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Wings Over Scotland


The flip test

Posted on August 21, 2019 by

If you’re a writer for a living and you want to check if something you’ve written might be embarrassingly stupid, there’s an easy and quick technique you can use.

By way of example, here’s Kenny Farquharson in the Times today, on the subject of the supposed similarities in the relationships between the Tories and the Brexit Party, and the SNP and the potential new Wings party:

So here’s the trick: switch the protagonists around.

Imagine for a moment that it was Wings Over Scotland that was demanding men be given access to all women-only spaces simply by announcing that they – with their beards and their penises and their Y chromosomes – were women too.

Imagine that WE were insisting male rapists should be housed in women’s prisons. Imagine WE were the ones trying to force women to accept the presence of men everywhere, even in rape refuges, no matter what the proven consequences for vastly increased numbers of sexual assaults or worse. Imagine WE were aggressively calling for crimes committed by males to be attributed to women.

Now imagine that Nicola Sturgeon was the one defending women’s rights from these demands. Imagine that with her impeccable feminist credentials, she was refusing to concede on any of them, saying that women’s rights to single-sex services had been hard-won and were much-needed, and that she would not be the First Minister who threw them away at the behest of some threatening middle-aged man, because to do such a thing would be to betray the clear wishes of women, and indeed everyone else, and to place women in real and serious danger of harm.

Do we feel, readers, that in such a scenario people like Kenny Farquharson would be attacking the FM as “angry and reactionary” for such a stance, while lauding us as the voice of “moderate, sensible, optimistic and progressive centre-ground nationalism” for trying to chuck women’s rights in the bin?

It’s a bit silly when you think about it, isn’t it?

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  1. 21 08 19 22:56

    The flip test | speymouth
    Ignored

134 to “The flip test”

  1. Den Cairns
    Ignored
    says:

    Absolutely!!

  2. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    Safe spaces equals happy faces 🙂 🙂

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZ2IjZ2YrTw

    Imagine the good of everything!

  3. Thepnr
    Ignored
    says:

    Kenny Farquharson is obviously concerned about the damage a Wings party might do to the other Unionists parties more than anything else.

    To write such a story comparing the Brexit party pressure on the Tories to become more right wing Brexit oriented in a first past the post system with and threat that a Wings party would have on the SNP in a Holyrood election is disingenuous to say the least.

    The Brexit party are a threat to the Tories if they fail to get the UK out of the EU by 31st Oct as promised, they could do damage. Wings are no threat to the SNP fighting only on the list vote in a Holyrood election given current polling.

    No, the main danger of a Wings party is to the Tories and Labour, Farquharson knows this as well as I or the Rev do. It’s just a fact, hence the shrill screaming. I’ll take the publicity though as it’s guaranteed to backfire and blow up in their faces.

  4. manandboy
    Ignored
    says:

    Confirmation that another Independence Party will torpedo Unionist ambitions in Scotland.

    Proposed by Stu, the new Independence Party is the best idea for Scotland for ages.

  5. Martin Gorrie
    Ignored
    says:

    It shouldn’t need a man in Bath to state the obvious that anyone with a penis, whatever they call themselves, should not be in women’s refuges, toilets, changing rooms and other single sex spaces. For Nicola to call herself a feminist but not listen to groups like For Women Scotland shows she is either out of touch or doesn’t care. She is no feminist if she puts women and girls at risk and doesn’t stand up for their rights in sports, business and other areas where transwomen are trying to take over.

    It’s also a total vote loser which is where the Wings party comes in because thousands of women and men are deserting the SNP over this issue. I am one of them. The only party i think that might stop this is the Conservatives as Raab and Davis have spoken out. Should i vote Conservative? I still want Independence which i think will happen but i don’t want to live in a Scotland with woke people like Nicola in charge. We can’t throw women under the bus and if people don’t understand this issue is bigger than independence then i feel sorry for this country.

  6. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    Ah think ahm a comin’ down wae ah FFFFFever…

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZ2IjZ2YrTw

    Independence is the Cure

  7. Ian McCubbin
    Ignored
    says:

    The non sense of many unionists when they try to take objective stances is at best confusing, at worst down right ticker to make the good guys bad and play off against each other.
    Then this allows them to playvthe bad guys as good.
    Confusing isnt it?

  8. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    Whose up for a chat THIS here Wednesday evening ’19

    How ye doin’ Scotland…

    Let’s hear ye!

  9. aldo_macb
    Ignored
    says:

    The gender identity is not something I have strong opinions on – and I can’t see what it’s got to do with independence. How many others are like me?

  10. defo
    Ignored
    says:

    Sorry Martin, but bigger than indy this ridiculous issue isn’t.!
    We won’t be voting Yes for a wokey dictatorship, but for a real democracy, where parties espousing unpopular policies will be told to gtf by the majority.

    Future generations will have a good giggle over this abhorrent madness currently poisoning the aether, but there’s not a lot to laugh about right now.

    I blame the lawyers 🙂

  11. TJenny
    Ignored
    says:

    There ain’t no party, like a Wings Over Scotland party. 😉

  12. Dr Jim
    Ignored
    says:

    News just in from Shetland as Nicola Sturgeon signs up 71 year old as a new member on the doorstep

    Aye but we’re leaving in our droves

    @Aldo mac 10:54pm

    Agreed Aldo

  13. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    Hey, THIS one goes out to you non-Winger Kenny Farquharssson hehe

    You Have Changed:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPu091i7AF4

    Iceland ROCK!!

  14. Martin Gorrie
    Ignored
    says:

    Two men who are blind to the fact biological women voters make up 50% of this country and are you are ignorant thats lots of female SNP members are saying they have left or will do. Just because you don’t understand the issue or are too stupid to google Katie Dolatowski, Jessica Yaniv or Karen White to see what is already happening. Ask your women friends and family if they want to share spaces with these three predators. Look at @glinner on twitter and read all his weekly war on women reports. If you’re not with women on this issue and are prepared to throw them under a bus, then you’re either ‘a misogynist, a predator, a woke’ imbecile or you have your head in the sand.

  15. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    Evenin’ Martin, how ye doin’

    Let’s see what the Wingers have to say, on…

    The flip test

  16. Morgatron
    Ignored
    says:

    Oh Stuart , your just a naughty ,naughty boy, you crazy extremist. KF is just a C without the fries and gravy- cock of a bloke.

  17. Robert Peffers
    Ignored
    says:

    News Flash!

    recent surveys show 99.999% of MSM, “Journalists”, are proven innumerate.

  18. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    Hey Morgatron, how be ye do?

    Ah went an picked up The Dark Crystal DVD frae the shopping mall late last week, watched it over NOW 17 times already, dance

    Westminster are the Skeksis
    iScotland, we be the Mystics

    Love creation

  19. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    As of the next hour it will be 70 days until no-deal Br UK-exit

    Whaddya think about dat?

    We own midnight

    Remember

  20. Morgatron
    Ignored
    says:

    Evening Cactus my old chum. I’m diddling well hows about you? The Dark Crystal
    is a super movie, must dig it out again.nite nite early in the morning.

  21. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    Cheers

  22. Dr Jim
    Ignored
    says:

    Martin Gorrie

    You’ve just slung about five different insults at people who haven’t insulted you, then invented numbers that don’t exist by saying thousands of people have left the SNP, then you go on to tell us we should maybe consider voting Tory because they’ll sort it all out

    The problem with all this rambling is the issue that you’re using to make a fuss about trying to get folk NOT to vote SNP hasn’t been decided on and that kinda gives your game away

    Now call me a name Martin, tell be I’m uneducated, that always goes down a treat

  23. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    Diddling dandy dude

    My PLAYlist just moved alphabetically from Eva Cassidy to Fleetwood Mac, the very early years, almost 70 days until “something”, said Morla 😉

    SO what do you readers think aboot Kenny…

    Is ee a Skeksis?

  24. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    THIS here Brexit/UKexit story is neverending

    We can bring it to an end

    Vote Scotland

  25. cynicalHighlander
    Ignored
    says:

    A chancer Cactus

  26. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    Welcome back to midnight

    It’s Autumn

  27. Lenny Hartley
    Ignored
    says:

    aldo_macb Re Gender self Id, some SNP elected officials have had a go at each other in public (Twitter) on this issue and not a tweetie bird about SNP “civil war” on the MSM. Why do you think that is? Perhaps they have got a cunning plan to come out with all sorts of outrageous storys during an Indy ref 2 to frighten up to 50% of the voting population into voting no.
    Maybe they are not going to take this golden opporchancity but i think there is a better chance of seeing a flock of pigs fly overhead.

