ScotGov spent £12 million on advertising in 2022 (the previous year, it was £27 million). At least some of these adverts could be rolled out on TV and the money reallocated.
You never know. Make the HR curated TV channel good enough and advertising revenue might even pay most of the costs!
What am I like, eh? Mentally impaired through and through.
Cue “reasons” why it’s all impossible.
That there was colonialism of Northern Ireland was an idea widely considered by many groups and individuals during what is euphemistically called the Troubles.
In the end when a settlement was reached, (which Northcode in his deluded reality believes to be the end of colonialism in NI) the UK government managed to have acceptance of its own position on the Troubles.
This position is that there was an internal conflict in which the UK government was a neutral participant. This is a HUGE lie.
Roll up, choose your bias.
link to tandfonline.com
“That there was colonialism of Northern Ireland was an idea widely considered by many groups and individuals”
That it was Scots doing most of the colonising is also widely considered by many groups and individuals.
I know, I know. Some big, bad English barsturts made us do it and then ran away. The Scots are the real victims here, as always.
Funny how that never seems to matter much to the people actually being colonised, ethnically cleansed or genocided though.
Whether in Ireland, America, the Caribbean, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, etc.
You forgot Palestine and Arthur James Balfour, 1st Earl of Balfour, born in East Lothian.
Well, Hatey, as far as I can understand you, I agree to a point.
The colonisation of the Scots of the north of Ireland was initially done by Hamilton and Montgomery. Followed up on a larger scale by Jams VI.
Jams was solving two problems.He forced the border reivers such as the Kerrs and Elliots from the Marches by offering them the choice of hanging or moving to the north of Ireland.
In their new home they were regarded by their own ministers of religion who went with them as “the scum of the earth”.
They took with them their religion, Presbyterianism. Their role was to do the work of the plantation. New agricultural ways were introduced and the land was divided to farm. The fields in County Down are small and divided by hedges as the face of the land was changed. They are an unchanging legacy of colonialism.
Catholics were inevitably displaced from their lands.Some went to Europe. Others stayed and became bandits in the forests and countryside.
The Presbyterian settlers did not have their religion recognised in legal documents. The Penal Laws were passed to support the Anglican establishment who had the full control of Ireland. Marriages were not recognised so children of Presbyterian marriages were as you say Scottish basturts but made so by the English. Right again.
Because of the infringement of freedom to worship many presbyterians went to America. Much later many would fight the English colonists to free America from colonialism.
“If defeated everywhere else, I will make my last stand for liberty among the Scotch-Irish of my native Virginia.”
Nope, Marie, I didn’t.
The Irish weren’t immune to a bit if colonisation either – take Scotland, for example – the place is even named after them!
Dan, thanks for the info on trees. I brought the chestnut tree up from Kent as a sprout 25 years ago – I lived near chestnut coppice woodland at the time. If I’d known I needed two I could easily have collected nuts from different woods! Being the age I am, I don’t think I’ll be planting another.
As for the hazels, judging by the empty shells left by mice, I think the trees are producing fruit but the mice get there first and I am picking up what they knew to be worthless!
I know you catch some good size fish so I won’t lure you by promising the same here. My husband keeps telling me that when he was young the loch was full of good size fish but we’ve not had anything worth catching for years. Is it because of the Mowi fishfarm now moored here for the last 15 years or so? One can’t but wonder. And we don’t see the wild salmon on their way to the river either. It is a great shame.
The repeated euphemism of the word ” the Troubles ‘ is a masterpiece of spin to mask the reality of Northern Ireland.
The conflict in Northern Ireland was a war, and a ‘ dirty war’ at that. But the use of the soubriqet ‘ dirty war ‘ is an accurate descriptor that never gained currency, or at least not in the mainstream.
At its peak the war in Northern Ireland required around 30,000 troops and by anyone’s counting that is a little more than ‘ Troubles ‘
But we live in Great Britain, and Ireland or at least part of it, is or was British and the troubles could never in common parlance or common perception be recognised.for what it actually was.
Over 3,000 dead, many many times more injured, many many more traumatised, chaos in England where cities and British government ministers were killed the 30 year was an outrageous tragedy – and for what. Vainglorious British pride and a failure to address sectarian colonial state with a compromised political system.
Northern Ireland, South Africa you dont need to look far to see the horror of discontent. But here’s the big question could the Troubles come back – is democracy today strong, fair and actively operating.
“for what. Vainglorious British pride”
I guess that’s one POV.
Another POV is that you have two disparate populations born on one piece of real estate. The two disparate populations want two different futures for their peoples.
That’s a situation surprisingly common throughout the world.
I guess it’s always far more comforting to believe that some big, bad English barsturts are behind it all. Nobody wants to believe it’s the attitudes and passions of their family, friends and neighbours, multiplied a million times, that lie at the root of the problems.
Nobody wants to discover the problem is actually themself.
An article about real colonialism.
It’s complicated, hellishly so. It may even be true! I mean, how could your average Scot ever know?
Readers who do already know all the answers needn’t bother.
link to unherd.com
The confusion begins with the name. “Treaty of Union” suggests an equal partnership, but the institutional reality created in 1707 behaved far more like a merger. England’s institutional machinery continued almost unchanged, Scotland’s institutions were largely dissolved, and the new state inherited the constitutional DNA of the larger partner.
Calling it a “Union” encourages people to imagine a balanced arrangement that never actually existed – “Treaty of Merger” would have been more accurate.
The outcome of this merger was structurally asymmetrical from the start — because that’s how mergers work when one partner is significantly larger than the other.
But unlike in 1707, Scots today have a democratic route to leave the arrangement if they decide it no longer works for them. That’s the modern corrective — and it’s the only legitimate way any Scottish independence movement can succeed.
In 1707, ordinary people weren’t given a choice. Across Europe, citizens had no democratic say in major constitutional changes; they could protest, but their objections carried little weight with their rulers.
In the 21st century, that has changed. In democratic societies, legitimacy comes from the people who live in the country, not from elite bargains made over their heads.
All the independence movement needs to do is persuade a majority of Scotland’s people that going their own way offers a better future. That’s the only route to independence that is workable, legitimate and real.
Morning Northcode,
” In 1707, ordinary people weren’t given a choice. Across Europe, citizens had no democratic say in major constitutional changes; they could protest, but their objections carried little weight with their rulers.
In the 21st century, that has changed. In democratic societies, legitimacy comes from the people who live in the country, not from elite bargains made over their heads.”
I understand what you are frying to say but the reality is quite different. Does anyone think that any real democratic legitimacy comes from our so called democratic system.
The system is rotten, and deliberately so, and even a plebicite, or should I say a referendum, which would come with a slanted franchise, we are told is at the discretion of the Westminster elite. A rigged opinion poll when it suits the masters.
So how do you get the democratic will of the people Northcote. Do you need to look at the British democracy that
was the horror of Northern Ireland.
Or the democracy of how this current prime minister was appointed andby who. Not the voters, but maybe the late Jeffrey Epstein set including but not limited to Labour grandees like Lord Peter Mandleson or our King’s brother prince Andrew.
But yes, I it’s simples,just persuade a majority of people that that going that their own way offers a better future and is is the route to independence.
Or am I missing something Northcote. Maybe I am.
I understand the frustration — democratic systems are imperfect everywhere. But my point was simply that, unlike in 1707, Scots today do have a democratic route to independence. Whatever people think of Westminster or Holyrood, the only workable path is still persuading a majority of Scotland’s voters. That’s the part that hasn’t changed.
