Victims of circumstance
In May 2016, this site published one of the most unfortunately prescient articles in its history. It didn’t actually use the words “woke” or “cancelled”, which weren’t yet in common parlance, but its purpose was very much to warn of the puritan, censorious, hyper-intolerant and catastrophically destructive culture they came to embody.
At the time Nicola Sturgeon had only been First Minister for a year and a half and there were few signs that she was that movement’s commander – or, those inclined to a more charitable outlook than us might posit, its prisoner. It would be two more years before she detonated the bomb that really shattered the unity of the Yes movement when she attempted to fit up Alex Salmond over fake allegations of sexual assaults.
But last night and this morning I was struck by an unexpected pang of pity for the fanatical, fundamentalist Twitler Youth rainbow stormtroopers who make up Sturgeon’s ideological frontline. Sympathy for the little devils, you might say.
And since it’s a somewhat rare feeling, it seemed worth a little exploration.
It came about from watching two TV shows either side of midnight – first the excellent “Who Killed The KLF?” on Sky Documentaries, and later “Britpop At The BBC”, a cobbled-together compilation of mid-90s Top Of The Pops appearances and the like.
Britpop – a generation past now, having ended meaningfully in 1997 – was the last time I felt any affinity with anything British. And it suddenly dawned on me just how good those of us who were in our 20s in the 1990s had had it compared to the same demographic today.
By the midpoint of the decade it was beyond any doubt that the Conservatives who had ruled for almost two decades were on their last gasps. After John Major’s surprise 1992 election victory (following the 1990-91 recession) it was clear that the Tories were rotten inside and out, riddled with sleaze and ineptitude, and there would be no more Indian summers for the party.
(Superficially we’re in the same situation now, but Keir Starmer is no Tony Blair and I’m not yet convinced that a Labour victory in 2024 is as inevitable as Blair’s in 1997 was. Labour genuinely, albeit briefly, looked fresh and new and vibrant, whereas Starmer’s main selling point is wholly passive – he’s not Boris Johnson or Liz Truss or Rishi Sunak. Labour’s rise in the polls is purely a result of the astounding Tory mega-implosion of 2022, not an energising new vision of change and renewal, however illusory. The same happened in Scotland in 2017, and quickly disintegrated again.)
And heavens, readers, what a dizzying time it was to be alive. Culture was euphoric. The MDMA-fuelled Second Summer Of Love at the dawn of the decade had evolved – with the KLF, who were a bridge between rave culture and the indie/alternative music scene thanks to Bill Drummond’s links to guitar bands like Echo And The Bunnymen and The Teardrop Explodes, playing no small part – into a unified communal entity which crashed wildly disparate artforms into each other and turned shoegazing white emo bands like the Soup Dragons, Primal Scream and the Stone Roses into purveyors of dancefloor anthems that crossed cultural and racial boundaries.
By the middle of the decade that joyful coming together had produced its children, of which Britpop was the most successful. Optimism and exuberance were still in full flow. (It helped that the AIDS crisis was pretty much over by this point, and we were all getting wasted and having sex again without worrying that we’d die as a result.)
Outsiders and subversives were mainstream and everywhere. Po-faced 80s agit-proppers Chumbawamba were improbably at No.2 in the charts, on the soundtrack of FIFA 98 and pulling off audacious stunts at the Brit Awards to highlight Labour’s lack of support for striking workers (plus ca change, eh readers?), while Banksy had just come to prominence, making guerrilla protest art smart and accessible enough that people actually noticed it. “Trainspotting”, “True Romance”, “Men In Black”, “Fargo”, “Fight Club” and “Babe” were in cinemas. Fun and sharp wit were in vogue.
The printed leisure media was enjoying its last great heyday – as well as the weekly music papers and magazines like Select and The Face pumping out vast screeds of pioneering writing spanning every conceivable style and viewpoint, “lad culture” (a legacy, crucially, of the loved-up Ecstasy boom) had for the first time given young men a way to be themselves and enjoy male things positively rather than aggressively.
For a few years from the launch of “Loaded” in 1994, it became acceptable in polite society for men to enjoy sport, beer, videogames, bacon sandwiches, comedy, graphic novels, action movies and being attracted to women without acting or being portrayed as toxic football hooligans, vomiting “lager louts” or borderline rapists. At its peak the magazine was selling hundreds of thousands of copies a month, as were many of its hastily-retargeted competitors like FHM and Esquire.
(I had a box seat for these events, writing regularly on games, music, TV and more for Esquire, The Face, Front, Wired and others during the decade. The 90s were also the era of the original Playstation, another fusion which famously brought together the worlds of gaming, music and clubbing.)
The first few years of the phenomenon, then, were probably the most benign cultural manifestation of masculinity in living memory, but as time went on both the intelligence and the tone of “lad mags” coarsened significantly in the search for market share, and the sector began to slide back towards a crude 1970s/80s sexism.
(There’s a whole other article, or probably book, to be written about which really had a more harmful effect on young women in the 1990s – “lad mags” which basically worshipped them, albeit in sometimes problematic ways, or women’s magazines which told them every aspect of their existence was wrong and ugly and urgently in need of correcting with fashion or cosmetics or surgery or personality reconstruction.)
So by now you’re probably wondering where this aimless nostalgic old-man ramble is going. But the point is that today’s millennial youth inhabit a much grimmer world, in almost every way, than that of a generation ago.
Music, for example, has shattered into uncountable disparate and polarised fragments characterised by insufferably preachy fifth-generation bedwetter emo children at one extreme and endless incomprehensibly brutal, crass splinter derivatives of hip-hop that are basically Andrew Tate in musical form at the other.
(And yet The Prodigy’s satirical video for their 1997 top 10 hit “Smack My Bitch Up” is banned from YouTube. A lot of Twitter users have found out in the last couple of years that you can say awful things for real on the platform with impunity, but if you satirise those things you’ll get suspended before you can blink.)
And more to the point, we’ve just come out of two lockdown years where young people couldn’t go out and communally enjoy ANY form of music, or indeed any real-life social contact. (And God forbid they try to have sex without filling out 36 pages of detailed consent forms and pronoun checks.)
That forced them deeper into the dark hellscape of social media, which amplifies and intensifies and accelerates almost any trope to the extremes in a heartbeat, turning even justified and well-intentioned movements like MeToo and Black Lives Matter into grotesque McCarthyite witch-hunts, power-trips and grifts almost instantly.
Divorced from the balancing effect of the real world, resisting that poisonous spiral is a lot to ask of young people whose adult minds are still barely formed. And hence our unexpected epiphany of empathy.
Because on one level it’s understandable that in an attempt to carve themselves some sort of identity and agency in a barren, hostile world, the less strong among them have fallen victim to a disguised totalitarian hate cult (“woke”) that at least offers them the power and protection of the lynch mob – as long as they conform perfectly – where we had a sweaty blissed-out mass hug to the Chemical Brothers.
(As ever, Orwell saw it first and expressed it with perfect concise clarity. He was even spookily on the nose with the line about the abolition of the orgasm, something which is now being cruelly perpetrated on unsuspecting “trans” children with puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones.)
But that just makes all those exploiting them for personal gain all the more despicable. In the next 12 months, Wings will not relent in our efforts to drive those people back into the wretched sewers of history where they belong.
…hear hear!
ATB for 23….
Spot on, despite the fact that I just missed the whole post-indy music acid house explosion and all the wonder that followed (just a teensy bit too old to take my t shirt off and yell in a night club, sadly). I really feel for early millenials also. I do however, and I work with this generation, have very high hopes for the Zeds. They have seen a lot of shit in their two decades or so, and they seem to have developed a maturity and pragmatism that keeps me hopeful for the future. As per the professionally self victimized, Cartesian post truth identitarians, they have been and continue to be used as useful idiots.
Thank you Mr Campbell, I had almost forgotten that passage from Orwell. Many of the music references are over my head, but it is pleasing that you as proprietor of these premises are examining the bigger picture.
Great article and excellent trip down memory lane. My 8 year old is thankfully more aware of all the bands in the links provided above than the current crop and your Orwell link is, as always, all too prescient.
You’re so OLD
League of Gentlemen (1999 – 2002), Monkey Dust (2003 – 2005) and others, joyously profane, exuberantly abrasive that could NEVER be commissioned today.
What passes for the Left these days, crushed by the infection of ubiquitous Culture Wars is devoid of spontaneity and fun.
Weep for the future.
I think this is very accurate. Music in general is now of very poor quality and lyrics are safe and nice rather than thought provoking or words against the establishment.
I was very involved in the dance scene in Scotland in the 1990s. I remember one morning my phone ringing at 9.30am and I was pure raging at getting woke up! It was Liam from the prodigy speaking in quite a posh accent inquiring about a dance mix. The prodigy were my fav band then so I was a little star struck but after a few minutes it was a great conversation which I am so grateful happened.
I also remember handing over N-Trance ‘set you free’ mix at the bottom of a close in Dennistoun. Some weeks later it was number 1.
I have so many great memories of the 1990s including a great conversation with the guy wearing the beads ‘moby’ who was touring in Scotland ???????.
Music was better back then, even dance music had meaningful expression and rhythmic melody.
Today I think university campus rule the narrative. The narrative has manipulated the working classes and at its core the musical sound coming from bearsden or morningside is absolutely pish!
“You’re so OLD”
You’re so BANNED.
gosh
call yerself a journalist
too feckin (w)right
“League of Gentlemen (1999 – 2002), Monkey Dust (2003 – 2005) and others, joyously profane, exuberantly abrasive that could NEVER be commissioned today.”
I was pondering whether comic books like Grant Morrison’s “Kill Your Boyfriend” (1995) or Peter Milligan’s “Skin” (1992) would have had a hope of getting printed now. Dear God we were so lucky.
“I also remember handing over N-Trance ‘set you free’ mix at the bottom of a close in Dennistoun. Some weeks later it was number 1.”
Proper fucking banger. I also had a particular soft spot for Farley Jackmaster Funk’s “Love Can’t Turn Around”. The fat lad had some PIPES.
What a brilliant piece
You ever tried to discuss anything regarding history or geography or basic maths with a member of the younger generation (below 25).
They are at a total loss.
Their excuse for not knowing what you are talking about is that they were not born then, so have no need to know about it
It does leave you shaking your head in disbelief,,,and deep sadness and great concern for the lack of knowledge they will be passing on to THEIR children.
It’s sad for the youth – they are too young to know how shit things are now; the only avenue for self advancement and improvement seems to be involving mutilating your genitals.
As for the 90s, it is notable how the first attack of cultural marxism outside of the university – “political correctness” – was destroyed utterly, savaged in the media, only to provide material for standup at the fringe. Second time, they won.
