As we’ve repeatedly pointed out, Wings has made NO comments about the “workplace harassment” allegations made against Alex Salmond several years ago. We’ve only commented on the CRIMINAL allegations, and workplace harassment isn’t a crime. (It’s a matter for an employment tribunal, not the police.)
But the real question is WHY Andy Wightman is so doggedly attached to these two complainers that he’s determined to keep digging himself further into a hole of lies. And everyone knows what you tend to find when you start digging holes.
“Hello Stuart. We’ve been contacted by a reader who says he also contacted you about a post on the website in the early hours of Saturday. Referring to Nicola Sturgeon, the poster says “Decapitating this witch would stop the SNP dead in their tracks.”
Our reader, Ian Reid, an SNP activist in the Borders, has been a regular Wings reader but was taken aback by the language. He had hoped you would have deleted the post, but that hasn’t happened.
He has reported it to the police and given a statement to them.
He has also given us these comments on why the Alba Party should condemn this sort of material and cut its ties to the Wings site.
“Alex Salmond and the leaders of the new party need to separate themselves from that, they need to call it out. They seem to be trying to set themselves up as the moral guardians for women’s rights, which I absolutely support. At the same time, we’ve got somebody posting this on a blog that they clearly associate with and clearly use.
On the one hand, they’re talking about gender-proofing their policies, which is great. On the other hand, they’ve got this where a woman is being described as the devil herself, and where there’s a reference to decapitating the witch having a justifiable end.
That needs to be called out. The party needs to come out and say something about it. The best possible outcome would be that they do condemn it. It would be such a powerful message. Separating themselves from that cesspit would be a very politically astute thing for them. As long as they don’t, it’s colluding with it, it’s condoning it.”
This is for a potential story online and in print.
If you didn’t already know that the BBC were going to run a character-assassination hatchet job on Alex Salmond tonight (and another one tomorrow), you could surmise it easily enough from the state of the Scottish media in the last few days.
But it’s today’s Daily Record that dredges the depths of the journalistic sewer with a barrel and then scrapes the very bottom of it for the grubbiest, oiliest sludge it can find.
The BBC’s Reporting Scotland is, in our view, directly responsible for at least 80% of Yes supporters’ belief that the UK’s state broadcaster is biased against independence. Almost all of the worst examples of unbalanced or downright dishonest coverage over the last five years come from the flagship teatime bulletin.
Normally the amateur blogger, unqualified would-be economist and unsuccessful dog-food salesman that BBC Scotland and the Daily Record employ on a regular basis to openly troll Yes voters restricts himself, when attacking this site, to crude abuse or smear and innuendo like the below, tweeted on Holocaust Memorial Day last year:
It’s important to note, firstly, that the version of Sadiq Khan’s speech to the Scottish Labour conference he tweeted on Saturday morning simply flat-out said that Scottish nationalists were the same as racists and sectarian bigots. Its meaning was as clear as crystal to the Daily Record, a newspaper which is hardly hostile to Khan’s party.
“No difference” is a stark and unambiguous phrase. The speech did not contain the hastily-added qualifiers about “in this respect” and “of course I’m not saying the SNP are racist” which suddenly appeared when he read it out onstage that afternoon.
There’s a truly abominable piece of hatemongering in today’s Times. A grotesequely dishonest Nat-bashing smear job based on stupendously misrepresented fragments of quotes, it’s penned by Patrick Harkness, someone who the paper identifies as “a past co-chairman of the RSE [Royal Society of Edinburgh] Young Academy of Scotland”.
For some reason it’s chosen to leave a few lines off his CV.
Readers may be aware that Wings Over Scotland is (fairly remarkably, really) the UK’s second-most-read politics blog, behind the hardcore right-wing “Guido Fawkes”.
Our “competitor” isn’t a site we look at a lot – the comments make the Daily Mail readership seem like enlightened and thoughtful moderates – but last week someone asked us about a smear piece they’d run on SNP MP Corri Wilson, and we only just remembered today to check it out. Our initial findings weren’t well received.
It seems that Mr Fawkes and his minions aren’t too keen on scrutiny themselves.
Since the astonishing election of 56 SNP MPs to the UK Parliament last May, the Unionist media – suddenly deprived of a whole contacts book full of friendly Scottish Labour bench-warmers ready to feed it cosy stories over a boozy expenses lunch in Whitehall – has raked through every bin and gutter in the land looking for anything (however pathetic) that it can try to puff up, distort, and rope into service as “dirt” on each of the Nat members, in an attempt to discredit them and the party.
So let’s just have a little look in here and – YIKES!
The Scottish Daily Mail’s front page lead today is so galactically despicable that it’s easy to overlook another story that it bundles in with the same “SNP BAD” attack.