Hey, it’s almost as though this “ancient guff” that happened over 300 years ago is of no pragmatic consequence in today’s world, and perfectly good, practical, modern day democratic mechanisms are available to effect independence that don’t involve (supposed, erroneous) recourse to such things.
Who knew!
It has a practical purpose in driving the cause of independence down a dead end and diverting time and resources, so if you were implacably opposed to Scottish independence then you’d very much welcome it.
If Alf thought these arguments had any merit, and any practical possibility of success, he could always take them to a court somewhere. The UN route I think is preferably because, unlike the legal system, arguments can’t be struck out with an adverse costs order.
Yes, the “useful idiot” argument (from a Unionist POV) isn’t lost on me. 🙂 However, it is bloody tedious, isn’t it. I’d rather see genuine, worthwhile debate in lieu of this “Groundhog Day” garbage.
It is extremely tedious, and it is not presented with the intent to provoke debate or discussion, it is simply a broadcast that we are all forced to endure, or abandon BTL like so many others have done. If only Wings is spammed just a little bit more then a critical mass of Scots will wake up and realise that Scotland is in fact just like the Belgian Congo or French Algeria, and then what? The last referendum was apparently rigged and anyone could vote – so there’s no point having another one of them.
We’ll see if the UN fancies rewriting its charter and designating a load more NSGT’s, just because a tiny campaign group has asked them to. Obviously we aren’t up for debating that strategy, but when we get zero traction we’ll blame MI5 and lie about DCMS having issued a D-notice. It’s pretty tragic.
“Rewilding” is another con job – what it means is :
GET ORFF MOI LAND
– and whenever an ANGLO tries that with you, there is only one response :
GET OUT MY FUCKING COUNTRY
you carpet bagger, you weasel, you ingrate, you vowel mangling parasite …
it is not a matter of a vote or not, or the local taxes, it is a matter of removing you physically, so we can start to rebuild without the taint of the anglo, just some fucking englishman, as usual, there to shit things up to his own advantage
– that needs to stop.
link to youtube.com
no oil gas or leccy for the anglo; we can handle our own money, thanks (we do know what to do with it), and start to rebuild, getting us back to where we should have been
Pished, hysterical, incoherent rambling as per.
getting into the english at the UN is useful, and enjoyable, because it “hits them where they live” – they love all that, on the international scene, the big stage, pow wowing with all the players – it lets them indulge this monty python-esque fantasy in which they still “run the world”, whereas they are little more than an interfering old busybody that people are very polite to in public, but they really wish they would just – GTF
it would also be embarrassing for them to have UN resolutions against -them- THEM! when they are the people always rattling on about “international law” and “the rules based order”, all that shite
– make them face up to themselves – they are lawless pirates from the beginning and still are (but they can do with finance far more looting than they ever did with musket and cannon)
It would also be delicious, a real humiliation, to see them kicked off the security council – they have no legitimate reason to be there, not in population, not in military power, not in economic power – and we should dispute “successor state” status. It is the ultimate humiliation for them – like telling the tranny he is “an ugly man in a bad wig and clown makeup”
the bully hates to be embarrassed
I’m guessing you had a tough time at school, Confused, and were no stranger to the “bogwash”.
I think Confused is having a tougher time as an adult. I would guess passing the days drinking very strong, very cheap alcohol sat in an arm chair covered in a blanket next to an electric oil radiator. He manages to squeeze out some meagre enjoyment fantasising about the English mass-eviction from Scotland which we all know isn’t going to happen.
It’s sad to see such a tortured soul.
Nah, CC, Confused retired from a long, successful and lucrative career in the higher echelons of the diplomatic service.
That’s how he can post so authoritatively about the UN and the international stage and the machinations that go on behind closed doors.
That’s how he knows that far from being about national interests, alliances, trade and those kinds of grown up things, international politics is conducted by Neanderthals screaming insults at each other like blazing Old Firm fans on derby day.
I doubt anybody in the M25 omniclusterfuckpermashambles-on-Thames is paying any attention to the UN capers (all of which is just a massive and irrelevant ego trip for The Nutty Professor and his mates who will get their 5 minutes of fame then fade back to obscurity), they’re too busy wrapped up in their own incompetent circlejerk to care.
Ru**ia’s interest is likely piqued considering The Nutty Professor is stroking Mad Vlad’s ego – oooo, “Mr” Lavrov – but nobody else is taking it seriously, least of all us Scots who actually want independence and understand that all this showmanship is like a fart in a tornado and the only way to achieve independence is through democratic means (including the removal of the SNP from power).
As it stands, I firmly believe that due to UK government incompetence, impending bankruptcy of the British state and social decay/disorder we will see a Yugoslavian-style rapid, uncontrolled and catastrophic collapse of the UK within the next few years and inevitable Balkanisation, which will lead to Scottish independence by default. Just my opinion.
The usual suspects can’t believe in the impending bankruptcy of the U.K. because they already believe Scotland is hoaching with resources, which are being stolen by the U.K. to bankroll its activities.
I can’t believe in Scotland becoming independent on break up of the UK. I see no reason why the ancient boundaries on the maps need to be adhered to. Scotland will itself fission further.
As will England. The process is already happening as demographic changes turn cities and regions into foreign statelets.
It makes absolutely no sense for white Brits on either side of the border to remain shackled to Muslim majority regions, if we are given the opportunity to make a clean break and a fresh start.
Needless to say, the Muslims reached the same complementary conclusion years ago. They are now strong enough to stand on their own feet. We’re just holding them back.
@Northcode; Re your “The Myth They All Rely On” post of 21 October; (I was too busy with a flitting to respond then)
Your argument is worthless because it fails to recognise that the 1707 Treaty of Union was already ‘void ab initio’ before the negotiations had even begun. England wanted to negotiate a Treaty with Scotland to unite the two kingdoms into a single one, but Scotland was against it, and said so. England wouldn’t take ‘NO’ for an answer, and began trying to force Scotland to the negotiation table by a variety of means including economic and military force.
But under the law of nations (Jus Gentium) recognised across Europe at the time, a coerced treaty was deemed unequivocally illegitimate, so as a direct result of England’s coercive actions, the 1707 Treaty was already ‘void ab initio’ before the negotiations had even begun, and everything that followed is tainted with the same illegitimacy, and still so today.
Nothing since 1707 has ever resolved that illegitimacy, and England’s establishment has made no effort to atone for its unlawful coercion. Quite the reverse in fact; England redoubled its abuse of Scotland and its people and their territory after the Union came into effect, and these crimes are extensively documented. The crucial part of that ongoing coercion is the power of England’s MPs to overrule Scotland’s MPs on any matter of governance on the basis of a single majority vote that was never mandated by the Treaty. That vote ignores Scotland’s sovereignty and thus enables an almost unassailable English numeric coercion to continue unabated today.
Thus that “International law recognises the UK, not Scotland, as the sovereign entity.” is simply inept, because it accepted the English establishment position as authoritative and true with no competent forensic examination of the actual historical and constitutional truth.
The only thing missing from your explanation is the eccentric bit which is;
“I, Xaracen, posting on Wings over Scotland BTL have the exclusive, unassailable and unappealable right to determine questions of statehood both in international and domestic law. So even though my arguments enjoy no support judicially or within any other form of authority, it is the entirety of the otherwise recognised body of domestic and international law, and administrative practice, has to be disapplied because of the conflict with my opinion.”