The “left” does not exist anymore – class was removed in place of identity politics; “left-right” made some sense up till 1984, then that war was lost. Politics had some meaningful choice until then.
Going way-back, as a little kid in the 70s, there was a time of optimism – tech would solve all problems in the future, flying cars, holidays in space, cancer, energy – all we got was the smartphone, by now a tracking and surveillance device. We went to the Moon in 69, and have not been back since; weapons tech is top notch though.
The young live through their phones and social media; it is a panopticon and a psychological torture device. I pity them.
There is a group of angry young men, disenfrachised, trying to fit in with their peers, only to find themselves blamed for – slavery, the holocaust and the oppression of women; this is quite hard to take when your favourite footballers are black, you’ve never met a jew and never had a sniff of vagina, or a squeeze of boob – there is bound to be a reaction.
It is indeed an “old man” cliche to say the young peoples music is shit; but it really IS. Consider Sheeran’s mediocrity against the sharpness of The Specials – “rat race” and “do nothing”. Prescient, wise and great fucking choons.
I am glad to have been born in the era I was.
I’ve said this elsewhere bur I feel extremely lucky to have had my late teens and early twenties during the 90s. What a decade! And thank fuck there was no social media or camera phones everywhere cos I did a *lot of stupid stuff.
Well said, Rev.
These people must be put back in the sewer, as you say.
The women’s movement hasn’t been as strong for a while, and it’s apolitical.
The common cause is to insist TW are males, no ifs, no buts
My era was way before yours, late 60s into the 70s.
How lucky we were.
You could do almost anything you wanted.
We felt really free.
“There is a group of angry young men, disenfrachised, trying to fit in with their peers, only to find themselves blamed for – slavery, the holocaust and the oppression of women; this is quite hard to take when your favourite footballers are black, you’ve never met a jew and never had a sniff of vagina, or a squeeze of boob – there is bound to be a reaction.”
Yep. I know which I think is the more toxic influence on them out of Loaded and Andrew Tate, but the latter is what they’re being tempted/cornered into by the aggressive hyper-intolerance of the woke.
Too old?
Too bloody young..
I missed that period, belatedly bring up brats..
The 70s were it anyhoo
Spent a lot of time clubbing to house and techno (but not rave) music in late 80s to mid 90s. Both here in UnUnited Kingdom and in the USA and Europe.
I have commented previously on OT that the cross-society togetherness of that scene was reminiscent of what was the YES movement.
Society’s all gone to shit now imo, but there are still occasional things that perk my interest music wise.
EG: Niteworks with their musical fusion of electronic and traditional.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVpgQgm7GZs
I was no fan, but Liam Gallagher made a good point in a documentary about that massive outdoor gig Oasis did in the late 90s and how it was the last hurrah of pre-internet spontaneous coming together, that made it really special. And that it was the fans who really ‘made’ Oasis by turning them into a phenomenon, but one that was more about that community than the group, who otherwise were a fairly ordinary band. Quite honest and perceptive comments from the much-maligned one.
And everyone was welcome. The rise of ‘identity’ as a politics and whole way of seeing the world has a lot to answer for. How can people ever truly come together if their biggest concern is their own identity, often forged in opposition to other ‘bad’ identities? My advice to young people would be stop thinking about yourself so much and stop being so defensive about your and your social / ethnic / political etc group’s so-called identity. In fact, stop thinking about it at all.
I’m still an 80’s thrash metal heidbanger and I’ve enjoyed the Britpop era as well, I’ve always had a wide range of music to enjoy and be comfortable in different music groups.
The days of tape sharing us over and the Internet has killed that and as you say, introduced the younger generation to an extremely wrapped environment where all common sense has lost its rationale.
The Internet is great for discovering things but it has allow cunts like Andrew Tate rise to prominence for his misogynistic behaviour.
I really do feel for the future generations, maybe this is the circle of all generations, the elders hated what we liked and this will continue till the end of days.
Great piece rev.
It really makes you wonder what the future holds for young people. There doesn`t seem to be any warmth and light anymore only cold and darkness.
How many fell for the Tony Blair propaganda.
I did,,, even before he was elected, I would be telling people to watch out for this up and coming wiz kid.
He was going to wipe the evil Tories off the face of the earth.
Then just to cement that viewpoint, they linked their campaign to the song,,”Things,,,can only get batter”.
How wrong were we?
And we swore blind that we would NEVER be fooled like that ever again.
Until 2014,,, when one Nicola Sturgeon stepped into our lives as our new saviour, and the rest is history, as they say
Moral of the story,,,
NEVER SAY YOU NEVER GET CAUGHT OUT LIKE THAT AGAIN BY A POLITICIAN.
Because another “White Knight” could ride up tomorrow, and we would all do the exact same thing again.
Are we gullible or what?
A nice wee nostalgic trip over the last thirty or so years, I’m of the era where there was no social media we played outside with real friends and where happy with what we got at Christmas no mobile phones around then, the biggest problems I recall were alcohol, glue sniffing and sectarianism.
Now young folk are bombarded with how they should look, talk and think, and if you don’t meet the standard on any of them and are outspoken you are branded something or other, and not taken seriously among the it crowds. I think being liked on social media now means everything to the young folk which is a shame as they have far more to offer than sitting around worrying about how many likes they’ll get for each piccy or post.
As for woke, I can recall when the word woke actually meant that you were aware in some respect of the machinations of your government and what the MIC and the non-gov NGO’s were up to etc. The word has long since been hijacked to mean something else, now young folk are being bombarded with social media comments, ads, etc telling them that its okay to do this and that to their bodies when its clearly not, as you rightly say young folks minds are still learning and they could easily be swayed by this woke nonsense and badly regret decisions made today in later life, there’s going to be a helluva lot of angry adults in years to come shouting and screaming why did you let me do this to my body, I was barely a teenager when this happened etc.
As for our children and granchildren etc, they are the new targets in this woke game of gaining access to them, they must be resisted at every turn, already the unamended GRRB has tipped the balance in their favour, removing the SNP and Greens from office should be our priority at any election for the sake of our women folk and children.
Vote Alba, Join Alba.
One of, if not the best post you’ve ever written.
Pure ‘dead brill’ A very happy NY + awerabest in 23. Delighted you’ll be busy & ta for all you’ve done thus far x
I was just the right age for the NWOBHM.
Having said that, I revisited a lot of Britpop stuff some 6 months ago and the standout – for me – was how well Echobelly’s music has aged. Some of the others seem a bit lumpen now compared to how they appeared at the time.
Blur at the Shepherd’s Bush Empire (in between Modern Life Is Rubbish and Parklife) was one of the best gigs I’ve seen.
As for the Left, the SSP have a presence at the east end of Princes St. every weekend (it seems like). I’m on a bus or a bike if I’m heading that way though, so haven’t stopped to talk yet. It’s maybe the likes of them that have to try to woo unhappy Labour voters.
Confused @3:48pm has it right. The seeds of destruction were sowed in the 1980s with political correctness and the idea that there was a correct way to think and everything else was reactionary. Once the teenage cultural Marxists grew up and got into positions of power then it was game over for humanity and the collective started to take over.
I’m not sure how we get out of this mess. To make it in any institution you have to conform to the views of the people in charge. To give an absurd example, mid last year, when the Russians decided they were not going to renew the launch contract for the International Space Station the spokesman, oops, spokesperson from NASA went on a rant about how Russia should be declared a state sponsor of terrorism and how Putin should be tried for war crimes – i.e. nothing to do with launching astronauts and everything to do with getting that promotion up the next few rungs by repeating the narrative. We see the same thing with the SNP candidate selection process. The whole “you need to please your masters to get on” circus only rewards the cynical sycophants and those with talent or ability need not apply.
So, pity the young, for newspeak is already here and their thinking is already constrained by it. The new feudalism is here, and they were told that it’s exactly what they wanted.
Wings will not relent in our efforts to drive those people back into the wretched sewers of history where they belong.
I have just been watching all this stuff on YouTube and my mind is reeling.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sf3b7A8Xh4w
The question is am I going off topic or is it all part of the same topic.
Before being ordained one of the paedophile priests had been charged with child sex abuse the church knew but he was still ordained.
Spot any similarities between this and the SNP’s self-id?
Chumbawamba!
The lyrics to Homophobia spring to mind often when reading about state collusion in trans madness and need little alteration to accommodate the new religion:
“Beware the Holy Trinity, Church and State and Law”
(As ever, Orwell saw it first and expressed it with perfect concise clarity. He was even spookily on the nose with the line about the abolition of the orgasm, something which is now being cruelly perpetrated on unsuspecting “trans” children with puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones.)
Alan Turing chemically castrated.
Alan Turing had an estrogen chip implanted in his thigh.
Suggestions that prison authorities like the idea of male sex offenders being in women’s prisons because of the cross sex hormones aka chemical castration.
Karen White boasted that he kept the pill under his tongue and didn’t swallow it.
Ah, the Britpop ’90s. I was happily working for Our Price at the time. There was also the fabulous “ladette” culture for young women who didn’t want to be left out lad culture. And shops like Flip where you could but all the retro skinny football T-shirts required of a ladette.
This rings very true. In addition the effect of the global failure to address climate change properly is also having a real and disproportionate impact on the mental health of young people. The feeling of impotence in the face of this, of political corruption, war, exploitation and destructive capitalism not to mention housing and cost of living woes must be intense. It is not a surprise that when the option of a seemingly easy win presented by some politicians as simple good v bad human rights struggle, it is grasped with a desperation to make meaning and see at least one positive impact from one’s actions. As for the left, I recall Nick Cohen writing about the easy slide into left wing authoritarianism and/or apologist views of it. Let’s hope for a brighter short term future for younger people seeking joy and meaning less hyper individualist and more universalist in focus.
Oh and Love Can’t Turn Around is superb!!
At the time, I always used to wish I’d lived in the 60s, and it may well be that the boomer generation had the best of all worlds, if the trajectory of shit keeps going as it is right now and we end up with a nasty kind of fascist world over the next few decades. But in hindsight, growing up in the 70s, 80s and being a young adult in the 90s was pretty great.
I do pity the younger generations today, but in large part that’s because their loud and vocal minority are absolutely horrific, and that must be far worse for them than for older people, who can largely ignore them. Those are their peers, spokespeople and leaders, promoted and enabled by older people for their own gain. Us older generations have to take some responsibility for that: it’s the politicians we’ve elected doing that.
