We’ve got it on tape
Posted on
September 09, 2013 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
This is what we use to record episodes of “Call Kaye”.
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Wings Over ScotlandA tall tale
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We can rest easy knowing that now the maximum pay-off at the BBC is £150,000. The original crowd-sourced funding called the licence fee.
I thought we were going to get a blast of bow wow wow! Gutted! I’m off to youtube to rekindle my youthful fantasies of Annabella!
Made me think of Tapes for Dancin’ by The Rubber Bandits.
I had a series of recordings from the Essential Mix from the mid 90’s on the exact same C90’s! Last year I finally pensioned off my car tape deck so now no longer have any tape machines. The end of an era….
Heh. Normal bias.
If you phone in with an awkward question, the machine chews the tape up. If that fails, they just wind it on a bit with a pencil.
Can anyone make a sentence out of the words “BBC”, “normal” and “Bias”? 😀
air blanc bombs
What’s happening Scotland? Golf? Police failings? Fear? Mundanity by the earful, professional journalists backed up by state of apart communication technology talking about trivialities and ignoring anything of substance. Radio Scotland, bubblegum for the ears. Candyfloss for the brain. I wish Kaye would take an “e” before broadcast. High definition bias.
Lanarkist.
LAST WEEK:
JACKIE BAILLIE LABOUR: – the £10 million (sic) for ‘Brave’, okay?
GLEN CAMPBELL: That’s been spent!
JACKIE BAILLIE LABOUR: Yeah, but that was something, that’s something, that’s about choices, that’s what politics is about. Jamie [Hepburn, SNP] can choose to spend it on a Disney movie, we choose to spend it on taking care of the people of Scotland. That’s what the Scottish Parliament was elected for.
[sits back with inexplicably satisfied smile]
THINK ON THAT!
NOW, ONLY A WEEK OR SO LATER AND:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-24014661
http://caledonianmercury.com/2013/09/09/braves-enduring-legacy/0041440
Coin barbs balm
Lanarkist.
O/T An honest cross border success story with a most interesting epilogue.
http://www.southyorkshiretimes.co.uk/news/och-aye-beautiful-scots-come-to-doncaster-1-6030061
Shit, if Call Kaye is the “normal bias”, how bad will it be when they REALLY ramp it up???
When Kaye started her programme, I used to listen. Thought it might be potentially interesting. It quickly dekayed – sorry – into the same old crap that BBC Scotland ‘news’ and/or ‘current affairs’ is. As I’ve noted before. lowest common denominator. Seems that’s all Scots and Scotland are worth. Attempting to raise their game is simply too much like hard work. This for the nation of the enlightenment. O/t. Had an interesting conversation with two work colleagues today re. Norway. One of whom is just back from her first visit (I’ve never been). Just pointed out to them that we too could be Norway-like if we had an oil fund 🙂 Both v. interested.
Sorry to go o/t so early Stu, but this important. Newsnight Scotland indy debate from Culloden a week on Wednesday. What’s that all about? Or am I just an old cynic? (Not that old you understand!)
“Newsnight Scotland indy debate from Culloden a week on Wednesday. What’s that all about?”
God knows. Anniversary? I have no idea what date Culloden was on. Never got taught any Scottish history in O-Grade or Higher.
Springtime, I think.
ETA: 16th April. Google is your friend.
Re the Culloden thing, if serious and not some closing joke, you can imagine the analogies, rebellion against the British crown ends in disaster for Scotland. Bonnie Prince Alex, If only Scotland had listened to the unionists etc etc.
They won’t be able to stop themselves, which is probably the idea!
April 1746. Might have been the 16th I think from memory.
They’ll have to do the debate in a field to be actually at Culloden, or the visitor centre maybe as it was refurbished a few years ago.
There is no reason whatsoever to have any kind of debate at Culloden relating to Independence because as misguided as the BPC campaign was I reckon, it is a really shameful episode in british history (murdering the wounded and captured) and one of the few battles that doesn’t have any battle honours related to it.
Maybe they will feed us the old ‘last battle on british soil’ pish although the battle of britain was fought in the air the planes from either side still crashed on british soil at times.
Bill C , if your a cynic then we can start forming a queue.
16th April 1746
It’s in Culloden Academy, Inverness
If you want to apply,
http://wwwnews.live.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-23866813
Angus
Jackie Ballie’s nonsense about Brave was simply a demonstration that she is clueless about anything that involves running a country in a multi faceted way. She is promoted beyond her capabilities and cannot think outside of looking after a tea float.