Alternatively – you could point to any judgement of a competent court where these issues have been considered and determined in a way that aligns to your views above? We haven’t had anything so far but maybe you’ve got the goods today?
Are you claiming that the 1707 Treaty was not voided by England’s coercion of Scotland to bring it to the negotiating table? And if so, what got England off the hook?
And are you also claiming that Scotland’s sovereignty was lawfully dispossessed from the Scots who owned it? And if so, who owned the higher lawful authority than theirs to do that?
On point 1: yes I am obviously saying that, I don’t know how anyone could think anything different. The treaty was clearer not voided, it was implemented through the acts of union which created the United Kingdom. Could someone in Scotland at the time have brought a court case on the basis you suggest leading to the creation of the Union being halted? Maybe, I don’t know enough about Scottish law in the 1700’s to answer that question, but what we know for sure is that the creation of the Union did proceed.
On point 2: I’m not saying that because that statement doesn’t mean anything in the English language. I can broadly infer that what you mean is that the Scottish Parliament did not have the power to pass the Act of Union 1707. I can’t say for definite that you are wrong, I’ve not seen any convincing argument but that’s not to say there isn’t one, or that again the Act of Union couldn’t have been halted by a legal challenge.
What we do know for certain is that the Acts of Union were passed, the United Kingdom was created, and the Union as a legal fact enjoys universal recognition in both domestic and international law and has done for a very long time. What you are saying, therefore, as a matter of law is objectively untrue, unless you believe your opinion trumps the judgement of any court anywhere.
That doesn’t mean everyone likes the Union or wouldn’t like to see it ended, obviously they don’t and would.
Aidan, are you claiming that the 1707 Treaty was not voided by England’s coercion of Scotland to bring it to the negotiating table in violation of the Jus Gentium? And if so, what got England off the hook?
And are you also claiming that Scotland’s sovereignty was lawfully dispossessed from the Scots who owned it? And if so, who owned the higher lawful authority than theirs to do that?
Good point, Xaracen.
I guess the surrender signed by Germany in 1945 was voided by the allies coercion bringing them to the negotiating table.
I’m in two minds over Clydebank. Do I hope the Germans will leave it alone next time around, or would it be better if they return to finish the job?
I realise you have far too much Sunk Costs invested in your will o’ the wisp fantasy about 1707 to ever give it up before you croak. But sane, rational, Indy-minded Scots do need to remind you from time to time that you’re a distraction and an anchor holding back sensible efforts to dissolve the union.
300+ years of entangled history, law, population movements and entrenched vested interests aren’t gonna be unwound by emerging from a garret clutching an ancient parchment and declaiming “Look what I just found, everybody!”
Members of he Nazi hierarchy were not offered financial inducement for their signed approval.
Members of the Scottish nobility of 1707 were.
Like other articles, this starts ok but ends with pushing nuclear.
Ideal as it only takes a couple of months to train up nuclear scientists…
link to yesthink.scot
A better idea for worthy discussion rather than forcing opinions onto us and telling folk to wind their neck in, might be to begin with asking the question: “Jist how much energy does Scotland actually need now and in the foreseeable future taking into account evolving usage and required industries.”
Then planning to develop an energy strategy would at least have something to work with.
But… It’s all a bit pointless anyway because a wee reminder that ENERGY IS A POWER RESERVED TO LONDON RULE! So Scotland can effectively do fuck all about it until we return to self-governing status and have full control over our geographic area and the resources within its boundaries.
Plus if we are going to be warring soon, then creating and offering up numerous nuclear power sites as potential targets for an enemy to take out, with the resultant toxic catastrophe for the environment if reactors are struck and radiation leaks occur, doesn’t seem like the best plan.
It is possible to generate power through much more inert means afterall.
Scotland has a massive coastline and could move towards tidal power due to the known regularity of and consistency of force created by the tides (which vary around the coastline so staggered generation is possible to meet demand).
Surface wave power is really too variable and inefficient as it requires generation infrastructure to be way overbuilt to cope with the forces involved with the extremes of stormy weather.
I believe the tidal generation project in the Pentland Firth will be the highest capacity tidal project in the world (as judged against current capacity, not projects in planning). Unfortunately electricity generation and transmission is reserved as you say, so it wouldn’t be possible to build a private supply into businesses in Orkney or Caithness which could otherwise benefit potentially from a high-capacity, low-cost supply.
Word reaches me that the ‘High Executive’ at the UN have met in secret session to discuss the recent presentation by Professor Plonker and others regarding the fate of Scotland.
‘Where is Scotland?’ asked one of the decision makers. Another inquired ‘Are the presenters members of some political party’? ‘Yes’ someone responded. ‘What share of the vote did they garner at the recent Scottish elections’? After much ‘googling’ it transpires that they received less than 1% of the votes cast said one.
The members of the ‘High Executive’ were stunned at this. Much head scratching ensued. ‘Instead of trying to convince us, why do they not try and convince the Scottish electorate’suggested one. No one could answer this. One bright spark suggested that the presentation by the Scottish worthies was simply in exercise in boosting the presenters already inflated egos. Nobody could disagree with this assessment.
So you’re saying there’s no date to save?
I’ve been saving a space on the front of the fridge to stick the Indy save the date sticker.
Drat! Here I was, waiting on our impending liberation!
I don’t know about you, but I can’t cope with any more oppression!!
It’s the pitiless crushing gets me down.
That, and the eternal promises of cheese which never materialises.
I like cheese.
Plenty of cheese in England Hatey, just saying.
It’s not Moon cheese. That’s the kind I’ve been conditioned to believe in.
I’m sure you’re right, SBS. You do have plenty of cheese, some of it damn good, too.
But as a colonised Scot, I want the Moon cheese promised me by Cesaire and his disciples.
I’m afraid the moon is merely made of cheddar so I think you might have been had.
Yes United and Independence Forum Scotland have started Yes2030.scot – it had a spot at the SSRG Conference to publicise the scheme for uniting all independence groups and individuals into an organisation to campaign for regaining independence.
See http://www.yesunited.scot and http://www.yes2030.scot for more information AND to join. The number of supporters will be evidence of the strength of independence.
Trustees of Yes2030 include Simon Forrest, Alex Neil, Sheena Jardine, David Thompson, William Duguid.
So Alex Neil and William Duguid who have feasted at the snp trough for years and done absolutely fuck all to oppose the sturgeon and useless deviants and perverts are now looking at the writing on the wall and seeing that their TROUGHING time at the snp maybe coming to an end so they are now looking for another way to continue the grift
Forgive me but has anyone asked them WHY they have sat for the last 12 YEARS earning loads of dosh but staying quiet as mice in case they were noticed , whilst Sturgeon and her merry band of deviants and perverts destroyed the indy movement and Scotland, maybe they were a wee bitty slow on the uptake , after all it’s only been 12 YEARS of throwing Scots and our womenfolk under the bus maybe they were SCARED Nicky would batter them
TBQH anyone who participated in the past 12 YEARS of misery and perversion and stayed shtum I wouldn’t pish on them never mind listen to them , FFS what’s next why not ask the chief BETRAYER to join the SSRG and YES2030.Scot , or just make it YES3030.Scot and get the good old snp band back together
Mony a guid idea said in jest, twathater.
Sturgeon is still immensely popular in Scotland. An experienced and plausible player of the “helpless victim” card, too. That goes down very well with many Scots. A chippy, wee woman in a hostile man’s world. She’s been accused of much by many, but never have any of the accusations stuck.