Absolutely couldn’t agree more. I watched Who Killed The KLF and almost cried when I thought about the sheer joy of living in that era. We had no mobile phone, yet knew exactly where and when we would meet up. There was a Revolution on the dance floor, not a shot was fired. It was a time I can hardly believe happened when I see the beige mess that music, fashion and culture has become. I work in the hairdressing industry, and it was alight with diversity and imagination. People had their own identities, not one forced on them by the Kardashian’s , ever longer hair extensions, nail extensions and lash extensions. Funny thing is that with all this “ beauty ” we see ever more increasing girls in a crisis of acceptance and confidence. I stopped reading the fashion magazines, they made me feel inadequate. The bbc put out this 3 part series that’s still available. Show it to your kids, because the decade it’s showing is the last of our beloved, precious, subculture.. now it’s going. But like you Rev.. this fight is one that I’m tooled up for and ready. Because I’m damned if my daughter is going to be made to feel inferior, inadequate or threatened, because of her sex. Life is for living.. let’s start where we left off.. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001cbst
Yes Winston McBride, there was great expectation when Tony Blair and new Labour formed the Government in 1997. But as events proved they were as rotten and corrupt as the Tories.
In Scotland in 2007 there was great expectation when the SNP under Alex Salmond formed the Scottish government. But as we now know they are a rotten as, and indeed are effectively as one with the Tories.
Blair, Brown, Darling Mandelson have all made multi millions post leaving office. Deferred payback Blair is now worth about £350 million as is son Ewen.
No doubt wealth aplenty will flow to Sturgeon when she leaves office for a job well done, and to others too. Of course when you look at some of the other elected SNP you’ll see others who sold out simply for the elected seat, the expenses and pension. Much better than they could earn elsewhere.
But yes, Scotland a country awash with oil, gas, hydro and wind energy, huge marine resource, a decent whisky export and the country moves on its knees best exemplified by the holocaust of cold houses and an underfunded NHS.
Ah well. like Michelle Mone, there’s those who sell out – just like Blair, Brown, Darling and soon to join them.
For the blind clueless sheep in England
About 500 people could be dying each week in England due to emergency care delays, a senior healthcare official has warned.
Dr Adrian Boyle, president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, said he thinks waiting times for December will be the worst he has ever seen.
Just re-read the original article and some of that article’s BTL comments. I just want to commend four of them by Breeks about the Scottish Borders and the railway etc. It’s quality contributions like his (or hers?) that really lifted the WoS site well above any other before or since.
Edit. Been reading more of the BTL comments…I almost feel more nostalgic for 2016 than the late 80s or mid-90s. Where have all those people gone?
It’s interesting though. A few standouts…there’s almost nothing BTL about the approaching EU referendum held just over six weeks later…there’s a guy with the tag Callmedave whose avatar is the Alba Party logo (is this a coincidence or do updated avatars end up populating automatically all BTL contributions?)…and there’s a link to a David Leask article about Ulsterisation that is actually worth reading (fancy that??!!!).
Been feeling a bit bored lately…think I’ve discovered my new year’s obsession/hobby.
The punting of safe karaoke type XFactor songs has destroyed youth culture. THat led to them searching for another way to rebel,hence the TRA’s… Big Business/BBC Radio stations now play songs that are 10 /20 years old as there’s no new music genre. Computerised pap with no musical skill has killed group/bands. It is now all about the individual(see Adele,Sam Smith,Ed Sheerin etc)
Primal Scream lived across the landing from me in 1987/88 in Glasgow & I ended up looking after their (much neglected) cat. They might have done some good songs but they were a shower of narcissistic wankers back then 🙂
I grew up in the 80s and mainstream pop music was absolute gash. If it is again, to me that’s just reversion to the mean.
The modern art form is memes, so let’s go find a picture of a smug-looking cat and riff on that.
The 1990s:
When Star Trek was good. TNG, DS9 and Babylon 5.
When PC games were good, like the wonderful Lucas Arts click-and-point adventure games – Monkey Island, Indiana Jones and The Fate of Atlantis, Day of The Tentacle etc.
Mega Drive Vs SNES.
Amiga Vs Atari STE.
Dial up internet, where it took 20 minutes to download an image of a woman’s breasts.
Duke Nukem 3D.
A good New Year to you and your family, Stuart.
What an excellent post.
Orwell was a Scotland-hating prick.
Lads mags were faux-ironic dross to allow the English middle class to pretend to be the ‘blokey’ working class. All they ever went on about were beer, shots, Harvey Keitel movies, big tits and tiresome football drivel.
Raves were braindead.
Tony Blair is a war criminal who turned UK politics into a PR-fest.
Britpop was a mostly English middle class media phenomenon that Scottish people could not relate to.
Mayflies is utter shite. (just had to add that)
Stu, What a great column. I could wax on at great length, but you probably know how good a piece of writing this is.
Keep up the good work.
After New Wave faded away I concentrated on classical music. No regrets, even if it aged me prematurely. [Castrati on the way back?]
Good to see the Rev back behind the wheel, ‘firing on all 6’.
In a major report just issued Police Scotland are now using the title MAF ( or Minor Attracted People) to describe pedophiles.
The report further considers how Police Scotland can help and support MAPs to prevent crimes.
Coming on top of the prior SG direction to police to disregard and keep secret sexual relationships with school children down to 13 years of age, assuming that the sexual relations are not abusive, one cannot belt help see a slide to legalising child sex.
What with teaching eight year olds about normal anal sex using a teaching aid of a banana and a jar of Nutella, and recently asking all school kids 14 year old about their anal, oral and vaginal sex life, you really have to stand aghast at what this Sturgeon government are trying to do.
This is turning Scotland into an animal kingdom where children are going to be corrupted and abused.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/12/30/scottish-police-call-paedophiles-minor-attracted-people-major/
Telegraph piece on Minor Attracted People – or pedophiles in normal folks language.
Off topic I know but…I went from 10 to 19 in the 90s. For a time, I was so obsessed with Pink Floyd and anything pre-80s that I told everyone “modern music is shite compared to the older stuff”. Thankfully that didn’t last long. WHAT A DECADE!
Was driving my daughter to work a few days before Christmas and the notion struck me to play a 90s playlist from Apple Music – so many memories came flooding back.
Its not like that now 🙁
“You’re so BANNED.”
I bet you think this song is about you.
I’ve been watching a few vids of Jordan Paterson.
He talks a lot of sense. (If you forward passed the suck up to the British system)
Paraphrasing
Men are angry & disenfranchised & have never grown up because they didn’t socialise & play early in life so don’t recognise boundaries or how to communicate in normal conversation. Absent/working parent, an only child, or played alone. So prone to have tantrums & aggressive traits later in life when they don’t get thier own way 100% of the time which is what they’ve been used to. Lack of social skills the rise of Incels?
They’re also pissed off they’re overlooked in the workplace by women because women have a vagina rather than it based on the best person for the job.
Women are amenable in nature. Hence the trans cult taking hold. Narsassistic men used to having thier own way.
I’ve heard this before by a lecture given by someone else – can’t remember who, but it was towards capitalism & consumerism. Basically that parents working 5 jobs to pay the house, the car, the holiday & all the nice things in life are to fecked for parenthood when they get home.
I think we’re witnessing the fruits of that generation now. Those spoilt children are now spoilt adults.
If you’re OK with ID politics taking the place of issues to do with the economy, inequality, class etc you’re not on the actual left.
Gordon Hastie says: 2 January, 2023 at 7:45 am
ID politics is helping groups of society who have been marginalised in many ways, including economically so it can be defined as being left wing politics.
Of course it totally ignores the majority who also face the same issues. It also means drawing the political centre of gravity to the left that anybody who disagrees with this ideology, is seen as right wing.
It is going to be an uphill struggle to argue against that with the strangehold of woke ideology in the MSM but nothing lasts forever and trends change so it’s hard to see this madness continuing.
Talking of 90’s, only recently got into Anime and there are quite a few classics from that decade:
* Ghost in the Shell
* Cowboy Bebop
* Neon Genesis Evangelion
* Princess Mononoke (not strictly Anime but a great early Studio Ghibli production)
Good article.
I started worrying a bit when I read a Herald one claiming Musk and Ronaldo to be among the greatest losers of 2022 (rather than, say, humanity – or even Kane and Southgate) and it dawned that that particular SMSM method of lowering aspirations by demeaning the achievements of others was probably not even intentional.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q051KMqBiws
Smiled again when I remembered quite how easy it is to fix
This post and the below the line comments are top notch on many different levels. Very interesting reading. Made me smile, made me angry, made me sad.
Not that long ago the extent of our decision making about whether to go on ‘social media’ or not was to go ex-directory or stay listed in the phone book. And that is not an exaggeration.
There is a real dark side to this ‘woke phenomenon’ though.
It has been likened to the colour revolutions that we saw deployed around the world and I’ve seen it said that the woke phenomenon is the culmination of the ‘domestic version’ of the same thing. These are our home ‘colour revolutions’.
Personally I think there is a lot of truth in this and it raises some really very troubling questions.
Because this woke phenomenon is essentially a very grave and deadly attack on ‘us’, ordinary people. Physically, mentally, socially, emotionally, you name it. It is bad news all round for us.
Ask who would want to destroy peoples belief in God, drive a wedge between men and women, break up the family, poison the education system, degrade the NHS, break us down societally so we are all fighting each other in perpetuity…
But more importantly ask why. The answers are all above.
Who has the means, the motive and the opportunity… and the power to enact it all, over decades.
Because whoever they are, THEY are our enemy.
And now they are coming after the kids.
But that just makes all those exploiting them for personal gain all the more despicable.
I understand why pharmaceutical companies & private medicine would gain but in what way do people like Patrick Harvie & John Nicholson gain from young people & adults being turned into eunuchs?
I believe in «evil», because my extended family has had first hand experience of it.
In the secular western culture that is considered metaphysical nonsense, even in the light of the numerous massacres of the 20th century and the psychological reality of the malignant and deviant infecting «society».
Denying evil’s existence lowers the defences, the perfect condition for evil to prosper ought of sight, out of mind, in the world of «homo ignorans».
Draw your own conclusions as to what drives «gender» politics and the new existential order promoted by globalist ideologists and their willing servants.
«The Trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt»
Bertrand Russel
https://archive.is/94iLo
Man faces jail after ‘infatuation’ led to him secretly film staff changing room at Aberdeen bar
https://archive.is/SDMDX
Briton arrested in South Korea on charges of secretly filming women
Both these men could be in your changing room filming you on their phones.
Who is going to stop them?
They could also be in the toilet/changing room next to you filming you.
How do you like the idea of being filmed while you are peeing/changing and the film being posted on some pervs website?
Sturgeon’s GRRB has made life a lot easier for these ‘voyeurs’ and made indecent exposure in women’s changing rooms totally legal.