Went to see Dennis and Nicola tonight and really enjoyed the evening. Really good crowd too, the organisers were scrabbling around trying to find more chairs. BBC were in there too something about 25 years since the Proclaimers Letter from America (no I didn’t understand either) My word when Dennis gets cranked up he can tub thump. He could still walk into Falkirk and be 10 times the Labour candidate than any “A list” place person they select. I don’t have many doubts who the voters would plump for either.
Wow, venturing out from that foyer area in Pacific Quay? Amazing stuff. How will they survive outside the Central Belt?
O/T Did anyone catch Keiron Andrews ‘Dundee Courier’ on STV ‘tonight’; doing his best to higlight how bad the SNP are going to do for not protecting the people of Dunfermline ? And how Labour are likely to win this seat back because Labour have a strong MP ? They further have radical ‘all women candidates’ (excellent councillors at the ready).
Looked to me like he was choking on his ready made lines and couldn’t get the words out quick enough. (Kept reading something that looked like a script form Labour HQ : ‘they only need a 1% swing you know’ and ‘the SNP have some explaining to do, why did they not stop this man’).
Apparently Labour have no worries of their own at this time. It took the other contributor to mention that Labour were ialso nformed of Bill Walker at the same time but also did nothing.
@Baheid – Had a look at the map. Culloden Academy looks like and kick in the arse from the battlefield. Still intrigued why out of all the venues/schools in Scotland they chose that location?
@gordoz – spot on another Labour mouthpiece. I thought Mandy Rhodes was excellent and provided a much more balanced perspective.
Gordoz
But Walker took the seat off a Lib Dem
@Gordoz
Soon there will be no pro-independence voices outwith the SNP on broadcast media. The BBC have already laid the groundwork for this. In that way the MSM/BT narrative can solidify around the notion that ‘only’ the SNP want independence, and even then most SNP voters are agin it.
Best get used to it.
Apologies should read “a kick…..”
HandandShrimp says:
9 September, 2013 at 11:57 pm
He took it off Labour by 600 seats (just checked again)
Billy C
Mandy Rhodes was very good, what is her role ?
Training Day says:
Still makes me boak though !
HandandShrimp says:
9 September, 2013 at 11:57 pm
Should have said he beat Labour into 2nd place by 600 seats, was it Lib Dem previously ? (They’re way too far behind this time).
Gordoz
Could have sworn he took it off Tolson who was a Lib Dem.
@gordoz – she is the editor of the Holyrood Magazine, so I would imagine she would have to be impartial.
HandandShrimp says:
On SNP website post by Nicola Sturgeon / Huge turnout tonight in Irvine – 200 in audience and lots of good questions.
Willie clearly fancies their chances. Not sure how this will play. Walker just squeaked it on a crest so by rights it should fall but who knows. The SNP need to put up a good candidate.
Mandy Rhodes is editor of Holyrood Magazine. It was she who managed to get Denis Healey to admit that they had fiddled the oil stats. You know- at the time Margaret Curran was too young to remember, as she was only 20 at the time! BTW the date of the Culloden programme is 18th Sept. Ring a bell? It also happens to follow the media obsession with Scottish battle failures. Flodden this week. Culloden next week.
Does one detect a pattern?
Gordoz
Yup, the talks were good and so were the questions. Couple of slightly odd ones, not really sure where the chap that asked about Trident was coming from but he seemed happy enough with the answer. It was a good crowd, God it was warm in there.
OT, but have you seen this? It’s fall-down funny.
http://bbc.scotlandshire.co.uk/index.php/city-news/524-yes-scotland-thinks-outside-the-box.html
Cynicism, David. I know for a fact that the BBC wouldn’t deliberately pick Culloden for a ‘debate’ exactly one year before the referendum.
The BBC told me so.
By God, even I am getting tired of confronting the overt bias of the MSM and dear old auntie Beeb. It has become a fixed permanence in our lives and we’ll really need to ignore it, or become ever more fixated, like the proverbial rabbit caught in the headlights.
The facts actually point to only the one thing – they’re going precisely nowhere with their hell-bent strategy to subvert a groundswell that’s ever building for no more status-quo and certainly no more jam tomorrow promises.
If the BT dumplings want to ignore the ‘real polls’ and sing la-la-la into their own ear,that’s up to them, they’re more than welcome.