And, TBQFH, she must have learned a thing or two in her decades at the top. That experience must be worth something.
It’s politics. You have to grit your teeth and focus on the goal.
Have you forgotten how she saved our lives during Covid? Plenty of Scots haven’t.
Why would I join? When Alex Neil said his strategy is to get support for Independence to a constant 60% on the hope that Westminster coincides to a referendum and if they don’t there going to disrupt business at Westminster. I thought when I heard this at the SSRG what a pile of unionist bull.
Its simple Scotland decides no one else.
No Scottish organisation has ever articulated the real, modern, internationally-rounded process that would govern independence negotiations. Not the Scottish Government, not the SNP, not the Greens, not the Constitutional Commission, not the Scottish Independence Convention, not the SSRG, not Common Weal, not Salvo, not ISP, not AFI, not any academic group, and not any think-tank.
So here is a clear, modern summary of how independence negotiations actually proceed under contemporary international practice.
1. Independence begins with a democratic mandate
A referendum or election must produce a clear, unambiguous expression of Scotland’s people choosing independence. Without this, nothing else happens.
2. International bodies respond to democratic legitimacy, not historical treaties
Once a mandate exists, Scotland signals its intent to the UK, the UN, and relevant international and regional organisations (including the EU). Recognition begins with democratic consent, not reinterpretations of 1707.
3. Negotiations are forward-looking, not historical
Scotland and the UK establish negotiation teams, timelines and working groups. The Treaty of Union is not a living bilateral instrument and cannot be “invoked”.
The Acts of Union are domestic UK legislation and do not govern state-to-state negotiations.
4. Assets and liabilities are divided according to modern international practice
This includes debt, military assets, embassies, infrastructure, natural resources and long-term obligations. Division follows population, territory and negotiated exceptions — not 18th-century documents.
5. Citizenship, residency and border arrangements are agreed bilaterally
Rights of Scots in rUK and rUK citizens in Scotland are settled through negotiation, human-rights law and modern precedent. Historical treaties play no role.
6. Scotland determines its international treaty succession
It chooses which treaties to inherit, renegotiate or join anew. This is governed by Vienna Convention principles and state-succession norms, not by the Treaty of Union.
7. Recognition follows stability, legitimacy and clarity
States and international organisations recognise Scotland once negotiations are stable, institutions are functioning and borders are agreed. Recognition is based on democratic legitimacy, not historical claims.
8. A transitional period manages practical realities
Shared systems, currency arrangements, regulatory divergence and interim cooperation are handled through temporary agreements. This phase typically lasts 1–3 years.
9. Independence is formalised when Scotland becomes a sovereign state
At that moment, Scotland becomes an independent nation. Any future negotiations between Scotland and the UK take place between two sovereign states.
The Treaty of Union is already a historical document with no modern legal force.
The Acts of Union remain part of UK domestic law until Scotland’s departure, but they play no role in modern independence negotiations and become legally defunct once Scotland becomes sovereign.
The Modern Reality
In contemporary international law, independence is achieved through democratic legitimacy and bilateral negotiation — not through “recovering” sovereignty from the past.
An accurate summation Northcode.
The ancient history guff is for numpties. The MAJORITY of Scots have to want Independence following a real and accurate plan/projection, most importantly including financials, of what would follow. The ‘money’ aspect is huge
The biggest stumbling block is who would act for Scotland in the negotiations that would ensue with the UK Government? The SNP!!!!
I genuinely believe that over 50% of Scots are in favour of Independence. However, only the rabid nationalists would vote for this today. When push comes to shove people simply will not vote for the unknown.
Of course, I forget, everything will happen by magic in the eyes of many.
“The ‘money’ aspect is huge”
Deid richt tae, Scots plundered £150 billion+ a year an mair by a bankrupt England, appen yer een:
link to yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com
Wheesht, Alf!
We dinna want tae tip aff the EU aboot hoo muckle they can rinse us fer when we gang tae beg tae be allooed in.
None of the numpties have ever said that a democratic route can be by-passed, but wishing away an international treaty is for the birds. Calling people numpties because they don’t agree with you is insulting. We embarked on a perfectly legitimate and democratic referendum in 2014. Crawford and Boyle were commissioned to develop the argument that Scotland was subsumed into a Greater England in 1707. Only the actual text of the Treaty and all the workings around it refute that premise. Walker and Campbell did an excellent job of refuting C&B, showing that Scotland did, indeed, enter into a Treaty with England. That Treaty will be our saviour one day, but, hey, what do I know? You can guess, I’m sure, the stance that Westminster would take, and we would be insufficiently prepared because people like you and others think that only numpties look at the Treaty. Nothing changes in this benighted land of ours.
Who Negotiates on Scotland’s Behalf After a Mandate?
Once Scotland votes for independence, the negotiating team is not automatically the SNP, nor any existing party. Modern international practice is very clear: a democratic mandate triggers the formation of a new, legitimacy-driven negotiation delegation.
1. Candidates would put themselves forward
After a Yes vote, public interest would be enormous. Individuals with constitutional, diplomatic, economic or legal expertise would declare themselves and undergo intense public scrutiny.
2. The negotiating team would be elected or formally authorised
There are two internationally normal models:
Option 1: A special election to choose negotiators directly, or
Option 2: A cross-party delegation appointed by Holyrood, including specialists and civil-service experts.
I favour Option 1 in Scotland’s case (let the people decide). However, both models give the team democratic legitimacy — which is essential in state-succession negotiations.
3. Negotiators are not the same as the governing party
In modern independence processes (Czech-Slovak, Baltic states, etc.), the negotiation delegation is a specialised national team, not simply the party in power. Scotland would follow the same pattern.
4. The UK negotiates with whoever Scotland democratically authorises
The UK does not choose Scotland’s negotiators. It negotiates with the delegation Scotland empowers through election or parliamentary mandate.
A Yes vote does not hand negotiations to any existing party. It triggers a democratic process to select a credible, publicly-scrutinised national negotiation team — exactly as happens in modern international practice.
The big problem from an “Indy Scot” perspective is the total dearth of political talent from its Political Class (of whichever hue you care to choose, usually “red” in the case of Scotland, much to its long-suffering detriment generally – and erstwhile entrepreneurial culture specifically).
Regardless of “Option 1” or “Option 2” (most especially the latter), the talent pool comprises of a bunch of rather thick, idiotic grifters, foamers and ideologues who’ve never had a real job, let alone ran a country. Which probably goes a very long way to explain why no plan for Independence – detailed or even summary – has been forthcoming from the Movement and/or Nationalist Government in its entirety, as since the (woeful) 2013 White Paper.
I’m not sure there’s necessarily right in the context of Scotland Northcode – you are right that there is significant International precedent for this route, but that is principally in examples where independence has occurred in an occupied/colonial context which clearly doesn’t apply in Scotland. In that context, the local administration is usually an appointed offshoot of the administering/colonial state who would clearly, for that reason, be considered unfit and illegitimate in negotiating independence.
In the Scottish context – the Scottish government is freely elected by the Scottish people and the current Scottish government is (at least outwardly) committed to independence. They would appear therefore to have both the democratic legitimacy and institutional capability to negotiate an independent Scotland. This of course depends on how independence is achieved.