Keep signing:
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/628382
Lets have no sex changes
No man masquerading as a woman.
Yes… There’s a lot in what you say, Stu.
The Internet has been culpable in decreased mental health in young people and has been ruthlessly weaponised by influencers.
Can’t help but be sympathetic… But at some point, insanity has to be trumped by mental health and wellbeing.
We are there now.
What a writer you were and are. Respect.
https://twitter.com/womenreadwomen/status/1219858729207660545?lang=en-GB
Complaints not valid says Sturgeon!
Ottomanboi 2 January, 2023 at 10:02 am
I can see where you’re coming from. However absurd it might appear from a common sense point of view, the older I get and the more I see, the harder I find it to persuade myself that Biblical evil isn’t a real thing.
@Wilson MacBride 5:16
“Things can only get batter” ???
That one must have passed me by.
But to be serious for a mo, approx 5.5 million of us sovereign Scots.
We won’t all get to shape the new Scotland in our own image. Around approx 5.49999 million of us will simply follow one, or a handful of leaders.
Those leader(s) will be politicians, even if we collectively decide to call them something else.
So the answer is not to have no politicians; the answer is to elect/support good ones. That reminds me. Who’s gonna be Sturgeon’s replacement? Still waiting for that debate to start.
Ruby
NO CHIX WITH DIX!!!
Happily, I didn’t understand any of this. My time was the seventies.
The idea, though, that ‘woke’ is in any sense left-wing is absurd.
That, and the rest of identity politics, is the result of a carefully crafted plan to get everyone talking about ANYTHING BUT the only political thing that matters: CLASS.
The real fight is against the plutocrats, oligarchs, bankers and their apparatchiks.
And that is why independence is so important. The fight against those things begins with national liberation and the destruction of the British State and Scotland’s place in it as an Anglo/British Colony.
Ha. The 90s were epic. I was on the cusp on adulthood and often listen to that era for the nostalgia. Watching Farley in his shiny green jacket shimmying to Love Can’t Turn Around at high volume would make anyone smile and start toe-tapping. Maybe we should start blasting that on loudspeakers from cars around the country.
@Ottomanboi
I would hope no-one is going to interrogate the inference you’ve drawn from your family’s experience…I would only want to ask whether as a result of seeing horrific human actions and categorizing them as evil, does that naturally lead to seeing other actions as absolutely ‘good’ in some way? Does combating evil human actions imply that this combat is good as a consequence?
It’s not really off topic as it ties directly into the theme that things were better in the past.
Unherd published an innarestin article recently to explain how the world is progressing into a new era of zero growth. Many of our global problems arise because political and economic systems, not to mention people’s expectations, assume the certainty, or high probability, of personal advancement over time. Those days are gone, resource depletion, climate change and population growth have seen to that.
But we have not woken to that reality, and in the democracies, no politician dare say “vote for me to ensure your shit life stays the same until you die”.
The short-term, localised answer is the same as it always was: kill your neighbours and take their stuff. Vlad has made a good start, read more on the global situation to find all of the other world-wide flash points that have a good chance of kicking off this year.
So what of us? Obviously, we Scots can buck the global trend by putting an end to the siphoning off of our stuff to our immediate neighbours. Why our neighbours are trying to stop that happening is obvious and needs no explanation. Why we are just accepting it is more complex, has been discussed endlessly on here, and no doubt will be further discussed endlessly over the coming year.
And the moral of this tale? Fucked if I know, other than that it’s not things changing we all need to understand, it’s the ever increasing rate of change, coupled to the consistent downwards trend. FWIW, I think the deteriorating international situation will end all hope of Indy by the middle of the decade. Maybes sooner, if Vlad escalates the way some people are predicting this year.
I have a substack piece titled
The pornographic unreality of gender
by an American mother that is horrific but explains the link between rapid onset gender dysphoria, grooming and pornography in girls entering puberty.
Do I just cut and paste the link?
@Wilson MacBride 11:22
I dunno, you just come across as the kind of poster who says “no” while really meaning “yes”.
Are you going to ignore my “batter” point though? I thought I made a good catch with that one.
The way the SNP ignored the ‘all under one banner’ movement, assisting the MSM to ignore, it was beyond shocking. For years I have attended SNP marches and 2000/3000 was a good turn out. I was at edin and Glasgow marches with 100000 attending and seldom a word from the msm or from the party wanting indy.
The only reason can be they want to manage the decline of the movement. They have been compromised and are being controlled. This is down to Nicola. She has to go
If that was a ramble, it’s the best written ramble I’ve ever read. Seriously, we have lost so much.
Garavelli Princip 11.39: “The real fight is against the plutocrats, oligarchs, bankers and their apparatchiks.”
And they spend a lot of their time and power in dividing and ruling us, and “identity politics” is a sure way of doing it.
Remember that the World Economic Forum state quite clearly their intentions for The Great Reset in this decade, where we will have nothing but be happy.
They will have everything, of course, if things go to plan.
Orwell was amazingly prescient with his dystopian vision of a boot stamping on a human face forever.
If all ‘New Year’ articles were as good as this, I’d read them all year round.
kt lorimer @11.40 Do I just cut and paste the link?-YES
Thank you Douglas.
Wrong title on my previous post though another excellent article – here is an american mother’s experience of her daughter’s ROGD – chilling.
https://pitt.substack.com/p/transgenders-connection-with-pornography
This is
The Pornographic Unreality of Gender
https://dennisnoelkavanagh.substack.com/p/the-pornographic-unreality-of-gender
Who else is behind this cult ideology?
https://jbilek.substack.com/p/gender-identity-a-corporate-fiction?utm_campaign=post
And another example of the real world consequences.
https://thebfd.co.nz/2022/12/27/i-thought-my-4-year-old-was-transgender-i-was-wrong/
Another job for Ruby to sort!
Bute House Bunker (Transwomen)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KiM6Q5zS7MI
My family had a family band in those days,
They practiced music after a full day work, they traveled local and miles away, they played at any and all events, from weddings, anniversaries to Band Aid, “feed the world” concerts, as a backing band to Joe Brown,
They played Music in concerts with Andy Stewart and were on radio,
Their music covered every era, and just about every country,
When they were not doing music they mechanic’ed on their cars and motor bikes,, went courting for the future wife’s and husbands,
When they any had spare time it was outdoors with helping the neighbours, trial bikes, fishing, building projects like a water wheel that was entered into the Chelsea flower show for Queen Elizabeth 11.
Young people today (besides pressing key pads) do not know how to be, all you can be,
It seems a very narrow path of opinionated interfering in others peoples lives,
Being bit older has its blessings.
There were not enough hours in the day to be woke,
Following on from my previous post, the Centre for Economics and Business Research has just pushed back its date for when China will become world Number 1 from 2028 to 2036. Reported on Unherd if you want to read more.
Presumably 2036 itself is provisional on no more suicidal national policies emanating from the PRC pertaining to their greatest gift to the world so far, Covid.
It’s the time of year when it’s good to look back and take stock. Soon be a year from when posters on here were confidently predicting the end of the good ol USA.
Myself, I think we Scots should bow to the inevitable and accept that the route to Indy lies with getting support from the only hegemon in town for now and the foreseeable future – the USA. Seems to have worked in the Republic Of Ireland after all.
GOOD & EVIL
Philosophers, theologians and metaphysicians have wrestled with this for centuries.
and this is no place to join them in that struggle. Nevertheless, our species appears to have an instinctive sense for telling the good from the bad even if, given the alluring «blandishments» of the latter, instinct may go into sleep mode.
The Devil certainly knows some good tunes and chat up lines, is a good «host» and has a plausible «answer» for everything and always the gentleman, never visiting without an invitation.
«Evil is the product of the ability of humans to make abstract that which is concrete»
Jean-Paul Sartre
Tinto Choel,
Well said,
The WEF.
The government running the British and Scottish government from within.
People that have never been voted in by us.
Tinto Chiel.
Whoops sorry about the spelling mistake in your name, fingers and hands are cold, thus not working properly 🙂
The woke, snowflake, entitled youth should be pitied – yes. But their crazy deconstruction of biology is not up for grabs. Their climate change activism is shrouded in hypocrisy – iphones, fast fashion, avocado smash, leaving a trail of destruction at festivals (we took our fucking tents home with us in my day), etc etc.
As a massive Stones Roses (and Ian Brown fan), I always thought Oasis were sell out pricks especially seeing them with Tony Bliar at the 97 election, so I like to think I was a cool kid (emoji wink)!
But this generation is fucked and i worry for my kid growing up in this leftish, conformist hell hole of wokeness.Thankfully he’s young enough to know what a boy and a girl is…jeez can’t believe I’m saying that, that my 9 year old is not yet fucked up in the head to think men can be women, women can be men, peodos are now MAPs, fuck knows soon you’ll be able to marry your dog or god knows what!
The 90’s were my decade and thank fuck I had that as I couldn’t have foreseen that it would have all turned to shit after. But I’m gonna keep telling the truth to the wee guy – he deserves logic, science and common sense over indoctrination and group think. If I teach him anything in this world it’s going to be critical thinking and don’t believe anything on the TV!
JC is quite literally a lesbian, which comes under the protected characteristic of sexual orientation, yet is so far down the radicalisation pipeline she’s peddling this bullshit which (in addition to impacts on disabled folk as per Fiona’s tweet) is NOT GOOD for gay people!
https://mobile.twitter.com/FionasWriting/status/1609905901732872193
How else do you expect to protect someone on the basis of their sexual orientation, you absolute weapon, but by taking them at their word they are who they say they are? What, are you going to go all Home Office and demand they reel off for you all the scissoring they’ve done?
Ottomanboi.
Idle hands make the devils work lighter.
” Myself, I think we Scots should bow to the inevitable and accept that the route to Indy lies with getting support from the only hegemon in town for now and the foreseeable future – the USA. Seems to have worked in the Republic Of Ireland after all.”
Hahahahahaha . So . nothing to do with the Easter Rising , Sinn Fein , Michael Collins et al + hundreds of years of oppression/struggle , no , it was all down to the beneficence of the good ol US of A .
You’ve descended into idiocy John Main .
Superb post , Stu . Makes the laughable , primary 6 schoolkid worldview/*insight * of the above mentioned JM look like what it is eg Right Wing wankery of the most intelligence-insulting tabloidesque kind .
Scozzie.
My family are doing the same, teach your children before the woke brain chilling education and media get a hold on them about history and biology,
Men with male attributes pretending to be women are imitations of women can be classed as frauds in the same way as a copy of a original painting.
It may look similar at first glance, but it is a fake.