I sincerely hope that the Yes campaign declares a holiday from campaigning on the 24th of June next year, maybe have a day in the garden or something.
Morag : It is good isn’t it !
David McCann: Cheers & They are just desperate to get back on to ‘Darien’ as well, oh and eventually Argentina
Sorry Paula Rose – 24th June 2014? Am I missing something here, or just brain-dead as forecast would eventually happen.
@Barontorc – 23rd/24th June, date of Battle of Bannockburn. We only need to say YES this time!
Oh, was it two days? even better!
@Paula Rose – skirmishes on the 23rd, de Bohun getting a nasty crack on the head from Bobby the Bruce!
The Transcription Department, when holidaying in Australia, inexplicably took along a dictaphone and a box of cassettes. Apparently we’re just that dedicated to transcription!
This cassette has now been repurposed as the case for a small power adaptor.
My serious point is that silence from the Yes side on that anniversary would speak volumes – this is not an anti-english campaign but one about the best way forward for the people of the British Isles.
Aw a cassette brings back memories, finger hovering over the pause button while taping off the radio. How old would you be now to look at that and think WTF is that?
As for Bannockburn I have had that date in my diary for about fifty years. I recommend that if you have not already read up on the life of Robert the Bruce and the wars of independence do so. He was an extraordinary man by anyone’s standard. The personal sacrifices that he made for Scotland are unbelievable. I don’t think that he would be at all bothered about a You gov poll. And what would he make of those opposing Scottish independence now? (Probably a sword belt or similar!)
Just to add.
“A noble heart may have no ease if freedom fail”
Inscription on Robert the Bruce’s heart casket.
Worth remembering!
The problem they have promoting Scottish battle failures is that the crucial one will not be a failure when it happens next September
Slightly O/T
I’m in the audience for the Victoria Derbyshire Radio 5 show from Glasgow next Monday.
Got a call from the BBC research guy yesterday.
Very keen to explore the ‘heart’ issues around the referendum he said.
My support for Yes is a lot more ‘head’ than ‘heart’ I replied, (citing the overwhelming strong economic and business case for Indy)
Well what about this ‘Anyone but England’ thing when it comes to sport he asked.
… you can see where they are trying to go with this.
I have to ask myself does the fact that Barca fans hate it when Real Madrid win the Champions League invalidate Catalonian self-determination?
You wont find anyone more upset than the Dutch when Germany wins major football honours – clearly the Netherlands has no right to its independence.
Why is it that everyone is allowed sporting rivalry except the Scots ? And any demonstration of it invalidates any right to self-determination.
Has anyone else who is going on the show had a similar call ?
Will be interesting to see how they spin this on the day.
doug daniel says
“How will they survive outside the Central Belt?”
never heard of spacesuits?
they can survive by breathing air brought from pacific quay carried in tanks duh 🙂
paula rose says
“My serious point is that silence from the Yes side on that anniversary would speak volumes ”
Sorry Paula
maybe Im too cynical but there’s no way the BBC will let that day pass without even a false flag report of braveheart SNP supporters baring their blue painted erses,
there’s no chance of that not happening 🙁
the man in the jar says
“. He(robert the Bruce) was an extraordinary man by anyone’s standard. The personal sacrifices that he made for Scotland are unbelievable.”
who was that said recently that he (Bruce) “links people links”
was only in it for the money?
a most craven and disreputable dismissal of a great Scottish King ? any descendants out there who could take a case against that idiot for defamation?
John King
There is a direct descendant of Bruce and I have met him, on a flight to Canada.
He owns Bruce’s broadsword and has loaned to some Museum. Nice old buffer but that was about 15 years ago so not sure now.
“finger hovering over the pause button while taping off the radio.”
Made a play list of favorites from the top twenty every week with the “finger hovering over the pause button” to avoid Tony Blackburns inane attempts at humour 🙂
his jokes are still just as bad now but as I’ve mellowed with age (stop laughing at the back there) I’ve become more tolerant of the man and even find myself a small smile every now and again at his banter,
but then I think of someone like Jackie Baillie and the smile is replaced by the (semi permanent ) scowl,
my mum says of if the wind changes your face will stay like that
my beaming smile NEEDS independence, vote YES for a smiley wee john guys PLEASE 🙂
“There is a direct descendant of Bruce and I have met him, on a flight to Canada.”
you jammy sod, I get sat in the middle of the 22 stone man and the woman with a screaming kid,
and you get the Bruce’s descendant ?
there is no god
(sorry to anyone who is a believer no offence meant)
“a most craven and disreputable dismissal of a great Scottish King ? ”
still trying to figure out the difference between ? and !