  28. Martin Gorrie
    Ignored
    says:

    So Jim ( i dont use pronouns they are only for self important morons and woke bros)

    So you can insult me by calling me a Tory but you cant take it, i bet you have a beard as well. So your’e happy for your wife, mother, daughter to get attacked in a toilet by transwomen like Katie Dolatowski?

    Do you actually read Wings on twitter and see the women who say they wont vote SNP on this?
    Nicola refuses to meet For Women Scotland but she did meet Trans Alliance so we know what side she is on. I want Independence as much as you but i realise this is a vote losing issue and in 2014 it was women who were most likely to vote remain so the YES vote needs all the womens votes it can get. You obviously dont care about women in the slightest. I hope you and your TS chums will be happy. Do you wear a puppy outfit at Pride as well?

  29. cynicalHighlander
    Ignored
    says:

    Been feeling like autumn for the past three weeks Cactus up here. You’re behind the times for once. Lol

  30. cynicalHighlander
    Ignored
    says:

    GRA is a vote loser as I will not vote for any party advocating this nonsense .

  31. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    Every day is a fucking rainbow… cynicalhighlander hehe 🙂

    All ye need is water and some shine

    What sayeth you Kenneth F?

  32. cynicalHighlander
    Ignored
    says:

    Not with Trump or Johnson at the helms there will be no rainbows only misery for the the many. Sweet dreams.

  33. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    “…there will be no rainbows only misery for the many…”

    Aye, where would we be without Rainbow?

    The Rainbow

    It’s a test

    Flip?

  34. Capella
    Ignored
    says:

    I won’t vote for any party that won’t guarantee to protect my rights. I agree this is a huge vote loser and demotivating. I certainly couldn’t urge any woman to support self ID or vote for a party that promotes it.

    I would say much more about this but there are people on here who don’t seem to understand why this is so toxic. Martin is right to suggest that everyone must get to grips with this and send a clear message to the SNP that women’s rights must be protected. Whether you are a member or not, independence is too important to be overshadowed by such a delusional policy.

  35. Liz g
    Ignored
    says:

    Martin Gorrie @ 12.02
    Oh behave yerself and calm doon…
    That’s no whit woman are sayin at all.
    They don’t like the GNR and let it be known they don’t.
    The Scottish Government have for now backed off.
    That’s what’s supposed to happen.
    That’s what doesn’t happen in the UK Union.
    The women making all the noise are mostly independence supporting women.
    They know fine well that they would have little impact on a Westminster Government!!!
    And they are very much aware of the Revs support too.

    An SNP 1 Wings 2 vote would be a good fit for them,and something they could campaign for…. Heartily…
    Think of it as multi tasking,( a particular feminine skill apparently ) and ye might see it?
    This issue transcends independence only in the long term…
    As in …… It’s on the to do list…. it’s letting Holyrood know that women fully intend to bring their Government within slapping distance,and, over this they will get that slap..
    A big one….

  36. Patrick Roden
    Ignored
    says:

    Isn’t it funny how some in the SNP are happy to agree that men can identify as women,

    And yet,

    wouldn’t tolerate Rev Stu identifying as a journalist.

    Do we all have the right to self ID or not?

    Since we have already had an Asian man self ID’ing as a black female, it isn’t just about gender, it’s about how we chose to identify ourselves…right?

    So, will the SNP leaders who are supportive of self identification, please start referring to Oor Rev as a journalist, as well as a ‘man of the cloth’.

    Because we wouldn’t want to start seeing them as a bunch of hypocrites, who have become the very thing that they hated about Labour in Scotland would we?

    Or should we all just ‘shut up and get to the back of the bus’ Nicola?

    Boils my piss, so it does!

  37. Breastplate
    Ignored
    says:

    The idea that somebody with a penis can earnestly masquerade as a coquettish ingenue is ridiculous in my opinion.
    If we all have to self ID then I would like to be a Roman centurion called Biggus Dickus or perhaps a Rastafarian who owns a llama.

    We certainly do live in interesting times but maybe it’s me that’s mad.

  38. Liz g
    Ignored
    says:

    Capella @ 12 .38
    Hi… Lovely to have finally met ye on Saturday Capella :-).
    We need to get a proper gabb about this stuff 🙂
    Martin I’m afraid is being very black or white about it.
    I’m sure you’ll agree that there is a world of difference between voting SNP and voting Yes to Independence.
    Indy isn’t an SNP thing…
    I don’t think he appreciates that ALL the Holyrood Party’s are currently on board with the GRA,there isn’t one “yet” who are against it!
    Nevertheless for Women and in particular Scottish women there is no way of bringing our Government properly to heal,unless and until it’s properly brought to Holyrood…
    When that happens the Government any Government,or party for that matter will not dare…
    Whither because of pure politics or as Robert Peffers would argue true democracy neither,I’d wadger, will the SNP!

  39. Liz g
    Ignored
    says:

    Just an FYI…
    I have no idea why my tablet insists that the GRA should automatically self identify as the GNR….
    But it insists!!!
    So apologies…
    There ought the be a law 🙂
    Whit say you Cactus???

  40. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    GNR is Guns n Fuckin’ Roses Liz yeah 🙂 🙂 🙂

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQivdk3dSZs

    GNRFNR, hey!

  41. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    #AUOBAberdeen ’19 sounded like an excellent day and night Liz

    We were watching y’all live on the indylive televisual screens

    Dunfermline march next… 31/08/19

    Gave ye ah shout out too, hey!

  42. Liz g
    Ignored
    says:

    Cactus..
    Oh we heard on the stall.. I can’t remember who said but thank you xx

  43. Martin Gorrie
    Ignored
    says:

    Hi Liz
    Maybe i do see things in black and white but at least its not fucking pink. If you really are a woman, ( only cowards don’t use their real full names) I am shocked that you are not with all the feminists on this. See Women Make Glasgow, For Women Scotland, Fairplayfor women, Dr Kathleen Stock, Professor Rosa Freedman, Julie Bindel. Are you with Joanna Cherry and Joan McAlpine on this or are you with Mhairi Black who likes to call women CUNTS for complaining?

    If this was WW2 would you be watching the jews going into the concentration camps and saying “its okay, we will deal with it later”? Trans Activists are trying to eradicate women’s rights now and people like you are helping them by staying silent. Read @glinners weekly War on Women blogs. It IS a WAR and i know what side I am on.

  44. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    Mornin’ Martin, how do, tell us more about you, ta, check this out:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNy-SoMD8DU

    NB GTAV ah’ve got Trevor in a taxi the airport, no hurry like

  45. Cactus
    Ignored
    says:

    It’s been another fun day/night, speak with y’all later today, tune in

  46. Dr Jim
    Ignored
    says:

    @Martin Gorrie

    You’re digging yourself into an even bigger mess by agitating insulting and behaving like an absolute moron on an issue that has not been decided, and what’s worse you’ve decided what my opinion is as well which indicates you also believe yourself to be psychic

    Your method of agitation smacks of just that, agitation for its own sake, a troublemaker stirring up trouble over something that so far hasn’t happened and might never happen, but you don’t care about that do you, it’s the agitation you enjoy just for the sake of it

    Women aren’t stupid they don’t need a man to tell them what to think before they need to think it, and if and when the time comes for them to be offended or not they’ll manage fine without people like you trying to sell them your fake brand of firewater

    It’s perfectly clear what you’re attempting to do and you still can’t manage it without insults, the world is not Twitter and creeping about on the Internet spreading garbage hoping women will fall for will in the end avail you nothing, because they’ll find you out for what you are

    Fake!

  47. twathater
    Ignored
    says:

    Martin as Dr Jim says it’s nice to come on here and sling insults and derogatory terms at individuals ( not ). This subject GRA has been aired on this blog numerous times and numerous wingers have posted vociferously in writing their opposition to this proposal , 2 of the most vociferous are Capella and Liz G so either you are a new visitor or you don’t take into consideration people’s posts
    As has also been aired , without independence NO ONE Male Female or other will have a chance to block this madness , so either you are just a individual determined to cause dissent or you want the status quo where more than the GRA will be impacted on Scotland
    I have stated openly many times on here and other places my opposition to this regressive act but without independence we do not have the power to force change , just like Liz G and others I want our government within slapping distance and I also want them to know that if they do not listen they will be replaced
    We have had enough of politicians ( liebour ) ignoring our wishes , times have changed , but we need independence to do it and anyone who cannot see that is either blind or is a false indy supporter

  48. Liz g
    Ignored
    says:

    Martin Gorrie @ 1.38
    Ok. Like I said… Calm doon…
    Think aboot it???
    Like the Women are!!
    Duh…
    If we really don’t want this!!
    How do we achieve this???
    We bring our Government home… Aye
    Then we tell them what we won’t tolerate..
    Otherwise…
    We let Westminster decide
    Do you think we are that stupid???