John Main says:
2 January, 2023 at 1:24 pm
Think of it as payback for the Opium Wars and the whole thing becomes much more reasonable…
@ 1.24
Unlike yourself we Wingers use our noodles in figuring things out for ourselves & don’t depend on trash tv reports
James Che, even men with female attributes are still men just as women with male attributes are still women.
O/T: Breeks has an informative and inspiring piece over on Yours for Scotland.
He stresses the need to recover the Scottish form of constitution whereby the people have the say above all others, and the aim of our society was very different from the Anglo-Saxon view.
We all need to get familiar with the constitutional provisions and promote them.
Perceptive post.
Nobody under the age of 30 has a chance of owning a house, unless they inherit wealth. Even a stable rented property is hard to come by. None of them expect a pension, and the world is on fire. It’s no wonder they have fallen down the identity politics rabbit hole.
@James Che 1.41: no probs, doll, and a Happy New Year. Hope it’s a better one for your family.
I’m self-IDing as Magenta Tinkerbelle in a few days anyway.
Or Tonto Chief, possibly.
As Ottomanboi suggested, we think in the “sophisticated” West that evil is pretty much a mediaeval concept but if you have a hard time conceptualising it in the modern world, just think of the sexual and medical abuse of children which the extreme Woko Haramers and Big Pharma have in store for them unless legislation like the GRRA can be stopped in its tracks somewhere down the line.
Susan AHF,
If their bodies have male attributes, anatomically their bodies are mens,
If a woman has female attributes anatomically they are women,
A chemical imbalance may make them feel uncertain in their overall body.
This is how the medical profession treat this in-balance (with chemicals) in favour or against the gender chosen,
Men cannot become women because they say so, or vice versa, with a issued certificate akin to passing a exam at school,
I ain’t gonna lie to suit someone else’s ideas,
And just so there is no confusion, I believe some people who do feel chemically imbalanced as to their gender.
Tinto Chiel,
Correct spelling on posting 😉
Also Wishing you the very best for 2023,
Ha haa ha many varied possibilities for self identification, perhaps we could all choose to self Identify as as pronoun independent People living in a pronoun independent Country.
John Main says:
2 January, 2023 at 11:40 am
“So what of us? Obviously, we Scots can buck the global trend by putting an end to the siphoning off of our stuff to our immediate neighbours. Why our neighbours are trying to stop that happening is obvious and needs no explanation”
I’m afraid you totally misunderstand. The UK state is not preventing Scottish independence because it wants to keep stealing your stuff. It is doing so because it knows that the UK’s last remaining claims to great power status end when you leave. It means England becomes more like Spain or Holland say, a mediums sized power of no great pretention. Stripped of its delusions of grandeur, such an England can become a better and more grown-uo country as a result, which is why this sasssenach totally supports your fight. But you have to understand really clearly, such and ending means the collapse in credibility of much of the UK ruling class. They wont let that happen without a fight – ask the Irish or the Indians if your doubt me.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrkOCiSotSA
In this video Mr Menno asks many interesting questions about trans.
One of them is
‘Born this way or porned this way?’
Turning the degradation of women and the sexual violence they are being subjected to into a fetish unfortunately seems to be the common theme among men ‘who identify as woman’
Sissy porn, the gender movement’s dirty secret
https://grahamlinehan.substack.com/p/sissy-porn-the-gender-movements-dirty
The fundamental assertion of sissification pornography is that being a woman is inherently degrading — that men who are insecure about the size of their genitalia must be transformed into women through “forced feminization.” In these scenarios, the penis is referred to as a “clitty,” and the an*s is referred to as a “pussy.”
I might be getting closer to why Patrick Harvie & John Nicholson are so supporting of trans rights/sissification.
My other question is why would a man want a job in a rape crisis centre? What sort of fetish does he have?
Tinto Chiel.
Thanks for your kindness, definately glad to see the back of 2022,
Perhaps we could pronoun and transgender our country into a different Country.
This may cause a problem for Westminster of course whom has a treaty with the pre-pronoun Scotland.
We could use a third gender pro-noun for Scotland.
Any suggestions?
John Main.
Your assessment of supporting a independent Scotland?
It is quite accurate, there are many many English people that support Scotland being independent, plus Welsh, and Irish people,
It actually stretches further than the boundaries of Britain, many other people from other Countries have also voiced their support.
No doubt all have their own reasons, but support for a independent scotland seems to be growing in Scotland and outwith.
Perhaps part of this is to do with nations losing their identity and wanting to govern themselves closer to home rather from the G7, the European Union or the trans- Atlantic doctrines.
In a way this was shown the results of the Brexit,
Thumbs up Owen! 🙂
Your link works perfectly you don’t need my help anymore!
Did you read my ramblings about YouTube links on ‘Song For The Yes Movement’ article?
Also helpful hints from BDTT.
Basically there is a difference between YouTube links from a mobile device (YouTube app) and ones from a computer.
Both work but need different treatment.
Keep up the good work. Your ‘YouTube’ links are appreciated.
Although that ‘In the ladies’ song that you posted is stuck in my head.
Hopefully I don’t start singing it in front of the family.
James Che I meant that even if men have fake breasts and vaginas created surgically, they are still men. Every cell in their body will still be XY. Ditto mastectomized women, they are still XX. Sorry if my previous post was confusing.
Angus B. McNeil calls for the scrapping of the GRRB. MSPs voted through the Bill on their last sitting day before the Christmas break, rejecting a series of amendments aimed at making it more difficult for sex offenders to exploit its provisions.
“Angus MacNeil, the Western Isles MP, said a “loophole” in the Scottish Government’s Gender Recognition Reform Bill allowed “bad-faith actors” to self-identify as women to gain access to female safe spaces.
Although the UK Government is considering a legal challenge to the legislation, Mr MacNeil argued: “This is a problem made in Scotland and should be sorted in Scotland.”
He said he hoped “common sense prevails over this” and that the Bill is withdrawn. His intervention further deepened the SNP’s civil war over the legislation, with a series of high-profile figures expressing their opposition.
However, Ms Sturgeon has previously dismissed similar concerns expressed by a United Nations expert and feminist campaigners, including JK Rowling, that it threatens women’s safety.”
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/scrap-nicola-sturgeon-s-gender-reforms-says-long-serving-snp-mp/ar-AA15Toc5?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=e4a7b39850af4e42af09fbc56d9a3dfb
Ruby.
I might be getting closer to why PH & JN are supporting trans…..
maybe some cross purpose fetishes are involved also 😉
@James Che 4.06: “Perhaps we could pronoun and transgender our country into a different Country.
This may cause a problem for Westminster of course whom has a treaty with the pre-pronoun Scotland.”
Ha! Ha! but The Rev has already given us an effective way to cause a massive problem for WM, it’s just that the SNP aren’t interested: https://wingsoverscotland.com/how-you-do-it/#comments
At least his return seems to have them rattled and who knows what might happen this year?
Susan AHF.
Thanks for clearing that up.
As many parents and grandparent males and females on here and across the breath of Scotland are beginning to worry about the safety of Scottish children and women,
This perversion that can become Scots law made under the Scotland Act of UK legislation and statues for the devolved government is unprecedented.
OVO which owns SSE wants to build a huge windfarm, plans for the Berwick Bank “super project” have been submitted to Angus Council and include a wind farm of up to 307 offshore turbines at a site east of Fife in the outer Firth of Forth.
Angus Council is ran by thirteen SNP and two independent councillors, so I fully expect the council to give the green light to another great ScotWind giveaway, Sturgeon the Judas is selling off our assets to the highest bidder but Scots don’t benefit from any of it.
Not one wind turbine was built by BiFab, or in Scotland, for the worlds largest windfarm the Seagreen venture. Scots will continue to pay through the nose for their own energy given away for a pittance to foreign companies, by Sturgeon the Judas, who are queuing up like hyenas waiting to feed on the Scottish carcass.
We must vote for Alba, and Join Alba, get the anti-independence SNP out of office at every turn.
God only knows how much more of our coastline Sturgeon the Judas will let out to foreign energy companies for a pittance, and at our expense, before we can oust the wretched creature squatting in Bute House.
https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thenational.scot%2Fnews%2F23223898.plans-major-firth-forth-wind-farm-lodged-sse%2F
https://www.angus.gov.uk/council_and_democracy/councillors/political_make_up_of_the_council#:~:text=The%20composition%20of%20Angus%20Council%20is%20as%20follows%3A,up%20of%2013%20SNP%20and%20two%20independent%20councillors.
@Friendly Sassenach 4:01
I understand your argument. Both can be true together: rUK will lose its great power status post-Indy, sure, but meantime Scotland can bankroll the UK treasury. As I have pointed out before, the recent shenanigans with Truss showed how much the markets actually dictate WM policy. Loss of Scotland will crash the pound and the rUK economy, the markets see that clearly, and so does the WM government.
In fact, they better both be true. So much of the justification for Indy is reliant on the belief that shorn of rUK, we Scots will be minted.
Watching the box last night, I was struck by the wall to wall recruiting ads for the army, navy, RAF and RM. Shooting war coming, or is WM just gearing up for some serious strike breaking?
No reason why both cannot be correct interpretations.
Republicofscotland says: 2 January, 2023 at 4:34 pm
From the lips of Nicola Sturgeon previously which contradicts what she just said:
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/is-nicola-sturgeon-now-guilty-of-transphobia/
I wonder how she will worm out of that?
@Bob 1:54
tabloidesque
Good word. Keep it up.
If you can double the number of good words in each post, and maintain that trend, in next to no time you will be a genuine contributor.
Tinto Chiel.
Thank you for bringing Rev Stu’s earlier post to my notice, I missed that one due to my mum being so ill and passing away in November,
My mums dog was pining for her and also passed away a week later,
I just have my one of my own two wee dogs ill at the moment, ( old age) but sad.
However I have a serious new years resolution to see the back end of 2022 out with a much happier constitution and throw myself into more fun times and hobbies, which I started on the 1st of January 2023.
There is a saying, ” when you are at the bottom, There is only one way to go, and that is up.
I have arranged to going gold panning where there is no Known gold just for a fun day out and catching up, meeting up with family and friends, hot flasks and sarnies,
Then in the spring time I am going fishing, Its years since I went fishing, and the sea is not to far away, looking forward to it
Besides sewing and gardening, painting, ( I used to be cartoonist you know) for local news papers, keeping up with WOS, long walks into nature and the countryside for recalibrating.
I think am looking forward to 2023.
@James Che 4:23
Support for iScotland may well be growing externally, I don’t know.
My point earlier was that as the predictions of the end of the unipolar world seem to have been optimistic, it would be wise for Scotland to get onside with the world’s only superpower.