I’m getting there though,
soon I’ll be able to use two fingers:)
I was bumped up because at time I was FFlier and he was on a flight to Toronto to some military reunion. He was met at the airport just on the way out of the airbridge by a mi ni pipe band and a guard of honour. I don’t think he went through immigration and customs like me. Nice old buffer as I said.
He was on then Post Office User Consultatlive Committee for Scotland ( a Quango) and as luck would have it a neighbour opposite me in Freuchie was on it also (Tory).
During the flight we talked a lot about what was happening to the PO and deliveries and stuff. E mails and electronic payments have knocked the stuffing out of the PO but their equivalents in Denmark and France seems to doing OK, from experience.
I’ve got 10 bear claws, pur Bugger to use a tablet, all scratched to hell.
You going on the 21st?
I’ll be in the Albanach before along with a wee team from here.
the man in the jar?
recently pointed out to me that Braveheart was “just a movie” and I shouldn’t allow myself to disown it just because it plays into the hands of the bitter brigade (sorry rev but they are)
I had said I disliked the film,
this led me to think about that because he(the man in the jar) was right, if it had not been for the current political climate both before the making of the film and now, I probably wouldn’t have had such a low opinion of it,
I thought back to my childhood, and remember watching John Wayne fighting to the last bullet at the Alamo, storming the beaches of Guadalcanal, and singlehandedly leading the troops up the Omaha beach on Dday and enjoying the films for what they were, fiction, and not for a moment did I then or now question the validity of those movies as nothing more than entertainment and not a statement of fact,
which the producers I’m sure did not claim they were,
But the propensity of the Better together campaign to paint anyone who supports independence as being influenced by (that film ) is in reality an attempt to prevent us (the Scottish people) from a legitimate identification with our own past, William Wallace was real for christ sake,
but their agenda is designed to prevent people from acknowledging the history which is ours to cherish, and maintain and revere the memory of our great (and not so great) forebears
the rev admitted on a previous post he did not know the date of Culloden because he was not taught Scottish history,
can you imaging that being the case in American schools? I know that analogy will come back to haunt me but you get my point
the Americans celebrate their history (unashamedly) not hide it and try to forget it happened in case it upset the relatives who were on the opposite side,
the cringe has surely come to the end of the road hasn’t it?
“You going on the 21st?
I’ll be in the Albanach before along with a wee team from here.”
I think I’ll be getting the train to waverley,(but definitely going) Wheres the alabanach?
@johnking…
Same with me, I never got Scottish history at school (or geography, or literature for that matter), anything I learned about Scotland came from my parents who were educated in the 1940/50s. I couldn’t tell you what date Culloden was or indeed any other battle fought on Scottish soil. Afterwards it was down to educating myself about the country I live in. This purge of ‘Scottishness’ and the creation of the cringe in the minds of the people is similar to what communists did to create the Soviet Union. No longer were they proud people of Georgia, Lithuania, Moldova, Ukraine, Armenia, Estonia etc. They were just Soviets, drones to serve the hierarchy and it’s ideology, purged of any cultural or historical (even religious) influences. Scottish Labour wanted Scots to forget any sense of cultural pride in their country because they don’t want Scotland to exist in the first place. North Britain, anyone?
ivan mckee says
“Well what about this ‘Anyone but England’ thing when it comes to sport he asked.”
whaaaaat?
if he asked me that I would have flipped and ruined my chances of getting on the programme
do these clowns thing independence supporters are made in a factory with the same default settings?
anyone BUT England,
comes straight from the the same play book as the point I was making about the braveheart lunacy,
made me think about a conversation with my boss the other day when I complained about the labour party abandoning their principles and forgetting their roots, when she replied “but they’re not all like that john”
and then went onto to agree with another contributor who said “all politicians are the same, in politics for what they stand to gain personally”
jeesh I despair of some people,
Watching BBC Scotlandshire news last night I was struck by the time devoted to Flodden and Culloden. OK fair enough a bit of history and significant defeats for Scottish forces. Why they then bring that up to the present day and query what impacts these defeats have on thoughts in independence?
Is the message maybe we are only on the winning side when we combine with UK?