  49. Liz g
    Ignored
    says:

    Martin Gorrie.@ 1.38
    Oh my Martin that’s a lot… A very lot of things ye want me to look at..
    Do ye no understand how much I really don’t care???
    This is no about you!
    We, Us, Wingers, have one proposal, one proposition,…
    Scotland should be Governed by Scots.
    Then we’ll work out what trans rights are, otherwise we have no say.
    Bring our Government Home…
    Then we have Righteous Government
    And we’ll take it from there

  50. Robert Louis
    Ignored
    says:

    I am all for making people’s lives better, including that of those who are transgender. However, REVSTU, in all his postings is bang on point, in raising the absurdity and danger posed by the ‘gender’ law changes. Of course many transgender folk are just wanting to get on with their lives and are completely harmless, BUT the changes would ENABLE men who are a danger to women to abuse those changes to attack, harass and endanger women. Whether we like it or not those creeps DO EXIST, and we cannot enact legislation which means such creeps have a LEGAL right to women’s spaces. Please note my distinction between predatory men and transgender folk.

    A few short years ago, people would have said that was freaking obvious, but now??

    The whole discourse has become absurd, with journalists now talking of gender, when they actually mean sex. A few days ago, a GP was on national television debating whether it is right for women to choose their babay’s gender prior to birth. A medical GP!! what she really meant was choosing the baby’s SEX. It is an absolute impossibility to choose a baby’s so-called ‘gender’ prior to birth.

    This is the level of absurdity.

    Women are quite rightly angry about it. Common sense, women’s rights and SCIENTIFIC FACTS have been jettisoned for utter nonsense.

  51. Reluctant Nationalist
    Ignored
    says:

    ‘Martin’, regarding Nicholas’ feminist rhetoric, how do you feel about her close relationship with some VERY conservative carpet pilots, not known for their….appreciation of emancipation?

    – Bruce McDonald

  52. Golfnut
    Ignored
    says:

    @ Liz g

    I agree Liz, all this gender bourach will get sorted our in the wash once we bin this union. The SNP membership will put the brakes on this at conference, just as they made their wishes known regards currency. So it’s kind of counter productive for people to cancel membership of a party where members constitutionally rule the roost.

  53. Breeks
    Ignored
    says:

    I really don’t know why this whole issue of gender politics can’t be parked up a quiet cul de sac for a few more short months while Scotland focuses its entire energy on Independence.

    It’s divisive and controversial, but so are a multitude of other ethical and moral dilemmas which societal progress demands we confront. As science continues to deconstruct DNA, we can moralise about designer babies. We can clone animals, now moralise about whether we should and bring back extinct species. We are now tinkering with the binary nature of sex. Of course there will be profound and uncomfortable ramifications, but Dolly the sheep didn’t sink the chances of Scottish Independence.

    There is a genuine ethical discussion to be had about transgender politics, but what the hell are we playing at by provoking small and minor conflagration until it threatens to blow up into a forest fire that divides the common Kirk who all want Scottish Independence?

    What the hell is wrong with a Scottish Government which cannot for the life of itself weaponise the unconstitutional outrage of Brexit to our advantage, but yet is more than happy to fumble it’s way into gender politics and gift the enemy Establishment the means to divide us?? Yet more ‘enigmatic’ brilliance no doubt…. SNP Bad meets SNP Mad, and the Tories smile as they sprinkle GERS on our cornflakes again.

    Get cracking Rev Stu. Get your party up and away, and I very much hope, focussed upon the Constitutional watershed which Brexit in October represents. Time is very short now, and the SNP are proving to be a Constitutional dead loss. You hope against hope a hero will emerge, but sadly there aren’t any contenders even prepared to grumble.

  54. Effijy
    Ignored
    says:

    Our intention is to strengthen the Independence cause,
    To reduce the absurd personalities that become MSPs
    after being 4th choice in their constituencies and reveal
    The truth from under the sea of corruption that is Westminster
    Propaganda promulgated by their house boy media outlets.

    Was this piece designed to turn Wings and SNP against each other?

    Both of us have enough enemies. Not a time to criticise each other to a point of division.

    I am WoS and SNP and I an Angry and Reactionary as my country has no voice in
    Westminster of the EU negotiation table.
    We are not allowed access to vital information relating to Scotland’s real economic figures past, present or future.

    When the country next door invades you and takes away your fiscal levers, your history
    Your Aspirations with lies and deceit it breads anger and that will make any normal person reactionary.

  55. PictAtRandom
    Ignored
    says:

    “moderate, sensible, optimistic and progressive centre-ground nationalism

    But…but…there cannae be such a thing… Ah’ve been telt that.

    Next they’ll be wanting a parliamentary voice for Scottish EUsceptics.

  56. Hackalumpoff
    Ignored
    says:

    See Nana’s links here:
    https://indyref2.space/nanas-links-2/

  57. Maria F
    Ignored
    says:

    I for one think that comparing the effect that a Wings Party that has not even seen the light yet may have on the SNP with the effect the Brexit Party has on the Tory party is ridiculous.

    It is ridiculous because I am yet to be convinced that a party that has suddenly appeared out of thin air, that is being led by a rather dodgy individual who brought to the ground a previous party pursuing the same things, a previous party whose strategists were so crap that while they got over 4,000,000 votes, they were so strategically challenged that they could not even choose the right constituency to get their leader a HoC seat; a new party with bags and bags of cash and with over 100,000 supporters but with no members to be accountable to; a new party that while unable to complete a decent website without it being immediately hacked but the remain site, was however able to field candidates in every single constituency in the UK for the EU elections on record time, is a real party and not just another political construct engineered by the tories themselves as I believe UKIP was.

    The brexit party and the tory party share the same voters, the same donors and the same candidates, candidates who move from tories to brexit party as fast as they move from the brexit party back to the tories. That “freedom of movement” of votes and revolving door for donors and candidates between the tory and the brexit “parties” is why the buffoon’s party can get so many points ahead of labour in a recent polls no longer after it was hammered by the brexit party. what are the odds that the Brexit party will neatly fold onto its footprint in the next GE, when the tories are going to need all the votes they can get, exactly as UKIP did for the tories in 2015?

    That is why I think putting the Wings Party and the Brexit party in the same bag, is incredibly short sighted.

  58. Ken500
    Ignored
    says:

    Just nonsense.

    A bunch of mavericks is not needed.

    Campaign to change the voting system.

    The trans legislation was an attempt to comply with international Law, People who break the Law get punished.

    Just mass hysteria. Out of date and old fashioned. Young folk and women are more understanding.

    This is so divisive. Giving unionists what they need at a critical time. Near to winning. So unwarranted.

  59. Ken500
    Ignored
    says:

    The Westminster imbeciles are fiddling the figures. They are not including Chinese borrowing for Hinkley Point and HS2 etc. They are being classed as investment but are borrowings. Not included in the figures,

    Scotland’s Oil revenues are down but renewables are up £3Billion, as the change over continues. If Scotland sold it’s surplus fuel and energy instead of going on the grid. It would be worth £8Billion. Scotland pays more because it is colder. Despite being in surplus and nearer the source. No parity.

  60. Heart of Galloway
    Ignored
    says:

    Fanny Kerquarson must be rubbing his hands right now that his re-sowing of the GRA seed has reaped such a rich harvest.

    His threadbare piece purports to highlight areas of “”division” but in reality is a poorly concealed attempt to resurrect the GRA issue from cold storage.

    Some very weird comments above suggest there are many ahem* contributors of dubious provenance who suddenly materialise when this topic reappears.

    With the greatest respect Stu, this self ID thing has been kicked into the long grass – and that’s where it belongs until after independence.

  61. Ken500
    Ignored
    says:

    More members are joining the SNP than leaving. The Johnston effect?

  62. Robert Peffers
    Ignored
    says:

    @Martin Gorrie says: 21 August, 2019 at 10:42 pm:

    ” … Should i vote Conservative?”

    Yes, of course you should and by the comments you make here you probably already do.

    … I still want Independence which i think will happen but i don’t want to live in a Scotland with woke people like Nicola in charge. We can’t throw women under the bus and if people don’t understand this issue is bigger than independence then i feel sorry for this country.”

    Stop talking drivel, in the first place the SNP leadership has called the proposal to a halt for further consideration. To personally blame Nicola is silly. As is claiming thousands are leaving the SNP when the membership figures are going up – not down. You are misrepresenting the situation.