Such a shame that when the POTUS was only one generation away from his Scottish heritage, our wise leaders decided to squander that advantage, preferring petty, value-signalling, points scoring instead. FFS, Trump’s maw was from Lewis! In what fucked-up fantasy world could nobody leverage that pricelessly advantageous connection?
Then again, maybes all part of the deliberate Indy sabotaging policy. Hard to understand why that sabotaging got such wide support in Scotland at the time though.
@ Owen Mullions 1.07pm I loved that u tube, and wasn’t she the spitting image of nicla right down to the moustache , the girls standing about were very like the rest of the snp troughers they didn’t have a spine either
https://archive.is/WN8Cw
Donald Trump: A second Scottish independence referendum would be terrible
Donald Trump has said a second Scottish independence referendum would be “terrible” and compared the initial vote on separation to going “through hell”.
The president also said he has a “very good relationship” with Theresa May
Seems Sturgeon has a rival.
Lula!
https://archive.ph/r015T
The devil really knows which buttons to press….
Seems muzzles are on the way back too, new «variant» to stoke big pharma profits.
2023, the year the shits hit the fan?….pray let us hope so.
What a great piece of writing. I very much agree at the effect which covid lockdown may have had on all aspects of society, but especially with young people in their teens. I think we have not even seen the half of it yet. I don’t think they see it themselves, but they have been a bit f****ed up by it all.
Is woke culture and the gender madness part of it? I think had lockdown not happened, the gender nonsense would have come grinding to a halt in the clear fresh air of hard reality and REAL life. But, it was allowed to flourish and grow to become the utterly absurd monster it now is.
Gender ideology is nuts. On every rational level, it is nuts, and yet soooooo many folk have just gulped that kool-aid down. They ‘think’ they are ‘progressive’, but are just deluded.
A reckoning will come, when some of these kids grow up, and start getting some of these monstrous ‘doctors’ and ‘counsellors’ into court, and they start getting them jailed.
That ANY doctor or so- called ‘health advisor’ would ever advocate ANY child, unless they were extremely ill to take drugs to alter puberty, or wear a chest binder, or worse have sex altering surgery, is beyond me. I genuinely hope the so-called ‘doctors’ and others pushing or even administering such treatments on kids who have been led to think they have been born ‘in the wrong body’ will eventually get jailed for life. They are beneath contempt. Absolute scum, and the day will come shen they are rightly seen as such.
As regards lad mags, could you imagine the hysteria if even the tamest of loaded were in WHSmiths today. That is how self censorious young folk have become. nae fun at all.
Ottomanboi @5.49pm.
You might find this interesting, on who and why the gender issue is being pushed, there’s a shitload of money to be made out of it.
https://jbilek.substack.com/p/who-owns-big-pharma-and-the-billionaires
@James Che 5.18: your resolutions are sound. As I have said elsewhere, keep your friends close and your family closer, because the world is a dangerous place at the moment.
Love of nature is a great restorer, stimulating empathy for living things and rooting you in the reality of the common earth under your feet.
If you really want to “knock your pan in” looking for gold, I recommend the Leadhills-Wanlockhead area, where the gold of the Scottish crown jewels was mined, but prepare to be snowed on as early as October. Make sure you get the Young ‘Uns to do the toiling, ‘cos it’s good for them 😉 .
Just don’t tell the Duke of Buccleuch…..
John Main @ 5:19 pm
“Such a shame that when the POTUS was only one generation away from his Scottish heritage, our wise leaders decided to squander that advantage, preferring petty, value-signalling, points scoring instead. FFS, Trump’s maw was from Lewis! In what fucked-up fantasy world could nobody leverage that pricelessly advantageous connection?”
I said the same thing at the time John. Scotland could have been independent by now if we’d played the Donald card right – would have been well worth it considering where we are now, i.e. naewhair. There was much mair chance o Trump liberating Scotland that this SNP/Green gang, that’s for sure.
Better movies as well back then. Another casualty of woke, how many movies now and entire film franchises have been turned to shit with all the ultra tedious woke political dogma sewn through every plot and character. It is more important now than making money by simply making good films, which says a lot.
‘The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist.’
I thought I understood that line for a long time. (i.e. It just makes it easier for Devil to sneak about doing Evil stuff undetected.)
But now I think it means if we knew that ‘Evil’ really exists then we would also implicitly know that ‘Good’ exists. If the Devil exists it means so must God.
So old Beelzebub figured out that the best way to convince us that (a subtle*) God does not exist is actually to convince us that the (much less subtle) Devil does not exist.
Strangely the most compelling ‘hard’ physical evidence on Earth for the existence of God is the existence of so many very powerful people sucking on Satan’s cock and doing outright Evil.
So they disguise it and themselves. Maybe another movie, Eyes Wide Shut, points to how. Hollywood of course just reeks of it…
Seems they are real believers even if we are now not. They kept their dark faith whilst destroying ours. I am not even religious, but when you see so many making self mutilation into a virtue and countless other abominations it does make one wonder… When they started going after the kids I think that was the point I became sure of what they are.
*Wanted to add a wee tune but it kept rubbering the whole post. Hopefully this works…
https://tinyurl.com/2was72cp
O/T: I had an idea about how Alba might raise their profile.
By standing a high-profile and excellent candidate in the forthcoming Edinburgh Council Corstorphine and Murrayfield ward by-election [caused by the resignation from the SNP of a man who was on the NEC committee but resigned that post when Peter Murrell refused to make the accounts records available to the National Treasurer, Douglas Chapman].
Having a big name, experienced and very capable candidate, should draw attention and votes to Alba. They might even win.
I have emailed this suggestion, and named my choice of candidate, to the Alba Party but had no response as yet. If anyone here has a contact high up in the party I would be grateful if you mentioned the matter.
wings over scotland twitter is back
I don’t understand – Trump had some Scottish ancestry so he must be OK and on our side.
That doesn’t make sense.
@ KT Lorimer: Trump never visited Lewis even though his mother came from there. Apparently the Lewis people were rather displeased/put out by this failure.
Frank Black says: at 8:03 pm
“wings over scotland twitter is back”
———————
..and I’ve just discovered so is the back-up:
https://mobile.twitter.com/TheGhostOfWings
Have they found out the Rev is a goodie, not a baddie. The wokey woos must be going utterly bonkers.. 🙂
@sarah
Yes that is what I heard regardless of their view on ending the union.
” I said the same thing at the time John. Scotland could have been independent by now if we’d played the Donald card right..”
Really ? Did Trump EVER express any support for Scottish Independence , has he ever seen his Scottish family connection as anything more than a bit of spurious * exotic * colour , has he ever done anything in his miserable , money-obsessed life other than exploit anything and everyone around him for his own advantage ? Oh , right , cheers for the AONB destroying golf course , Don , we owe you one .
Like decrepit, corrupt to the core Biden’s equally superficial * Oirishness * , these people don’t give a fuck about anything other than power & self-enrichment . Good Friday Agreement n’aw that , aye , fair enough : does anyone really think a Trade Deal between UK – USA wouldn’t happen if it was in the economic interests of Big Business ? A way would be found to * circumvent * the GFA .
Maybe you missed this
https://www.thenational.scot/news/18806513.donald-trump-may-fail-recognise-independent-scotland-report-warns/
KT Lorimer says: 2 January, 2023 at 12:49 pm
The pandemic and subsequent lockdown forced everybody to use digital payments and ecommerce to such a degree never seen before.
The result of this has wakened the public, governments and financial institutions to the dangers of online fraud and scammers. Because of this, there is a lot more awareness about it and hopefully people will wise up to online bad faith actors and not get caught out.
While hopefully this leads to a more mature attitude towards the financial side of online activity, hopefully in time the same can be said of the safety towards children on the internet.
Anybody with an ounce of common sense wouldn’t leave their children alone in their house with a complete stranger. However, allowing children access to the internet without any controls is doing exactly that.
Anybody who allows their children internet access is potentially allowing anybody to access their children. Nothing is going to change with this issue, in fact it is going to get worse if the level of awareness about this isn’t the same as that given towards digital financial crime.
KT Lorimer @ 8:06 pm
“I don’t understand – Trump had some Scottish ancestry so he must be OK and on our side. That doesn’t make sense.”
The most powerful person on the planet at the time, and who has very strong emotional as well as family/ethnic origin in Scotland. Only to be publicly dis-respected by Sturgeon and Harvie and Holyrood wokerati on our nation’s behalf? Personally I would have preferred seeking his help in liberating us, and he as a Scot who qualifies for citizenship as first generation diaspora may well have obliged. A more savvy nationalist leadership and colonized people could have offered him the kingship in return for delivering national liberation from our oppressor – that’s how it uised tae be in times past. A long shot but it was surely worth a wee phone call tae the White Hoose, naw?
It’s all about promoting insecurity as a means of selling products to help. It was ,and remains a common tactic for advertisers hired to promote future sales.
Remember at the turn of last century very few women smoked until advertising taught them how it would give them an air of being suave and chic. Instant success. Sales soared.
This is probably such a campaign aimed at rudderless adolescents for future sales by big pharma.
Tinto Chiel says:
2 January, 2023 at 3:28 pm
“I’m self-IDing as…
Or Tonto Chief, possibly.”
How?
How no, Derek?
Check Wings Twitter….
Priorities!
TV U.K. National News Major lead story with extended coverage is Millionaire Harry Windsor
promotes new book to bring in more millions by having yet another exclusive interview about
Dad Charlie and Bro Willie not loving him and the wife.
Second rated story- 500 a week dying due to the under resourced NHS in England.
Global religious leader lies in state with 10’s thousands paying their respects
One of the world’s great footballers lies in state and has 100’s thousands paying their respects.
Tinto Chiel says:
2 January, 2023 at 9:53 pm
How no, Derek?
My attempt at a Lone Ranger kind of joke. Apologies…
Here’s one for your trans bathroom assault collection, assuming nobody else has posted it here already:
https://www.christianpost.com/news/trans-student-charged-with-assaulting-classmates-in-girls-room.html
Alf Baird says:
2 January, 2023 at 9:08 pm
KT Lorimer @
Once you start trying to invoke the assistance of US presidents you would be taking a risk. It is an operation on another level from the network running Scotland in the interests of and with the support of our neighbours. It would be risky trying to invoke support from Trump, Biden, or any other president whether they are descended from scots or not.
Alf Baird @ 9.08
Excuse my rather abrupt reply to your previous comment . I stand by the substance of what I said ..eg.. I don’t think there was ever a chance Trump would have helped us in our struggle ( or will , in the unlikely event he ever becomes POTUS again ) but I could have phrased it less harshly and , yes , it wouldn’t have done any harm to try to get him on side , even if , as I say , the chances of him responding positively were just about zero ; I doubt very much the virtue signalling buffoonery of Sturgeon had any bearing on his stated opposition : was he even aware of it ?