B(tP)
HMQ is a descendent of Rab Bruce.
700 years after they have lived, anyone has either no descendants or about 20 million. There is a good chance that in any pub fight in Scotland, both participants were descended from the Bruce. And from most of the men who fought on that day (Scottish and English).
Mandy Rhodes doesn’t like bs or mendacity whatever its source, she likes politicians of any stripe who are capable and can clearly articulate their plans and visions, and does not have a unionist axe to grind so unlike most Scottish political journalists, and more like Lesley Riddoch in that regard.
She also hires Rab McNeill for the back page, it is worth getting Holyrood magazine for that alone.
Murray McCallum, did they seriously try to link Flodden and Culloden to the indy debate?!
More relevant to the debate I would think would be the dates 1956 (Suez crisis – British finally realise the empire is over), 1972 (entry into common market, free trade of goods and services across Europe), 1975 (first Scottish North Sea oil pumped ashore), and 1989 (poll tax).
Surely the end of the empire, end of protectionist imperial economic policies, discovery of oil, and imposition of democratically opposed tax, are more relevant to the indy debate than centuries old battles.
Allegations of a coordinated plan to swamp a UK polling organisation with Yes supporters in order to influence independence polls have been traced to a sole pro-Union activist.
According to polling firm Panelbase, its decision to block new members from taking part in future independence polls was prompted by a tweet from an individual called Andrew Skinner. Skinner, who sports the official Better Together logo on his twitter page, is part of an online group of Unionists formerly called British Unity, but renamed VoteNo2014.
http://newsnetscotland.com/index.php/referendum/7992-attempt-to-discredit-panelbase-poll-traced-to-british-unity-activist
Craig P – Mandy Rhodes also just so happens to be married to an SNP supporter (maybe even a member?), so I think it’s safe to say she’s not going to be joining the MSM unionist cabal any time soon!
Of course, she might still be a no voter (Lord & Lady Steel spring to mind), but if so it certainly doesn’t affect her work.
Dcanmore
Britain and the former Soviet Union are/were both unitary state(s), formed through political agreement. There is absolutely nothing natural or ‘God given’ about the British state or the reasons for its creation, which like the Soviet Union, was not as indicated on the tin.
Interesting article in Newsnet about the attemp t to discredit Panelbase polls,saying it was all down to one proUnion tweeter (named him ) and the Herald picked it up and ran it as a story.
Today’s Herald (print edition, and no, I don’t buy it) has a fascinating group photo of the gathered Clan Chiefs – it’s worth a swatch just to check out some of the names, outfits and fizzogs. (And Isla St Clair’s in there as well.)
I think “Normal Bias” was ditched in 2011.
The BBC are now running on “Super Bias (plus)”.
halfway down the High Street in the pedestrian zone.
@scottish_skier (on another thread) –
(Hope you don’t mind me reposting your comment, but a lot of folk just read the current thread, don’t delve back:)
The polls are turning against the union. Once they turn, they can’t be turned back; they had one chance to scare people, that chance is now largely over. Same stories over and over again. Cry wolf and all that. We’re starting to see the pro-union camp respond to this situation with increasing panic. By the end of the year polls should be regularly coming close to parity, this will really cause a pro-union shitstorm, which will drive the polls further to Yes and so on. The situation will begin feeding on itself. A Yes vote in 2014 will be in a large part due to Scotland being forced out of the union by unionists. After all, you don’t stay at someone’s party when they continually lie to you, belittle you, shout at you etc. Eventually, you get up and leave. Scotland is a human being, just one with 5.3 million minds. The No camp would do well to remember that. The recent article on human response to radical change is spot on. We’re entering the examination phase now; next is commitment.
http://wingsoverscotland.com/on-the-other-side-of-fear/
Interesting Doug re: Mandy Rhodes, and like you say, not relevant to her own personal politics. But, as she gives all politicos a fair crack of the whip in her interviews and gets exasperated when interviewing clueless mediocrities, it doesn’t take a genius to work out what side she might prefer.
Interesting, it may be coincidence but two comments I made on the Herald are awaiting moderation, never happened before, as all my previous comments went straight in.
Could it be to do with trying to put in some information about the Ashcroft poll yesterday, where the comments were deleted. I wonder?
Craig P says:
did they seriously try to link Flodden and Culloden to the indy debate?!