The SNP government could commit to holding a snap election following a referendum, but there is nothing in law that would oblige them to and I am not sure they would face electoral pressure to do so either. Outside of an overriding reason to hold this snap election, I’m not sure many politicians from any colour would pass up the chance to become the founder of a newly independent Scotland. Obviously the thought of the current SNP/Greens doing that would fill any right thinking person with horror, but we can sleep safe in our beds knowing that isn’t going to happen.
What Independence Actually Means(my compressed version)
Independence is a modern constitutional process, not a feeling or a grievance.
Takeaway
Independence = mandate > negotiation > transition > recognition > sovereignty.
A normal, modern process – not myth, not metaphysics, and definitely not magic.
Some good ideas there, Northy, but the idea that the SNP wouldn’t fight like rats in a sack to be the negotiating group flies in the face of what we already know about Scotland’s entrenched tribalism.
As does the idea the Scots could be trusted to democratically elect a negotiating delegation. We continue to reward failure and criminality, election after election. It’s a real stretch to imagine we’ll suddenly grow up and start voting on merit. Some of the best people might be English, FFS!
Still though. If what you write is true, and I have no reason to doubt it, it’s gob smacking that 12 years after a referendum that might have kicked all of this off, I’m only just hearing these ideas for the first time.
To be fair, I was obviously talking about you, Alf, not some other guy.
Since you brought him up, though, it would be good if you could cite a verbatim, genuine quote from him describing the Union as a “hoax”, with no added context nor caveat, thereby (supposedly, somehow) enabling its reality to be summarily ignored by everyone, including the courts and international community as a whole, forthwith? (LOL)
Even assuming you *could* do this, so what? He’s one lawyer.
Northcode,
What constitutes a mandate?
The Scottish independence movement has never operated at constitutional altitude because it focused on history, identity and party politics instead of the modern constitutional process that actually governs independence.
Constitutional altitude means:
democratic mandate > structured negotiation > legitimacy-driven delegation > transitional governance > international recognition.
No Scottish political party or independence organisation ever articulated this pathway. Instead, the movement relied on 1707, 1689, the Claim of Right, grievance narratives, and the assumption that the SNP would somehow know what to do and competently lead negotiations when the time came.
None of this reflects how modern independence actually works, and it has left voters without the clarity needed to make an informed decision. When people don’t understand the real process, hesitation and uncertainty are inevitable.
There are highly competent Scots with the constitutional literacy, diplomatic skill and statecraft experience to negotiate independence professionally — but they remain outside the political spotlight because the movement has never operated at the altitude where their expertise is required.
Independence is modern statecraft, not historical metaphysics — and Scotland has never been shown the real process.
International law concerning territorial alienation suggests there is no democracy for people in an annexed country.
…e.g. all those ‘democratic mandates’ ignored by the colonizer.
Northcode: you are going to be hugely disappointed if and when you go down that route and try to body swerve the Treaty and the parts of the constitution that adhere to it. I can’t say I know of any constitutional expert who has ever offered to lead Scotland. The late Professor Walker and Professor Campbell both investigated Crawford and Boyle rigorously and built a case around the Treaty, showing how C&B were completely wrong because they started from a flawed premise.
We have been part of a Union since 1707 and we have operated politically, socially, economically under that Union, with the Treaty of Union underpinning the UK as a political entity. It is the Union itself that require to be dismantled: first by a democratic vote for independence, followed by UDI and the negotiations. The very reason that no legal expert has taken on the mantle of constitutional leader because they all know that the Treaty is crucial to the dissolution of the UK. Simply reiterating that Scotland was annexed/subsumed/defeated – whatever you want to call it – plays right into the hands of Westminster. There simply is no constitutional altitude that fits Scotland – because of that bloody Treaty.
“We have been part of a Union since 1707”
Correction: Annexed Scotland has been subject to the Union hoax since 1707.
“Independence is modern statecraft”
Correction: Independence means decolonization, according to postcolonial theory and the UN, via the process of self-determination.
“Correction: Annexed Scotland has been subject to the Union hoax since 1707.”
Correction: Just because some deranged, delusional, narcissistic old guy with an unfeasibly overblown opinion of himself proclaims “the Union is a hoax” does not make it so. Not in the eyes of the law, the international community nor the people – not to anyone or anything that matters, basically. In fact, to no one at all, really, except maybe a half dozen or so random, wholly inconsequential cranks on the internet.
On the increasingly obvious reality of the longstanding annexation of Scotland by England, only an eegit would describe Prof Robert Black KC as “some deranged, delusional, narcissistic old guy with an unfeasibly overblown opinion of himself”:
link to youtube.com
As usual, confusing “opinion” and “fact”, Prof.
P.S. Watched your SSRG speech, interesting points to note – some of which I agreed with – but not a lot of references, just a lot of supposition and opinions being presented as facts without much evidence. Also disappointed to see it delivered in the best Morningside patois rather than yon Scots yer aie gaun oan aboot. Must be yon colonisation again, cos ye cannae dae public spikkin or be a Tefal Heid in academia if ye dinnae spik the Queen’s Inglis.
One thing I’m interested in with all this talk about International Law is the aviation policy of an independent Scotland. As an Aviation professional and independence supporter I’ve been seeking clarification on this since before the last referendum without any success; the complete lack of info was a big factor in me voting “No” in 2014. Unfortunately such critical things to a nation’s CNI and economic success tend to be forgotten about and left in the weeds by professional politicians clueless as to the real world.
spartan says:
“As an Aviation professional and independence supporter I’ve been seeking clarification on this since before the last referendum without any success; the complete lack of info was a big factor in me voting “No” in 2014.”
FFS, that’s some crazy kind of “independence supporter” that when the oppurtunity came along, voted no to returning Scotland to self-governing status for reasons.
So yer actually jist a Unionist.
It’s right up there with other #ProjectFear bullshit reasons such as Scots would not get transplants, or lose their EU citizenship…
(That was then, this is now, so no need for Hatey Main to spew out his usual drivel re EU)
How long till we hear…
“I’m an indendpendece supporter and feline expert but there was no clarity on whether I would still be able to own a ginger cat in a self-governing Scotland, so I voted no.”
Or
“I’m an independence supporter and expert meteoroligist but there was no clarity on whether the sun would always shine on my birthday in a self-governing Scotland, so I voted no.”
Oh sorry, I forgot, in today’s tribal times people aren’t allowed to think critically and change their mind with changing circumstances. That requires an IQ greater than 100.
I’ve been quite open here regarding my previous views and how they’ve changed quite substantially since 2014. Obviously too radical a concept for some simple minds.
Fuck me, no wonder politics is a fucking mess with “logic” like that.
“One thing I’m interested in with all this talk about International Law is the aviation policy of an independent Scotland.”
Astute thinking Spartan, as many ex colonies once independent started their own national airline and shipping line too. There is no chance of that happening when everything here is routed via the metropolitan capital. I covered this issue in my other presentation at SSRG on Sunday 18th Oct entitled ‘Scotland: A Colonial Economy’, the video for which will be out shortly.
Thank you, I’ll keep an eye out for that and will watch with interest.
What a stupid thing to say Dan, an aviation professional likely means a highly specialised, industry-specific set of skills. It’s entirely legitimate to consider how independence would affect that sector, given the potentially profound impact of being made redundant (I.e. having to undergo length retraining or move abroad).
Scotland already has its own airline – Loganair. If Scotland were independent with its current government I think they would offer more support to regional internal flights within Scotland. But would increase passenger duty and implement a frequent flier levy. The number of flights to England (by far the biggest market) would reduce. Overall I would say a net negative for aviation in Scotland.