We’re all entitled to our opinions and it would be pretty tedious if we all had the same political positions , but yr man JM’s tedious demands to ” SHOW US THE MONEY ” – ( how TF could that be done IN ADVANCE of Independence ? ) relentless nonsense re ” Vlad ” – straight from the UK MSM propaganda sheets – and his * vision * of an iScotland that is a clone of Unionist/Tory England ie pro-Monarchy , Top-down economic policies & apparent approval of the * Scroungers * narrative etc is the opposite of what I think an iScotland should/could be .
As I said , each to their own n’all that , but such Conservative views should not go unchallenged .
I disagree that it wouldn’t have done any harm.
It could have resulted in even more headlines like this:
https://archive.is/WN8Cw
Donald Trump: A second Scottish independence referendum would be terrible
This discussion about Donald Trump is completely bonkers!
Who believes that because someone has Scottish heritage they support independence?
Gove, Blair, Brown, Cameron, Jack, Davidson etc etc etc do not.
I have some doubts about the Scottish mother from Lewis story. Fake news?
Did the family completely die off when the mother left Lewis? Has Trump ever been to Lewis? Doesn’t he have any relatives living on Lewis?
When was Trump supposed to have been asked to support Scottish Independence?
The question is was this Trump comment posted as yet another flame-bait by John Main or is John Main totally bonkers
I’m very disappointed with Alf.
Re JM’s tedious demands to ” SHOW US THE MONEY ”
My response to that would be why don’t you ” SHOW US THE MONEY ” you are an independence supporter who thinks ‘showing the money’ is very important so you must know where the money will come from. If you don’t then why do you support Scottish independence?
Is this demand to ” SHOW US THE MONEY ” a flame bait or is John Main totally bonkers?
I am asking John Main to supply us with an answer to the ” SHOW US THE MONEY ” question.
Maybe independence supporting Chas could do likewise.
Robert Hughes says:
3 January, 2023 at 7:27 am
Alf Baird @ 9.08
Excuse my rather abrupt reply to your previous comment . I stand by the substance of what I said ..eg.. I don’t think there was ever a chance Trump would have helped us in our struggle..
I think Trump might have helped if it had been worth his while, but to make it worth his while, would likely have seen us losing some natural wilderness ploughed under in order to build a vainglorious golf course.
Trump is just one man however, and there’s a bigger argument whether Scotland should be courting support from wider parts of the US and Scottish diaspora. At the moment, the Unionist / UK narrative that Scottish Independence is a threat to NATO appears to have a lot of traction.
Kinda funny how there’s always a “catch” to support from the US. Yet at the same time, the US did back Ireland and sided with Europe over the Good Friday Agreement.
Like Ireland, I don’t believe an Independent Scotland would have any “problem” with the USA. I strongly suspect the current political landscape is “engineered” by BritNats in America and London who recognise the value in keeping America misinformed about Scotland.
Personally, I think an Indy Scotland has a lot going for it. And “if” Scapa Flow was to be developed as a humongous bulk Container base, falling out with Scotland would be cutting off your nose to spite your face.
The irony is, I think you could say the same about London. If / when Scotland gets serious about Independence, as in it becomes inevitable, (no chance of that under Sturgeon), London might be naturally reluctant at first, but business is business, and they’d be stupid to make an enemy of Scotland when Scotland is going through a renaissance of prosperity and influence.
There is also a BRICS element to consider… If the US doesn’t want to embrace an Indy Scotland, then that will create it’s own consequences.
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/628382
Keep signing
Its at 9742
Ruby – Trump’s one visit to Lewis and his mother’s heritage there is well documented and not at all in dispute.
https://www.scotsman.com/news/opinion/opinion-plea-scottish-island-donald-trumps-mother-mary-called-home-let-be-end-our-disgrace-3020372
@ Derek: “My attempt at a Lone Ranger kind of joke. Apologies…”
No need to aplogise. My mind was a bit distracted last night because I was out with shy Anne Crow in my Winnebago but when we went for a walk along the creek I noticed she had a black foot and a rather flat head so things didn’t end well, I’m afraid 🙂 .
@Bob 7:27
Get doon aff Ideological Purity, yer pet hobby horse, and engage with realpolitik.
No stone unturned, and a that, eh? The Donald was the most powerful man in the world for 4 years, got to have been worth a try, what the fuck ever was there to lose?
Still, water under the bridge. Just like 2014 and Brexit, these days ain’t coming back. By all means you persist with the same failed ideas if you want to wallow in your comfort zone, but the rest of us need to move on.
As for your claim that nobody could be expected to have begged, borrowed, stolen, honey trapped, hacked, copied, bribed, bought or worked out from first principles the economics of an iScotland by now, even if every fucking Scottish metric is a WM state secret, that is beyond parody.
Stick Ideological Purity back in her stable, drink yer milk, and show us the fucking money. That’s if you are in any way serious about growing Indy support in 2023.
@Southernbystander 10:03
not at all in dispute
Just give it a little time, SB.
John Main, try some simple arithmetic:
£70 billion tax revenue (not including taxes not correctly registered against the Scottish account). £40 billion Barnett pocket money. £30 billion right there to be spent in Scotland.
We have 34% of the UK’s natural capital
https://naturalcapitalscotland.com/natural-capital-accounts-for-scotland-released/
From the Express, that well known independence supporting newspaper
https://www.express.co.uk/news/science/1714264/UK-energy-jackpot-scotland-green-hydrogen-goldmine-export-25-billion-eu (this is about to be squandered by the SNP – think the £900 million auction CAP on the recently awarded franchises). £25 billion is 65% of our ENTIRE BUDGET
With these natural resources underpinning the £Scots, the country would be in a great position to borrow on the money markets and fund the capacity to manufacture renewables technology in-house, internalising the profits for the benefit of the Scottish population.
The are some of the more egregious examples from a never-ending list. I could go on but even you must see the point. Welcome to the indy camp!
Tinto Chiel , heap good idea. Smokum peace pipe too!
@Breeks 9:55
The idea that an iScotland might weaken NATO may have been helped by the relentless anti-NATO BTL comments on here.
The facts are that a fantasy-land occupying EU has skimped on defence spending for most of our lives, relying on the US big stick and the fable that if you are only nice, then the rest of the world will be nice back.
Plenty of BTL comments on here peddle the same trope: an iScotland will be the nicest, cuddliest, wee nation in the world, and in return, the entire world will just love us to bits.
Still, feel free to ignore or shout down what I say. Meantime, the EU, which is still mostly Germany, is ramping up military commitments and spending because it no longer believes just being nice to Vlad, or expecting Biden to step in, will be sufficient to stop several EU (formerly sovereign) nations being assimilated into the new eastern imperium.
Realpolitik in clear sight.
Plenty of BTL posters on here believe it is our own manifest Scottish destiny to vanish into the EU. Fair enough, but Scots need to know that some of our long awaited and long promised post-Indy cash bonanza will be diverted to buy guns and ammo.
Realpolitik again.
https://archive.is/jXxoq
Can’t hide the cowardice in some people, (or party fanzine), but far as I can see, the “chaotic stupidity” would be trusting the SNP to deliver or run, well, pretty much anything.
Collapse Holyrood? Since the troughing turkeys obviously won’t do that, how about impeaching the damned place and rid the YES Movement of Holyrood’s obsequious subservience to the Colonial Scotland Act and Sturgeon’s disingenuous treachery at the same time?
Out with the old and in with the new…
For the once dominant anglosphere states circumstances are changing. The Gulf and Saudi Arabia once the playground for UK/US interests are turning their direction eastward to India and China.
The influence of anglophone countries is weakening. Scotland ought not to be caught out defending their interests and their supposedly superior «values» by proxy only to end up penned in by the retro colonialism of declining once «big players».
Allies are useful, the more different and the more distant the better.
@Dorothy 11.09: we could maybe even get Rev. Stu to play the part of Big Chief Toffy Teeth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bud_Neill
I’ll get my mukluks……
@Gordon Currie 10:57
That’s good info, thanks.
My point has never been about doubting the finances for iScotland. It has always been about getting that information out there and into the consciousness of every Scot, as the simplest and most universally feasible guarantor of Indy support.
It needs forensic detail, probably running into hundreds of pages, for experts.
It needs summaries that can be printed on bus stops, for thickos.
It needs repeated ad nauseum and hammered home until anybody can strike up a conversation with a total stranger and find shared knowledge of Scotland’s post-Indy finances. When everybody just knows they will be better off post-Indy, then unstoppable Indy support will follow, as night follows day.
And yes, I am aware some of this has been done before, but times have changed, so it needs done again with today’s changed facts in the equations. And it needs communicated. Few people I meet ever tell me they expect to be better off post-Indy. That needs to change.
My final point has always been that when Scotland’s changing demographics are considered (remember that ticking time bomb?), then again, personal gain is key to turning No’s to Yes’s. I don’t have a misty-eyed view of the charitable status of New Scots. They are here on the make. Show them how to make more.
Breeks @ 9:55 am
Robert Hughes says:
3 January, 2023 at 7:27 am
“I don’t think there was ever a chance Trump would have helped us in our struggle..”
I suspect we might never know and this is largely because the Holyrood wokerati took a massive pro-Hillary hissy fit over Trump’s election and decided to openly bad mouth him as someone grossly inferior to their obviously higher standards of morality and civility!?!
Had Alex Salmond still been FM I expect he would have rightly laid out the red carpet for Pres Trump and moved into some serious diplomacy over what the USA could do for Scotland (and what Scotland could do for USA), maybe even helping draft an Anglo-Scottish ‘Good Friday Agreement’, for example. At least Alex would have made the effort. As ma mother said, it disnae cost anything tae be nice.
Trump fell out with Salmond over the wind farms he could see from his golf course in Aberdeenshire. Called him Mad Alex in a series of letters moaning about it. Trump holds a grudge big time and is a very vindictive and vengeful person, something he is proud of. I would not be at all surprised if he came out against independence just to spite him, he is that petty. He was also the sitting US president before during and after the attempted Salmond stitch-up… just saying.
Breeks.
Out with the old, an in with the new..
I wondered what you thought about the the House of Lords ( privileges committee ) discussing in the 1960s, as to wether there actually was a treaty of union that continued, as both the parliaments and states of Scotland and England had ceased to exist in 1707 and therefore could no longer be a treaty.
In my analyses judging from records in the UK parliament site only Scotland ceased to exist in the treaty of Union, due to Queen Anne’s speech in 1707 were she conveyed the English parliament of Westminster into the new British parliament of Westminster, but not Scotlands parliament which was extinguished by agreeing to the Commissioners proposals.