    The whole subject has been hijacked as just another thing to flog the SNP, and hence the independence movement and in particular the First Minister.

    In the first place no one in the SNP has any more votes than anyone else and no one person can change party policy as that can only be changed by delegates at national conference.

    The point being that what you are doing here on Wings is nothing more than an anti-FM/SG/SNP rant and it cannot have any effect upon the matter. If you want to change SNP policy you can only do so via an SNP branch meeting.

    And, before you go of on another anti-Nicola rant, the SNP leadership at Holyrood has called the matter to a halt for further consideration. All political parties have factions fighting for something or other and they usually are noisy and pushy. However, neither they or those who oppose whatever it is they are shouting about can change anything by shouting louder.

    The only way to change SNP policy is by doing so via a branch meeting and, if you have your proposal voted through, dealt with at National Conference and before you go of yet another anti-Nicola rant. I happen to believe that unless a person, of either sex, has had operations to physically change their physical sex they have no right being in places reserved for the opposite sex.

    Most people do actually know the difference between sex and gender.

  63. Craig P
    Ignored
    says:

    Its not really the attempt to link a Wing party with the Brexi Party that gets me.

    It’s the attempted equivalence of the SNP with the Conservatives I find upsetting.

    Anyway.

    Talking of proud Scot buts and flip sides!

    I remember my father-in-law in 2014 coming out with what he thought was a killer line,

    “if Scottishness is such a strong identity, it can easily coexit in a British state.”

    to which I replied:

    “if Britishness is such a strong identity, it can easily coexit in a Scottish state.”

    The fact he disagreed and seemed to think his identity would be erased without the union tells you a lot about the existential fears of British nationalists.

    Personally I think British identity will inevitably die off a bit, but there will probably always be a core of 15-20% of Scots who prioritise it, even after indy.

  64. Clootie
    Ignored
    says:

    Post Independence Scotland will be shaped by the people who live here. I am very confident that they will do a good job. The result will be democratic compromise that reflects Scotlands current views. It will be a far better society than the current abomination imposed by Westminstet.

    Now back to the story. Independence comes first. Nothing will change until we can replace those who represent us at Holyrood and we end the flawed system that delivers a UK version of society shaped by the views of England via its larger population delivering Rightwing politicians to Westminster.

    From Nukes to Gender Recognition. From Fracking to Royalty. From Renewables to Pensions it all sits in limbo until WE demand and vote for self determination.

    At the moment in a UK election I will vote SNP every time without fail as our best vehicle to deliver Independence. In the Scottish elections my second vote is currently wasted ( I cannot vote for the current Greens). However I am quite capable of assessing the polling pre a Scottish election. If the SNP are flagging in my region then they will get my second vote. If they are riding high in the polls then a Wings Party will get my second vote.

    I cannot understand people being offended by this! What I find offensive is Tory, LibDems and Labour MSPs crawling into Holyrood and working together to retain the rule by another nation over our future and more importantly our children’s future.

  65. galamcennalath
    Ignored
    says:

    Can anyone imagine the SNP u-turning like this? Or, how the media would react?

    We get throw away comments about once in a generation brought up at every opportunity. Do the media give this lot a kicking?

    https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ECjxicRXUAEe2Ho

    Let’s be unreasonably generous – maybe they just changed their minds when circumstances changed. In which case, why isn’t anyone else allowed to change their minds?

  66. mike cassidy
    Ignored
    says:

    If your head feels strange thinking about the transgender issue

    Prepare for another level of strange

    Cos the transgender cricketer currently wowing them at the womens county level – next stop the England womens team

    http://archive.is/rLQDD

    Doesn’t actually play for ‘her’ club’s female eleven

    ‘He’ plays for one of the men’s eleven.

    That’s some serious urine extraction.

    https://twitter.com/HubbleVicky

  67. Doug
    Ignored
    says:

    Surprised rabid British nationalist Farquharson didn’t concentrate on the latest GERS. Is it because even rabid British nationalists realize GERS is a heap of keech?

    He chooses to write about a “potential” new party instead. Desperate desperate stuff from rabid British nationalists – once again.

  68. Cubby
    Ignored
    says:

    Lizg@4.04am

    Liz you have the patience of a saint. Not one of my qualities so I’ll just stay away from commenting on this guy.

  69. Thepnr
    Ignored
    says:

    And there you have it in a single Kenny Farquharson tweet.

    “It’s been interesting to see how this has divided Yes opinion today. Trouble ahead.

    This isn’t journalism or news. It’s an article seeking deliberately to cause division within the Yes movement. Never fall for any divisive crap from the mouth of Brit Nat journalists.

    https://twitter.com/KennyFarq/status/1164214796822228992

  70. Doug
    Ignored
    says:

    Weren’t we pro-indy supporters supposed to be in a political civil war decades ago?

    A bit like “devolution will kill Scottish nationalism stone dead”.

  71. mountain shadow
    Ignored
    says:

    I see someone has scrolled SNP on the war memorial in Shetland.

    Clearly, this is a Unionist stooge but the blame will be laid full square at the SNP.

    Can’t see the SNP winning now.

  72. Ken500
    Ignored
    says:

    The elderly are dying in the rest of the UK because of austerity. Social services are non existent and being starved of cash. To keep down the deficit? while the debt goes up. False economy,

  73. manandboy
    Ignored
    says:

    http://archive.is/pNKVz

    BE IN NO DOUBT, DEMOCRACY IN THE UK IS AT THE MERCY OF UNSCRUPULOUS PEOPLE WITH COMPUTERS AND DATA FROM SOCIAL MEDIA. I.E.THE TORIES.

    “Communication has been weaponised, used to provoke, mislead and influence the public in numerous insidious ways. Disinformation was just the first stage of an evolving trend of using information to subvert democracy, confuse rival states, define the narrative and control public opinion. Using the large, unregulated, open environments that tech companies once promised would “empower” ordinary people, disinformation has spread rapidly across the globe. The power that tech companies offered us has become a priceless tool in propagandists’ hands, who were right in thinking that a confused, rapidly globalising world is more vulnerable to the malleable beast of disinformation than straightforward propaganda. Whatever we do, however many fact-checking initiatives we undertake, disinformation shows no sign of abating. It just mutates.”

  74. Breeks
    Ignored
    says:


    Craig P says:
    22 August, 2019 at 9:12 am
    Its not really the attempt to link a Wing party with the Brexi Party that gets me.

    It’s the attempted equivalence of the SNP with the Conservatives I find upsetting.

    Same but different… I’d swap Brexit Party with UKIP, for a better fit of the narrative about a narrow, single option political initiative punishing the complacency of the comfortable ‘establishment’ party in government.

    Ironically, the Brexit Party probably did more actual damage by winning Euro seats, but it was UKIP which put the original frighteners on the Tories and suffered Brexit upon us.

  75. starlaw
    Ignored
    says:

    Mountain shadow 10.05 am
    Do you think the people of Shetland are daft?

  76. SilverDarling
    Ignored
    says:

    @Martin Gorrie

    You can see what is going on here – polarized positions by some of the posters here who cannot be proven wrong, ever. It is jousting to them. The point of every post is lost to them, they must defend the SNP at all costs and they go to ludicrous lengths. Every comment is the same repetitive patronizing drivel towards women and non – SNP supporters of Indy.

    Look at the post Rev Stu has written, hardly any of them can bear to address the core issue – Nicola Sturgeon’s judgement on an issue that will lose her votes. They cannot admit she might be wrong on this so they attack you.

    ‘Nicola’ is all things good, clever and true even if her actions as a leader give lie to that. Every action is interpreted with spin, she has a plan, she knows what she is doing, she has supported Indy all her life. To want to vote for a party you must have something to vote FOR. For many, she is giving nothing to support at this stage. We are treading deeper and deeper water.

    In order to allow themselves to deny that everything is not hunky dory with SNP strategy, they will turn on you, citing their credentials, age, martyrdom to the cause and personal emotional and physical pain. They will call you a Tory, a Britnat, a ‘plant’ if you do not wholeheartedly get on board with the ‘Nicola’ fanclub.

    These are grown men and women who would feel sick at the thought of fawning over ‘Maggie’ or ‘Boris’ or ‘Jeremy’ yet they do exactly that with the FM.

    It is impossible for them to acknowledge that Independence is far bigger than the SNP can manage as THEY equate the SNP with Independence even though hundreds of thousands of Scots do not.

    We have a mandate for Indy and increasingly it looks like we are leaving the EU with no deal. The SNP can do something about one but not the other. So why are they not concentrating on that. ‘But they are’, they cry ‘they are just not telling YOU’. Well WTF not?