“Overall I would say a net negative for aviation in Scotland”
That is not the experience of numerous former colonial territories who created their own national airlines after independence with a focus on developing direct international links as well as improving domestic connections.
Put simply, after independence these territories were no longer constrained by limited aviation (or shipping) connections mainly to London.
In several cases former colonies became regional hubs themselves, e.g. Singapore, Dubai, Reykjavik etc. Given our advantageous geographic position on the Great Circle route and less congested airspace there is absolutely no reason to believe that Scotland would not also be able to develop major aviation (and shipping) hub status.
No chance of that happening under continued colonial domination.
All very well for you, eh Dan?
You’ll be confident that post-Indy, there will be no impact on home soup making.
There’s much to think about with regard to aviation, space too.
As our wee, pretendy party has connived (by committing to Net Zero ahead of the rest of the UK) with the closure of our only refinery, aviation kerosene will continue to be another dependency on foreign-sourced imports.
Then again, with all that “cheap” leccy supposedly going spare, we might be well placed to push for production of synthetic kerosene. All the advantages of existing aviation technology and infrastructure, and carbon neutral to boot. Heck, produce enough of the stuff and we could sell it for much needed foreign currency.
As for space, Scotland seemingly is well placed geographically to serve the demand for polar orbit launch facilities. A growing market as players move to develop and exploit the thawing polar regions, and international competition for access to them grows.
It’s perfectly reasonable to look at potential new hi tech industries like these and wonder if a government that failed spectacularly at jam jar recycling would be up to the task.
@Aidan – sadly its the response I’ve come to expect from political types on comment sections on various websites in today’s tribal, polarised, monotropic-thinking society where a Google search makes everybody an expert in their own eyes, opinions are mistaken for facts, social media has given a voice to chronic stupidity and disagreement invokes a fit of rage.
Not to blow my own trumpet, but as a CEng MRAeS in the industry for 22 years, working in Air Traffic Management and also an active private pilot throughout that time, I sort of know what I’m talking about regarding aviation. And yes, regarding 2014, the thought of losing an established career, a good salary and potentially having to relocate my family abroad for job prospects (ATM/ATC is a very niche role) after reading the thoroughly unconvincing White Paper did directly impact my voting decision at the time, which I will not apologise for, despite it seemingly invoking illogical and hysterical rage in others, for whatever reason.
As a point regarding Loganair, although branded “Scotland’s Airline” and having tartan-painted tails, they aren’t a national carrier; they’re a private business, who’s pricing and service receives a lot of justifiable criticism from remote communities reliant on them.
Alf is correct that independence would allow us to shape transport policies in general – aviation, shipping, rail and road – to our own tailored needs, unconstrained by the bungling barons on the Thames. My biggest concern with this would be ignorant and destructive idiots like the Greens or the professional politicians in the likes of the SNP, UniPartyRed and UniPartyBlue being put in charge of stuff they clearly are ignorant of and inflicting utter ruin.
Put even more simply, Alf, you become a regional hub by being in a suitable location for lots of places and routes that need a regional hub.
I consider it rather self evident that if a regional hub was needed anywhere near here, then Oslo and/or Dublin would have become that regional hub long since.
Global Warming leading to the development of new polar shipping routes might affect that calculus. I can’t see Scotland offering easier access to any sizeable market, other than the English one. It’s questionable if any shipping would regard saving a day’s sailing south to any of the English ports over the hassle of unloading in Scotland and transporting goods by land further south.
@Spartan
CEng? Respect and kudos 🙂
“I consider it rather self evident that if a regional hub was needed anywhere near here, then Oslo and/or Dublin would have become that regional hub long since.”
You obviously know little about intercontinental hub and spoke transport networks, Hatey, compared with those who have actually researched the subject:
link to taylorfrancis.com
link to sciencedirect.com
link to link.springer.com
@Alf – as part of that study did ask any shipping or freight operators whether they’d be interested in shipping their goods onto Orkney, then loading them onto another boat where they could then take them to Rotterdam/Copenhagen/Felixstowe (I.e. where they actually want them) rather than just shipping straight to those destinations. Not only that inconvenience for no purpose, but it would also involved goods undertaking two crossings of the Pentland firth which is a notoriously dangerous stretch of water. It was described in a recent fatal accident report as “extraordinary violent and fatal sea conditions”
@Spartan – I know Loganair is private, but so is BA, Aer Lingus, Iberia, the American Big 3 etc. I’m not sure there is much benefit in a post-independence Scotland setting up state owned airline. I do wonder whether the highlands/islands route could sustain competition that might help bring down prices. I know Flybe used to fly some of the larger routes but the market conditions, particularly costs, are more difficult now.
Ach, who knew in a self-governing Scotland so many folk would lose their jobs because we wouldn’t have any aircraft flying and need for airports, and all the other “CNI” that goes along with a functioning society.
What a short-sighted waste of dosh putting that near billion quid piece of shit tramline in to serve Edinburgh airport when some hybrid buses would have sufficed. But at least the Spanish built trams (no Scottish jobs building them…) are leccy powered unlike most of the main rail network so we still need diesel fuel (imported now) powered trains.
Strange that with your aviation credentials you had nothing to add when I’ve previously mentioned aviation content such as the substantial change in fuel supply origins with the closing of Grangemouth and loss of those jobs, skillsets, and infrastructure. So pretty much all the huge volumes of fuel used in Scotland for the likes of transport, agriculture, and heating is imported now. Crazy letting so much of our critical national infrastructure being out of our control.
What about International Law and the legality of extraordinary rendition flights within the UK’s aviation policy.
Obviously there would be quite a lot of matters requiring clarity and negotiation with the dissolution of the UK. But the bigger picture positive is that we could actually begin to improve Scotland’s lot in so many ways instead of everything going to ruination under continued London Rule and its bastard child parliament in Auld Reekie.
You have to remember that the UK is so shit that even Reform supporter CC is planning to move to Greece. He’ll be an expat and not an immigrant though.
It’s not a question of NO aircraft flying. If;
– independence significantly reduces demand on the rUK – Scotland routes;
– the Scottish government increases APD; and
– The SNP/Greens introduce a frequent flyer levy.
Then it’s very likely that carriers like BA and EasyJet who base aircraft/maintenance in Scotland, will move some of their assets elsewhere where they can make more money. Aviation is a hard nosed commercial business with fierce completion, airlines have to allocate their assets on the routes where they can make the most money. The strategy teams at those airlines will always be considering whether that narrowbody in Edinburgh would be better off in Alicante or Copenhagen or somewhere else. If the decision is made to move it and you’re the engineer that looks after it it’s tough cookie.
You’ll get no argument from me Dan regarding any of your points raised.
The closure of Grangemouth was an utterly grievous act of self harm which is infuriating for all the reasons listed, allowed by an ignorant and dogmatic government full of brainwashed Net Zero activists.
Edinburgh Trams were a colossally overbudget, catastrophically disruptive and completely pointless pile of shite – a facsimile of the No.22 bus route – imposed by a malevolent and hopelessly incompetent local council hell-bent on a crusade against private motor transport and individual liberty.
And yes, independence would allow us to make the decisions we need for this country. The UK is falling apart and it’s time to leave out of necessity in my opinion.