On Newsnight the discussion with two historians seemed to link the defeat at Flodden (loss of king and countless nobles) to a fundamental loss in talent and Scottish confidence. It seemed to me that a line of thought being drawn was that something that happened several centuries ago somehow impacted the Scottish outlook to this day.
This is rubbish of course. The destruction of Germany by 1945 and loss of the majority of its talent and infrastructure does not seem to have held it back. “History” is exactly what it says it is – maybe best to look to shaping what has yet to happen?
On Flodden, a ‘Flodden historian’, said last night, for Scotland it was a catastrophic, but for England, it was, well err, just a minor side issue. That was effectively how he said it. BBC news item.
Mandy Rhodes….heartily encourage a read at Holyrood magazine, fine publication even if it does allow Johann, Ruth and Wullie to appear and talk usual nonsense.
Good wee article recently about how the Independent MSP group dont get same recognition at Lib Dems despite relative same seats.
Im pretty sure I read somewhere Mandy is inclined towards YES ( although the mag is objective), given Holyrood could disappear soon after a NO vote, her thinking may well be biased!
It will be interesting watching them attempt to spin the Bannockburn 700th anniversary next year (three months before the referendum) as pro union. I guess they will try the old chestnut “It was only a fight between the Norman elite.” Aye right!
Luigi says:
10 September, 2013 at 9:00 am
I think “Normal Bias” was ditched in 2011.
The BBC are now running on “Super Bias (plus)”.
Nice One …. drum roll cymbal
I actually enjoyed hearing the discussions of Flodden on both Scotland Tonight and Newsnat Scotland, and fairly even-handed at that I thought. It highlighted by its novelty just how little Scottish history gets discussed on live mainstream television.
I was slightly confused by both programmes refering to James IV as being poorly thought of until very recently – I can remember being taught about him building a large navy , trying to emulate the best of what he saw in the various European countries of the time, and generally being one of the best kings we ever had.
By the way, why is the current queen Elizabeth the Second, given that there has been no other Elizabeth since either 1707 or 1603?
Oh aye – the Clan Chiefs! What’s with all the plummy Eton-educated accents? When I hear that lot I begin to understand why my father was a communist in his idealistic youth.
Interesting read and I wish them success but why should it have to come down to tape measures.
Size matters — Fife rulings could have national implications for future of ‘bedroom tax’
http://www.thecourier.co.uk/news/local/fife/size-matters-fife-rulings-could-have-national-implications-for-future-of-bedroom-tax-1.129061
call me dave
Very encouraging news from Fife.
The reason it comes down to tape measures in a developed and resource rich country (i.e. Scotland), is because consecutive Westminster governments have wittingly/unwittingly encourage a concentration of the population in southern England, without ensuring adequate housing supply. It is widely accepted that HS2 will add to this problem. The housing market is broken and it is those least able who are paying.
How a FIAT Ponzi scheme is kept alive.
http://www.spectator.co.uk/features/8915781/osbornes-bubble/
http://www.spectator.co.uk/features/8874941/the-great-savings-robbery/
I was down at Flodden yesterday for the 500th anniversary and did the battlefield guided tour. You can’t really get the full picture from reading about it in a book or leaflet. You really need to walk the battlefield itself to understand how it all went wrong. In a 2 and a half hour period, 10,000 Scottish men and 4,000 English were killed – at a rate of 2 deaths per second, much of which was in hand-to-hand combat. Many others died of crush injuries. The next day many more died – men, women and children. It was a very moving experience to stand on Branxton Hill, where the Scottish army was positioned, and where they had a clear view of their homeland, to which most never returned.
The guide was very good, but I was disappointed he made a couple of anti-independence remarks – along the lines of: we’re good friends along the borders, fear that might change with independence, though he doesn’t think it will actually happen anyway. It didn’t need to be said. So, I was quite proud to drive through the crowd at the end of the tour, with my Yes sign prominently displayed on the back window.
Going back to earlier comments on what Scottish things you were taught at school: I was in secondary school in the 90s. In English we got a whole block on Rabbie Burns and the Scots language and read Sunset Song.
In history we had a whole block on Wallace and Bruce with school trips to Stirling castle and the Bannockburn centre. We also covered the Scottish industrial revolution and visited New Lanark.
My history teacher loved Braveheart (even though she knew it was not exactly accurate) and encouraged us to see it.
Well good on you Jeannie, As people go forward they take their history, good or bad with them.