    Roll on the Wings Party when the SNP will make them have to choose. They have used Wings as an SNP propaganda site for too long. How will they do that if the site actively promotes policies that go against the SNP doctrine? Remember the SNP is ‘famously’ disciplined and ruthless – if you are seen fraternising with ‘the enemy’, it may be a step too far.

  77. Clapper57
    Ignored
    says:

    O/T

    Want a wee ( actually BIG) laugh.

    Yoons be scared….they no really believe NO APPETITE in Scotland for Indy…so much so that they, or rather an Uber Yoon, has started petition in Scottish parliament petitions for the following ( I believe it is being passed around on Facebook and twitter in Yooniverse) Lol.

    Petition :

    “Calling on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to ensure that any referendum advocating constitutional change should have at least a two thirds majority for it to succeed”

    So begs question as to why they insist majority of Scots do NOT want another Indy ref also majority of Scots want to remain in UK….HOWEVER…they the yoons , who are so so uber confident of this fact, will try and promote a way to rig any future referendum in their Yoon favour………hmm see what you are doing there guys…you Yoons who are UBER confident of that pro Union message which you promote endlessly…You are so so confident that you are actually demonstrating , via this petition,that you are in fact NOT confident that any future Indy Ref will go in your favour BLol …..so basically you are feart to just allow a referendum to go ahead with just a majority vote deciding the result….you bad guys…again….Lol

  78. mountain shadow
    Ignored
    says:

    starlaw says:
    22 August, 2019 at 10:31 am
    Mountain shadow 10.05 am
    Do you think the people of Shetland are daft?
    —————-

    Starlaw, no I dont.

    However, there are plenty of Shetland folk who won’t know the levels to which Unionists will stoop like we do.

    In a tight race, if only a couple of hundred folk do believe this the work of an SNP supporter, then it could make all the difference.

    Is see Uncle Tom Gordon of The Herald already has an article on it.

  79. Heart of Galloway
    Ignored
    says:

    Thepnr@9.52am.

    Quelle surprise. How right you are my friend.
    See my thoughts above at 8.40am.

    I hope the lesson has been learned. The False Friend Legion is primed to jump all over this if we are foolish enough to air it.

    The issue has been mothballed. Period.

  80. Ian Brotherhood
    Ignored
    says:

    @SilverDarling –

    Hear hear.

    Zealots, no matter what stripe they are, wreck everything they get involved in.

  81. Liz
    Ignored
    says:

    I see people having a go at people criticising the SNP on Self ID. If you should criticise anyone it should be Nicola Sturgeon
    It hasn’t been kicked into the long grass, NS has doubled down on it.
    She refuses to meet women’s groups and she posts tweets with pics of pro trans.
    She is the one to blame.

    Drop self ID or they will lose the Women’s vote.
    I’ve been unfollowed by several projects indy supporters for not stopping to argue that self ID needs to go.

  82. manandboy
    Ignored
    says:

    The name ‘Cambridge Analytica’ has been buried as ‘having gone out of business’. But the people who did the work at Cambridge Analytica are still very much alive. Many of them are Tory Party members and some are senior. Does anyone think for one minute that Cambridge Analytica’s work-force’s capability to influence election results no longer exists. That capability is still at the service of this Tory Government.

    Being a Voter used to mean something, or so we were taught to believe. But that was back in the age of innocence when the government and the BBC were trusted to always tell us the truth. Even the Tories.
    Being a voter today however, means voting in a ballot which almost certainly has already been decided, using data harvesting and micro-targeting, with broadcast media spewing out propaganda, aka.lies, as back-up.

    These methods were almost certainly used in Indy2014, GE17 & the EU referendum. What price them being used again, and even more so, in Indyref2?

    Scotland is at war with England, not over oil or even Independence, not yet, but over Democracy. Westminster is desperate to remove effective authentic Democracy from Scotland, to be replaced by a ‘gamed’ voting system. Like loaded dice, or marked cards, a magnetic roulette wheel, doping horses, or a bribed referee in a football match.

    England is determined to ensure that Scotland will not attain Independence by the ballot box in a fair and legal referendum.

    All the while, flooding Scotland’s media with lies about every aspect of economic and political life Scotland.

    Voting. Fings ain’t wot they used to be, as they say down the East End, apparently.

  83. mike cassidy
    Ignored
    says:

    Silver Darling and others

    I relink to this.

    Where the suggestion is that things may be bleaker than any of us think.

    … politicians don’t look at politics like you do. For you, it’s a value system. For them, it is a daily set of chores and a constant series of problems

    http://archive.is/QJtOx

  84. Socrates MacSporran
    Ignored
    says:

    Old Baby Boomer that I am, I refuse to deviate from my stance on gender and self id.

    If a person has a cock and balls, he is a man. I accept, there are cases of people born in the wrong body, who realise this and, difficult though it may be to arrange, they go through the long and occasionally painful process of gender realignment, to end up with the “correct” body.

    I have every sympathy with them, and believe they should be given every assistance to find happiness in that correct body.

    However, it appears to be the case, from evidence thrown-up by this whole argument, that there are some men, who self-id as women, who do not come into this category, and indeed, I am willing to believe, some of these liars and charlatans will use their self id status as a “woman” to do ill to genuine women.

    It is this bunch of chancers we must guard against, and from whom we must protect our women-folk.

    To me it is simple, to self-id as a woman, you have to undergo gender re-alignment, and your progress towards this must be monitored.

    These arse-holes who want to use self-id as a woman to make it easier for them to stick their penises inside a woman should be told: no way Jose, if you’re going to be accepted as a woman, Wullie, Dick or Boaby has to go.

    Once he’s gone, you are a woman, but until then, you will have to be categorised as man or trans-man, and you don’t get into women-only spaces.

  85. manandboy
    Ignored
    says:

    Is it just me, or does anyone else think the politics pressure gauge has shot up since Stu’s interview with the Kenny Farquarson?

    There’s been a noticeable increase in pressure within the Yes movement, with lots of arguments and disagreement, not always very civil either. Tempers rise when the pressure is on alright. Can the Independence movement cope with the pressure building as it is? At the moment, ‘not very well’ is the tentative answer.

  86. kapelmeister
    Ignored
    says:

    Electoral Calculus is predicting that the SNP will retake the Dumfries & Galloway seat from Alister Jack.

  87. Bill Hume
    Ignored
    says:

    Don’t worry manandboy……independence supporters are made of sterner stuff.

  88. heraldnomore
    Ignored
    says:

    Socrates I’m with you there.

    And I’d extend it to the prisons, where rapists and child molesters, murderers even, suddenly discover their inner woman and want a transfer to perhaps a less dangerous nick.

    Ditch the nuts first, be a woman, then be a woman prisoner.

  89. kapelmeister
    Ignored
    says:

    Reported by the Herald. Someone has sprayed SNP in large letters on a Shetland war memorial.

    The unionists are panicking now, to resort to such desperate measures.

  90. sassenach
    Ignored
    says:

    Socrates @ 11-07

    “… if you’re going to be accepted as a woman, Wullie, Dick or Boaby has to go.”

    Surely that sums up the whole question of who can self ID as whatever, nicely. Make your mind up time.

  91. manandboy
    Ignored
    says:

    FWIW. Leaving aside the intricacies and complexities of TG for a moment, and thinking only in political terms, the SG’s programme for altering existing TG UK legislation, does appear to be a poor political decision.
    First, because the implications and ramifications for women in general, and mothers in particular, have not been measured in political terms. In short, the risk of alienating large numbers of women voters, plus their partners, and the close relatives of children, is great – too great.
    Second, the timing is atrocious. With Scotland embroiled in the Independence – Brexit crisis, this has simply not been the right time for such controversial legislation. Holyrood TG amounts to texting while driving the bus.

    It’s time to park it, and let it be for a while.

  92. Clapper57
    Ignored
    says:

    As a woman the way I see it is……….if you as a man, self ID as an occasional woman but think that you can also BE an occasional man in committing a sexual act that as a woman you would be physically unable to commit…..then you are just a man playing a female role, via Self ID, to benefit you, as a man, sexually…. which is blatant exploitation of the women you seek to exploit while you are hiding behind your self ID identity.

    All political parties should consider ALL people involved before they endorse or promote their position on any issue…there is human rights and then there is human exploitation…with self ID there is a very weak and ‘thin’ line in recognising and respecting the rights of those who seek to exploit and those who are being exploited..consider the risks to women…consider the feelings of women…consider the opinions of women….consider the motives of those who want to self ID…in fact consider why some men choose self ID but do not choose full transition….for what purpose would a man self ID as a woman and yet still cherish and want to keep the very sexual organ that would distinguish him clearly as a man…..hmm…now that position is clearly them self Identifying as a ……..MAN first and a woman only when it suits them.