“as part of that study did ask any shipping or freight operators whether they’d be interested in shipping their goods onto Orkney”
The port authority had received bids from international container terminal operators to develop an Orkney container transhipment terminal and had selected an operator. Modelling confirmed the location was optimal based on zero deviation for mainline ships and lower average feeder distances relative to hubs in the North Sea basin.
However, despite industry commitment the UK Dept for Transport opposed the project, preferring instead to support container terminal developments in the south of England, e.g. at London Gateway, and also to develop a new port at Liverpool.
The Scottish Gov then diverted funding earmarked for the container terminal to support the wave energy Pelamis project – the latter was cancelled after £50m+ of state investment and the council eventually bought the broken wave machine for £1 which went for scrap.
Which explains what happens in a colony, ‘where the colonized wish to develop and the colonizer holds him back’ (Memmi).
Okay – so reading between the lines this is another one of these schemes dreamt up in the public sector where a private operator/investor will be interested, but only if:
– the U.K. Government provides 90/100% of the capex; and
– underwrites the opex for a 30+ year period.
Because as you know in logistics customers buy largely based on price (and to a lesser extend speed). Nobody is going to want to pay the extra port fees to have their container unloaded and reloaded in Orkney when it could sail straight into Rotterdam/Hamburg/Felixstowe etc. where it can go onto a truck/train to its actual destination.
In contrast, London Gateway, sits adjacent to one of the largest and wealthiest cities in the world, with 17m people living within around 90 minutes drive, hence DP World were willing to invest c£1.5bn with very little state support. I would imagine they had binding agreements with major shipping companies to use the facility before the first spade went into the ground.
“Which explains what happens in a colony, ‘where the colonized wish to develop and the colonizer holds him back’ (Memmi)”
Naw.
In your first example, you can’t logically argue that we’re being fleeced by a rapacious, extractive, exploitative coloniser AND argue that a potentially profitable logistics solution gets held back because the coloniser doesn’t want to make any rapacious, extractive, exploitative profits.
Your second example, the broken wave energy machine, is a simple manifestation of the laws of physics.
And the laws of economics again. If the machine had demonstrated any promise, or been capable of further improvement, they’d have fixed it, eyes focused on the rapacious, extractive, exploitative profits to be made from yet another of “Scotland’s mahoosive resources”.
There are very good reasons why the world is standardising on wind turbines, solar panels and batteries for renewable electricity, Alf.
They work, they’re becoming cheaper every day, and they’re what the world’s manufacturing superpower – the Chinese – are making and selling.
The reason for the imperial takeover of Scotland was that Imperial England was deep in debt, primarily due to successive wars over the preceding century.
For centuries Scotland has been robbed of her wealth. More importantly, Scotland’s sons and daughters have been sacrificed in Imperial England’s wars.
England is again poking the Russian Bear, as the UK and its EU / USA conspirators, lust after Russia’s wealth of oil and gas reserves.
Again, Scots will be sacrificed as colonial cannon fodder for Imperial England.
You’d think with all the ‘prepare for war with Russia’ nonsense that that Whitehall, the Army top brass, and Jacob Rees Mogg types are getting rabidly excited over, the SNP could easily attract the additional 10-20% needed to make an independence a complete shoo-in.
Yet, just watch it court favour with EU and NATO mainstream dinner party opinion instead, than actually use an issue to put clear water between the two options.
Had to laugh at this.
link to archive.is
I say this in light that the whisky industry urged people to vote no in 2014:
link to archive.is
I’ll bet they regret saying that now.
Personally speaking, I’ve drank a few whisky’s in the past, even expensive ones and it never grabbed me as a drink so can’t really say I’ve any sympathy over this apart towards the ordinary workers whose jobs might be at risk over this ruling.
I do love my Bailey’s 1tre at Asda £11.
100% Yes.
I’m content with a just a few of can’s of lager myself 🙂
Compared with a 6-pack, a single bottle is easier to shoplift.
Not me, I hasten to add. Not now the mental enfeeblment PIP is coming through, regular as clockwork.
Miss M. suggests “feeding disorder, unspecified” for the horse food, so that’s a win. Apparently I could also bag circadian…err, thingy disorder because I prefer to work at night and sleep through the day. There’s also my raging fear of dentists, but that would just be greedy 🙂
I tried that working at night idea but security would never let me in.
Jobsworth, fascist cants.
A wee word of advice about the horse food, MH.
Go easy on the oats.
So it has to be gloves off on our part. Make the English barsturts rue the day they ever dared to make whisky.
Scotland must, as a national priority, commence the commercial production and marketing of hotpot.
You do make me laugh Hatey. I can still feel the tremors of you banging your desk as you read my post.
As much as I don’t really care about whisky or the industry that makes it, the point that is being made is that the issue is not about the location where it is made but how it is made and how it impacts the public perception of the whisky brand.
It like making an alcoholic drink by distilling apple juice being able to sell it as cider. It tastes a bit like cider and will be cheaper to make than real cider which uses pressed apples but it dilutes the brand recognition of cider.
Ach well, not to worry Hatey, details were never important to me when you go on a rant. I just sit back and laugh.
I will stick my neck out and say not a single job will be affected, Scottish whisky is unassailable
@ Aidan
If the production method to make English whisky is cheaper where savings are passed on and is just as good as the traditional method of making Scottish whisky, will it have an effect on whisky?
Scottish whisky is a top tier luxury item – if consumers want cheap whisky they can already buy mass produced stuff from the states so,English whisky won’t make a dent in the Scottish market even if it’s cheaper to produce.
Sadly, a lot of Scotch whisky has greatly declined in quality. Casks are being reused too often to save money and quality is sacrificed to make cut price supermarket swill. Barley is chosen for it’s alcohol yield not for it’s flavour.
There are discerning customers out there, though, who want something better and new and old distilleries like Ardnamurchan and Springbank turn out superior whisky to cater for them. English distilleries are stepping up to the mark too. I bought a bottle of Wireworks whisky from the White Peaks Distiller and it’s a darned good whisky. I still prefer my Springbank though.
Just checking: Are you “£1,400 better off” per year as colonial subjects of the English Crown?
Constitutional lawfare / UN / decolonisation is necessary and useful, but is only really a tactic; you can get lost in the mists of time, or poring over the fineprint of what some archaism in an ancient parchment -really- means, in doing so forgetting how simple the situation really is.
In the wizard of oz we find dorothy lost in that mythical land go on a magical journey – (she -must-) “follow the yellow brick road” – with the lion and the tinman the scarecrow, and the munchkins, the flying monkeys … witches … we’ve all seen it – she eventually gets to the end to find the wizard, who is revealed as a fraud, a little man behind the curtain, making a big noise about how powerful he is, in reality – a weakling …
WHAT THE FUCK WAS THE POINT OF ALL THAT, the fucking pissing about, the side quests, the subplots … waste of time (apart from the drug-fuelled gangbang from the munchkins)
– dorothy still wants to go home – I think it’s the good witch who just says to her :
YOU HAVE THE RUBY SLIPPERS … YOU COULD HAVE GONE HOME AT ANY TIME …
AT ANY TIME
we don’t need to prove anything legally, historically, or engage in some baroque dance, coming home to indy is simpler than you think; first of all you need an indy party, one which will actually do it. It should have no other policies – yes, none – when people try to divert you, divide you with “what is your position on” – “how would you deal with that” – “a penny on or off income tax” – you simply say “indy”. No splitters, no LGB caucus, none of that, indy, indy alone and nothing but; vote for us, you get indy. Also having to prove at the outset you have “all the answers to everything, right now, and in the future for all time” – is also a trap; politicians in the UK generally make it up as they go along and understand little of the world, geopolitics, finance, AI etc. We do not need to be all knowing and perfect to deserve our indy.