Megsmaw, that’s sort of why I was so appalled when someone said that Anas Sarwar’s old school had held a mock referendum with only 8% Yes vote. I suddenly realised he went to the same school I did, and when I was there it wasn’t quite as you describe but the same sort of thing. The Engllish department in particular (ironically!) were very pro Scottish culture and history.
Now they’ve got the weans brainwashed into unionism. Oh dearie, dearie me.
@jeannie
Interesting day it seems.
Your reference to the unnecesary referendum point is what Alan Little did last night on the main BBC news. Basically, on Flodden, …’since this was a monumental disaster for Scotland the SNP don’t talk about it’.
At the same time we’re always being told the YES camp want to make everything about the referendum.
Win, not can, but we know we will!
You could equally make the point that Flodden was when Scottish history started to go really wrong for Scotland. A bad defeat, loss of the king, and the entire population of Edinburgh reduced to huddling in fear behind a wall which led to massive overcrowding and stagnation of the city for decades.
2014 is when we take the biggest and irrevocable step back to normality and pride in our nation.
@Albalha
Your reference to the unnecesary referendum point is what Alan Little did last night on the main BBC news. Basically, on Flodden, …’since this was a monumental disaster for Scotland the SNP don’t talk about it’.
At the same time we’re always being told the YES camp want to make everything about the referendum.
Win, not can, but we know we will!
Yes, I heard Little’s remark yesterday about the SG not marking the Battle of Flodden. He had to get his little dig in didn’t he? Of course it is people like Little that have a considerable amount of self interest in the result of the referendum. He has his career to think about. It is one of the main elephants in the room, unspoken most of the time.
The irony about Unionists is that they are accuse independence supporters of being “Bravehearts”, and yet most of the time it is they who use the history of Scotland for their political purposes (the SNP did used to have a Bannockburn rally so it is not exactly one sided). They use Bannockburn and the Wars of independence to attack Yes supporters, implying that indy supporters are only motivated by medieval battles, and are living in the past, and they use Flodden and the Darien Scheme to promote the Scottish cringe, and their too wee, too poor, and too stupid line.
@albalha
since this was a monumental disaster for Scotland the SNP don’t talk about it’.
Actually, the English don’t talk about it either. In 1513, Henry VIII was a young man and was fighting a war against Louis XII of France as part of a wider European war involving the Pope. His wife, Catherine of Aragon had been left in charge of England. James IV of Scotland was married to Henry’s sister, Margaret Tudor. As part of the marriage deal, a treaty of perpetual peace between Scotland and England was signed. But at the same time, Scotland had a mutual defence agreement with France as part of the Auld Alliance. So when Henry attacked France, James found himself between a rock and a hard place – he had to decide which treaty to honour. Henry had upset him by not honouring his obligation to pay Margaret’s dowry and had made a vague, silly threat to re-establish overlordship of Scotland by England, so when a request came from Louis’ wife, Anne of Brittany for Scotland to “take a yard of England”, i.e. open up a second front on England’s northern border to draw Henry’s army away from France, James had to make a decision and decided to support France. I think this is where internationalism gets you!
The English won the day at Flodden, but their army was not led by Henry – it was led by the Earl of Surry and Catherine of Aragon had been left in overall charge – so it was not a win for Henry VIII per se and couldn’t be “bigged up” as such. And the Howards (Earl of Surrey’s family) became increasingly powerful throughout Henry’s reign, so it was not in Henry’s interests, public-relations wise, to place an emphasis on this victory.
For its part, Scotland was in deep mourning as the muster had come from every part of Scotland, including the islands. Many chiefs were lost as well as the king. Nothing to celebrate, just a nation grieving.
Incidentally, if James IV had won the Battle of Flodden, it might have been a pyrrhic victory for Scotland and Catherine of Aragon had another couple of armies lined up in the background and Henry would surely have invaded Scotland and the carnage could ultimately have been much worse.
This campaign was started by the Scots, on behalf of France. It was to do with international relations beyond the confines of the British Isles and thus was very different to the situation that gave rise to the Battle of Bannockburn, where Scotland was fighting for its independence.
If only Mr. Little knew something about the history of his country, he would perhaps realise just how inappropriate and ill-informed it is to compare Bannockburn with Flodden.
Rant over.
@Jeannie
Little probably does not even care about Scottish history. He has made it into the heart of the British establishment, where he no doubt intends to stay…
@Jeannie
I think you should send him an email, if you fancy.