  93. kapelmeister
    Ignored
    says:

    “I hope they catch the idiot who did this” tweets Ruth regarding the war memorial grafitti.

    I bet she hopes they don’t since she knows there’s a good chance the polis would find a Conservative & Unionist membership card in the culprit’s pockets.

  94. Shug
    Ignored
    says:

    Get the wings party set up now

    You do need to be careful who you select, the last thing you need is a troublesome plant
    You can make the final decision a month out from the election

  95. Shug
    Ignored
    says:

    Icant help thinking the Merkal says possibly french willsay no, irish say no, only anothwr anothwr 24 to ask. Borris is being sent for a long stand
    Looks like hard brexit or no brexit followed by general election, pesky europeans

  96. auld highlander
    Ignored
    says:

    The real reason for Brexit has been mentioned on here before but I saw this letter in one of the southern papers earlier today.

    “SIR – Many readers of Worcester News are in favour of Brexit.

    Do they ever wonder why many extremely rich people such as Aaron Banks, Sir Richard Dyson, William Rees-Mogg and many other billionaires pumped millions into the leave campaign?

    These people are not known for throwing their money around recklessly without an ulterior motive.

    Could I suggest to your readers that the UK billionaires’ attraction to Brexit and their keenness to get out before the end of 2019, has something to do with the EU Anti-Tax Avoidance Directive which is due to come into force in the UK on January 1 2020?

    This directive makes it a lot harder for members of any EU country to use the various tax avoidance schemes the the extremely rich use to avoid paying tax.

    They do not give a fig for the damage done to the ordinary person. They do not give a fig for a border in Ireland and all the other downsides of Brexit.

    They are OK whatever and are able to minimise their tax liabilities but must stop this directive at all costs.

    They have co-opted Boris Johnson as a figure that is easily manipulated due to his raging ambition and his ability to lie with impunity.

    I am asking your ordinary readers who favour leaving the EU to think.

    Just why did the billionaires sink millions in the Brexit campaign?

    Terry James

    Drakes Broughton”

    https://www.halesowennews.co.uk/news/regional/17853543.letter-day-uk-billionaires-keen-leave-eu-due-anti-tax-avoidance-directive-2020/

  97. Alan Crerar
    Ignored
    says:

    manand boy says:

    “Can the Independence movement cope with the pressure building as it is? At the moment, ‘not very well’ is the tentative answer.”

    Indy/Yessers are a family. Knock lumps out of each other. Shout, swear, threaten. Throw food!

    But when someone outside the family has a go, watch the ranks close and every family member turn against the outside threat.

    Idle hands, that’s all. Wait till we’ve something real to do.

  98. Shug
    Ignored
    says:

    Gender id and named persons was the snp being sent for a long stand
    Whoever was behind these initatives might be working for hmg

  99. Dan
    Ignored
    says:

    manandboy says: at 11:42 am

    Holyrood TG amounts to texting while driving the bus.

    It’s time to park it, and let it be for a while.

    No, dinnae park the bus! I understand what you implied but feel the wording could be better, more suitable might be – “Stop wi the texting of divisive pish and get the bloody Indy bus up a few gears”.

    Oh, and congrats manandboy on becoming a fully fledged member of the archiver club. Maybe a new Wings badge is required.
    BDtt mentioned that this is a better site to use to archive for various reasons instead of the one you and I have been using.

    https://web.archive.org/

    See all this proposed surgical intervention to reassign. That’s got to be pricey coz one guesses it ain’t done under a local anesthetic doon the doctor’s surgery.
    Who’ll be paying for this in these austere times?

    I was beginning to think I’m gonna Self ID as an individual that feels unhappy that my mind is trapped in an ageing body, and I should be given a napper transplant onto a much younger and better looking body.
    Then I came back to reality and remembered that we are all just different individuals that through the events of nature and nurture during our lives, have our own unique issues that we just have to learn to adapt and attempt to live with, and that is all pretty much done in the mind.

  100. Socrates MacSporran
    Ignored
    says:

    Alan Crerar

    Well said that man. Scottish history is full of instances where, without the English to fight, the Scots turned on each other. It was ever thus.

    There was a great line in George Macdonald Fraser’s memoir: “McAuslan in the Rough,” putting forward the proposition, all the Scottish regiments were never stationed in Scotland at the same time – since this only led to them fighting with each other.

    It’s in out DNA as a nation.

    But, once Nicola finally finds the starting pistol for Indyref2, and fires it, watch the unanimity.

  101. Dan
    Ignored
    says:

    @auld highlander.

    That’s a good letter. Here’s the archived link so it is saved in case the powers that be decide to remove such truthful comment.

    https://web.archive.org/web/20190822113710/https://www.halesowennews.co.uk/news/regional/17853543.letter-day-uk-billionaires-keen-leave-eu-due-anti-tax-avoidance-directive-2020/

  102. Effijy
    Ignored
    says:

    Well Done!

    The Independence Petition is now approaching the 272,000 Mark.

    It should reach that today!

  103. Robert J. Sutherland
    Ignored
    says:

    “Reactionary”? There speaks the genuine voice of Labourite-style exceptionalism, the only true bearers of the progressive torch. Liberal authoritarianism being the eventual bastard offspring. The SNP has always seemed to me to be exceptionally well-grounded, but increasing signs of wokeist entryism is worrying. As others have observed, this kind of displacement activity is creating conditions the BritNat media are just ready and waiting to exploit when the time (for them) is right.

    “Angry”? As is rightly said, if you’re not angry at what’s being perpetrated by London in our name, you’re just not paying attention.

  104. chicmac
    Ignored
    says:

    Last Topic

    Following on from my observation that the nominal Scottish deficit was only about 36% of the total for the three ‘Celtic’ countries never mind including those English regions which are in deficit, I tried to find out what those English deficit regions amounted to.

    I was unable to get the figures for 2018 as they are not on the ONS site yet, so I had to use the available 2017 figures.

    It turns out only 3 regions were nominally in surplus, all in the SE corner of the UK and one of which is, of course, London.

    Hooray for them (ignoring the litany of dodgy reasons why that is the case).

    So, I totalled up the deficit for those regions and countries which are in deficit and the result was that the Scottish deficit accounted only for 11.4% of that figure and since Scotland’s population is over 14% of that ‘deficit area’ then our deficit is actually less than the average for that area.

    But somehow I don’t think the story line ‘If all the regions in deficit in the UK improved performance to Scottish levels then the UK deficit would be reduced by 25%’ would have the same allure for our wonderful MSM.

  105. Proud Cybernat
    Ignored
    says:

    I quit SNP over their Self-ID plans (which thankfully have been shelved until after IndyRef).

    But I will STILL vote for Indy when the Ref comes. Two completely separate issues. And when we’re Indy and if SNP STILL pursue that policy then they will feel my wrath and, hopefully, of the wider electorate.

    All folks have rights – sure – but it is simply wrong to trample all over the hard-won rights of one group of people in order to satisfy the rights of another. There has to be a better way.

  106. Robert J. Sutherland
    Ignored
    says:

    Alan Crerar @ 11:57,
    Socrates MacSporran @ 12:34,

    Actually, that observation I think explains a little-recognised reservation that some people have about supporting independence – the feeling that once on our own, we would spend far too much wasted effort in arguing heatedly and uselessly with each other over everything, and that what is (supposedly) needed is the moderating influence of English sang-froid.

    Another toxic colonial inheritance, perhaps, though there may be some truth in it. But doing things for ourselves will be a necessary learning & maturing process.

    Just part of growing up.

  107. Effijy
    Ignored
    says:

    Johnson says a great deal of work has already been done to ensure that the transition on 31 October will be as smooth as it can be. He says he wants to ensure all the remaining necessary work gets done before the end of October.

    Yes indeed. As the country is about to leap off an economic cliff on the the ragged rocks below, covered by a raging sea,
    he has arranged to do it while it isn’t raining and with 2 pairs of socks on.

    Johnson says- London is one of the cities with the biggest French populations on earth.

    The are over 7 Million French Speakers in Canada,
    867,00 in Reunion Island, 377,000 in Martinique, 300,000 in Guiana.

    I take it then you know 300,000 london French are against Brexit
    and many may take their skills with them back to France on Brexit

  108. CameronB Brodie
    Ignored
    says:

    Consulting the likes of Kenny Farquharson over political morality or the quality of governance, is a bit like asking a dentist to formulate a nation’s macro-economic policy. Pointless and unhelpful. Being gender-critical is not analogous to being a Nazi. Those who seek to undermine gender-critical science and who support totalitarian forms of social organisation, are.