While excoriating Dr Philippa Whitford for having the sheer shameless gall to help save women’s lives in her holidays, the alleged newspaper also devotes a page-high article to an attack on another Nat MP, George Kerevan, for employing his wife.
agent x on The Pillars Of Sanity: “Notice also that Upton is described as “she” despite having a cock and bollocks.” Jul 19, 19:34
Aidan on The Pillars Of Sanity: “@Kelpie – you are exactly right, that is definitely what they are planning to do” Jul 19, 19:22
Aidan on The Pillars Of Sanity: “@Alf – how does that relate specifically to the comments raised?” Jul 19, 19:20
Kelpie on The Pillars Of Sanity: “There are plenty of legal types on X saying that NHS Fife can totally end this right now by basically…” Jul 19, 19:15
agent x on The Pillars Of Sanity: “The National barely mentions the Sandie Peggie case but yesterday published: “Sandie Peggie denies making racist comment as new allegation…” Jul 19, 19:09
Alf Baird on The Pillars Of Sanity: “In the colonial situation there is only colonial governance: which implies “a government and a judicial system fed and renewed…” Jul 19, 19:04
Dave Hansell on The Pillars Of Sanity: ““The days when police forces across the UK acted as pet goon squads for every misogynist incel with a grudge,…” Jul 19, 18:39
Dave G on The Pillars Of Sanity: “As a matter of strict law the Northumbria Police judgement does not apply in Scotland since the jurisdiction of the…” Jul 19, 18:30
James on Points Into Prongs: “Dave L; yep, they don’t call he/she/it the Site Prick for nothing….” Jul 19, 18:19
agent x on The Pillars Of Sanity: “@ Alf “On 8 December 2023, the Outer House of the Court of Session, part of Scotland’s highest civil court,…” Jul 19, 18:15
Confused on The Pillars Of Sanity: “balance is restored to the force www.youtube.com/watch?v=HAbIL8C2JJ0” Jul 19, 18:12
agent x on The Pillars Of Sanity: “16 APRIL 2025 – VICTORY #1 Arguably (we’ll come to that later) the most crucial victory of them all was…” Jul 19, 18:11
Andy Storrie on The Pillars Of Sanity: “Come on, Campbell. You just canny help yourself, son. Let it go. This bullshit is yesterdays propaganda, lad!” Jul 19, 17:33
Aidan on The Pillars Of Sanity: “@Alf – but isn’t that exactly what has happened, look at who are the hero’s in this story. The U.K.…” Jul 19, 17:27
William G Walker on The Pillars Of Sanity: “Dear Rev, I’m pleased that your “report of victories” got a first-class response from all your fans! It must take…” Jul 19, 17:21
Lorn on The Pillars Of Sanity: “Great piece, Rev. I do hope that you, with all the other people who placed their heads above the parapet…” Jul 19, 17:13
Alf Baird on The Pillars Of Sanity: “A widna haud ma breith on any UK state quango protecting the rights of Scots, though she may learn something…” Jul 19, 17:06
Peter McAvoy on The Pillars Of Sanity: “Well done to everybody who refused to accept and challenged this woke fascism and to the deserved victories you have…” Jul 19, 16:22
Ian le coup on The Pillars Of Sanity: “DEI Diversity Equality Inclusivity is an absolute and utter con, created by the woke by the woke. DEI must DIE!!!” Jul 19, 15:57
sarah on The Pillars Of Sanity: “Somewhere, over the rainbow… there is a happy land of sanity where children and women, and their supporters, can live…” Jul 19, 15:53
Marie Clark on The Pillars Of Sanity: “Well done Stuart, you’ve been in this fight for a long time and it’s nice to see the outcome now.…” Jul 19, 15:49
panda paws on The Pillars Of Sanity: “However deranged this week has been, I have every faith that next week will be the gift that keeps on…” Jul 19, 15:47
agent x on The Pillars Of Sanity: “Meanwhile I am really enjoying watching the beautiful talented women playing in the EURO’s 25 without seeing big bollocked men…” Jul 19, 15:45
SilentMajority on The Pillars Of Sanity: “Great article (and many thanks to the author!). Each and every victory an occasion to cheer. I am especially pleased…” Jul 19, 15:28
Robert Mellish on The Pillars Of Sanity: “Meanwhile, at Pride Glasgow this morning, we could see on open and ‘proud’ display the extent of capture of corporate…” Jul 19, 15:22
Mark Beggan on The Pillars Of Sanity: “It looks to me that the whole of Civic Scotland licks the gravy one way or another.” Jul 19, 15:06
agent x on The Pillars Of Sanity: “Sturgeon: “There are people who have opposed this Bill that cloak themselves in women’s rights to make it acceptable, but…” Jul 19, 15:03
agent x on The Pillars Of Sanity: “Well done Stu. I note that various press are stating that Swinney and NHS should put an end to the…” Jul 19, 14:55