If memory serves me correctly her speech of continuing and conveying the English parliament into the British parliament was on the,
14/ 4/ 1707,
The first parliament of Queen Anne, (English parliament)
Third session,
Which prorogued on 30th April 1707.
Been as the House of Lords has had its doubts but kept quite regarding the issue, I would enjoy hearing you’re take on this.
Breeks.
Out with the old, an in with the new..
I wondered what you thought about the the House of Lords ( privileges committee ) discussing in the 1960s, as to wether there actually was a treaty of union that continued, as both the parliaments and states of Scotland and England had ceased to exist in 1707 and therefore could no longer be a treaty.
In my analyses judging from records in the UK parliament site only Scotland ceased to exist in the treaty of Union, due to Queen Anne’s speech in 1707 were she conveyed the English parliament of Westminster into the new British parliament of Westminster, but not Scotlands parliament which was extinguished by agreeing to the Commissioners proposals.
If memory serves me correctly her speech of continuing and conveying the English parliament into the British parliament was on the,
14/ 4/ 1707,
The first parliament of Queen Anne, (English parliament)
Third session,
Which prorogued on 30th April 1707.
Been as the House of Lords has had its doubts but kept quite regarding the issue, I would enjoy hearing you’re take on this.
It seems between extinguishing the Scottish parliament and state (in England only) and conveying and converting the english parliament directly into the newly named British parliament, not much had altered in the English parliament regards a treaty of non-union.
Other than a presumption.
That was a really enjoyable read and it did indeed take me back to the good old days. Whilst I was able to get into the clubbing scene around the 2002 mark it seemed I would catch the tail end of the 90s but it will be a time that stays with me for the rest of my life.
From the wonderful variety of dance festivals across the UK to the eclectic, believe it or not Edinburgh club scene which included the Venue and Super Saturday, Club ego and Nuklear Puppy, Taste and Musika to name some others and many more competing in a brilliant night scene. How Edinburgh’s nightlife has declined in comparison.
The only relic of the time is the dance festivals that are held annually which I guess we should be thankful for.
It is true also that the messages of modern music that proliferate are far different and you encapsulate that perfectly with Loaded by Primal Scream and Star Guitar by the Chemical Brothers, two favorites of mine.
The conclusion though, whilst I sympathise, I fear is an unwinnable war. It is quite possibly the previous generation fighting against the changes of time. Something that has always happened but never succeeded.
Good luck though, in many ways the 60s and 90s do have something special about them that is worth fighting for and trying to pass on. However, the decline overall in drink and drug use probably points towards a more profound change occurring.
The sexual aspect of this new era I believe only affects a minority of people but due to the nature of it causes significant distress to many people on both sides of the argument.
I think the stratification you touch on though is very real, and far reaching in comparison to when I was at University. This is something that is far more toxic and really hope does not last. The loss of a fairly composed and calm discourse is probably the bigger loss as it seems it really is a case now of choose a camp or be damned or go it alone and walk your own path, maybe that is something to promote before we sleep walk into a more American politics which is so extremely divided.
Anyway, that was an interesting read and sums things up pretty well. Hopefully you are not just marching against the tide of time with regards to the culture war. As far as independence is concerned. Every day we are a step closer and I truly believe that and that is what motivates me.
Sssshhh!
But Twitter. 😉
Groundhog Day
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ru2lxxCZ-PU
Groundhog Day Every Day
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ru2lxxCZ-PU
Gordon Currie says:3 January, 2023 at 10:57 am
John Main, try some simple arithmetic:
£70 billion tax revenue (not including taxes not correctly registered against the Scottish account). £40 billion Barnett pocket money. £30 billion right there to be spent in Scotland.
We have 34% of the UK’s natural capital
————————————————————
I don’t understand where you got those numbers from considering the SNP led Scot Gov themselves publish these numbers, checking out the URL links at the top left hand side of the page shows authorisation for those numbers to be published comes from Kate Forbes SNP MSP’s own Office. Scotland raised £77.3bn but spent £97,5Bn from the SNP’s own Mouths. https://www.gov.scot/publications/government-expenditure-revenue-scotland-gers-2021-22/pages/1/
Breeks.
Alf Baird.
Having attained this information from records, the House of Lords ( privileges committee ) which was held during the discussion on Scotland law revision in the early 1960s
The lords discussed the idea that the treaty of union might not be in existence since 1707 due to both parliaments and states of Scotland and England had ceased to exist in 1707.
However under study I reserve the opinion that the English parliament continued in Westminster parliament as the Newly named British parliament under a prorogued English parliament on the 30th of April 1707, aided by the Speech that Queen Anne gave at the end of the Third session of the English parliament, to both Houses.
Thus the English parliament of Westminster simply conveyed itself into the British parliament.
Meanwhile The Scottish parliament and state however was extinguished (in England) by Agreeing to the Commissioners terms of agreement, ( see: UK parliament site, 2022)
Documents and records from Westminster Parliament, old and new, imply that legally the English state and the English parliament of Westminster did not alter from pre-union,
This is a glitch in the treaty of the union for the UK,
As the Scottish parliament and state was extinguished in England only) in 1707, according to UK parliament site. 2022,
The Parliament in Scotland under [ Scots law ]Sine Die’d its own parliament, meaning it could reconvene as a original Scottish parliament once more without Englands permission,
If the Scottish parliament was extinguished in England and is not entered into the English parliament of Westminster even under a treaty of union, as it extinguished the Scottish parliament, state and kingdom solely in England.
Joe says:
3 January, 2023 at 12:55 pm
Gordon Currie says:3 January, 2023 at 10:57 am
John Main, try some simple arithmetic:
————
Aw bless. Is it becos they luv us so?
Acht, gee us peace man!
Joe 12.55pm
Royals, Westminster, Trident, Defense, London vanity projects, Foreign policy (even though we don’t have one) House of Lords, Westminster, A permanent share of ALL of Englands debts.
+ Interest.
Scotlands magical deficit on shit we don’t want.
Reading all the remarks on GERS figures, 1707 union, english and scottish parliaments etc etc being the reason why there will not be an indy ref this year and no independent Scotland. Folks, it is really simple – to get an independent Scotland you need to get the polls showing +/- 60% of Scots supporting an indy ref. Then Westminster will allow an indyref under Section 30. The +/- 60% is exactly the number Nicola Sturgeon qouted a few years back as her hurdle to have a second indyref with a chance of winning. As she is not there yet she does not another Indyref now because if she loses the SNP are finished forever.
This guy’s bitchin that collapsing Holyrood to hold a snap election as a de facto indy vote is stupid because conditions are not ideal FFS, this clown is looking for an ideal situation to dump this prison of a union, when Sturgeon the Judas let great opportunities such as Brexit pass us by.
What’s even more shocking, but sadly not surprising, is that this numpty is the organiser of the Aberdeen Independence Movement.
https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thenational.scot%2Fpolitics%2F23224317.collapsing-holyrood-force-indyref2-chaotic-stupidity%2F
Collapsing Holyrood is a our best chance of exiting this onesided prison of a union, but many supposedly independence supporters who hold a position such as the guy in the article, BfS, the Yes Groups SNP/Green MSPs and MPs, are NOT interested in actually obtaining independence for they have much to lose from Scotland dumping this rancid union.
I’ve figured out why some are so keen on Trump’s intervention.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J14szcA66_c
@ Ruby 5.50pm then you have the opposite Ruby MOST politicians and do gooders who WANT untrammelled immigration into Scotland, another dream of the new world order where there is NO nationalities NO Borders NO sexes just worker ants who are disposed of when they become unwell or aged
Politicians who INSTEAD of stopping wars and conflicts that FORCE people to flee to other countries and places of safety they are content to promote the sales of arms which CREATES refugees and destroys other countries
Sorry to come so late to the party, but this is something I discussed with the young ones – late teens, early twenties – in my extended family over the Christmas holidays.
They’re all very straitlaced, “good”. Of course don’t smoke, don’t drink except maybe some craft beer or a glass or two of wine. Never want to do or say anything to offend anyone. Their student parties don’t sound like much fun to me.
It’s a generation thing. I grew up during the Cold War, the threat of a nuclear war was ever present. That was our angst. The greatest generational event was the fall of the Berlin Wall, the end of the Cold war. The euphoria, the feeling of optimism, the freedom of thought and movement! The music! The parties! The 1990s were a time of optimism, and those were my formative years.
Today’s young generation? The optimism of the 1990s has turned sour, now there’s climate angst and biodiversity angst and identity politics angst, all compoundend by social media angst and fear of public pillorying and cancellation.
Tellingly, the young don’t have democracy angst, which I’m beginning to feel very acutely. They want “safe spaces” – real world equivalents of social media bubbles. A world where everybody thinks right as they do – all others are… vermin…nazis… everything bad and should be shunned and cancelled.
And then the generational event is the Covid pandemic, a cessation of all normal face-to-face interactions. And when the pandemic is finally easing off, war in Ukraine. Russia attacking a neighbour – especially worrying in a country with a 1000 mile border with Russia, like mine.
So, yes, the young today have reasons to feel angsty and pessimistic. But some of the angsts are self-inflicted. Worrying about how they appear in social media, or centering on own “identities” and the many “problems” the surrounding society presents for them and their “identities” (pure navel-gazing).
I’ve told the young in the family of just some of my escapades, cencored versions, yet they think their aunty was a real wild child. And I wasn’t particularly wild, we all were like that back then. The way we used to chew the fat, make jokes, laugh. Yeah, sometimes we realised “Oh, that was BAD!” Then laughed about it, moved on, didn’t CANCEL whomever told the off joke. Because we were face-to-face in a pub, nobody was posting it on social media.
I feel so old when I think back to the optimistic, heady days of my youth. It informs the way I handle life even now. I’m sad that the young today have far worse, pessimistic generational events to inform their future adult lives.
The young would probably find Echo and the Bunnymen problematic.
Bunnymen? Why not bunnywomen? Sexist! But wait, bunnywomen is even more sexist! Horrible sexists anyway! And it’s very problematic using bunnies in a band name, it’s very speciesist. Bunnies have human rights, too. The band ought to be called Echo and Other Humans. And some of their songs are so vegetableist. Cu-cu-cucumber, ca-ca-cauliflower clearly threaten and demean cucumbers and cauliflowers, who clearly have feelings and human rights, too!
One of the board of directors of the House of Rainbow claims to be a graduate from the Integrative Nutrition School in New York. I looked this place up and you basically pay them to do some online courses and in 6 months can “graduate”. I don’t trust any of these people.