    It pains me to say this, but the FM appears poorly advised over the source of human rights, as she appears to have been influenced by the humanist drive to ground human rights on the sexuality of individuals. Unfortunately, this approach to human rights denies biology and the physical impact biology has in the real world. Subsequently, such policy is not compatible with the demands of public policy that is supportive of social sustainability.

    N.B. Claims to sex-based rights can only be ethically justified, if the claimant’s sexual epistemology matches the sex-class pertaining to the right being claimed. The claimant must have embodied experience of actually “being” the sex they claim to be.

    From being sexual to having sexual rights

    From sexual identities to the sexual field

    The epistemological move whereby sexuality becomes the ontological foundation of every subject is at the basis of the notion of sexual rights and the humanist perspective that sustains it. This perspective necessarily forgets that sexuality is a device that came into being in the European nineteenth century as a mechanism for the standardisation of modern Western bourgeois sexual behaviours.[19]

    This device is a racialised construct with a colonial legacy, which also depends on class markers.[20] Nonetheless, within this sexual epistemology, a particular historical and cultural trajectory for experiencing, imagining, and understanding sexuality is universalised and subsequently understood as the point of reference with respect to which any experience associated with the sexual is to be judged.

    As for how this sexual epistemology impacts on notions of sexual orientation and identity, we can consider for instance how the formula “LGBT” functions as a universal descriptor in manifold reports, declarations, and campaigns organised by international organisations. These uses reinforce the oblivion of the historical character of the notion of sexuality. Further, they indicate how this sexual epistemology limits the scope of the claims related to sexual justice and freedom, requiring any rights claim to be framed within the terms of these onto-epistemological categories in order to become legible.

    Yet the problem is even more complicated, because the search for more inclusive categories able to register the different ways of being gay, lesbian, bisexual or trans does not necessarily avoid the risk of reproducing this sexual epistemology.[21] That is what happens when, in the attempt to dismantle the universal idea of what it means to be gay, this deconstructive gesture is provincialised as a particular case which confirms the universality of homosexuality, as a framework configured through ideas of sexual orientation and identity.

    Consider the fate of the MSM (men who have sex with men) category. As Massad points out, this category – which originated precisely to distinguish a culturally inflected socio-sexual practice from the universalist paradigm of homosexuality – has been reinscribed into the logic of sexual orientation, converted into another sexual-identity category to be added to the list of non-normative sexual identities that oppose the norm of heterosexuality.[22]

    Along these lines, Greg Thomas criticises hegemonic Western contemporary academia for not being able to address the whiteness embedded in the onto-epistemology of sexuality itself. Thomas states:

    as neo-colonialism and imperialism are replaced by the language of multiculturalism and the rather liberal rhetoric of “race, gender, class and sexuality,” contemporary academia does not confront but rather consolidates the Occidentalism that universalizes sexuality both at the level of politics and epistemology.[23]

    eprints.lse.ac.uk/68062/1/From%20being%20sexual_2016.pdf

  109. Jack Murphy
    Ignored
    says:

    SCOTLAND.Prediction based on opinion polls from 18 June 2019 to 20 June 2019, sampling 1,024 people.

    Picked up from Twitter re voting intentions at next UK General election:

    https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/scotland.html

    AND

    https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/conlist_scot.html

    ” Electoral Calculus has built a reputation over the years as a trusted provider of electoral facts, data and predictions.
    It has pioneered new electoral models and user-defined predictions, as well as giving individual constituency drilldown to ward level.

    It is regularly cited in the national press, and is consulted by MPs, candidates and opinion formers. ”

    It makes interesting reading.

  110. Old Pete
    Ignored
    says:

    Jack if you add the Brexit supporters to the Tories as is likely then the picture is not so rosy.

  111. Charles
    Ignored
    says:

    oh please, can you post some evidence that you actually give a f**k about womans rights BEFORE the transgender debate began? i also think the issue of transgender equality has not been properly thought through, but Wings being the champion of Womans rights all of sudden is laughable.

  112. CameronB Brodie
    Ignored
    says:

    Supporting the proposed changes to the GRA, is not compatible with being a liberal democrat, as the claim that ‘trans-women are women’ lacks ontological and epistemological integrity. Subsequently, the proposed changes to the GRA would encode this logical weakness into legislation, challenging the notion of “embodiment” and undermining the potential universality and effectiveness of human rights, globally.

    I don’t like saying this but the FM is quite obviously fallible. We all are. Why would folk imagine our collective fallibility does not impinge on the indy cause?

    Gender as an ‘Interplay of Rules’: Detecting Epistemic Interplay of Medical and Legal Discourse with Sex and Gender Classification in Four Editions of the Dewey Decimal Classification
    https://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/sites/default/files/publications/Political%20Economy%20-%20A%20Review%20of%20the%20Literature%2012012015%20Final.pdf

  113. Capella
    Ignored
    says:

    The SNP have not parked the Self ID issue.
    After Shirley Anne Somerville announced a pause in Holyrood on 20th June, Mhairi Black posted video decrying the “bigots” and “jeremy hunts” seeking to delay the legislation. This video was then posted on the official SNP twitter account.
    Ian Blackfird then published an article in the Record, reprinted on the official SNP website, urging the Scottish Government to press on with the legislation.

    https://www.snp.org/scotland-is-right-to-move-ahead-on-trans-equality/

    This week, Fiona Hyslop has sent a letter, now circulating on twitter, to Joan McAlpine announcing that NRO, who are responsible for the Census in 2021, are consulting on allowing people to answer the sex question in any way they want. This renders the sex question useless for monitoring women’s sex based rights. She gives several reasons:
    1 Transgender people will feel uncomfortable about answering the sex question truthfully. Since this is a statutory question it is an offence to lie or not answer.
    The 1920 Census Act would have to be amended and, as this is a reserved matter, not within Holyrood’s remit.

    2 The 2011 Census had guidance online, seen by whoever, advising people to answer the sex question however they wanted. Fiona thinks it important to have continuity with the 2011 botched Census but not with every other Census since 1801. We no longer have robust data on how many women there are in Scotland. This folly has spilled over into police and NHS statistics.

    3 The Westminster ONS is considering allowing anyone to answer this question however they want. Fiona thinks it important to be aligned with Westminster and adopt their crackpot policies.

    4 Fiona thinks people were not advised about answering the sex question. This is disingenuous. The advice is that it is an offence to not answer it or to lie, just like all the other statutory questions. Also, there are clear scientific guidelines about what determines male and female individuals, understood since time immemorial.

    So for those who believe that this matter has been parked for now, I regret to say it has not.

  114. CameronB Brodie
    Ignored
    says:

    I really need to get home today, so I’ll just point out that claiming “trans women are women”, is an affront to semiotic theory and human reason. Subsequently, the claim the “trans women are women”, should be viewed as an assault on liberal constitutionalism.

    Consistency, Completeness and the Meaning of Sign Theories
    The Semiotic Field

    The final sentence of Stephan F. Barker’s Philosophy of Mathematics (1964) can be paraphrased as follows: The house of semiotics has many mansions, and in it many games are played. But we can ask ourselves whether consistency and completeness – logical concepts in the first place are
    effective in approaching the legitimacy of semiotics, not to mention that after Gödel’s (1931) research on the relation between consistency and completeness, one would be playing the game of ignorance trying to answer whether sign theories should be both consistent and complete….

    http://www.nadin.ws/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/consistency-completeness-and-the-meaning.pdf

  115. CameronB Brodie
    Ignored
    says:

    Allowing the self-ID of sex would undermine legal reason and the potential effectiveness of protection afforded by human rights. It would also undermine the potential to politically contestant these rights.

    Does it sound like I’d have anything to do with WOS, if I thought the site owner was a misogynist? Those who attempt to paint him an alt-right supporting sexist, are perhaps a tad guilty of self-projection.

    A Semiotics of Legal Argument
    duncankennedy.net/documents/A%20Semiotics%20of%20Legal%20Argument_European%20Intro.pdf

  116. CameronB Brodie
    Ignored
    says:

    This is what the world looks like from a inter-disciplinary perspective, where consideration is given to the semiotics of law and legal theory. You can’t really understand political economy without understanding legal semiotics.

    Decoding International Law: Semiotics and the Humanities
    Legal semiotics

    Semiotics is the science of signs. As mysterious as the word may seem, semiotics has become a household term among interpreters of art, music, literature, and now, the law. This chapter explores the basic elements of semiotics, the role that sign theory has played in the law, and the potential use of the semiotic method yet untapped by the legal community.