– then you need to win an election. Then you go to the UN and call it, and win overwhelming acceptance from the world – PEOPLE IN THE UK, THE ENGLISH, HAVE NO UNDERSTANDING OF HOW MUCH THEY ARE DESPISED, HATED, by almost everyone else on earth – but what makes it stick is when you go see the americans and you tell them 2 things
– as a successor state of the UK, you wish to retain NATO membership
– all commercial contracts with american companies will be honoured
(as a sweetener, if necessary, you can offer to kit out the new armed forces with US gear; the british gear is decrepit and not worth taking our share of)
the yanks say “business as usual” with a shrug (and no desire to involve themselves in a “local beef”) and are okay
that leaves england with no moves and nowhere to go; it is a vassal of the US, mind, and NATO countries don’t attack one another. They are fucked, and in any case they have bigger problems to worry about as sooner or later their midlands muslims will start similar shite to what we have seen in france lately. It is inevitable, and the UK army (shite) is in no way setup to deal with a civil war.
Once you see how easy the plan actually is – we have “the ruby slippers” all along – the main block is in creating this “indy and nothing but” party; there is tremendous inertia involved in getting a party started, the main problem being that it is always the mainstream media which decides the overton window, who is legit, who is a “nutter”, and we see even with the best raw material – Salmond, a proven leader – Alba struggled, and is now defunct.
– but history tells us small parties can appear out of nowhere and win big; england is interesting right now with reform, but not so much them – farage is a cityboy playing bait and switch, but with no actual intent to solve the problems he pretends to address – and he is being found out among his own support; Lowe and restore is actually the “real deal” (if you are into all that little englander shite). And people on twitter and on youtube, nobodies from nowhere, can suddenly become “influencers” and create major channels – even idiots like craig houston, real amateur hour, who forgets what he is saying half the time, but he is out there, talking to people, reporting on what the media ignores.
Anything is possible, and nothing happens, until it does; then it happens all at once.
now “click your heels”, end the MYSTIFICATION, stop playing into the con, the eternal bait and switch
– all you need are people with the balls to do it, to actually go for it, to press the button and deliver what they promise.
Of course the english will go nuts, foaming at the mouth, making threats, conjuring up nightmares – but when you realise – “they’ve got nuthin” – they are the “man behind the curtain” – and they have so many other problems to deal with right now, they have never been weaker – and a successor Scotland which retains NATO membership leaves them no cards to play (- quitting NATO 10 years down the line is fine by me; its an army for gangsters, but it could do a job for us) – then there is nothing to fear and nothing real to stop you, only union jack smoke and mirrors.
England, over populated, under resourced, an economy with no growth, a country where about 10 families own fucking everything, that is controlled by the city, and with powerless politicians who can’t do nowt in case the bond markets grumble, then the muslim 5th column playing taqqiya games waiting for its moment, and to help them – an uncounted, unseen army, living in HMOs and huts in back gardens; armed forces which are decrepit and useless mainly because they are set up to fight old wars, not the new ones. And faced with overwhelming domestic problems (their water is full of shit and the leccy grid is creaking) – they turn round and tell us to “prepare for war” with a far more powerful nation which knows how to defend itself and is thoroughly “match fit”; england has never been weaker, and given what is to come, it is time we left, to leave them to their karmic punishment.
Alf: there are hundreds of thousands of Unionists in Scotland who believe explicitly and implicitly in the Union. Telling them now, after more than 300 years that, sorry but we were annexed/subsumed/whatever is not a good look. It makes those of us who are independistas look like a bunch of collaborative amateurs who acquiesced in everything.
If the Treaty underpins the UK – and, constitutionally, it does – and, yet, there is no Treaty, why do we continue to treat the UK as if there were a Treaty?
Professors Walker and Campbell argued that there was and is a Treaty, but that it has been breached by England-as-the-UK. They were arguing against Professors Crawford and Boyle who said what you and Professor Black are saying: that Scotland was annexed/subsumed into a Greater England. So, we are agreeing with Crawford and Boyle now, are we? If we are, we will be trying the secede from a state as a region of that state – not as a colony, which I do not believe we are in constitutional terms -instead of as a partner nation. That is a whole, new ball game, as our American cousins would say.
International law relating to territorial alienation informs us that annexation is unlawful; hence an annexed people/nation retain the right to recover their sovereignty under international law.
As I explain here:
link to youtube.com
Alf: even where they have signed a treaty and where they have acquiesced in their own subsumption for over 300 years?
Baird-Do you trawl through the comments section on Wings solely to say the same crap time after time AND ESPECIALLY to post a link to some other shite you have written or said.
It is clear you are in love…………..with yersel!
Lorncal:
Scotland’s unelected elites never had the constitutional authority to sell the nation in the first place, even under extreme military threat and coercion, and with an inoperable worthless deceitful violated treaty that was never intended to be in Scotland’s interest.
The issue is about the grab of territory and undue power that entailed the forcible persuasion of other peoples. That has been part of English imperial policy in numerous countries which they considered essential to the defense and furtherance of their own selfish economic and strategic interests.
Northcode,
Just in case you missed it ( I have been elsewhere) I asked today upthread what you think would constitute a mandate for Scottish independence.
I suppose I should also like to ask how such a mandate might be had.
Other views welcome.
There is a very interesting post on Mark Collets blog if anyone is interested
Sigh… Response held in moderation because the links must have had “bad” words…
From an article about Rosebank in the Guardian Online:
“The Guardian also revealed on Tuesday that the Treasury had already factored in tax revenues from the scheme, which are expected to hit about £500m by the end of this parliament”
If any of these boys know about what’s happening with Indy at the UN, they sure as feck aren’t taking a blind bit of notice.
Looks like they’ve parked the entire topic in the Nothingburger file.
Personally, I’m stoked that hundreds of Scottish jobs and the economic success or failure of hundreds of Scottish families is now determined by somebody called Miatta Fahnbulleh.
Back in the bad, old days, it would have been some pale, stale male, with a resolutely English name, calling the shots.
Ain’t progress grand?
“Thus we see the most tragic aspect of colonialism is that the colonised become willfully blind to who is colonising them and hence become unable to extricate themselves from their doun hadden state” (Hatey)
Consensus across the MSM is clear – yesterday’s “do nothing” budget fired the starting gun for a WM GE in 2027.
So Scotland has less than a year to get started on building a democratically popular alternative to the SNP. Doable, given drive, determination, insight, planning, and a bit of charisma from the people fronting the operation.
Being young enough to still have hair and not having faces like skelped erses won’t hurt either. As will being able to string coherent words together and be confident on whether they are men or women.
Looking forwards immensely to seeing all this firing up and getting under way. Indy hope in every Scottish postcode!
Sorry! I just felt like having a laugh at what might have been.
Scotland will do fuck all other than hand wringing, as per usual, act surprised when Andeh calls it, then slouch out to vote the SNP and a rag tag of other has beens back to the WM trough in 2027.
As some long dead, third world racist observed, “out of the game”, but only because we have made that national, collective choice to assume that role.
That right, aye?
Prick.
Shut up James
Yer maw gaun oot agin, James?
Mind and dinna question her too closely when she comes hame. Sometimes best not tae ken, eh?