    Part I broadly defines semiotics, proposes a definition of legal semiotics, and discusses some of its frequent uses in everyday legal practice. Part II traces the history and development of semiotics as it grew out of the varied disciplines of medicine, philosophy, linguistics, anthropology, and literature. A goal of the chapter is to determine the extent to which these disciplines have made specific contributions to the field of semiotics and the manner in which they have been applied to the law.

    Keywords:
    law, semiotics, sign theory

    https://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195385779.001.0001/acprof-9780195385779-chapter-002

  117. CameronB Brodie
    Ignored
    says:

    I really must go, so here one to highlight the validity of the statement that “The house of semiotics has many mansions”. Hopefully it will convince folk that we ignore the concept of “embodiment” and legal semiotics, at our peril.

    The role of semiotics in connecting the spaces, words and embodied experiences of refugee politics
    https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:bcc3352f-b42d-454f-aae0-3fe1c67bd638/download_file?file_format=pdf&safe_filename=The%2Brole%2Bof%2Bsemiotics%2Bin%2Bconnecting%2Bthe%2Bspaces%2Bwords%2Band%2Bembodied%2Bexperiences%2Bof%2Brefugee%2Bpolitics.pdf&type_of_work=Journal+article

  118. Liz
    Ignored
    says:

    Fiona Hyslop is a mealy mouthed middle class woman.
    She has quangos s part of her remit but fails to pull in their unionist tendencies because, we can’t rock the boat or some such weaknees.

    However i think this is coming from.NS.
    SAS said she would meet with women’s groups and then said she didn’t have time.
    NS will not let this go as I think it’s a stepping stone to a UN job.
    If necessary it will end up in court, like the NO, because it’s breaking the 2010 EqA.

  119. Liz
    Ignored
    says:

    Damn autocorrect. Like the NP

  120. Thepnr
    Ignored
    says:

    It’s pretty obvious that not all Independence supporters number one priority is actually Independence.

    That’s fair enough, but for those I’m referring to do they really believe that staying in the Union or having a party other than the SNP governing at Holyrood will provide them with what they seek on any single issue?

    If so, good luck with that.

  121. CameronB Brodie
    Ignored
    says:

    Thepnr
    Informed and constructive criticism of the SNP does not undermine the indy cause, it strengthens it.

  122. CameronB Brodie
    Ignored
    says:

    An inter-disciplinary world-view follows a gender-critical approach to understanding reality. Though it is not immediately apparent, the legal definition of sex, can’t really be separated from Scotland’s constitutional position within the union. Denying biology matters is essentially the same as claiming Britain is one nation. Both courses of action have mahoosive human rights implications.

    Personhood: An Essential Characteristic of the Human Species
    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6081772/

  123. CameronB Brodie
    Ignored
    says:

    I’m not simply a rigid, gender-critical, idealist, I do know a bit about constitutional legal theory and stuff. 😉

    Persons and citizens in constitutional thought

    1. Persons or citizens: Aligned or opposing concepts?

    The ideas of citizenship and personhood have an ambiguous relationship in constitutional thought. Often, they are understood as aligned, even as identical. Claims for “equal citizenship” and “democratic citizenship” are, in effect, claims on behalf of the rights and recognition of individuals qua persons. American constitutional theorist Kenneth Karst made this presumed equivalence plain when he wrote that the principle of equal citizenship protects the “crucial interest in being treated by the society as a person, one who belongs.”1

    Frequently, though, citizenship and personhood are regarded as opposing concepts. Whereas citizenship references national belonging and its associated rights, personhood evokes the rights and dignity of individuals independent of national status. Personhood stands for the universal, in contrast to citizenship, which is ultimately exclusionary. The most well-known exponent of this view is Alexander Bickel, who eschewed a citizenship-centric constitutionalism on grounds it was “regressive” and “parochial”. He maintained that “the authentic voice of the American Constitution” finds expression through its protection of persons.2

    Much of the ambiguity of the personhood–citizenship relationship results from the multivalence of the idea of citizenship itself. Analytically, the term is used to indicate both relations among existing members of a political community and the process of constituting that community in the first place. Normatively, citizenship is understood as committed to universalism within the community, but in its community-constitutive mode, it is associated with bounded national commitments…..

    https://academic.oup.com/icon/article/8/1/9/682631

  124. twathater
    Ignored
    says:

    My opinion and I have my wife’s permission to post it , if the SNP push forward with this GRA in the face of protest from opposition and this then becomes law , I would appeal to women and their supporters ( relatives ) to think of the LONG term and still vote SNP for independence and thereafter INSIST and FORCE a referendum takes place to determine all opinions on the matter without predudice or coercion , and unlike the OBFA the ELECTORATE will decide whether the legislation should be repealed or accepted

    I have indicated numerous times my support for referendums on societal decisions this could be one issue that we show politicians that they will not FORCE their views or opinions on us , I want a government that listens to their electorate not decides that they know best , we had enough of that with liebour

  125. RM
    Ignored
    says:

    Career politicians are educated by the current political doctrine that’s taught around the world, we need politicians that think outside the box, playing by the rules won’t get us independence.

  126. Gary
    Ignored
    says:

    No, I think you’ve misunderstood the ‘why’ of this.

    The reason she could probably say this and you definitely CAN’T is that she has credibility built up over years as a progressive politician, which obviously you don’t (not being a politician at all)

    I can’t over look either the fact that she is a woman, and therefore CONSIDERED to be more in tune with what women need and want.

    And, looking at the negatives, she didn’t ‘lose’ a courtcase where she was being made out to be homophobic. No one in the press CALLS HER a homophobe either. Neither does she write pieces on her blog heavily criticising these rights which some advocate. (Something you could either just NOT do or do so in a way that comes off less aggressive Stu!)

    She has a party with a long term history behind it. A party that has taken DECADES to even begin to be considered as mainstream and be invited on TV to actually ASK HER OPINION rather than just shout at her and make her out to be a fringe loon ball – this is SO recent this is still delicate and should be nourished, not dismantled. When the mainstream media FINALLY accept that the wish for Indy is reasonable and widespread THEN we will get it.

    This ISN’T about you, it isn’t about the SNP, it’s about having an independent country. I get it, it can’t come quickly enough. But we DO need patience, once we GET independence we won’t be going back (thank God) we’ll have won.

    I urge you not to split the Indy vote, put your resources behind something that works. It’s not JUST the votes that you take off SNP and allow the Tories or Labour in, it’s that your resources drum up support for SNP at the moment. People could just completely move away from supporting ANY Indy party and go back to Labour again. They’ve heard McDonnel say he won’t block an Indy vote and many might believe him, don’t allow them this chance Stu!

  127. David
    Ignored
    says:

    Stu have to ask why did you give that interview to the Times .
    Why not the National or at least a Scottish paper

  128. manandboy
    Ignored
    says:

    http://archive.is/QRSMy

    BREXIT DIAGNOSTICS ON JOHNSON’S VISIT TO BERLIN & PARIS. Johnson remains in character as the principal entertainment & distraction, at the Brexit Punch and Judy show.

    “The central question is whether this is anything more than a game, in which all sides try to sound open to reason and alternatives while, at the same time, nothing changes. The worldly answer is that it is not. As Mr Johnson headed back to London, Britain remains headed towards no deal. Nothing that he has said in public is a remotely serious attempt to prevent that. There is no suggestion that he intends anything different in private. The logical conclusion is that we are all bystanders in an elaborate, polite, but irresistible masquerade whose purpose is to prepare the ground for the participants to heap blame on one another when the inevitable comes to pass, Britain crashes out and Mr Johnson calls an election in which he blames everything on Europe.”

  129. chicmac
    Ignored
    says:

    My cynical side tells me BoJo is only ploying to placate potential Tory rebels (i.e. those with a modicum of sanity) by keeping the myth of a Brexit deal alive.

  130. Fran
    Ignored
    says:

    I thought it was nice of them to say you were optimistic and progressive

  131. cadogan Enright
    Ignored
    says:

    this is not a mainstream issue – it is troubling – but not what will decide the vote of 90% of people

  132. callum
    Ignored
    says:

    No matter what your opinion on this feverishly difficult topic is; I can guarantee that it will be used as a weak spot to undermine the case for independence by unionist causes.

    Brexit has given Scotland fabulous opportunity; let’s not create an open goal and waste it.

  133. David
    Ignored
    says:

    Read that Boris is planning to flood the Lords with pro Brexit business men .Corbyn holds a meeting with SNP etc CH4 news say todays meeting moved away from a no confidence motion its now a plan to delay the date .SNP they are in a bunfight over who wants to be national Secretary .



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